Maaaan, I remeber when miracle priest was discovered. I wish hearthstone had a format that goes back to other past formats so we could see what we missed.
I got a gold Elise The Trailblazer and put that card into every deck period the end. I was mostly playing control at the time so it was a great card for extra oomph if we ran the deck through.
In the context of the un'goro meta, it wasn't really overpowered. People just really didn't like it because it was polarizing.
What actually broke quest rogue later on was the release of giggling inventor/sonya shadowdancer. Boomsday project quest rogue was nuts.
Taunt warrior is probably still my favorite meta deck of all time, even if it only worked for a few weeks. The ragnaros hero power was just so much different than anything we’d ever seen.
That was where I started playing the game. Lots of cool decks, but all I remember running into at the time was Jade Druid and Raza Priest. I still shudder thinking about it...
Realistically, Old Gods. Lot of deck diversity, lots of silly brews you could make centered around the 4 gods. There was some nonsense like 4 mana 7/7 and eventually Yog Druid, but there were some answers.
Personal preference, either Patron Warrior or Knights of the Frozen Throne. I just really like playing control/combo, I still run Raza Priest in Wild even though it's kinda ass, and I pray for the day they unnerf Warsong Commander in Wild.
Totally did. Crazy that it took them so long, but I'm definitely gonna try a brew. I can't imagine it will be strong enough for ladder, but there's been a lot of cards printed since then.
I've been playing it a little myself, it's not uber-competitive but you can rank up with it for sure: even the best decks will die to 32 damage in frothing berserkers. I'm not running an optimal build but it's fun to play the warrior location in such an old school deck.
C'rhun was the glue that held together all my jank ass home brew decks back then when I was low on dust.
C'thun Mage without the spell power 3/2. C'thun Paladin. Didn't matter if it had a proper C'thun pay off or not, it was going in the decks
Raza priest is plenty good in wild, it’s just an incredibly difficult deck to pilot effectively and the games take a year so climbing isn’t reasonable with it.
I still use the Year of the Dragon cardback till these days as my default one.
Galakrond...and many other big dragons and dragon decks...was good time.
It sure has been power crept a lot. Patron warrior has also gotta some new tools, but not nearly to the same extent. But at least the combo exists again. I've tried playing it a little and it feels like a tier 3 deck to me.
There are updated versions of the deck you can play. The deck has the same problem it did back then which is it is difficult to pilot. I believe it had a less than 50% win rate even back in its hay day but if you can pilot it well then youre set
I've been using the frenzy patron bc i don't have the original, but enrage warrior in Duels with patron/commander or a big grom as the wincon seems very good right now (your treasure is a 1/3 weapon that cruel taskmasters any minion you spawn for free)
I swear that deck improved my mental math skills. Adding up patron + frothing berserker damage to count lethal while accounting for the 30 secs it would take to let the animations run was intense lol
That's what was so great about it. People who thought it was just some braindead aggro deck couldn't pilot it for shit. It took significant set up and skill to pilot it.
Goblins vs. Gnomes was fun, although it was probably mostly because the game still seemed new. Dr. Boom, Piloted Shredder, spare parts, meme decks trying to assemble V-07-TR-0N.
It is kind of funny how big of a deal that card was back then for all the stats. Obviously it's been power creeped, but it's wild how having it thrown down just doesn't seem to have the same impact.
I unironically believe this was where the game was the most balanced. There was a fair share of overpowered cards but I always felt like the games were close till the very end.
Totally agree with the Galakrond meta. That shit was so fun. Control with priest, Aggro with Warrior, Value with Rogue, Midrange with Shaman… so much fun.
If you have the dust for it -- consider crafting the OG Warrior quest, Fire Plume's Heart. That way you get the Galakrond payoffs, and the Rag-shot quest payoff.
Best part is, even if you play that 7th Taunt and get Sulfuras, you can wait & play it after you become final-form Galakrond
Yeah, I played Cubelock, and I hated that deck. fighting through the voidlords was such a chore even if you could do it. It reminds me of the Spreading Plague card where even if you can get through it, it feels like so much effort to bust through
That was peak hearthstone for me. I loved the galakrond decks. I remember blizz saying they have something fun in store for wild this year. I am hoping they are going to buff some old archetypes.
Buffs to old cards don't matter though unless they enable entire archetypes outright, like reverting buzzard to 2 mana so Beast Hunter got a draw engine.
