Hearthpwn

EDIT 4 (6/8/2015): Budget version of this deck can now be found in the "Card Replacements" section of the guide.

 

EDIT 3 (6/6/2015): Deck was briefly on the front page of Hearthpwn! Thank you all so much for this! Also the guide for the deck I promised is also up now! Read it below and feel free to give feedback of any kind!

 

EDIT 2 (6/3/2015): 20+ Likes goal has been reached, I'll take free time from these couple days and get that guide out for you all. Hopefully it'll be up before the week is over!

 

URGENT EDIT (6/3/2015): I just noticed that I had mistakingly put 2x Voidcaller in the deck instead of 2x Haunted Creeper. This was not a conscious decision and was a mistake I never realized I made when putting the deck on Hearthpwn. The correct version of the deck I had used to climb the ladder has Haunted Creeper instead of Void Caller. I am terribly sorry for the mistake and if I had unintentionally misled anyone.

As with any other early game deck you will generally be hoping that you go first. The coin is nice but I’ll take being the first player every turn save over only having one turn of extra tempo any time of the day. If you go second you will basically be literally playing from “second”. You’ll also be much less likely to abuse opponents who have weak early turns since their mana lead will get them back on their feet much more easily.

 

Now onto the standard mulligan of the deck:

 

General (With or without coin): Individually good 1 or 2 cost minions are the top priority. These include: Voidwalker, Flame Imp, Zombie Chow, Argent Squire, Knife Juggler, and Haunted Creeper.

 

Only keep early-game support cards if you already have a solid turn 1 play and/or you feel that their support will help greatly in the early game given the rest of your hand. These include: Abusive Sergeant, and Dire Wolf Alpha.

 

In regards to the Nerubian Egg, it’s usually only a good idea to keep it if you have some sort way to boost it out as well and you have something else to play on turn 1 (Especially if you don’t have the coin to play the egg on turn 1)

 

If you have a good enough curve, like say being set for plays on turns 1, 2, and 3, then you can keep higher cost minions if they work well enough with the curve you have.

 

If you have the coin: In this case it is more acceptable to skip having a one drop if you already have two individually good two drops that can be played on turns 1 and 2 respectively. Haunted Creeper on turn 1 into turn 2 Knife Juggler+pop the spiders to throw extra knives can also be a very powerful play (Although many people seem to expect it now if you coin out a Haunted Creeper and try to play around it)! In a much less likely case, another hand worth keeping is when your hand has a good one-drop, and two good three-drops (Only Imp Gang Boss)

Here are some exceptions to the general rules of this deck’s mulligan I mentioned above. They are mainly all tech keeps depending on the nature of these specific matchups.

 

Vs Hunter: In this matchup the best cards to absolutely keep (Or look for) are Zombie Chow, Voidwalker, and to a lesser extent Argent Squire. You will need the high stats, taunt, and stickiness of the mentioned cards to combat the Hunter’s onslaught. If you open with these cards then your chance to win is already fairly high.

 

Based on the rest of your hand it is even correct to keep a Defender of Argus. YES, a FOUR MANA DEFENDER OF ARGUS. This is mainly for two reasons:

 

1. The taunt is invaluable vs Hunters

 

2. The surprise HP buff can ensure that the opponent doesn't get ridiculous value from Explosive Trap by buffing out of 2 HP range

 

If your hand is really high quality you may even be able to get away with keeping Ironbeak Owl to use against Mad Scientist. It can really mess with the Hunter’s game plan if you deny him the free secret.

 

Vs Mage: Similar to the Hunter matchup, Ironbeak Owl can be kept if the rest of your hand is high quality. Mainly used for the same purpose of silencing the very common Mad Scientist.

 

Vs Shaman: Almost all Shamans these days are aggressive Mech Shamans. Again in this case, Ironbeak Owl can be kept as a tech card to combat the situation where Powermacesuccessfully buffs a mech with its deathrattle.

Main game plan of this deck: Use your early game drops to gain early board control. Continue to control board with your minions with the help of the many instant buffing effect cards in this deck. Keep denying board for your opponent, out tempo the opponent, and eventually win.

