We're just about over our first week of Madness at the Darkmoon Faire and what a jolly time it has been! Today we're going to be looking at the most popular Legendary cards that are being used right now and a few decks that make use of them.
We aren't giving you specific crafting advice yet though, the meta still has not fully solidified so if you're still waiting to get the most bang for your buck as far as your dust goes, hang in there with us!
The popularity of these cards is based on data from HSReplay. All data will be provided at the end of the post.
The Most Popular Darkmoon Faire Legendaries
If you are looking to get your Old Gods on, Guardian Druid is a popular archetype right now that features both Yogg-Saron and Y'Shaarj.
On the C'Thun side of things, Control Warrior received a nice boost thanks to this Old God's spectacular ability to annoy your opponent.
That just sounds like damage with extra steps! Il'gynoth, unsurprisingly, is found in Demon Hunter decks. Soul Demon Hunter loves this little growth of N'Zoth and the deck is doing very well on the winrate side of things, only really having a problem with some Druid decks (notably Big and Clown).
The Highest Winrate Darkmoon Faire Legendaries
The most popular doesn't always mean the best so its important that we look at another side of the puzzle - which legendaries command the highest deck winrates?
We've been asked about Evolve Shaman and so it is appropriate we get a chance to showcase it now with the high deck winrate of Inara Stormcrash.
As far as Yrel goes, it should be no surprise that we're going to be using a Pure Paladin deck.
What's that? Totem Shaman? Sure thing!
The Most Kept Darkmoon Faire Legendaries
Certain legendary cards are powerful enough that you want to keep them at the start of the game and its not always the low-cost ones.
Not Interesting Enough
Where there's a top, there also must be a bottom. At the bottom end of the legendary cards for Darkmoon Faire, we've got cards that are used in less than 1% of decks.
Data
Higher-ranking players (Diamond->Legend) from November 23, 2020.
| Card | In Decks | Deck Winrate | Kept |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yogg-Saron, Master of Fate | 17.5% | 47.0% | 4.1% |
| Y'Shaarj, the Defiler | 15.4% | 47.2% | 3.8% |
| C'Thun, the Shattered | 10.7% | 45.0% | - |
| Il'gynoth | 9.7% | 55.9% | 10.1% |
| Tickatus | 8.8% | 46.7% | 47.0% |
| Inara Stormcrash | 4.6% | 56.6% | 8.7% |
| Rinling's Rifle | 4.4% | 55.2% | 51.7% |
| Grand Totem Eys'or | 3.8% | 55.3% | 96.5% |
| High Exarch Yrel | 3.7% | 57.8% | 3.1% |
| Sayge, Seer of Darkmoon | 3.1% | 52.3% | 12.6% |
| N'Zoth, God of the Deep | 2.9% | 46.7% | 4.2% |
| Deck of Lunacy | 2.5% | 47.4% | 90.0% |
| Tenwu of the Red Smoke | 2.5% | 49.3% | 18.9% |
| E.T.C., God of Metal | 2.3% | 53.9% | 21.9% |
| Ringmaster Whatley | 2.2% | 47.8% | 47.0% |
| Lothraxion the Redeemed | 1.9% | 52.7% | 58.7% |
| G'huun the Blood God | 1.9% | 44.3% | 5.8% |
| Kiri, Chosen of Elune | 1.5% | 44.4% | 42.5% |
| The Nameless One | 1.2% | 43.9% | 45.4% |
| Silas Darkmoon | 0.8% | 45.8% | 5.6% |
| Grand Empress Shek'zara | 0.6% | 46.7% | 5.7% |
| Maxima Blastenheimer | 0.5% | 44.9% | 54.8% |
| Zai, the Incredible | 0.3% | 49.6% | 11.5% |
| Greybough | 0.3% | 39.4% | 44.5% |
| Deck of Chaos | 0.2% | 33.0% | 78.2% |
Comments
I'm surprised to see Silas so low. He kicked ass in my Pen Flinger paladin before the set dropped.
Maybe it's a combination of people getting bored of him and Pure Paladin just being the better deck. Still, I wasn't expecting him below G'huun and The Nameless One.
Of course I open a golden N'Zoth, God of the Deep and nobody's playing him.
Also, here's another point to people saying that Pure Paladin is still at the top of the meta: People will complain if the new decks overtake the meta ("this is just powercreep, I can't afford all these cards") and people will complain if the old decks are still strong ("Blizzard sucks at gauging power levels, this game has become stagnant"). I'd say 60-70% of the decks I face are built around new cards. This is the perfect balance between allowing people to experiment with new cards and decks, while people that aren't able to craft all the new cards can still find success with the old decks. This is arguably the best possible situation. We shouldn't be complaining about this, it's the best of both worlds for casual, hardcore and for-fun players.
When a new set completely dominates the meta: “The power creep is huge!” “How can I afford all these new cards so quickly?” “This will be unplayable until nerds arrive!”
