Hearthstone Deck Guide: Zarimi Priest - Fill Your Board with Dragons!

Into the Emerald Dream was released in March, and, since then, a few cards have changed. After these changes, Zarimi Priest became the best list to play in the Standard ranked queue and currently has a 61.17% win rate - according to HSReplay on April 24th, 2025.

This deck revolves around a bold strategy - dominating the board until you can set up a devastating turn. It is also relatively easy to play, and should be a lot of fun. Check it out!

Zarimi Priest is one of those traditional control decks centered around really impactful cards that cost seven or more mana. Until the last few turns, it only focuses on drawing cards and staying alive.

The minion that names this deck is Timewinder Zarimi. It is in this list because it mostly plays Dragons, and we'll get an extra turn when we play it.

Next, we'll discuss all the most relevant cards in this list. You'll find out how, exactly, this extra round will be useful to us, and, as such, how important Zarimi is.

Cards

You need many resources to play your combo. More specifically, you need the most expensive cards in your deck. That's why you also need Taelan Fordring and Scale Replica.

This card draw won't be enough to draw you what you need. By the way, Timewinder Zarimi is not the most expensive Dragon in this list. So, I recommend you play more card draw, like Prize Vendor, Ancient of Yore, Tormented Dreadwing, and Power Word: Shield.

Finally, if you want to Discover a particular resource, Birdwatching and Thrive in the Shadows are both great. By this point, you must have realized card draw is essential in this list.

As this is a slow deck, we need removals to deal with enemy pressure and stay alive until the last few rounds. Fly Off the Shelves, Shadow Word: Ruin, and Repackage are a few of them.

Indirectly, Chillin' Vol'jin can also remove enemy minions, as we can swap the stats of one of our opponent's big minions with the stats of one of our small Dragons.

To activate Timewinder Zarimi, you need to play 8 Dragons before you play him. So, we play Giftwrapped Whelp, Ship's Chirurgeon, Petal Peddler, and Illusory Greenwing. These Dragons are cheap and will progress your overall game plan.

Win Condition - Your Combo to Win

So far, the cards we mentioned will only help you set up your combo, which you'll play on turn 8. They'll either keep you alive until then, draw the cards you need, or activate Timewinder Zarimi's effect.

Finally, to win, first you need to play Naralex, Herald of the Flights. This will make all your Dragons cost 1 mana, from the cheapest to the most expensive. Ideally, you'll play this on turn 8, then use the leftover mana to play Ysera, Emerald Aspect.

This Dragon will give you three mana that you can use straight away, so you'll be able to play even more Dragons - namely, two copies of Briarspawn Drake and Timewinder Zarimi. After you finish playing this turn, the two Briarspawn Drake will attack two enemy minions at random and deal any excess damage to the enemy hero. Then, with Zarimi's extra round, you'll be able to get even more value out of these minions, and attack with your entire board as well.

This strategy is very easy to play, and you'll certainly win the match after you execute it correctly, considering how powerful Briarspawn Drake is.

Your mulligan is also quite straightforward: focus on getting 2 or 3 low-cost Dragons to deal with enemy pressure early on, and some cheap card draw, like Prize Vendor and Scale Replica. Your starting hand should look like this:

Obviously, this is only one of the possibilities. You can swap a Giftwrapped Whelp for a Ship's Chirurgeon, as it won't change much.

Aggro

Make sure you get your 1 and 2 cost minions early on to deal with the enemy board as early as possible. You should also look for card draw like Prize Vendor, Ancient of Yore, and Taelan Fordring, as they're minions that, on their own, can beat some threats. Some also have Taunt or give you armor, so they're quite defensive.

Your removals are also essential, but you must use the right ones. Aggressive decks focus on low-cost minions that rarely have more than 5 attack, but they can still kill you in the first few rounds, so Shadow Word: Ruin and Repackage aren't that interesting.

As for Fly Off the Shelves, it can destroy all enemy minions very quickly.

Control

You'll have the advantage against these lists, as time is on your side. Just focus on getting all the cards you need to play your combo - Naralex, Herald of the Flights, Ysera, Emerald Aspect, Briarspawn Drake, and Timewinder Zarimi should be in your hand on turn 8.

Zarimi Priest is nearly unbeatable, so I'm not surprised to see it is the strongest deck in the meta right now. I'm sure you can climb a lot on the ranked queue with it!

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Thank you for reading, and see you next time!