Hearthstone Grandmasters 2020 Season 1 - Week 4 Recap

As Week 4 began in Grandmasters, so did the "main part" of the competition, Round Robin matches. All 48 players now have the same goal in mind: getting to the playoffs and avoiding the relegation. You can re-live the action with our post below.

Selected Decklists

As this phase of the competition consists of individual matches rather than mini-tournaments, there are no "winners' decklists" to show; instead, we'll showcase some of the more unusual choices that players decided to bring.

Ryvius's Quest Warlock

Warlock, in general, was not a usual class to bring, but this Quest Warlock from Ryvius was the most unique pick of the week. The deck did perform in its sole match this weekend, although the victory wasn't achieved through the usual gameplan. He's not alone in putting his faith on Quest Warlock as NoHandsGamer, the main culprit behind the highly popular Risky Skipper Tempo Warrior, has also tweeted about a 58 % winrate in 43 games at Legend. Is Ryvius just ahead of the tournament meta here?

Seiko's Control Warrior

Warrior was, alongside Demon Hunter, the most popular pick of the week, but while others were playing their Risky Skippers, Seiko went with a more unusual Control Warrior build (which, to be fair, also included Risky Skippers). Interestingly, Grand Lackey Erkh was included in the deck as there are plenty of ways to create Lackeys with Livewire Lance, EVIL Quartermaster, and Boom Squad. Sadly, Seiko wasn't given the chance of showcasing the power of this deck on stream as it got banned in both of his matches.

Firebat's Face Hunter

Arguably not that off-meta, but still not the most popular pick. Firebat decided to cut Dragonbane which many of the lists still run and add Worgen Infiltrators as the only Face Hunter to do so this week. A true flashback to simpler times. The Hunter became the hunted against its demonic namesake in a match with Purple but was eventually able to take a win as well, leaving it at a 1-1 record after Fr0zen banned it in Firebat's second match of the weekend.

VoDs

Here are the match VoDs from the three days of competition in spoilers. I've also embedded a couple of personally recommended match videos that I enjoyed watching.

Results & Standings

The individual match results can be found on the official site. Current standings within each Division can be found in spoilers below.

Discussion

The return to "normal" conquest brought back the "normal" decks: Demon Hunter and Warrior were brought by 46 of the 48 players while Rogue was only one pick behind them. Paladins and Shamans, the heroes of last week, were nowhere to be found. Asia-Pacific had the widest variety of classes as the players chose to bring all 8 "playable" classes, while Europe opted out on Druid and Americas on Priest. Druid's fall on popularity was evident in Europe and the Americas, but seven APAC players still included it on their lineup. Similarly, Highlander Mage was a popular pick only in Europe whereas Hunter wasn't to the Europeans' liking. The Americas got the closest to descending into a four-class format as only six players brought something outside the popular top 4 classes.

Result-wise, there's not much to discuss yet. As this was the first week of a four-week long period, nobody has yet secured their playoffs spot, neither has anyone got into irredeemable relegation troubles yet. The players going 2-0 got a good foundation to build on, and those falling to 0-2 have to pick up the pace in the coming weeks, especially if they're in the dreaded Division B.

(The excellent archetype listing put together by ShangHigh has been used in writing this discussion section.)

Grandmasters continues next week with some more Round Robin matches. Don't forget to tune in!