Decks

I’m a new player and managed 57-20 or 75% wr to Champion with this deck.

The goal of this tempo list is to establish board control in the early-through-mid game and win by then.

• Pocket Instance helps you maintain early tempo and board control, saving your 2/1 or 3/3 against 2/3s and 3/4s respectively. The deck plays with a lot of initiative in an attempt to punish when the enemy thinks they can just play a higher defense minion in front of yours and pass. You only spend 1 mana on Pocket Instance, so after you protect your minion and clear one of theirs, you can usually develop a new unit on the same turn. You just spent 1 mana to kill one of their minions without any losses to your own; insane tempo. You can also play it in a proactive defensive way e.g. to prevent your Shinobi or Gamer God from getting killed by rush. Pocket Instance is insane removal with Vixen’s deadly.
• Shinobi of Smoke is the mvp in the deck. Against early game minions, you have a lot of tricks to maintain your board presence, especially Shinobi to teleport around and protect your valkyries. Going into the midgame, Shinobi one turn followed next turn by impel teleport + Demolition Speedway has so much value and reach. One Fossegrim is there to combo with Shinobi: turn 3 Shinobi followed by turn 4 Fossegrim is insane tempo: eliminates one of their minions while developing one of yours.
• Freki Sidecar can make a surprise Shinobi, God of Gamers, or Rogue Idolon devastating.
• Ingrid helps bring back your Valkyries, while Vixen helps bring back your spirits (Shinobi and Racer), so you can get a second wind and card advantage. The deck empties your hand pretty fast, so these help push through the mid-to-late game, although ideally you end the game before you need to play Ingrid. She does however really save you against Misanthropia. Vixen recurring Racers helps so much against aggro.
• Loki’s Veil is an underrated card. Sure, it’s a tech card, but you’re rainbow so you draw it for free and burn it for mana if you don’t need. It’s particularly strong or can save you against: Samosek which can wreck your tempo, Barbed Bolts which ping away your units, stopping Sea Lord’s Trident value or rush combo, can shutdown high value enchantments like Heaven, Hades, or Giant’s Stairway, etc.

Match-ups:

Your main weakness is yellow. They have a lot of annoying little minions that stall and draw cards, and then you get hit by Misanthropia. That’s a significant consideration for running Mindfreak. However, you can also change your playstyle a bit. Instead of burning enchantments and playing minions, try to get some enchantments down, since those will be there post Misanthropia. And I swear: 90% of the time against yellow, you will get hit by a Misanthropia on 5 mana, so I wouldn’t hope that it’s not there. Hold that Ingrid in your starting hand against yellow because you’ll need the recovery, and she lets you play into Misanthropia. Vixen also provides recovery for your spirits, so she’s good to hold for post Misanthropia. In the early game, I’m never sure whether I should clear Maze or hit face, but the more I played the deck, the more I would opt to go face since yellow will just outvalue you and play scary things if you don’t end the game. Using Speedway to clear a Maze is good though.

Against red, do not play your Freki Sidecar unless you have a Road Queen in play or you have Sidecar on a strength buffing enchantment. Otherwise, she will be removed by Daring Trapezist. It’s usually not even worth playing Sidecar because it sets up to get all your minions wiped out by Magmataur. Try to only play minions on tiles 1, 4, and 7. I almost always burn my Sidecar against red unless I have nothing else to play, or I can setup a high value play, or it’s late in the game.

I felt the deck had pretty favorable match-up against mono-blue Valkyries. Just try to get your Shinobi of Smoke out, and it can completely control the game. Pocket Instance also wins you these games. Demolition Speedway + Racer also really good against them, causing me to often hold my Racers until I draw Speedway. The difference between you and them is that they’re trying to go face and only clear board if they have to, while you can win on value and have options for controlling the flow of the game.

Which brings me to my favorite thing about the deck: as it’s a tempo deck, it’s neither aggro nor midrange. You have the option of playing the deck as aggro, going face and racing to finish off opponent (against more control decks), but you have the option of controlling the game and getting insane value out of your non-retaliatory and alphastrike cards (against more aggressive decks, which will run out of steam before you do). This versatility and the amount of options you have makes it truly a pleasure to play.