Wheel Spider Huntsman Deck Tech as of Super Slam - Archived 10/05/2025

Hello! Modern day Etasus here, I posted this a couple weeks ago to reddit, but recently decided to make the jump over to my own site. This is an archived version of that deck tech I wrote. You can find the original link here: https://www.reddit.com/r/FleshandBloodTCG/comments/1nz74ku/wheel_spider_huntsman_deck_tech_as_of_super_slam/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

You are probably just like many other prospective players. You saw Hunter or Hunted get revealed and thought to yourself “Dang, this really interesting hero that’s never really been playable might have legs now… I wonder what they can do? I saw the reveal and thought to myself “Holy crap! My favorite hero in the game that I’ve been playing since release just broke the game!”

Well, spoiler alert, they didn’t break the game. But they are very good in a very specific niche of the meta that might lead to a couple more LL points than the 13 they currently have to their name. So here’s what I did to build the hero using the new card.

Here’s the decklist: https://fabrary.net/decks/01GTYH5DW94ECW7HY9EZ1JRVAP

The main idea of the deck is simple: Remain on the back foot, preventing damage, blocking out, and holding just enough cards back to present a threat that chips away at the deck. In general, this deck is focused on one very powerful interaction: Double Trouble.

Double Trouble is a very strong card for one specific reason: It costs one card to play and takes two cards from your opponent. It’s one of the few cards in the game with a net positive card advantage value. On paper, it’s really good. Actually playing it out, though, is the difficult part.

The big problem is where to find the two reactions to turn it on. They generally come in three categories.

With deck cards, we have a slight risk. If you play out Razor’s Edge onto the Double Trouble chain link, you are now losing two cards to take two of your opponent's cards, instead of one for two. This means that the inherent value created by Double Trouble is diminished with each reaction card you play out on it’s chain link. But that doesn’t mean we don’t play out reactions to Double Trouble. Just a Nick works incredibly well on the blue Double Troubles, though in a pinch it can be used on the reds and yellows. Coercive Tendencies may not give go again, but it’s a free banish you can play out to trigger Double Trouble. Both of these reactions banish additional cards in deck, allowing you to maintain the inherent card advantage provided by Double Trouble. We are also running Tarantula Toxin and Concealed Blade which can help trigger Double Trouble, but both do incredibly little to help progress the gameplan to the point where you should most often block with them. In a pinch though, extra reactions may be needed and they both offer incredible flexibility in their other modes to make it just another tool in your toolbox.

The better way to turn on Double Trouble, though, is with arena cards. Mask of Perdition, Flick Knives, and Blacktek Whisperers. As these reactions don’t cost cards, you’re maintaining the inherent value of Double Trouble with no lost card advantage. Additionally, this allows you to pull off a one card Double Trouble play, blocking out with everything else and presenting a 0 for 5 on hit banish two with just your equipment to threaten it. And that’s ignoring the impact the equipment has on this. Mask of Perdition adds a third banish, and Flick Knives can turn on Graven Call (more on this later). Blacktek mostly just increases your reaction count on a 1 block stick. A good rule of thumb here is that for every 4 silver you generate you get to play 1 more Double Trouble, as all three of these activations utilize silver to play out additional activations.

There is one other interesting way to reach the two reactions though, and it’s one you might not think of. You don’t. Play out a Double Trouble blue and hold back a single card. Your opponent might sense a Just a Nick in their future. Maybe they don’t want to be hit for 8 damage and 4 banishes (W/ Mask). They block it out. Instead of any tricks, you just let it all resolve and stick the card in your arsenal. In this instance, you obviously have to be able to punish no blocks as well with enough reactions to turn it on across all your effects, but you can just hold onto all the reactions if they decide to block and save them for the next Double Trouble.

