We’re extremely excited about the launch for Minion Masters, the crazy BetaDwarf take on Free-to-play skill-based minion action! It’s the game we always wanted to play, so we made it! Join us and over a million players, and show us your unique strategy!
Other Minion Masters Guides:
- Minion Masters: How to Build a Deck
- Minion Masters: Picking the Right Card in Draft
- Minion Masters: A Beginner’s Guide to Draft
- Minion Masters: Daily Challenges and Levels Rewards
- Minion Masters: Chat Commands
The deck
Here it is, an aggressive Volco deck. To be clear, this deck doesn’t contain all common cards because I am trying to make a statement about how anyone can reach decently high ranks with cheap decks. This is literally the best combination of cards I found to work. Do note that I don’t have all the cards but even if I did I don’t think I would change a thing.
Why Volco?
I played a midrange Apep deck which was similar to this one with slightly higher curve and I figured I could do the same thing with Volco and it would win even more games since I can capitalize more on the successful trades by doing face damage thanks to perk 1 and I can continue that onslaught and defend myself against slower deck thanks to perk 2. All I needed to do was slightly lower the mana curve in order to make it more aggressive to keep those early bridges easier. Unlike Apep, Volco cannot attack flying minions but that isn’t really an issue considering the anti-air options the deck runs.
The cards
All cards in the deck are common precisely because they’re boring with no special effects. However, this means that the cards have good stats to compensate for the lack of fancy effects. And we do need those boring minions with good stats in order to do efficient trades. Almost every card in the deck has the ability to consistently destroy minions that are worth more than the card you destroyed them with. These small mana advantages eventually pile up and turn into a big lead. Having boring cards in the deck also means being in less situations where you don’t have a proper answer to the enemy plays, increasing the decks consistency. And now, for some specifics:
Scrat Pack – Cycles. Takes bridges. Wins you trades between two same minions. Delays enemy cleaver. It’s just an all around great cards, especially considering it’s low mana cost.
Shock Rock – This is the most replaceable card in the deck. But I like it because it helps with trades for cheap. When pushing face damage with minions it can provide a decent face damage by hitting both the minions and the enemy master hitting your stuff. It can also slightly help versus big minion decks by cancelling their attack animations giving you more time to finish them off.
Beam of Doom – Most consistent removal in the game that also provides face damage. You should preferably use it when having a push going on in order to kill the minion enemy plays to defend themselves while also hitting face. But other than that it’s also essential in defending against decks with big minions and the way you use it will determine whether you win the game or not. In this case you want to do the opposite ie use it on big minions when they are on your side of the field, unless you’re absolutely sure that they have no means of healing them back up.
Cleaver – Another consistent form of removal, except this one is better since it’s an actual minion. Usually after the inital minion’s death, Cleaver can be countered by vomiting small minions in front of it denying any additional value. But due to the nature of the deck, it’s not hard to support Cleaver and kill those low value minions before he gets to them.
Gameplay
The basic premise of the deck is to abuse it’s low curve to get early control of bridges and to keep it as much as possible throughout the game in order to snowball to victory by double dipping on the fact that almost every positive trade results in additional face damage due to the perk 1. Keeping the both bridges in control as much as possible is key because:
- Early perk 1 is vital for maximizing damage output.
- Early perk 2 helps in either closing out the game or preparing for enemy’s comeback due to their own perk 2.
- You want to deny enemy the tools they need in order to fight back.
During midgame where you hopefully have the mana advantage from all the early pressure, is time to start using your cards a bit more sparingly to capitalize on that perk 1 damage, implying they don’t have the AoE to easily deal with your cards. If they do, play the slower game but still stay on the offensive and keep getting that chip damage.