Deck of the Week: Post-TGT Class Rankings

Last week’s Deck of the Week talked about my impressions of the latest Hearthstone expansion, The Grand Tournament.  Overall, I was pretty let down by the new cards added in this expansion, especially the ones with TGT’s new mechanics, Inspire and Joust.  This week, I’ll rank each class, post TGT, to see where they stand. 

I’ll be making my rankings based off of personal experience on the ranked ladder, comments from professional players/casters, and most importantly, pick rates in recent competitive tournaments.  In addition to ranking each class, I’ll try and explain how the expansion affected it, and give what new card impacted each class the most.

1.  Warrior

Warrior has been the top class in Hearthstone, both competitively and on the ranked ladder, for a long time, thanks to one little card called the Grim Patron.  Ever since Blackrock Mountain introduced the card and its synergies with a warrior’s natural ability to add charge and deal 1 damage at a time to minions were discovered, Grim Patron Warrior has been the deck to beat.  Many people were hoping that TGT would give rise to some other decks or cards that could counter this deck, but it seems nothing short of a nerf will bring down this powerhouse.

Impact from TGT:  None.  TGT added no cards that Patron Warrior includes in its deck.  Some cards like Bash and Justicar Trueheart have made their way into the Control Warrior decklists, but Control Warrior is simply inferior right now.

Best TGT Card:  Bash

2.  Druid

Druid is far and away the biggest winner in this expansion, all on the back of one card, Darnassus Aspirant.  Druid has always been a solid class with its mana ramping abilities and the Force of Nature + Savage Roar combo to seal a victory.  Until TGT however, if a druid didn’t draw into his ramping cards before turn 3 or so, the druid player was often too far behind on board to stabilize and get the opponent into combo range.  Along comes Darnassus Aspirant which is not only a solid 2/3 minion for 2 mana, giving the druid a better early game board presence, but it also ramps up your mana!  Basically, this one card shored up most druid deck’s weaknesses and turned them into strengths.  It also has a good match up against Warlock typically, the next class on the list.

Impact from TGT:  High.  Darnassus Aspirant single-handedly shot druids from middle of the pack to a top tier deck.  Savage Combatant is also one of the few Inspire-type cards that sees play right now, although not every decklist runs it.

Best TGT Card:  Darnassus Aspirant

3.  Warlock

The warlock class has always been strong thanks to the versatility of its hero power.  Because they can draw cards at will, warlocks usually have more options in hand than other classes, letting them react more easily to threats or flood the board with minions.  The most popular version right now is a demon teched Handlock, featuring lots of giants, some heavy hitting demons, and some Voidcallers to get those demons out for free.  The main reason for Handlock’s popularity is a favored match up against Patron Warrior.  Zoolock is still around, but mostly on ladder as it doesn’t fare so well against warriors and druids.

Impact from TGT:  Low.  The current Demon Handlock came about mostly in response to Druid becoming so strong but none of the new cards from the expansion made their way into either Handlock or Zoolock.

Best TGT Card:  Dreadsteed

4.  Hunter

The choice between Hunter and Mage for the fourth spot was a tough one.  Mage has certainly been on the upswing since TGT released, but in the recent Americas Championship, Hunter tied Warrior for the most played deck, with 5 of the 8 players bringing it.  Again, this has little to do with any new cards from the expansion and more to do with Hunter simply still being a strong class with lots of deck variations.  Mid-range Hunter seems to be the current favorite, but Hybrid Hunter still sees lots of action.

Impact from TGT:  Low.  The only TGT card that sees regular play right now is Bear Trap, but some of the beast related ones like King’s Elekk and Ram Wrangler see play from time to time.  King’s Elekk is probably the best card in the game that features the Joust mechanic, though that’s not saying much.

Best TGT Card:  Bear Trap

5.  Mage

Tempo Mage has experienced a renaissance thanks to TGT cards Arcane Blast and Spellslinger.  Both of these cards have great synergy with a Tempo Mage’s bread and butter minion, Flamewaker.  Arcane Blast also fills a bit of a hole in the Mage’s spell line up.  Until Arcane Blast was added, mages didn’t have a 2 damage for 1 mana spell like several other classes.  What is keeping Tempo Mage down right now is the strength of the Big 3 classes.  They are simply more reliable and aren’t impacted so much by random pings or Unstable Portal drawing a bad minion.  Frost Mage has also almost disappeared as well.