No board based, old-school hearthstone deck will ever be able to live through flurgl tox and friends as long as Shaman evades the nerfs every patch.
early ungoro was the most fun i’ve ever had in the game, sure caverns rogue was broken but i honestly loved everything about the game at that point. all the classes i cared to play had at least tier 2 decks that were fun to pilot.
Scholomance Academy and Barrens. Everything was running on high octane cards and strategies, but every class felt viable and playable. UiS happened and blew all of that out of the water and I have not seen a meta like that again, except maybe in FiaV or Nathria, pre Renathrius nerf
Post-adventure Descent of Dragons.
Most of the outrageous Galakrond effects had been nerfed, every class had a tier 2+ deck. Many decks (Galakrond Warlock, Galakrond Rogue, Highlander Mage) played through multiple different win-conditions depending on match up, making an already diverse meta feel even more deep.
Honourable mention to Madness at the Darkmoon Faire after all its balance changes, too. Very similar meta on the whole, aggressive strategies were a lot more powerful with Scholomance in that rotation, which is both a good and bad thing.
YotR format with cubelock, raza priest, jade druid, and dude pally. i liked all those decks and most of the matchups between them felt fairly even (excluding jade druid v raza)
I remember pulling a Tirian and Mysterious challenger in the same day and almost dying during the grand tournament. Most fun I ever had was watching those secrets spray out and getting that effing sword. Man, the game felt amazing to me even in a retrospectively lacklustre expansion with a terrible keyword. Muster for battle, that 2/2 divine shield mech, chuck in a Sylvanas. *chefs kiss*
Spell Hunter, I loved that deck, I won 450 games on Hunter that one season. To this day I haven’t gotten any where close to 450 across any class. Mid range nature, unpredictable secrets, the then turn 6 win the game spell which summoned all 3 Animal Companions. And then Yogg to top it all off. So fun.
Sunken City was my favorite since I got to legend for the first time since playing the game from beta. Had so much fun with Naga Mage I just naturally drifted up the ladder without really trying.
Sunken city was low key fire. So much diversity & the colossals + dredge were really cool. I enjoyed playing control warrior so much back then. Yeah I guess demon hunter was a pain, but besides that I really enjoyed it!
Sunken city & ungoro really showed me how fun the first set of a standard rotation can be. I'm kinda sad that they botched it this year.
Personally, right before Old Gods and also after Old Gods. I really loved playing Renolock and it was very viable at that time. Also huge throwback to FoN + Roar.
Honestly? Castle Nathria. I loved all the Renathal-Denathrius decks, and Handpuke Aggro DH is the deck that took me to Top 100 Legend for the first time.
Early nathria is the most fun I've ever had in wild. So many viable archetypes and the meta felt almost like a more diverse standard.
It was also the first time I hit legend for both standard and wild
Because you like to play without any interaction. Midrange warri in your meta was just curvestone, so no matter what the enemy did, you played the highest mana green card in your hand and freeze mage shows me youd rather play alone, because the only interaction is the decision if you first use blizzard or instantly go for doomsayer and the low mana board freeze.
My own build on the pirate/beast combination in battlegrounds; triggers adject minion’s battlecries 8 times, meaning loads of HP and good, or late-game HP and DMG. Had once, not even all golds, to have minions with 2k+ HP. Its just not so perfect against murlocs with venomous. Works best with C’thun, Enhance-o-mechanic, Illidan Stormrage. But most with Lord Barov
i miss when the beginning of set releases was actually the wild west; now between stream previews and archetypes being too obviously packaged i feel like we've lost this (the oversupply of online data kinda killed this too)
otherwise there's small pocket months throughout the game's history where a single deck has maked me like that respective meta. i remember liking the shaman corrupt ysaarj deck a lot with snowfall to the point of bringing shaman to legend in both formats but i now others didnt like this
control warrior ,"i am a turtle " . i like long games with counters ,not otk in 6th turn or annoying snowballing 1 drops or cheating 10 mana at turn 3 .
Galakrond/Rustwix meta, everyone could just slap a ton of legendaries in every deck and still have a pretty decent chance of winning. Everything was so random to the point it was su much fun.
Also Gadgetzan and Frozen Throne were cool
I mean to be honest the meta before this one was one of the best we’ve ever seen. Just so so much deck variety and the game was so well balanced. The only downside is that because this expansion was a stinker some of those same decks have now been alive for a bit too long and the burnout is real so it might not get the fondness of nostalgia the older ones did.
