Barrens Spell Hunter

I knew when I saw that Lock and Load was back in Standard that I'd have to try making Spell Hunter work. It being such a low-cost spell naturally gravitates us towards a deck with a low curve, and eventually, I decided that topping out at the new Barak Kodobane was where this deck was headed. It makes sense with Hunter's naturally more aggressive leanings, though there are some great Control tools present here.

Aside from running a variety of smaller spells to feed the cards mentioned above, I also decided that if Professor Slate has any chance of shining it's now. There are a lot of damaging spells in this deck at quite low costs, which will make picking off minions the same turn you play him something you can do quite consistently.

Wandmaker and Venomous Scorpid are our only Neutral cards for this deck - which makes sense, given the focus on spells. You'll be hard-pressed to find a bad option from Wandmaker, though there are a total of 8 options so don't go into it anticipating any particular one. Venomous Scorpid has the added bonus of being a Beast, which while not incredibly relevant for the spells I've chosen to include in the deck is a good tag to have when considering the possibilities for generated cards.

There are a lot of other directions you could take this kind of deck, especially if you cut the curve even more harshly and drop things like Krolusk Barkstripper, Rinling's Rifle and Piercing Shot. You could put more Secrets in, or increase the amount of 1-Cost spells to give you a higher chance of an insane Lock and Load turn. Even something as simple as swapping out Arcane Shot for Overwhelm if the potential for extra damage outweighs the benefit of being able to go face. This is very much a first draft, something to be built upon as the meta develops and it becomes more obvious which specific spells will have the most impact.