How do you play freeze mage?

[Ronduwil]

True but if they get your Doomsayer you might as well have just hit nova and not played Doomsayer at all.

I guess it fishes some removal/silences?

It's a gamble, but so are half the other cards. Besides, the resources they spend dealing with your Doomsayer would have been better spent developing their board. Sometimes you play it by itself. Take the last game in the Trump Freeze Mage guide. He was two turns away from having the mana to finish off the hunter, and he had a read that the hunter was definitely going to play Savannah Highmane on turn six. So he Doomsayered on an empty board (crazy, right?). Sure enough, the hunter passed his turn. Then he Doomsayered a second time in a row. This time the hunter realized he was on the clock and (sure enough) played his Highmane. By then it was too late and the hunter ultimately lost.

The Frost Nova by itself already provides value because it stalls the opponent. When the Doomsayer hits, however, it forces the opponent to redevelop from scratch, and that's going to buy a few more turns. The whole idea is to stall, and Doomsayer does that very effectively, whether it's by forcing the opponent to waste a turn dealing with the Doomsayer or by resetting the board state.

[patseguin]

I agree very much. I've adjusted my play style recently to use doomsayer separately from frost nova. 99% of the time they are going to spend cards dealing with it which usually buys me another turn. So, I get 2 stalls by using it separately from frost nova instead of waiting for 5 mana to do the combo and they usually deal with anyways.

[patseguin]

Just updating my thread. I seem to run into many control warriors who stack up 25+ armor before I can even drop Alexa plus face hunters seem to usually own me so I am playing a couple of tempo decks. I have no problems with control warriors but brainless face hunters are still a problem sometimes. I am using the trump tempo deck plus one I found on icy veins called aggro tempo. What would you guys say is the basic strategy for tempo? I often find it difficult deciding when to attack minions or face. I've made the mistake of ignoring minions against paladins, shamans, and druids, and they drop a +4 damage or something and destroy me. Is it usually best practice to attack minions in early game tempo decks?

[Sedralis]

Is Pyroblast or Malygos generally considered better? It looks like Malygos has higher damage potential, but also has a harder combo to achieve as it needs Frostbolts and Icelances made cheaper by Thaurissan to get the most out of Maly.

[Ronduwil]

I think it's a matter of preference. I use Pyroblast but I'm seriously thinking of cutting out because it's usually a dead card that just sits in my hand. I think I've won maybe one game with it. At least Malygos puts a big body on the board that they have to deal with. If I had Malygos I would probably run him instead of Pyroblast.

[Solmyr13]

Is Pyroblast or Malygos generally considered better? It looks like Malygos has higher damage potential, but also has a harder combo to achieve as it needs Frostbolts and Icelances made cheaper by Thaurissan to get the most out of Maly.

Maly doesn't work to be honest. You're better off dropping Anto + 3 spells for the 3 fireballs that net you the win.

[durrtygoodz]

Malygos is overkill but it's actually nice against warrior. I've put it in my deck over pyro and ofc sometimes you don't "need" it to win, but you wouldn't need pyro in those games anyway so..

[patseguin]

You guys are kind of right. When I think about it, I don't win much with pyro either. Especially against damned control warriors. I really need ant to survive more than 1 turn to generate enough fireballs. Would any kind of taunts make sense in this deck to perhaps protect ant?

[Sedralis]

Thanks all. I haven't actually got a freeze deck I just saw a streamer using his 'Malygod' freeze Mage deck (as he nicknamed it) and thought it looked pretty fun.

[Solmyr13]

You don't beat Control Warrior btw. If you're going up against a lot of them for now change decks. You'll win 1 out of 10 matches if he's not a complete moron.