Learn Hearthstone Ask /r/CompetitiveHS | Sunday, March 18, 2018
Learn Hearthstone Ask /r/CompetitiveHS | Sunday, March 18, 2018 |
- Ask /r/CompetitiveHS | Sunday, March 18, 2018
- Born out of boredom: Legend with Handbuff Val'Anyr Paladin
- The Paladin crusher: Analysis and guide after Legend with Fatigue Warrior (39-13)
- Hearthstone HCT Bangkok March 2018 Tour Stop decks, results, and analysis
| Ask /r/CompetitiveHS | Sunday, March 18, 2018 Posted: 18 Mar 2018 08:00 AM PDT This is an open thread for any discussion pertaining to Competitive Hearthstone. This is a thread for discussions that don't qualify for a stand-alone post on the subreddit. This thread is sorted by new by default. You can ask for deck reviews, competitive budget replacements, how to mulligan in specific matchups, etc. Anything goes, as long as it's related to playing Hearthstone competitively. Has your question been asked before? Check our FAQ to see if we've got you covered. Or if you're looking for an educational hearthstone read, check out our Timeless Resources There are a few rules:
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| Born out of boredom: Legend with Handbuff Val'Anyr Paladin Posted: 18 Mar 2018 01:44 PM PDT I just hit legend with my Handbuff Val'Anyr Paladin. The list is heavily inspired by Firebat's and Zalae's Double Deck Doctor from over a month ago, so thanks to them for the awesome deck skeleton. Without any other bla bla, here is the deck code: AAECAZ8FCPoG4KwClbwCvL0CucECm8ICycICt+kCC/sBsQjZrgKzuwL5vwKbywLjywL30AL40gLq5gKW6AIA and In the following I'm going to write a bit about my thoughts about certain cards, the most common matchups, a small mulligan guide and some general thoughts on the deck. Let's start with General thoughts Reason to play the deck: I'm just gonna leave this here which is probably a pretty good answer to that question. What is not visible in this screenshot is the fact that the animations of 16 Val'Anyrs dying took my opponents whole turn. He wasn't able to play a single card. Felt pretty dirty. Archetype of the deck: Honestly, I don't really know. It's definitely not aggro and it's not control which leaves tempo, midrange and combo. The deck also doesn't belong in the tempo category since it doesn't have any great tempo removal tools, so it's probably some weird hybrid of midrange and combo, but I'm not sure if that's even a thing. Silence heavy meta: Silence is obviously a big problem for the deck but after an inital overreaction to the power of Cubelock, silence has been on a decline and has reached a level that is manageable for the deck. Umbra also helps with this issue. Card discussion Rather than cards, I'm going to discuss certain packages I added to the deck and what cards don't belong in this package. Obviously, we're going to begin with
Cards that could be run in the deck but I haven't really tried are Equality and Consecration, the Lynessa package (maybe instead of N'Zoth and the handbuffs) and maybe Acolyte of Pain. Spellbreaker is obviously also something that could be run, but I don't think that it's correct to run it. It's not needed against Control Warlock and it does little against Cube. Focusing on the gameplan seems better. Matchups Spiteful Priest (4-6): Pretty bad matchup, like any other Priest. The only answer in our deck to a t6 Spiteful is Tarim and we only have one of him. We can't really play Tirion without the coin because the Priest can just Mind Control him after not attacking for a turn. Some Spiteful Priests also run Twilight Acolyte + Cabal Shadow Priest so they can take him right away. The way to beat this deck is double buffed Doppelgangster in my opinion. 