The Hearthstone meta is wide open after the Paladin nerfs! There are several newcomers vying for the crown. Some have already failed the test in the first couple of days, whereas others are still to be fully refined and have yet to prove themselves. We have multiple new Rogue archetypes, Priests have returned to the ladder (but not in Control form, at least yet), and Sludge Warlocks are finally winning some games.
Let’s take a deeper look at what is happening in the Hearthstone meta right now. Note that it is still early after the patch, and things are in constant flux. It is not the best time to craft your long-term deck, but it can be a great time to try out some things that you have the cards for.
Is the Morning Coming for Rainbow Death Knight?
Rainbow Death Knight is a deck with a cult following. Who cares that the most power available to you comes in the form of triple-rune cards, when you can just use all the runes and mix and match a glorious abomination of a deck.
The patch buffed Climactic Necrotic Explosion, Corpse Bride, and Maw and Paw. Surely, the archetype will work this time!
Well, I have to say that Climactic Necrotic Explosion is better than I thought it would be. It was completely useless before, but now it is easier for players to upgrade it and the base numbers are all a bit higher, which means that it can actually do something if your game lasts more than ten turns. When a Rainbow Death Knight player gets into a good position to play Climactic Necrotic Explosion, they win two games out of three. Now, getting to that position does not happen nearly that often, but it is a clear improvement to the card.
Corpse Bride has also been improved a lot. You can summon a bigger minion, and it comes with Taunt, so you don’t just instantly die despite having that big body on the board. The Taunt minion can also help you set up a future Climactic Necrotic Explosion turn.
Thanks to these improvements, Rainbow Death Knight can now win close to half of its games. It’s not quite there, still.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
14,640
Rainbow Death Knight may get another chance next year because Climactic Necrotic Explosion and Maw and Paw both have another year left in Standard. The deck will lose Frost Queen Sindragosa and Corpse Bride, but its losses can be replaced. Next year, for sure. For now, Plague Death Knight remains the better Death Knight deck.
Demon Hunter Was Left Out of the Patch
Nothing interesting seems to be happening with Demon Hunter. Naga Demon Hunter is still a playable deck that sees moderate play with pretty much the same results as before the patch.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Player:
- 7,200
Druid Was Nerfed, But You Would Not Know
When the Druid nerfs were announced, it looked bleak for the class. Blizzard had Splish-Splash Whelp and Desert Nestmatron in their sights. Two of the most powerful Dragon Druid cards. A big nerf would kill the deck.
As it happens, Blizzard chose to just gently brush the two power cards, and Druid has not even noticed. The reduction of one Attack from the Whelp and one Health from the Matron has still left them both in a good position. Consequently, there are no changes to Dragon Druid after the patch.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 9,600
If anything, Druid is having a good time in the post-patch meta. The best budget deck in Hearthstone is Treant Druid, and Treant Druid is not good against Paladin. With fewer Paladins around, these trees are thriving! The deck has existed for a while, but now it has seen play all the way to high Legend!
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 1,800
The Return of Cleave Hunter
Hunter was not directly touched by the patch, but there is one interesting development for the class. The drastic reduction in the number of Paladins on the ladder has opened up a patch for Cleave Hunter to see play again. I expect this to be a temporary phenomenon because Paladin does not look unplayable at all and I expect more players to return to the class later. Either way, if you enjoyed cleaving your way through the ladder in the early Showdown in the Badlands, you have an opportunity to relive some of those moments now. You can even use the same deck list.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-116
- Player:
- 5,760
Mage Is Still Going for Rainbows
The small Health nerf to Arcane Wyrm has not has any noticeable effect. Rainbow Mage remains the top Mage archetype and its two competing variant – the Excavation variant and the Elemental Inspiration variant – remain neck and neck. They will both kill you with Sif much of the time, anyway.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 7,200
Paladin Goes Back to Business as Usual
For much of its existence, Paladin has been a class that has been frowned upon at the highest levels of play. Even when Paladin has good results throughout the ladder, it has not been a popular choice at the very top. There is something about the Paladin gameplay that does not appeal to the most hardcore players. Paladin tends to be straightforward and rather simple in its gameplan. Sure, Badlands Paladin was so overpowered that everyone brought it to Worlds, but that was a rare sighting of Paladin in top-level play. Rare even in that tournament, as it mostly got banned.
Now, the nerfs to Paladin’s board clears, Keeper's Strength and Prismatic Beam, have made it more vulnerable again. We are also now seeing the familiar Paladin win rate curve, where it is still doing great in Diamond, but starts to get closer to 50% in Legend. Paladin is not bad by any means, but its heyday seems to be over.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Player:
- 7,140
Priest Enjoys the Buffs
Priest received several buffs in the patch: Pip the Potent, Ra-den, Elise, Badlands Savior, and Invasive Shadeleaf. So far, these buffs have mostly benefited proactive Priest strategies. Sure, there have been some attempts to build a new Highlander Control Priest as well, but so far it appears that such a deck can only target a narrow meta and does not have the staying power against a more diverse field.
