When Rexxar Hunts Alone - Diving into the Kobolds Spell Hunter Archetype
Spell Hunter is a new archetype brought to us with Kobolds & Catacombs. Let's look at what makes it tick and why you should be giving it a shot.
The Face is the Place
Rexxar does not, typically, hunt alone. Hunter has been an aggressive class since Hearthstone was in beta, providing players with minions, spells, weapons, and a hero power that collude to deal damage early and often. So-called Face Hunter decks were a force years back, when Knife Juggler and Leper Gnome aided Rexxar's beasts, and the archetype has surged back time and again. It's usually what Hunter does best.
That hasn't stopped Blizzard from promoting other Hunter archetypes. Cloaked Huntress and Professor Putricide inspired decks that leaned heavily on secrets to keep tempo and win games. Deathstalker Rexxar and its Build-A-Beast mechanic gave players perhaps their first means to keep up in control match-ups. But these cards lack consistency. While other classes had decks of 30 cards working in synergy, Hunter decks attempting anything other than aggressive gameplans felt like an amalgam of disparate parts: a fast opener, Savannah Highmane on turn six, Deathstalker Rexxar late. Reinforcing this stagnancy is a hero power with no flexibility, unlike Warlock, Paladin, and Mage. For a while, this formula hasn't competed with tier 1 decks.
No Minions Allowed
Enter Spell Hunter, the newest Hunter archetype not-so-subtly presented by Blizzard. Not to be confused with Secret Hunter, Spell Hunter runs zero minions—just spells, weapons, Spellstones, and the Death Knight. Two new cards promote this archetype. To My Side! summons two random animal companions for six mana (only one if your deck contains minions), while the legendary weapon Rhok'delar features a Battlecry that fills your hand with random Hunter spells. Both have so far over-performed expectations, making Spell Hunter an immediate threat on ladder.
The best part? Although Hearthstone is increasingly criticized for being expensive, Spell Hunter is a relatively cheap deck, requiring just a handful of cards from the Kobolds and Catacombs expansion.
Kibler immediately popularized the archetype, piloting his list to seven straight wins on stream after Kobolds and Catacombs went live. It's worth noting that most of those matches were against Tempo Mage, which fares poorly against this deck (especially Freezing Trap). It struggles to combat Warrior's armor gain and removal and hits a wall (after wall after wall) against Control Warlock. But competitive viability aside, the deck is just plain fun. We'd wager this is the reason for its popularity anyway.
Kibler's list runs a lot of cards that will get Hunter fans excited. The secrets confuse opponents and often force awkward, sub-optimal plays, triggering the new Lesser Emerald Spellstone in the process. These Spellstones flood your board with Beasts after you have committed secrets, making their removal difficult without a timely Hellfire, Dragonfire Potion, or Whirlwind/Sleep with the Fishes combo. If your Wolves manage to stay on the board for a turn, they deal repeated damage and threaten buffs by both To My Side! and Call of the Wild. Flanking Strike provides a means to protect these wolves and regain tempo if you have lost it. And fewer things are more satisfying than using Hunter's Mark and either Candleshot or On the Hunt to remove a Y'Shaarj, Rage Unbound or Deathwing unscathed.
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Which RNG Is Best?
People can argue about To My Side! all day, but there's no denying that Rhok'delar is ultimately what persuades players away from sticky minions like Savannah Highmane and toward low-cost spells like Hunter's Mark. It's effect feels reminiscent of Yogg-Saron, Hope's End, only it will always fill your hand with things to play—and never kills you. It can even give you more secrets, in case you haven't had an opportunity to trigger your Spellstones.
[Side note: In Wild, the existence of Lock and Load makes Rhok'delar better by a lot.]
There's merit to the argument that the benefits of Rhok'delar and To My Side! do not outweigh those of playing, say, Yogg and Arcane Giants, even Cloaked Huntress, in the same spell-heavy package. Yogg provides a last-ditch win condition, the Giants provide much-needed late-game threats, and Cloaked Huntress, in the right hand, can trigger an overwhelming early tempo swing. Or will these decks fade out entirely as control decks tech in the AoE they need to keep Rexxar's arcane Wolves at bay?
The answers to these questions will be worked out over the next few weeks, as the meta continues to change and players continue to experiment. But for now, Spell Hunter has asserted itself as the new, fun, and inexpensive deck to beat.
Meh, not thrilled about this archetype. However, Hunter is my least played class, so what do I know.
i wasn't happy when i got the hunter weapon, but i have to admit for the first time, i m having fun with Rexxar!
Who says that they don't use minions in this deck? Have you played it, or watched someone play it?
Yes, you don't have minion cards but you can summon minions with your spells. Who cares how they get to the board as long as you have them and the deck is fun and/or competitive?
If we use your logic then the other classes shouldn't have minions almost at all, because they don't use them in WOW.
HS is a different platform than WOW. Don't take the words like "spell" and "summon" literally.
In WOW you had to use an ability to call your pets. In HS this ability falls under the spell category. It doesn't necessarily mean that they summoned it like Warlocks do. Warriors don't use spells in WOW but they have spells in Hots. To keep the game simple all abilities fall under the spell category.