3 4/4s are something that is hard for them. Inner Fire Priest (1-3): Twilight Acolyte + Potion of Madness is just a mean combo. What's worse than a silenced Val'Anyr is a stolen one. Go on the board and kill them asap with medium sized threats is the way to victory. Big Priest (4-3): Honestly, I think I should be the underdog in the matchup and that I got lucky. They run silence, they run Psychic Scream and they run a lot of minions that want to murder you. Should be very unfavored, but the way to beat them is probably Val'Anyr with Umbra. You have to make sure that you don't throw all your Val'Anyr minons on the field after duplicating it. In this matchup, Tirion and N'Zoth can shine, they saved me a couple of times. Control Priest (0-0): I don't know how I haven't played against a single Control Priest in 101 games. Probably very unfavored matchup because they can steal your stuff and probably even find your win conditions before you do. Control Warlock (9-2): The most beautiful matchup of them all. Here we can live the big Val'Anyr dream and hit them hard. Get Val'Anyr, duplicate it and start playing big threats leads to the road to victory. Cubelock (2-6): They want to murder you with Giants and Doomguards and you don't have much say in that. Honestly, I don't know how to beat this with Paladin. Praying seems appropriate. Zoolock (1-2): Didn't see much of them. Fight for the board, heal back up with lifesteal minions and play big buffed minions. Should be around 50%. Murloc Paladin (5-8): If you're on the coin, they just snowball out of control and there's not much you can do against that. In my experience the matchup is decided by call to arms and juggles. Fight for the board is key obviously. Dude Paladin (7-4): Felt much better than Murloc Paladin since they don't snowball too hard, but always need a bit of time to explode in the midgame. This gives us enough time to build our own minions and go on a counter offensive. Again, fighting for the board is key. Secret Mage (10-1): Like any Paladin, we eat Mages for breakfast. We can go wide on the board to keep board control and then even heal back up with lifesteal minions. Plated Beetle is awesome for Explosive Runes and Counterspell is only a problem if we don't have the coin. Otherwise we can also just test with Smuggler's Run. Control Mage (1-1): Should be 50%, the question in the matchup is just who can explode first. Umbra is needed to duplicate Val'Anyr because of Polymorph. Tirion is basically good bait for Polymorph and if we duplicated Val'Anyr once with Umbra, the mage can't stop us. They might just murder us before we get to that point with Medivh and Alanna. Spell Hunter (7-0): Like Big Priest, I think I got lucky, but we should be favored. We can deal with a t4 Y'Shaarj by stalling with Righteous Protector or Corpsetaker until we can either kill it on board or Tarim it. The Spellstone is also pretty strong, but most of the time manageable with minions and Rallying Blade. Play around the traps, save some healing for the time after their power turns (if possible) and go on a counter offensive. Jade Druid (1-2): Probably favored. We can generate a lot of big threats with Val'Anyr which the Druid can't handle. Tirion and N'Zoth are also pretty strong. Shaman, Warrior and Rogue were rare, like you can see in the stats. Shaman should be pretty damn horrible because of Devolve and Hex, Warrior should be easy by playing gigantic minons without an end (just like Control Warlock), Mill Rogue is winnable by pure aggression (otherwise they just Sap and Vanish your Val'Anyr) and Miracle Rogue is probably very bad (Striders, lots of burst and Sap are pretty bad). Small Mulligan Guide Easy thing: Call to Arms. That's not the entirety of course, but sums it up pretty much. Never, ever, ever throw this away, if you have two, keep both. Most busted card in the deck, possibly in the game right now. Other than that you want to keep Val'Anyr against control decks and Tarim against Priest (maybe not even correct, I just like to have an answer for Spiteful from the get go). Against aggressive decks you want to keep Beetle and Protector (but not too much, if, for example, you go first and have Protector and Beetle, you may want to toss a second one and look for Call to Arms). Keep Rallying Blade against Secret Mage, probably not against Paladin (Righteous Protector is a big blade buzz kill). Thanks to all of you who read this small wall of text and I'm excited about your feedback. Also, this is my first post in this sub, so please criticize anything I'm doing wrong (the way I write, structure of the post etc.). Edit: added the deck code and the mulligan guide, forgot both. [link] [comments]  |
