Introduction
Welcome to the Hearthstone Arena Class Tier List (TGT) by ADWCTA and Merps. We produce a variety of content for the Hearthstone Arena, including the most consulted Arena Tier List in Hearthstone and the drafting algorithm behind HearthArena. We have been playing Arena exclusively since beta, and currently average 7.6 wins/run on stream. You can find links to our other content here under “Arena Tools”. One of the questions we get asked most frequently is:
How are the 9 Arena classes ranked?
After careful consideration, we produced this comprehensive class tier list of where we believe each class is situated in the TGT meta. Although the meta may change over time, the Arena meta is typically more stable than the Constructed format between expansions. We ranked the classes by placing them into tiers; some classes occupy their own tier, and some classes share a tier with other classes. Keep in mind that these rankings are based on their potential in the hands of the best player for that class; rankings for new players and average players would be different. We do not consult any stats prior to ranking the classes. As of the writing of this article, HearthArena’s global averages for all players match our list exactly (with Paladin ahead of Mage rather than even).
Quick List
Current TGT Meta: Rogue | Mage, Paladin | Druid || Shaman | Warlock | Hunter | Priest || Warrior
(Prior BRM Meta: Mage | Paladin, Rogue || Druid, Shaman, Warlock | Hunter | Priest | Warrior)
Rogue
Do you enjoy sharp objects? Do you enjoy hurting yourself with those sharp objects? (Now with extra pirates and ninjas!)
Meta (Rank 1): We have published our class rankings since back in Classic, and for the entire duration, Mage held the top spot. The class was easily accessible, had a hero power and a few class cards that completely wipe away any mistakes you may make (or bad RNG you may suffer), and the tutorial even starts you off with Jaina. But Rogue was never far off the radar. If Mage is the most accessible class, then Rogue is the most precise and demanding class. You generally have double the options of any other class on each turn between hero power setups, combo order, and low-costing spells, but you also have to have a clear sense of your win conditions in each match to be able to, well. . . win. HearthArena stats have consistently shown Rogue to possess the highest win differential between high win players and low win players, because frankly, this class is just difficult to play. For the longest time, it seemed that the higher difficulty at most matched Mage’s raw power and defensive flexibility, but with the arrival of TGT, we believe that a properly drafted and played Rogue has more firepower than any other class in the meta. As the meta shifted a few turns slower, TGT pushed the Rogue (far more than any other class) in the opposite direction, with two amazing class cards that are 1-mana (Buccaneer), and 2-mana (Undercity Valiant) respectively. A rule of thumb is that it is either always better to be a slightly slower and slightly bigger deck than your opponent… or a MUCH faster deck. In this Meta, with the +25% TGT card offering rates, Rogue is MUCH faster than the typical deck. In an “attrition” meta of card advantage, Rogue can tempo onto the board and either spread wide, dish our direct reach damage, or play aggro-control for the victory. You also have two common hard removals at your disposal (and an epic), more than any non-Mage class. In no case does the opponent ever get a chance to respond. You are in full control of the game as the Rogue, and you maximize your skill impact and minimize your opponent’s skill impact. Best of both worlds.
Strengths: Speed. One-drops are extra valuable due to the ability to act as combo triggers. Combo effects also mean it is usually a good idea to play 2 2-drops rather than a 4 drop on turn 4, a 2-drop and a 3-drop on turn 5 rather than a 5-drop. Coin gains extra value. Everything is set up for a very fast game. This doesn’t mean you have to start turns 1-3 fast though. Because you are so in control of the game, it is usually better to start slow as the Rogue, play control in the early turns to bait out your opponent’s small easily removable minions so that you can swing the board on turns 4-6. Hero power on turn 2 is a perfectly acceptable play as the Rogue (and no other class). After you establish some form of board presence, be constantly wary of your health and your opponent’s health. Because you are sacrificing a significant chunk of the late game, and your hero power progressively gets more useless as the game wears on, you are on a soft clock to end the game. Unless you have a Sprint in hand, or facing an extremely aggressive deck, you are unlikely to win the late game, so make sure you position yourself within range to make a lethal push at some point before you start running out of cards and options.
