Hearthstone Players!

Devolve against Rogue feels so right. I love watching their Concealed, ColdBlooded, Auctioneers and 10/10 Van Cleefs turn into a Nightblade and a Defias. I wish it worked better against Shaman, but they just shit out minions so fast it can't save you sometimes.

Hex Sinister wrote: I've been playing with a modified version of your deck, Jack, and it's pretty fun. Didn't have Argent Horserider so replaced with Silent Knights. Ragnaros Lightlord instead of Tirion who I've not crafted yet and some other minor changes which I can't recall. Oh, Don +4/+4 dude who gets my Dopplegangsters big. Psych0 Trons are absent and probably shouldn't be... can't remember why they got cut. The consecrations are missing as well and I probably need to fix that.

Sweet. Don Han'Cho is pretty good. Like I said, I just dislike the RNG and I also don't like having to limit the way I play my hand in order for him to hit the target I want. Buy, yeah, when he lands on the Doppel and you drop 3 7/7s for 5 mana, you laugh at all the Shaman players. Lightlord is a solid replacement for The Man. I considered him, except that The Man is The Man and he also works with Rallying Blade. I feel like the Consecs will always be needed with aggro dominating the field (i.e. the game's entire existence and, seemingly, future.) I've played Paladin aggro decks that didn't have a minion above 3 mana and still played 2 Consecs to try to sweep the field ahead of me. It's like an auto "2 of" in any Paladin deck I ever make. If they do follow through and start removing classic cards like Innervate, that probably means Consec will be on the block for Paladin, which would basically ruin the vast majority of past archetypes.

Man, I just don't get Paladin I guess. I can't buy a win with any version of it. I used to play it a lot a couple of years ago when Control Paladin was a thing, but nowadays I'm just getting run over early or out controlled by the Reno decks.

On a side note, holy crap did I get the best deck I've ever drafted in Arena. Previously my best was 7 wins, but I'm usually topping out at 3 or 4 wins. This rogue deck got everything. Tons of jade cards, assasinate, sap, plus a lot of good minions. I got to 11-0 and then lost to 2 Warlocks in a row. The final game was another warlock and it was real close, but I got my 12th win. Scratch that off the hearthstone goal list.

airmarkus wrote: Man, I just don't get Paladin I guess. I can't buy a win with any version of it. I used to play it a lot a couple of years ago when Control Paladin was a thing, but nowadays I'm just getting run over early or out controlled by the Reno decks.

It's the second worst class right now, just ahead of Hunter and miles behind everything else. Which is a shame since it's my personal favourite. I remember the glory days of mid-range Paladin with the Aldor Peacekeeper and the Stampeding Kodo and the endless board wipe combos. I loved that deck.

If you want to play Paladin in the current meta, one option is to play Wild. Secrets Paladin, indeed any deck with Shielded Minibot and Muster for Battle in the 2 and 3 slots, is still terrifyingly effective. If you want to stick with Standard there are several variants on Murloc Handbuff doing the rounds which just about hold their own, but they require some expensive niche cards like Finja to work well.

That's how the meta crumbles. Hopefully Paladin will get a boost in the next meta. But then again it could be in the doldrums for years ... look what happened to Priest until very recently.

Crafted up an Aya, which was a missing piece for me.

Had a five-win Druid quest, so I went on a tear last night before the month reset, using a pretty stock Golems deck.

The brokenness of cycling "Jade Idol, stuff my deck with 1-point spells" and Gadgetzan Auctioneer saying "it's cool, draw them back!" or "played one? draw another!" is such a ridiculous late-game end condition. When I think "okay, 11 cards left, and nine of them are Jade Idols..."

It's pretty degenerate, but I guess that's the theme of the game now. At least it takes a few turns to get going.

Aya is prettttty good. That's a well-designed card. Nothing crazy, but totally playable. And quasi-neutral, which is nice for deckbuilders. The long game with Druid is pretty sick. I think there's a Control/Mill Druid deck out there to be found. The issue is board control. Druids have sucked at this since Force of Nature got garbage'd, as those 6 hasty damage could save your hash in a dire moment. When Aviana rotates away, I think this deck will get built and be interesting.

