Hearthpwn

Introduction:

Hello guys, I'm TwoBiers! Many people asked me for a guide of my midrange hunter I used in the hs-arena invitational tournament. So here it is!

I'm a multiple legend player and known for some creative deck building ideas like my Top50 Hobgoblin Token Druid back in the january season.
I'd hit Legend with Midrange Hunter many times and in Season 18 on EU and NA too.
I also hit Legend 23 with this Hunter on EU last Season too and my Hunter helped me a lot to get in the hs-arena finals!



Here is my Midrange Hunter statistic (NA+EU) in September (before Aggro Druid got popular)

Deck and Deckbuilding:



So let's talk about my card choices!

2xHunter's Mark:

So why a second Hunter's Mark over 1x Hunter's Mark and 1x Ironbeak Owl?
I think Hunter's Mark is much much stronger in the actual meta than owl.
It got so many good targets and synergies so well with the other cards in the deck!
The main problem with the card is that you need other cards to combine with it!
So let's see how strong Hunter's Mark can be!



Secret Paladin is so popular and pretty strong! Some people think, I'm here in a really bad position! I got a Snake Trap up and the Paladin got a really strong board. But Dreadscale along with Hunter's Mark and Quickshot can do here wonder. In Ladder are so much Secret Pallys, but Hunter's Mark is a pretty good counter after a Mysterious Challenger turn, because if you trigger the secrets there is most of the time a big ass Challenger along a Defender(after redemption). If you can use Unleash + Hunter's Mark or Dreadscale with Hunter's Mark you can gain board control pretty easy along with a Freezing Trap or Snaketrap!

Voila!


In this situation the synergy with Hunter's Mark and Dreadscale is just nuts! I regain boardcontrol against the secret pally and the trap is my backup!

So here is another Situation where Hunter's Mark is really powerful and better than an Owl!
Sometimes you just use Hunter's Mark to "deal damage" like a big health minions.
It's important for that kind of Hunter to get board control and not to SMOrc to face!
You can silence a Belcher to remove the taunt and the 1/2 slime but the body remains! So you are forced do deal with it anyway!

So here I use the Hunter's Mark Bow synergy to get through that Belcher. I got double Hunter's Mark and I don't know if I can use both Hunter's Marks properly. So I used it like a Backstab as a tempo play to stay ahead on board!

 
Here is another example where Hunter's Mark this time with Scientist can be a HUGE tempo swing on board. In this situation I can use the Hunter's Mark like a 4DMG Spell for 0 Mana! I get a trap, remove the big ass taunt and can play a shredder on curve!



In all of these situations Hunter's Mark is so much stronger than a Owl!

Enough with Hunters Mark! Let's talk about some other Cards!

1xWebspinner:

Let's talk about Webspinner. Webspinner is a solid card. 1 Mana 1/1 body with a nice Deathrattle effect! The upside is that get something like a card draw to refill your hand and it's your only 1 mana card to play. It's great on turn 1 to deal with other 1 Mana creatures like Leper Gnome or Worgen. You can deal with a divine shield aswell or just try to utilize it along Hunter's Mark. I don't like that RNG-effect so much. It can give you a parrot, chicken or King Krush and Gha'zrilla. So sometimes It can help you to win games and sometimes Webspinner will give you a useless card. I think 1 off is enough because Webspinner isn't hat strong in mid or late game and we just run 1 Houndmaster! The upside is that your opponent don't know which beast you get out of the Webspinner and your mission is to use that beast in the right situation and adjust it with the other cards!

So let's see some great or not so great outcomes of the webspinner!



So here I got a Boar pretty early out of a webspinner against StrifeCro. Normally a Boar isn't that great as a card. But I was so patience to wait until the challenger turn to use it to trigger Repentence, Noble Sacrifice and my Kill Command to win me the match!

Next situation. I get a Timber Wolf out of a Webspinner. Again not such a great outcome either. But Timber Wolf synergizes pretty well if you got a board with many beasts. So along some little beasts I could build a a really scary board and StrifeCro is forced to use a Bash on a 1 Mana creature!


I think 1 of a Webspinner is enough. Not everytime u get lucky and a great synergy aswell and you play a value and board control oriented kind of deck!

So let's talk about the traps!

2xFreezing Trap:

I think Freezing Trap is the most powerful secret of the Hunter. It can lock up the opponent in an awkward spot. It's like a better sap, but you can't use it by yourself. You force your opponent to do it. It's hard to play around Freezing Trap in that kind of board control oriented hunter because most of the time your opponent ist force to trade. The downside of Freezing Trap is your opponent can use little minions to activate the trap to save their big minions. Your mission is to clear the little things beside that big ass creature like a sylvanas or a grown shade to lock them up. You got a Bow, Quickshot and some other nice stuff to clear up the little things. Most of the classes (except face aggro classes) don't have charge minions(or just a few) to trigger the freezing tap directly. So you can lock up strong minions like Sylvanas or even a Challenger. Freezing Trap is the best trap for board control and tempo!