Weaknesses: The Rogue has three glaring weaknesses: 1) Self-lethal. To play Rogue effectively, you have to be wary about killing yourself. It takes an excellent judge of your opponent’s reach, and your own vulnerability with heals/taunts to know exactly how much extra tempo you can squeeze out of the Rogue’s hero power before doing so starts being very costly. The evaluation of how much risk you should take in this area will determine 10-15% of outcomes. That’s a lot, for something most other classes rarely have to consider. 2) Board clears. The Rogue flat out doesn’t have any. Dark Iron Skulker is situational, and a rare; Blade Flurry requires a combo; Fan of Knives is only one damage. If we let our opponent get a wide board, we’re almost certainly dead. Lucky for us, we have more tools than any other class to ensure that that never happens. 3) Early turn planning. One truth in Hearthstone Arena is that the more powerful an effect, the clunkier the card. The Rogue has very powerful over-tempoed class cards, but they all have their situational uses. Daggering up on turn 2 could be the difference of a 100% available tempo swing in the early turns, losing the board, and having to come back. Knowing what your opponent is likely to play, how each option affects your position, and your various possible responses is key. While this is true for all classes, most classes don’t have much say in the matter of how to deal with such early threats. The strength of the Rogue is that she has all of the turn 1-3 tools, and a very special coin to deal with anything that comes her way. The flip side of the weakness is that if you don’t work things out well here, then more often than not, you only have yourself to blame. This is a huge part of the Rogue’s strength, and so its unrealized potential in the hands of most players makes this class not top tier for many players.
X-Factor Common: Sprint. It’s been a year and a half since the game first launched and still no common card changes the shape of a game more than Sprint. It may be a hugely anti-tempo card, but it is the only common card in the game that has more card advantage (and non-situational at that) than North Sea Kraken. This card can singlehandedly disrupt your opponent’s card advantage expectations and solidify your board, or draw you the crucial reach needed to finish off your opponent. Never rely on drawing it to win (unless it’s your only out), but if Sprint is in your hand, your entire gameplan changes. You can be either more control-oriented, or more aggressive depending on the flow of the game. Sprint gives you the edge you need to close out the game either way.
Mage
Now that it’s finally neither the most popular, nor top-ranked class . . . nothing changes. Most hated class since 2013.
Meta (Rank 2/3): While Rogue may top out at a higher rank than Mage in this meta, Mage is still one of the top classes. The very design of such a flexible hero power means that the Mage can at any point in the game push for lethal, gain incremental card advantage, or situationally cause huge tempo swings on the board. There is no downside here, and the flexible hero power ensures that Mage will not be falling out of the top any time soon. Mage also has a nice balance of all types of class cards for the Arena game, fitting any archetype your deck trends toward. Remember, Priest and Warlock aside, the Mage has the highest card advantage hero power, and Hunter aside, also the highest lethal dealing hero power. The key to playing a Mage is to be able to shift your long-term game strategy to adjust to your opponent’s deck. Like the Rogue, you have options, and you are one of the very few classes that plays almost as well without the board as with it. As the game grows, and more and more types of win conditions pop up, this flexibility gets more and more important as you are more frequently put into positions where you must shift your game-plan mid-game to account for your opponent’s strategies. The old days of mana+2 max tempo shifts of Classic are gone, and Mage is better suited than any other classes to this adjustment.
Strength: Answers. The Mage has the largest variety of answers to any situation she may be confronted with. Whether it be small removals, large removals, board clears, pings, or even freezing a weapon, the Mage has answers for everything. Your job is to use your answers only as liberally as you have spares, and you should be able to overcome most problematic swing turns your opponent throws at you. More than any other class, you will end up with the removals you need to avoid disastrous turns. Remember, Priest matchup aside, you can always spend multiple turns to ping down a problematic minion, and frozen minions can usually be removed the next turn as easily as this one. Getting good value out of your removals and not getting baited too hard into using them inefficiently is key to the Mage’s success.