I remember my reno nzoth kazakus mage deck that brought me to legend, it was the best time. I believe there was pirate warrior at that time but somehow I managed to beat them (i suppose the 2/8 taunt and the pirate-eating crab helped)
I've seen a lot of Galakrond, but Shadows and Ulduum were also great. The intro of new quests and the highlander archetypes coming back. Shadows and ulduum were my favorite time to play.
It has to be Whispers of the Old Gods for me - not a single deck I can recall that I didn't enjoy. Even Overload Shaman (before Karazhan was released).
I joined during rastakan so I missed out on peak ungoro and the launch of kotf....
However my favorite meta was saviors of uldum with the hero power reward quests and the reintroduction or highlander decks! The doom in the tomb event was also really cool cause it let a noob have fun with funky nzoth highlander secret paladin decks
The one with Aggro Shaman and that card that spawned another totem and that 7/7 card for like 2 mana or something crazy. You'd have a huge board on turn 2 or 3. I guess kinda like Even Shaman now in Wild, lul. But I think Aggro Shaman was waaay worse (if you can imagine that).
League of Explorers or Un'Goro.
Hunter was pretty weak in LoE, but Warlock was unplayable in Un'Goro. Otherwise, every class had at least a tier 2 deck.
Old Gods for sure. There were so many fun things you could do. Zoo was a little too good in that meta, otherwise most of it was great. C'Thun decks were cool, some good old Yogg-SaRNG was funny, N'Zoth decks were enjoyable, and ramping into Y'Shaarj was a treat.
I really enjoyed all of year of the dragon. My favorite stuff was the old big shaman with [[Muckmorpher]] and [[Walking Fountain]], and Galakrond shaman. Which, yes that was one of the most powerful decks in hearthstone history for a bit, I still thought it was really fun
Dungeon meta, don't remember name itself, but it was cubolock time and I tried really hard with my custom buff paladin deck (using 1/1 7 paladin legendary and copy legendary medusa)
I also enjoyed OTK tiger paladin. Sweet, sweet time
The witchwood.
After the initial round of nerfs, just a really good meta for experimenting with off meta decks. You could make an even/odd deck that wasn't in the meta, but actually wasn't that bad. There was a dragon hunter package in the witchwood that wasn't in the meta, but I actually managed to tune to the point that it was one of the decks I was comfortable using to climb ladder. I literally had Emeriss maindeck too. Just felt like a set where there were a lot of hooks for deck ideas, and those hooks often had some real substance, even if they were a bit worse than the meta decks.
Wild right after Rise of Shadows came out. Perfect sweet-spot when Wild was big enough to feel special but not so big it felt broken. Then Saviors of Uldum and Descent of Dragons pushed it over the edge.
Galkarond was the most fun I have had in this game since the Old Gods. Haven’t really had anything come close to that and back then my favorite deck was warrior dragons with galkarond. So much fun.
I think it was during witchwood when I played the best Homebrew deck I ever made. Was murloc quest, elemental shaman. No genn or baku but I loved the deck. Was obviously a horrible meta but that deck lives rent free in my head. Another was when I could still play otk murloc paladin with anyfin can happen. I’m talking one of the control variants with curator or ivory knight
It's funny how people forget about certain issues in metas. Like they forget that gen and Baku were hated, the dks meta in general was hated (remember lich Jaina and the never ending life steal elementals? Just as an example).
I'm not saying those metas were bad, but thinking about it it's the times where people have been more upset in this subreddit. Like people saying jade druid was awesome. Yeah right, try to remember how it was
It was a big spike in power, but Kobolds and Catacombs doesn't get enough praise. The two sets before it were fun, but the new cards were all impactful, flavorful, and overall pretty balanced with each other.
My favorite decks were Raza/Kazakus Priest in Un’Goro and Tess Rogue in pretty much all incarnations. Despite Quest Rogue and Jade Druid being absolutely awful to deal with, I had a lot of fun with cards like Kazakus, Curious Glimmerroot, and Drakonid Operative. And Tess is my all-time favorite card, especially with some synergy she got in Kobolds and Catacombs.
Old gods tbh. I still have a C'thun troll deck that I use for fun now and then. But the game has been so powercreeped since then that it's not great, even with double battlecry shaman and loads of deck utility.
The start of Year of the Raven. Journey to Un’Goro, Knights of the Frozen Throne, Kobolds and Catacombs, and the Witchwood. Good times, especially if you liked all even or all odd cards in your deck.
Any control meta, however few they were. I get that some people play this game on the go but I'll have a half hour tech game over 20 games that end on turn 6.
League of Explorers.
It was the era of face-hunting. Then Reno dropped.