Impact from TGT:  Medium.  Mages got some good cards, but other cards like Effigy just don’t fit the meta right now.  Effigy needs high cost minions to be effective and Flamelance requires lots of opposing high health minions.  If more heavy control decks were being played right now, TGT would have made more difference to mages.

Best TGT Card:  Spellslinger

6.  Paladin

Paladins actually got a lot of help from TGT cards.  Mysterious Challenger is simply the most overpowered card from the expansion.  The card is a 6/6 for 6 mana and it plays one of every secret in your deck for you.  Most Secret Paladins run around 4 or 5 secrets, meaning you get about 10 mana worth of effects all for 6 mana.  Paladins also got the best Inspire-type minion in the game, the Murloc Knight.  This summons a random murloc every time you use your hero power.  Sadly, Secret Paladin isn’t consistent enough for competitive play, though most paladins on the ladder are running it right now.  Control Paladin is also fairly weak right now, even with cards like Justicar Trueheart.  The meta is just too fast for most control decks to keep up.

Impact from TGT:  High.  Paladins got not only a brokenly strong card in Mysterious Challenger, but also Murloc Knight, the only Inspire-type minion that sees regular play.  They still have trouble closing out games though and this is keeping them down.

Best TGT Card:  Murloc Knight

7.  Priest

Priest was another winner when it comes to new cards from TGT.  Twilight Guardian and Wyrmrest Agent finally gave the class enough synergies to build a strong dragon variant.  The problem is that Dragon Priest decks lack any way to close out a game besides board control or lucky draws from Ysera.  Without any reliable burst combos to finish off an opponent, if the other class is able to stabilize, Priest simply starts dying a slow death.

Impact from TGT:  High.  Next to Paladin, Priest is the only other class to get a completely new competitive deck archetype out of this expansion.  It’s also the only class with a competitive dragon synergy deck.  All it needs now is burst damage.  Maybe next expansion.

Best TGT Card:  Twilight Guardian

8.  Shaman

Between Shaman and Rogue, it’s hard to say which is the worst class right now.  Both are stuck in Hearthstone’s last expansion, Goblins vs. Gnomes, with no help in sight.  Mech Shaman is the only decklist that is close to competitive right now and the mech synergies just can’t keep up with other classes any more.  Mech Shaman does have a lot of burst damage, but the problem is that unless they are able to overrun their opponent early, they can’t develop a board strong enough to get their opponent into burst range.  The reason I rated Shaman above Rogue is that the class did get at least a couple useful cards out of the expansion.

Impact from TGT:  Medium.  Totem Golem and Tuskarr Totemic are strong cards by themselves.  Unfortunately, they don’t synergize with mech cards and the other totem related cards shaman received are just too weak without multiple totems on your board before you play them.  This leaves Shaman stuck with good cards but no real way to play them.

Best TGT Card:  Totem Golem

9.  Rogue

Oh how the mighty have fallen.  Back in the days of Leeroy Jenkins and 5 mana Gadgetzan Auctioneer, Miracle Rogue was the king of Hearthstone.  In fact, it took the nerfing of both cards to bring down the deck.  After that, rogues stumbled around for a while until the Oil Rogue decklist was created using GvG cards.  That’s where the class has stayed as well.  Oil Rogue was a strong deck, but it’s clearly showing its age, and TGT did nothing to revitalize the class.  Pirate Rogue never panned out.  Burgle is about the best card rogues got, but its random nature means you either get great spells like Fireball and Flamestrike, or junk like Sense Demon and Sacrificial Pact.

Impact from TGT:  None.  Burgle being added into Oil Rogue is about as exciting as the expansion gets for this class and adding two random spells to your hand usually doesn’t help you keep tempo or draw your own burn spells, making it kind of pointless to even put in the deck.

Best TGT Card:  Burgle

I hope my analysis was a least a little bit helpful.  While these rankings are geared toward competitive play, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t more competitive decks out there.  Remember, it’s always important to have fun, so keep trying out new ideas.  Also, if you have a fun new deck that’s winning you games, let me know about it in the comments or on Twitter @AGRitterific.