And this is where the most important facet of this deck comes into play: Your arsenal. Knowing when and what to arsenal is obviously an important skill for this game, but this deck dials it up to 11. You may have asked yourself upon viewing the deck as to where Shred ran off to. Why the Regicide went to the market. Why gems got lost in the packs. Quite simply, none of these cards are cards you can safely arsenal. Every single card in this deck is designed to be at worst an awkward arsenal. Every single card in this deck can be arsenaled and still played out as soon as the very next turn.

Triggering Double Trouble aside though, how do you actually play out Double Trouble?

The best way to do so is a “naked” Double Trouble. This is when you play it out with no lead up. No dagger attacks, no go again actions, just as your first and only action of the turn. Why is this the case? Because Arakni works best on the back foot, and in a 4 card hand, shooting for 2-3 of those cards defending to preserve life and prolong the game is a solid place to be.

In general, the folly of fledgling Arakni players is that you really need to not be greedy. The long and slow grind is where Arakni wins. Block out, keep your life total nice and healthy, and chip away with deck damage every so often.

If you do find yourself with extra cards, the best thing to add onto your Double Trouble, aside from reactions to trigger it, is a leading dagger attack. Simply swing a dagger for 1 damage and an on hit or 2 damage, all by pitching a blue or yellow. It’s not a lot of damage nor a very large threat, but it keeps a card in circulation so that your deck remains fatter for longer. In a game where you are accumulating card advantage across turns, finding any and all ways to preserve your own deck size is good. Keep those cards in circulation, dagger where possible. Just don’t get greedy and lose too much life to be able to present the dagger.

Double Trouble is the key to the deck, and nearly every single card in the deck works to help support it. Outside of the previously mentioned attack reactions, you also have contracts for more silver to turn into more equipment activations, defensive cards to preserve your life total, and control cards to slow down the pace of your opponent. Let’s go through each category one at a time.

Obviously, when so much of our deck revolves around playing out attack reactions, you need a lot of silver to fuel it. Thankfully, we have lots of ways to do it.

The primary one, and the reason this deck exists now, is Hunter or Hunted. Hunter or Hunted alone accounts for 90+% of our silver generation. Before the card’s release, we’d be lucky to have 3 silver over the course of the entire game. After the card’s release, we can often generate 3 silver from a single play. The best way to play out Hunter or Hunted is very simple: Early and often. The moment you see it, you play it. If you can’t play it, arsenal it and then play it when you can. There are some matchups you need to be smart about playing it out, those being Dash I/O, Oscillio, and Gravy Bones, who can all adjust the top card in the window between looking at the top card and resolving the banish. Additionally, heroes like Teklo and Verdance require you to actively look for specific cards, which can be done through careful planning, manipulating, and even reverse pitch stacking if it comes to it. All of this is fairly advanced enough to where I won’t delve into it deeply in this guide, especially because I, myself don’t have enough experience with the card to navigate some of these unique interactions. If you just play it out though, you can usually just grab a card and get some free silver for your troubles.

Beyond Hunter or Hunted though, the deck features 4 playsets of contracts and two copies of Cut to the Chase. Plunder the Poor and Annihilate the Armed are mostly critical redundancy for Cut to the Chase and Coercive Tendencies, but you’ll mostly just be blocking with them. Surgical is mostly a pitching card that you stick in your deck for some deterministic end game hand attacks, which means that you mostly don’t ever play the card. The important one, though, is Leave No Witnesses. I don’t need to explain why CnC on a contract stick is powerful, but just recognize that there are situations where I would rather play out Leave No Witnesses than a Double Trouble.

You may note the lack of Eradicate in this list. This is a change that I am not 100% sold on, but the theory as to why is fairly sound. When the deck is so efficient and banishing cards, you don’t need yet another mass banish attack to close out games. Pair that with the super awkward statline of a yellow 1 for 4, and it can lead to messing up the consistency of some hands and get in the way of playing out your preferred gameplay loop. I could see bringing it back in, because the combo of Eradicate + Cut to the Chase is super degenerate, but for now I will not include it in the list.

