Deck Archetypes Guide

When you finally become established in Hearthstone with cards and choices, you can easily become lost in options. As you rank up you can also feel perplexed by the strategies of your opponents. To understand strategy you have to understand both what you are trying to do and what your opponent is trying to do. Both of these issues can be addressed by understanding the basic archetypes of gameplay. This article is a guide intended to help you construct a reasonable deck as well as help you identify your opponent’s strategy.

This article is more than just a list though. It’s insight. It’s intended to show you where you need to step up your “A-Game” and where you know you have the upper hand. As you read through this list of deck archetypes, I hope you also absorb what other player’s weaknesses are, too. It is just as important to understand your opponent as it is to understand your own strengths.

Aggro

Optimal Classes

Construction: Many small minions for low mana cost. Lots of early card draw.

Strenghts: Decks relying on late game heavy hitters. Decks that lack clears or control.

Weaknesses: Control and clear decks. Lack of a late game.

Aggro decks is a play style many players are extremely familiar with. It dominated the meta game for months while people were still learning the game and did not have a volume of cards. It also countered the priest’s Mind Control before the card was nerfed and brought up to 10 mana. The aggro deck’s goal is to do as much damage with many small minions as possible. The goal of an aggro deck is to come hard and win fast, and if your opponent cannot counter this, you will win fast.

An aggro deck isn’t difficult to spot. You’ll often see it in full force by round three. Again, the goal of an aggro deck is to set up a win scenario by turn 5, so watch your clears. If you can wipe out their entire force in turn 4, their likelihood of having draw to both recover and deal kill damage is slim. It sounds easy, but it’s often better to just mitigate as you go. If you ignore their minions, you could find yourself in quite a bind.

There isn’t a single class in the game which cannot be an aggro deck, and for that reason, it’s by far the most accessible strategy. That said, it works well with classes that can buff or has a lot of early card draw. Such classes are Warlocks, Druids, Priests, and Paladins. Shamans can do well with aggro decks because of totems and bloodlust. Also Hunters can do well if they get their Starving Buzzard early in the game. However, like I said, any class can be aggro, so always be prepared for this.

Besides the main strategy, you can also augment this strategy in two ways:

Buffing

There’s a lot to be said for buffing. Turning a 3/2 into a 4/3 is a nice upgrade, especially if you also have a 3/2 Shattered Sun Cleric on the board as a result. For this reason, the following cards are almost no-brainers for this deck: Shattered Sun Cleric, Dark Iron Dwarf, Defender of Argus. That said, because of the strength these cards had, they have been nerfed. Don’t worry, they’re still viable and totally worth it.

In addition, there’s some things you can do to really put a card over-the-top and deal some killer damage. Buffs like Bloodlust or the Blessing of Kings can help bring your low mana minions into high mana territory. However, these buffs are hard to pull off in an aggro deck because of their cost. That said, if you control the board, and you can use it, it’s often wise.

Charge

These cards are great for retaining board control. Wolfrider, Bluegill Warrior, Stonetusk Boar, and Stormwind Knight are great cards because they can instantly knock out your opponent’s low-health minions or help in removing taunt cards sooner. It’s not a major focus of the aggro deck, to be honest, because these cards are almost guaranteed not to survive long due to their low health, but they are extremely useful utility cards for the mid-game.

Combo

Multi Combo	Dual Combo	OTK Combo (Mostly Nerfed)

Construction: Set up your deck to pursue a combination of cards in your hand that benefits you in one turn.

Strenghts:There’s a variety of combo decks, so specific strengths are difficult to discuss.

Weaknesses:Relies on RNG being your friend and giving you the cards you need.

A combo deck is a deck that tries to establish a scenario with the cards in your hand that gives your player a huge advantage. Advantage can be board control, a incredibly strong minion, or even a virtually unstoppable amount of damage. Combo decks come in a lot of flavors, so discussing each one is difficult. However, it is important to note that if you have a deck that can kill someone in one turn without them being able to do anything about it, it’s likely to get nerfed as Blizzard has made it very clear that this is against their design goals.

