Reweave Crownwatch Press-Gang to play a shifted
Iceberg Scattershot.
Then, either this turn or next turn, play or copy a
West-Wind Herald. Scattershot will cause the herald to do 1 damage and infiltrate. Herald can then play
Mirror Image from your void to make another herald. The new herald will also infiltrate.
Once the board is full, have a herald play
Reweave, turning a herald into a
Calderan Gunsmith for maximum damage.
Demand Death should be played when either:
- you have
Iceberg Scattershot in play
- you have
West-Wind Herald in play and ready to infiltrate
- you have 8+ power available
Waystone Titan generates power when played or copied thanks to
Iceberg Scattershot. It can also be reweaved into a scattershot or herald after attacking.
If you have
End of Hostilities in your void when you combo, you can copy a herald,
Reweave a herald into a herald to enable tribute, and then End of Hostilities will be able to make two heralds and you can use extra infiltrates on other spells.
Some card choices and numbers are still being tuned.
I also have another variation on the theme that I haven't updated for the newest set but that I think is pretty good: JPS herald combo
How necessary is Press-Gang relative to other options for the combo? It feels like it's in there solely because you need a 4-drop with Porter and Gustrider just being in there for Press-Gang support when there are other cards that could support the strategy just fine in a lot of different ways. Some possibilities include Svetya, Marley, Vargo, Chunk Chunk, Poaching Drake, Elder Meditant, Imperial Loyalist, Mining Team, Ruckus Rouser, and Shingane Firebrand. Replacing some of these could open up the slot for 1-drops for other cards that do something more than be market fodder and cycle.
Also, how necessary are End of the Barrel, End of the Story, Harsh Rule, Pristine Light, and Demand Death? I don't have Barrel, Story, or Light, have only 1 Harsh Rule, and am really not a fan of Demand Death, so I'm really looking hard for replacements, even if it's a simple as putting in more copies of the other 1-ofs in the deck.
The end of X cards primarily exist because of the ability to search for them with resurface from garden of omens. End of Hostilities and End of the Barrel can be powerful when played by West Wind Herald, so getting the only copy in the void is nice too.
As for a list without Demand Death, I made RYp9vcEl-mw which is probably a stronger deck than this one, but I find the risk of demand death to be pretty fun.
What I learned from playing it is that after Scattershot is on the field, you can reweave your West-Wind Heralds into more West-Wind Heralds to further increase the damage from your combo. The highest damage with a 4-drop on board would be 28 damage: Reweave into Scattershot, play the marketted West-Wind Herald, use it to play Mirror Image 10 times, Reweave a West-Wind Herald 3 times, then Reweave into Calderan Gunsmith. It's really sick that this variant of the combo deals more health than the health players start the game with.
I also really, really like Svetya in my version. It seems like everyone playing Primal has Royal Decree in either their main deck or market and it really puts a damper on your combo, and Svetya gives you a 1-2 turn window to start playing pieces of your combo before that happens. I literally won a game where my opponent played Howling Peak Smuggler on 3 while I had full combo in hand, and I played Svetya on 4 into Herald on 5. My opponent conceded on turn 6 after I pulled out my marketted Mirror Image and started replicating West-Wind Heralds with it before I even got to Reweave into Scattershot.
I also like that this deck has a really high skillcap. Feels like most of my losses are from my own misplays rather than my opponent playing better cards, and the remaining losses are usually from power/influence screw where I didn't have much of a chance to begin with.