Weaknesses: The Mage has no general weaknesses. Playing as the Mage generally only requires responding to your opponent, which is easier than anticipating your opponent’s response, and you can play in a fairly carefree manner. The story is flipped when you’re on the other side. Against a Mage, you don’t have to worry much about her healing (Ice Barrier is not the most commonly seen secret), so aggressive strategies and Hunters do quite well against Mages, but that’s about all you can rely on. Mage’s flexibility in terms of speed and gameplan means you’re generally at their mercy in terms of long-term gameplay unless you are extremely fast. The best way to play against a Mage is to limit the effectiveness of her hero power by making trades that leave your minion with one health on turns where the Mage would lose too much tempo to use the hero power (typically, turns 3/5; but other turns as well if you get a read on their hand and lack of certain mana drops), limit the power of Flamestrike by putting out awkward boards if you’re ahead, and generally force the Mage into even value trades while knowing your deck is significantly heavier. If your deck is not significantly heavier, you’ll be better suited trying to go faster.
X-Factor Common: Flamestrike. The bane of every new player. The effect of this card has the potential to end the game if your opponent does not play around it. With the card dilution in TGT, it becomes more and more common for opponents to abandon playing around this card if they are not in a great situation. This also means you can generally bait your opponent into extending further into the Flamestrike by delaying for a turn or two (health permitting). As with all cards, the less your opponent plays around it, the more powerful it is. In the TGT meta, and especially with the rise of Paladins and to a lesser extent Shamans, this card has become even more devastating. Oftentimes, the tradeoff between playing into a Flamestrike and your % chance to have one in hand pushes your opponent to play directly into this card so you reap maximum value. Does he have a Flamestrike: probably the most often asked question in the Arena.
Paladin
A simple class for a simpler time, when all a guy needed were dudes. . . and fish. And more dudes, and more fish. And more dudes, and more fish. And more dudes, and more fish.
Meta (Rank 2/3): Paladins simply dominated the meta in the early days of the TGT meta, with the best new class card in the game (Murloc Knight) and a hero power whose flexibility makes it the best suited for inspire-mechanic cards. However, the meta has caught up with the Paladin. Players are wary now of Murloc Knights, and have found ways to mitigate the impact. The sheer number of Paladins in the meta also means that high win rate decks you’re likely to face (even if they are Paladin decks) are more likely to be fairly good at taking care of Paladins, or they wouldn’t have gotten that far to begin with. Overall, the Paladin has NOT gotten better relative to Rogue and Mage in the TGT meta. One of the things that continuously holds the Paladin back is the lack of control in how the early game progresses. This has always been one of the classes where win rates drop relative to other classes as the player gets better. At a certain level of skill differential between you and your typical opponent, the control provided by Rogue and Mage is preferable to the sheer power of the Paladin, and the value of “win if you have board” type cards diminish in favor of downside prevention.
Strengths: Power. Paladins have the highest powered common and rare cards in the game, and a large number of them! They are mostly concentrated in the 4-mana slot, so you’ll have to wait to unleash the “skill”, but when you do, your opponent will have problems keeping up card for card. It’s a rare Paladin deck that doesn’t end up oversaturated with high power cards, and that’s the biggest strength of the Paladin. The power also comes in a diverse set of cards, from 4-damage weapon, to 3-damage direct damage, to 3/4 damage buffs, 2 damage board clears, and infinite murloc factories. It’s near impossible to play around everything the Paladin can dish out. Add in some frankly unbalanced higher rarity cards like Muster for Battle or Coghammer, and the Paladin can seemingly come out of nowhere on an even board to dominate everywhere.
Weaknesses: The Paladin is by far the most predictable class to play against. This means that much of how you enter into turn 4 is determined by what your opponent has and how much advanced planning they make for your turn 4. Your weakness is that you are rarely in control of the game against good decks and good opponents, and you need to contest the board and win out in the mid-game. On the bright side, you have an easier time doing this than most classes, but if you slip a little bit and lose the board fight, it is very difficult to come back onto the board as a Paladin. Against an opponent who knows what they’re doing, you can often be boxed into inefficient uses of your powerful cards, most of which requires a board to actually get better than average value. While a Fireball or Hex is always good value, Blessing of Kings or Murloc Knight are only situationally above average value. Speaking of hard-ish removals, Paladin essentially has none. This creates problematic late game situations where as soon as your opponent drops a 5+ health minion on an empty board, your prospects for victory become slim. So, the key is to not get yourself into a situation where you’re completely off the board. An even board is fine for the Paladin, behind on the board is death. Tempo!
