The Nationals Metagame-Telrander Cat Form

My Nationals metagame breakdown continues today with a breakdown of one of, if not the most explosive decks in the format, Telrander Cat Form. For reference, we'll use Matt Loomis' Top 8 deck from Darkmoon Faire:Chicago since it is the most recent version.

4 Apprentice Teep
4 Apprentice Merry
3 Latro Abiectus
3 Jeleane Nightbreeze
2 Chipper Ironbane
4 Parvink
2 Moira Darkheart

4 Cat Form
4 Claw
4 Rake
4 Predatory Strikes
4 Nature of the Beast
4 Heart of the Wild

4 Zapped Giants
4 Finkle Einhorn at Your Service
4 Crown of the Earth
2 Battle of Darrowshire

Side deck

2 Moira Darkheart
2 Chipper Ironbane
4 Alas, Andorhal
2 Nature's Majesty

This deck took everyone by surprise when Pierre Malherbaud took it to a Darkmoon Faire Championship. It took off in popularity right after that as it seemed like everyone wanted to play a good Druid deck.

The deck is capable of some very explosive draws. Turn 4 goldfishes aren't out of the question, with turn 5 being a common occurrence. However, to get that explosiveness, the deck has to sacrifice some consistency. For me in testing this deck is the polar opposite of Pagatha control. Where Pagatha is rock solid vs. ally based strategies but struggles against some of the solo builds, Telrander is gold against solo strategies but struggles against the ally based decks.

The problem I run into playing Telrander against ally based decks is that while you're packing a rush shell with the Teeps and Merry's, etc., It's not as much as they have. All too often you will find yourself trading allies early on while trying to set up your Form cards. With no ally control other than your own allies you simply have to try to outrun every deck you play because you can't go sending Telrander in as board control like you would with Bulkas or Azarak. The problem I have with this deck is that it simply cannot play control. Telrander players are forced to win before they die, and when your opponent knows this it gives them a lot of control over the match.

Another problem I have with Telrander is the vulnerability to bad draws and ability removal. You have 12 cards that are blanks when you're not in Cat Form and 4 more (Rakes) that aren't very good. While it doesn't happen very often, it's still possible to go through the first 5 or 6 turns without seeing a form card. What's worse is the amount of Chippers running around than can kill your Form cards and with Shamans playing Purges in their boards, games 2 and 3 against Phadalus are rough to say the least. While the raw power of the deck alone may carry you to 2 or 3 wins throughout a tournament, the dependency on Cat Form will lead to at least as many losses when you either don't draw it or simply can't keep one in play.

If you can't already tell, I'm not a huge fan of this deck. I generally prefer consistency over raw power as I just want my deck to keep me in the game. I don't particularly like the idea of playing a deck where I'm hoping to see a specific card in my opening hand every game. Especially one that is as easily removed as Form cards are. Sure, you can leave 2 resources open at all times to save your Cat Forms, but then you're playing 2 resources behind and just getting pummeled by resource advantage.

Now that you know how I feel about this deck, let's move on to some matchups.

Phadalus-I'm going to be very honest here. I think this matchup comes down to the playskill of the Phadalus player in many instances. There is one major flaw here for Telrander and I mentioned it earlier. Telrander cannot play control, so it simply has to commit to trying to outrace Phadalus. This is where the playskill of the Phadalus player comes in. Despite probably being the best deck and the most consistent, Phadalus probably can't just flat outrun Telrander most of the time. A good player will understand that his deck can play a little bit of control here knowing that Telrander has to win fast because there are simply no defensive cards in the deck (except possibly Parvink). A good Phadalus player who understands the matchup will be able to control the tempo and keep it in his favor waiting for a perfect time to play Chipper to cripple the opponent. Games 2 and 3, Phadalus gets Purge which is even worse for Telrander. Someone who has just picked up Phadalus and doesn't know the matchups well, will often times assume since Phadalus is a rush deck that it wants to race here as well, and that person will lose a lot of times in this matchup and then curse how lucky their opponent was. Banking on your opponent not knowing how to play their deck isn't the fastest ticket to the top tables, though, and I think this matchup favors Phadalus. Even more games 2 and 3.

Pagatha-There's not too much to say here. This matchup is honestly almost a bye. Pagatha's only hope is to play enough protectors to stay alive long enough to get an Ice Lord into play and hope you don't have Rake or Claw. This matchup points to one of the things that makes picking a deck in a defined metagame so dicey. If you think that there will be a lot of Pagatha decks as a foil to Phadalus, Telrander is a perfect choice as this is probably its best matchup. But if your guess is wrong, you could really pay the price for it.

Dizdemona-Again, from what I've been gathering these are mostly Dizdemona aggro decks. This is similar to Phadalus. One thing to note here is be careful with your non-Untargetable allies. This deck empties its hand quickly and Shadow Bolts can be devastating. Chipper is still a problem here. I honestly haven't tested this matchup very much, but I would say it is still in Dizzy's Favor, but not as much as the Phadalus match.

Sen'Zir-This matchup depends a lot upon whether the Sen'Zir deck runs Wing Clips and/or Old Bones. Neither of these decks really play defense at all. If Sen'Zir doesn't run Clips or Bones, it is probably at the disadvantage here. Telrander is faster and Sen'Zir doesn't have much in the way of defense. This is a matchup where you're almost always just going to attack directly to the face. About the only time I can think of attacking allies is a Jeleane into a Fury. You don't really like to leave 5/3's around when you can take them out with your 2-drops. When possible, try to leave a Parvink back to soak up an attack unless attacking with her wins the game right now. Telrander is generally about a turn faster than Sen'Zir but the matchup is still relatively close.

Bulkas-This is a matchup that Telrander enjoys. Most Bulkas lists are designed to handle rush decks. Cruelty loses a lot of its effectiveness in this matchup. Bulkas can take a while to really get rolling, and in the meantime you can just pound away. They don't run many protectors and not all of them run Intercept which is the only card that can stop you from attacking. Like Pagatha, Bulkas is a very good matchup for you.

Gorebelly-Whether you realize it or not, these decks are very similar. Both run aggro shells backed up by explosive win/finishing conditions. Telrander has the advantage in this match though because of the weapon removing allies. With no weapon Gorebelly can't fire off the combo and most likely won't have any chance in keeping up in the damage race. When you go up to the full complement of 4 Moira, 4 Chipper in game 2, it becomes an even better matchup.

Azarak-Another solo-deck. Another near bye.

Grennan-I will be perfectly honest here, I haven't played a single game in this matchup. Having said that, I think that Telrander would just play his natural-straightforward-kill-them-in-five-turns game plan and try to win before Grennan can stop him. Game 1 seems like it would probably be pretty close, but Grennan gets to bring in 4 Purges which is pretty bad. Like I said though, I haven't playtested this matchup at all, so this is just theory.

Nimaasus-In most matchups, Nimaasus is a lot like Phadalus, but in this particular matchup, Nimaasus is probably worse for Telrander than Phadalus. Purge can be devastating, but so can Hammer of Justice. That card is just brutal, negating 2 attacks by the hero and netting the Nimaasus player a card. Nimaasus may lack some of the efficiency of Grennan, but it doesn't show in this matchup. This is probably Telrander's worst matchup.

Well, there you have it. I'm personally not a huge fan of this deck because I think it beats itself too often for my liking and is very vulnerable to a lot of the hate out there right now, but it's still one of the two most explosive decks in the game (along with Gorebelly) and despite the inconsistency, it also will have more than its share of Oops, I Win draws as well.