My Top 3 Hearthstone Decks - Post Open Beta
Hunter / Shaman / Paladin
Hearthstone has recently gone into the official open beta so there are many new players joining the fray. I've been playing these 3 decks for a while now and the recent nerfs to other classes, as well as the changes to some of the Hunter's cards, have made these 3 my top performing decks by far. I decided to share them with you so you can see what I've been playing and hopefully will help some of you newer players with deck ideas. Feel free to copy these decks, make changes, and adjust them to your own play style preferences.Cold Cocked - Hunter Mid Range Control / Trap Deck
Remember how much you hate playing against a Hearthstone Mage Deck because all they need to do is 20 damage to you, then kill you with a Pyroblast? Yeah. We all do. Well, this Cold Cocked Hearthstone Hunter Deck works very similar to the Mage Decks. This Hunter deck uses removal, traps, and creatures to control the board, while plucking away with the 2 damage to opponent Hunter ability. The goal is to control the game and keep plucking away at their life total until you can get them down to 22 life, then it's time for the big ass stompin' dinosaur King Krush to come in and seal the deal.This deck combines elements of control along with efficient creatures and many possible combo set ups to catch your opponent off guard. With the right opening hand, this deck turns into a hunter rush deck with removal for support or can play the control stall game and bust out some heavy damage in the mid to late game.
The single Houndmaster works ok in the deck, but is really just a place holder for Leeroy Jenkins, which I do not own yet. This deck is a lot of fun to play!
Some possible fun combos that can appear while playing include:
- Snake Trap w Knife Juggler and / or Starving Buzzard.
- Starving Buzzard w Unleash the Hounds
- Unleash the Hounds w Knife Juggler
- Beast w Double Kill Command for 10 damage
- Eaglehorn Bow with 5-6 durability from Trap triggers
- Unleash the Hounds plus Scavenging Buzzard
Paladin Rush Deck
This Hearthstone Paladin Deck is designed as a speed rush deck. The goal is to get an early tempo advantage with cheap cost, efficient pesky creatures and never ease up off of the accelerator. Speed beatdown is all about mantaining tempo, trading smart, and keeping pressure on the opponent so that he can't get a good defense set up, or must make poor trades to stay alive.
This deck can dominate the early game, push into the mid game for the kill. If you get to late game without winning, you can get into trouble as the late game is where speed rush decks stall out. Avenging Wrath and Lay on Hands are there to either help finish the game out or help to give you a bit more staying power in the later half of the game. Aldor Peacekeeper and the Equality / Consecration or Wild Pyromancer combos are a couple of answers to other player's big beefy minions and legendaries, should they appear.
Tirion, Ragnaros, and / or Leeroy Jenkins would all make great additions to this deck if I owned any of them!
Remeber, when playing this deck:
Push, Push, Push!
Shaman Control Mid to Late Game Wins
This deck is a ton of fun to play and can be a nightmare to your opponent as there are a ton of removal spells, AoE board clearing, and some late game nasty heavy hitters. The goal with this deck is to control the board and let your opponent whittle his hand down to nothing, then you take the game over with your own minions and or remaining direct damage to finish out the game.
This deck was made after all of the Warlock Murlock Rush Decks became so popular and it pretty much destroys all types of rush decks. So if you are tired of losing quickly to swarm decks, then this is the deck to try out! Big Taunts, AoE removal, and weapons that can kill 3 minions alone spell disaster for weenie rush decks and it is so much fun to have a full hand of cards against a petered-out rush deck that's stuck top-decking without a hope or prayer.
A late game Al'Akir with Rockbiter Weapon and Flametongue Totem gets really nasty really fast, especially if the opponents has little to no cards left after your AoE and efficient removal whittles them to nothing.
Earth Elemental is just plain Beatdown and can end the game early if cast on turn 5 and your opponent has no answer. It's not uncommon to drop an Earth Elemental on both turns 5 and 7 and you can almost hear your opponents whincing when they hit the board!
Wild Pyromancer & Hex Combo will clear any (unstealthed) minion or legendary thrown at you. Fire Elemental is just plain Beatdown as well. Give this deck a try and I'm sure you will have as much fun playing it as I do.
This deck was made after all of the Warlock Murlock Rush Decks became so popular and it pretty much destroys all types of rush decks. So if you are tired of losing quickly to swarm decks, then this is the deck to try out! Big Taunts, AoE removal, and weapons that can kill 3 minions alone spell disaster for weenie rush decks and it is so much fun to have a full hand of cards against a petered-out rush deck that's stuck top-decking without a hope or prayer.
A late game Al'Akir with Rockbiter Weapon and Flametongue Totem gets really nasty really fast, especially if the opponents has little to no cards left after your AoE and efficient removal whittles them to nothing.
Earth Elemental is just plain Beatdown and can end the game early if cast on turn 5 and your opponent has no answer. It's not uncommon to drop an Earth Elemental on both turns 5 and 7 and you can almost hear your opponents whincing when they hit the board!
Wild Pyromancer & Hex Combo will clear any (unstealthed) minion or legendary thrown at you. Fire Elemental is just plain Beatdown as well. Give this deck a try and I'm sure you will have as much fun playing it as I do.
I hope you guys try these decks out and have fun with em. For other Hearthstone deck ideas and strategies, be sure to check out these previous Hearthstone articles here at Cold's Gold Factory.
- Basic Cards Only Starter Mage Deck
- Card Advantage Priest Deck
- Improper Weapon Use In Hearthstone
- Grinding For Gold & Hearthstone Starter Tips
- Eviscerated Gaming Podcast - Hearthstone Arena Drafting Episode
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Thanks in advance & Thanks for reading!
