Hearthstone’s Knights of the Frozen Throne: The Upper Reaches guide

You’ve conquered the Lower Citadel! Only one more level remains before you can challenge and dethrone the Lich King.

In case you missed it, Knights of the Frozen Throne has officially released. The new single-player adventure mode sends us up the icy steps of Icecrown Citadel to take the fight to the Lich King. If you’ve been out of Hearthstone for a while, remember that you can get to these adventures by selecting “Solo Adventures” from the Hearthstone menu, then selecting “The Frozen Throne.”

The Upper Reaches wing has three bosses to defeat after the prologue: Blood-Queen Lanathel, Professor Putricide, and Sindragosa. You’ll want to build a specific deck to tackle each, so if you haven’t yet had an opportunity, check out our list of all expansion cards. (For added fun, consider putting in The Lich King in your decks to watch their interactions.) And remember, when building your deck, toggle your deck type to Wild. You do not have to use exclusively standard cards to beat these encounters.

Try the wing out on your own, but if you need extra help, come back here for a walkthrough of each encounter.

Blood-Queen Lanathel

Lanathel is the gateway boss to the others in The Upper Reaches area of Icecrown Citadel. Her ability is similar to the Bloodreaver Gul’dan Death Knight. She can lifesteal and deal 3 damage with her Vampiric Leech ability. I ran what was essentially a standard Jade Druid deck against her. No matter what deck you use, you need to be able to keep ahead and generate minions.

Don’t expect to be able to use your Hero Power at all. She casts Bite of the Blood-Queen which turns your hero into a vampire. This changes your Hero Power to Vampiric Bite, where you have to give a non-Vampire +2/+2 (which then turns the minion into a vampire). She also starts with a pair of Sleeping Acolytes who are both 0/10s. If it comes down to it, you can use Vampiric Bite on them. Her deck consists largely of demons and other cheap minions to try to force you to bite one of her minions.

Tip: If you play a Death Knight hero, you can temporarily morph back into a non-vampire hero. She’ll play Bite of the Blood-Queen again right after though.

The strategy

Try to mulligan into a Jade Idol on your opening turn. You want to start ramping up and generating your Jade army as quick as possible. Spreading Plague is the MVP in this deck as well since it can create a cluster of spiders to help blunt her offense. Likewise, if you play Malfurion the Pestilent, he should generate the 1/5 taunt spiders. {PB}

### Drake
# Class: Druid
# Format: Standard
# Year of the Mammoth
#
# 2x (0) Innervate
# 2x (1) Earthen Scales
# 2x (1) Jade Idol
# 2x (2) Wild Growth
# 2x (2) Wrath
# 1x (3) Feral Rage
# 2x (3) Jade Blossom
# 1x (4) Fandral Staghelm
# 2x (4) Jade Spirit
# 2x (4) Swipe
# 2x (5) Nourish
# 2x (5) Spreading Plague
# 1x (6) Aya Blackpaw
# 2x (6) Jade Behemoth
# 1x (7) Malfurion the Pestilent
# 2x (8) Primordial Drake
# 2x (10) Ultimate Infestation
#
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#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone

Other Options

For a budget approach, check out this Paladin deck. These are all cards that can be unlocked and do not need to be purchased. Try to have at least two minion advantage over the Blood Queen. Your hero power should help keep your minions alive.

Professor Putricide

This is one of the more frustrating encounters (albeit one of my favorites) because it has multiple stages. Professor Putricide’s opening hero power is Mad Science. This opening part of the encounter heavily favors classes that utilize secrets. Putricide starts out with an additional 15 armor. Once you punch through it, his armor will reset, and he summons Festergut. This will deal 3 damage to your minions at the end of his turn. His Hero Power also changes to Madder Science, which drops the cost of all weapons to (1). That’s not even his final form. Once you remove his armor again, Rotface will come into play. Putricide’s Hero Power evolves into Maddest Science, forcing all cards to cost (5) mana.

