0
Been playing a variation of this deck for quite a while:
0
Not unprofessional, Blizzard is just slow at things. They have been since the beginning of the company. I think players are just a tad excited or impatient.
6
The cat was in the old Naxxramas raid instance (near the entrance). If you killed it, Kel'Thuzad would yell:
No!!! A curse upon you, interlopers! The armies of the Lich King will hunt you down. You will not escape your fate...
But the joke about Mr. Bigglesworth actually running the whole thing is probably a reference to players making the same jokes.
3
I enjoy playing Zoolock. Yes, I am a bad person. I play other decks as the meta warrants, but I love the fast-pace and success of Zoolock. It's not the most complicated deck to play. True. But neither is it completely devoid of decision-making. It's a partial control deck, after all. You're not going to the opponent's face exclusively (such as is the tactic with Hunter or Paladin aggro), there are still decisions and interactions to make on the board with Zoo.
Since Zoolock came to prominence, a large number of variations have cropped up. Each subsequent variation has grown the deck's size and cost, as each try to solve various problems that crop up with the meta.
Zoolock first came to prominence around mid-April via Reynad. At the time he proclaimed it the best deck in Hearthstone. And at the time he was right. There were no counters to the deck, and it maintained an over 70% win-rate in high level play. And even as the counters started to appear, the deck was still difficult to beat, even when it didn't draw into the perfect curve turn after turn.
The original Zoolock was a tight, cheap deck. One of the reasons why it became popular was its ability to win and its inexpensive card cost; it uses no legendaries or epics and costs only 1480 dust (less than the cost of one legendary).
This is still the Zoolock deck I use more often than not. It's the cleanest and surest implementation. Whereas it can suffer in very control-oriented metas, its win-rate still doesn't drop below 50%.
For the following decks I'll list how their builds differ from the original Reynad Zoolock, and then give my own analysis of the deck based on played in the early July season ranked meta.
Differences: -2 Mortal Coil, -2 Shieldbearer, -2 Young Priestess, -1 Argent Commander, +2 Abusive Sergeant, +1 Elven Archer, +2 Blood Knight, +2 Dark Iron Dwarf
I find this to be the weakest of the variants I examine. It mainly tries to counter control decks by enabling stronger trades through attack boosts via Dark Iron Dwarf and Abusive Sergeant, while also giving larger board presence via possible Blood Knight synergy.
What I find weakest about this deck are the two Blood Knights. First of all, there's an urge to keep Blood Knight in hand until you can get the value from the card, which means a dead card in hand. Oft times, you're simply forced to play Blood Knight without its battlecry. One Blood Knight that doesn't get value is inefficient, but two really weaken the deck.
I also find the Eleven Archer an odd choice in the deck, especially without including Amani Berserker. A 1 mana 1/1 is weak board presence, even with it's one additional battlecry damage. I personally favour Mortal Coil in this instance, since you can often get the value for the additional card draw. I would personally rather have the card draw than the additional 1/1 on the board.
Differences: -2 Mortal Coil, -2 Shieldbearer, -2 Harvest Golem, -2 Scarlet Crusader, -2 Shattered Sun Cleric, +2 Abusive Sergeant, +2 Elven Archer, +2 Amani Berserker, +1 Blood Knight, +1 King Mukla, +2 Dark Iron Dwarf
I find this deck to be a stronger variation of what the Trump deck is trying to do. Elven Archer synergy with Amani Berserker means more powerful damage to the opponent's face in aggro matchups or better ability to control the board against control and mid-range decks. An early King Mukla is a strong play against most every matchup except aggro (and especially weak against Paladin aggro). I find it's easier to get value from a single Blood Knight, and it's not as detrimental to hold it back until that advantage can be gained (although the loss of the Scarlet Crusaders impacts this somewhat).
I play this deck reasonably often when the meta is more oriented towards control. I do find this weaker against aggro matchups than Reynad's original Zoolock, but not so much that it's advantages against control will tank win percentages.
