Hearthpwn

Quote from Sinti >>

Thanks for sharing. Some nice info for sure!

Question about Hunter. While i agree Marked Shot is insanely good, you dont mention Unleash the Beast at all. Iv found that card to be almost, if not equally as broken as Marked Shot. Decent body that acts as an immediate removal and packs value, since you get two copies of it. How was your experience with the card so far?

 Love the card its nuts. Near auto pick on the first one. It's more for a mid range deck and less effective as a finisher for an aggro deck. 

Hi all,

Been having a lot of success in this meta across all the classes I've played. I'd like to offer a bit of insight into what has worked for me. Some are obvious, some might be less obvious. Hopefully they can be of some help for the last week of the meta.

My ROS stats played across all 3 servers (8.17avg over 89 runs):

• Druid - Obviously token is the archetype you want to go. You will want some late game cards but leave these to cards that increase your minion count or boost your minions on board, or offer some kind of value. 1 or 2 reach spells is preferred. Against Druid, control their board, and slowly add to yours, you will likely have better card quality and value so winning the late game is your win con. 1st Auto picks: Acorn Bearer, Mark of Lotus, Eccentric Scribe, Savage Roar.

• Hunter - I'm loving Hunter right now. Was playing it even when it was lower on the hsreplay tierlist. A big factor into the fun factor is Marked Shot. The card gives the class a way to build towards more valued oriented drafts. You don't necessarily need to go all in aggro win by turn 6 type drafts. Generally I prefer a midrange build with multiple 5s and 6s with minimal reach. I'm loving the 1-drops that refill your hand ex. Webspinner / Shimmer. I've stayed away from single target removal like Freezing trap and Deadly shot due to reduced consistency with tokens and lackeys in meta. Playing against - you'll need to stabilize ASAP against them and know when to all in race them. 1st Auto picks: Unleash the hounds.

• Mage - Managing your greed is probably key. Most drafts I get are minion based so don't depend on getting those Flamestrikes and Callings. Value minions are nice, but make sure you have solid curve plays. Generally I don't take Fireball or Pyroblast, so its going to be minion focused damage. Against Mage i'll focus face as much as I can since the inevitable Calling BS will take over the game and you'll never recover. Try not to leave minions up. 1st Auto picks: Flamestrike, Twilight Flamecaller

• Paladin - I've drafted a couple heavily Paladins and they've worked out. Secrets and hand buffs I haven't played around too much with it, but i've heard various success stories. I found having all types of initiative is really good for Pally. IF you stick the board, you will take over the game. Various weapons and rush minions really help secure your board. Balancing your draft between board support and solid bodies is key. I don't usually go too crazy with minion buffs, maybe 2x Bells. Sticky minions that give additional resources are solid too. Priority picks like Truesilver Champion and Bronze Hearld are great cards. 1st Autopick: Silversword

• Priest - All tempo priests - I have really good success with Priest even though I got a 0-3 recently with one draft. It's usually minion centric builds with minimal control tools. I haven't taken Dragon Fire potion or Potion of Madness this expansion. Favoring first Death over Mind Control. Shadequill is replaceable with strong 4 drops like Soldier of Fortune. Since Priest lacks reach, make sure you grab some larger minions to finish, or value cards to refill. A lot of my games go into top deck draws, so having some reload or larger draws is nice. Developing the board is key, often times you build a board so strong, the opponent cannot recover, this can happen as early as T4. Playing against Priest is a bit tricky. Take the good trades if possible. Kill their 2-drops on turn 2 if you can. Spread out and jam face if you're build. Occasionally you can out value priest just play trading efficiently since their hero power can't kill your minions without their own initiative. 1st Autopick: Cabal Talon Priest, Shadow word death

• Rogue - My rogues mostly were played after the 1st adjustment of Rogue's offering rates. As I posted before, I wasn't offered Rogue for 15 straight runs during that 1st week of Rogue dominance. What I can say is that Rogue still excels at grabbing the board and winning through tempo. The issue with Rogue is that they run out of value unless you specifically draft for value and give up Tempo picks. Ex. Cheap shot over Backstab type choices. Obviously you will need SOME value options, but don't forget you're a tempo class. Use your dagger to gain tempo, especially early. Balancing spending removal and minions for trading. You don't want an empty board with a hand full of removal type scenarios. I've taken Rogue twice since the 2nd nerf, and draft quality is down but it's still playable. Hunter makes it a lot harder to play against though. Playing against Rogue you'd probably favor trading / removing instead of developing and giving the Rogue the option to remove. Often, Rogues will seize the board and you'll never get it back, keep this in mind. 1st Autopick: Evil Miscreant, Sap

• Warlock - Need a good mix of taunts and heals to make Warlocks work, especially slower builds. Keep AOE spells to 3 max IMO. Draft a strong early curve 1-2-3-4 and use your hero power to refill - you want to avoid using your hero power early if possible. I found slower builds not working out as well, so keep that in mind. Rarely do match ups hit fatigue so you'll have some run way to tap into cards without needing each card to be a home run value card. 1 or 2 reach cards have proven very useful, ex. Felfire potion, however don't over do it since your life is a limited resource. I've seen drafts where someone drafted 3x Felfire potions. Playing against Warlocks you have to keep in mind the key turns where AOE will rek you. T6 - 1 dmg Dread Infernal and 5 dmg Felfire. T7 - Abyssal. Fight for the early board and stick face damage. Avoid marginal trading if the following turn is a potential AOE turn. If you get a good lead in, their AOE is useless. 1st Autopicks - Abyssal Enforcer, Evil Geniuses

Probably missed some stuff - but these are just random tid bits that have worked for me during this meta. Excited for the new rotation, but hopefully this helps some people in the last week of the current rotation. Feel free to discuss or correct. These are just things that work for me and shouldn't be taken as rules.

GL HF all :)