Naga Priest was doing well already before the patch, and the buff to Pip has sealed her lace in the list. Before the patch, Pip was on the verge of getting cut, but now the list looks solid.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Player:
- 9,720
Automaton Priest also got a sweet buff with the improved Ra-den. The Taunt makes a world of a difference, and Ra-den is now a strong card in the list. Overall, its performance has also slightly improved and is now safely above 50% instead of just under.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 9,840
Rogue is Everywhere!
The class with the most new ideas is without a doubt Rogue. There are at least three new, distinct archetypes that see play. Will any of them last? That is too early to say, but all of them look promising and the buffs have completely revitalized the class that was previously just riding on the old tools of Mech Rogue.
First, we have the familiar band back together: Scourge Illusionist, Thunderbringer, Crabatoa, and Neptulon the Tidehunter. But this time, the band does not support a Mech package, but is instead supported by an Excavate package and the newly-buffed Velarok Windblade. Excavate, concoctions, and a big package. Fun times ahead. For the one playing them, anyway.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Player:
- 15,720
Second, we have Scourge Illusionist again, but this time with some new friends. What if your Scourge Illusionist were to die immediately thanks to Shattershambler, and pull a zero-cost Drilly the Kid, ready to be played for some sweet Quickdraw Excavate effects. No big minions, but even more Excavate and concoctions!
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Player:
- 13,260
Third, what if we revisit Wishing Well? Better Excavate support, Velarok Windblade, and some good old discounted random Legendary cards can turn a game into chaos in no time!
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 14,760
There are not enough stats to reliably tell how good these new Rogue decks are. The preliminary results indicate that Wishing Well Rogue could be a new tier 1 deck, and the Excavate Concoction lists could be tier 2 decks. We’ll know more in the coming days. If you have waited to play some new Rogue decks, this is a fantastic opportunity with multiple new archetypes to choose from.
The Doctor is Still in the House
Doctor Holli'dae was a spectacular card before the nerf to his staff (down to one Attack, from two Attack). It is still good, but now it is only on par or slightly worse than Reno, Lone Ranger. I guess that is not a bad place to be!
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 15,060
Reno Shaman remains a playable deck throughout the ladder.
May I Interest You in Some Delicious Sludge in These Trying Times?
Warlock has not been doing well in Badlands. Hot, arid. Hard to get a good demon-summoning ritual together. The Warlock set largely focused on promoting Sludge Warlock, but the archetype was stuck in the low 40s when it comes to win rate. The latest balance patch buffed the Barrels of Sludge, from two mana and three damage to three mana and four damage – and the cost component is irrelevant for Warlock, who intends to destroy or discard them for the effect anyway. Furnace Fuel and Pop'gar the Putrid also received buffs.
Consequently, we have seen the rise of new Imp Sludge Warlocks, which are the strongest iteration of the archetype yet.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Player:
- 6,960
This is by far the best-performing Warlock archetype on the ladder right now, but does that mean much? It looks set to clear the 50% win rate hurdle at ease, but whether it can push up to tier 1 remains to be seen. Either way, some aggressive Warlock action is once again possible on the ladder.
Warrior Tries to Move Beyond TITANS
The most popular and generally successful Warrior decks are still mostly old TITANS decks. If you have a Control Warrior deck from TITANS, you can bring ti to the ladder and do fine.
However, Excavate Control Warrior decks with Prince Renathal are showing some promise after the patch. We even have a #1 Legend deck here. With sample sizes in the low hundreds, it is too early to say whether their success is based on taking advantage of the developing meta, or whether there is something solid behind them.
- Format: wolf
- Season: season-117
- Posted By:
- 18,880
I don’t know if there’s anything to the buffed Slagmaw the Slumbering yet. Searching for decks with it on HSReplay comes up with zero results. It does not feel like a card that works, either. But I’m sure people will try to find something with it over the coming days. Perhaps you will be the first in the world to make it work?
Conclusions
The patch has changed the meta more than I expected. Especially Rogue has been a surprise to me: there are multiple potentially viable ways to build a new Rogue deck now. The more moderate improvements to Priest and Warlock were to be expected, as was the failure of Rainbow Death Knight (sadly). Cleave Hunter and XL Control Warrior finding some success without buffs to them has been interesting. Paladin should not be ignored either. It got nerfed and people wanted to play other things, but if Paladin can still perform, people will return to playing it again. It is clearly not as dominant anymore, but some of the decks that shine at the moment are really weak against Paladin, and its return in numbers would force another shift in the meta.
Overall, there are lots of interesting things going on in Hearthstone, and if you have some time to play during the holidays, there is still some room to try out new things now before the meta stabilizes again.
Old Guardian
Ville "Old Guardian" Kilkku is a writer and video creator focused on analytic, educational Hearthstone, and building innovative Standard format decks. Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/OldGuardian Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/old_guardian
Don’t forget about Thaddius lock/druid, blizzard deleted pyro thad and opened the door for a better more consistent combo, what’s up with blizzard shitting on combo decks ?_?
Corpse Bride wasn’t buffed from spending 8 corpses to 10 corpses though.
Corpse Bride was sitting on the 10 corpses from the beginning, they just made a mistake by saying she was at 8.
The only real change is the taunt on the groom and some changed wording.