Caverns Below Aggro Rogue Quest Standard

[positiv2 950]

1 hour ago, Paracel said:

First of all - Swashburglar. The card is completely out of place, and I strongly believe it is outdated at the moment and does not belong to Quest Rogue's composture. It gives you Burgled spells on the bounces! Yeah, but do you have any use for them unless you land a really good one? It's not drawing cards, and Burgled spells do not advance your gameplan of assembling the Crystal Core. You don' want to spend your mana on them either, because they are not pieces, and you don't win without completing the quest, period.

Swashburglar is a good card to bounce. You don't always get double Fire Fly with Igneous Elemental, so another minion to bounce without losing card advantage that significantly. However, you are missing an important thing; "It gives you Burgled spells" - it also can give you minions. 

If you don't have any good/better plays, or if you have spare mana that could be spent by the card you get from the Swashburglar, you do play the card from the Swashburglar. Since this is a combo deck, you will find the situation to arise somewhat frequently.

Now for the stats of the card - HSReplay has this deck and since the amount of games is quite high, I think it is fair to use it as a reference. The card has 56% winrate if you play the card, which is more than acceptable.

2 hours ago, Paracel said:

Does Patches really bail you out of early game, when you're looking to develop your combo ahead and not to die?

Sometimes a free 1/1 with charge is all you need to win the early game.

2 hours ago, Paracel said:

Bilefin Tidehunter is ok past Core, but is a pretty poor bounce target

Reading the guide would answer that. It is not a bounce target, but rather a way to stabilise.

2 hours ago, Paracel said:

I don't have the time to give my analysis on the replays just now, maybe later today, but I think the more passive lines and reactive gameplay are acceptable and perhaps even preffered approaches to playing the deck, as well as casing Mimic Pod when behind on board.

What use is having more cards or completing the quest earlier if you are basically dead by then? Sure, some decks, playing Mimic Pod when behind on board is fine, but certainly not against the majority of aggro decks and against a lot of midrange decks.

[Paracel 165]

2 hours ago, positiv2 said:

Swashburglar is a good card to bounce. You don't always get double Fire Fly with Igneous Elemental, so another minion to bounce without losing card advantage that significantly. However, you are missing an important thing; "It gives you Burgled spells" - it also can give you minions. 

If you don't have any good/better plays, or if you have spare mana that could be spent by the card you get from the Swashburglar, you do play the card from the Swashburglar. Since this is a combo deck, you will find the situation to arise somewhat frequently.

Now for the stats of the card - HSReplay has this deck and since the amount of games is quite high, I think it is fair to use it as a reference. The card has 56% winrate if you play the card, which is more than acceptable.

My point still stands. There is hardly time and mana to be spent on these Burgled cards, and their consistency never satisfies. With this deck, if you don't spend mana towards your win condition, you're losing. Unless that mana is somehow spent towards not-losing - which Swashburglar can't guarantee - you're losing. It's really the win-more thing here, and from a deckbuilding perspective I'd rather walk the path of optimizing main strategy and improving the consistency of something I have control over - the contents of my deck, and thus what I am most likely going to draw.

Bilefin is OK, but I think it's just as win-more as Swashburglar. You generally don't lose after resolving Crystal Core, and Tidehunter helps you to fix the issues when you go off and still lose when you get really behind early, which in its turn could be dealt with by, well, not falling behind early. Latter is, perhaps, harder to achieve than the former, but it is much more useful in the long run.

Yeah and Doomsayer is just a good card to slam turn two so you don't die. It buys you time anyways, which is the most important resource for the deck, one way or another. I saw the tech somewhere on the internets, (XiXo, maybe?) and then it paid my bills on the ladder a couple of days ago.

Edited May 14, 2017 by Paracel

[KingMe 289]

@Paracel, giving your interesting take on this archetype I am curious as to what your version looks like and to know what your statistics are with it. 

[Paracel 165]

5 hours ago, KingMe said:

giving your interesting take on this archetype I am curious as to what your version looks like and to know what your statistics are with it. 

Oh, don't get me wrong, but I netdecked that. I just see the changes made by the very best, understand their reasoning and try to convince everyone else that's just strictly better, like a pro player name is not trademarky enough. I don't play as much Hearthstone as I'd like to right now, a bit short on time. But the quad crab configuration steadily gave me stars (12-5 or something like that. I wasted these stars playing dailies, as usual). 