X-Factor Common: Murloc Knight. This card single-handedly reshaped the way Paladin is played in the Arena. This is an infinite tempo + card advantage machine, and if your opponent doesn’t remove/silence it on the first turn it comes out, you’ve likely won the game. So, many games will turn on this one play, of whether you’ve picked a good enough spot to drop this guy so that he doesn’t die immediately. He’s sturdy enough to survive almost all board clears except for Flamestrike, so you’re likely to get a 2 for 1 value regardless. Playing this card with the proper amount of greed vs expediency will significantly affect your win rate.
Druid
Screw you, I’m Player 1.
Meta (Rank 4): The biggest winner in TGT so far, to no one’s surprise, is the Druid. Like the Rogue, while everything’s getting slower, this class got faster with, of all things, two of the best 1/2-drops in the game, Living Roots and Druid of the Saber. While many people were expecting (or just hoping) that Druid would push its way into the elite tier, it hasn’t quite all come together for this class. Despite the higher powered cards, Druid still lacks an identity to set it apart from other classes in a game-changing way. The three core Druid-identity mechanics, “choose one”, ramp, and taunt all improved in TGT with a removal-deficient meta, but only slightly. Druid has always been the most balanced class, with strong minions, decent reach, and a flexible set of removals. At its core, it functions in the Arena like a more stable, more minion-based Mage. While nothing is blatantly overpowered and we generally prefer spells to minions, there’s still plenty to like here. The very fact that we’re making comparisons to Mage and Rogue shows the potential of this class. It’s just not quite there yet.
Strengths: Curve. Druids class card offerings have always made it the easiest class to curve out in a draft, with plenty of high-powered 2-drops and 3-drops. TGT bumped that trait up to ridiculous heights and even added a 1-drop, which gives Druids an inherent drafting advantage in every draft. By not having to worry much about curve, Druid players can select higher quality of cards overall and generally put together a slightly more powerful set of neutral minions than other classes. While this may sound unimpressive, the consistency provided will average out over time to cause significant positive impact on win rates, making it more difficult to bottom out in a draft, while not necessarily helping your 12-win rate. Consistency may be boring, but who needs the “excitement” of playing with truly non-functional decks?
Weaknesses: Druid’s biggest weakness is that it is the most “honest” class. It gets ahead through board trades, timely use of removals, and clever selection of minion stat distributions. Like Mage, you have all the answers, you just have fewer of them, and they’re generally not as good. This means that it is probably the class with the least potentially to significantly swing the board on a single turn. This meat and potatoes, fundamentals-focused style makes for a great class to use for learning the game, but it also makes for heartbreaking situations where your opponent swings the board and you have no response. The Druid’s lack of flash isn’t just a cosmetic flaw, it also impacts the way the game is played. Flexibility’s cost is power (so the top class cards do not have extra power, just extra flexibility), and therefore players need to squeeze every last drop of value out of flexibility and consistently make the right decisions to compensate for the lack of power. This isn’t the class with the highest skill ceiling by far, but it is probably the class where fundamentals matter the most to your success. For players who are not yet infinite, Druid is the best test of skill level in gameplay. Finally, the hero power’s flexibility to armor up also comes at the cost that it is not limitless advantage like the Mage or Paladin, and the late game oriented meta of TGT really exposes this difference.
X-Factor Common: Innervate. For such a settled class, Druid has one very swingy card that changes the game when it is played. By allowing the Druid to play a larger minion than typically allowed, Innervate forces your opponent to think on their feet and cobble together improvised solutions to uncommonly seen sights. The best part about Innervate is that it is a card that cannot be played around, and depending on how you use Innervate (spells, taunts, hero power), you can have the flexibility to exit the typically confined “honest” space Druid occupies and shatter your opponent’s expectations to keep or take back the board. An early Innervate can end the game, if followed up with a proper curve, but remember, Innervate takes the place of a card, so it is significantly more difficult to curve out with this card in your hand. Knowing the proper time to use Innervate has a huge impact on the game, and it’s not always better when used earlier.
Shaman
Before he sold out, RNGesus went by “the Elements” and held a day job crafting totems.
