Reno Hunter is a unique deck in the Hearthstone meta. The Reno Hunter deck is a traditional midrange deck, with some end-game tricks up its sleeve. Generally speaking, Reno Hunter does well against aggressive decks, such as Kingsbane Rogue. Kingsbane Rogue is one of the most common in the current Wild Hearthstone meta.
Against control-style opponents, however, we have a lot of options to disrupt their gameplan. Cards such as Dirty Rat, in particular, are your best option to defeat the current deck-to-beat, Raza Priest. Besides this, cards such as Deathstalker Rexxar allow us to generate more value than most decks in the Hearthstone meta.
Reno Hunter’s biggest weakness is its lack of a board-clearing spell. Hunter makes use of various minions with Rush to deal with the threats as they come up.
Core cards
Two cards define the core set of cards for Reno Hunter. These two cards are Dinotamer Brann and Deathstalker Rexxar. The strong board development and effectively infinite value from these tools allow the deck to function as well as it does. One of the mini-combos Reno Hunter can access Brann Bronzebeard alongside Dinotamer Brann. Combining these two cards allows you to generate 16 damage from hand, often surprising your opponents.
Secrets for Reno Secret Hunter
Nearly every Hunter deck in the history of Hearthstone played a secret of some kind. With 30 unique cards in a deck, including secrets is almost inevitable. However, one old legendary card is uniquely fit to make a large variety of secrets more impactful. This legendary card is Subject 9. Subject 9 is effectively a draw-5 cards & play a decent minion for only five mana. Because of this strength, it is no surprise one of the popular Reno Hunter decks centers around this card in particular.
With 14 different secrets available, however, choosing which ones to include is often a difficult decision. The majority of Reno Secret Hunter decks play anywhere between five and seven secrets, so choose wisely.
What secrets should you play?
There are a few secrets that are most common to include in your build. Cat Trick, Explosive Trap, Freezing Trap, and Wandering Monster or Bear Trap are most common in Reno Secret Hunter. However, there are interesting options to purposely not include one or more of these secrets, as they are easy to play around.
Secrets such as Misdirection, Venomstrike Trap, Snipe, and Rat Trap are the best secrets when they are not common. If players don’t properly play around these, the payoff is massive. Think wisely about when you want to include these secrets, and work out which matchups you are targeting with each of these.
On the other hand, some secrets are simply not worth including. Hidden Cache, for example, is probably the worst secret in the entirety of Hearthstone. Other just not-great secrets include Dart Trap and Pack Tactics. However, the exception for Pack Tactics is that it is quite a good secret if you play a more deathrattle oriented build of the deck.
The final option is Pressure Plate. Pressure Plate fits a unique role where it is fantastic against specific decks such as Druid and Mage. Targeting Kael’Thas from Druid, or a Flamewaker or Sorcerer’s Apprentice from Mage can be game-deciding.
Reno secret & Reno N’Zoth hunter
There are two main Reno Hunter archetypes. One focusing more on the earlier discussed Secret build of the deck, and another with more priority on Deathrattle minions & N’Zoth, the Corruptor. The majority of Reno Hunter players focus on the Secret build of the deck, but the Deathrattle version is a deck that is worth exploring more.
Reno Secret Hunter:
Reno Secret Hunter focuses on everything Secret synergy. The cards that make this archetype run are cards such as Subject 9, Emerald Spellstone, and Cloaked Huntress. Combining these tools allows you to quickly draw through your deck to find higher value resources while making the game impossible to play for your opponents. We have all tried to navigate through five different secrets at one point and failed miserably at it.
It feels amazing to be on the other side of that, seeing your opponents often miscalculate and fall into the traps you carefully placed for them throughout the game.
Reno N’Zoth Hunter:
Reno N’Zoth hunter, on the other hand, still plays some secrets. However, its priority is more on Deathrattle tools such as Khartut Defender and Teacher’s Pet. These powerful Taunt minions are incredible to improve the deck’s matchup against aggressive archetypes in the meta. So, the N’Zoth, the Corruptor build of the deck, does much better in these matchups, at the cost of losing more often against more combo oriented archetypes.