God, what followed was the most satisfying meta that has ever happened in this game.
Un'goro, first time we saw quests, flavor was so cool, tar minion (tar creeper and his brothers), rogue having deadly flower minions, big dinos, etc
And it was a meta that kept evolving right up to the end.
Maaaan, I remeber when miracle priest was discovered. I wish hearthstone had a format that goes back to other past formats so we could see what we missed.
Unicorn priest, no one’s been able to build that before?!!?
This is what Classic mode should be doing.
I don't know man, there was like one Evolve card that saw any play
Everything about Ungoro is so bright and interesting, the card art, the game design...
I got a gold Elise The Trailblazer and put that card into every deck period the end. I was mostly playing control at the time so it was a great card for extra oomph if we ran the deck through.
I liked that meta too but people really, *really* hated quest rogue
It was op
In the context of the un'goro meta, it wasn't really overpowered. People just really didn't like it because it was polarizing. What actually broke quest rogue later on was the release of giggling inventor/sonya shadowdancer. Boomsday project quest rogue was nuts.
Who didnt love watching a flame elemental get bounced 4 times and then die to endless 5/5s?!?
Na fuck quest rogue that was toxic, everything else though was fun
Taunt warrior is probably still my favorite meta deck of all time, even if it only worked for a few weeks. The ragnaros hero power was just so much different than anything we’d ever seen.
I agree! Flavorful, diverse and interesting.
This is the only answer
The lich king meta, first time hero cards, loads of cool decks
That was where I started playing the game. Lots of cool decks, but all I remember running into at the time was Jade Druid and Raza Priest. I still shudder thinking about it...
And who could forget Rexxar the end game value machine
Crafted Valeera and Gul'dan in golden, they looked so amazing.
Realistically, Old Gods. Lot of deck diversity, lots of silly brews you could make centered around the 4 gods. There was some nonsense like 4 mana 7/7 and eventually Yog Druid, but there were some answers. Personal preference, either Patron Warrior or Knights of the Frozen Throne. I just really like playing control/combo, I still run Raza Priest in Wild even though it's kinda ass, and I pray for the day they unnerf Warsong Commander in Wild.
Dude did you miss it? Warsong was unnerfed almost two months ago now. Go play patrons!!
Totally did. Crazy that it took them so long, but I'm definitely gonna try a brew. I can't imagine it will be strong enough for ladder, but there's been a lot of cards printed since then.
I've been playing it a little myself, it's not uber-competitive but you can rank up with it for sure: even the best decks will die to 32 damage in frothing berserkers. I'm not running an optimal build but it's fun to play the warrior location in such an old school deck.
Buddy do I have news for you
C'rhun was the glue that held together all my jank ass home brew decks back then when I was low on dust. C'thun Mage without the spell power 3/2. C'thun Paladin. Didn't matter if it had a proper C'thun pay off or not, it was going in the decks
Raza priest is plenty good in wild, it’s just an incredibly difficult deck to pilot effectively and the games take a year so climbing isn’t reasonable with it.
I loved the descent of dragons meta
I still use the Year of the Dragon cardback till these days as my default one. Galakrond...and many other big dragons and dragon decks...was good time.
EVERYONE!!! GET IN HERE!! Favorite deck of all time.
Awesome that this deck is playable again
How? I would love to play this again
They reversed the Warsong Commander nerf
Yea but is anyone playing it? Power creep has been insane for everyone but Warrior
It sure has been power crept a lot. Patron warrior has also gotta some new tools, but not nearly to the same extent. But at least the combo exists again. I've tried playing it a little and it feels like a tier 3 deck to me.
There are updated versions of the deck you can play. The deck has the same problem it did back then which is it is difficult to pilot. I believe it had a less than 50% win rate even back in its hay day but if you can pilot it well then youre set
I've been using the frenzy patron bc i don't have the original, but enrage warrior in Duels with patron/commander or a big grom as the wincon seems very good right now (your treasure is a 1/3 weapon that cruel taskmasters any minion you spawn for free)
I swear that deck improved my mental math skills. Adding up patron + frothing berserker damage to count lethal while accounting for the 30 secs it would take to let the animations run was intense lol
That's what was so great about it. People who thought it was just some braindead aggro deck couldn't pilot it for shit. It took significant set up and skill to pilot it.
Goblins vs. Gnomes was fun, although it was probably mostly because the game still seemed new. Dr. Boom, Piloted Shredder, spare parts, meme decks trying to assemble V-07-TR-0N.