 

Mana Usage: Attempt to use every single point of mana every single turn. This is important for any deck but even more so for this deck since it relies so heavily on tempo. Unless there is some super good play that requires you to play off curve, then ALWAYS spend all your mana each turn. Failing to do so will give your opponent breathing room in your tempo rampage which you do not want.

 

If you have a non-individually good minion such as Abusive Sergeant or Dire Wolf Alpha in your starting hand, it is still worth in certain matchups it to play it on its own. Versus aggro you definitely will want that early board presence out there. Versus slower decks it is worth considering if the lost value from playing a card without benefiting from its immediate effect is worth it or not.

 

Also NEVER tap over playing suitable minions. A general game plan of this deck is to always play a suitable minion from your hand instead of tapping. A key to this deck's success is to out tempo them which means you will need that board presence. Tapping will slow you down.

 

You can always tap on later turns when you have the spare mana, better to go for tempo now.

 

Minion Placement: Simply because of the Dire Wolf Alphain this deck, minion placement is of utmost importance in this deck to achieve maximum value. I have sorted out a general graph on how I usually play my minions:

 

(You can also use this to practice how to play minions for Flametongue Totems as Shaman haha)

 

 

 

 

 

Zone 1 Blue: The minions who are the beefiest which usually do not need buffs will go on the farthest left. Also minions you do not want to die will also go in this area such as Knife Juggler.

 

Zone 2 Yellow: Next to the beefy minions you’ll want to place special spawning minions, such as Imp Gang Boss OR Nerubian Egg. If you are going to have both of these minions out on the board at a time then put the egg instead in zone 5, or rightwards zone 3. Reason is that if you put the egg to the right of the Imp Gang Boss then you’ll block the spawning imps from gaining access to the Dire Wolf Alpha, and if you put it to the left of the Imp Gang Boss then the egg can’t access the Dire Wolf Alpha as well.

 

Zone 3 Red: This is the redshirt pile which is reserved for minions you want to kill off the most. To be even more specific, generally you want to put the minions with the most total stats farther to the side, and the minions with the least total stats closer to the middle.

 

Zone 4 Green:Dire Wolf Alpha zone. Put him wherever you feel like would be most beneficial to your board at the time.

 

Zone 5 Pink: Minions with deathrattles will go into the furthest right, almost always Haunted Creeper. Reason you don’t want to put this in a position with minions to the right of it is because when the Creeper dies the small spiders may potentially block off any other minions to the right from gaining access to theDire Wolf Alpha.

 

Also if you can help it, try casting Imp-losion FIRST before putting down the Haunted Creeper since the imps fromImp-losion will always spawn to the farthest right.

 Cards which I feel are self-explanatory and/or do not need anything else said about them will not have sections in here:

 

Imp-losion: A extremely power swing card as many have come to know. When you cast this card it is highly recommended that you have some sort of backup plan to prepare for all three scenarios if you have the luxury to do so. This also sometimes includes killing off some of your own small minions before casting the spell and bring your minion count down to three to “prepare” for best results. It’s a minor optimization, and very rarely matters but it’s a good habit nonetheless.

 

Doomguard: Very big card and potentially a huge tempo swing as well. The way I play Doomguardis usually a bit greedier. I try to wait until I have a minimal amount of cards or even no other cards before I play him so that I don’t suffer the full effect of the downside. However if you are slightly behind and need a swing to get back into the game, then dropping him while discarding two cards is completely fine as well.

 

Zombie Chow & Argent Squire: One of the main key differences from most Zoo decks. These two represent sticky minion value. The Zombie Chow is definitely the best early one-drop in this deck. I personally think for the deck’s purposes and state of the meta that I was facing, it is even better than Flame Imp since the 3 HP is immensely useful and its 2 attack can easily be buffed to get over hurdles it could not previously pass. The Argent Squire may not have the 3 HP but it does have the divine shield which means it can usually trade up against other minions when buffed and leave a body behind on the board. In the worst case scenario it can still make your opponent paranoid and expend effort on getting rid of the divine shield. TheArgent Squire is also a high ranking candidate to use Defender of Argus [/card]on since it has divine shield and will be a mini [card]Sunwalker of sorts which is very annoying to deal with for the opponent.