| The Paladin crusher: Analysis and guide after Legend with Fatigue Warrior (39-13) Posted: 18 Mar 2018 04:34 PM PDT Hi all, I'm imnotanumber, Hearthstone writer for The Game Haus and Warrior fanboy. Today I'd like to share with you my most effective iteration on deck that's rising in popularity, Fatigue Warrior (occasionally referred to as Mill or Control Warrior). With the rise of Paladin, the meta has grown increasingly receptive to Warrior, and this version is one I believe is the one best suited to the brief window before the Witchwood expansion hits. The idea behind Fatigue Warrior is simple; outlast the opponent, and then if necessary kill them with Coldlight Oracles. My list discards some of the cuter tech choices in order to double down on the deck's anti-aggro capabilities for a more consistent overall deck. Here's the list:
If you compare my list to more conventional ones, like the one Odemian used to win HCT Toronto, you see 5 key card changes. Notable omissions include: -2x Dirty Rat I don't think Dirty Rat is a luxury Warrior can afford currently. The card can be great, but has high variance, and is a liability in many matchups. If more Control Warlocks were around, then I would consider one purely as an occasional counter to Azari, but otherwise I think Warrior has higher priorities (most notably reliable early board control). -1x Shield Slam, -1x Bring it On! I currently run 1 Bring it On! and 1 Shield Slam. While Shield Slam is great vs certain decks, running two can be a big risk. This deck has an abundance of removal and the ability to generate more, so in almost all matchups the second copy is overkill. To make matters worse, Shield Slam is most effective in the Mid-late game, at which point there's a high likelihood you've drawn and wanted to play Geist if you run it (which I do). The second copy of Bring it On! I feel is a touch risky and unnecessary. Versus many decks (Cubelock in particular) it can be a death sentence, and only ever delays the inevitable necessity of clearing the board. With 2 Drywhiskers, 2 Shield Blocks and 1 Bring it On! to shuffle back in, you'll have more than enough lifegain. Removal (particularly AOE) will be your biggest concern. -1 Whirlwind While I consider Whirlwind effects to be key to the deck's success, the necessity of running 2 Whirlwinds has long since past. In previous metas, being able to rush out a turn 2-4 Whirlwind into Fishes was vital, but now is largely unnecessay. Instead of 1 copy of Whirlwind, I run 2 copies of the more potent Ravaging Ghoul to provide clears and Execute/Fishes activators. Meanwhile, several of my replacements were somewhat unconventional. Beyond the expected Geist, I had: +2x Blood to Ichor I would argue that Blood to Ichor is core to Fatigue Warrior right now, despite the fact it sees almost zero play. The deck has virtually no efficient turn 1-2 answers, and for reasons I have written a pending article about, I think that it is incredibly strong in the current early meta. Watch this space for a link! +2x Ravaging Ghoul Ravaging Ghoul is another card I consider core to Fatigue Warrior that is run very rarely, if at all. Since the Patches nerf, early drops are rarely efficiently answered with a Whirlwind effect, and Ravaging Ghoul's 3/3 body is simply more relevant on those dangerous first few turns. While it lacks the Geist deck-thinning synergy, that's not always a downside; it's nice to be able to play Geist and still have lots of 1 damage clears in the deck. Matchups You can see my stats here. In order of frequency, my matchups were as follows: Paladin: 10-1 My best and most favoured matchup, this deck destroys aggressive Paladins of all stripes. The inclusion of Blood to Ichor and Ravaging Ghoul really shores up the otherwise wobbly early-game, meaning you'll almost always have the time to clear their boards with the huge arsenal of AOE at your disposal. This matchup rarely requires you to shuffle Coldlights, so play them liberally. Worry about running out of cards more than them running out of steam, and feel free not to play around Divine Favour if it means you have the resources to keep clearing. Your win condition is Scourgelord Garrosh. Mulligan: Ravaging Ghoul, Whirlwind, Blood Razor, Acolyte. Keep Scourgelord. Mage: 9-1 The mages I faced were mainly Secret Mages, with a few Control and Quest Mages here and there. Control is almost an auto-win matchup, and Quest is almost auto-lose, so always mulligan for Secret. Vs Secret, the key is to deny them any chip damage and to prioritize lifegain and