There’s a lot of challenges to designing a proper combo deck. First off, you’re not likely to have the cards you want as soon as you can use them. You will need to have some draw in order to mine the cards you need to complete the scenario you’re going for. You need be able to delay your opponent well enough that you can obtain the cards you want for this combination. If you’re unable to get these cards in your hand when you need them, it could spell your doom.

It’s interesting to talk about what classes have successful combo decks because there’s really so many possibilities. I think it’s more important to emphasize that if your build relies on some combination of cards in your hand for either offense or defense, it technically is a combo deck. For instance, a Paladin can have a board clear by having Equality as well as either Avenging Wrath or Consecration in their hand. A Priest can rely on Divine Spirit and Lightspawn to get an early card with massive health and damage. A Hunter can rely on having two Unleash the Hounds and a Timber Wolf to deal massive damage to their opponent. The point is, the difficulty in relying on a combo isn’t in the combo itself, but in getting the combo in your hand and having the mana to use it.

There are a few types of combo decks, and here they are from lowest risk to highest:

Dual

A dual combo is a combo that can work out from multiple ways but relies on at least one card to pull it off. For instance a Paladin can board clear very easy with Consecration or Avenging wrath, but it would be even better if all his targets had one health. This is why Equality is especially helpful when playing a Paladin that has two Consecration and two Avenging Wrath in their hand. It can be a difference maker, but it’s not necessary to win. In fact, it’s in no way a kill scenario as much as a method of board control. For this reason, this combination isn’t dire, but it’s worked into the deck to be a convenient method of retaining control.

Multi

Multi combo decks are very risky, but they rarely rely on this multiple combination to initiate an win scenario. It is a choice to withhold the cards they want to set up rather than use them earlier. For instance, if a Hunter has one Timber Wolf and one Unleash the Hounds, it’s up to them if they want to use this combo now or wait until they obtain a second Unleash the Hounds or another Timber Wolf. While this may seem like it isn’t terribly risky, it can be if your entire play style depends on these sorts of combinations. If you’re unlucky, you could be waiting for a very long time to set up for that miracle hand. Then there’s combos like dual Inner Rage and Cruel Taskmaster with Charge on a Molten Giant as a Warrior. It’s risky even when you execute it, but it yields huge returns if you do.

OTK

Frankly, I doubt you’ll see these anymore, but there’s a possibility there’s still an OTK combo out there. If you find one, I suggest you keep it to yourself, because Blizzard wants none of that. Either way, just so you know, an OTK deck is a multi combo deck that relies on dumping the right combination of cards onto the field which immediately kills your opponent in the same turn. OTK stands for “One Turn Kill,” in fact. I’m sure you see the balance issues revolving around this strategy. If the opponent has no recourse to stop you just because you have the right cards in your hand, that’s not really fair, now is it? Either way, it’s a high risk build because it often requires you to have so many cards in your hand that it makes these builds a bit risky.

Control

All Classes Viable - Mage, Paladin, Shaman, and Druid are superior.

Construction: Cards which control the pace of the game allowing the player to lay down stronger cards and spells.

Strenghts: Decks that rely on many minions or cannot circumvent your control mechanisms.

Weaknesses: Silence and taunt removal. Spells bypass all control.

Control decks force calm games and tend to be a war of attrition. The goal of this is to delay the game, allowing you to execute stronger cards and preventing your own demise for as long as possible. It relies on board clears, taunts, freezes, or even debuffing your opponent’s minions to allow you to survive. Some pally decks even use healing as a method of control.

For many decks this can seem rather frustrating. A lot of players just want to play as many games as possible as fast as possible. A control deck ignores this notion and focuses on, well, surviving. Aggro decks are particularly known to be weak against control because they rarely have a solid game plan after round six.