The strategy

Try to mulligan hard for a Secret Keeper in your opening hand. She will snowball into this giant, face smashing monstrosity with the amount of secrets being played here. Eater of Secrets is equally just as fun to play. This deck actually took me a few tries to get. Even then, I only succeeded when my Secret Keeper reached stats over 10/11. You want to be able to time and sequence your attacks in such a way that when you remove Putricide’s armor, you still have enough attacks or spells left to remove Festergut or Rotface at the same time. If you can accomplish that goal, you’ll have a much easier time with the boss. Always attack with a minion you can afford to lose first so you can do a check for secrets like Vaporize or Freezing Trap.

###Saurfang
# Class: Warrior
# Format: Wild
#
# 2x (1) N’Zoth’s First Mate
# 1x (1) Patches the Pirate
# 2x (1) Upgrade!
# 2x (2) Bloodsail Raider
# 2x (2) Execute
# 2x (2) Fiery War Axe
# 2x (2) Forge of Souls
# 2x (2) Heroic Strike
# 1x (2) Hobart Grapplehammer
# 2x (3) Bloodsail Cultist
# 2x (4) Blood Razor
# 2x (4) Death’s Bite
# 2x (4) Dread Corsair
# 2x (4) Naga Corsair
# 2x (5) Arcanite Reaper
# 1x (7) Gorehowl
# 1x (7) Malkorok
#
AAEBAYwWBKoG064CkbwCorwCDbACkQP/A5EG7gbnB+8HjQ6CsAKIsAK5vwLMzQL2zwIA
#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone

Other Options

If the Hunter deck above isn’t working, give this Mage list a try. Just make sure you have some removal handy to deal with Festergut when it spawns. Make sure he doesn’t enter phase 2 on his turn, otherwise Festergut will activate and potentially wipe your board. Duplicate and your Eater of Secrets work extremely well together to smash his arsenal of secrets.

Sindragosa

You can play Taunt Warrior here with the Fire Plume’s Heart quest. When you first start the match, you’ll notice you have four ice blocks on your side of the board. There is no way to remove them. That means you can play a maximum of 3 minions. Frost Breath activates when Sindragosa’s health reaches both 20 health and 10 health. This will freeze and turn your existing minions into ice blocks. She’ll also cast Unchained Magic will deal 3 damage to you per spell in your hand.

The strategy

Just drop taunt minions and keep developing your armor. Play your quest, then play your minions so that you can eventually activate it. If you can find a way to trip Sindragosa’s health below each threshold level without forcing an Ice Block on your side of the board, definitely do it. Sometimes this involves trading and sacrificing your minion into something before following up with a weapon attack into Sindragosa or using your upgraded Hero Power to deal 8 damage to her face. Board space is a premium here. Alley Armorsmiths, Shield Block, and your taunts should help provide you with some durability to outlast her.

### Sindragosa
# Class: Warrior
# Format: Wild
#
# 1x (1) Fire Plume’s Heart
# 2x (2) Annoy-o-Tron
# 2x (2) Execute
# 2x (2) Fiery War Axe
# 2x (2) Slam
# 2x (2) Stubborn Gastropod
# 1x (3) Fierce Monkey
# 2x (3) Ravaging Ghoul
# 2x (3) Shield Block
# 2x (3) Stonehill Defender
# 2x (3) Tar Creeper
# 2x (4) Bloodhoof Brave
# 2x (5) Alley Armorsmith
# 2x (5) Sludge Belcher
# 2x (6) Ornery Direhorn
# 1x (7) The Curator
# 1x (8) Primordial Drake
#
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#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone

Other Options

If you’re missing some of those cards or are new to the game, there’s a budget version of a Warrior deck you can use.

Previous Adventures

If you haven’t yet, we’ve also released guides and walkthroughs for the previous two adventures. Check them out and polish off the rest of the bosses! Save any charge minions or weapons for the final push.

• One Night in Karazhan
• League of Explorers
• Blackrock Mountain