Token Druid deck list guide - Saviors of Uldum - Hearthstone (August 2019)

Our Token Druid deck list guide features the best Saviors of Uldum deck list for Season 65 of Hearthstone (August 2019). Our Token Druid guide also contains Mulligan advice, card combos and strategy tips.

Token Druid is a Hearthstone deck that we saw riding high at the peak of the competitive tier list in the early days of the Rise of Shadows expansion. It’s no longer the best deck around, but remains a Tier 1 list capable of destroying opponents who don’t take the initiative. It’s got a decent bit of support for the upcoming Saviors of Uldum expansion, so we’ll be keeping an eye on the deck’s direction.

In this update to our Token Druid guide, we’ve reassessed the best version of the deck you can play right now. It’s still full of the new minions and spells that emphasise its powers, but just know that it’s not quite as dominant as it once was a little while ago. We also have lots of in-depth strategy advice on how to pilot the deck in the best way possible, as well as some important Mulligan tips and a breakdown of the key card combos you need to know.

UPDATE - AUGUST 2019 #1

Token Druid enters August with a lot of new tools at its disposal. There’ll be some changes to this deck list as the meta develops at the start of Saviors of Uldum.

This article contains additional reporting by James Pickard.

Token Druid deck list and strategy

Here is the best version of Token Druid available to play in Hearthstone right now.

Select and copy the long ID string below, then create a deck in Hearthstone to export this deck into your game.

Deck Import ID: AAECAZICBsQGr6ID2KkDn7cDiYAD76IDDM6UA/b9AsqcA7SRA/cDw5QDjIAD5gXtogP9AkDTnAMA

General strategy

Token Druid is a very fast aggro deck that aims to flood the board with extremely cheap minions and then make them progressively stronger by applying a number of group buffs. Each turn your plan is very straightforward: empty as much of your hand onto the board as possible and then buff those creatures. Play aggressively, only take trades when necessary and push for face damage at all opportunities.

For a while, Token Druid was able to thrive in the meta as a way to beat unrefined decks due to its ability to very rapidly re-establish a board presence turn after turn. Many decks – even the most extreme control ones – simply don’t have enough area of effect removal tools to stop the onslaught, and so your opponent is left completely helpless. Decks are now better established to deal with that now, so it’s not quite as effective as it once was.

Early game: Flood the board with all your early drops and slowly start chipping away at your opponent’s life total. You may lose a creature or two to removal effects, or be forced to make a trade in some situations, but that’s not too much of a problem as you always have more cheap minions ready to go. That said, Wrath can be used as a way to clear your opponent’s minions while keeping yours safe and BEEEES!!! is a fantastic option to simultaneously clear the enemy’s minions and keep some tokens alive for later buffing.

Where you can, look to find ways to trade up or eke out more damage with your buffs cards such as Power of the Wild and Blessing of the Ancients. With both of these, you’re aiming to hit a board of at least 3 minions to get good value from either spell.

Mid game: Keep making your board as wide and as overwhelming as possible. You’ll want to be moving into a position where you can end the game in the next few turns to ensure slower decks can’t stabilise. A well-timed Savage Roar on an especially wide board is a devastating finisher – even this early!

You’re entering dangerous board clear territory too, so look to buff your minions out of damage range from the likes of Warpath, or give yourself some insurance if they are killed using Soul of the Forest.

Late game: If the game isn’t won yet, your opponent is, hopefully, on their last legs so you can finish them off very soon. If they’ve managed to wipe out all of your previous boards, you can immediately give them a wall of problems to deal with once again using The Forest's Aid. As it’s a Twinspell, a copy will sit in your hand ready to be used again in the future. Meaning, if they somehow find more board clears, you’re still able to establish another on the next turn. Not a lot of decks can weather all that constant pressure!

Aggro opponents

These tips will help you overcome aggro decks you face on ladder:

• 1. Wrath and Swipe are your best bets for board control in this deck. The latter you might want to prioritise in aggro matchups as a way to clear their board and keep your minions safe.
• 2. Aggro decks often lack strong board clears, so once you start generating and buffing token creatures you can make more efficient trades and take control of the game.
• 3. If you absolutely must, you can use Savage Roar to give you some extra attack power to kill off your foe’s creatures, although you'd prefer to save it for the kill.

