Ricochet Shot
This a cheap AOE spell for Arcane Hunter, which is the primary focus of the set. It can go face, but it must hit three different enemies, so if there are no minions on the board, it will hit face once. What’s most enticing about it is its great scaling with spell damage, as it can turn into a strong board clear if buffed. Auto-include in Quest Hunter and makes that deck better since any 1-mana spell that triggers the quest is strong for it. Should see play.
Score: 3
Shockspitter
This 2-drop works best with Candleshot, as it can turn into a 2/2 that deals 3 damage on curve, being able to clear any kind of early game minion. This is not always going to happen, but Shockspitter has very good scaling provided you run multiple early game weapons. Might enable some crazy combos thanks to Brann and Selective Breeder, but even if that doesn’t pan out, it can go in different kinds of Hunter decks if they run weapons.
Score: 3
Keeneye Spotter
Another minion that works best with Candleshot, as it allows us to cleanly deal with any threat while taking no damage in the process. Bloodseeker can also work in the early game, though Spotter can’t grant it an honorable kill. The main problem is that these are the only strong applications for Spotter, otherwise a 3-drop with vanilla stats. Could see play in a deck centered around Shockspitter, but unlikely to feature elsewhere.
Score: 2
Conjured Arrow
A 2-mana spell that only deals 2 damage to a minion sounds awful, but this card gets crazy good once it hits its Manathirst requirement, drawing cards for the total damage it dealt. So, at its baseline, it draws 2 cards on turn 6. If buffed by spell damage, it can draw more. Conjured Arrow is likely to be a staple in both Arcane Hunter and Quest Hunter, but we wouldn’t be surprised if it snuck in elsewhere considering it offers very cheap card draw for a class that isn’t normally blessed with it. Staple for both early and late game strategies and makes Furious Howl look redundant in comparison.
Score: 4
Silvermoon Farstrider
A vanilla 2-drop that buffs all Arcane spells in hand, which tend to scale extremely well with spell damage. There are only 8 Arcane spells available that you can buff, and 6 spells that you ideally want to hit. So, on average, you might only hit 1 spell when you play this on turn 2. It might be better to hold on to this card until you can find more spells, making Arcane Hunter reactive and swingy in nature.
But another way of looking at it is that Farstrider is a spell damage minion. At a pinch, you drop it to the board to buff one spell, but it can buff multiple spells across multiple turns with a banked mana investment and a decent body. So, it’s much, much better than Bloodmage Thalnos, Rainbow Glowscale or any other spell damage minion out there.
Score: 3
Eversong Portal
Our opinion of Arcane Hunter is strongly influenced by how insane this spell is. A single spell damage buff makes Portal a 4-mana unconditional Faceless Corruptor. A double buff makes this one of the strongest mid-game cards in the format. You can play this with Talented Arcanist, Silvermoon Arcanist, or double it with Twinbow Terrorcoil to completely cripple the opponent’s control of the board. We wouldn’t be surprised to see it regularly summon 4 minions and just win faster matchups. This is the reason we tolerate the idea of playing a couple of vanilla minions to set it up.
Score: 4
Arcane Quiver
Thrive in the Shadows, with a bonus for picking an Arcane spell. This card is already good enough at its baseline to potentially sneak into a deck like Quest Hunter, but it’s obviously huge for Arcane Hunter. Being able to find Eversong Portal or Conjured Arrow and buff them is a major consistency boon for the deck. Anything that works well with Eversong Portal gets +1 on its rating for us.
Score: 3
Scourge Tamer
This is a cute callback to Deathstalker Rexxar if nothing else, but we think that players might be underestimating Scourge Tamer because of its ‘whimsical’ Hearthstone lore. A 2 mana 2/2 with discover has historically and consistently been a good enough card to see constructed play. For example, this could be a consideration for Beast Hunter as it appreciates early game bodies that scale late game. It’s versatile enough to be a consideration, at the very least.
Score: 2
Halduron Brightwing
This legendary has a slower but more reliable effect than Silvermoon Farstrider. Dropping this card early puts you in an advantageous position if you survive to the late game. Following up on Halduron with Arcane Quiver can offer a nice set up to the mid-game swing that this deck is looking for. If you believe in Eversong Portal, you should believe in Halduron.
Score: 3
Hope of Quel’thalas
Ironically, we think there is no hope for this weapon. It is extremely reliant on having a significant board lead to best leverage, and extremely expensive. Yes, this weapon buffs all the minions in your hand and deck by +2/+2 after the second swing, which sounds good, but paying 6 mana for that pleasure is a bit much. In addition, this card clashes hard with the best package of cards in the class in Wildseeds, since Stag is a very awkward early roll if you intend to equip this weapon on turn 6. We can’t see how this single legendary take priority over Wildseeds or Harpoon Gun. If you’re dreaming about Rat Hunter, it’s time to wake up and smell the rat. It stinks.
Score: 1
Final Thoughts
March of the Lich King Set Rank: 7th
Overall Power Ranking: 8th
Hunter’s set is a unique take on the class. Most of the time throughout Hearthstone’s history, Hunter has been a class reliant on developing on-curve minions, utilizing them to push damage and snowball on the opponent, and then finishing off the opponent with direct damage spells. Beast Hunter is particularly minion-centric, and it’s all about developing strong stats every turn to take over the game. It’s been a reliable and working formula in Hunter’s design.
But this set is supporting a different Hunter. It’s the pew pew Hunter. The Hunter that sits far in the back and snipes the opponent from further away. One that doesn’t depend on a horde of minions to accompany it to its hunt every turn. We think that’s cool. Well, perhaps it will rely on a horde of minions. They’ll just all come out in one turn with Eversong Portal.
Arcane Hunter has a lot of potential. The more we tweak its build, the more it looks like a Fel Demon Hunter deck. As a wise Hearthstone player once said, Collateral Damage is basically Jace. Spell Damage is suddenly a thing the class is focused on, through both direct buffs to the spells as they sit in your hand or deck, as well as enablers such as Talented and Silvermoon Arcanist.
But that’s not the only pew pew Hunter that’s lurking. Quest Hunter could make a comeback, with some of the new cards looking like perfect additions to the archetype. Any 1-mana spell that procs the quest becomes one of the stronger cards in the deck, and Ricochet Shot should be no different.
And then there is the weapon package and Shockspitter. It looks like a package rather than a deck, and it will be interesting to see whether there’s a shell ready to accept it. It can’t be Beast Hunter, which is worthy of a mention as it’s currently the only viable Hunter deck.
One thing we can notice is that Beast Hunter didn’t seem to get any significant new addition, which could be a setback to its competitive aspirations in the next expansion. There are some neutrals that could make sense, but it will be mostly unchanged.
Will Hunter pew pew or bow wow? Find out next week.
