The first major HCT action is days away. February 11-12, the 64 best players in Europe together with the Tavern Heroes will spar to claim the four seeds into the HCT Winter Championship. The competitors are looking at seven rounds of swiss into a single elimination top 8 cut-off.

The HCT Europe playoffs will be the first western HCT tournament on the schedule, with Americas and APAC following the next weekends. China has already chosen its representatives in OmegaZero, Lovelychook, XHope and LVGE, all four of which proved itself already, beating Team NA in the recent CN vs. NA Championship.

With the playoffs approaching, pros have started sharing their line-ups on social media. Today, we look at a collection of seven line-ups, as we search for oddities and cool techs in these pirate-infested meta waters.

Thijs “ThijsNL” Molendijk: Highlander peculiarities

A two-time European champion already, ThijsNL is putting a lot of faith into his highlander decks. The G2 marquee player is bringing both RenoLock and RenoMage to the tournament, both of which have their own small twists.

Alexstrasza is notably missing from the Mage list as ThijsNL has teched the deck specifically against aggro. With Mind Control Tech and double weapon hate with Harrison Jones and Acidic Swamp Ooze and the healing effect of Ice Barrier, Thijs isn’t looking to win the late game, more to survive the early/mid turns.

The same logic is applied for his RenoLock, where Mountain Giant—a staple of the build—has been cut short, and the same is true for Shadowflame. Their spots are taken by two uncommon tech cards: Corruption and Felfire Potion.

Corruption is a great tool that allows this list to clear big threats for cheap investment. Apply it on a Flamewreathed Faceless, Edwin VanCleef, Questing Adventurer or a Big Druid taunt and wait for the trigger. Even aggro decks are susceptible to Corruption: Getting just one attack off your pirates is better than multiple, especially when you can chump-block the attacked with a Voidwalker—another tech card Thijs has included that’s not often seen in RenoLocks. And for control match-ups, there’s always the good old Jaraxxus.

Jon “Orange” Westberg and Alexey “ShtanUdachi” Barsukov: The heavy Jade

Two-times SeatStory Cup champion Orange is another favorite to go to the Bahamas in what would be his first appearance in a Blizzard tournament. Like Thijs, he’s playing a couple of standard decks in combination of a few list twists that should take his opponents off-guard.

The major outliner in Orange’s line-up is his Shaman, a variation of which is also played by Russian powerhouse ShtanUdachi. The Swede has not gone the way of the aggro and is favoring a slower, midrange Jade deck. Orange has even gone one step further: He’s cut both Tunnel Trogg and Totem Golem and is only relying on the pirate package for early game presence.

In fact, none of Orange’s decks are aggressive ones. His Warrior is the slower Dragon variant and his Reno decks are “heavy” as well, the Mage in particular running the Inkmaster Solia + Pyroblast combination for a fiery finish for the highlander vs. highlander match-ups.

Orange’s strategy here is very straightforward: Ban the aggro decks, outvalue the midrange ones (his Shaman will be particularly effective with all the Jade generation) and absolutely crush the control decks with his big RenoMage and persistent midrange Shaman and Warrior.

Jeffrey “Sjow” Brusi and Yevgeniy “Neirea” Shumilin: Not your traditional miracle

Team Liquid has always been a team that has favored Rogue, even during the days the class wasn’t Tier 1. Well, thanks to Patches and Buccaneer, it’s back, and more powerful than ever.

Sjow and Neirea are running the same line-up and are almost card-for-card: They have the standard Pirate Warrior, standard Aggro Shaman and the Solia/Pyroblast RenoMage. Nothing weird here, but—hey—what’s that Rogue?

Forget about Questing Adventurer. There’s a new Miracle tech in town, and it includes Red Mana Wyrm—a card which Firebat experimented with early in the Gadgetzan meta at the ECL Superstars tournament—and Beneath the Grounds.

That’s right, Sjow and Neirea have devised an evil plan to get free value. Rogue has always been a class which can sneak in free removal with Backstab and Preparation, so Beneath the Grounds can be played without losing too much tempo on T3 on paper. For just one card, you get 3x 4/4 minions, putting extra pressure on the highlander decks.

With two months of having exactly two viable Miracle archetypes in the meta, Sjow’s and Neirea’s lists are a fresh take that gets us excited. Though admittedly not as much as TwoBiers’ line-up.

Tobias “TwoBiers” Graap: Is that… a Hunter?

“Don’t try this at home or ladder!” This is what TwoBiers has written in big red letters. Can’t say you weren’t warned.

So what’s so wrong with TwoBiers’ line-up? For one, he has Burgly Bully in every single one of his decks to block those pesky Reno decks that rely on spells half of the time. And then, he’s playing Hunter, the class that hasn’t seen ANY play outside team leagues and is considered the absolute worst and in its in lowest point since Hearthstone launched.

TwoBiers is not only trusting Rexxar but is also using cards I had to Google to remember what they do (looking at you, Trogg Beastrager). Other than that, we’re looking at a standard N’Zoth Deathrattle Hunter, as much as “standard” and “Hunter” can be used in the same sentence in 2017.

James “Greensheep” Luo: SMOrc it

OK, it’s not totally fair to call Greensheep’s line-up true SMOrc, though he is running a Pirate Rogue, Pirate Warrior and Tempo Mage. I mean, look at his Shaman, it’s a Jade Midrange like Shtan’s and Orange’s that also has…

…Bloodlust.

OK, nevermind.

The only thing left to see is what will be the outcome of the Playoffs. Will Rexxar go to the Bahamas? Will SMOrc crush the midrange dreams? With nerfs reportedly coming at the end of this month, the Winter Playoffs could be the last time the Pirates terrorize Hearthstone, at least for the time being.

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