1x Snake Trap
So I think 2 traps are not enough, because if you draw 1 trap your second scientist will be useless. So why Snake Trap? We play a very board control oriented Hunter. Other good traps like Bear Trap or Explosive Trap don't to much if you play the boardcontrol oriented game, don't help if there is a heavy trade oriented thing. So if they don't attack your face, the Explosive and Bear Trap just stays there for years. That's why I think Snake Trap is the better option because most of the time you want to force your opponent to deal with your board and they must trade. So your snakes trigger and do a lot of value stuff. Nice synergy with Knife Juggler, Hunter's Mark, Kill Command, Leokk, Belcher, Houndmaster and more of the beast synergy. The downside is, if you are behind on board and you can't force your opponent to deal with your board they can ignore your board and your Snake Trap and just go face. But therefore you got a Misha, Houndmaster or Belcher to force them to let them trigger the Snake Trap.

2xQuickshot:
Man I love Quickshot! Most of the Midrange Hunter play just 1 off a Quickshot but I think it's to strong to play just 1 copy of it. It helps you pretty well with strong early minions like Darnassus, Secret Keeper, Apprentice, Shredder, Knife Juggler and much much more!
You can use it as an early removal, to get card draw or optimize your burst potential! Not all people expect a second Quickshot. The Main Problem of a Midrange oriented Hunter is card draw. You just hope that you win before you get out of steam! Quickshot helps a lot to get key cards like Highmanes or Dr.Boom if you have no cards in your hand in the lategame!And yea it's synergieses aswell with Hunter's Mark to shoot down the big minions! Awesome flexible card!

2xKing's Elekk
Did you notice something? Well, we got 13 cheap spells and 2 weapons in our deck!
Our low mana cost minions are 1xWebspinner, 1 Juggler, 2xScientist, 1xDreadscale and 2xElekks!
Most of the time you search for the low mana cost minions. That means that the Joust effect of Elekk pulls out most of the time atleast a 4 Mana Cost minion! Awesome stuff. Most of the classes got some low cast mana minions and your percentage to draw a card out of Elekk isn't that low! Elekk can help you alot to curve out through your midgame. A Shredder, Loatheb, Highmane or even Dr.Boom draw is pretty scary! Even if you lose the Joust and don't get the card draw you can explore the cards in the deck of your opponent to get some early informations what they play and what they haven't in their hand! Use that as a tool to win! We can empty our hand pretty fast with that low mana curve and cheap spells like Hunter's Mark! So sometimes we need that card draw! Try it, you get it pretty often! More than you expect! And a turn 2 Elekk is better than a turn 2 Juggler!

1xKnife Juggler
So why only 1 Knife Juggler? Well I don't play Haunted Creeper anymore because the anti-synergy with dreadscale. Haunted Creeper is good against Aggro but bad against Control Decks in my opinion because Creepers don't build up pressure with 1 attack!
Knife Juggler is good with Snake Trap, but with only 2 Health your opponent can deal with it easily before they trigger your Snake Trap. Yes Knife Juggler Unleash is a pretty sick combo if your opponent builds up a big board but most of the good players will play around. It's a really situational combo! And we got already some situational cards like Dreadscale, Hunter's Mark, Houndmaster and so on. Too much will hurt our game play. If your opponent just got 1-2 minions on board the combo effect isn't that great. So I think one of is enough. If you play against many board flood enemies you can put in a second knife juggler for Elekk!

2xMad Scientist
Double Scientist is clear right? That deathrattle effect gives you so much tempo! 2/2 Body AND a 2 Mana Trap for 2Mana? Hell yeah! Hunter's Mark synergy! Trade in and get a secret! Nice!

2xEaglehorn Bow
Eaglehorn Bow helps you do deal with your opponents minions to gain board control in exchange with you life! Your traps will help you to gain more stacks! 2 Bow charges along with your hero power will do 10! DMG in 2 turns! Be aware of that if you think your opponent is low enough to go just face! Hunter's Mark synergy aswell! Nice!

1xDreadscale
Dreadscale! I love this card! "BGH for 1/1's" That card can help you so much against aggro decks and some board flood effects. Nothing is greater than a Dreadscale after a Muster for Battle in Turn 3. Nobody expect it and man that thing does a great job! You need to watch the VOD's against StrifeCro and Eloise what that Dreadscale can do!! It's just freaking amazing sometimes! And the Hunter's Mark synergy is awesome aswell. It allows you to destroy a big minion and gain board control.


MORE COMING SOON!!


I don't have a enough time to do the full guide at once! But I'll finish it the next few days with all other cards and a mulligan and match-up guide!


Closing:

Here are the VODs against StrifeCro and Eloise with some nice gameplay of my Hunter!!

Match against StrifeCro

Match against Eloise

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