Murloc Paladin can still work but you need to run ALLLLLL the clears (Doomsayer's, Equality's Wild Pyro's, Consecrate's) and ALLLLL the lifegains (Ivory Knight, Lay On Hands, Forbidden Healing's) and it makes the games really boring. You usually need Barnes to luck you into an extra combo guy (Warleader pls pls) too. AND not get anything that matters Hex'd, Devolve'd or Polymorph'd. The struggle is real. There are enough Eaters of Secrets in Wild to make things less than ideal there as well. Tough spot for Paladins. They keep getting shit Legendaries to build around. Bolvar? Eadric? Yeesh.

MattDP wrote: If you want to play Paladin in the current meta, one option is to play Wild. Secrets Paladin, indeed any deck with Shielded Minibot and Muster for Battle in the 2 and 3 slots, is still terrifyingly effective.

I'm that guy. The one who dusted all cards that weren't Standard when Old Gods release. Sometimes I regret it briefly, mainly for the occasional tavern brawl, but not much. When I have time to play the game I want to play Standard Ladder or Arena. My thought process was that it would be easier to get cards I want from new sets and it would also narrow my focus since I'm easily distracted. I think doing that has served me pretty well. I don't really want to play Paladin these days. I don't enjoy the Anyfin deck at all and I think that's the only competitive build from what I understand. There's too many other fun decks to play right now. Evolve, devolve Shaman is fun and I've tried a few games with a kind of Zoo Druid deck made by a guy named Feno. I might try to ladder with that or Dragon Warrior early this new season.

airmarkus wrote:

MattDP wrote: If you want to play Paladin in the current meta, one option is to play Wild. Secrets Paladin, indeed any deck with Shielded Minibot and Muster for Battle in the 2 and 3 slots, is still terrifyingly effective.

I'm that guy. The one who dusted all cards that weren't Standard when Old Gods release..

Right there with you and I've been playing since the second week of the closed beta. When Standard arrived, everything non-Standard went in the trash. That let me create a bunch of cards from Whispers without spending a dime. I've kind of stuttered along through Mean Streets, only playing the three classes I really enjoy (Priest, Paladin, Shaman) and in order to get some of the legendaries for those, I've started scrapping stuff from classes I know I'll probably never play like Rogue and Mage, even if they're still Standard. I've also basically determined that I'm no longer going to play Arena because it's usually not worth the gold or the time. Play what you like. That's why all games are supposed to be fun.

Egg Druid stuff kicks ass this weeks tavern brawl btw. Buff those crate bodies and attack.

But I am here to tell you about a crazy new Paladin build. Combo meme. PIrate Murbuffloc or something. Starts out with pirates and buffs. Lots of draw, finish with Murlocs.
2x lights justice
2x small time buc
2x south sea deckhand
Patches.
2x grime street outfitter
2x smugglers run
2x mean street Marshall
2x runic egg
2x equality
2x hammer of wrath
2x solemn vigil
2x small time recruits
Tiriion
The seven Murloc cards that every Paladin plays

The game plan. Control the early board with Pirate stuff. Hopefully get off small time recruits and then buff. The charge minions act as removal. It's an aggressive deck. If things go alright you can cast Anyfin on turn ten without all the Murlocs and end the game. I am 3-2 with it at 18. Not a huge sample size. It's terribly draw dependent. Need to have minions in hand to buff and there are enough spells in the deck that you can easily be holding two after the mulligan and if one of those isn't small time recruits it's dicey. I may cut equality and see what happens.

End of last month I played Jade Druid for 3 days with decent success, drove down to 8 on Standard. My version is draw centric without Ancient of Lore. I beat many Jade Shaman and Mirror druids by just trying to outpace them on putting down Jade. I think it's possible we will all be more burned out the Jade mechanic way before Pirates though. It's kinda not interesting.