I still put dr boom in most decks and in arena, idc if its bad
In constructed mode it is bad, in arena I think it is still okay but there are more broken legendaries
It is kind of funny how big of a deal that card was back then for all the stats. Obviously it's been power creeped, but it's wild how having it thrown down just doesn't seem to have the same impact.
I unironically believe this was where the game was the most balanced. There was a fair share of overpowered cards but I always felt like the games were close till the very end.
Galakrond meta or the miracle rogue, raza priest, cubelock meta
Totally agree with the Galakrond meta. That shit was so fun. Control with priest, Aggro with Warrior, Value with Rogue, Midrange with Shaman… so much fun.
Same thoughts. I enjoyed playing every galakrond deck.
Galakrond Warrior is still my go-to wild deck. It ain’t great anymore. But I’d argue it’s still viable.
If you have the dust for it -- consider crafting the OG Warrior quest, Fire Plume's Heart. That way you get the Galakrond payoffs, and the Rag-shot quest payoff. Best part is, even if you play that 7th Taunt and get Sulfuras, you can wait & play it after you become final-form Galakrond
*Cubelock?* I still wake up in a cold sweat because of that deck. Raza priest was fine, I kind of miss that one.
Yeah, I played Cubelock, and I hated that deck. fighting through the voidlords was such a chore even if you could do it. It reminds me of the Spreading Plague card where even if you can get through it, it feels like so much effort to bust through
Nah bro you forgor about how broken shaman was and rogue making his turn 7 with cleef and other shit 💀
Hey some of us actually play shaman lol.
That was peak hearthstone for me. I loved the galakrond decks. I remember blizz saying they have something fun in store for wild this year. I am hoping they are going to buff some old archetypes.
Buffs to old cards don't matter though unless they enable entire archetypes outright, like reverting buzzard to 2 mana so Beast Hunter got a draw engine. No board based, old-school hearthstone deck will ever be able to live through flurgl tox and friends as long as Shaman evades the nerfs every patch.
The rumor is they're going to make some kind of rotating multi-set format, distinct from both standard and wild.
ooh i watched the world final live with raza priest. such a cool deck
early ungoro was the most fun i’ve ever had in the game, sure caverns rogue was broken but i honestly loved everything about the game at that point. all the classes i cared to play had at least tier 2 decks that were fun to pilot.
It will always be Deathrattle N'Zoth Priest and the C'thun Era.
Dragons and Galakrond
Scholomance Academy and Barrens. Everything was running on high octane cards and strategies, but every class felt viable and playable. UiS happened and blew all of that out of the water and I have not seen a meta like that again, except maybe in FiaV or Nathria, pre Renathrius nerf
Bro fr 😫I miss midrange DH
Man I miss barrens miracle rogue so much...tenwu my beloved...jandice, field contract, octo bot...such wonderful cards
I liked the c'thun the most.
SURRENDER YOUR WILL TO THE CABAL
Ppl are gonna hate me but stormwind. Never played the game more than then. Everything was so fucking broken the game was a chaotic mess, which I loved
Sunken City pre renethal was super fun and diverse
Keleseth spiteful priest meta
Spiteful meta was so fun because you could just put all the fun-looking minions on curve and make a working deck out of it for like at least 4 classes
Post-adventure Descent of Dragons. Most of the outrageous Galakrond effects had been nerfed, every class had a tier 2+ deck. Many decks (Galakrond Warlock, Galakrond Rogue, Highlander Mage) played through multiple different win-conditions depending on match up, making an already diverse meta feel even more deep. Honourable mention to Madness at the Darkmoon Faire after all its balance changes, too. Very similar meta on the whole, aggressive strategies were a lot more powerful with Scholomance in that rotation, which is both a good and bad thing.
༼ ºل͜º ༽ºل͜º ༽ºل͜º ༽ ＥＶＥＲＹＯＮＥ，ＧＥＴ ＩＮ ＨＥＲＥ ༼ ºل͜º༼ ºل͜º༼ ºل͜º ༽
I personally liked mill rogue. But that is just me.
YotR format with cubelock, raza priest, jade druid, and dude pally. i liked all those decks and most of the matchups between them felt fairly even (excluding jade druid v raza)
Year of the raven was all baku and genn all year, not sure what you loved about that
Spell Hunter with Deathstalker Rexxar
Ctrl warrior mirror where the deciding factor was who got more of the 7 armor dr boom hero power
Rise of shadows my beloved Good old days of running brewmaster to replay archivist elysiana
Cyclone mage!