[positiv2 950]

23 hours ago, Paracel said:

My point still stands. There is hardly time and mana to be spent on these Burgled cards, and their consistency never satisfies. With this deck, if you don't spend mana towards your win condition, you're losing. Unless that mana is somehow spent towards not-losing - which Swashburglar can't guarantee - you're losing. It's really the win-more thing here, and from a deckbuilding perspective I'd rather walk the path of optimizing main strategy and improving the consistency of something I have control over - the contents of my deck, and thus what I am most likely going to draw.

So does mine. It increases the bounce consistency, does not give you card disadvantage, is a body, summons Patches the Pirate. If you are going to play the card 4 times, you get 4 cards (obviously), and that means you get a good card in more games.

23 hours ago, Paracel said:

Bilefin is OK, but I think it's just as win-more as Swashburglar.

I'm not really sure how a card that helps you stabilize and counts as two minions is a win-more card. It can protect you from minions that you didn't manage to clear, from charge minions, or from weapons. If you do not need protection anymore, it still counts as two bodies, giving you 10 damage.

On 14. 5. 2017 at 11:48 PM, Paracel said:

Yeah and Doomsayer is just a good card to slam turn two so you don't die.

I checked 5 quest rogue variations running Doomsayer with a total of cca 70k games, and the Played Winrate of the card is the lowest in the decks, making it arguably the weakest link. So, while it might have worked for some people, yourself included, it does not work for the majority of players. 

Also, I believe FanOfValeera made a good point about Doomsayer in the deck.

[zifmia 14]

FWIW, I tried this http://www.hearthstonetopdecks.com/decks/kolentos-anti-meta-rogue/ and went 14-18 rattling around rank 7. This "anti-meta" deck takes out the vanishes, swashburglars, and bilefins and replaces them with 2x hungry crab, 2x golakka crawler, 1x backstab, 1x eater of secrets.

As always I'm sure my play could be improved. I never drew Golakka Crawler at a time when it could make a difference against a Pirate Warrior, but I did have a couple games against paladins that were won singlehandedly by a Hungry Crab, and ended up going 5-2 against paladins, compared to 6-9 with the deck here on icy-veins. The Eater of Secrets managed to eat just one game-winning ice block, and also helped a couple times against paladins, but was usually a dead card. Overall though, I'm not sure the meta (at least at my level) is polarized enough to make the anti-meta techs worthwhile. It felt gimmicky, great when it connected but inferior overall. There were definitely spots where I missed the bilefins and vanishes. I might reserve judgment on the hungry crab, though; almost 1/3 of my games have been against paladins, at 1 mana it is a convenient bounce target, and the swings when it connected (especially as a quest bounce target) were huge.

I gave up and switched back to the deck here, but with backstabs swapped in for the mimic pods, and went on a 7-0 streak to finally hit rank 5 for the month. Obviously not a valid sample size, but I found the backstabs to be helpful in not losing the board early, and also useful for dealing with awkward enemy minions with 6-7 health when I don't want to use two minions or take face damage with a dagger. Plus it seems like way too many times I try mimic pod looking for a bounce target and draw mimic pod, vanish, or igneous elemental.

[OroNerVoSo 1]

7 hours ago, zifmia said:

FWIW, I tried this http://www.hearthstonetopdecks.com/decks/kolentos-anti-meta-rogue/ and went 14-18 rattling around rank 7. This "anti-meta" deck takes out the vanishes, swashburglars, and bilefins and replaces them with 2x hungry crab, 2x golakka crawler, 1x backstab, 1x eater of secrets.

As always I'm sure my play could be improved. I never drew Golakka Crawler at a time when it could make a difference against a Pirate Warrior, but I did have a couple games against paladins that were won singlehandedly by a Hungry Crab, and ended up going 5-2 against paladins, compared to 6-9 with the deck here on icy-veins. The Eater of Secrets managed to eat just one game-winning ice block, and also helped a couple times against paladins, but was usually a dead card. Overall though, I'm not sure the meta (at least at my level) is polarized enough to make the anti-meta techs worthwhile. It felt gimmicky, great when it connected but inferior overall. There were definitely spots where I missed the bilefins and vanishes. I might reserve judgment on the hungry crab, though; almost 1/3 of my games have been against paladins, at 1 mana it is a convenient bounce target, and the swings when it connected (especially as a quest bounce target) were huge.

