So Hunter has to be the worst class right now, right? With my old decks completely invalidated by the latest bit of rotation that happened during a multi-month absence of the game, I've been left without any reliable hunter decks. I initially tried netdecking a couple from this site (Namely a Reno Hunter and a couple different Beast Hunter builds), but all of them felt awkward or just plain lacking. I tried piecing together some versions of these archetypes on my own and got pretty consistently bad results. So, perhaps in frustration at not being able to win at all with my only gold class, I decided to go back to the well, and build a new version of the now-out-of-standard Mad Hatters deck I used to run to good effect (http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/378646-the-mad-hatters). And as such I arrived at my new Deathrattle Hunter build: Rats With Hats (http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/731493-rats-with-hats and also posted to this thread).
Obviously the loss of several great cards for this type of deck (Feign Death, Baron Rivendare, Sludge Belcher, Piloted Shredder, and Webspinner), but I also needed this deck to be able to stand up to the omnipresent pirate decks currently amok in the meta. So I prioritized token spamming, and Knife Jugglers are working overtime. The idea being that against heavily aggressive decks like Pirate ones, you'll be able to use the Knife Jugglers and Explorer's Hats to efficiently trade their board down until they run out of steam. Against slower, more control-oriented decks, you are able to field a consistent board presence, even in the face of multiple wipes, either overrunning them outright, or using a late-game N'Zoth, the Corruptor after having everything traded or wiped away and they've run out of big clears to counter it. So far, after having just made it last night, it's gone 6-3 on ranked (all ranks 15 or below), with all three losses being to Dragon Priests. This is too small a sample size (and at too low ranks) to call the deck a success, but it is a promising enough start that I want to work with the deck for a while. At the moment it doesn't feel done, and I am positive that with the community's help, I can make it better. So here I am, looking for suggestions and advice.
Some of my choices and the reasons behind them:
Barnes is probably not really a keeper. I liked the idea of him, as with so many deathrattle minions I'm quite likely to get a 1/1 with a good effect behind it, but in practice, he's never once given me something useful the few times I've even gotten him out. I swear he's predisposed to picking N'Zoth, the Corruptor, as he's done it 3 of the 4 times I've gotten him out (the last time he gave me a Defender of Argus).
Kindly Grandmother is pretty questionable too. While I like the general value of the card, it seems a bit too slow, as I already have no turn 1 minions. I'm thinking of switching her out for Fiery Bat for quicker early game presence.
Powershot is an MVP against Pirate decks, but I'm wondering if 2 is really a good call considering it's far less useful against Control decks. Or even mid-range.
Rat Pack is my superstar (and the impetus for the name of the deck, which was called something else until I saw just how much use those rats were getting). A buffed Rat Pack synergizes so well with Knife Juggler that it's not even funny, and almost forces a trade followed by an AoE blast immediately. It's pretty well the backbone card for the deck, so keep it in mind when making suggestions.
If the rats are doing so well, try hound master? And what about the alphs wolf that gives adjacent minions +1 attack; he helps a lot when trading in a large number of minions.
Barnes probably isn't very good since a lot of your minions battle cry rather than deathrattle
If the rats are doing so well, try hound master? And what about the alphs wolf that gives adjacent minions +1 attack; he helps a lot when trading in a large number of minions.
I was using Houndmaster on intial conception, but quickly ended up switching him out for Defender of Argus as further anti-pirate tech. Two taunts is better than one if you get stuck against the wall. I also found myself immediately in situations where I was getting more rat spawn than I had room for.
So Hunter has to be the worst class right now, right? With my old decks completely invalidated by the latest bit of rotation that happened during a multi-month absence of the game, I've been left without any reliable hunter decks. I initially tried netdecking a couple from this site (Namely a Reno Hunter and a couple different Beast Hunter builds), but all of them felt awkward or just plain lacking. I tried piecing together some versions of these archetypes on my own and got pretty consistently bad results. So, perhaps in frustration at not being able to win at all with my only gold class, I decided to go back to the well, and build a new version of the now-out-of-standard Mad Hatters deck I used to run to good effect (http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/378646-the-mad-hatters). And as such I arrived at my new Deathrattle Hunter build: Rats With Hats (http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/731493-rats-with-hats and also posted to this thread).
Obviously the loss of several great cards for this type of deck (Feign Death, Baron Rivendare, Sludge Belcher, Piloted Shredder, and Webspinner), but I also needed this deck to be able to stand up to the omnipresent pirate decks currently amok in the meta. So I prioritized token spamming, and Knife Jugglers are working overtime. The idea being that against heavily aggressive decks like Pirate ones, you'll be able to use the Knife Jugglers and Explorer's Hats to efficiently trade their board down until they run out of steam. Against slower, more control-oriented decks, you are able to field a consistent board presence, even in the face of multiple wipes, either overrunning them outright, or using a late-game N'Zoth, the Corruptor after having everything traded or wiped away and they've run out of big clears to counter it. So far, after having just made it last night, it's gone 6-3 on ranked (all ranks 15 or below), with all three losses being to Dragon Priests. This is too small a sample size (and at too low ranks) to call the deck a success, but it is a promising enough start that I want to work with the deck for a while. At the moment it doesn't feel done, and I am positive that with the community's help, I can make it better. So here I am, looking for suggestions and advice.
Some of my choices and the reasons behind them:
Barnes is probably not really a keeper. I liked the idea of him, as with so many deathrattle minions I'm quite likely to get a 1/1 with a good effect behind it, but in practice, he's never once given me something useful the few times I've even gotten him out. I swear he's predisposed to picking N'Zoth, the Corruptor, as he's done it 3 of the 4 times I've gotten him out (the last time he gave me a Defender of Argus).
Kindly Grandmother is pretty questionable too. While I like the general value of the card, it seems a bit too slow, as I already have no turn 1 minions. I'm thinking of switching her out for Fiery Bat for quicker early game presence.
Powershot is an MVP against Pirate decks, but I'm wondering if 2 is really a good call considering it's far less useful against Control decks. Or even mid-range.
Rat Pack is my superstar (and the impetus for the name of the deck, which was called something else until I saw just how much use those rats were getting). A buffed Rat Pack synergizes so well with Knife Juggler that it's not even funny, and almost forces a trade followed by an AoE blast immediately. It's pretty well the backbone card for the deck, so keep it in mind when making suggestions.
So? Thoughts?
Trying Real Hard To Keep Hunter Relevant
If you really want to play hunter and a lot of your deck suffer with rotation I recommend you play wild, sometimes is more fun than standard.
Hunter with all cards sucks hard in standard, lacking cards is only for masoquists.
I don't have any suggestions but that looks fun, I am going to try it and let you know how I did :)
If the rats are doing so well, try hound master? And what about the alphs wolf that gives adjacent minions +1 attack; he helps a lot when trading in a large number of minions.
Barnes probably isn't very good since a lot of your minions battle cry rather than deathrattle
Trying Real Hard To Keep Hunter Relevant