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The Most Impactful Balance Patch for a Long Time! Early Best Decks Meta Report

By: Old Guardian - - Updated:

Blizzard promised some spice for the January balance patch, and they delivered. I had hoped for a patch early in January, but we had to wait until the 26th for the changes to actually arrive. Were they worth the wait? At the very least, the meta has changed and Blizzard showed that they are still willing to kill decks when it is necessary. Yet, the way they kill them and the way they leave options open for the affected classes has changed from the early days of Hearthstone when dead meant dead.

Let’s take a deeper look into the winners and losers of the big January balance patch.

Maestra Rogue is Dead, Long Live… Miracle Rogue?

The nerf to Wildpaw Gnoll completely erased the card, and Maestra of the Masquerade alongside it, from the meta. Should we get a refund for Maestra? That’s one of the hot topics in the Hearthstone community, as the card went from being ubiquitous in Rogue to practically no longer existing.

However, the nerf did not kill Rogue. Sure, people tried to play with Maestra for a couple of days. However, a win rate that’s down in the low 30s sobered up any aspiring Maestra players real quick.

OK, with Maestra gone, what is a Rogue to do? The masks have been dropped, but that does not mean that Sinstone Graveyard, Edwin, Defias Kingpin, and Necrolord Draka would have suddenly lost all of their powers. The Graveyard nerf – Ghosts no longer have Stealth – made the card fairer, but it remains powerful. The loss of Wildpaw Gnoll makes the deck more vulnerable to aggro, but Scribbling Stenographer still exists. And as for Necrolord Draka, she received the call that she needs to get back into action.

This is what current state-of-the-art Miracle Rogue decks look like:

Post-Maestra Miracle Rogue

Deck Import

Now, there is still some experimentation going on. Some of the current key questions include:

We are talking about the last four cards or so. The list is almost there. The main idea is clear. But there is some development work that remains at the fringes, and some of these questions will determine how well the deck can adapt to the new meta.

Miracle Rogue still displays a relatively high skill cap for a Hearthstone deck. The deck actually gets better as we move higher on the ladder, which clearly indicates that skill plays a role when piloting this archetype. Now, how many percentage points you can gain from skill in Hearthstone is a topic that could be debated all day long, but in the right hands, Miracle Rogue is still a contender to be the best deck in the game. The difference between pre-patch and post-patch is that now it requires a good pilot to contest the absolute top decks, and even with a good pilot, there are arguments that some other deck may be better. Also, you now know which class you are playing against, as the masquerade is over. Very welcome changes to the game.

Demon Hunter Looks Beyond the Final Showdown

The Demon Hunter Quest is also dead. No more Final Showdown. The need to draw a whopping six cards to get past the first stage of the Questline is just too much. The Questline had a good run though. It kept returning to the meta in various forms all the way from United in Stormwind. Instead of mourning, we can look ahead to Demon Hunter’s bright new future.

And that future looks bright indeed. Spell Demon Hunter did not miss a beat after ditching the Questline. With cards like Jace Darkweaver and Artificer Xy'mox, Demon Hunter still has superb tools to swing games in its favor. It does not have to go for a one-turn-kill to end the game. Sometimes it can still do that, but now it’s more about applying pressure and hurting the opponent, and then just using the big power tools for a finishing move at the end.

Digging through our archives, I can find the exact list Demon Hunters are using now from the beginning of December:

Relic Scythe Demon Hunter – #153 Legend (vinospumoni) – March of the Lich King

Deck Import

The Questline Demon Hunter was only a little bit better than this. But it was also favored in the mirror. This deck was almost completely abandoned over such a small difference. But it was waiting on the sidelines, ready to step in should the Questline falter. Now, it is one of the best decks in the game.

But there’s more. With the oppressive power of the Questline gone, Demon Hunters are also experimenting with their aggressive plans:

Aggro Demon Hunter – #353 Legend (Ramses) – March of the Lich King

Deck Import

Spell Demon Hunter looks like the superior archetype, but there is always a time and a place for some quick games where you just hit face. When you have that urge, Aggro Demon Hunter can be a fine tool that gets you a good number of wins in the process.

Nobody Expects the Shockspitter Hunter

Maestra is dead. The Final Showdown is dead. But Shockspitter, oh my. Can you imagine that they released this card at two mana? Now, two nerfs later, it sits at four mana and still wins games! That’s amazing.

Shockspitter Hunter – #67 Legend (Helve187) – March of the Lich

Deck Import

That said, Shockspitter is starting to feel the nerfs. Shockspitter Hunter is now roughly equal to Beast Hunter in terms of power. I think Beast Hunter is actually slightly better now.

In some ways, this is good for the game. Beast Hunter is the epitome of a strong minion pile. It uses all the good stuff and attempts to overwhelm you with sheer quality alone. If it is clearly the best deck, there are not enough synergies in the game. If it is awful, there may be too many strong synergies in the game. Right now, it is strong, but there is a handful of decks that are probably stronger. In that regard, the balance is now almost there.

Lor’themar Beast Hunter

Deck Import

The most popular lists nowadays include Lor'themar Theron. I am actually wondering what happened to the Hope of Quel'Thalas lists? I hope to see some data about them again. Either way, Beast Hunter does Beast Hunter things and remains a solid deck.

Death Knight Grows Stronger

Frost Death Knight was hit with a nerf as Glacial Advance‘s discount effect was toned down from two mana to one mana. Frost Death Knight is still OK and the lists have not changed at all. It is just a bit slower and less bursty, that’s all.