hero powers. Their win-condition is burn, so feel free to execute that 4/3. Try and save cheap spells for Counterspell, and don't proc Runes until you have to. Deny their board and their damage and you can let them kill themselves with Atiesh. It's good to use your first DMH to proc Counterspell, but don't waste both, as smart Mages will hold Aluneth and you'll lose in fatigue. Vs Control, just play around Alexstrasza and don't clog your hand with removals and they should die easily. Depending on how aggressively they draw, you may not need to DMH your DMH, but you will always need to DMH coldlights unless truly desperate. Vs Quest, you'll hurt from the lack of Dirty Rats, but it's not unwinnable. Try and waste cards to empty your hand, NEVER attack face and their hand will become clogged with secrets and combo pieces. Then try and shuffle Coldlights back in with as few other cards as possible to mill their win conditions. Mulligan: Blood to Ichor, Ravaging Ghoul, Blood Razor Priest: 7-3 Priests will either be Control, Combo or Spiteful. You will lose games to them Drakonid-ing into Dead Man's Hand, but you should be favoured. Control and Combo have virtually no threats after Geist, so play around Drakonid by holding DMH until you can draw on the same turn. Spiteful is harder, but you can be extremely greedy with your removal as they have no burst and should win. This is a matchup where you always need to shuffle DMH with DMH, at least for the first couple of cycles. Mulligan: Blood Razor, Acolyte, Geist Warlock: 3-4 Control/Cube Warlock should be even, but it depends a lot on how well they draw. Vs cubelock, if they get weapon and demons and you don't draw Harrison, you'll probably lose. Control will win if they can get an early Rin down. Otherwise, a largely skill based matchup. Shuffle Coldlights ASAP, even if you're not shuffling DMH. Milling them or filling their hand so Rin won't activate is incredibly strong. Don't let Giants or Doomguards stick to be Cubed, as you run no silence. It's correct to coin Acolyte if you have a proc to follow up next turn, but otherwise only play it if you're drawing with it. I also lost to one Zoo Warlock. This is a tough matchup that I haven't faced often enough to give advice on. Mulligan: Acolyte, Execute, Blood Razor Rogue: 3-1 I faced 2 miracle and 2 Kingsbane Rogues. Miracle is extremely easy; just save an execute for Edwin and you should be fine, as their only other real win condition is 4/4 Spiders. As you have Scourgelord, 2 Brawls and 2 Fishes to answer this, they have very little chance. Kingsbane is complicated. I won my one game with Harrison into Coldlight to mill their Kingsbane. Otherwise, try and get to your win-condition faster than they get to theirs, and play around Coldlight. This is an incredibly tricky matchup, so ask an expert! Mulligan: Acolyte, Ravaging, Blood Razor Hunter: 2-2 Spell Hunter is extremely Y'shaarj dependent. The main way you'll lose is not having an answer to a turn 4 Barnes -> Y'shaarj, so look for that Execute. Otherwise, play around secrets, try and Harrison a big Eaglehorn, and save AOE for spellstone. You should outlast even a turn 6 Deathstalker if you pace your removal correctly. I also lost to one face hunter thanks to no answer to a turn 5 Bittertide Hydra. Mulligan: Execute, Blood Razor, Ravaging Ghoul, Sleep with the Fishes Druid: 2-1 The only Druids I faced were Big Druids. The two I beat were down to executing a Deathwing Dragonlord into a Brawl. Beyond that, prioritise non-Execute removal and try and shuffle in Executes. Don't worry too much about shuffling in DMH with DMH, unless they hold Ultimate. Mulligan-wise, prioritise draw. Mulligan: Acolyte, Blood Razor, Slam, Geist. Warrior: 2-0 The two mirror matches I faced I won with the same strategy. Kill your own minions, waste removal on theirs, play Brawls and Executes whereever possible, don't draw too much and play around Coldlight. If they can't play their Executes and Brawls, their hand will quickly clog up and they will lose fast. It's also worth considering if you have 2x DMH and a Coldlight in hand to allow yourself to be milled, as all other cards (other than perhaps bring it On!) are basically worthless Mulligan: (Just in case it's pirate) Ravaging, Blood Razor, Slam Shaman: 1-0 I only saw Jade Shaman. As long as you can draw enough, you will easily outlast their limited threats. Evolve can be higher variance, but you have enough clears to deal with them easily. Mulligan: Acolyte, Blood to Ichor, Ravaging, Blood Razor, Fishes Conclusion All in all, I think Fatigue Warrior is an excellent choice to ladder with if you love Warrior. My games averaged almost 10 minutes, so it will be a painfully drawn-out and intense experience for many, but I believe that there is huge potential to counter large swathes of the meta. [link] [comments]  |
