Hearthpwn

HeyGuys
My name is xBlaine, some may or may not know me from different deck guides I did earlier in my life or from L0rinda mentioning me somewhere.
Maybe you know my Twitter, Twitch or you don't know me at all, sucks to be you than tbh.

So in this post I'm going to talk about Quest Warrior and why I disagree with a bunch of other pro player and deck builder when it comes towards the winrates of the deck in the current meta.

Here is Match Up chart for the Quest Warrior (based on hsreplay 23.6.18):

So we can see the Quest warrior is a neat deck to beat on aggro and board floaty decks with little minions or even Token druid with the Soul of the Forest deathrattle on them.
Reasons for that are obviously cards like Warpath , Brawl , Blood Razor , Scourgelord Garrosh and ofc the ability of burst healing and having a lot of taunt minions up.

Against slower control decks with less early game pressure like a Big Spell Mage or a Mind Blast Priest you are also favored because of your Quest Reward Sulfurasand the 8 Damage Hero Power that comes with it.

Now when we look at decks like Taunt Druid and Evenwarlock we can see alot of big minions like the Mountain Giant and the Hooked Reaver in the Evenlock.
And even worse extrem big minions board floating with Hadronox or Bloodreaver Gul'dan .
Because of the mana ramp in the druid and the 1 Mana Life tab in the Evenlock they do have a faster access to these big threats that the most popular list is strugeling with.
Eventhough the Quest Warrior list is running Cornered Sentry it's still highly unfavored against the Taunt druid because they are just using their Carnivorous Cube to get a wealthy board and run all over you.

 

So till this point I am totaly with everyone the List is not made to be favored against Evenlocks, Taunt Druids or other midrange decks. It's a version of the Quest Warrior with the task to beat aggro and still be able to punish super slow control decks.
Cornered Sentry is played together with Drywhisker Armorer to generate burst heal (armor), Slam is an activator for the Execute [/card], [card]Tar Creeper , Saronite Chain Gang and Primorial Drake offer enough protection to slow down any aggro deck.
And for the board float deck like Odd Paladin & Token Druid we are just ignoring the Quest and play Scourgelord Garrosh and our AOEs to win.
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BUT . . . . what If I tell you that you can actually beat all these decks that you already beat and still be able to win against decks like Taunt Druid and Evenwarlock? Here you go: 

About a year ago I played a Arcane Giant Quest Warrior, the whole Idea of the deck was finishing the quest as soon as possible with cheap taunts, alot of cycle and removals.
You then start throwing out the Sulfuras Hero Power every turn into the opponents Face and board to finish them off early.
Now Rase ( Professional Hearthstone Player from Brazil playing for REDCanids. Champion of Copa America (Summer 2018). Top 4 at Summer HCT) has came up with a simular Idea he also thinks that the earlier you get down the quest reward the higher are the odds of winning against decks like Evenlock and Taunt druid as your Hero Power can contest a giant or take about 1/4 of the opponents health if it hits face.
Once you completed your Quest you use your AOEs and single target removals to get rid of the board to ensure hits on the opponents face.
Against aggro we change the way too, atleast a bit.
We still go for the Quest road but do not focus on fastly doing it we rather do it as a side quest, we use taunt minion and the AOEs to remove the opponents board and slowy get in some damage by them face trading off minions or getting hit by our little taunt minions.
When the opponent is running out of ressources we turn on the Ragnaros Hero Power and jam the 8 Damage to the face to finish them off within next couple of turns.

"bUt bLaINe I DoN't NeEd ThE rAgNaRoS hP aGaINsT AgGrO I mULLigAn mY qUeST AwAY tO fInD aN aOe!" - Twitch_Chat_Legend_27

I can see people doing that but some aggroish decks like Token Druid are able to fatigue you if the quest is in the bottom of your deck you may not be able to finish it anymore.
You are mostlikly not needing 30 whirlwind AOEs to win against an aggro deck use your ressources correctly and turn on the Ragnaros Hero Power to pressure the aggro deck to no give them more time, set them on a clock, force them to play cards and avoid losing in fatigue. Yes you want AOE in these Match ups but you'll find these any way by cycling or stalling with taunts.

 

So now I'm going to breakdown the Quest Warrior list into "Core Cards" , "Anti Aggro Techs" (which we you guys should stop playing as they are freaking useless btw) and "Fast Build Techs"

For the "Core Cards":

Fire Plume's Heart obviously the Quest and keycard to beat controllish decks.

Cornered Sentry has a great synergy with Drywhisker Armorer and any kind of Whirlwind effect. You first up get a stack on your Quest as it is a Taunt Minion but you also summon three Raptors to the opponents side these can be used to lower the chances of your opponents Witching Hour as well as generate Armor with Drywhisker Armorer or increasing the odds of winning a Brawl. Since the Raptors are only 1/1 drops they can be easily removed by Warpath or Blood Razor.