Meta (Rank 5): Another class that was widely expected to rocket to the top of the meta in TGT, Shaman’s reality has been even bleaker than the Druid. The slower TGT meta was more forgiving for missed hero power totems, and totems in general became more valuable with added card synergies (more than enough to offset the dilution of Flametongue Totem’s offering rate). It’s still on the upswing, but the raw power of the new Shaman minions does not quite compensate for the awkward curve issues this class suffers from. Further, the more board-centric game disfavors the Shaman’s ability to keep totems alive on the board. Ultimately, neither its early tempo nor late card advantage is strong enough to carry the class by itself, and it ends up being a mix of the Druid and the Mage, without the crucial ability to hero power ping. If the Druid is a flexible neutral class with no special identity, then the Shaman is suffering from an identity crisis. It has all of the tools to break open the game with every win condition in the book, but it has few tools to set up those win conditions. It’s not so much flexible as it is disjointed.
Strengths: Swing. Historically, one of the trademark Shaman abilities was to overload his mana, and swing the tempo incredibly hard in the most flexible way imaginable. With a mix of cards that overload for extra tempo, flat out over-tempoed cards like Fire Elemental and Hex, and cards that feed off of overloads, incredible things can happen. You are never safe facing a Shaman. In BRM and TGT, Shaman’s suite of game-swinging overload removal spells has become diluted, but replaced by equally powerful overload minions. Now, the swing effect is the same, just more balanced between removals and minions. The payment on the next turn is typically mitigated by the board presence and the complete disruption of the opponent’s gameplan. In addition to this board swing, Shaman also has the largest single turn reach to deal lethal, with windfury effects and Bloodlust. The strengths of this class are in blowing expectations out of the water, and effectively winning the game on one turn from an even board, or even from behind on the board.
Weaknesses: RNG is never a good thing for good players. Shaman unfortunately depends very heavily on RNG, and reacting to its own RNG for hero power totems (on top of Tuskarr Totemic and Crackle) is one of the necessary skills to being a good Shaman player. But, even beyond the RNG nature of the hero power, Shaman has an additional difficulty of actually getting value out of any totems at all. A 0/2 that gets buffed is a significant card advantage, but one that does not is generally not much better than saving some health. Being able to use your hero power effectively while recovering from “misses” and setting up the board state necessary for your hero power to be useful is what defines an effective Shaman player.
X-Factor Common: Flametongue Totem. Aka: the original Murloc Knight. Where Flametongue lacks in body size, it more than makes up for in its instant board effect buff, and its stable output of damage. For 2 mana, 2 more mana for a hero power, and typically playing one more card, you can almost certainly clear the board and establish dominance in one vital swing turn. The Flametongue setup is typically unavoidable by the opponent and even if a removal is used the next turn by your opponent, Flametongue would have already gotten 2 cards worth of value. Even more impressive, is that a proper setup allows for infinite card advantage with totems for the rest of the game. While we have two more totem activators now in Thunder Bluff Valiant and Mukla’s Champion that do similar things, Flametongue is still the most flexible of the bunch and the easiest to pull off. Together, these cards, if available, define a large part of your win conditions as Shaman.
Warlock
Life Lessons from Blizzard: Tapping that hurts, but only a little, and it’s probably still worth it.
Meta (Rank 6): What’s the biggest class in TGT? It’s not Druid. With the addition of Fearsome Doomguard, Warlock has officially become the class with the most frequently offered large minions. This is a stark departure from where they started at in Classic, as the posterchild for aggro play in the Arena. As the meta gets slower, not only are slower drafts more viable, but the Warlock gets to take less face damage, which means even more card advantage. The more attrition decks you see in the meta, the better Warlocks become, because unless the curve drafted is super low, the Warlock can out card advantage nearly all attrition decks, while also curving out better, thanks to its insane hero power. The dilution of top tier board clears also allows the faster version of the Warlock to thrive if you can jump out to an early 1-drop lead, and less spot removal means you’ll almost always have something on the board to buff. If you know what you’re doing, the Warlock has handled the TGT transition surprisingly well without any top tier class cards added.
