Tier 1
TPC Comments
Davide Magri
Harpies are now your worst nightmare, as we are back to one of the worst situations ever for the game: a solo Tier 1 deck with a mirror decided by straight up luck, with little to no outplay potential. Fire Kings, the supposed counter to Harpies, is not even able to beat them consistently, as the 30-card Harpie build has a good matchup into it thanks to cards like Loading... , and even the 22/23-card builds are able to beat it if they're on Loading... . So far, only very few cards have been used to counter Harpies, as Harpies' Hunting Ground completely invalidates basically all of them (like Loading... ), meaning that on a good day, nothing will stop this deck aside from itself. And the worst part about all of this is that Harpies aren't even an overpowered deck, it's fair and it makes sense in the context of Duel Links, but currently, there is nothing that consistently beats it without having consistency issues.
EatMyBroccoli
The deck is strong, versatile, consistent and affordable. This makes Harpies take the largest cut of the Swiss representation and Top Cut cakes. The deck has no real rivals to fear more then themselves and this makes them the solo Tier 1 at the moment. On the other side, none of actual Tiered decks have autolose matchups against Harpies, and the chances of winning aren't that low to stop playing anything else, like the Tier 0 decks from previous metas.
moodtrapper
Harpies remain as the solo Tier 1 deck of the format. We all know it is very consistent and we saw it dominate the MCS. However, this can be easily changed. The current format supports deck diversity like never before, which is what everyone been asking for for a while now. However, when we actually got the format, a lot of people tunneled on Harpies as we've seen in the MCS wher 57/140 decks were Harpies! The power level of Harpies isn't high; a deck like that being tier one should encourage players to be creative and diversify.
trapdexter
Harpies continue to dominate the format and have shown insane results, including 17 spots in the Top 32 of the MCS. The deck is the best in the game currently and shows no sign of slowing down. Some TPC members shared thoughts to raise the deck to Tier 0 status, however, as a whole we decided that Tier 1 is adequate. One of the major reasons being that Harpies domination is a result of many decks being brought down to earth because of countless banlists and was viewed as a Tier 3 deck not too long ago. Therefore, we felt that the push to Tier 0 status was a bit extreme at this time. Make no mistake though, Harpies are far and away the best deck in the game and everybody should prepare to face it and counter it.
Tier 2
TPC Comments
DanielYGO
While the Harpie matchup in theory should be in favour of Fire King, due to Loading... being able to blow-up the board and Harpies not having any destruction protection, reality is not that simple. Fire King is quite slow and only starts going once the Garunix loop is in play. There are multiple ways of getting there like with Loading... popping a Garunix in hand, Loading... being able to special a Garunix from the deck which will be destroyed during the End Phase. The problem is that the Harpie players can play around it with the right hand.
Against Arvata pass, for example it is possible to just summon a monster bigger than Arvata and run over it. With the new inclusion of Loading... one could simply normal summon her or special it with Loading... , activate The Tie that Binds and just attack over it. Against Onslaught one can just Loading... the Loading... to prevent the End Phase destruction. The alternative would be to bounce back Garunix with Loading... 's effect by using one of their own Spells or Traps. Also, by leaving Loading... on the board after trying to put pressure on the opponent, the Harpie Player prevents a potential Onslaugh (since a monster is on the field). As such, the only reliable way to get Garunix in the graveyard and trigger its effect, is to use Loading... and destroy a Garunix in the hand. Drawing such a hand is rather unlikely though, since they're only three-ofs (in what is usually a 30-card deck) and cannot be easily searched if the opponent is mindful.
All those points do not mean that the matchup is unfavoured. It just shows, that the matchup is more skill-intense for both sides and needs a good understanding on how to navigate to win. As such, Fire King remains at Tier 2 as the best Harpie counter we currently have, while having overall good matchups against the rest of the decks in the format