BEFORE YOU JUDGE ME, I would like to start by saying that I don't personally play Face Hunter. My main deck is Tempo Mage, which according to Tempostorm, has a really bad matchup against Face Hunter, which would seem to lend itself to me hating the deck. This season, I've also played Egg Druid and Patron Warrior, neither of which are great against it either. However, I LOVE FACE HUNTER. Here's why:
I like playing against it. If there's one thing I hate in Hearthstone, it's watching a Control Warrior work his way up to 30 armor as you slowly lose your will to try. Turn after turn, he kills your creatures without even bothering to develop a board. Fun stuff. Face Hunter is the opposite of this. Games against Face Hunter are like playing a tower defense game! In card game form! How cool is that?? There is an initial barrage of damage, and your job is to hold it off as best you can. If you're still standing after turn 7, they usually run out of steam and you win in a few turns. Either way, the game does not drag on for 20 minutes, which is great. Sure, I love it when a fantastic game goes to fatigue and is decided completely by skill, and I would never want to eliminate those games from my play experience. However, as someone with limited time to put into the game, I would not be able to ladder if each game lasted that long. Face Hunter games add variance to my play experience and keep the average length of games down so that I can fit more in.
It's a fantastic deck for new players. Starting out in Hearthstone just gets harder and harder with each expansion that's released. As a new player, it can be hard to build decks that can actually succeed in ranked play. Basics-only decks or janky brews can't get you very far unless you have an enormous level of skill and knowledge of the game - which new players usually don't have. If you are just learning the ropes, it's a sure-fire way to get discouraged. Several of my friends that I've tried to introduce to Hearthstone see people playing legendaries online, realize the amount of time or money required to get them, and quit immediately. For people like this, it's important that there are options to introduce them to the game inexpensively so that they have a chance to get hooked and start actually building a collection. Face Hunter requires no epics or legendaries, most of Naxxramas, and one wing of BRM. With the traditional Patron Warrior no longer viable, this is one of the cheapest options for new players.
It's a balanced deck. It's plain to see that none of the cards it runs are unfair. Never have I lost to Face Hunter and thought "Wow, that card is ridiculous." Contrast that with something like Mysterious Challenger. Against Secret Paladin, if you're not winning by the time it comes down, you pretty much lose. That's very rarely the case against Face Hunter. Even with the Hunter hero power, it's often possible to mount crazy comebacks against it in the later turns of the game. Sure, there are games where you don't stand a chance because you draw badly and they draw well. But that's the case with almost any deck.
In short, I think Face Hunter is an important, valuable piece of the meta, and I think it gets a bad wrap. I see lots of hate for it on this and other Hearthstone websites. It doesn't seem to matter how hard it is to play Face Hunter in the current meta or how many people are currently playing it, it always gets hate, and people always talk about how happy they are to squash Face Hunters and how they are a cancer, etc.
It's a cheap, accessible deck, but it's not a fantastic deck for new players, it's completely the opposite of that. It doesn't teach you anything about the basics of the game, like value, trading or board control. It teaches you to hit face, might as well play Clicker Heroes for that.
@Soundwave I completely disagree. If they are only hitting face and not trading in the beginning of the game, it's likely they will lose. If not, you mulliganed badly or got a really bad hand.
I too dont understand the hunter hate, esp. not when there are other decks out there that are way less "interactive", like freeze mage. I much rather lose to a facehunter than to the exact same recipe of alex and a bunch of OTK spells. Even placing loatheb does not help (because they apparantly always have 2 ice blocks on hand)
Your post will most likely garner a lot of hate as well, but I wholeheartedly agree with it. It boils down to personal preference, really. As some people likes drawn out hard fought games while some would like a more laid back casual environment in which to play. Having played tournaments in paper based TCGs, I understand why people hate a certain deck flooding the meta, however, in Hearthstone, there is no mechanism to adjust your strategy in a match since a match is only 1 game.
Personally, I feel better if I lose to an onslaught of early damage rather than dragging me to turn 20++.
@Soundwave I completely disagree. If they are only hitting face and not trading in the beginning of the game, it's likely they will lose. If not, you mulliganed badly or got a really bad hand.
Actually, it's knowing when to go face or when to trade is what's important. Although, with face hunter, more often than not, you go face.
Fun fact: Face hunter isn't nerfed, it just had a card introduced that countered its strategy (*cough* Big Game Hunter to handlock*cough*, *cough* Kezan Mystic to mages, *cough* Loatheb against spell burst decks* dies of coughing because the list obviously goes on).
