So, I realized that there's no dedicated place to talk about raids, playing against them, making them tougher/easier, making decks for beating them, playing as the raid leader, etc. . .

So lets make this the official Raid Deck Thread (TM)!



Someone begin a useful topic of discussion, or perhaps run with these two to begin:

1. What unexpected raid-tuned deck have you played, or seen played, that worked out very effectively, despite your doubts? (Something we haven't all seen/heard before, i.e. holy priest is not an example of a unique deck).

2. How do YOU play the raid bosses, when you're the bad guy? How do you plan your card usage, and why? (For example, a playstyle choice could be to play blindside ASAP as magtheridon to slow them down and make them take more damage from the summoners, or save it till later when the big cards would be played, OR to kick them while they're down at some point).

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Great idea! Sticky please! Also.....first!

Personally my friends and I ran an fairly unusual team against Black Temple during Darkmoon Faire. It was a holy priest (typical), traitor warlock and beast master hunter. Its mostly the hunter's inclusion that made people's head spin and our lack of a mage for counters.

What they didn't realize was that the hunter WAS the counter deck. It ran a full set of arcane torrents and silent fangs, which granted sounds less effective than fizzle, fracture and the others that are available to mages but worked very well for us because the priest ran Field Repair Bot. The hunter was able to recur silent fang almost every other turn, which was pretty great.

Additionally the reason why we chose hunter was the favorable interactions it had with the warlock. Bestial swiftness, bestial wrath, Kassandra's flip effect are all useful on her own pets but work just as well on the warlock pets. Big things with ferocity = pain. Plus snipe was incredibly useful if we stalled too long on a particular boss in BT and was afraid of the many allies that were going to come into play. Just play snipe after the boss dies and all the allies vanish. Its also uncounterable considering the boss would have no resources at the time too.

Lets assume we're talking about a Black Temple raid.

First, lets begin by what the Raid Boss player is doing. He plays abilities first and foremost. He doesn't play any equipment. So no equipment removal is required. There are allies, but none of them are played. They just come into play when a boss is defeated (or under specific rules by the current Boss).

One of the classes that is pivotal in my mind in a successful Black Temple raid is Mage. You need to have one player be able to counter the abilities played by the Raid Boss. If I were to build a Mage designed for a raid deck, I'd want to focus on the following. Counterspells and AoE damage. Depending on your group, you'll be either Alliance or Horde. Lets assume we're going Horde.

Lets go with Ceripha Sunstreak (Blood Elf Fire Mage)

Abilities (31):
4x Fizzle
4x Taste of Arcana
4x Counterspell
3x Mystic Denial

4x Blast Wave
4x Dragon's Breath
4x The More, The Scarier
4x Conjured Cinnamon Roll

Allies (4):
4x Blood Knight Kyria

Equipment (2):
2x Gladiator's Regalia

Quests/Locations: (18)
3x Darkmoon Faire
4x Solanian's Belongings
4x Counterattack
4x Toxic Horrors
3x Forces of Jaedenar

There are 5 slots remaining in this decklist. I chose alot of quest/locations because the Black Temple encounter is an endurance fight. You need to keep your hand and full and not resource too many non-quests.

Blood Knight and Cinnamon Roll help provide healing. The 15 counters (fizzle, taste, counterspell, denial will likely be enough). Nether Fracture is less useful in this type of scenario. The only cards you'll be countering will be abilities and most of the abilities cast will cost less than Fracture. I think Spell Ricochet might work better to be honest.

This is just a rough list of what I'd try to put together as a Mage raiding player. Thoughts and opinions are welcome.
~DF

Is it good to stack healing as a mage in a raid setting (4x Kyria, 4x Roll)?  Shouldn't you have a dedicated healer?  I've only raided MC but it seemed accurate to the game where you could have one player tank, one player heal and X DPS/Utility classes.  I would think you'd want to focus more on damage / interrupts and leave the heals to someone else.  Maybe 3 rolls would be enough just to help out the healer, but the BKK seems like overkill.  If everyone else is doing your job, you shouldn't need to heal yourself.

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Trains, Planes, or Automobiles...you better have my DOUGHnuts.

Having just one player as a dedicated healer can cause problems. What happens if that player is tapped out and can't respond at a critical moment? Having a backup certainly helps. As a team you need to look out after yourself and your teammates.