Strengths: Life Tap. The Warlock’s hero power has such a special (and powerful) effect that, more than any other hero power, it completely shapes the draft, and your gameplay. With infinite card advantage, you’ve eliminated one of the key downsides to having “too many” curve cards like 2 and 3-drops, and the major overwhelming downside of having 1-drops. So, the Warlock is free to overload on those minions to get that head start on the board, free to overextend into board clears, and generally be able to recover from anything, as long as they’re facing an empty board and have the health to back it up. Having a hero power that makes half the minions in the game more powerful is a pretty good deal. But beware, even with the hero power, not having a mid-range curve and going super aggro won’t make up for the loss of card advantage. On turn 10 with two 2-drops, you’re still putting out less than half the power of an opponent that plays a 4-drop and a 6-drop. So, this class’s strength lies in lower-mid range curve and not extreme aggro. One extra subtle effect of the hero power is that it allows you to more easily draw your key cards, so it offsets the need for situational removals and utility cards in the deck in favor of minions.
Weaknesses: The Warlock has few removals (fewest in the game besides Priest) and almost no control over how the game goes in the early going. If your opponent can properly curve out and match you step for step, then you will almost inevitably lose the board as you have few ways to gain extra tempo (while your opponent almost certainly has several ways). The hero power is not helpful without the board, as it puts your life even more in danger, and the 2-mana cost will set your tempo back even further. So, while staying ahead on the board is more important for Warlock than any other class (except maybe Priest), it’s also a tall order. There’s no trick here to overcoming the weakness, just be sure to prioritize early tempo over everything else, and hope for the best. Win-more cards may not be a bad idea because unless you have a few very specific cards, you are not coming back onto the board after you lose it until your opponent runs out of cards. Finally, prioritize buffs, because if you’re in the game at all, then you’ll have things to buff so they are needed to fill the removal void.
X-Factor Common: Hellfire. The one exception in the “coming back onto the board” game for Warlock is Hellfire. This is not a highly rated card because its situational-ness is very high as you (hopefully) will typically start the game with the board. But, the nature of removing small things on the board generally leaves your opponent with several sizable attack minions at around 3 health or lower, so this card is one of the few ways to come back onto the board. The fact that almost nobody plays around it makes it even more effective those times when you need it. At only 4 mana, this card will also let you set up your own board on the same turn, which you can then buff for the next turn.
Hunter
Calls randomly a boar, a bear or a wyvern because they’re totally the same thing. . . when it comes to the companionship.
Meta (Rank 7): In a slower meta, class hero powers become absolutely game changing in providing card advantage for the late game. Unfortunately for the Hunter, Steady Shot is the only hero power in the game that does not provide any card advantage. This means that the Hunter will have much difficulty trying to outlast another deck designed to be viable in the late game. We can look at the three “fast” classes and how their hero power helps them add a win condition: Rogue = tempo, Warlock = cards, Hunter = lethal. Their ranking also reflects how reliable each of those elements are in this meta. In the TGT meta, direct damage without a good way to set up the board on the tempo is just not a very good win condition. Taunts and heals as a whole have gotten more popular in the meta, and ignoring the board to go face can be punished by even more engine/inspire cards. If a Hunter manages to bust out an early game lead, or a mid-game swing, then victory is a foregone conclusion. But, they simply do not have the tools to draft and play that style successfully on a consistent basis. So, more often than not, Hunters trade the entire late game for an extra push in the mid-game for lethal. It’s not the best tradeoff.
Strengths: Lethal. The Hunter does not have access to the best cards in the game, but the hero power is very good at doing one very specific thing: finishing your opponent off. The Hunter can erase a cushion of 20 health to nothing with one turn of sending minions to the face and some hero power usage. For opponents that look to stabilize the board and win on card advantage, this is a nightmare if they do not have healing. Oftentimes, this results in a game of rock, paper, scissors, which is not a favorable gamble for high skilled players, but it does provide an alternate win condition no matter how poorly the game itself is going. The Hunter just needs one good turn to end the game. The best way to play Hunter is not to go face with everything always, but rather to set up a board and have enough damage to attack in (rather than continue trading), while dropping additional minions. This forces your opponent to backpedal and clear more minions on the board than they have attack for, which usually means you will end up dealing more face damage over the course of the next few turns, which along with your hero power and any reach, should end the game. Like the Warlock, the hero power is so unique that opponents are not used to playing with it in mind, so their inexperience and need to adjust their gameplay will cause many misplays and losses that would otherwise be wins.