When a new set doesn’t completely dominate the meta: “What a disappointment!” “The game is so stale.”
Come on. I’d say 2/3 of the decks I’m facing on the ladder are built around new cards. That’s probably the sweet spot in terms of providing variety without punishing budget players. Great job, Blizzard
I know it's early days; "let the dust settle", "let the meta form" - I know.
Although, it's quite a shame to see such little impact on the meta from such a large set like DMF. It really shows how OP some of the SA agro decks are that little to no modification is needed. The amout of immediate variance added to the meta after launch has been minimal, and with all the shiny new tools (cards) geared towards control, they should stand the chance against a balanced agro meta- which they do not.
I'm sitting this one out until some serious balance changes come because all the fun NEW stuff I want to toy around with just does not compare to the old boring things we've already spent half a year playing against. Blizzard needs to get back to doing lightning nerfs to help the meta form into a healthy direction, not leave it to rot.
Lovely. 3/4 of the legendaries I have so far (including Silas) are in the bottom of the list. Though perhaps Druid and Rogue aren't that popular right now period.
Welcome to the club, all my legendaries I have are in the bottom of the list.
I feel even more betrayed by Blizzard ...
Poor N'Zoth, God of the Deep
Zai is another case of a good legendary that is completed wasted in DH because the class is so good at aggression that it's always the best way to play regardless of the meta. Value cards or late game bombs (Nethrandamus) ends up only seeing play in short lived experiments that only last a few days.
I opened a golden Shek'zara and i still have to test it. I don't have much hope. The card seems too slow and Galakrond Rogue doesn't need it. I'm going to try a tempo rogue with some deathrattle synergy to see if i can get a lot of value from Ticket Master. With enough tickets even Shek'zara can cause an impact on the board.
Most of the legendaries with a positive deck winrate seem to be used for aggressive archetypes. The exception seems to be E.T.C. which is seeing play in OTK decks. He should also fit well in a tempo based deck as a win condition but it will take some time for people to drop the whole OTK thing and start looking at the card from another perspective. Also, this is another card that people were disregarding completely during the reveal period and now he is doing better than other cards that were hyped a lot more.
Wheres Nzoth? Is he safe is he alright?
Poor Silas, it's his Faire, and nobody wants to hang out with him anymore.
😢
Interesting statistics and a great article by the way.
On a personal note, the least used legendary cards seems like a bit of a problem of deck archetypes being pushed.
Silas Darkmoon, being the expansion pre-release legendary falls into most other pre-release legendary cards. Nichely useful and fun to entertain people until the rest of the expansion arrives. A great card in arena and duels, but hard to leverage properly in ranked where the meta is defined by how broken of a combo you can make, and a 7 mana pseudo mind control just doesn't cut it there. In any other card game, Silas would be an auto include. I think this shows just how much Hearthstone has moved away from reactionary play to combo oriented play.
Grand Empress Shek'zara seems like a card that would be great for a togwaggle scheme combo with a low cost value card, but unfortunately that scenario just doesn't seem to exist (yet).
Maxima Blastenheimer seems like a great card (to me). It's unfortunate that that path of least resistance is to continue to use the old meta face hunter deck. A fun card at that, that couples well with deathrattle synergies.
Zai, the Incredible is simply put. A square peg for a class that only looks for round holes. DH since the early nerfs to Priestess of Fury and Imprisoned Anteon, has been pigeon holed into the aggro department. Which is sad, because I do look forward to the day that a big Demon Hunter deck can be viable. It's an incredible card (pun intended) for any value oriented demon hunter deck....which simply does not exist at the moment. I could see this being used in a highlander demon hunter deck to duplicate high impact cards that happen to be on the left or right (like zephyrs or DQA).
Greybough simply put is a fair card in a non-fair meta. And in a deck that has a win condition of playing a 9 drop that fills the board with 8/8+ minions, a 5 mana 4/6 that requires another target to gain value (and die twice to see that value) just doesn't cut it.
Deck of Chaos is most likely being slept on. It seems like many people are too afraid of building a deck around it, draw the card and play it, to have any consistency.
Just want to say that I've been testing out Deck of Chaos in a Malygos deck and it's strictly worse than the Quest version of it. It's incredibly inconsistent to the point that I've been thinking of running Silas Darkmoon + Soulbound Ashtongue combo just so I can make sure I hit one of the pieces. Most of the time I pull off the combo it's from Jepetto Joybuzz so yeah I'm not sure that Deck of Chaos is meant to be played in a combo deck.
I agree - great article and cool stats to see.
I don't understand the Deck of Chaos being at the bottom of this list as being in 1% of decks. Honestly, I love that card. I have put it in everything non-zoo in the past 72 hours.
In wild, honestly, getting that 3 mana 9/9 Voidlord makes people not happy. Not to mention the Khartut Defender becoming more of a hassle than it normally is. Even in the games where it was close to the last of my cards to be drawn, it wasn't a make or break for the decks... but when I drew it early, it was wonderful.