Black Temple is alot less forgiving than Molten Core or Onyxia. Its challenging to say the least. If you haven't given it a try, I suggest you do. Its alot of fun.

This is unrelated to the current topic of conversation, so don't let it derail, but:

I feel that Illidan was created in a very lame way.

Essentially, it almost always boils down to the raid leader tapping to heal 15 every turn, and if you don't kill him in 6 turns you lose.

That's not fun or epic.

The betrayer events are rarely significant on their own, and from my experience a player almost never dies before the 6th turn on illidan.

Does anyone else agree? I thought Ragnaros was much cooler.

EDIT: And I think they managed ragnaros much better too; give cards that stop stuff like cyclone and no-attack clauses and protectors from preventing the pain train from arriving. 'Course, now those ragnaros cards are still quite inneffectual, but the idea is right IMO.

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I am unsure how original this is but for my group of friends we decided to make a dot warlock be our boss damage dealer.  We combined Nemesis Leggings and Gladiator's Spellblade to do ridiculous damage.

With a mage protecting my equipment and just a few counters on the spellbade we could one round most bosses.

As long as you can protect the abilities and equipment, while preventing the warlock from outright dying, I can see that working. But rampant destruction backed up by a counter or two on the bosses' part would set back that DOT deck irreperably.

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I was waiting for a thread like this- I have it bookmarked.


Our campus plays the WoW TCG, and although PVP happens from time to time, raiding is where the experience is. I always tell people never to learn this card game through a raid, but people see that so much fun is going on that they want to come over and play, patient to learn the game. To answer the questions, and contribute my information:


1) We have played a hunter in some situations that provided good trash mob cleanup (all those allies that pop out). The hunter provided good DPS too. An Eclipse priest deck did some uber damage.

2) No mercy. I take every opportunity I can to rip at these guys. Despite losing continuously, the ladies and gentlemen in our guild (we have a gaming guild that plays games) come back for more. I modified all raid decks to make them difficult to take down. To date, Illidan has not been taken down. I suspect the same with Naxxramas coming in September. Because Illidan has become so hard to take down, I will probably let Myriam Starcaller and Detect Traps come back into the fray.


I have a theory that needs some practice. If raids are a staple 5 man team, these are my positions:


1) Tank (takes the damage and redirects attacks)
2) Healer (focuses on healing the tank and other damage)
3) Damage (called DPS, this person focuses their damage solely on the boss)
4) Interruption (usually a mage, this player prepares for major death dealing cards bosses can play).
5) Trash Cleanup (AOE, Area of Effect to get rid of mobs of boss allies).


The more difficult the raid, the more people you take away from the bottom of the list. The list can be modified if you don't see it fit or you see a better way.





Tank (Paladin, Warrior, Druid) - Responsible for taking the brunt of the damage during a raid fight. The tank will focus on the boss and take all of the attacks from him. If possible the tank should also guard aganst allies, but it is the job of Trash Cleanup to get rid of allies first. Paladins can hold their own and heal themselves, but they rely on ally tanking rather than ability tanking (which means if a boss wipes out the tanks allies, how can he tank?). Warriors are the best choice for tanking; their abilities control where attacks end up.


Healer (Priest, Shaman, Druid) - Responsible for keeping the tank alive. They also must heal other damage that is incurred during the fight. Priests are usually the kings of healing- having many cards available to do wide healing- although Druids are very competitive as well as Shamans.


Damage (Pick Your Class) - Responsible for dealing damage to the boss. Rogues are great choices, and sometimes Warlocks- however if you are raiding where there are multiple bosses, the DOTs may not stick on all of them. Mage is great at damage, as well as Paladins, Priests, Hunters, Druids, pick your class. This is a slot that can also be highly customized- for example, although this slot deals damage to the boss, you can select a Druid or Paladin to off heal or off tank (a backup healer or tank).


Interruption (Mage) - Responsible for stopping the boss from dropping his big bomb cards. Mages are perfect for this role, and can also provide trash cleanup. The frost tree can stop his card draw temporarily and Blizzard (or Water Elemental) can rain ice shards continuously to get rid of the mob. Pack Mystic Denial in your tool kit!


