I still need to make changes, because it can’t beat Hunter often, and I’m seeing 40%+ hunter.
I made a novelty silence priest deck, with deathlord, wailing soul, dancing swords, ancient watcher and venture Co. Mercenary.
I don’t think there’s quite enough minions for the theme to work. But it’s sort of interesting to play with.
Quaro
1845
I felt like I’ve lost my way, been getting stomped at all the levels of the ladder. Resorted to netdecking… and still treading water at the bottom of the ladder. Wow.
Decided to screw it, made a Paladin deck with the contraint that I had to use every single secret and do the best I could. Won 6 in a row. Eye for an Eye even won a game. lol. I give up.
prolix
1846
Arena is crazy. Sometimes I draw killer decks that just get stomped, and then sometimes I just flail around picking value minions and end up 7-3. Whatever the results, it is a refreshing change of pace from constructed, where you just see the same builds over and over and over and over and over.
Still having fun with my secrets mage though.
Keep putting up priest builds; I really enjoy playing priest but cannot seem to come up with anything that is better than “above average.” Not sure I’m sold on zombie chow since it only works if you can combo it with Auchenai. Deathlord is a huge improvement though!
More Survivaldin stuff!
I’ve been continuing to play with this deck. Made a handful of changes to where I think I’m at a local maximum (added KT and Shade of Naxx, crafted a Sunwalker and a Sunfury, dropped Tauren Warrior, went back to 1x Brewmaster).
The result of all my tweaking and crafting and etc is that I’m bobbing right around rank 15, which is significantly worse than I was doing last month. I don’t think the bulk of my changes were that negative, and I don’t think I’ve gotten a lot worse, so I think the meta might just be working against this deck at the moment. Thoughts in no particular order:
- Maybe last month was easier than usual because people were playing Naxx content?
- I feel like I’m seeing more hard removal (Hex, Polymorph)?
- Speaking of which, I feel like I need silence or hard removal myself. Aldor Peacekeeper is the closest this deck comes, which doesn’t quite cut it, but that could just be vividness bias talking. My tendency to water down decks to handle any situation often makes them sloppy messes.
- My understanding is that the Naxx cards were, on balance, anti-aggro. This may mean more late-game control decks? which means less success for mid-range decks? I’m seeing more games get to 10+ turns.
- Seeing more mage-secret decks, which means more hunters running Flare, which hurts a little.
- Feel like I’m seeing lots of mage decks in general, which is a dodgy matchup for this deck (divine shield, etc)
I’m not 100% sold on KT yet. If I’m at turn 8, and I have minions on the board, that probably means that I’m in good shape.
I am stagnating bobbling around 15 as well. Even though I am playing my “fun” secret deck, I confess to being a little disheartened it seems to have reached its limit. I may try a few more tweaks before bailing but part of me is definitely thinking “sod it, I think I will play zoo for a couple of weeks to rank up”.
Buzzard and Leroy Jenkins to be nerfed to become 5 mana drops.
Squee
1850
Yes. YES. YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS.
That golden Leeroy I unpacked months ago is paying off now. Glad I held off on tearing him up, was hoping they’d nerf Leeroy since he’s the key to just about every stupid fucking combo in the game.
Happy he’s getting a nerf both for gameplay reasons and because of all the sweet sweet dust. Although to be honest I would’ve preferred if they just gave him the “Cannot be targeted by hero powers and spells” ability. That would have removed his ability to combo most things (20 damage empty board warlock combo, 26 empty board rogue combo, 24 empty board shaman combo) and would have made him more appealing just as a minion. If you had taunt or a sweeper to clear away whelps he’d work just as a 6/2 with charge, etc. Just bumping him to 5 mana means the combos are lessened a little. Warlock can no longer do 20 damage and could only do 12 (With current decks), rogue 20, shaman 21.
“was hoping they’d nerf Leeroy since he’s the key to just about every stupid fucking combo in the game.”
Totally agree.
Brakara
1852
The Buzzard nerf is glorious as well. Can’t wait for September 22 now.
Yeah, basically they have nerfed two of the most annoying combos. It’s great the game allows for comebacks, but these were forcing people to play against the possibility they might be played, instead of playing against what was really happening on the game.
Both make some sense, although as Squee mentions, I don’t think this is going to change Leroy all that much. It’s possible the change will have more impact than first glance though, somebody with more familiarity with running those decks might have some insight.
