Fan Community Spotlight - Neoguli's Core Set Reworks - Part 4 (Demon Hunter and Hunter)

Hello everybody, and welcome back to another Fan Community Spotlight. In the world of fan-made content, Season 2 of our WCDCs just recently began, and I couldn't be more excited for 18 and a half more weeks of competitions and cards. In this installment, we've got Neoguli for the fourth time now (and it won't be the last either) to cover their core sets for Demon Hunter and regular Hunter. Compared to the other classes, designing a core set for Demon Hunter is a bit different since they don't have a Classic set yet, meaning that a larger part of the core hasn't been established yet and is pretty much in your hands alone. Let's see how Neo handles this.

What cards did you cut and why?

Neoguli: "I didn't butcher that many cards this time, in fact I only moved away only one card from Demon Hunter, but that is due to their basic set being officially released. Speaking of that one card, Glaivebound Adept was contradicting with my newly set weakness of no burst damage that can't be blocked by Taunt. Just pure rampage.

Hunter got more cards removed due to them having an official Classic Set aswell. Most of these cards were boring, sometimes dangerous to keep, sometimes borderline useless and powercrept severly."

Let's talk about the cards you made yourself for these classes.

Neoguli: "Predatory Hunter gives you access to a decent tool to push damage or control the board, all in a form of summoning two minions, which matches Hunter's ability to swarm the board. To be honest, I might have screwed over the card because of adding Charge on a token, leading you to have a 4/3 with "Battlecry: Deal 2 damage to the enemy hero", which I don't think I intended, but I guess it's now close on power level to cards like Tour Guide, who with Hunter also comes close to the vanilla statline with that ability.

Monstrous Mark lets Hunter push damage and control the board. The initial version cost (5), but lasted until the minion died, and it could be used on any minion, which led to many comments pointing out broken uses - notably using on your minion to clash with a big one; or with Trueaim Crescent.

Storm Arrows may seem weird to most people, but I still hold on to my opinion on keeping it as an evergreen tool for Control Hunters. We all know how Blizzard really tried to make that archetype work, but with this tool, it should have a solid card to include.

Battle Felguard does a similar job to the removed Adept, but it doesn't deal damage that can't be blocked by Taunt.

Aeladori Prophet is named a bit after the Aeladori - one player's Demon Hunter in WoW, after I did some research on the art. She lets you rearrange your hand to your liking, triggering Outcast effects.

Demonic Sigil lets you buff your Demons, and with Outcast, you can let it loose.

Dark Portal does break the value weakness, but it does not really give you that much value on average, especially with the Core Set Demons you are offered. Maybe except Battle Felguard. Great with cards like Pit Commander.

Illidari Dancer is mostly a way to have a decently strong unit that also "doubles" your Hero's attack, granting a lot of burst potential.

Cordana Felsong grants defensive stats and a Sap effect. She is made the way it is right now, as I delved a little into her lore, and she was originally Khadgar's defender."

The Hero Power for Demon Hunter costing 2 like all the other classes instead of 1 is a significant change. Where did you land on the idea to change this, and how does this affect the design of your sets?

Neoguli: "It was dictated by improving the new player experience, because when they are new, the current DH Hero Power adds another layer to the learning process, as you must have a different mindset when it comes to playing DH. The change also allowed me to not nerfbat many cards like Satyr Overseer."

Demon Hunter's Classic set is a bit on an interesting one since they don't have one yet, but are planned to get one eventually. How does this affect the way you designed the Classic set for Demon Hunter compared to other classes?

Neoguli: "It felt different, almost as if I had to create an entirely new class, which I haven't done for a long time. And even then I still had some pieces ready thanks to the class being already in the game. It wasn't a pretty process to pick up the right scrap and then also make something yourself. Sure, it's what you would usually do on the class set changes, but with DH, you also have the additional hurdle, but also an imagination advantage of having to create a Classic Set from scratch."

What identity were you going for with both classes?

Neoguli: "So… Hunter didn't really stay away from it's identity, except it's lost the ability to have any long-term value, because we all know Deathstalker Rexxar. But at the same time, while it can't generate many cards, it's now more suited to control the board overall.

Demon Hunter also got a mere knee slap in pros and cons, further restraining their non-attack damage, but actually putting emphasis in hand control. I don't assume it would let Demon Hunter pass on Handlock's legacy, but maybe in the future, the class may get a similar archetype at their disposal."

And that concludes this part of Neoguli's Core set reworks. We only have two more classes to cover, Shaman and Priest, which will be in part 5. Priest however is not up yet at the time of writing this, so next time on Fan Community Spotlight might be something different.

Be sure to check out Neoguli's Demon Hunter and Hunter core sets and let us know what you think of them.