Healing Healsing: how to play the Van Helsing control deck

The deck in one paragraph

Healing Healsing was the first deck published on OriginsMeta, on 15 September 2026, by Davdas, a member of the site's staff. It is a control list led by Van Helsing, tagged for the ladder. The plan is to survive the early rounds while taking value, to heal through the damage while Phuong Hoang grows with every heal, and to reset the board with Forbidden Knowledge once you have eight mana. The full list, the composition charts and the OM code are on the deck page; this guide explains how to pilot it. A second guide covers matchups, key interactions and the mistakes to avoid.

The list

Twenty-five cards: the Legendary plus twelve cards played as two copies each.

Card	Cost	Role
Van Helsing ★	4	Legendary: before combat he adds Van Helsing's Tools to your hand if you do not have it
Baby Bear	2	Pings enemies that damage your barrier; On Death adds Papa Bear to your hand
Scarecrow	2	On Reveal: draw a card
Shahrazad	2	1/4: heals 1 damage from your barrier every time a card enters your hand
Ali Baba	3	2/3 that draws a card when it damages the opponent's barrier
Jill	3	2/4: heals 2 damage from your barrier every time she takes damage
Spellbook	3	For the rest of the game, a random spell in hand at the start of every round
Phuong Hoang	4	Rebirth, Move; gets +1/+1 every time an ally or barrier is healed
Jekyll	4	On Reveal heals 3; if still in hand after combat he becomes Hyde, a 5/3 with Trample
Searing Light	4	4 damage to an enemy and 4 healing to your barrier there
Boitata	5	5/5: spell and ability damage to your barriers is dealt to the opponent's barrier instead
Tin Woodman	6	On Reveal heals 8 from any other character or barrier in its location
Forbidden Knowledge	8	Destroy all characters

Nine units and three spells; almost everything costs between two and four, with Boitata, Tin Woodman and Forbidden Knowledge on top. Three cards draw, five heal, one wipes the board.

How the deck wins

The plan from the deck page, in four steps:

1. Control the first rounds while taking value quickly with Spellbook and Ali Baba.
2. Reach round eight or nine and cast Forbidden Knowledge to take the initiative. Try to cast it in a round where the opponent is the first to reveal, so their cards are on the board when the spell resolves.
3. Win on card advantage and value. The opponent's deck should run out of resources while you still have enough healing to scale Phuong Hoang's damage.
4. Keep control. The extra cards let you hold the board for a long time.

Two engines make this work. The first is cards entering your hand: Van Helsing adds his Tools before every combat, Spellbook adds a spell at the start of every round, Scarecrow and Ali Baba draw, and each of those cards heals 1 through Shahrazad. The second is healing: every heal, from Shahrazad's single point to Tin Woodman's eight, gives Phuong Hoang +1/+1. A Phuong that has been on the board for a few rounds is the deck's real threat, and she also carries the Rebirth and Move keywords (see her card page).

Van Helsing's Tools

The Legendary himself is a 3/4 for four mana. What matters is the card he adds before every combat when you do not already have it: Van Helsing's Tools, free since patch 0.6.2, lets you choose one of four effects.

• Holy Water: remove all abilities from any character.
• Silver Bullet: damage to any character.
• Garlic: Stun any character.
• Wooden Stake: destroy any damaged character.

"If you do not have it" is the clause to remember: use the Tools every round, or Van Helsing stops adding them. Wooden Stake is the single-target removal the deck page says the list otherwise lacks: damage a character with Baby Bear's ping, Searing Light or the Silver Bullet, then stake it.

Mulligan

Keep Ali Baba, Baby Bear, Scarecrow, Van Helsing and Spellbook. Against aggressive decks keep Jill too: she heals 2 from your barrier every time she takes damage. Shahrazad and Phuong Hoang are not useful in the first rounds: they are the payoff, not the setup, so send them back.

Round by round

1. Rounds 1–3: set up. Scarecrow or Baby Bear on two, Spellbook or Ali Baba on three. Spellbook is the best round-three play: from then on you start every round with an extra spell, and Shahrazad turns each of them into a heal.
2. Rounds 4–5: Van Helsing and the first heals. Van Helsing on four, or Jekyll to heal a damaged unit or barrier. Phuong Hoang comes down once at least one heal source is on the board. Boitata on five: from then on, spell and ability damage to any of your barriers is dealt to the opponent's barrier in that location instead.
3. Rounds 6–7: stabilise. Tin Woodman's eight points of healing on the barrier under pressure, Searing Light on the biggest threat, Tools every combat.
4. Round 8 or 9: Forbidden Knowledge. Everything dies, on both sides. Your side loses less: Baby Bear leaves Papa Bear in your hand, a Jekyll kept in hand has already become Hyde, the Tools come back before the next combat, and you have been drawing more cards than the opponent all game.

Where to go next

• The deck page has the list with mana curve and keyword charts, the author's notes and the OM code to open it in the deck builder.
• Matchups, key interactions and mistakes to avoid is the second part of this guide.
• Card stats are those of playtest patch 0.6.3. Scarecrow, Van Helsing's Tools and other cards in this list were changed in 0.6.2 and 0.6.3: see the balance history on each card page.