As far as contract Huntsman triggers are concerned, your top priority with these cards is silver generation. If it creates a silver, leave it on top. If it doesn’t, bottom it. If changing the top card would have no impact on silver generation (Leave into Cindra or Annihilate into Kano), dig for power cards.

Typically, playing out a contract is simple: Do I have a Double Trouble to play / can I turn on the Double Trouble I have? If the answer is no, play a contract instead. If the stars align and you can Cut it, then go ahead and push through the on hit and get the necessary silver to power your future Double Trouble turns. If the contracts don’t work out, they always have a nice 3 block value in the corner you can take advantage of.

The best thing you should be doing with the hero, though, is blocking. While most of our defensive tools are in the sideboard, you should be bringing in at least a defensive card or two into nearly every matchup. Basically, you want to be blocking with most of your hand on most turn cycles.

The biggest problem new players will have with this list is getting too greedy. Most cards in your deck have 3 block or more, so take advantage of it. In general, 3 life prevention is worth more than extending your turn. Obviously, play the turn by ear based on the current gamestate, just remember that when in doubt, block out.

As far as the number one strongest card in Assassin is concerned, Codex of Frailty is a staple card that should be played when you have it. It’s a single card that basically allows you to present your entire hand on defense and still swing a bomb. This is not an aggressive extender, nor is it a card you arsenal and save for a punish later (Remember, arsenaling in this deck is important and you shouldn’t be sitting on cards very often), this is a card that you play when you see and use to increase your defensive value for the turn cycle.

Sometimes, though, you just need to control the pace of play. This deck features substantially less disruption than other Assassin lists, but you still have some pieces to play around with.

The most interesting question to answer about these control pieces, though, is when do you play them out and when do you play out deck damage? The answer, as it often is, is that it depends.

As a rule of thumb, though, if you have the tempo, you should be playing control elements to slow down your opponents pace of play. If you do not have the tempo, you should present those cards as block or pitch cards, and threaten deck damage with Double Trouble. This actually leads towards the deckbuilding decision of blue stealth cards. Persuasive Prognosis and Bonds of Attraction represent some powerful disruption, often requiring a card from hand in the late game. But, the blue 3 block stat line allows them to still find use in the early stages of the game. The same is true for Surgical as well, though Surgical can’t be presented with a card in hand to make your opponent think you might be swinging in with a two card 6.

Blue stealth cards themselves are actually incredibly impactful when holding back a card, as bluffing Just a Nicks can lead to your opponent way overblocking simple disruption. In general, because of this, you should be attempting to hold a Just a Nick in deck at all times, so that your opponent counting your graveyard will be curious as to the wearabouts of the last Nick every time you present a target.

The sideboard of this list is very “in flux” right now. I have not played enough games on this deck to say with confidence what the best sideboard decisions look like, and I’m not entirely sure what the best decks are to target.

In short, the “run it back” board is a random splattering of 6 cards between Sigil, Sink, and Shelter (depending on opposing hero)

Against decks with lots of go again and weapon/arsenal plays, bring in Frailty Trap (Ninja and aggro Warrior)

Against defensive decks, bring in Stains

Against arcane decks, bring in Oasis

Never go above 60 (It messes up the ratios too much and I’m not convinced it’s ever worth screwing with your ratios)

For equips, run it back should include Spider’s Bite. Defensive decks should include Graven Call x2, and Warrior should include Scale Peeler. Bring in AB1 into Runeblade (Chest), and AB3 into Wizard

Remember though, all of this is very tentative at best. Play your sideboard how you think your sideboard needs to be played.

I believe that’s all the explaining I need to do for this deck. If you have any additional questions, be sure to join the Spider’s Web Assassin discord to hop in the discussion in real time: Spider's Web Discord Server

If you have would like to read my preliminary thoughts on Hunter or Hunted, check out this post I wrote last month: Hunter or Hunted? What is means for Huntsman

If you want to follow me on any socials, here’s my Bluesky handle: Etasus