I gave up and switched back to the deck here, but with backstabs swapped in for the mimic pods, and went on a 7-0 streak to finally hit rank 5 for the month. Obviously not a valid sample size, but I found the backstabs to be helpful in not losing the board early, and also useful for dealing with awkward enemy minions with 6-7 health when I don't want to use two minions or take face damage with a dagger. Plus it seems like way too many times I try mimic pod looking for a bounce target and draw mimic pod, vanish, or igneous elemental.

Guys i'm noticing that every quest deck might be good. every week , Others change their decks looking on the internet , they want to rank up , so everyone play that specific deck.

so , Yesterday i've met 40 mages out of 50 games (rank15) , and they played everyone the same Alexstrasza deck , medivh and various secrets...

the previous week , midrange hunter was the spot.

we just need to play 5 or 6 decks with some "rotation" cards. there is no best quest rogue , there is just a "meta reading" , like now.

anyway i agree with Swashburglar question. The cards you get with him are like "rocks" in your hand , and 70% of times you can't play those cards due to "mana Math" of the quest rogue (i already said that)

today , Hallucination is just better. you can choose the card that fits more the situation.

 

 

[positiv2 950]

1 hour ago, OroNerVoSo said:

Guys i'm noticing that every quest deck might be good.

Not really. Lakkari Sacrifice and The Last Kaleidosaur are outright trash with cards currently in the game - they get countered very easily and do not provide any significant advantage. 

Open the Waygate and Jungle Giants have considerably stronger rewards than the aforementioned quests, but get countered by fast meta, which has however been here since LoE, with each expansion speeding it up. To some extent, same goes for Awaken the Makers - you often get killed before completin the quest, and completing the quest doesn't help that much against control decks.

The Marsh Queen doesn't get countered that easily with commonly played cards, but the reward is not that strong. If drawing Carnassa's Broods was more consistent (like, "Put 15 Carnassa's Brood at the top of your deck" rather than randomly shuffling them), it would be a strong deck.

So, five (or six with Awaken the Makers, if it's to be considered a weak deck) quest decks are weak, which is over half of them, so I wouldn't say that "every quest deck might be good", sadly.

1 hour ago, OroNerVoSo said:

anyway i agree with Swashburglar question. The cards you get with him are like "rocks" in your hand , and 70% of times you can't play those cards due to "mana Math" of the quest rogue

Sometimes, yeah, but I wouldn't say 70% of the time.

[OroNerVoSo 1]

Lorewalker Cho , i'm using this inside the quest deck , it's like it gives me 1 turn or 2. they wait me to play quest , but i get 5 extra damage in the closing turn , because cho become 5/5 and i have also their spells , if they played.

I've put inside also Barnes , even if rogue got the strongest quest atm , i never met such harder meta then now for Rogue...

the other classes just play that 1/2 1/1 1/1 1/1 all day long no matter what we got in my just play that 1 mana , so the meta it's just playing 1 mana cards it seems , except for paladin. Paladin got Tirjon GGyordring.

*rage end*

i think it's good also this : Tinkmaster Overspark do you think it's viable?

i'm looking for good prequest cards that aren't 1/1 or 2/1 , i think the deck needs somethin playable if quest goes wrong.

Edited May 18, 2017 by OroNerVoSo

[KingMe 289]

44 minutes ago, OroNerVoSo said:

Lorewalker Cho , i'm using this inside the quest deck , it's like it gives me 1 turn or 2. they wait me to play quest , but i get 5 extra damage in the closing turn , because cho become 5/5 and i have also their spells , if they played.

I've put inside also Barnes , even if rogue got the strongest quest atm , i never met such harder meta then now for Rogue...

the other classes just play that 1/2 1/1 1/1 1/1 all day long no matter what we got in my just play that 1 mana , so the meta it's just playing 1 mana cards it seems , except for paladin. Paladin got Tirjon GGyordring.

*rage end*

i think it's good also this : Tinkmaster Overspark do you think it's viable?