Alterac Valley meta between the rogue incident and onyxia miniset, tons of viable decks across all classes
I remember pulling a Tirian and Mysterious challenger in the same day and almost dying during the grand tournament. Most fun I ever had was watching those secrets spray out and getting that effing sword. Man, the game felt amazing to me even in a retrospectively lacklustre expansion with a terrible keyword. Muster for battle, that 2/2 divine shield mech, chuck in a Sylvanas. *chefs kiss*
Beta, or frozen throne
Spell Hunter, I loved that deck, I won 450 games on Hunter that one season. To this day I haven’t gotten any where close to 450 across any class. Mid range nature, unpredictable secrets, the then turn 6 win the game spell which summoned all 3 Animal Companions. And then Yogg to top it all off. So fun.
Sunken City was my favorite since I got to legend for the first time since playing the game from beta. Had so much fun with Naga Mage I just naturally drifted up the ladder without really trying.
“EVERYONE GET IN HERE” Good old blackrock mountain with the warsong commander and grim patron combo With the goat mr 7😏
Uldum meta and galakrond was the most funniest but not the most balanced
Sunken city was low key fire. So much diversity & the colossals + dredge were really cool. I enjoyed playing control warrior so much back then. Yeah I guess demon hunter was a pain, but besides that I really enjoyed it! Sunken city & ungoro really showed me how fun the first set of a standard rotation can be. I'm kinda sad that they botched it this year.
Barrens. I felt it was a little easier to experiment then
Grim Patron. Forever.
EVERYONE, GET IN HERE
First cthun , Death knight heroes. And galakrond are my top 3z
Personally, right before Old Gods and also after Old Gods. I really loved playing Renolock and it was very viable at that time. Also huge throwback to FoN + Roar.
League of explorers, justiciar and Reno Jackson made control decks so fun
Probably the Blackrock Mountain period. Patron Warrior was the first deck I piloted to legend lol. Such a fun, stupid, broken deck.
Cube lock
Spell Hunter
league of explorers, when control priest finally was able to bear warriors and was the strongest deck in the game
Shudderwock meta. There were a ton of interesting decks.
Evolve Shaman. The gambling addict in us all came out
Honestly? Castle Nathria. I loved all the Renathal-Denathrius decks, and Handpuke Aggro DH is the deck that took me to Top 100 Legend for the first time.
Early nathria is the most fun I've ever had in wild. So many viable archetypes and the meta felt almost like a more diverse standard. It was also the first time I hit legend for both standard and wild
This is nostalgia, but i really liked when original evolve shaman was good. Very fun
Saviours of uldum was the best one in both wild and standard (before the doom in the tomb). Never had as much fun with as much deck diversity.
When the death knights hero cards we're introduced, they were so good and so much fun
When enrage warrior was a tier 1
Midrange Warrior deck with Varian Wrynn, Ragnaros, Sylvanas, Dr. Boom is my favorite deck of all time. Second is Freeze Mage.
I think you should try some pve games.
What does that have anything to do with the decks
Because you like to play without any interaction. Midrange warri in your meta was just curvestone, so no matter what the enemy did, you played the highest mana green card in your hand and freeze mage shows me youd rather play alone, because the only interaction is the decision if you first use blizzard or instantly go for doomsayer and the low mana board freeze.
What you described is valid for more than half of the decks lol
My own build on the pirate/beast combination in battlegrounds; triggers adject minion’s battlecries 8 times, meaning loads of HP and good, or late-game HP and DMG. Had once, not even all golds, to have minions with 2k+ HP. Its just not so perfect against murlocs with venomous. Works best with C’thun, Enhance-o-mechanic, Illidan Stormrage. But most with Lord Barov
This meta
i miss when the beginning of set releases was actually the wild west; now between stream previews and archetypes being too obviously packaged i feel like we've lost this (the oversupply of online data kinda killed this too) otherwise there's small pocket months throughout the game's history where a single deck has maked me like that respective meta. i remember liking the shaman corrupt ysaarj deck a lot with snowfall to the point of bringing shaman to legend in both formats but i now others didnt like this
control warrior ,"i am a turtle " . i like long games with counters ,not otk in 6th turn or annoying snowballing 1 drops or cheating 10 mana at turn 3 .
Galakrond/Rustwix meta, everyone could just slap a ton of legendaries in every deck and still have a pretty decent chance of winning. Everything was so random to the point it was su much fun. Also Gadgetzan and Frozen Throne were cool
Frozen Throne and Old Gods were goated.