Trash Cleanup (AOE Class) - Responsible for getting rid of enemy allies before they slaughter (wipe) the group. Warlocks are good at this task, as well as hunters and mages.





I will post more later, fingers tired...

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Casual/Constructed
Raider
Deck Builder
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*reserved*

^ I am going to come back and post some basic decks I have set up for raiding- They are budget decks that are easy to pick up (and, if desired, modified).


Sample Tank Deck: Lionar the Unbound Protection Warrior

Hero (1)   Cards (60)   WoWTCGDB Price: ~$30.76 USD
Lionar, the Unbound


Abilities (24)
4x Absolute Poise
4x Defiance
4x Duty Bound
4x Taste for Blood
4x Taunt
4x Taunting Blows


Ally (8)
4x Blood Knight Kyria
4x Darbun Steppeheart


Equipment (12)
4x Axe of the Legion
4x Platinum Shield of the Valorous
4x Slayer's Waistguard


Quest (16)
4x Forces of Jaedenar
4x Ring of Blood: The Blue Brothers
4x insert
4x insert


Description- This deck offers room for a conversion to alliance if necessary. The tank will focus attacks towards himself and requires a healer to heal him. Weapons are not of extreme importance- but they are there to cause damage near the later game. Insert your quests of choice. Allies can be converted to arena allies if necessary. Blood Knight Kyria offers some tanking and good opportunities to heal. Absolute Poise interrupts, Taunts direct attacks and Duty Bound is the core card of this deck. Defiance allows maximum control. Deck could benefit from Shuriken of Negation.







Sample Trash Cleanup Deck- Black Ice Fizzlefreeze/Vor'na the Disciplined (incomplete)

Hero (1) WoWTCGDB Cost: ~ $111.28USD
Vor'na the Wretched
Black Ice Fizzlefreeze


Ability (24)
4x Blizzard
4x Cold Front
4x Disappear
4x Heartburn
4x Mystic Denial
4x The More, The Scarier


Allies (8)
4x Magistrix Valthin
4x Water Elemental


Description- There has to be a better build than this- there are a lot of big ticket abilities in there. Could a warlock build do better? I think an off tank could do a better job economically than this mage. Perhaps a Death Knight? I've seen a few cards and they seem good for off tanking... we will see...

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Casual/Constructed
Raider
Deck Builder
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2067168:

This is unrelated to the current topic of conversation, so don't let it derail, but:

I feel that Illidan was created in a very lame way.

Essentially, it almost always boils down to the raid leader tapping to heal 15 every turn, and if you don't kill him in 6 turns you lose.

That's not fun or epic.

The betrayer events are rarely significant on their own, and from my experience a player almost never dies before the 6th turn on illidan.

Does anyone else agree? I thought Ragnaros was much cooler.

EDIT: And I think they managed ragnaros much better too; give cards that stop stuff like cyclone and no-attack clauses and protectors from preventing the pain train from arriving. 'Course, now those ragnaros cards are still quite inneffectual, but the idea is right IMO.

If Illidan is not epic enough for you because everything up to Illidan is too easy, I'd suggest adjusting the raid deck then.

Something like... x4 parasitic shadowfiend, x4 crushing shadows, x4 fel rage, etc

Ally deck... x4 bonechewer behemoth, x4 ashtongue battlelord, x4 promenade sentinel, x4 priestess of dementia, etc

Event deck... you can get really creative here, but some ultra annoying cards that can be x2 of... players discard hand and draw that many, remove graveyard from game, players can't draw cards, weapons -2 and defense -2, cards enter play exhausted, etc.

Imagine getting... players can't draw cards, followed by each player discards his hand and draws that many, and finishing with remove all cards in graveyards from the game. Yes, that actually happened to our raid group once. We lost that raid =).

This setup makes everything up to Illidan a bit harder. As for Illidan himself, I too, dislike the idea of everything coming down to heal 15, stall; but there are ways around it. Exhaust effects like Thud!, gouge, hammer of justice work well. Eclipse is very strong. As for the 6th and on sort of thing.... silvermoon city set to fire? In all honesty, it becomes a dps race once Illidan comes out which makes it epic for me at least (kind of like a gear check in the MMO?). You control him just a little bit with cannot ready effects and just push through as much damage as you can.