Lorewalker Cho is bad for this deck, yes you are getting spells from your opponent but you are also giving them spells and if you are playing a mirror match with another Quest Rogue then you are just giving them more fuel for their fire. Barnes could be good once the quest is active but before that he is just a dead card because you don't want to run the risk of possibly pulling a potential activator for your quest so I would say he is also a bad choice for this deck. As far as Tinkmaster Overspark, I personally don't think it is viable at the moment. It was only really viable in the Whisper's Meta when there was a ton of N'Zoth, the Corruptor decks running around and giving them a 5/5 was still better than them having something like Sylvanas Windrunner returning after having already dealt with her once but even then the card was not that reliable.

57 minutes ago, OroNerVoSo said:

i'm looking for good prequest cards that aren't 1/1 or 2/1 , i think the deck needs somethin playable if quest goes wrong.

 The Caverns Below needs four cards with the same name to active so you want all the small minions you can get to help pull that off as soon as possible and consistently but when you start taking them out to replace them with higher cost minions then you start killing off that speed and consistency that you need. Certain cards need to be in this deck to make it work but those same cards would cause a midrange or control deck to fail and this is the very reason why, right now at least, The Caverns Below can not succeed in anything but an aggro deck. Honestly if something goes wrong and you know you are not going to be able pull off your quest in time to turn the game around then it is best to just concede and move on. 

[OroNerVoSo 1]

i specify from your opponent mages....cho.. i need that ice block...

for tinkmaster we get benefits even if he give a 5/5  to the enemy , we can "remove" after this because we have all 5/5 down , or get a 1 mana 5/5 after 

Barnes give a creature that you can probably shadow step , and you have a body 4 down , and a 5/5 after quest  i don't know what to do , every deck i play i just get countered. if i play quest i get hunters and mages , if i took piarate warriors and permafrost stuff.

and finally i can't even pass 15 with the "top" decks , just mad at it. sorry

 

[KingMe 289]

8 minutes ago, OroNerVoSo said:

i specify from your opponent mages....cho.. i need that ice block...

for tinkmaster we get benefits even if he give a 5/5  to the enemy , we can "remove" after this because we have all 5/5 down , or get a 1 mana 5/5 after 

Barnes give a creature that you can probably shadow step , and you have a body 4 down , and a 5/5 after quest  i don't know what to do , every deck i play i just get countered. if i play quest i get hunters and mages , if i took piarate warriors and permafrost stuff.

and finally i can't even pass 15 with the "top" decks , just mad at it. sorry

 

This deck can only be teched so much before it loses itself. With that being said, if your meta is primarily counters to what you are running then it's time to switch decks until you find yourself in a meta that your deck can thrive in. 

[Guest]

5 hours ago, KingMe said:

. Barnes could be good once the quest is active but before that he is just a dead card because you don't want to run the risk of possibly pulling a potential activator for your quest so I would say he is also a bad choice for this deck.

He just summons a copy, doesn't he? -> No negative impact on the deck possible.

[positiv2 950]

5 hours ago, OroNerVoSo said:

Barnes give a creature that you can probably shadow step

By turn 4, you will usually have decided on the minion to play 4 times, so Barnes will rarely pull something useful. This deck doesn't have that many minions that would make Barnes a value card either. He is not bounceable due to his mana cost, which makes him a poor choice for this deck.

5 hours ago, OroNerVoSo said:

and a 5/5 after quest

The same goes for Murloc Tidehunter, but for 2 mana less and it has a higher bounce value.

[grellth 1]

Please provide feedback for improvements on my latest replays:

https://hsreplay.net/replay/RXHtPaqbDkfvn7Hmg4tJMK

https://hsreplay.net/replay/bZACmNjbsCHnM2QQMT7wf9

https://hsreplay.net/replay/C29bTg9Cq7Cs9CrUCkckeA

[OroNerVoSo 1]

10 hours ago, positiv2 said:

By turn 4, you will usually have decided on the minion to play 4 times, so Barnes will rarely pull something useful.

i disagree only with this.

he can potentially summon a charge

Edited May 19, 2017 by OroNerVoSo

[positiv2 950]

4 hours ago, OroNerVoSo said:

i disagree only with this.

he can potentially summon a charge

That's why I didn't say never, but rarely. There are so many minions in the deck that the probability of pulling a charge is quite low, especially when Patches the Pirate will be pulled by a pirate minion most of the time. 