Weaknesses: The Hunter falls into the same trap as the Warlock in that it needs to set up a board, but has no special tools with which to do so. In the expansions since Classic, Hunter has gotten Glaivezooka, which helps a bit, but generally it is still one of the weaker classes at holding an early board. Getting to the point where you can have that “one good turn” is a lot harder than it may sound. Without the card draw of the Warlock, going the 1-drop route in drafting puts you on a very short clock to find your turning point turn. On the other hand, going the mid-range route pits you against competition that typically has superior class cards and a more flexible hero power for curving out and value in the mid/late game. Luckily, you don’t need to win the board, just hang on long enough to find your opening to go face. Timing this moment is the most difficult decision to make as a Hunter, and when you find your moment, you need to go all-in. Face is an all or nothing proposition (0 life left, or some life left), hedging your bets should only be considered when it would allow for even more face damage the next turn.
X-Factor Common: Unleash the Hounds. By itself, this card is an efficient board clear for any wide board setup. But where it really shines is when combo-ed with one of any number of cards (Hunter’s Mark, Animal Companion, Dire Wolf Alpha, Cult Master, Houndmaster, Deadly Shot) to achieve a ridiculous swing on the board. These combos give the Hunter an extra dimension and having the combos means that you can play “combo” style Hunter, which is similar to control style, or just save the cards as backup or to deal lethal in a more aggressive style. Either way, this puts your opponent in a tough spot where they want to spread on the board to have enough attacks to hit all of your minions, but in spreading, they make themselves vulnerable to a massive swing that will likely end the game in your favor.
Priest
The cruelest man in Hearthstone. He COULD heal you, but he usually won’t.
Meta (Rank 8): The TGT slower meta with larger minions should have made the Priest better, with their Shadow Word: Deaths, and Mind Controls, and healing. But it didn’t. Priest remains a binary class. If you have the board, you win, and if you don’t have the board, you lose. It shares the board-centric downsides of the Paladin, but to an insane (even determinative) degree. The TGT meta did not reduce the chances for decks to curve out, but rather slowed the game down and substituting larger minions in while swapping out spells and utility cards. This did not help Priests at all. More importantly, TGT, while adding a very nice card in Holy Champion, diluted the few ways Priest had of getting on the board (Velen’s Chosen, Northshire Cleric, Power Word: Shield, Shrinkmeister). With that drop in consistency, Priest has actually gotten worse. With heavier decks now for almost all classes, even if Priest holds on to the late game now, there is no guarantee that they’ll actually have the card advantage necessary to finish the game. Of course, if you can grab the board, you’re still set, but that proposition has gotten significantly more difficult in TGT. This is not a good time to be a Priest.
Strengths: Board Protection. Much like the two classes on the list before this, Priests only do one thing well. Priests make sure anything that stays alive on their board for one turn, stays alive pretty much the entire game. There are four highly rated common buff cards that accomplish this along with the healing hero power, providing twice the card advantage and tempo as the Standard Mage/Paladin hero power base. This means that you should always expect the Priest to be able to buff/heal their minions on the next turn if it stays alive, so that that minion will continue to haunt you for the next several turns, if not the rest of the game. As the Priest, this slow process of sticking things on the board will eventually win you the board and provide infinite card advantage on the board as the game progresses, making this the most powerful late game class. . . assuming you can get something sizable to stick on the board at all.
Weaknesses: The flip side of all of this amazingness when on the board, is that the Priest is mostly useless when not on the board. They have the fewest removals in the entire game, and the removals can be avoided by keeping minions with 4 attack above 2 health. This makes the Priest hero power completely worthless and prevents the Priest from having any initiative to take back the board. Fittingly, the Priest’s best and only strategy is typically to continuously drop high health minion(s) on the board and pray they do not get removed. Priest is by far the most useless class without the board, and by the very nature of the game (and their lack of early board control tools) and RNG, they will oftentimes start in this position. These guaranteed loss games hurt more and more the higher your average win percentage.
