Pro-Player Bio: Pun the Punisher
I don’t think people understand how good he actually is at the game because most of his streamed matches came after the GM cancellation announcement, so that was definitely a nerfed version of Pun.
-PrancingPony
Hearthstone Career
Pun made his debut onto the radar of competitive Hearthstone mostly toward the end of 2020, specifically with his epic top legend ladder battles with fellow American player McBanterFace. With Enrage Warrior being the meta tyrant, Pun employed the novel tech card of “Platebreaker” to gain a large edge in the crucial match up, getting himself onto the map.
Pun was able to repeat his strong performance on the ladder over the following months to qualify for his first Masters Tour in early 2021.
Debuting at Ironforge, March 2021, Pun started with a strong 6–3 performance. Pun qualified for every Masters Tour of 2021, before obtaining the highest total qualification points for Grand Masters in the Americas region at the year end cut-off. This promoted him into the Hearthstone Grand Masters program, just in time for the program to announce that this year (2022) would be the final season.
Pun’s 2021 Hearthstone season was legendary, as he was focused on obtaining his goal of entering the Grand Masters program, which was a prerequisite at the time to be able to compete at the World Championships. With 34 swiss wins for the season, he found himself 6th on this chart behind 4 of the top Chinese players of Tianming, Xc, Yuansu, Leaoh), and Alutemu of Japan.
With the wind taken out of sails somewhat due to the imminent cancellation of the Grand Masters program, Pun split his time between Competitive Hearthstone and applying for janitor jobs, which impacted his performance greatly during the course of the year.
2022 had Pun starting shakily in his GM career before finding his groove later in the season, enough to qualify him into the playoff week as well as to GM Final Call, but he was unable to convert these opportunities to a ticket to Worlds. Like many other competitors, he is currently eagerly waiting for the announcement regarding the 2023 competitive season of Hearthstone with the hope that the system is something he can give his all to.
A word from PrancingPony
He likes to think of himself as a control player, but all of his most loyal fans enjoyed him most when he was playing one of the best aggressive decks ever to exist in the game, Penflinger Rogue, or “Punflinger Rogue”.
I don’t think people understand how good he actually is at the game because most of his streamed matches came after the GM cancellation announcement, so that was definitely a nerfed version of Pun.
It’s sort of a long story, but Pun was essentially the trigger to how the Pony Dojo ever became a thing… I want to see how good he is when he can truly give a game his everything. That is one of my motivations for why I am involved in Aegir Tactics.
Follow Pun
If you are interested in following Pun and joining his community check out the following links.
About the Author
PrancingPony is the founder of the Pony Dojo, a place where top level card game players can level up and practice. He is also helping design Aegir Tactics, a game built to improve issues experienced in the competitive game scene.
