Agrro has become extremely popular in hearthstone,Each archetype has its place in the game,but with minions and spells becoming stronger in aggro decks than in the past ,there is a need for "viable " neutral taunts below 4 mana,Stabilization usually occurs around turn 6 with below 15 or less health if you can survive and draw a board clear.Any opening hand /turn 2 draws of mutiple 6 mana cards playing control =surrender. Past cards such as :Stonehill ,Tarcreeper ,annoyotron,lone champion etc gave better chances to stabilize,however there are no real viable taunts below 4 mana starting with bonewrath as viable .Did blizzard intentionally do this to continue to push the meta towards aggro?Again each archetype has a place however,Certain classes have become aggro based or random specific such as mage which diminish deck building and variety.
Face hunter support boggles my mind its such a hated deck then they make cards like toxic reinforcements that are just TOXIC to the game.
There is Belligerent Gnome
people have hated every deck type in the game …they would never release anything playable if they tried to avoid supporting a deck people have complained about before
A certain subset of players will hate anything they lose to and think it must be unfair.
They’re wrong.
No, they would be too popular. Good taunts are class cards such as warrior’s Funky.
its 5 mana but zilliax crushes aggro. heal 6 and kill 1 to 2 dudes. its op and often ends gmaes
Zilliax can easily be countered by freezing trap or gets picked off by a cheap spell. Rarely does it heal 6.
For 4 mana or less, we need taunts that aggro can’t abuse. That was the problem with Tar Creeper, it just protected their field more than it help you.
We need early game taunts that have negative effects like healing the opponent or damaging/destroying own minions.
We must play different Zilliax because mine hardly ever gets 6 healing done and never ends a game.
Always take Taunt Lackey
Sky Gen’ral Kragg is a good 4 cost taunt 2/3 body that also summons a 4/2 rush parrot if you played a quest at any time during the game. Strong for any deck that uses a quest.
Kragg is a very good card in (start-in-hand) Quest Decks, but it’s a terrible Taunt.
Infested Goblin is a 3 mana taunt, but meh stats unless you have some other synergy (eg: Druid buffing tokens or Warrior Into The Fray/Bolster)
Alternatively a Sunfury Protector gives other minions Taunt for 2mana. I run it in Handlock.
Some decent taunts we could use below 4 mana except last one.
0 mana epic, Target Statue, 0/5. Taunt, Cant Attack, Deathrattle: Your opponent gains 2 health.
1 mana epic, Leprechaun, 2/3 Taunt. Deals no damage to heroes.
2 mana rare, Barrens Vultures, 2/2 Taunt.
Whenever you summon a taunt minion this gets +1 health (wherever it is)
3 mana common, Tar Coagulation, 3/3. Taunt. Has +2 health during opponent’s turn.
10 mana legendary, Colossus of the Sun, 10/10 Taunt, Omega, Battlecry - Fill your hand with random non-colossus taunt minions.
Omega - When this attacks a minion it also damages all other enemy minions.
I use gnome in control quest shaman. Very useful.
we need a 3/5 taunt for 3 that heals your opponent 7 health.
Those cards worked for their meta, but I doubt they would work in today’s meta even if they’re available. Aggro decks these days can flood more, possibly taking longer to run out of steam to boot. This means playing taunts one at a time won’t stop the whole flood of minions. Not to mention rush exists, which can complement aggro as much as it is a defensive tool.
For slower decks to survive at least until April, it’s better to rely on other things, or combine other things with what taunts we do have.
Turn 3 taunts?
We are in a midrange meta. Rogue, Hunter and Druid are the 3 most popular classes. They’re not trying to rush face and kill you super fast.
I guess you want to counter the ~3% Face Hunters and ~3% Token Druid players, that are dwarfed by the higher value decks.