 

Dire Wolf Alpha: One of the main key cards in the deck. It can cause of train of value to happen assuming one place their minions properly. You can find the proper ways to place minions for this deck in the section above. A good thing is that the Dire Wolf will almost always come down after the minions you plan on sacrificing are already in place so you can decide where the “center” of the train of death can start depending on your needs at the time.

 

Haunted Creeper: Can be combo’ed with Knife Juggler for great value in the early game. My personal play style with this card has me usually decide however NOT to pop the spiders if I don’t need to in order to act as insurance against any sort of AOE damage.

 

Nerubian Egg: One of the most important cards in zoo. Can be buffed through various means to get value AND have the Nerubian out. Early game I’d say it’s definitely correct to pop the egg as soon as you see possible. Later in the game though, if I already have board control I like to keep the egg unpopped to act as insurance versus AOE, same as theHaunted Creeper. It is also a high ranking candidate for Defender of Argusbecause your opponent definitely does not want to attack into it most of the time.  

 

Defender of Argus: Extremely versatile card which can be used in worst cases as an expensiveDire Wolf Alpha, but in best cases completely seal a game out by giving taunt to key targets. It’s generally the best idea to give taunt to the bigger minions you have instead of the really small ones like imps who are going to die off really easily. Given the minion placement guide I posted above, this should not be particularly difficult to do in most cases. If your board state forces you to give it to imps though then that’s not a bad thing either! Buffs are buffs!

 

Loatheb: Also a versatile card. Can either be played in the earlier stages of the game on curve at 5 mana or be played later as a protection against board wipes right as you have achieved complete board dominance.

Full matchup winrates for this deck can be found here (All tracked games took place in ranks 5 to 1): http://hearthstats.net/decks/kreek-s-fast-control-zoo?locale=en

 

Druid: Very poor matchup regardless of what type of druid deck it is. Druids have very efficient removal in the form of Swipe [/card]which can rally ruin your board. The most terrifying card though has to be[card] Keeper of the Grove which will clear a key minion of yours while leaving a body on the board very well suited for dealing with small minions.

 

Hunter: Slightly favored matchup regardless of the type of hunter deck. Your early game will be able to contest your opponents’ very well and bring you to victory. The key card in this matchup is the Hunter’s Explosive Trap and Unleash the Hounds. Explosive Trap will literally decide the game based on how much damage it is able to do to your board state. Unleash the Hounds is bad in the sense that it can do a crap ton of damage to your hero if enough dogs spawn and you don’t have taunt up. Defender of Argus will help fight against these two cards very well.

 

Mage: Against aggro and mech Mage this deck is extremely favored. Before I started meeting Freeze Mages this deck had a consistent 90% winrate against all mages I though which eventually became a running joke in my climb up ladder that any mage I saw was a free win (All tracked games took place rank 5 or higher). This is mainly because of the burst tempo you can get from the Abusive Sergeant, Dire Wolf Alpha, and Nerubian Egg. Put together with the low cost sticky minions with 3 HP like Zombie Chow and Voidwalkeryou can very easily out-value them AND out-tempo them.

 

Against Freeze Mage though, this deck’s chances of winning are abysmal. This deck is not aggressive enough to kill the mage fast enough and tapping to get more fuel after you’ve passed the early game will only put you closer to defeat. Against Freeze Mage you basically need to hope that they do not draw the proper answers for your board.

 

Paladin: Didn’t meet much Paladins on the ladder during my climb (Only 6) but I would say the matchup is somewhat even. Nothing too much to say about this matchup since everything is fairly standard and run of the mill with nothing particularly standing out.

 

Priest: Very unfavorable matchup: Priests have lots of very cheap and powerful AOE. The most well-known is of course the Auchenai Soulpriest + Circle of Healing combo. Holy Nova is actually less scary since it’s more expensive and does minimal damage. The scariest though is Wild Pyromancer plus any amount of spells the Priest can throw at do which can almost perform a full board wipe regardless of what it looked like before.

 

Even with all that said though, if you play around the AOE properly and try your best to maintain tempo then you should still stand an okay chance of winning the game.

