Hearthstone Arch-Thief Rafaam

[Vlad 411]

This thread is for comments about our Arch-Thief Rafaam guide for League of Explorers.

[Guest 808_puma]

The mage deck that was suggested for normal mode has a card that players won't have until they've beaten Rafaam Unleased. That card is Eerie Statue. The "Cheap Arch-Thief Rafaam Mage Deck (Normal and Heroic Mode)" can only be fully played in Heroic mode. Please suggest a replacement card for those playing in normal mode.

[csarmi 4]

I have used this deck:

 

2 Circle of Healing

2 Angry Chicken

2 Dragon Egg

2 Flash Heal

2 Light of the Naaru

2 Power Word: Glory

1 Sir Finley Mrrgglton

2 Ancient Watcher

2 Lightwell

2 Nerubian Egg

2 Wyrmrest Agent

2 Coldlight Oracle

1 Emperor Cobra

1 Illuminator

1 Auchenai Soulpriest

2 Eerie Statue

2 Jeeves

 

The AI has only healing spells, can't remove your weapon and can't activate the watcher/statue.

[csarmi 4]

The AI will play Lightwell with Achenai Soulpriest, tried and true. Managed to make him heal down his own Mal'Ganis :)

[csarmi 4]

This is your deck btw.

4x Wisp

2x Footman

2x Statue

2x Shade

2x Peddler

2x Scarab

2x Ooze

1x Nesingwary

1x Harrison

2x Hat

2x Torch

1x Entomb

2x Mind Vision

2x Raven Idol

1x Flare

2x Rare Spear

[Zadina 923]

Sir Finley and Sideshow Spelleater don't work when Arch-Thief plays them. Tried and tested both of them.

[Guest Ironshaft]

On Heroic, Sir Finlay is a dead card in his hand. He will not play it even if he is in fatigue. Not sure about normal.

[AussieEevee 0]

I highly suggest replacing Eerie Statue with Zombie Chow. When he is killed, Zombie Chow restores health to YOU. You shouldn't need the heal, as the deck is pretty bad, but it'll be there if you do.

[Chacal 23]

File the Heroic version of this under 'not fun'. 

Repeat

    <exercise in futility>

Until (<he consistently draws bad random cards> && <your Discoveries are excellent>)

[positiv2 953]

I highly suggest replacing Eerie Statue with Zombie Chow. When he is killed, Zombie Chow restores health to YOU. You shouldn't need the heal, as the deck is pretty bad, but it'll be there if you do.

You don't need heals. Chow has too high value to be worth it. Especially not when your deck contains a 1/2 Goldshire. 

[AussieEevee 0]

 

I highly suggest replacing Eerie Statue with Zombie Chow. When he is killed, Zombie Chow restores health to YOU. You shouldn't need the heal, as the deck is pretty bad, but it'll be there if you do.

You don't need heals. Chow has too high value to be worth it. Especially not when your deck contains a 1/2 Goldshire. 

 

Chow is a pretty bad card... a 2/3, with a deathrattle to heal his opponents hero.

I agree you don't need the heals, not unless he gets lucky with his portals... But Eerie Status is impossible, so when i looked through my collection for a worthless card to take its place, that stuck out at me.

Either way, it worked perfectly and I finally crushed him.

Edited December 22, 2015 by AussieEevee

[Chacal 23]

He can and will silence Eerie Statues when he gets Owls (or whatever) from Portals. I wouldn't give him ESs or Watchers. Having said that, no matter how dire the deck I give him is I still get killed by the Portal cards. I know it's not impossible, but I'm struggling to believe it!

 

Edit: Him - Turn 4 Dr Boom. Turn 5 Ragnaros. My hand - 2 x Wisp, Raven Idol, Eerie Statue.

Come oooooooon! Really???!

Edited December 22, 2015 by Chacal

[Guest YourGod]

I made a rogue deck with a ton of weapon buffs, but no weapons. (Deadly poison, Tinkers sharpsword oil) I also added cards like Deathlord and zombie chow to grant me benefits, as long as cards that could hurt him, like ancient shade. Lastly, I added cards with terrible attacking capabilities, like stones kin gargoyle and ancient watcher. It worked brilliantly.

