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Numerous posts address this ´issue´ of the hunter dominance on ladder. So I guess I´m sorry for making another one. Even after the recent nerf Rexxar invokes hate and despair in streamers and noobs alike. There will always be a king of the current meta, but is hunter to good? I have some thoughts about this.
1) My win rate over about a hundred games (very small sample size indeed) this season suggest that hunter is at least above average. But as said, there must be a king of the meta.
2) The Undertaker, Webspinner and Mad scientist synergy is very strong. On the other hand, a zoolock can have a stronger start. While more controlling decks can deal with even the best possible hunter start, it´s a costly endeavor especially in life which plays into Steady Shot. Strong starts like this keeps decks honest, too slow decks will be punished.
3) Hunter class cards are arguably a little bit stronger than average. On the other hand, the neutral card pool is strong and synergies can remedy a lack of strong class cards in other decks.
4) The hero power favors an aggressive play stile since only priest and warrior can "stabilize" against hunter with any consistency. Steady Shot often force a race.
Points 1)-3) can be attributed to the "there must be a king of the meta thesis". I don´t even think the Undertaker is that ridiculous, but maybe I´m biased playing a lot of priest.
The ´problem´ with hunter is in my opinion instead number 4) in conjunction with 1)-3) and the secret mechanics. Like the oldschool freeze mage, Miracle Rouge or OTK warrior - the Steady Shot is frustrating to play against. All these decks have one in common, less player interaction; if my adversary draws X, I´m dead, nothing I can do about it...
Hunter is a little bit different where the player have some foresight into his inevitable doom. "I have just stabilized with the a taunt and a stronger board, but WAIT I only have four turns left no matter what." This has very negative psychological effects (at least on me lol), it feels like you did the better trades and the better plays but are inevitably loosing anyways.
The truth is that you may have been too greedy and have failed to protected your life total. In reality you are frequently doomed in other matchups as well, the difference is that the mutual playing of cards over some turns creates an illusion of control even when you are inevitably loosing. Against a hunter the opposite is true. As it stands hunter will probably be somewhat hated even if the meta where to crown a new king. The only solution in the long run would be to change Steady Shot somehow.
People hate aggro decks. Especially newer players hate aggro decks. If you lose on turn 6-7 before getting to play your "cool" combo or beefy legendary you end up feeling bad because you lost and you didnt get to do the cool thing you wanted to do. The only way to end the constant whining would be to eliminate the possibility to play aggro and force everyone to play control.
I'd rather let people whine than kill the game trying to please them.
Boys you don't get it, let me explain.
What do i want from a game ? Feeling of happiness, satifaction and having fun. And when playing control vs control you get that feeling, becouse you pull out "cool combos", play ysera's, grommashes, alakirs e.t.c, and even when i lose in control vs control i'm still satisfied. And that's how it looks like when i'm playing against aggro, or i play aggro, i win fast, and the only satifaction is small, and not rewarding enough, for new players it's enough, but not for someone who is playing this game for a year. If i wanna win against aggro i must counter, and trust me it's not funny at all, cause you won't be able to show your cool stuff, and will even replace it for owl or ooze to deal with undertaker or bow. Thus control meta is way more attractive and satisfying to play...
I disagree. People hate EVERY deck they're losing against. If it's aggro, they complain it's "just mindless spam", if it's control, they complain "Legendaries are OP, p2w!".
For you.
Not everyone feels that way though. Many people hate the longer games that control demands. They like the adrenaline rush of aggro decks.
Myself, I hate the lack of variety. I want to be able to face slow decks and fast decks. The idea of everyone playing control all day is dull to me. Same goes for endless aggro. Mostly, though, I like counters. I want to play a midrange deck when folks go aggro, a control deck when they go midrange, and aggro when they go control. I get just as much enjoyment tearing down an opponent fast JUST as the Rag shows as I do blocking a rush deck over and over until turn 15 when my win condition shows up.
Note that all of these opinions are fine, mine, yours, and the others. The issue is when you start demanding the game change to suit your playstyle at the cost of others. "I prefer control, so aggro can go away."
That's pretty similar to aggro demands demanding that Rag get nerfed to oblivion. Either way, it's meh.
CAN you request the game change? You can. But then so can everyone else. Unless you really want your opinion to go the way of "OMG Legendaries OP, NERF EM!" then we'll need an argument other than "I prefer this".