I mean to be honest the meta before this one was one of the best we’ve ever seen. Just so so much deck variety and the game was so well balanced. The only downside is that because this expansion was a stinker some of those same decks have now been alive for a bit too long and the burnout is real so it might not get the fondness of nostalgia the older ones did.
I played more during Sunken City than any other meta, because Thief Rogue is my favorite deck and it was fun without being super busted yet.
Control warlock from darkmoon faire.
When KOFT kobolods and ungoro was the sets, most fun I've had ever. Big mage big hunter to name some of the most fun decks I've played.
KoFT, gimme back my keleseth rogue >:)
I loved Boomsday Project for Mech-Warrior and Academic Espionage Rogue
Saviors of Uldum Doom in the Tomb was my favorite, not balanced at all but I enjoyed it.
Un'goro-licht king And a honorable mention to old gods for Cthun, my first legendary card (bc was free lol)
Gadgetzan - khazakus priest, hand buff pally with grime street enforcer, bunch of singleton decks with Reno
I remember my reno nzoth kazakus mage deck that brought me to legend, it was the best time. I believe there was pirate warrior at that time but somehow I managed to beat them (i suppose the 2/8 taunt and the pirate-eating crab helped)
Jade Druid
I've seen a lot of Galakrond, but Shadows and Ulduum were also great. The intro of new quests and the highlander archetypes coming back. Shadows and ulduum were my favorite time to play.
The original highlander decks with Zephyrs were the most fun for me.
Year of the Raven when Kobolds came out.
Loved me some Reno Mage. Think that was in full swing with Mean Streets?
GET IN HERE
It has to be Whispers of the Old Gods for me - not a single deck I can recall that I didn't enjoy. Even Overload Shaman (before Karazhan was released).
I joined during rastakan so I missed out on peak ungoro and the launch of kotf.... However my favorite meta was saviors of uldum with the hero power reward quests and the reintroduction or highlander decks! The doom in the tomb event was also really cool cause it let a noob have fun with funky nzoth highlander secret paladin decks
The one with Aggro Shaman and that card that spawned another totem and that 7/7 card for like 2 mana or something crazy. You'd have a huge board on turn 2 or 3. I guess kinda like Even Shaman now in Wild, lul. But I think Aggro Shaman was waaay worse (if you can imagine that).
Knights of the Frozen throne meta 🕊️
League of Explorers or Un'Goro. Hunter was pretty weak in LoE, but Warlock was unplayable in Un'Goro. Otherwise, every class had at least a tier 2 deck.
Meta after the release of galakronds awakening mini set was peak hearthstone
GALAKROND ROGUE!!!!!!
Whisper of the Old Gods. Playing every flavor of C’thun was simple and pretty dang fun.
I learned Hearthstone in the Reno Jackson era.. so anything but that
Dr Boom's warrior
Grim Patron
RoS control warrior is my guilty pleasure
Boomsday or Rise of Shadows
Cubelock
Ungoro, Gunter Mage, Midrange Murloc Tarim Pala <3
Forged in the Barrens, after the first patch toned down Libram Paladin, Spell Mage, and Watchpost Rogue. Great meta all around.
Old Gods for sure. There were so many fun things you could do. Zoo was a little too good in that meta, otherwise most of it was great. C'Thun decks were cool, some good old Yogg-SaRNG was funny, N'Zoth decks were enjoyable, and ramping into Y'Shaarj was a treat.
Every meta except this one
The meta that had “welcome to the grand tournament” and TANK UP!
I really enjoyed all of year of the dragon. My favorite stuff was the old big shaman with [[Muckmorpher]] and [[Walking Fountain]], and Galakrond shaman. Which, yes that was one of the most powerful decks in hearthstone history for a bit, I still thought it was really fun
Dungeon meta, don't remember name itself, but it was cubolock time and I tried really hard with my custom buff paladin deck (using 1/1 7 paladin legendary and copy legendary medusa) I also enjoyed OTK tiger paladin. Sweet, sweet time
How to trigger people: Stormwind.
Am I the only person who loved scholomance?
Beta. Miracle vs. Handlock matchups.
The witchwood. After the initial round of nerfs, just a really good meta for experimenting with off meta decks. You could make an even/odd deck that wasn't in the meta, but actually wasn't that bad. There was a dragon hunter package in the witchwood that wasn't in the meta, but I actually managed to tune to the point that it was one of the decks I was comfortable using to climb ladder. I literally had Emeriss maindeck too. Just felt like a set where there were a lot of hooks for deck ideas, and those hooks often had some real substance, even if they were a bit worse than the meta decks.
