I've seen a spike in threads about wild, and a lot of whining at that. Seeing as I almost exclusively play wild, I'll ad my 2 cents;
Every single class in wild has 2 or more meta (strong) decks, and every class with the exception of DH (which is to be expected, they have way less cards) has 3 or more viable decks.
Yes, the games between D5 and legend don't show much deck variety, but that doesn't mean you can only play 1 or 2 decks. And there is class variety. (in my last 20 games, I encountered 8/10 different classes).
The problem comes with players that want to play meme decks, at the highest rank possible, in the most powercrept format, and demand to win half of their games. I'm sorry, that's not attainable. I remember reading a thread of someone looking for a deck thats "not too meta", "fun" and has a winrate of more than 60%. Problem; when a deck reaches a 60% winrate, it is a meta deck.
You're not forced to play secret mage or mech paladin. If you look for it, there are strong decks in every single class. Here's a list of all the decks that win a lot of games, ordered by class (a * means that the deck is not really really strong, but can easily go above 50%);
Warlock; Aggro discard Control Cubes Highlander* Mecha'cthun
Hunter; Face Dragons Highlander Egg Spiteful Even
Paladin; Mechs Murlocs Odd Pure
Warrior; Pirates Odd Egg DMH*
Shaman; Even (Jade or totem variant) Evolve Murloc* Big* Shudderwock
Rogue; Odd Big deathrattle* Combo*
Druid; Malygos Toggwaggle* Mecha'cthun* Jade-spell Token New quest* Taunt (hadronox)
If I missed any, do let me know. All of these decks are either decks from HSreplay with a >50% winrate in wild, or decks from professional players (not in tournament setting), or decks that I have found perform well at D5.
Of all the wild decks, quest and secret mage are the most OP and need a nerf. Renolock is my fav and is 50-55% winrate but renodh is terrible, I had 35% winrate with it. Just doesn't have enough tools to deal with aggro.
Of all the wild decks, quest and secret mage are the most OP and need a nerf. Renolock is my fav and is 50-55% winrate but renodh is terrible, I had 35% winrate with it. Just doesn't have enough tools to deal with aggro.
Oh yeah, I should 100% have said that this doesn't mean I don't think these decks deserve to be nerfed. Variety is always welcome, and these decks have been at the top for a long time.
Mage is warping the entire wild meta. It encourages aggro and forces control out.
While mage is certainly strong, secret mage only enforces a healing into the metagame (think reno, khartut), and quest mages makes sure that all control decks must run taunts, or have 1 weak matchup.
But the notion that there is no control in the current metagame is simply untrue; Cubelock, jade druid, odd warrior and control warlock are good examples.
Mage is warping the entire wild meta. It encourages aggro and forces control out.
While mage is certainly strong, secret mage only enforces a healing into the metagame (think reno, khartut), and quest mages makes sure that all control decks must run taunts, or have 1 weak matchup.
But the notion that there is no control in the current metagame is simply untrue; Cubelock, jade druid, odd warrior and control warlock are good examples.
Odd warrior is nonexistent in the meta (and that's putting it kindly), cubelock I guess you could consider a control deck and it loses like nobody's business against quest mage and the two most popular aggro choices of pirate warrior and odd dh. The only other control deck that's common on ladder is reno priest and while that has a slightly better than 50% wr against pirates and dh, it simply can't win against quest mage, it's one of the most lopsided match-ups on ladder right now. What other control decks are actually played? I'm currently facing people on diamond and low legend, 1000-ish (those that accept my friendship request to check, at least) and I can count on the fingers of two hands how many control decks I've faced in the past 40 games...7 or 8, at best. From bronze 10 (with a 2x multiplier) to diamond 10 I haven't faced a single jade druid and I also haven't seen a single person playing jade druid in the past month while watching hours of wild streamers...I'd really like to meet anyone playing it, they must be the dodo of wild hs. There's no such thing as control warlock in wild, I'm guessing what you meant was renolock which sure, is a fine enough archetype (tier 3, if that) as is reno mage that doesn't also employ the quest (all of the 3 people playing it).