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
I do not hate aggro decks. In fact, almost all decks I play have an aggressive theme. This includes Zoolock, Ooze Paladin, Tempo Rouge and Token Druid (the only non-aggro I play is Control Shaman); half of which run undertaker and I win around turn 7-15. But Undertaker is so broken, it makes any deck archetype that runs it viable. The only time I played Aggro Hunter to get a 5 win quest was so boring, I D/E ALL my hunter cards afterwords. I'm not saying everyone should, I'm just saying that the deck is so one-sided that it ruins any excitement for all opponents and generally makes the game less enjoyable. There is NO problem with aggro in general, but some of the current cards are defiantly in need of a nerf.
This is statement is false.
they haven't changed a hero power since Rogue and won't ever do it now post release... i don't think the hunter class or hero power is a problem, it really just speaks to the player base. most players are relatively f2p and play zoo or hunter because they are effective and cheap and probably just don't have the cards, skill or patience to play any other classes on ladder.
the problem with hunter is just that there's too many people who play/rely on it which could be said for zoo as well and there's just not enough variance in the decks to make the game interesting when you're playing against it over and over. the innovation for hunter is too specific and becomes so homogeneous once somebody finds a deck that counters nerf, making it just boring as eff to play against and forces you to switch to stuff like priest and warrior or other counters that frankly you might just have no interest in playing with right now. i think hunter itself could be played many different ways but sadly Kolento just doesn't play it anymore, so nobody considers it and it's just boring boring boring same decks +/- a few cards.
The difference between people being mad at Zoo and people being mad at Hunter is that Zoo is good because of the hero power and can't really be fixed because it's almost all neutral cards and, as said before, hero powers won't be changed. The deck annoys some people because of the way Hearthstone is built.
Hunter is good because of obviously broken cards that could easily be fixed, like Undertaker and Mad Scientist.
The other difference is that Zoo, while strong, is just one good deck among many and can be countered, while Hunter is just the best deck and even its "counters" (control Priest mainly, slightly Warrior) are not very bad matchups for Hunter (40-60 at worst). Paladin, Zoo, and Druid get destroyed by Hunter, idk what variations the above poster has been playing..
Hero power doesn't need any change, a lot of hunter cards are way more powerful so I'd rather get 2 to my face then to deal with another undertaker f***king leper gnome for the same exact mana. If I were to face all the classes equally, I wouldn't care at all about this class. But when half of your games are against one single class, then there's a problem. I see a lot of you saying, "stop whining about aggro, aggro is fun, full of adrenaline, I love variety." I'm definitely good with this. But wait, where's the variety in a 50% meta hunter? Where's the fun when, even yourself, has to go mirror match in half of your games? Better start or first to flare wins. Wow that must be an interesting match indeed...
Personally, I'm a priest player and proud of it, so throw your aggro decks at me I don't care it's almost a free win every single time. Still, I know I have to get auch + COH, wild pyro, holy nova, cabal or I lose, no question about it. If I draw it, I win, if I don't GG. That relies on 100% RNG, no mulligan strategies here since I KNOW what I need, just need to get it. But I do miss the variety everyone's talking about. I don't say kill aggro, I say kill the fact that there needs to be a class everyone has to play to grind. I miss those long-lasting priest vs warrior that will go to fatigue, I miss the games vs the long-gone control paladin. When I finally get one, that's when I remember why I play this game in the first place.
For my last word : long-live shrinkmeister, king of all priest removals!
xSnP
The ladder is full of hunters and zoo. Some days, I go into ladder looking to have some fun, and come out super salty after facing Hunter into Hunter into Hunter. It doesn't even matter if I won all those games, I am still insanely salty. I just want to play some ResidentSleeper games, because those are my favorite games.
What I do in these situations is I go to my friends list, rant about it. Then whoever I'm talking to, we both agree how we hate the meta, one of us says "it's all zoo zoo huntard zoo," then the other will say "Wanna play a few friendlies?," we queue up. Then I blow off some steam with my fun control decks like Handlock, Paladin, and Druid (You can't play control Paladin or Druid on ladder because the meta is way to fast). Then one of us says, "I wanna try out my new [insert class] deck." We test it out, we talk about cards, we switch out the cards, and then one of us says "Okay, I'm going to try and test this out on ladder" And the cycle continues.