You often play N’Zoth, the Corruptor when you need to. Since the card gains more value as the game progresses, it is generally best to hold it as long as possible. For example, against Priest, you try to bait out the Psychic Scream before the N’Zoth, the Corruptor, or else it can mess up your deck. Against other removals like Brawl, Mass Hysteria, Dragonfire Potion, etc. It’s normally fine because you have deathrattles that can build up your board once they die.
Decklists for Reno Hunter
Eggsbenedict Reno Secret Hunter
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Reno Secret Hunter w Zul’jin
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Reno N’zoth Hunter
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When to use Zephrys the Great
In every Reno-style deck, Zephrys the Great is a uniquely important tool. But how do you use him properly? Generally speaking, it is best to use Zephrys the Great as early as possible to stabilize the game against aggressive opponents, whether this is on turn two for something like a Backstab, or a few turns later for a board-clearing effect.
Against combo and control decks, on the other hand, Zephrys the Great is great to use early on in the game for something like Wild Growth on turn two, or to generate lethal later on. The best examples of cards that create lethal are Savage Roar, Bloodlust, and Soulfire. Another option is Mass Dispell, Silence, or Sap, to get through Taunt minions against a deck such as Cube Warlock.
Mulligan for Reno Hunter
The mulligan for Reno Hunter is fairly straight forward. However, there are some exceptions worth knowing. Before we get to those, let’s start with the basics. In the majority of games, you simply want to keep tools you can play early on. Deathstalker Rexxar, on the other hand, is worth keeping in long-control matchups against decks such as Odd Warrior & Lunar Pocket Galaxy Mage.
The cards you always keep
Our best early game cards include Zephrys the Great, Eaglehorn Bow, Cloaked Huntress, and Mad Scientist. No matter what the matchup is, these cards perform consistently throughout. Other cards worth holding include Zixor, Apex Predator, and Candleshot against more aggressive opponents. Another worth keeping is Dirty Rat. However, if you are uncertain what deck your opponent plays, this card loses a lot of potency.
Matchup specific tips for Reno Hunter
Against Reno Priest specifically, cards such as Dirty Rat and Brann Bronzebeard go up massively in priority. The reason for this is that our primary goal in this matchup is to disrupt their combo as much as possible, and these are our best tools to go about this.
For Kingsbane Rogue, on the other hand, our anti-aggressive cards are vastly more important. Cards such as Diving Gryphon, our taunt minions, Bear Trap, and Explosive Trap are helpful to reduce the damage we take from the Kingsbane Weapon.
Quest Mage is one of our more difficult matchups; however, cards such as Cat Trick, Emerald Spellstone, Animal Companion, and Pressure Plate are most important. Sometimes Quest Mage cannot deal with an early scaled up Emerald Spellstone, which is why the card is high up in our list for the mulligans.
The general game plan of Reno Hunter
Reno Hunter’s primary goal is to spend its mana efficiently throughout the early game. Combining Secrets, taunts, and weapons to stabilize the board and develop our side of the board sets us up quickly for success. While the deck primarily preys on aggressive decks, it has a chance to beat nearly every deck in the Hearthstone meta.
While Hunter is not the best class in the format, the deck is very enjoyable to play! Once you send those King Krush’s face, you know you’ve picked the right class to play!
Conclusion
Reno Hunter is a great midrange deck to play in the current Hearthstone meta. With a nice number of burst damage, a solid matchup against aggressive decks, and a way to outvalue nearly every deck in the meta, the deck can do it all! While there are many decks you are likely going to have trouble with, it is worth learning this unique playstyle. While the deck is quite uncommon to see on the Ranked Ladder, this is probably an advantage since many people won’t remember how to play against it! Give it a try, and fight your way to the legend rank!
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