For as long as card games have existed, players have combined cards in broken, degenerate ways. The imaginations and drives of a dedicated player-base will always exceed that of the developers, and as such new and exciting combos have the potential to break the game. Each new bout of cards offers new opportunities for exploitable shenanigans.

Hearthstone’s Journey to Un’goro expansion is no exception. More than perhaps any other expansion, there are a number of absurdly powerful combinations to create absurd situations, generate huge value, or simply kill your opponent.

Murloc Tidecaller and Rockpool Hunter

Murloc decks haven’t been too scary for a long time now. While the Finja package is in certain archetypes, full on tribal synergistic board-flood murlocs simply haven’t kept up with the growth of early game power. However, with the rotation out of Tunnel Trogg and Totem Golem, they may be able to reestablish their place as the terror of the opening turns. Helping them is Rockpool Hunter, an incredibly strong card. Representing 3/4 of stats split across two bodies for two mana, it could snowball a one drop into a near insurmountable board advantage.

The most egregious of these on-curve plays would be Murloc Tidecaller into Rockpool Hunter. This creates a 3/3 and a 2/3 on turn two, which is perhaps better than Tunnel Trogg into Totem Golem, only with no overload in exchange for one less health. This could then be followed up with the nightmare of Murloc Warleader for a 3/3, a 6/3, and a 4/4 on turn three.

The ability of Murloc decks to generate huge early tempo and value with Rockpool Hunter might make them a very tempting option for certain classes, most notably Warlock and Shaman. The ability to buff the attack and health of high priority targets in the early and mid game shouldn’t be underestimated.

Jade Idol, Gadgetzan Auctioneer, and Earthen Scales

Jade Druid is a deck that has been dominating the hearts and minds, if not the statistics, of the Hearthstone world. Despite its overall poor showing, its ability to hard-counter certain types of control decks means it’s controversial to say the least. One of the counterplay mechanics against this deck, especially against Control and Midrange, is to simply rush them down or out-tempo them.

What Earthen Scales offers is an opportunity to turn the huge Jade Golems generated as part of a Gadgetzan Auctioneer turn, into a huge health advantage. With Auctioneer on Board, you even gain tempo with +1/+1 and draw a card. Meanwhile, you’ve forced your opponent to deal with your minions rather than your face. Earthen Scales is an extremely powerful combo tool that shores up Jade Druid’s weakness in a way that makes it potentially meta-dominating.

The Caverns Below, Fire Fly, and Igneous Elemental

Rogue’s new Quest seems hard to complete at first. The requirement of playing four minions with the same name seems to require a lot of effort to get to everything becoming a 5/5. However, things get a lot easier when you consider the new Elemental minions, Fire Fly and Igneous Elemental. These give you 1 and 2 1/2 Elementals respectively. This means that you simply need to draw two Igneous Elementals or one Igneous Elemental and two Fire Flys in order to activate the quest. Alternatively, you can just draw one Igneous Elemental, one Fire Fly, and a Shadowstep.

This makes it absurdly easy to activate the quest, leading to a turn four swing turn when you suddenly summon four 5/5s. This also means you can get other advantages, like not playing the quest on turn one, devoting the rest of your deck to more solid aggressive minions and spells instead of combo activators, and having more flexible activators for your end-game. A deck with Rogue’s almost uncompromised early game aggro, followed up by a Jaraxxus-like endless stream of 5/5s, after a huge early swing turn, could be potent indeed.

Time Warp, Arcane Giant, and Alexstrasza

Time Warp is one of those cards that stretches the limit of what’s possible. Its power is perhaps unrivaled by any card. It will likely break many cards and mechanics. One of the simplest of these involves playing two Arcane Giants, Time Warp, and then following up with Alexstrasza. This is one of the easiest one turn (or two turn, depending on how you look at it) kills in the game, requiring only four cards. Moreover, it promises to be exceedingly flexible, as Alexstrasza can be replaced with Fireballs if need be depending on the opponent’s life total.

Potentially more powerful kills exist, such as using Sorcerer’s Apprentices, Molten Reflections, and Archmage Antonidas to create infinite zero mana fireballs. However, this kill’s use of only four cards (one of which is guaranteed from the quest) makes it supremely reliable and consistent. It still can be countered though, most notably by taunt minions, Armor, and Dirty Rat.

Giving Mages a way to kill their opponent from nowhere is supremely powerful, as freeze mage has proven. Their arsenal of stall and board control tools makes them the ideal combo class for bursting the enemy down from 30 to zero over a turn or two.

Sulfuras and Auctionmaster Beardo

The ability for Auctionmaster Beardo to refresh the hero power on playing a spell is usually too low impact to be worth considering. However, that could all change if instead of gaining health, you’re tossing fireballs. With Warrior’s ability to have all of the upside of becoming Ragnaros without any of the armor-shredding or health-losing downsides, the option to cycle small spells and burst down the opponent seems very tempting.

Warrior has a slew of impactful low mana spells, even zero mana ones, leading to up to three hero powers with Beardo on the board. If Beardo manages to stick, they can almost certainly finish off any opponent.

Of course, getting to this position may be tricky. it may be more reliable simply to run additional taunt minions in order to activate the hero power a turn earlier than what would otherwise occur.

Carnassa’s Brood and Tundra Rhino

The Hunter Quest turned quite a few heads on its release. A five mana 8/8 is one thing, but filling your deck with one mana cycling 3/2s is potent indeed. Even more potent could be potential combos with Tundra Rhino.

By giving your Beasts Charge, Tundra Rhino could help turn the ever-cycling raptors into cannonballs to launch at the enemy face. You can easily generate massive damage and value if Rhino sticks, or as part of a combo turn. With a Stampede spell thrown in the mix, you can generate huge value in addition to killing the opponent.

The other route to go down is even more interesting. If you can play Hemet and Jungle Hunter prior to the quest reward, you could make your deck almost entirely raptors. This makes the combo far more consistent, as well as allowing you to easily draw through to your potent high-mana minions.

All images courtesy of Blizzard Entertainment via hearthstone.gamepedia.com

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