Knights Of The Frozen Throne Mission Guide

The Knights of the Frozen Throne expansion brought a lot of new content to Hearthstone. The Missions system, which involves a series of linked single-player encounters united by a story and a theme, is probably its most beloved and lasting addition. While similar to Adventures, Missions have a stronger narrative focus and offer card pack rewards instead of collectibles. In this content type’s debut, players who have unlocked all classes were invited to brave the Icecrown Citadel, facing the Lich King’s strongest minions and finally their master himself in a sequence of eight boss fights. Although a lot of time has passed since this campaign’s 2017 release, it remains a fun and interesting challenge with some unique rewards that can give you a major edge in the Wild Format. It can certainly be worth taking a break from the leveling routine to complete it.

The Icecrown Missions

The Icecrown Missions are a callback to the original raid from World of Warcraft, featuring most of its famous bosses. Before you can face them in battle, though, you will need to play through the Prologue that serves as an introduction to the campaign. It is perhaps more fun than challenging, but that makes it a welcome change of pace from the grind of ranked play. Without wishing to spoil more than necessary, you should not try too hard to win the first fight, as it is more of a cutscene. The outcome of the second fight isn’t so predetermined, but you would find it difficult to lose it if you have even a basic grasp of the game. You will be given Freeze abilities that should help finish the Mission quickly. Enjoy the easy victory and the random Death Knight Hero Card that comes with it. The rest of this campaign will be much more difficult.

Lower Citadel

Completing the Prologue will give you access to Icecrown’s first Wing: the Lower Citadel, where you shall face three bosses in order. Their unique abilities make those fights quite tricky, so you may even need coaching to learn the best ways to go around some of them.

• The first boss, Lord Marrowgar, can get all his HP back for free due to his hero power, forcing you to look for a way to destroy him in one turn. The simplest class for this encounter would be the Priest, as it allows you to convert or copy one of the gatekeeper's Bone Spike minions and then empower it with Divine Spirit and Inner Fire for an assured quick kill.
• The next enemy, Deathbringer Saurfang, can only take damage from weapon cards. This immunity extends to fatigue, so you can’t try to run the clock. Fortunately, he has relatively low health, so the fight is definitely winnable so long as you pay careful attention to the board. You should take out Saurfang’s healer and taunt minions first before focusing on the boss. Rogue or Warrior may be your best options here; the former can buff Assassin’s Blade using Deadly Poison to quickly chip away at the undead orc’s health, while the latter can call upon a wide range of weapons that synergize well with Pirate cards.
• You will then confront the cult leader Lady Deathwhisper. The dragon Valithria Dreamwalker, your ally in this battle, can carry out immensely powerful attacks at full health. However, the boss’ hero power will constantly chip away at her and all your other minions until they are reduced to 1 HP. Valithria starts out at low health, so you will probably want to heal her as fast as possible, although reducing her maximum health through spells like Equality or removing the limitation through Silence will work too. Her firepower is irreplaceable in this encounter, as the lich starts with an impressive 90 Armor! After taking care of all those bosses, you will get one of the expansion’s card packs. Some of its cards, like Defile or Righteous Protector, are very formidable when enabled. This is a much faster method of getting them than grinding gold in the Arena or through Daily Quests to buy them in the store.

The Upper Reaches

The Upper Reaches have three more bosses and another card pack at the end.

• The level’s first foe, Blood-Queen Lana’thel, will replace your power with Vampiric Bite every turn. You must empower a new minion from either side of the board every turn or you will die. Deploying hordes of cheap minions is the obvious tactic here, though the vampire’s ability to transform minions into spells might partly undermine it. Still, if you place a minion every turn, you should be able to overwhelm her.
• As Professor Putricide goes through three phases, his power evolves from making Secrets free through lowering weapon costs to 1 mana to tweaking all cards to cost 5. The last stage also features Rotface, who can spawn random Legendary enemies every time he takes damage without dying. Removing or converting him as soon as possible is crucial. You can control the transition between phases by timing your destruction of his armor. Mage’s flexible array of tactical options, including powerful Standard Deck cards like Fireball and Polymorph, makes this class ideal for this encounter.
• The wing’s final boss, Sindragosa, will freeze hostile minions on hitting 20 or 10 health. The frozen minions join the four irremovable ice blocks that take up space on your side of the board. Also, the dragon can use Unchained Mana to punish you for any spells you have in your hand. The key to victory here is using high-potential weapons, such as the Rogue’s Kingsbane or the Warrior’s Arcanite Reaper.

Lich King

Finally, you will face the Lich King. Outside of the Demon Hunter, who normally can’t access this encounter, all classes give the final boss a distinctive and impactful Challenge Card (seen above). As a result, the fight is a markedly different for each class, but you will want to complete it with every one of them to get the best reward.

• At first, you should focus on surviving and building up your forces, though particularly aggressive decks might be able to win early with minions like murlocs or Molten Giants. Otherwise, if he gets to turn 7, the Lich King will summon Frostmourne, destroys all minions on his side, and summons six Trapped Souls that render him immune.
• Destroying the Trapped Souls will make him vulnerable again, but also give him a different hero power that will raise his damage every turn. Make sure that you are in a position to finish him off quickly before initiating the final phase!
• Beating the Lich King once will yield your third card pack, but winning with nine different classes offers a unique reward: an uncorrupted version of Prince Arthas as an alternate Paladin hero. Note that if you already have a golden Paladin, you will get a golden hero version of Arthas straight away!