Hearthpwn

Now that I'm back at a low rank after the season reset, I decided to experiment with a new deck.  (New for me; I know I'm not the first to try this concept.)  Normally I play the very slow Big Ramp, so this time I decided to try the opposite extreme, and built a Murloc Druid deck:

I think of that list as just a prototype; with more testing and suggestions from you guys, I'm hoping to refine it.  I had a lot of fun pwning casuals with it at the end of last season, and I think it's well placed for the metagame at the moment.  The metagame at the end of the May season seemed to be heavy on Zoo, Token Druid, and Miracle Rogue (in that order).  This deck is fast, sometimes blisteringly fast, so it puts a lot of pressure on Miracle Rogues.  It does well against Druids because they have so little removal, and most Druids nowadays are playing Swipe as their only sweeper/AoE, without Starfall.  It seems a little weak against Zoo though, because they have the card draw advantage of Life Tap, and because this deck forgoes the anti-Zoo cards that Druid usually leans on in that matchup, like Keeper of the Grove and Wrath.

The advantage of this deck is the element of surprise.  People will mulligan incorrectly against you, because they're not expecting a rush deck.  I think that's a big part of the success of Handlock/Giants decks, because people have to mulligan against Zoo when they play against Warlocks.  My dream is for Murloc Druids to become so super popular that people start to mulligan against Murlocs, and then I'll switch back to Ramp and pwn.  :D

Apart from the obvious Murloc tribal synergy, the deck has a lot of other cool synergies.  Power of the Wild and Savage Roar are much better here than in traditional Burst Druid decks, because you play much more aggressively.  Soul of the Forest is outstanding for protecting you against mass removal, and it swings the board back to you if you get into a situation where you need to start trading instead of going for the face.  I haven't been too happy with Force of Nature, because it's too expensive to help in the early rush, but it's good to have a way to catch up later in the game, and of course it combos with Savage Roar.  It also combos with Soul of the Forest.  Naturalize is the perfect removal card for this deck.  Because you're so fast, the opponent doesn't have much time to use the extra cards you give them, and you'll often use Naturalize to get rid of a taunt on the same turn you win anyway.  Swipe is the secondary removal option, but it's usually better aimed at the opponent's face as a finisher.  There's also some synergy between Naturalize and Coldlight Oracle.  If you time them well, you can max out the opponent's hand and force them to fizzle their card draws.

I tested Cenarius for a while, because I thought he would be like a big Power of the Wild, but he's too late to be useful.  I also cut the second Force of Nature, and I'm still tempted to cut the other one to make the deck faster.  I haven't tested it yet, but I think King Mukla has potential as a replacement for FoN.  He fits the curve better, and he has synergy with Naturalize and Coldlight Oracle by filling the opponent's hand.  Leeroy Jenkins doesn't have any juicy synergy here, but of course he would still fit the strategy well.  The other card I'm planning to test is Hungry Crab.  He can eat a Murloc Scout or something and get large, which is especially strong against decks that can easily deal 1 damage with their hero power, because the 1-health Murlocs don't last long there anyway.  I just wish the Crab were a Murloc cannibal, so it could benefit from the tribal boosts of Murloc Warleader etc.

I just started testing this deck in Ranked yesterday, so obviously I don't have much in the way of matchup analysis or metagame breakdown yet.  So far I've only got a 57% win rate, at rank 17 and 16 (NA server).  Surprisingly, I haven't seen a single Rogue player yet, and only 1 Zoo player.  Maybe that's just because of the low rank and the mixed up meta from the ladder reset.  I'll post more data later.

I've posted some gameplay videos on YouTube.  The first one was awesome, I got the nut draw and killed my opponent on the 4th turn:

1: vs Aggro Mage

2: vs Ramp Druid

3: vs Secrets Hunter

4: vs Frost Mage

5: vs Control Warrior

6: vs Handlock/Giants

7: vs Watcher Druid

8: vs Shaman

For comments and suggestions, please go to my discussion thread.