Playing Sindragosa at 12k MMR - A Detailed Guide!

Sindragosa isn’t the most exciting hero, it doesn’t let you high-roll a golden Hangry Dragon on turn 4 or steal a minion from your opponent but I find his hero power makes for a very consistent early/mid game carry that lets you avoid damage and win fights while building up an end-game board. Here’s a detailed breakdown of the early game and how I play Sindragosa.

Turn 1 – 3 gold – 3 minions in shop

Out of the 3 minions offered, generally pick the strongest minion or the minion most likely to win or tie fights, you want to avoid taking damage in the first two turns. You can’t be too picky and you need to freeze the board on turn 1, even if the minions aren’t necessarily that great. Best case scenario minions to freeze:

• Righteous Protector – taunt and divine shield, makes a fantastic early game minion as a 3/3 or 4/4 taunt with divine shield

• Fiendish Servant – deathrattle to transfer attack to other minion, it’s not the best but could possibly help you win a fight or two you would have otherwise lost

• Vulgar Homunculus – if I’m not buying this on turn 1 because I have other options, I actually like freezing this minion because it becomes a quick 4/6 or 5/7 taunt and can be further buffed by Nathrezim Overseer at Tier 2 if you find one.

• Mechs – I generally don’t mind freezing mechs because they are so easy to buff at tier 3 and 4.

• Wrath Weaver – I like freezing the Weaver because I can defrost it at turn 3 or 4 and keep buffing it. Even if I don’t force demons I can spend a little bit of health and have a quick 8/8 minion by tier 3 to help win some fights.

Turn 2 – 4 gold – 3 minions in shop

Tier up and freeze the board.

Turn 3 – 5 gold – 4 minions in shop

This is where things get weird, it depends on how you started and what are your minions in the shop. At this point you have 3 buffed minions in your tavern (2 with a 2/2 buff, 1 with a 1/1 buff) and a 4th unbuffed minion, hopefully tier 2. There’s generally a couple common situations but you’ll still freeze the board at the end of your turn:

• You started turn 1 with a token, so either a 2/1 murloc tidehunter or a 1/1 Alleycat. I’ll sell the token and buy two minions. I don’t want to lose to next fight so my best case scenario would be to buy the unbuffed minion and buy the minion that benefits the least from a buff. So for example, if I have a Deck Swabbie and Righteous Protector that has been frozen since turn 1 and a Mecharoo frozen since turn 2, I’ll likely buy the Deck Swabbie that is now a 4/4 since it can probably win a fight and I’d rather keep buffing the other two minions.

• You did not start with a token, but the 4th minion that just came out is stronger, say a 3/4 Steward of Time, sell your minion, buy the 3/4 Dragon and buy a 4/4 Deck Swabbie.

• You did not start with a token, and the 4th minion that just came out is trash. Buy the trash, sell the trash so that the empty spot refills next turn, buy the 4/4 Deck Swabbie.

Turn 4 – 6 gold – 4 minions in shop

This is again another interesting turn with Sindragosa and it depends on your board and your health at this point:

• You’re still above 37 health and you’re fighting someone weak, buy the two weakest minions (if they’re still useful) or buy one of the minions that has been frozen since turn 1. Freeze the board.

• You’ve lowrolled into Rafaam turn 2 and AFK turn 3 and your health is getting low, buy the 2 minions that have been frozen since turn 1. Freeze the board.

Turn 5 – 7 gold – 4 minions in shop

Really depends on what you’ve built up to this point but you should buy one minion and tier up to Tier 3. If you’ve only got one remaining buffed minion in the shop, buy it and don’t freeze and look for tier 3 minions next turn. If you have been greedy, you may just buy a single minion frozen since turn 1 and freeze the board again.

At this point, you should have a decently buffed board. Try to build the strongest board you possibly can at turn 6 to ensure that you can comfortably tier up to Tier 4 by turn 7. Don’t get married to your minions and if you can sell a buffed minion to replace it with a stronger minion, don’t be afraid to do it. Your hero power beyond this point is a perk but don’t freeze minions that aren’t that great just because of the 1/1 buff.

To recap all of the above, freeze your board every turn for the first 4 turns and try to play around with what is being offered to you as best as you can. I’ve uploaded a video of me playing Sindragosa at 12k MMR that further explains my thought process throughout:

https://youtu.be/Vk-3KOBwn84