His betrayer events are not too significant, I agree with you on that; only the event that lets him bring traitor allies into play is ultra good because Illidan has traitor allies that have solutions of almost everything (barring no Gladiator's Regalia, Great Sword of Horrid Dreams, etc)

Then, if you can epic rules if you want. Use your entire collection of cards to make a super raid deck. Form of Serpent, Sudden Death, Death Trap, Spiritual Domination, etc along with Lady Vashj, Prince Kael'thas, Warlord Kalithresh, etc and events... man.... so many possibilities with events. You can PM to hear my thoughts for that.

Rag was kinda cool. At the time, it was awesome raiding MC. Although if you adjust the Black Temple deck enough, I think you'll have a much more fun time playing against and as the raid.

I was just wondering, which Raid deck is the most fun? I'd like to know all of your inputs, because I thought of buying one, just don't know which.

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Level up Daemon!

I can has a level up?

1248088:

2067168:

This is unrelated to the current topic of conversation, so don't let it derail, but:

I feel that Illidan was created in a very lame way.

Essentially, it almost always boils down to the raid leader tapping to heal 15 every turn, and if you don't kill him in 6 turns you lose.

That's not fun or epic.

The betrayer events are rarely significant on their own, and from my experience a player almost never dies before the 6th turn on illidan.

Does anyone else agree? I thought Ragnaros was much cooler.

EDIT: And I think they managed ragnaros much better too; give cards that stop stuff like cyclone and no-attack clauses and protectors from preventing the pain train from arriving. 'Course, now those ragnaros cards are still quite inneffectual, but the idea is right IMO.

If Illidan is not epic enough for you because everything up to Illidan is too easy, I'd suggest adjusting the raid deck then.

Something like... x4 parasitic shadowfiend, x4 crushing shadows, x4 fel rage, etc

Ally deck... x4 bonechewer behemoth, x4 ashtongue battlelord, x4 promenade sentinel, x4 priestess of dementia, etc

Event deck... you can get really creative here, but some ultra annoying cards that can be x2 of... players discard hand and draw that many, remove graveyard from game, players can't draw cards, weapons -2 and defense -2, cards enter play exhausted, etc.

Imagine getting... players can't draw cards, followed by each player discards his hand and draws that many, and finishing with remove all cards in graveyards from the game. Yes, that actually happened to our raid group once. We lost that raid =).

This setup makes everything up to Illidan a bit harder. As for Illidan himself, I too, dislike the idea of everything coming down to heal 15, stall; but there are ways around it. Exhaust effects like Thud!, gouge, hammer of justice work well. Eclipse is very strong. As for the 6th and on sort of thing.... silvermoon city set to fire? In all honesty, it becomes a dps race once Illidan comes out which makes it epic for me at least (kind of like a gear check in the MMO?). You control him just a little bit with cannot ready effects and just push through as much damage as you can.

His betrayer events are not too significant, I agree with you on that; only the event that lets him bring traitor allies into play is ultra good because Illidan has traitor allies that have solutions of almost everything (barring no Gladiator's Regalia, Great Sword of Horrid Dreams, etc)

Then, if you can epic rules if you want. Use your entire collection of cards to make a super raid deck. Form of Serpent, Sudden Death, Death Trap, Spiritual Domination, etc along with Lady Vashj, Prince Kael'thas, Warlord Kalithresh, etc and events... man.... so many possibilities with events. You can PM to hear my thoughts for that.

Rag was kinda cool. At the time, it was awesome raiding MC. Although if you adjust the Black Temple deck enough, I think you'll have a much more fun time playing against and as the raid.

Im not saying that its too easy. I mean that dying because we didn't kill Illidan in 6 turns to an AOE that one-shots several heroes is a lame way to be killed by a raid boss, considering that in all likelyhood he wasn't doing anything but standing around healing up until then. Atleast losing to ragnaros involved heroes getting clubbed in the face for ludicrous amounts of damage.

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Blah, sorry. I needed to phrase my answer better.

I do agree with you that the 15 heal per turn is pretty lame, but there are ways to stop him from healing that 15. If the healing is what is getting lame, throw in a few cards that prevent that from happening. Also, there are a few limited ways of stopping the 20 fire damage to everyone event as well.

I tried to say that I felt it was not lame, but epic because fighting Illidan turns into a DPS race. Hopefully that clarifies things.