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With the rise in popularity of Portalcraft Hybrid and Swordcraft decks, many players have found an excellent counter: Pure Portalcraft Puppets.
Puppet Portalcraft is a high-tempo, consistent, and aggressive deck. It revolves around generating Puppets — followers with Rush that cost 0 to 1 play point.
The ultimate goal? To finish your opponent in two turns using 10174120 and/or 10173130.
How to Play the Portalcraft Puppet Deck
In the early game, your goal is to take control of the board. You'll generate a lot of Puppets through your cards to maintain tempo and keep pressure on your opponent.
Save your evolution points — this deck doesn’t rely on them to remove enemy followers. Use that to your advantage and force your opponent to evolve first.
That said, you’ll need your Evolves to push damage to the enemy leader later in the game. This is another reason why you should preserve your Evo points as much as possible until you're ready to go for lethal.
Portalcraft Puppet Deck Tips and Strategies
Mulligan Tips
10172120 and 10174110 are great cards to keep in your opening hand. They are your best on-curve openers.
10072210 is also worth keeping in specific matchups — especially against Swordcraft, Forestcraft, or another Portalcraft deck.
10174120 and 10172130 are powerful cards you’ll want to see 2–3 times during a match. Don’t worry about your curve — your deck contains enough low-cost cards to support your early game draws.
Set Up Your Puppets
You need to start preparing for lethal early. A key part of this setup is creating a 90071120 and keeping it in your hand. You can generate one by playing either 10071120 or 10171140.
On turn 6, drop 10172130. Just reading this card is enough to understand how broken it is. Not only does it unlock huge damage potential with 10174120, it also gives you an immediate tempo advantage.
If your opponent plays a lot of Wards, make sure to keep some 90071110 in hand. They’re great for clearing Wards with 10174120, especially against Swordcraft decks that include 10122120 and 10123140.
Budget and Possible Inclusions
The core of the deck is quite cheap. The only expensive must-craft card is 10174120. If needed, you can run a third 10173130 as a temporary replacement.
10072120 is another potential inclusion. It offers some protection against Storm followers while you wait for your win condition.
There’s also 10002110, which can be a fine replacement for 10002110 (note: this seems like a duplicate — check the card name), though you’ll lose some draw power in exchange.
Closing Words
With Hybrid Portalcraft and Swordcraft being over-represented, this deck is a smart and effective choice. It’s consistent in the early game and offers a powerful combo to close out matches. The trickiest part is calculating your damage and knowing the right moment to go for lethal — but once you master that, you’ll find this deck incredibly rewarding to play.
If you're looking to get started with Portalcraft, this is probably the easiest and most effective place to begin.