So yes, control is not nonexistent in the current metagame because that'd be literally impossible. I certainly don't think people whine because they want to play meme decks and have high wr% (I certainly haven't seen anyone doing that, but YMMV) but when you queue into odd dh, pirate warrior, odd dh, mech pally, secret mage, secret mage, quest mage, pirate warrior, mech pally and quest mage again, well, it starts to get tiresome, no matter how good your deck is.
I'll also put asterisks on most of your decks up there (there's a reason why Dane fell from top 70 legend to 2000 something, it's because he played big deathrattle rogue, the deck sucks balls, just to point the first one out) but I can't really be bothered to copy and paste them here to do it. Yeah sure, if your mmr is horrid you can get 50%+ wr with pretty much any of the decks you named. I've seen multiple people reach diamond or legend with standard decks, too...it's not difficult, you need a lot of time to invest in the game and a lot of patience. But try playing pure paladin (lul) or hadronox druid (omegalul) against odd dh or secret mage and then come tell us how long it will take you to reach that 50%.
And as a note, if the answer to quest mage was "just play taunt brah" believe you me, I think someone would have been able to realise that a while ago.
If these decks lose to litterally everything under the sun, then how are their winrates above 55%.
And no, of course the answer to quest mage isn't "just play taunt, ez wins", but it is a way to not lose that matchup every single time. I've won plenty of games with galaxy mage against quest mage by taunting up and deleting their boards.
Also, I'm not a great player, but in my last 30 games of razakus priest, I've lost only 4.
I gave highlander galaxy mage a * because of the low playrate, but I got from D5 to D3 while memeing around with it, which is very hard to do with a sub 50% winrate.
As for Big Deathrattle rogue, you're right, I forgot to put the * there.
"When a deck reaches a 60% winrate, it is a meta deck", i don't fully agree with that statement, a deck is meta if it is played enough. When almost nobody expect that your deck is played it is a off-meta deck.Some off-meta (not meme deck) can perform well when played by a good player. I think for example of OTK-paladin (with DK-Uther), Odd Shaman, Togg Priest, Quest Rogue.
The metagame is also linked to your MMR and your server, with a High MMR you see less diversity, and it reduces the number of decks you consider that can be played against you. Some players consider 1/4 of your list off-meta. But i can confirm there is some class diversity.
I have also a question what do you mean by Combo* Rogue ? A rogue with a OTK combo like Malygos ?
I think you miss a few decks that are played like Kingsbane, Mill rogue (I was surprise to see 3 of them I am 300-1000 legend, I think it is only played because people like the deck), Evenlock (but maybe it is off-meta i played few game with success), Reno Shaman.
"When a deck reaches a 60% winrate, it is a meta deck", i don't fully agree with that statement, a deck is meta if it is played enough. When almost nobody expect that your deck is played it is a off-meta deck.Some off-meta (not meme deck) can perform well when played by a good player. I think for example of OTK-paladin (with DK-Uther), Odd Shaman, Togg Priest, Quest Rogue.
The metagame is also linked to your MMR and your server, with a High MMR you see less diversity, and it reduces the number of decks you consider that can be played against you. Some players consider 1/4 of your list off-meta. But i can confirm there is some class diversity.
I have also a question what do you mean by Combo* Rogue ? A rogue with a OTK combo like Malygos ?
I think you miss a few decks that are played like Kingsbane, Mill rogue (I was surprise to see 3 of them I am 300-1000 legend, I think it is only played because people like the deck), Evenlock (but maybe it is off-meta i played few game with success), Reno Shaman.
These decks only perform well because streamers actually only upload wins on YouTube.
If you watch their streams on twitch, you see that they lose 80% of the time when playing DK Combo Paladin or something like that for extended periods of time.
Yes sometimes they get streaks, often with Aggro decks like Odd Shaman, but that comes often down to being lucky with favorable match-ups.
If you watch their streams on twitch, you see that they lose 80% of the time when playing DK Combo Paladin or something like that for extended periods of time.
I know this is only my personal experience but I find DK Paladin very strong in this meta. It is good against most of the aggro decks and destroys slow control decks (so mostly Reno decks). Only really bad matchup is Quest Mage since it's way faster.