Drywhisker Armorer is our Burstheal tool, really important to generate health back esp. after the Quest Reward was dropped.

Execute as a single target removal.

Warpath can be a 1 to 5 Damage board clear and can be really usefull to free the board for a face hit with the Ragnaros Hero Power also works really well with Acolyth of Pain .

Acolyth of Pain is a great way to cycle through your deck as this guy benefits from the 1 Damage AOEs alot.

Phantom Militia is 1 to 3 stacks on the Quest depending on the turn you drop them as their Echo ability allows it to summon multiple copies of this minion. So basicly this minion is 2 Slots for up tp 6 stacks on the Quest.

Shield Block another Burstheal and card cycle.

Stonehill Defender is also atleast 2 minions for one slot and by discovering another taunt minion you are able to grab a minion which fits into your curve. Another 2 Slots for 4+ stack on the Quest.

Tar Creeper generic good taunt and anti aggro tool.

Blood Razor 2x 1 Damage AOE + 2x 2 Damage swing as an activator for Execute, board clear, Acolyth of Pain , ect.

Saronite Chain Gang geneic good taunt, DOES NOT COUNT AS 2 STACKS.

Brawl . - It's Brawl.

And now...

Anti Aggro Techs and why I hate them.

 

All of these Tech cards are more or less played to have extra % against aggro but are they necessary at all? I am sure they are not and that they just dragg down the overall winrate of the deck.

Whirlwind and Doomsayer both don't help towards the quest reward and are mostly useless later on in the game while you are able to deal with the early threads of your opponents anyway.

For the bigger taunt drops like Primorial Drake , Rotten Applebaum , ect. these cards are just to slow if you go with the fast quest plan you can fit other taunts with them nor do we really need their abilites in our game plans.

The Scourgelord Garrosh is probably the most discussed card for me everytime I talked to someone about the build as most player think the Hero Power of the DK is important in any match up but bamboozled its not. You can also just clear the board and start throwing 8 dmg into your opponents face that also beats the aggro decks (and it doesnt take every game into fatigue aswell).
Ofc I'm not going to deny that Garrosh is useful vs Miracle Rogue for example as you can hit 3 minions with 4 damage on turn 8 but do you know what else does 4 Damage on turn 8?
Warpath (Brawl also deals with the board).
In advance is the DK the ultimate Deathdraw in any cntrl match up post dropping the Quest Rewards.


Now we gonna throw in the fast version which gives you early access on the Quest Reward (by turn 6-7) while still beating aggro without having all these extra anti aggro cards in the deck.

So here is the List:

Shieldbearer? Yes. The 1 mana taunt is helping to stack up the Quest while being able to fit in basicly every turn to make use off the full mana. Shieldbearer is also really useful in term of getting Battle Rage value.

Battle Rage a huge draw potential and cycle card to have faster access to you cards.

Ironbeak Owl the silence effect is getting rid of Hadronox & Cubes.

Reckless Flurry this card is another Tech that made the Taunt Druid Matchup so easy because of the synergy with Drywhisker Armorer you are mostlikly getting rid of every board. (Owl + Drywhisker + Flurry + Hero Power = Board Clear + 8 Damage to the Face against Taunt Druid) If you had an Cornered Sentry dropped earlier it's gonna be a hard time for them rolling the odds on their Hadronox.

Azalina Soulthief this is the tech I saw Rase playing since you are cycling and pushing the Quest really fast you are running out of cards at some point. Azalina is probably the best refill option in the game and if you copy an opponents hand to find more removals. burst or heal you're going to have an amazing time that game.

Flexspot:
Executes/Shieldslam
One Battle Rage 
Owl/Ooze - Owl is better than Ooze in this Meta. 

So here are some stats from ladderin with the deck earlier this month on NA (The druid loses were to toggle and what every theo played):

So overall I am sure that Quest Warrior if built and played correct (a fast version) has a high winrate vs Taunt Druid and is favored against Evenlock and can compete with the Recruit Hunter.

 

tl;dr stop playing bad cards in Quest warrior.

EDIT:
Replays:

https://hsreplay.net/replay/8e7xxHc6akTpRLxkUV35sY (Quest done t6)

https://hsreplay.net/replay/bWJfMxuNtjd9UwFVDwDUgT (Quest done t7)

https://hsreplay.net/replay/bN7nV7DXiqiLssCmu47n7Y 

EDIT:

Of course you are not able to pull of the early quest everytime as your opponent also plays cards that you have to interact with yet the low cost taunts also fit in a turn with a removal to push the Quest.

Cornered Sentry can be played on curve vs cntrl. I don't keep Phantom ever. I never mulligan away the quest. I always take low mana cost Minions from stonehill as the value drops don't fit the gameplan.

Video gameplay by Kiwiinbacon:

Cheers xBlaineHS