 

Rogue: Extremely few rogues were fought on ladder. Of the 150+ games I climbed from rank 5 to legend with, only 5 rogues were found. On top of that they all ran a variety of different decks including Mill Rogue, Mech Rogue, and Oil Rogue. The sample size is far too small for me to be able to deduce how the matchup is against them. What I can say though is that there aren’t very many rogues currently running around in the meta.

 

Shaman: All Shamans faced were Aggro Mech Shaman Decks. This is the same case with mages and is a very good matchup for this deck. Your tempo will very likely be able to outstrip the opponent’s and come out on top.

 

Warlock: Slightly unfavored against Handlock. Even matchup against other Zoo decks.

 

Versus Handlock I came to the conclusion that you cannot worry about Molten Giants. You have to go all in and hope that he doesn’t have them. The choice is up to you: Do you want to worry about the likelihood that he has two Molten Giants more, or the likelihood that he will be able to stabilize and clear your board more? I generally think that the latter has a much higher chance of being true. Beyond the Moltens I find that the matchup isn’t that bad most of the time. It’s even quite good sometimes. By the time the handlock taunts up a minion you will almost always have the ability to remove it with not too much of your board.

 

Against other Zoo decks it really depends heavily on several things. First off is who goes first. The player going first will have the better chance at winning. After that it comes down to who can control the board better, perform the better trades, and can get the tempo snowball rolling faster. Against midrange Zoo it is both a blessing and a curse for you since their opening turns will not carry as much tempo as this deck’s but their mid to late game will pack heavy stopping power if you have not yet dominated the board.

 

Warrior: Slightly unfavored against both Control Warrior and Patron Warrior.

 

Versus Control Warrior, it’s a very standard game. Just out-tempo the opponent and win from there before his big stuff starts coming out

 

Versus Patron Warrior though, it’s a slightly different story. Patron Warrior is a combo deck so your goal is to go all out. KILL HIM. FAST. You have at least until turn 8 before the scary charging Patrons pop out to ruin your day(Warsong Commander + Grim Patron for people who don't know). Defender of Argus will be very key for this matchup if you can’t seal the deal before turn 8. You will have to try your best to taunt up minions who will have 3 attack at least to avoid the Patrons just outright winning the game through too much “Getting in Here!”

 

In both flavors of warrior the most feared things to see are the weapons: Fiery War Axe and Death's Bite. Death's Bite is the scariest since it can also act as a form of board wipe on its second swing, putting you in a very awkward position on the turn after the first swing.

This section is mainly for players who do not have the full wings of adventure mode and/or are just starting Hearthstone. I will post a complete budget version of the deck soon that I used on EU to climb the ladder but for now here are replacements for the adventure cards. Budget version of deck is as follows:

Kreek's Budget Zoo (100% F2P) Unknown Deck by Kreekakon - Jun 8, 2015 View Deck String Export to BBCode Export to Cockatrice Export to MarkDown Export to Html Clone this deck
Minion (27) 1x Maexxna 2x Defender of Argus 2x Doomguard 2x Knife Juggler 2x Nerubian Egg 1x Young Priestess 2x Harvest Golem 2x Abusive Sergeant 1x Argent Squire 1x Clockwork Gnome 2x Dark Iron Dwarf 2x Dire Wolf Alpha 2x Flame Imp 2x Haunted Creeper 1x Ironbeak Owl 2x Voidwalker	Ability (3) 2x Imp-losion 1x Power Overwhelming
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(Unfortunately the first wing of Naxxramas is absolutely crucial to this deck so the cards from there, Haunted Creeper and Nerubian Egg, cannot be replaced. You’re going to have to save up that 700 gold if you don’t have the wing yet.)

 

Zombie Chow -> Any value oriented 1 drop minion. For my EU deck I went with Young Priestess and Clockwork Gnome

 

Imp Gang Boss -> Harvest Golem will serve the same purpose of being a sticky minion.

 

Loatheb [/card] ->  [card]Maexxna isn’t the greatest but she’ll do if you don’t have anything else to fill this slot with. Try to get that second wing of Nax ASAP though to replace her!

If anyone else has anymore question on what cards to replace and/or is still missing cards for the deck, feel free to throw me questions below!