You may think this makes it a superior choice, but there’s many counters to a control deck; specifically board clears are painful to most control decks. Secrets can neutralize control pretty easily. A spell like Flamestrike is especially damaging to control decks as it wipes out any control minions you may have. So it is vulnerable, but definitely reliable that you will likely see round eight or higher.

Any class can be control, but it’s important to note those classes which are strongest at it. As stated, Mages are interesting because they have such successful spells like Flamestrike, but they also have Frost Nova, Cone of Cold, Mirror Image, Polymorph, and Blizzard, all of which are control spells. Shaman also have Lightning Storm, Feral Spirit, Hex, and the Grounding Totem to help them maintain control. Paladins have and excellent board clear combo with Equality and either Consecration or Avenging Wrath. Druids have swipe as well as a boatload of taunt buffs and cheap taunt minions. Most classes have some form of control, but those classes are definitely great at it.

There’s a few tools you can use to construct a control deck:

Taunt

Taunt is by far the most common method of control. They force your opponent to attack your minions, buying you a lot of time. There are plenty of ways around taunt, be it silence, taunt removal, and spells, but overall it’s pretty reliable. You’re at least forcing a play when someone drops a silence minion, right? Taunt is literally in the game to aid control.

Clear

Clears are an exceptional method of retaining control. While Mages are vastly superior to other classes in this respect, there’s plenty of options, including the Doomsayer, Abomination, or even Deathwing. If your opponent loses all their minions or even if all their minions are severely damaged, then you are clearing to retain control of the situation.

Kite

Well, this is a really unique one to the Mage to be honest. It’s taken a huge hit with nerfs, too. The idea with “kiting” (and I call it that merely because of World of Warcraft) is to use spells to keep minions away while you build up enough mana to lay down some major damage. This means your Cone of Cold, Frost Nova, and Blizzard spells. It also helps with weapons builds (described below) if you use Frostbolt or Water Elemental. While other players can do a little kiting with Frost Elemental… it rarely comes up. Kiting is powerful, even after the nerfs to Mages.

Spells

Tier A: Mage / Druid / Rogue — Tier B: Priest / Paladin / Shaman

Construction: Spells! Spells that do stuff to the hero! Pew pew!

Strenghts: Bypass all defenses except Counterspell.

Weaknesses: Healing tends to mitigate pretty well. They’re one-off damage, whereas minions can hit multiple times. You also need the spells in your hand, and they’re rarely there when you need them.

Spell decks means just what it says… it uses spell damage to hurt the enemy hero. There’s no real counter to spells in this game at this time other than Counterspell, which is unfortunately a Mage-only secret. However, other classes can do some level of spell-focused damage as well.

As far as strengths go, the fact it bypasses taunt is huge. It means that a character that can directly damage the hero will have an advantage in the end game when the enemy’s health is low regardless of the minions on the board. It’s literally what makes spell damage most worthwhile. If taunt affected spells, they just wouldn’t be as worth it. Can you imagine having a Pyroblast wasted on a Silverback Patriarch?

Regardless of this, spells have a definite weakness in that they’re one-off damage. You hit something, and then it’s over. With a minion you at least get some possible board clear with every single one you drop. They could attack multiple times, too. A spell, well, that’s over as soon as it lands. This means spell damage’s greatest counter is healing. Deal six, heal four, they netted two damage and really didn’t get much out of their turn. This is especially true if you’re able to place a minion on the board in the process.

Spell decks are mostly the domain of Mages, which is I think why people dislike this class so much. Druids and Rogues also have some useful spell damage going for them that can be quite practical. While other classes can do so-so with spell damage, it’s really rare it’s the major game center. So if you see a Mage, you will likely see spells being a focus. If you see a Rogue, there’s a decent chance. If you see a Druid, it’s less likely, but still possible. Any other class, I wouldn’t expect it much.