[positiv2 953]

I made a rogue deck with a ton of weapon buffs, but no weapons. (Deadly poison, Tinkers sharpsword oil) I also added cards like Deathlord and zombie chow to grant me benefits, as long as cards that could hurt him, like ancient shade. Lastly, I added cards with terrible attacking capabilities, like stones kin gargoyle and ancient watcher. It worked brilliantly.

Chow is a card that is played in constructed. I don't really think that Chow is a right choice for the deck.

[Guest zoom]

This was a great idea thanks, worked first try and Zombie Chow worked out great.

 

 

[Guest Tom]

I did this first try on heroic with giving Rafaam nothing but high mana legendaries, easy peasy. He discarded 5 cards, IMO much better than making a crappy deck.

[Chacal 23]

 

I did this first try on heroic with giving Rafaam nothing but high mana legendaries, easy peasy. He discarded 5 cards, IMO much better than making a crappy deck.

Haha. Well played sir!

I got there in the end. I won't be replaying this for fun in future though.

[Bob21117 15]

I defeated Heroic Arch-Thief Rafaam with these F2P decks.

Rafaam will steal your deck and you will have to make do with a spare deck full of bad and situational cards.
Rafaam's hero power is Unstable Portal, making every match completely unpredictable.
There are two viable strategies to this fight:
1. Build a very expensive deck to overstuff Rafaam's hand, gain an early lead on the board and hope, that he does not get anything too powerful from his hero power.
2. Build a very cheap deck with Discard effects to empty Rafaam's hand quickly and hope, that he does not get anything too powerful from his hero power.
Whichever way you choose, you should include the most useless cards you possess, ideally Rares because of the Rare Spear you will get.
Your best (and possibly only) chance to win is to play Rare Spear on turn 1 and never use up all its charges.
It is unlikely that you will be able to keep board control. As soon as you have a big weapon and an Ancient Shade on the board, you should go face and hope for the best.

F2P Paladin (0 Dust)
Inspiration: http://www.hearthhead.com/deck=142304/loe-nocost-solver-rafaam

2x Humility
2x Light's Justice
2x Sacred Trial
1x Sir Finley Mrrgglton
2x Holy Light
2x Magma Rager
2x Ancient Shade
2x Eerie Statue
1x Nightblade
2x Stormpike Commando
2x Summoning Stone
2x Wobbling Runts
2x Core Hound
2x War Golem
2x Fossilized Devilsaur
2x Anyfin Can Happen

Mulligan for Rare Spear. If you cannot play it on turn 1: concede.
Try to gain early board control by putting high cost cards into your (then stolen) deck and gain value from the secret (Flare), weapon (Harrison Jones) and beast (Hemet Nesingwary).
Tokens synergise with Explorer's Hat. Make heavy use of this value generator.
Difficulty: Medium (may take up to 10 tries), IF you get the Rare Spear on turn 1, otherwise the fight's difficulty will be ridiculously high.

 

Deck changes for Normal Mode: 2x Ogre Magi, 2x Darkscale Healer, 2x Archmage instead of 2x Eerie Statue, 2x Fossilized Devilsaur and 2x Wobbling Runts.


F2P Warlock (0 Dust)
Inspiration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvVYcdcN_Qg

2x Murloc Tinyfin
2x Sacrificial Pact
2x Corruption
2x Murloc Raider
2x Reliquary Seeker
2x Soulfire
1x Sir Finley Mrrgglton
2x Stonetusk Boar
2x Voodoo Doctor
2x Succubus
2x Magma Rager
2x Ancient Shade
2x Eerie Statue
1x Nightblade
2x Summoning Stone
2x Wobbling Runts

Mulligan for Rare Spear. If you cannot play it on turn 1: concede.
Try to empty the opponents' hand to minimze his options by including very cheap cards and Discard effects like Soulfire and Succubus in your deck.
Difficulty: Medium (may take up to 10 tries), IF you get the Rare Spear on turn 1, otherwise the fight's difficulty will be ridiculously high.

Deck changes for Normal Mode: 2x Elven Archer and 2x Grimscale Oracle instead of 2x Eerie Statue and 2x Wobbling Runts.

[Guest Aldo]

Thanks for the paladin deck.  Worked first time (got the spear right away) although I was down to 4 life at the end.

 

Subbed in a couple of Nerubian Eggs and the AI ended up casting both eggs and both eerie statues.