Deck is still underwhelming. Last time I said so I got downvoted. Now people are starting the rumblings of 'not T1'. Face it, the deck is fading away.
I just want to point out that this is the first deck I can recall that goes for a true class card only archetype. Think about it for a moment. I've found it rather dull in the past when the majority of decks are running the same neutral minions, Dr Boom, Doomsayers, Cobalt Scalebanes, Bonemares, etc. The list goes on. It's actually rather refreshing, especially if you enjoy hunter has a class.
I actually would rather see the other classes see a similar treatment, future sets with larger class card pools and fewer neutral cards. Really forge that class identity.
I've done renounce when I was bored, it's by far not the very first card you may want to use only class cards with.
also, more class cards and fewer neutral is not consumer nor player-friendly, considering the removal of certainty in value for money from the adventure wings to replace it will full on rng-locked progression this year. If they made fewer neutral cards all around useful, it would cost way too much dust therefore way too much real world money to make just a single deck in a single game compared to buying real games where you can get the full game or most of it anyways in one go. I'd wind up purchasing hearthranger instea dof ever buying a bundle again int he game. And I played since beta and bought every bundle except for mean streets and every adventure wing except for nax with cash.... but that would be the last straw, I am already displeased with the lack of neutral legends, let alone ones actually useful outside the recruiter, and the abundance of class specific legendaries in which it makes decks far more expensive to play unless you win at the slot machine and grab both legendaries for the class in a few cases in their equivalent of lootboxes (packs). botting will be way freaking cheaper next year at this rate. My wild experiences seem to tell me lot sof people already had this bright idea at least since the second expansion this year. I don't blame them.
i rarely vote but this piece of misconception deserves my -1. absolutely disagree, best times of hearthstone involved less cards in general and more stronger neutral minions.
The only way to a completly new archetype to survive after the early weeks of a new expansion set is the support future cards will give to it. Actually only two cards push you into this new minions-less Hunter: To My Side! and Rhok'delar and that is not even close to ok. When the new meta will be shaped and new Tier 1 decks will come out, then all the new clucky experimental deck will be simply shoved away. Two cards are not enough to make this new type of Hunter worth it: lots of more cards are needed in the future or it will be another dead idea like many others in the past.
I really hope the Hunter Class will be able to surpass the Face archetype that has been its trademark almost since beta.
Nah
lol, I made face hutner out of the dungeon run choices I wa spresented with, it was the only class to beat all 8 bosses the first run, the other classes i got bored with after a few failed runs each. face hunter isnt going anywhere any time soon. especially as cheap as it typically is to play, making it not only fairly effective (including for bots if the game becomes too slow and winrate too low for grinding to be practical) but also and more importantly accessible to most players within a month or so of starting the game (considering enough time to gather dust to craft missing components).
TLDR face hunter isnt going anywhere any time soon no matter what they do
Now, the deck is fun and surprisingly effective.
Maybe a t3 deck, overall. I doubt any better without further support.
I was about to craft To My Side!, simply because i like Hunter, and having a new viable archetype is great.
But now, with the silent lockdown of Deathstalker Rexxar to Frozen Throne Beasts, noway i am gonna spend any resource on Hunter!
DK Rexxar is fancy and all. Powerful but very inconsistent. Now with an increasingly narrowed set of options, inconsistency is bound to grow.
And DK is a key card for whatever Hunter archetype that wants to have chances beyond the Midrange clock.
Wild, yes. But would you try and spend resources on a crippled deck with crippled cards?
Man, this archetype is fun... and reminds me of the good ol' days of Yogg-Lock & Load hunter. I was cautiously optimistic when the archetype was revealed... and am glad that it is as fun as I hoped AND maybe even viable.
The weapon honestly feels like a win more card (crafted it this AM and haven't used it once in >10 games). It seems the DK/weapon help against control... I echo the comment of the deck being strong against tempo mage (flare is very strong and no minions). Deck seems like it may struggle against opponents who don't attack you with minion damage and also have large board sweepers (control warrior/heavy control lock/OTK mage).
I'm 7-0 with Kibler's deck so far and Rhok'delar has dealt 8 damage and I've played one spell from it during all 7 games combined. Not impressed.
that stinks; i crafted it this morning (cautiously being early in the expansion cycle), but so far no regrets. i've had pretty good luck with the rng spells; x2 call of the wild in a recent match, and arcane shot comes up pretty often too which comes in handy for adding up lethal in several games.
Wow you have 700% winrate then
I don't know if it'll be a tier 1 deck when the meta settles, but I haven't won a game against it yet as I've been doing my own experimenting. It's way, way better than it should be, mostly thanks to the 4-mana damage/wolf card and the spellstone, as much or more than To My Side and the weapon.
I'm going to be toying around with the idea of putting in the Barnes Y'Sharrj package in this deck. Obviously anti-synergy with To My Side & the weapon, but if you do happen to get it before those cards you get a big highroll pay off.