| Hearthstone HCT Bangkok March 2018 Tour Stop decks, results, and analysis Posted: 18 Mar 2018 08:23 AM PDT Hearthstone HCT Bangkok March 2018 Tour Stop was played from 16th March to 18th March 2018 at the Pantip Esports Arena in Bangkok, Thailand. It was an open Hearthstone Championship Tour Stop, where 213 players competed for a $15,000 USD prize pool and HCT points. The control meta is here? Warlock's numbers remained steady, but the class saw a major internal shift from HCT Toronto to HCT Bangkok: at Toronto, two-thirds of Warlocks were Cubelocks, but while Cubelock remained the most popular archetype at Bangkok, it was almost neck-and-neck with Control Warlock (86), which had siphoned numbers from both Cubelock (105) and Zoolock (12). Priest held fast to its second place. The most popular archetype of the class was again Combo Priest (86), which had gained some more popularity after Toronto. Control Priest (56) and Spiteful Priest (48) well still well-represented though. Niche Priest strategies had also gained some ground with 6 Big Priests, 3 Velen Big Priests, and one Healbot OTK Priest making an appearance. The third-most popular class this time was Mage. Secret Mage was still narrowly in the lead (56), but it had lost a lot of ground to Big Spell Mage (47 – double the numbers of Toronto) and N'Zoth Mage (15, up from 2 at Toronto), and even Exodia Mage had gained some more followers (8, up from 3 at Toronto). Paladin's popularity waned, but it still came in fourth with Murloc Paladin (61) maintaining its popularity and taking the lead from the spiraling Silver Hand Paladin (35) by quite a margin. Control-oriented Paladin decks increased in popularity with Beardo Paladin (14) leading the way ahead of N'Zoth Paladin (9). Hunter remains a middle-of-the-pack choice, almost entirely dominated by Spell Hunter (57 of the 61 Hunter decks). It retained its popularity from Toronto. Druid saw a leap upwards with Jade Druid (45, up from 14) surging in popularity while Spiteful Druid (8, down from 14) fell down. All Rogue archetypes saw some increase and retained their internal order: Quest Rogue (27), Miracle Rogue (9), Kingsbane Rogue (6) – and this time even one Tempo Rogue making an appearance. Fatigue Warrior was one of the stars at HCT Toronto, and it showed at Bangkok: 28 Fatigue Warriors entered the tournament as compared to just 9 at Toronto. Shaman was marginalized even further. Only three players brought the class, and none made it even as far as top-64. There was a significant rise in the number of control decks – and also in decks that can beat control decks, as players made the read that control would be more popular this time. For example, five of the six Big Priests made it to the top-64, as did six of the 14 Beardo Paladins, and 12 of the 27 Quest Rogues. Control Warlock overtook Cubelock on the way to top-64 by 31-29. What about Fatigue Warrior? 11 of the 28 made it to top-64, so while the class did not have the surprise element of Toronto on its side, it was still solid. The control meta seems to finally be here. On the other hand, the winner of the tournament brought one of the most common and unsurprising lineups: Cubelock, Spiteful Priest, Murloc Paladin, and Secret Mage. While others try to prey on greedy control decks, he simply chose to kill them fast. The tournament meta is far from solved, with multiple strategies taking players to the top. It will be interesting to see how HCT Oslo will shape up next week! The full article includes more stats and details, and the following deck spotlights:
Full article: http://www.kilkku.com/oldguardian/2018/03/hearthstone-hct-bangkok-march-2018-tour-stop-decks-results-and-analysis/ [link] [comments]  |
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