Uncommon Applications: Lookout for Goldfish

This is a deck from my Uncommon Applications series of decks, which aims to use low-rarity Battle Lines cards in Throne decks. This deck is an example of how to use Haven Lookout, one of the most explosive new cards for Throne.

The entire idea behind the deck is that you use a combination of Haven Lookout, Darkwater Vines, Gift of Battle, and assorted discard effects to kill the opponent on turn 3. Fervent Siphoner is there as redundancy for Lookout while also eliminating the need for Gift of Battle if you draw both, Dreamsnatcher can be redundancy for either for a weaker combo, and most of the other cards still work with the combo if you have the right cards (see here for the full rundown of how you can kill within the first 3 turns).

Furthermore, cards like Mournful Deathcap and Tome of Horrors allow for further mill strategies, of which Blight Pass Smuggler can draw either Savage Incursion or Solitude for the win, depending on how hard you milled your opponent. You can also draw Haunting Scream to either pull off the combo in the mid-late game or reuse a Dreamsnatcher that died early in order to close out the game. Permafrost and Strange Broker round out the market as removal and mill, respectively.

This deck runs 31 power cards to both restrict the number of cards you can have in the opening hand to the minimum number you need for nuking the opponent early, but it also enables the rest of the deck to get going rather quickly, enabling Deathcap, Incursion, and Solitude in the mid-late game.

Problems and Improvements:

One of this deck's biggest problems is how much it relies on a strong early play to set the tone for the match. You only beat aggro if you can race it (although none of the cards die to Autotread, which is very nice) and you can fail to beat midrange and control if you don't draw the right cards at the right time (like drawing non-Vines units and Gift of Battle when you have no discard in your opening hand or drawing Tome of Horrors when you have Lookout and/or Fervent Siphoner but no Gift of Battle because Tome's only method for comboing with them are to give them berserk).

In addition, mill is an incredibly inconsistent strategy overall since it relies on a handful of pushed cards sticking in order to be relevant. Running it as a backup plan means the strategy isn't always necessary to pull out a win, but it doesn't make it any less consistent.

Fear might be a good card to use, but you're almost exclusively using it for power and it cuts down the number of actual power cards you have in your deck, that number of which is very important. Cabal Standard can be useful since this deck runs more power cards than is normally necessary, but I haven't tested it yet. Final Push and Chastisement have both been tested as combo enablers, but I took them out for more power. They might still be good as market cards, and would replace Broker in the market if you run either of them (although either could replace Permafrost too).

Rating: 6/10

This deck has an inherently inconsistent game plan that heavily relies on either the opponent having no depleted power on the first few turns and/or having the right early draws, but it has an explosive gameplan when it does work and a long-term backup plan that also works incredibly well.