However, the Frost Death Knight nerf and the buff to Battlefield Necromancer opened up new space for internal competition. Unholy Death Knight is now finally able to challenge Frost, for example with decks like this:

Unholy Death Knight – #58 Legend (Otsuna) – March of the Lich King

Deck Import

Unholy Death Knight’s main weakness is the lack of good one-drops. That has also been the main thing I have been asking for when it comes to buffs. Death Knight can somehow make it work because of Body Bagger, but all other Undead aggro decks are in a completely hopeless position.

While the Battlefield Necromancer buff makes things better for Unholy right now, it also opens up potential future problems. If there ever are more good Undead one-drops, the Necromancer will be insanely powerful. It is already the best card in the deck, even though the deck cannot make full use of its ability.

In the grand scheme of things, Frost Death Knight and Unholy Death Knight are both viable for climbing, but neither is an absolute top-tier deck, at least for now. Unholy Death Knight probably has more room for improvement, as it has been experimented with far less than Frost.

The Big Four

All of the above-mentioned decks can take you all the way to Legend, but there are four other decks that you are most likely to meet on your way there. Some of the above decks, especially Spell Demon Hunter and Beast Hunter, may actually be stronger than these four popular archetypes, but these are some undeniable winners of the patch.

First, it is impossible to talk about the effects of this patch without mentioning Mage. Mage is the big winner, but not because of the Mage buffs. In fact, the buffed Mage archetype, Casino Mage, is also the only Mage archetype that cannot be used for climbing the ladder. Mage has four archetypes that can succeed on the ladder! Secret Mage is the weakest of the four, barely reaching above the magic 50% win rate. Ping Mage is the dark horse: we still have only a small sample of games with it, but it looks very promising. At the top, Aggro Mage and Big Spell Mage are neck-and-neck in win rate, fighting for supremacy over the Mage class and the entire ladder. Big Spell Mage is clearly the more popular of the two, at least for the time being.

Big Spell Mage

Deck Import

Second, we have Evolve Shaman. Jambre’s list keeps rolling over the opposition on the ladder:

Evolve Shaman – #201 (BabyBear) – March of the Lich King

Deck Import

Third, Curse Imp Warlock has made its triumphant return to the meta. The regular Imp Warlock is also perfectly capable, but the Curse variant seems somewhat better for now.

Abyssal Imp Warlock – #181 Legend (sentist) – March of the Lich King

Deck Import

And finally, the most popular deck in the game at the moment, Pure Paladin.

Pure Paladin – #167 Legend (NoHandsGamer) – March of the Lich King

Deck Import

There are many variants of Pure Paladin on the ladder, and the archetype looks far from solved. Many of the variants are doing great though, so the core of the deck is very strong.

Some examples of Pure Paladin variants:

As you can see, the final four or five card slots are not fully determined yet. Some approaches go for more burst, whereas others seek more value from some of the excellent Paladin Legendary cards.

What About the Other Classes?

That covered eight of the 11 classes in the game. What about the remaining three?

Control Warrior did not become a thing with the buffs. That did not exactly surprise anyone. Enrage Warrior continues with the same decks as before and is still a perfectly fine deck that can climb the ladder. With the buff to Nellie, the Great Thresher, people are also playing some Questline Pirate Warrior again. It is not great, but it is doing better than expected. Legend might be a rank too far for the archetype, but you can expect to win some games with the good old Pirates in this meta too.

Aggro Druid remains the top Druid archetype. It’s still a perfectly capable deck that you can pilot to Legend. Ramp Druid is weaker, but not completely dead. You can still win games against anything with Ramp Druid, but it lacks the consistency for a good ladder climb.

Undead Priest is searching for its real shape. There are aggro variants of the concept now alongside the old list that uses the best three-cost Undead minions and focuses on resurrections. Both are currently displaying above-50% win rates, but the sample sizes are small and their performance changes daily. It seems to me that the aggro variant is slipping as other decks get more refined and the resurrection variant may have more longevity. It is too early to say for sure though.

Something New, Something Old

The patch affected the meta a lot. Many of the old meta tyrants are dead in the form we used to know them. However, new variants of those concepts have risen and continue to be part of the ladder. Even so, they are no longer the tyrants they were, even when they remain strong.

Several decks that were right behind the meta tyrants have now taken over the top spots. Decks like Pure Paladin, Evolve Shaman, Curse Imp Warlock, Beast Hunter, and various Mage archetypes already existed and now have more room to breathe.

The buffs, on the other hand, were not that effective. Warlock and Warrior buffs might as well not have been made at all. Undead Priest is better now but unlikely to reach the top tier. Then again, the buffs were not necessarily meant to bring it up all the way to the top. Unholy Death Knight is the top contender of the buffed decks, and we do not know where it will land yet, either.

Buffs are hard to get right. Blizzard often ends up buffing useless cards that still remain useless after the buffs. On the other hand, that one time, at the band camp, they decided to buff Edwin, Defias Kingpin. I guess that made them a bit more cautious too.

As the meta keeps developing, we may yet see some completely new archetypes rise to the top. So far, there are many more viable decks than there were before the patch, and no absolute tyrants have risen to take the place of the old tyrants yet. Judging by those criteria, the balance patch has been a success.

Old Guardian

Ville "Old Guardian" Kilkku is a writer and video creator focused on analytic, educational Hearthstone, and building innovative Standard format decks. Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/OldGuardian Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/old_guardian

Check out Old Guardian on Twitter or on their Website!

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One Comment

  1. LaBomba
    February 6, 2023 at 12:33 am

    Great overview, thanks for that. I really enjoy the meta at the moment. Meet many Unholy DK who have a hard life against my dragon paladin 🙂