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Face Hunter is what it is and is basically mostly always face. But recently if people have realised you do actually have to trade. I don't play face hunter much but its unlike most of us not to have played some sort of aggro. Aggro decks are always cheap and easy so that's why so many play them. Face hunter is just one of the best aggro's because of hunter hero power but thing is I'd probably rather face face hunter since i usually will never stand a chance against control giants late game. Also it is probably one of the first really well known aggro decks made because of the class and its many benefits with aggro.
Hunters do what they are meant and are important part of Hearthstone, even though not really in meta today. Face Hunters were a milestone in many of our careers in some way, whether we hated or liked it. Each deck throughout Hearthstone history has always left some mark on our experience where we have memories good or bad. At the end of the day its a deck and like many hated decks, that's just the part of Hearthstone. Therefore what's the point of complaining. Hearthstone :)
Face Hunter is perhaps the most unforgiving aggro deck. There is much less room for error than with Fel Reaver Aggro Druid or Secret Paladin for example, and in order to win a high percentage of games, your decisions have to be solid from turn 1.
Sure, it is a deck that wins some games just by going face all the time, but that does not win enough games to get past rank 5 when the bonus stars stop.
I wonder how many people who declare Face Hunter a mindless deck have played it with a win rate high enough to get to legend with it. I have: season 19, 65% win rate. It is not the only deck I have played to legend - and it definitely is not the easiest deck I have played to legend.
Unfortunately, I don't think it is that fantastic for new players. The differences caused by your decisions are so subtle that it might be hard to spot what the right play was. As games go by so fast, it is also sometimes difficult to stop and reflect on what has happened when playing the deck. A board control oriented deck is probably the best to get started with, such as some variant of Zoo or a Midrange Hunter. People who start with those decks tend to overtrade at first though, so some Face Hunter lessons to teach calculating the path to lethal can be useful as well.
I think the Pre-Naxx Zoolock was one of the best decks to learn the game for new players. It teached a lot about trading and board control and when to Life Tap. I played Face Hunter once to do a quest and it was comparatively way too easy to teach a lot. Yes, sometimes you have to choose to trade when the opposing damage might kill you or when you want to play around some specific cards but there's by far not as much learning as with the classical Zoo.
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BEFORE YOU JUDGE ME, I would like to start by saying that I don't personally play Face Hunter. My main deck is Tempo Mage, which according to Tempostorm, has a really bad matchup against Face Hunter, which would seem to lend itself to me hating the deck. This season, I've also played Egg Druid and Patron Warrior, neither of which are great against it either. However, I LOVE FACE HUNTER. Here's why:
I like playing against it. If there's one thing I hate in Hearthstone, it's watching a Control Warrior work his way up to 30 armor as you slowly lose your will to try. Turn after turn, he kills your creatures without even bothering to develop a board. Fun stuff. Face Hunter is the opposite of this. Games against Face Hunter are like playing a tower defense game! In card game form! How cool is that?? There is an initial barrage of damage, and your job is to hold it off as best you can. If you're still standing after turn 7, they usually run out of steam and you win in a few turns. Either way, the game does not drag on for 20 minutes, which is great. Sure, I love it when a fantastic game goes to fatigue and is decided completely by skill, and I would never want to eliminate those games from my play experience. However, as someone with limited time to put into the game, I would not be able to ladder if each game lasted that long. Face Hunter games add variance to my play experience and keep the average length of games down so that I can fit more in.
It's a fantastic deck for new players. Starting out in Hearthstone just gets harder and harder with each expansion that's released. As a new player, it can be hard to build decks that can actually succeed in ranked play. Basics-only decks or janky brews can't get you very far unless you have an enormous level of skill and knowledge of the game - which new players usually don't have. If you are just learning the ropes, it's a sure-fire way to get discouraged. Several of my friends that I've tried to introduce to Hearthstone see people playing legendaries online, realize the amount of time or money required to get them, and quit immediately. For people like this, it's important that there are options to introduce them to the game inexpensively so that they have a chance to get hooked and start actually building a collection. Face Hunter requires no epics or legendaries, most of Naxxramas, and one wing of BRM. With the traditional Patron Warrior no longer viable, this is one of the cheapest options for new players.
It's a balanced deck. It's plain to see that none of the cards it runs are unfair. Never have I lost to Face Hunter and thought "Wow, that card is ridiculous." Contrast that with something like Mysterious Challenger. Against Secret Paladin, if you're not winning by the time it comes down, you pretty much lose. That's very rarely the case against Face Hunter. Even with the Hunter hero power, it's often possible to mount crazy comebacks against it in the later turns of the game. Sure, there are games where you don't stand a chance because you draw badly and they draw well. But that's the case with almost any deck.