There’s two approaches to a spell deck:

Quality

Quality means more bang for your buck, so more spell damage minions. This isn’t a bad choice as using puts a minion on the field at the very least. Even if the minion dies, it at least draws a great deal of attention. Some minions, such as the Kobold Geomancer, are such low cost that you may be able to play one or two of them before you even cast a spell. Unfortunately, it’s hard to keep spell damage up because people tend to get nervous about it. If you can, your fireballs can turn into a Pyroblast (especially with Malygos).

Quantity

Quantity means you put as many spells in your deck as possible and cast them whenever reasonable. It’s actually pretty safe for a mage to live that way, but I think you’ll find with other classes that you’ll be better off using spells for removal. Mages just have the book for it, and that’s a pretty nifty class trait. Frostbolt followed by two Ice Lance is a great combo, for instance, and it can really be a tide turner. No other class can spell cast quantity enough to be competitive.

Class Specialty

Some classes can do things others can’t. Unlike spell decks, these are literally only viable to these specific classes and cannot be properly implemented by others. They’re they’re own “archetype” because, well, they don’t typically fit into the bean boxes above. Here’s three examples to show what I mean:

Bouncy Rogue

Optimal Classes

Construction: Use any and all minions and spells which put a card back into the owner’s hand. Also tons of battlecry minions.

Strenghts:It’s a bit control, it’s a bit offense. It’s hard to keep track of anything you own, but it’s also the same for your opponent.

Weaknesses:It’s really dependent on the minions in play.

The bouncy decks are peculiar. They’re decks which rely on kicking cards back into the opponent’s hand and vice versa. It uses battlecry over and over to buff your minions or deal damage to the opponent. Essential cards are Ancient Brewmaster, Youthful Brewmaster, Sap, Shadowstep, and Kidnapper. You also want a lot of cards like Stormpike Commando which damage or Darkscale Healer which heals. It also works great with buffing cards like Shattered Sun Cleric.

Divine Shield Paladin

Optimal Classes

Construction: Anything with a divine shield, spells which give divine shield, and Blood Knights.

Strenghts: Divine shield is crazy annoying, and if you keep them up, Blood Knights can become quite powerful. The shield are always two hits for one minion drop.

Weaknesses: Anyone who is aware of what you’re doing won’t let those shield last long. Not to mention that damage done to all characters removes shield.

So Paladins have these divine shields they can drop on minions. Cool stuff! This tactic is using that to your advantage. Drop everything with a divine shield and hope you can get a Blood Knight down. Even if you don’t, the divine shield mobs are pretty strong by virtue of being two hits for one drop. It’s an interesting tactic and does have some merit and work pretty well.

Minionless Mage

Optimal Classes

Construction: Spells! Also Mana Wrath and Venture Co. Mercenary, perhaps.

Strenghts:Almost all decks revolve around killing minions and using minions. When they can’t, well, it’s tough to work against.

Weaknesses: Frankly, with the new cost of control spells and pyroblast, this is a bit more difficult to pull off.

This deck is still valid, but really much harder to pull off since the Mage nerf. Please see the following for more information: https://ihearthu.com/minionless-mage-how-to-throw-off-control-decks/

Secrets

Another archetype worth mentioning are secrets decks. Only three classes have secrets: Hunters, Mages, and Paladins. Some have made decks using every secret as the main source of control. This is especially effective for Mages, lesser so Hunters, and even lesser Paladins. Nonetheless, given the right cards to support these builds, they can have some moderate success. It’s a fun type of build, but you have to realize, when you use a secret, you’re not in control of when that secret goes off (except for Ice Block). This means it’s not exactly control, but more of a consequence deck. The best way to play this style is to be as random and unpredictable as possible with your secrets, really. After all, the what’s the point of a secret if everyone knows what it is.

Weapons

Weapons decks use weapons. I know shock, right? The only valid classes are Warrior, Paladin, and Hunter. While Shaman have weapons, it’s a bit more unusual to see a Shaman use them as the main source of damage. Warriors definitely do well with this build. This build synergizes well with the pirate deck, as well. It’s somewhat effective, and definitely fun to play.