I've seen a spike in threads about wild, and a lot of whining at that. Seeing as I almost exclusively play wild, I'll ad my 2 cents;
Every single class in wild has 2 or more meta (strong) decks, and every class with the exception of DH (which is to be expected, they have way less cards) has 3 or more viable decks.
Yes, the games between D5 and legend don't show much deck variety, but that doesn't mean you can only play 1 or 2 decks. And there is class variety. (in my last 20 games, I encountered 8/10 different classes).
The problem comes with players that want to play meme decks, at the highest rank possible, in the most powercrept format, and demand to win half of their games. I'm sorry, that's not attainable. I remember reading a thread of someone looking for a deck thats "not too meta", "fun" and has a winrate of more than 60%. Problem; when a deck reaches a 60% winrate, it is a meta deck.
You're not forced to play secret mage or mech paladin. If you look for it, there are strong decks in every single class. Here's a list of all the decks that win a lot of games, ordered by class (a * means that the deck is not really really strong, but can easily go above 50%);
DH;
Odd
Regular tempo
Highlander N'zoth*
Priest;
Raza-Anduin
Ressurect
Spiteful*
Combo
Mage;
Quest
Highlander quest
secrets
Highlander Galaxy*
Warlock;
Aggro discard
Control
Cubes
Highlander*
Mecha'cthun
Hunter;
Face
Dragons
Highlander
Egg
Spiteful
Even
Paladin;
Mechs
Murlocs
Odd
Pure
Warrior;
Pirates
Odd
Egg
DMH*
Shaman;
Even (Jade or totem variant)
Evolve
Murloc*
Big*
Shudderwock
Rogue;
Odd
Big deathrattle*
Combo*
Druid;
Malygos
Toggwaggle*
Mecha'cthun*
Jade-spell
Token
New quest*
Taunt (hadronox)
If I missed any, do let me know. All of these decks are either decks from HSreplay with a >50% winrate in wild, or decks from professional players (not in tournament setting), or decks that I have found perform well at D5.
Of all the wild decks, quest and secret mage are the most OP and need a nerf. Renolock is my fav and is 50-55% winrate but renodh is terrible, I had 35% winrate with it. Just doesn't have enough tools to deal with aggro.
Oh yeah, I should 100% have said that this doesn't mean I don't think these decks deserve to be nerfed. Variety is always welcome, and these decks have been at the top for a long time.
Mage is warping the entire wild meta. It encourages aggro and forces control out.
While mage is certainly strong, secret mage only enforces a healing into the metagame (think reno, khartut), and quest mages makes sure that all control decks must run taunts, or have 1 weak matchup.
But the notion that there is no control in the current metagame is simply untrue; Cubelock, jade druid, odd warrior and control warlock are good examples.
Odd warrior is nonexistent in the meta (and that's putting it kindly), cubelock I guess you could consider a control deck and it loses like nobody's business against quest mage and the two most popular aggro choices of pirate warrior and odd dh. The only other control deck that's common on ladder is reno priest and while that has a slightly better than 50% wr against pirates and dh, it simply can't win against quest mage, it's one of the most lopsided match-ups on ladder right now. What other control decks are actually played? I'm currently facing people on diamond and low legend, 1000-ish (those that accept my friendship request to check, at least) and I can count on the fingers of two hands how many control decks I've faced in the past 40 games...7 or 8, at best. From bronze 10 (with a 2x multiplier) to diamond 10 I haven't faced a single jade druid and I also haven't seen a single person playing jade druid in the past month while watching hours of wild streamers...I'd really like to meet anyone playing it, they must be the dodo of wild hs. There's no such thing as control warlock in wild, I'm guessing what you meant was renolock which sure, is a fine enough archetype (tier 3, if that) as is reno mage that doesn't also employ the quest (all of the 3 people playing it).
So yes, control is not nonexistent in the current metagame because that'd be literally impossible. I certainly don't think people whine because they want to play meme decks and have high wr% (I certainly haven't seen anyone doing that, but YMMV) but when you queue into odd dh, pirate warrior, odd dh, mech pally, secret mage, secret mage, quest mage, pirate warrior, mech pally and quest mage again, well, it starts to get tiresome, no matter how good your deck is.
