The Meta Report #35

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With Hunter’s days numbered, has the meta begun to shift or is Hunter still numero uno? Who are we kidding, of course it is! Check out the meta report to see what else is doing well!

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: Hunter hangs onto the top spot for one last week. With Starving Buzzard being nerfed, and to a lesser extent Leeroy Jenkins, it’s hard to expect Hunter to have a strong showing in the coming weeks. However, now is now, and Buzzard is still an incredibly powerful draw engine maintaining Hunter’s dominant position in the meta. What really puts Hunter over the top is its lack of truly poor match-ups. Expect lots of players to take advantage of this week to play Hunter and 2-mana Starving Buzzard one last time.

Priest: Deathrattle Priest continues to remain a popular deck. The deck arguably utilizes Undertaker better than any other deck. It backs up the powerful zombie with a large tool kit and a Hero Power capable of keeping Undertaker in the fight that much longer. Some players have opted to play cards like Ysera and Mind Control over Thoughtsteal in order to shore up the deck’s weaker control match-ups.

Warlock: Zoo keeps Warlock as one of the more popular classes on the ladder. While Hunter keeps Handlock close to unplayable on the ladder, Handlock was a popular choice by players in the World Qualifiers last week in order to counter Miracle Rogue (which was popular as a counter to Hunter). Expect Handlock to crop up more with the Hunter nerfs, but expect Warlock to play Zoo in the meantime!

Warrior: Warrior remains a powerful deck in the current meta, sporting a reasonable Hunter match-up and few truly bad match-ups. Warrior has suffered slightly recently due to the increased play of Harrison Jones (meant to counter Hunter, Rogue, and Warrior). Expect Warrior to see increased play after the Hunter nerfs.

Shaman: Shaman has seen increased play on the ladder due to its tournament success and strong match-ups. While particularly weak to Priest, Feral Spirit and efficient removal give it a reasonable Hunter match-up. Flametounge Totem and Haunted Creeper give the deck a strong proactive game plan and Hex gives you an answer to nearly anything. Expect Shaman to maintain its popularity after the nerfs.

Druid: Druid seemed like the best deck for the longest time, but then the meta sped up and outpaced Midrange Druid. With cards like Freezing Trap and Sap being popular in the meta, Druid has struggled. Where once it relied heavily on pushing initiative with early Innervates, those turn 2 Chillwind Yetis are now easily countered with the efficient bounce spells. Expect Druid to see a re-emergence with both Hunter and Rogue taking a hit in the upcoming nerfs.

Rogue: Rogue has seen a reasonable amount of tournament and ladder play as Miracle has seen a small resurgence. However, this uptick will likely be short-lived as the Leeroy nerf devastates Rogue’s game winning combo potential. In the meantime, expect a fair number of players seeking to deal 18 damage on turn 8 a few more times.

Mage: In a world of Haunted Creepers and other small minions, Mage’s Hero Power is quite powerful. However, the deck has struggled to find the consistency it once had on the ladder. While some variants of Mage seeking value with combos like Loot Hoarder, Undertaker, and Duplicate have seen some play on the ladder, Mage is still a relatively unpopular class.

Paladin: While popular as a Hunter counter and general all-around solid control deck in tournaments, Paladin has struggled to find a place on the ladder as of late. Paladin Aggro benefited little from Avenge while Paladin Control remains a fairly inefficient and slow method for climbing ranks.

Deck of the Week: Zetalot Deathrattle Priest

This week we will take a look at the Deathrattle Priest, mainly innovated by Zetalot. There are a lot of variations of it , we will use the list [DKMR]Faramir played in the Blizzcon Qualifiers. The reason it got so popular is that it consistently has a winrate from around 60% against Hunter, which is more than most of the other classes can say of itself. It also does fairly well against other meta decks right now, so it see a lot of play in tournaments and on ladder. Lets break down the cards and analyze what this deck wants to do. Before we start though, we need to say, “Priest is a thief and in the course of this article you will learn why”.