Differences: -2 Mortal Coil, -2 Shieldbearer, -1 Dire Wolf Alpha, -2 Scarlet Crusader, -2 Shattered Sun Cleric, -1 Argent Commander, +1 Power Overwhelming, +2 Abusive Sergeant, +2 Leper Gnome, +1 Amani Berserker, +1 Big Game Hunter, +1 Dark Iron Dwarf, +1 Leeroy Jenkins, +1 The Black Knight
This is mainly a tournament deck, meant to offer tools to get around many of the strengths of a control deck. Control being popular in tournament, you can't ignore it when building an aggro deck. The inclusion of Big Game Hunter and The Black Knight can get you past those mid- to late-game taunts and threats.
This deck just doesn't work on ladder. You don't see enough consecutive control matchups to make this worthwhile overall. This deck is exceptionally weak in aggro matchups. It's a much slower version of the other Zoolock decks examined. It's also weaker versus mid-range decks than the other decks examined, an archetype that Zoolock generally shines against.
I included this deck in my examinations to illustrate that a strong tournament deck (and this did get Alchemixt to a Hearth Wars season final) do not always translate successfully to ladder play. The reason being that you can always expect certain deck archetypes in tournament (control being the most popular) whereas in ladder you're always facing a variety of deck archetypes.
I personally favour Zoolock decks with as few synergies as possible. About the only strong synergies you're looking for in Reynad's original build are the Defender of Argus taunt plays and the Knife Juggler juggles. I feel the inclusion of cards like Amani Berserker encourage keeping cards in hands (i.e. not making plays) until full value can be gained. The strength of the original Zoolock is the ability to make strong plays every single turn. Synergies encourage slower play, a slightly decreased tempo, whereas Zoolock should be all about applying constant pressure to the board.
(original article: http://hearthpoe.blogspot.com/2014/07/comparing-zoolock-variations.html)
3
Only problem i have with rage is hes a bgh target i hate running him because if i have bad rng and he dosent hit what i want him to my opponent can bgh + faceless him and i auto loss. Ive currently been trying no force of nature and two mark of the wilds on ladder and its works a lot better because im not metting the decks i met last season. Last season i met 50% miracle rouge while this season im metting a lot of late game control decks like ramp druid, priest, warrior etc The ramp druid matchup is so easy after i made these changes it used to be a auto loss and now its an auto win.
4
Quote from TheSithCode »Enjoying this deck so far. Raging Worgen catches people by surprise but I imagine it will lose effectiveness in higher ranks. Still, if they happen to have no way to deal with it, boom.
Only problem I've sort of run into is card draw. Gets tight. And Shamans, I dislike Shamans.
Happy to hear!
Typically it doesn't matter whether or not you can pull off the ping and windfury because they know they can't ignore it. I've had mages coin + fireball asap and that to me is already worth it.
Card draw depends. As it runs a ton of minions you SHOULD be able to maintain board position for a little while by constantly putting them out. But yes it is tight, which is why success in my experience depends greatly on planning your turn beforehand, maximizing every card/mana available, and recognizing what deck your opponent is playing so you know when to go for the face instead of trading. TYPICALLY, when I decide to go for the face, they won't be able to race you unless they can clear the entire board, so they'll be trying to deal with your minions turn after turn which is why a lot of my wins came untouched at full life.
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Enjoying this deck so far. Raging Worgen catches people by surprise but I imagine it will lose effectiveness in higher ranks. Still, if they happen to have no way to deal with it, boom.
Only problem I've sort of run into is card draw. Gets tight. And Shamans, I dislike Shamans.
6
Great deck and easy to pick up and play. Flew through my 5 win quest very easily. Only lost once to a Miracle Rogue. And I feel that loss was mainly due to my poor card draws.
Don't have a Black Knight so I subbed in another Sunwalker.
Rank 13 player. Will be higher next month.