In short, I think Face Hunter is an important, valuable piece of the meta, and I think it gets a bad wrap. I see lots of hate for it on this and other Hearthstone websites. It doesn't seem to matter how hard it is to play Face Hunter in the current meta or how many people are currently playing it, it always gets hate, and people always talk about how happy they are to squash Face Hunters and how they are a cancer, etc.
Yes, beep boop, I agree with my fellow human's view points beep boop.
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My mandibles which are capable of pressing down and tearing, my talons which are known to intercept and hold.
It's a cheap, accessible deck, but it's not a fantastic deck for new players, it's completely the opposite of that. It doesn't teach you anything about the basics of the game, like value, trading or board control. It teaches you to hit face, might as well play Clicker Heroes for that.
@Soundwave I completely disagree. If they are only hitting face and not trading in the beginning of the game, it's likely they will lose. If not, you mulliganed badly or got a really bad hand.
I too dont understand the hunter hate, esp. not when there are other decks out there that are way less "interactive", like freeze mage. I much rather lose to a facehunter than to the exact same recipe of alex and a bunch of OTK spells. Even placing loatheb does not help (because they apparantly always have 2 ice blocks on hand)
Your post will most likely garner a lot of hate as well, but I wholeheartedly agree with it. It boils down to personal preference, really. As some people likes drawn out hard fought games while some would like a more laid back casual environment in which to play. Having played tournaments in paper based TCGs, I understand why people hate a certain deck flooding the meta, however, in Hearthstone, there is no mechanism to adjust your strategy in a match since a match is only 1 game.
Personally, I feel better if I lose to an onslaught of early damage rather than dragging me to turn 20++.
Fun fact: Face hunter isn't nerfed, it just had a card introduced that countered its strategy (*cough* Big Game Hunter to handlock*cough*, *cough* Kezan Mystic to mages, *cough* Loatheb against spell burst decks* dies of coughing because the list obviously goes on).
If you look closely, you can see this is a signature and not a comment. Why are you reading? Stop reading this. Did you read this too? Dang you must like reading.
Face Hunter is what it is and is basically mostly always face. But recently if people have realised you do actually have to trade. I don't play face hunter much but its unlike most of us not to have played some sort of aggro. Aggro decks are always cheap and easy so that's why so many play them. Face hunter is just one of the best aggro's because of hunter hero power but thing is I'd probably rather face face hunter since i usually will never stand a chance against control giants late game. Also it is probably one of the first really well known aggro decks made because of the class and its many benefits with aggro.
Hunters do what they are meant and are important part of Hearthstone, even though not really in meta today. Face Hunters were a milestone in many of our careers in some way, whether we hated or liked it. Each deck throughout Hearthstone history has always left some mark on our experience where we have memories good or bad. At the end of the day its a deck and like many hated decks, that's just the part of Hearthstone. Therefore what's the point of complaining. Hearthstone :)
TX
Face Hunter is perhaps the most unforgiving aggro deck. There is much less room for error than with Fel Reaver Aggro Druid or Secret Paladin for example, and in order to win a high percentage of games, your decisions have to be solid from turn 1.
Sure, it is a deck that wins some games just by going face all the time, but that does not win enough games to get past rank 5 when the bonus stars stop.
I wonder how many people who declare Face Hunter a mindless deck have played it with a win rate high enough to get to legend with it. I have: season 19, 65% win rate. It is not the only deck I have played to legend - and it definitely is not the easiest deck I have played to legend.
Unfortunately, I don't think it is that fantastic for new players. The differences caused by your decisions are so subtle that it might be hard to spot what the right play was. As games go by so fast, it is also sometimes difficult to stop and reflect on what has happened when playing the deck. A board control oriented deck is probably the best to get started with, such as some variant of Zoo or a Midrange Hunter. People who start with those decks tend to overtrade at first though, so some Face Hunter lessons to teach calculating the path to lethal can be useful as well.
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I think the Pre-Naxx Zoolock was one of the best decks to learn the game for new players. It teached a lot about trading and board control and when to Life Tap. I played Face Hunter once to do a quest and it was comparatively way too easy to teach a lot. Yes, sometimes you have to choose to trade when the opposing damage might kill you or when you want to play around some specific cards but there's by far not as much learning as with the classical Zoo.