I'll also put asterisks on most of your decks up there (there's a reason why Dane fell from top 70 legend to 2000 something, it's because he played big deathrattle rogue, the deck sucks balls, just to point the first one out) but I can't really be bothered to copy and paste them here to do it. Yeah sure, if your mmr is horrid you can get 50%+ wr with pretty much any of the decks you named. I've seen multiple people reach diamond or legend with standard decks, too...it's not difficult, you need a lot of time to invest in the game and a lot of patience. But try playing pure paladin (lul) or hadronox druid (omegalul) against odd dh or secret mage and then come tell us how long it will take you to reach that 50%.
And as a note, if the answer to quest mage was "just play taunt brah" believe you me, I think someone would have been able to realise that a while ago.
Odd warrior, 320 games, 63.7% winrate in the last 30 days; https://hsreplay.net/decks/JrTBcheBdmevtFhlpqv0Ye/#gameType=RANKED_WILD
Odd warrior, 250 games 58.8% winrate in the last 30 days; https://hsreplay.net/decks/3zopSfUNhOmB5xtHhY9Vgg/#gameType=RANKED_WILD
Cubelock, 2300 games, 60.8% winrate in the last 30 days; https://hsreplay.net/decks/nEfdisZ032KED5QzcpdHLf/#gameType=RANKED_WILD
Hadronox druid, 290 games, 59.6% winrate https://hsreplay.net/decks/N3aIEDpw3k0L0gPNOeC9ag/#gameType=RANKED_WILD
Jade druid has 4 decks with a >55% winrate over >200 games; https://hsreplay.net/decks/#gameType=RANKED_WILD&timeRange=LAST_30_DAYS&sortBy=winrate&playerClasses=DRUID&includedCards=40372
If these decks lose to litterally everything under the sun, then how are their winrates above 55%.
And no, of course the answer to quest mage isn't "just play taunt, ez wins", but it is a way to not lose that matchup every single time. I've won plenty of games with galaxy mage against quest mage by taunting up and deleting their boards.
Also, I'm not a great player, but in my last 30 games of razakus priest, I've lost only 4.
Across 240 games, 73.4% winrate (that's a lot more than "barely 50%")
https://hsreplay.net/decks/7Uu2PxGMxaHygBG9Qe30Nd/#gameType=RANKED_WILD
Bigger sample size; 3200 games, 61.9% winrate;
https://hsreplay.net/decks/GRiNj4qMa0RElgHKMVVhfd/#gameType=RANKED_WILD
I gave highlander galaxy mage a * because of the low playrate, but I got from D5 to D3 while memeing around with it, which is very hard to do with a sub 50% winrate.
As for Big Deathrattle rogue, you're right, I forgot to put the * there.
"When a deck reaches a 60% winrate, it is a meta deck", i don't fully agree with that statement, a deck is meta if it is played enough. When almost nobody expect that your deck is played it is a off-meta deck.Some off-meta (not meme deck) can perform well when played by a good player. I think for example of OTK-paladin (with DK-Uther), Odd Shaman, Togg Priest, Quest Rogue.
The metagame is also linked to your MMR and your server, with a High MMR you see less diversity, and it reduces the number of decks you consider that can be played against you. Some players consider 1/4 of your list off-meta. But i can confirm there is some class diversity.
I have also a question what do you mean by Combo* Rogue ? A rogue with a OTK combo like Malygos ?
I think you miss a few decks that are played like Kingsbane, Mill rogue (I was surprise to see 3 of them I am 300-1000 legend, I think it is only played because people like the deck), Evenlock (but maybe it is off-meta i played few game with success), Reno Shaman.
These decks only perform well because streamers actually only upload wins on YouTube.
If you watch their streams on twitch, you see that they lose 80% of the time when playing DK Combo Paladin or something like that for extended periods of time.
Yes sometimes they get streaks, often with Aggro decks like Odd Shaman, but that comes often down to being lucky with favorable match-ups.
I know this is only my personal experience but I find DK Paladin very strong in this meta. It is good against most of the aggro decks and destroys slow control decks (so mostly Reno decks). Only really bad matchup is Quest Mage since it's way faster.