Wow, let's switch place, I would be pleased!
xSnP
Yeah, I agree OP. The class is based on racing for damage (Hero power says it all...) and has very effective removal in the form of secrets and spells. Normally that would balance out because the hunter would not have a beefy board if it chose to spend the mana playing secrets and spells for removing your minions.
HOWEVER, Webspinner, Undertaker, Mad Scientist (1-2 cost minions) gain them early board control quite quickly. Just dealing with one secret can put almost any class behind in the early game. And we have no mechanic to remove secrets. Once early board control is established, the looming pressure allows Hunters to coast and use their removal to keep the control their first secret/undertaker/eaglehorn gives them.
Having no mechanic to remove enemy secrets without being a scummy Hunter yourself is one of the most singularly annoying aspects of the game to me.
Alongside topdecks and RNG, "my opponent is using an OP deck" completes the trifecta of things to blame your losses on (in the case of Magic, replace RNG with mana problems.) It is important, especially early on, that players can blame their losses on something else than their skills, otherwise most would just quit the game.
"I am sitting at rank 18 this month"
I believe most people at this rank are playing their own decks, or don't have all the cards. So, I would say, there should be some variety where you're at. I'm sitting at Rank 3, and yesterday I faced Hunter into Hunter into Hunter into Warrior into Hunter. I think I played for about 3ish hours and ran into a Shaman once. Once. The ladder is so congested with Hunters that the only decks you see on it is a) Hunter b) Warrior c) Priest. Sometimes you see a couple of Rogues, and a zoo every once in a while. I've been playing this game for 4 months, and I don't think there has ever been a time where Hunter hasn't reigned on ladder.
It's true, Hunters aren't as strong on ladder since the Buzzard/Leeroy nerf. Hunter is pretty stupid, but any deck is capable of beating it. But that feeling you get when you see Undertaker into Leper Gnome Leper Gnome into Leokk as a Miracle Rogue. You feel like you've already lost the game before it even started. And it seems like Hunter always has Undertaker turn 1.
What's great about playing Hunter is its crazy mana efficiency. They always have tempo because they're always able to put down something each turn. If you're playing against them it sucks, because there will be games when you don't have that specific answer every time they put down a threat. Even if you're ahead, you're always scared you might lose to something as dumb like Double Kill Command.
I agree, I don't really mind facing Zoo. Zoo is a 50/50 matchup, so when I lose to it I don't feel too bad. But when I face Hunters, it always feels so one-sided.
^^This
This is an excellent statement that I agree with.
...But sometimes the whiners are right. 8 mana Pyroblast and Mind Control actually WERE OP. 2 mana Buzzard and Unleash were DEFINITELY broken. Warsong Commander giving all minions charge was CERTAINLY too strong. I'm a multi-legend player and I know pretty accurately how good I am and how good I'm not. Undertaker and Mad Scientist are overpowered design mistakes, and Hunter is best positioned to take advantage of them. Hence, Hunter is the best deck. It's fun to play too-powerful cards sometimes, but I wish there were other options.
Game really needs a Secret Eater neutral minion. We've got Weapon destroying minions, 7+ ap destroying minions, a near-Spell Lock minion, but Secrets cannot be destroyed by a minion.
That privilege remains solely in the hands of the class who needs it least. This would be a very easy problem to fix.
To be fair, every other persons deck is OP. I mean. I'm the best so it can't be me. So I either don't have the cards or you are cheap.
Jokes aside, I really can't play control because I get Legend-stomped. So Control isn't really an option for me. Barring a sub-par Druid.
I really want Pirates to be a playable theme.
I think the biggest problem is definitely what many have said, the proliferation of hunter locks out too many archetypes. During the times when zoo and miracle were the top decks I saw more variation. I played more variation. I built a Pirate Warrior deck, (multiple) Paladin Secret decks, (multiple) Rogue variants that didn't include Gadgetzan Auctioneer, a Token Paladin deck, a token Druid deck that didn't use Violet Teacher, an aggro mage, a control/miracle shaman that utilized Far Sight (dropping Rag and Faceless in the same turn is hilarious), a OTK murloc warrior deck, and many others and played them (with success) in ranks 8-3.
Now if I want to compete anywhere past rank 13 or so I have to play control Warrior, control priest, heal paladin, or zoo. I honestly feel like I can't be creative in the game anymore. Maybe I've just run out of ideas, maybe its that the game has gotten to be more competitive, but I blame it fully and squarely on hunter. It was the same feeling I had when 2 mana UTH hunter was around.