X-Factor Common: Velen’s Chosen. The introduction of this card in GvG single handedly catapulted the Priest from extremely bad to decent (now back to bad again due to dilution of the card pool). It’s not that the Priest does not have access to an array of buffs, but rather that Priests never had a way to buff the attack of a minion before. This card combines the thing Priests always want to do (keep a minion alive) with a very high 4 health, with something Priests struggle doing in the first place (raising a minion’s attack). The ensuing chain heals to an early Velen’s Chosen can typically hold the board for good for the Priest. There’s no way to play around this card and like most Priest cards, it is not difficult to use. But, the impact is immense, and if given a target, whether the Priest has this card in hand will likely determine the game. Side note: This card does not have any more stats/value than it is supposed to for its mana cost, and by that measure, is the highest impact “properly statted” card in the entire game. It fits the Arena Priests’ game plan just a little too well.
Warrior
Warrior was removed from the meta on August 24, 2015, after months of prolonged suffering and progressive decay. #ArenaWarriorsMatter
Meta Meta (Rank N/A): The Warrior is currently not in the TGT meta. In the Arena, the meta only pushes classes incrementally toward playstyles and environments that are more suitable or less suitable. You will find high infinite players achieving 8+ wins/run with their top classes, even as Hunter/Priest. However, when a class falls below the line of viable draft consistency, the meta becomes irrelevant. After TGT’s dilution of older playable cards and introduction of newer non-playable cards, the Warrior has fallen below the line of viability for consistent play. Win rates with the Warrior top out for the top players across the board at marks significantly below their top classes, and Warrior win rates for average players are laughable when compared to Hunter/Priest, much less the top classes. While it is possible to have good drafts and good runs with the Warrior, it is impossible to keep a high win rate over a large sample size.
Strengths: Element of Surprise. WTF is happening!?!?!? That is the typical response to seeing a Warrior at a high win number. This is followed quickly by feelings of fear, dread, and admiration for the Warrior player. This is the most powerful psychological response elicited upon seeing any class in Hearthstone. Warrior players can take advantage of this temporary confused state by quickly overwhelming opponents with Warrior strategies such as “playing cards”, “ending turns”, and NOT using the hero power. Fear will make your opponent play conservatively, repeatedly clearing your board and playing with no greed. This should gain you some advantage in value missed by your opponent. Dread will make your opponent pay less attention to his turns, as he knows he is likely to lose anyway to such a high win Warrior. Finally, admiration may cause your opponent to forfeit altogether, to ensure that the brave Warrior player may continue his run unharmed. A lack of BM and friendly post-match friend requests characterize the Warrior experience. Of course, all of this rests upon the assumption that the Warrior is already at a high win number. Good luck.
Weaknesses: Actually selecting the Warrior would make you prone to several weaknesses, including: Minions, Spells, Weapons, Secrets, Coin, Hero Power, and Emotes. However, this is easily countered by a knowledgeable Arena Warrior through a process known as selecting a different hero. Hearthstone will always offer you three choices for heroes, so it is difficult to misplay here. If a misclick is made, the damage caused by the Warriors’ weaknesses can still be mitigated. In the options menu (accessed by hitting Esc on the keyboard), there is the ability to “Concede” the game. Making liberal use of this ability will greatly decrease the effects of your opponent’s advantage in class, cards, and hero power. To avoid further imbalance, advanced players know that on the lower left corner of the Arena page, before queuing a match, there is a “Retire” button.
X-Factor Common: Bolster. Moreso than any other card, Bolster plays into the Warrior’s greatest strength, the element of surprise. Bolster can trigger on a maximum of 7 minions, a 14 point tempo gain for only 2 mana. This sudden tempo increase will leave your opponent blindsided and end the game on the spot. Although this effect cannot be easily set up, the power of unleashing a Bolster combo is unmatched by any other common card in the game. Players have not yet adapted to play around this combo because the Warrior is so rarely seen in the TGT meta, which only serves to increase the strength of Bolster. Bolster’s effects may also be stacked (up to 5 times on a single turn), although this is typically unnecessary as even a single Bolster in your deck will generally decide the outcome of the match.
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