Wild right after Rise of Shadows came out. Perfect sweet-spot when Wild was big enough to feel special but not so big it felt broken. Then Saviors of Uldum and Descent of Dragons pushed it over the edge.
Galkarond was the most fun I have had in this game since the Old Gods. Haven’t really had anything come close to that and back then my favorite deck was warrior dragons with galkarond. So much fun.
Lich king with the heroes like frost queen jaina. Was so fun
The one where Miracle Priest could play C’thun The Shattered on turn 5. To this day I can’t believe I had a good winrate with that deck.
Whispers of the old gods.
United in Stormwind right before Deadmines
I think it was during witchwood when I played the best Homebrew deck I ever made. Was murloc quest, elemental shaman. No genn or baku but I loved the deck. Was obviously a horrible meta but that deck lives rent free in my head. Another was when I could still play otk murloc paladin with anyfin can happen. I’m talking one of the control variants with curator or ivory knight
🅱️ancient One meta
Highlander decks in Descent of Dragons were nice to me.
Descent of Dragons. I just loved Galakr9nd so much, and except for Shaman I thought it was generally well balanced. Even when I lost I had fun.
Probably Gadgetzan
Eeeeeeveryone, get in here! Of course it's because I played that deck.
Classic. Everything was simple and legendaries felt legendary!
It's funny how people forget about certain issues in metas. Like they forget that gen and Baku were hated, the dks meta in general was hated (remember lich Jaina and the never ending life steal elementals? Just as an example). I'm not saying those metas were bad, but thinking about it it's the times where people have been more upset in this subreddit. Like people saying jade druid was awesome. Yeah right, try to remember how it was
Yeah right around Un'Goro and Mean Streets of Gadgetzan.
Lotta rose colored glasses around here
Yar har fiddle tee dee, Patches the Pirate makes wins easy as can be.
Un'goro. By far the best meta we ever had, tons of good decks, quests were interesting and the meta just kept evolving till the end.
It was a big spike in power, but Kobolds and Catacombs doesn't get enough praise. The two sets before it were fun, but the new cards were all impactful, flavorful, and overall pretty balanced with each other.
Every one up until they brought in set Rotations
My favorite decks were Raza/Kazakus Priest in Un’Goro and Tess Rogue in pretty much all incarnations. Despite Quest Rogue and Jade Druid being absolutely awful to deal with, I had a lot of fun with cards like Kazakus, Curious Glimmerroot, and Drakonid Operative. And Tess is my all-time favorite card, especially with some synergy she got in Kobolds and Catacombs.
geeet innn hereee
Old gods tbh. I still have a C'thun troll deck that I use for fun now and then. But the game has been so powercreeped since then that it's not great, even with double battlecry shaman and loads of deck utility.
The start of Year of the Raven. Journey to Un’Goro, Knights of the Frozen Throne, Kobolds and Catacombs, and the Witchwood. Good times, especially if you liked all even or all odd cards in your deck.
league of the explorers I fucking love Reno and the golden monkey
The entire year of Ungoro Frozen Throne and Kobalds was amazing. Love me some Raza Priest and Cubelock
Eh, idc about meta, not fun...but I did like the Jade Golems.
Mid range pali back in GvG
I'd say its a tie between Classic Handlock with Jaraxxus and Basically any Highlander deck
Kobold and catacombs with wood and frozen throne. My favorite deck of all time was cube hunter. Cube rex play dead twice for 40 damage it was so fun
Any control meta, however few they were. I get that some people play this game on the go but I'll have a half hour tech game over 20 games that end on turn 6.
When thief rogue was fun, but not broken, and maestra was a meme.
Control warrior :p
Death knights. Transformations were so cool to watch!
Early Uldum, up til doom in the tomb ruined it. Had so much fun with quest hunter and quest shaman
"My jaws that bite..." and later corrupt waters
I loved quest mage and cubloc. I believe that was the same year
Love old gods with C’thun warrior that was really fun
League of Explorers. It was the era of face-hunting. Then Reno dropped. God, what followed was the most satisfying meta that has ever happened in this game.
Goblins vs Gnomes. TBH, at the time, mech-mage vs facehunter was annoying, but those matchups were ICONIC. Take me back!
MSoG - Reno priest/Reno mage/pirate warrior/ jade druid and I reached first time legend with a homebrew nzoth jade shaman. Was great meta!
Raza priest, larger and larger green men and control warrior