Also, if charge is the best it can pull, you can include Bluegill Warrior for half the cost and with 100% charge rate.

[OroNerVoSo 1]

37 minutes ago, positiv2 said:

That's why I didn't say never, but rarely. There are so many minions in the deck that the probability of pulling a charge is quite low, especially when Patches the Pirate will be pulled by a pirate minion most of the time. 

Also, if charge is the best it can pull, you can include Bluegill Warrior for half the cost and with 100% charge rate.

i'm wondering in a game where you start questing later. so you can shadow step that minion , and start with it , i will try this out :P

including in the deck also 1 copy of Deadly Poison and Perdition's Blade . i can get some early board control till turn 4 also with Backstab.

There should be for sure a more solid way to build it then the standard quest type.

[zifmia 14]

The strength of this deck is that you can often complete your quest and dominate the board by turn 6. How is waiting to start the quest until turn 5 ever going to be better?

I don't think a couple weapon cards out of 30 are enough to reliably fight for board control unless you have really good luck with your mulligan and your opponent. That said, I often find myself forced to contest the board early against aggro decks with nothing but backstabs, a dagger, and some tiny charge minions, so maybe there is need for a bit of extra early board control tools, but I'm not sure what to take out. I've already taken out the mimic pods for backstabs.

 

[OroNerVoSo 1]

56 minutes ago, zifmia said:

The strength of this deck is that you can often complete your quest and dominate the board by turn 6. How is waiting to start the quest until turn 5 ever going to be better?

I don't think a couple weapon cards out of 30 are enough to reliably fight for board control unless you have really good luck with your mulligan and your opponent. That said, I often find myself forced to contest the board early against aggro decks with nothing but backstabs, a dagger, and some tiny charge minions, so maybe there is need for a bit of extra early board control tools, but I'm not sure what to take out. I've already taken out the mimic pods for backstabs.

 

so i'm happy for you. The enemies i met got stronger decks and often i can't survive turn 5 while i quest.

so , better for you my friend...

[edit --> sorry i totally misunderstood your reply]

Edited May 19, 2017 by OroNerVoSo

[positiv2 950]

11 hours ago, grellth said:

Please provide feedback for improvements on my latest replays:

https://hsreplay.net/replay/RXHtPaqbDkfvn7Hmg4tJMK

https://hsreplay.net/replay/bZACmNjbsCHnM2QQMT7wf9

https://hsreplay.net/replay/C29bTg9Cq7Cs9CrUCkckeA

First replay - I'm probably missing something here, but I don't get why you traded like that on turn 5.

Second replay - since you ended up playing Swashburglar anyway, it would have been better to play him as the first card in case you got Freezing Potion.
Some of the trades felt off, but sadly I can't really put my finger on it. I think that you were focusing too much on keeping the board clear rather than developing one yourself, and you weren't trying to complete the quest, which I feel like is the reason you lost, but I could be completely wrong here.

Third replay - Can't really say much here. Quick win, no obvious misplays, well done!

So, it seems like the trading is a bit off (but I am not exactly great at guessing trades when playing aggro, so I could be wrong, ofc), but it should be good enough to get you to rank 5 at least.

[zifmia 14]

FWIW, I have played a lot of matches that look like your second replay against the secret mage. This deck will quickly run over quest rogue (at least with me piloting the rogue) unless you get really lucky draws. I am 2-8 against mages at rank 3, and they are (almost?) all variations of this deck. I probably make the same trade into the Kabal Crystal Runner, but I probably also lose this match. I guess you could consider bouncing the Fire Fly and replaying it with the Flame Elemental, but I think you will get usually get run over before you can complete the quest, especially here since we know he drew the second Runner next turn.

[Zock 0]

There needs to be some offensive spell(eviscerate and backstab). Any taunt minion will completely derail rogue in first 4-5 turns without spells. 

[positiv2 950]

42 minutes ago, Zock said:

There needs to be some offensive spell(eviscerate and backstab). Any taunt minion will completely derail rogue in first 4-5 turns without spells. 

You can add those in place of Bilefin Tidehunters or Vanishes, if you want.