Control opponents

Here’s some advice when dealing with control opponents:

• 1. This deck is already very aggressive, but you’ll want to play even more quickly against control players to defeat them as soon as possible.
• 2. You’ll want to play as much as you can on the board each turn, but do be cautious of committing all your resources to a single play if you think a board clear could be coming next turn.
• 3. That said, Soul of the Forest and The Forest's Aid are both excellent counters to board clears as your opponent will have to find a way to deal with a whole new board immediately.
• 4. The best way to win against control is to surprise them with lethal damage. Save cards such as Savage Roar and even the likes of Swipe to achieve this.
• 5. This deck has no hard removal, so the best way to deal with big threats is to generate a large enough board to push through them, or aim to defeat your opponent before they can get them down on the battlefield.

Token Druid Mulligan guide

These are the cards you’ll want to have in hand at the start of the match when playing Token Druid:

• 1. Acornbearer: Solid one-drop that can contest the board early while also refilling your hand with tokens to play on later turns.
• 2. Mecharoo: A sticky minion that can get work done and then essentially replace itself on the board when it's taken out of action.
• 3. Dreamway Guardians: Strong spell that can establish you on the board very quickly with some added survivability too.
• 4. EVIL Cable Rat: Not great in terms of stats but the effect from the Lackey can be very useful in upcoming turns.
• 5. Microtech Controller: More Mech value, and a great way of growing your token presence.

Token Druid tips, card combos and synergies

It’s a fairly straightforward deck, but these are some of the important combos to Token Druid:

- Once you’ve got a healthy board established in the early turns, look to get those creatures buffed as soon as possible using Power of the Wild and Blessing of the Ancients.

- EVIL Cable Rat will add a Lackey minion to your hand when played. These can include:

• Ethereal Lackey - Discover a Spell.
• Faceless Lackey - Summon a random 2-cost minion.
• Goblin Lackey - Give a friendly minion +1 Attack and Rush.
• Kobold Lackey - Deal 2 damage.
• Witchy Lackey - Transform a friendly minion into one that costs (1) more.
• Titanic Lackey - Give a friendly minion +2 Health and Taunt.

- All friendly characters - including your hero - gain two points of Attack when Savage Roar is cast. This is your core finishing move. Don’t miss out on that damage from your Hero attack!

- Explodinator generates two tokens which can be empowered for more damage. Make sure you include their Deathrattle damage into your lethal calculations as well!

- Soul of the Forest gives all of your minions a Deathrattle effect that summons a 2 / 2 Treant in their place when they die. These can sometimes be stronger than the cards you had in the first place and can leave you with wide boards after your opponent has used an area of effect clearance.

Card choices and substitutions

Token Druid will continue to be refined during the Saviors of Uldum meta. Here are some of the key cards in the deck, as well as experimental variations you might see sometimes.

• Acornbearer: Fairly unassuming one-drop but comes with the bonus of granting you extra token creatures on death, which you can use to flood the board immediately.
• Crystalsong Portal: Sometimes you may have run out of minions in your hand and this spell is the perfect way to refill your hand once again.
• Power of the Wild: A powerful card that can buff your entire board by +1/+1. You shouldn’t be using it to summon a minion, but sometimes this is necessary if you’ve drawn badly in the early game.
• BEEEES: A card that doubles up as removal and token generation. If you cast it on a target with 2 Health for example, you’ll end up removing it and still having 2 Bees leftover.
• Blessing of the Ancients: Similar to Power of the Wild but there’s the chance to get even more value out of it thanks to the Twinspell keyword, which will give you another copy of the card after it’s been cast.
• Savage Roar: Perfect for finishing off your opponent with some surprise burst damage if you’re well entrenched on the board.
• Soul of the Forest: An insurance policy against your opponent’s board clears that ensures something will remain even if they wipe out your creatures.
• Garden Gnome: You’ll often be holding on to The Forest's Aid around the mid game, being both 8 mana and Twinspell. This is the perfect activator for Garden Gnome, who summons 6/7 worth of stats over a wide area.
• Soul of the Forest: This is a perfect card to give you some protection against board clears. Even if your opponent takes all your creatures out, more will immediately spawn onto the board so you can keep the pressure up!
• Anubisath Defender: Another card that synergises with The Forest's Aid, it can protect your Treants thanks to its Taunt and add another threat after spending 8 mana on the spell.
• The Forest's Aid: A huge part of the deck’s success. Many aggro decks will have run out of steam by turn eight, but this spell ensures you have a way to build a wide board fast again on two subsequent turns.