The Meta Report #31

Team DKMR: Twitter | Website
Sponsored by: Hearthstats | Gunnar | 2P.com | Waypoint Media | SoulFireMasters

This week we have the last of the new cards! Will we see an increase in play in the ladder this week from a class that isn’t seeing much play? Will a class that died off, rise out of the ashes and become a popular deck again? You will have to read this week’s Meta Report to find out!

Here’s Team DKMR’s weekly Meta ranking. Keep in mind, it’s about which classes and archetypes are played the most, not about which are the strongest. Most of the time, the strongest decks will also be the most frequently played, but that’s not always the case. That’s just part of how the Meta works

Hunter: Still the king of the hill, the new found love for Midrange Hunter has not subsided and the amount of Hunter players on the ladder only seems to increase. There are so many variations out there on the ladder right now that it’s hard to keep track, some playing many secrets, some playing none and some decks even making use of cards like Undertaker as well as Mad Scientist. A new set of Naxx cards has just been released however and they are some of the more hyped cards like Echoing Ooze and Kel’Thuzad; these don’t seem to synergize very well with Hunter. Maybe this will make players lean towards trying decks with these new cards instead in the upcoming weeks?

Warrior: Rising from the bottom of the pile we have Warrior and this is a prime example of what Naxxramus is doing to the meta, one week no one plays the class and then suddenly some cards that synergize well with a class comes out and then it becomes one of the strongest classes out there. With Death’s Bite as well as Sludge Beltcher and Unstable Guul, Warrior has certainly become a class to be reckoned with on the ladder and with popular streamers such as Trump and Kolento taking a liking to the class, Warrior has only gotten more play on the ladder.

Warlock: There has been a quite unexpected decrease in the amount of Warlock players out there over the last week. Many people are straying away from the always popular Zoolock, maybe because of the rise of a Warrior deck that does very well against it. Even though Undertaker was released last week which was predicted to be a card that would tip Zoolock over the edge of becoming too powerful it seems like people didn’t find it that good. The Meta has shifted towards a more control oriented scene which does not benefit the fast paced Zoolock.

Rouge: Over the last couple of weeks there has been a steady decrease of Rogue players on the ladder and this week is no different. It seems a little bit strange that this is the case since we feel like the deck is still super strong but it seems like players are simply playing the new equally as strong decks out there at the moment. Nothing has really changed with Rogue the last few weeks and it might just be that many are tired of the deck that dominated the meta for so long.

Druid: Over the last few days Druid has slowly come back into the meta from having completely disappeared. Both some new variations of Token druid with Undertaker, Haunter Creeper as well as some of the old goodies like Force of Nature and Savage Roar and Ramp Druid which is basically just running all the big taunt minions that you can think of. The only problem for Druid is that it is still weak to Midrange Hunter which is dominating the meta and the only way for Druid to come back to the top is to find a way to combat this.

Priest: The increase in Priest we saw last week seems to have slowed down a bit over the last few days. The big streamers have strayed away from the class and soon thereafter the result was the same on the ladder. Although Preist have seen many new cool additions with the new Naxx cards the class still struggles against many matchups which makes it a bit weaker on the ladder compared to something like Midrange Hunter or Miracle Rogue which can win against almost anything. Another factor that has caused people to shy away from Priest is that the final week of cards don’t synergize at all with the class and many want to play decks where they will strive.

Shaman: It seems like more and more people are jumping off the Shaman train that started a few weeks back when Haunted Creeper and Nerubian Egg were first released. The Shaman class card seemed to be kind of a bust and even though many felt that Baron Rivendale could be extremely good in Shaman it hasn’t seen much play. No one is debating the validity of Shaman as a class because it is for sure still extremely strong but unfortunately many of the most popular decks like Midrange Hunter are very good against the class much like Priest. Maybe the new cards this week can turn the class around?

Mage: So… Secret Mage is a thing. With the addition of Mad Scientist this deck has become a force to be reckoned with since it plays 6-8 secrets depending on the deck list. However with the amount of Hunters running double flare it is very hard to play this deck on the ladder right now and this is the sole reason we are not seeing tons and tons of mage being played. There is no other deck that can effectively play against than Secret Mage simply because it is so hard to figure out what the secrets are and you can’t play around them all always. When the Midrange Hunter craze dies down expect this deck to be one of the first to increase in play.

Paladin: Paladin has once again fallen to the bottom of the pile now that the Tauntadin hype has slowly died down. Even though the deck is still very strong many have once again put this class down as they simply favor the decks that are in flavour right now with Midrange Hunter and Control Warrior. The players that favor the style that Tauntadin provided in that super heavy control with a lot of removal can now play Control Warrior which does the same thing and still have a very high chance of beating every deck on the ladder.

Deck of the Week

This week we have a classic Control Warrior with some Naxxramas twists that have been springing up on the ladder recently. The strength of Control Warrior is it’s ability to outlast Aggro decks by throwing up taunts and armoring up, while also having weapons to efficiently remove minions turn after turn. Warrior has a lot of very inexpensive, yet very strong removal which allows us to fit a lot of high mana threats into the deck, with the result being the following deck list.