Buzzard is pretty huge though. He’s going to 5? That’s a huge cost increase. That means you basically need 3 draws for him to be worth it?
I guess it makes you have to make a tradeoff between early unleash the hounds and card draw before end game, instead of getting both every time. Since you still more or less need to assume he dies in 1 turn, he’s an end game play only now.
Heh. Reincarnate Shaman is now the best Leroy…
slantz
1856
Unfortunately between work and Destiny I haven’t been playing as much, but I’m currently at a 5x win streak with Survivadin at Rank 15. In the last couple of seasons, I was able to get up to 5-7 without too much hassle, but I didn’t have the time to invest in grinding up from there. So it’s hard to say if that was a hard ceiling or if I just needed to put in the time after that.
I totally agree with your comments around the shift from aggro to control, and I have been inching up my average cost a bit to compensate. That shift would also explain the presence of more hard removal, which you’re right, can really sting. And sure enough, it’d also mean the deck having its own silence/removal could help as well. I’m not as worried (yet) about my own silence/removal because the deck seems to still perform through brute force and versatility, but I’ll keep an eye on it.
I do think KT is a rock solid bomb, as long as you have a reasonable minion presence on the board and you use him from a pure-control mindset. He won’t prevent imminent death by direct-damage or charge (taunt helps with the latter), but most of the time he translates to quick and complete board control with a win coming a turn or two later.
FWIW I’m still not sold on Brewmaster. I think he’s just too tangential to the core premise and there are stronger cards to use. Do you feel like he’s an active credit to the deck?
I disagree. Pushing Leeroy one turn back creates a significant difference, since many decks that use it are very agressive and tend to be (in my experience) really low on health when they finally pull the combo off).
I’m coming around on KT. I think the problem is that he can’t recover a game that’s already in the hole the way some Legendaries can, but he can absolutely tip a game that’s even or slightly behind back into your favor. At 6/8, he’s also not a terrible top-deck to hit with an empty board.
I still have 1 Brewmaster because I like that he’s a no-guilt turn 1/2 drop. I often feel stranded in the early game, because many of the 1 and 2 drops really need somebody already on the board to be useful (Abusive Sergeant, Sunfury, Argent Protector) - Sunfury I’m willing to drop without a target, but the others are total wastes. Really, he replaces a Haunted Creeper. I just can’t help but feel that haunted creeper wasn’t making enough of an impact on the board. I know the Creeper is crazy efficient in theory, so maybe I need to re-evaluate again. (Maybe I should swap out an Abusive Sergeant with a creeper…) I see it as a Raptor with upside - bouncing a minion is almost never a straight negative for me.
I think you mentioned you have a Dire Wolf Alpha in that slot? I like the straight 3 attack, because it counters the 1/3 utilities (Northshire, etc). I was trying to find a 2 drop that’s strictly better, but wasn’t really able to think of one.
JFrazer
1859
Wow, that buzzard nerf is harsh. Bumping it to a 3/2 is little compensation. The 5 cost makes sense for a card with such a strong draw component, but I feel it should have been raised to a 3/3 to bump the survivability up a bit. By turn 5, a 2 health card might as well be 1 health in most cases.
Leeroy is more reasonable now. Not nerfed in to the ground, still worth running and comboing with. I still don’t own one, so I’m especially happy to see him slowed down a bit :)
I’m anxious to get up to the higher ranks to see what it’s like. I haven’t been able to play much, maybe a game or two every other day, but have managed to move up to rank 11 using my shaman deathrattle deck with very few losses in there. At times the deck feels imbalanced, but I expect I’ll get slapped down a lot more once I’m in the single digits.
prolix
1860
Leeroy nerf is overdue and welcome. I think they overdid it on Buzzard though. Five mana for a 3/2 is pretty rough, even with the card draw bonus. Four seems more in line.
Trelane
1861
Even at 4 mana I think buzzard would be mediocre, at 5 it’s probably unplayable. Buzzard-Unleash is now like Sprint, which is considered a poor card. Except you may get fewer cards than Sprint. And it requires 2 cards. And you might need 9 mana + Timber wolf or 10 mana + Hyena to make the hounds actually useful. And all those cards are dead in your hand until you have the combo AND the mana.
I wonder if the buzzard nerf isn’t just about the buzzard, but is also about how Blizzard thinks the entire Hunter class “should be played”.