[Guest Gavin]

Thanks csarmi for the priest deck. Subbed in two Summoning Stone and a wobbling runts for two wyrmrest agent and a lightwell since I do not own the cards. 

 

[Guest ReverendDel]

Killed him first time. Amusingly he got Sir Finley from his first portal and played it. Game was over from that moment forth.

[CaptLando 26]

I let Heroic Rafaam use one of my Dreadsteed decks, and I won on Turn 4 of my 1st attempt!...however, Dreadsteeds had nothing to do with it. He killed himself by using Mistress of Pain. Lol

 

 

Let me explain. On Turn 2, Rafaam played Auchenai Soulpriest that he got from Unstable Portal. Rafaam does not understand that this card turns heals into damage... On Turn 3, he played Mistress of Pain from my deck. When she was ready to attack on Turn 4, he hit me with her for 1...and she proceeded to ping him to death! Her ability first activated from the 1 dmg to me. Because of Soulpriest, the 1 life gain was turned into 1 dmg to him. Since the Mistress had just caused another damage (to Rafaam), her ability activated again...and again and again and again, until he was dead. She took him from 30 health +7 armor down to -3 health. (Idk why it went to -3 and stopped, but I'm glad it didn't get stuck and go forever!) In the image above, you can see the recap in the sidebar on the left- a long string of the Mistress of Pain inflicting damage upon her handler.

[Jesslynn 1]

For Normal mode, I used Bob21117 paly deck, but made changes since I didn't have a few of the cards

 

Won on the first try:

 

2x Humility
2x Light's Justice
2x Sacred Trial
1x Sir Finley Mrrgglton
2x Holy Light
2x Magma Rager
2x Ancient Shade
2x Eerie Statue (didn't have so I used 1X Argent Watchment, 1X Reno Jackson)  *Probably should have used something else besides Reno, but he never came up 
1x Nightblade
2x Stormpike Commando
2x Summoning Stone
2x Wobbling Runts (didn't have so I used 1X Skeram Cultist, 1X Captured Jormungar)
2x Core Hound
2x War Golem
2x Fossilized Devilsaur
2x Anyfin Can Happen

[Raiden 0]

I played this 20 times and I never got through his armor. I've tried 3 or 4 different decks. It always seems like he has 4+ minions on board by turn 3 and somehow always has something like gruul on turn 5. This is just insanely unfun

[Guest Luxu]

I found this deck way too expensive as I had only been playing a week or so. After going through what cards I did have I managed to make a much cheaper deck that won on multiple runs easily. 

Some of these cards I might have gotten by luck and therefore might not exist in everyone's deck, but if I can get them within a week of playing they can't be hard to obtain.

 

My goal was to pick the cards that would be most useless + all the "draw cards" so that they would continually draw those useless cards. 

 

Mage deck:

2 x Murloc Tinyfin

1 x Wisp

1 x Sir Finley Mrrgglton 

2 x Arcane Explosion 

2 x Shatter

2 x Ancient Watcher 

2 x Novice Engineer

2 x Arcane Intellect 

2 x Dalaran Mage

1 x Ironforge Rifleman

2 x Ancient Shade

1 x Cult Master 

1 x Evolved Kobold

2 x Gnomish Inventor

2 x Polluted Hoarder 

2 x Naga Sea Witch

2 x Stormpike Commando

2 x Venture Co. Mercenary

 

 

Naga sea witch is one of my favorites because there are no cards above 5 mana in here so by summoning this, you just make it worse because lower cards cost more - same theory for Venture co. mercenary. All the draw cards seemed like common sense and I had to make a decision about good cards that weren't impossible for me to destroy like Ironforge Rifleman or impossible to handle like Arcane Explosion. There are almost no spells so minions that offer spell damage + as their primary use were great. 

 

An alternative deck that seems like a great idea to me is the Druid deck where you fill the deck with stuff like Wild Growth and Innervate but don't actually put in useful minions to use with the increased mana.

 

A shaman deck full of + totem cards is great too if there is no way or fewer ways to get totems LOL. Deadly Poison is also useless as a rogue card if you don't have a weapon, it won't let you use it. The trick is filling as many of these useless cards as possible and determining what's useless enough and what's handle-able. The Mage deck I made is tried and tested several times though ;) it should work well, even better if you have better cards to substitute for stuff like Ironforge etc.