Hearthpwn

Hello Everyone, all credit to Warshack for the deck idea and composition.

I just wanted to give my opinion on how this deck plays out from the perspective of a first time Legend player now in the top 5k using solely this deck, I'll post the win rates below with a little explanation of each match up.

Overall - 174 Wins / 90 Losses - More often than not the aggressive nature of this deck overpowers even other aggro decks with similar trading patterns.

Demon Hunter - 5 Wins / 2 Losses - Pretty self explanatory, hardly anyone plays this class and for good reason. The only way one can get ahead is if they have a good turn 1/2 play with Metamorfin which counters this deck quite heavily with trading.

Druid - 22 Wins / 5 Losses - One of the easiest matchups for this deck at 81% win rate, if you get a Druid it's basically free legend points. The only time you should be scared is if they're able to surpass 15ish mana, the Sea Giant really destroys any taunt minions they try on the turns leading up to then and Shady Bartender ensures that Flipper Friends and Scale of Onyxia are effectively useless as board clears.

Hunter - 21 Wins - 15 Losses - Now to one of the worst matchups, and this has to do with those damn wild seeds. If you get lucky and they only get Stag Spirit Wildseed you can easily rush them down however if they get either Fox Spirit Wildseed or Bear Spirit Wildseed you're going to have a bad time. Though there's also secret hunter which is.... actually not so effective against this deck if you're able to get a good Shady Bartender down, they do lack board clear outside of their secrets so use this knowledge to your advantage.

Mage - 36 Wins / 19 Losses - This may surprise some but despite all the board clear Mage is pretty pathetic when it comes to trying to deal with imps. Yeah it can freeze them usually, and yeah it can destroy almost any board but the problem for them is how many big minions you can dish out along with your small ones. Most of these Mages can only freeze so much and are banking on a turn 8 cheese with Mordresh Fire Eye (Though this card is usually played on turn 10 due to the conditions they need to meet so use that to your benefit in rushing face down).

Paladin - 5 Wins / 0 Losses - Paladin is basically budget Implock, and utterly useless against us. The most they can do is maybe spam out those annoying buffed silver hands, but they're -never- going to get that far into the game. Same as Druid they are basically free legend points hence the 100% win rate out of all of my games so far.

Priest - 13 Wins / 6 Losses - Ahh Priest, the main two variants you will see are either buff/silence (the easier of the two) or the dreaded quest priest. They have a really frustrating Undying Disciple which has one of the most cringe voice lines in history and is also the most cringe card you can play against as an Implock. The best way to counter such is to rely on buffs from Shady Bartender which will usually ensure that you get the most value out of your minions. A common misconception is that the later it gets the priest, the worst it gets. That actually isn't so true, as late game you can repeatedly fill your board with imps they have to answer or you win. Always best to try for the victory, rather than accept defeat.

Rouge - 12 Wins / 6 Losses - This can be a tricky one to grasp, but they either kill you in one turn or they don't. Always slam the board with lots of annoying Imps until they uninstall as Rogue cannot do any AoE outside of vanish with Shadowcrafter Scabbs but honestly it hardly ever gets to turn eight with all the coins this class has the potential to generate. They either get a godly reset hand with Gadgetzan Auctioneer , or they perish.

Shaman - 25 Wins / 19 Losses - Now to another one of the hardest matchups alongside Hunter, Shaman can really cook your goose. For some reason they always end up getting Sire Denathrius with their evolves which is -usually- a concede play however I have won a game against that luck once so you can always try if you think you have the cards for adequate trading. In that case any other card they get that doesn't have life steal is usually manageable as long as you keep your cool and focus on making wide boards. Another pain will be the Snowfall Guardian which ultimately there's little you can do about. You just have to hope that they cannot kill you in the free turn they get to attack, and that you can counter with a lethal of your own.

Warlock - 35 Wins / 18 Losses - The fated mirror match, and more often than not you will win with this deck honestly. There's not much to say other than some people choose to use Piggyback Imp and Bloodbound Imp but honestly from my own testing I've found that both of those lack the tempo needed to push for lethal especially in a mirror and the latter basically makes you die faster than your opponent which is never good against aggro.

Warrior - 0 Wins / 0 Losses - Seriously? Does this class even exist in the meta anymore? Out of 264 games (Some of which weren't even in Legend mind you) I'm yet to encounter a Warrior. Somehow they fall short of even the Demon Hunter's insane 39% win rate relic decks, because that's somehow possible.

Anyway I hope this has been an informative, if not entertaining, spin on how this deck plays from my perspective being so new to Legend. I'm having a lot of fun with this deck despite how 'meta' or 'hated' it might be, I'm just glad Imps are back as some of my fondest memories from 2016 come from aggro lock.