Got my 500 win Golden Sombrero for Warrior last month. Already made Rogue. It's nice because it makes me want to play the other classes more. I am 300 Ian wins with Druid Mage Warloc Paladin. Have super long way to go on Hunter. I never even played hunter when it was good. Anyone care about Golden heroes? I notice when I play on ladder now when I am facing a Golden hero. It's a little bit scarier. Mostly see Golden Warriors though, which is odd. As prevelant as Shaman is I would expect to see lots of those.

MacDirk Diggler wrote: Got my 500 win Golden Sombrero for Warrior last month. Already made Rogue. It's nice because it makes me want to play the other classes more. I am 300 Ian wins with Druid Mage Warloc Paladin. Have super long way to go on Hunter. I never even played hunter when it was good. Anyone care about Golden heroes? I notice when I play on ladder now when I am facing a Golden hero. It's a little bit scarier. Mostly see Golden Warriors though, which is odd. As prevelant as Shaman is I would expect to see lots of those.

Congrats on the Warrior golden. Until recently most Warrior games were long ones.

Yeah, I decided early on in playing this game that golden heroes was going to be my motivation for playing the game after I got my first one with Hunter a couple years ago. Then it was priest which took forever, followed by Mage. Late last year I got my last one, which was Warrior. It was an incredible grind and fun for the way I like to play games, but it worked for me and got me playing each class. I tend to be goal driven and focus on one or two games at a time, so I thought about quitting, but then I set goals to get a 12-win arena run and did that. All I have left is hitting legend, but that seems so insurmountable right now. The best I've ever done is Rank 7 and that was on a sweet winstreak when Secret Paladin first came out and nobody knew how to play against it. Needless to say, I love the feelings of accomplishment so knowing any game I play will be with a golden hero feels pretty cool.

Despite having already played it before, I forgot how the gift Tavern Brawl works so I just threw some Reddit-recommended Priest cards together for a one-and-done deck. I went against a Warlock and I ended up using Confuse earlier than I wanted in order to claim 2 gifts after a couple turns of my opponent using spells to steal mine. I pulled a 4 mana Jaraxxus and a 0 mana Doomguard that I wanted to save for Turn 6. Things got dicey when he played a Fearsome Doomguard but I was able to take care of it with Pint-sized Potion + SW:P before dropping Jaraxxus, Doomguard and hero power ("INFERNAL!!!!") on Turn 6. Thankfully he wasn't running a Sacrificial Pact and I had my complimentary pack a couple turns later.

I'm pretty much done spending money on HS until Team 5 gets their shit together. That damn pirate core has crapped on the rest of the game to the point where it's warped everything around it. There are some legitimately fun things to come out of this expansion: for example, the Priest shenanigans that are possible when using Confuse, Pint-Sized Potion and Djinni of Zephyrs. Today I also saw an awesome board clear where a Priest dealt with three, four attack minions by playing Pint-Sized Potion -> Wild Pyromancer -> Confuse. But it feels like things like that exist accidentally in spite of what Hearthstone is right now rather than being a natural outgrowth of it.

I'm also avoiding Standard; the deck diversity is (mostly) better in Wild Casual and I can still get a lot of mileage out of and do quite well with my Resurrect N'Zoth Priest. For a class not known for flooding the board it is so satisfying to get an Injured Blademaster killed and resurrect him 2-3 times on subsequent turns.

Get rekt: clips.twitch.tv/thijshs/ZealousFlyKreygasm

Devolve is fun as hell. Sometimes it's not that great. It's a shitpile against Jade, for example, as big Jades at 7+ are almost always better as real minions at 6+. But what can ya do.

Brode did a readout on Blizzard's internal stats. Over the last two weeks, 17% of decks were Shaman (at all ranks), but it was 30% at Rank 5+. He also notes the "Pirate Package" (Patches + Small-Time Buccaneer) is in HALF of decks Rank 5+. Aggro Shaman win rate is 53%. Tuned Control Warriors beat it (Aggro Shaman is 35% against that), but it's such a crime that they print Jade at the same time, which honestly, I don't Control Warriors can win against. Still better than Undertaker Hunter, which was 35% of decks (!!!) and 60% win rate.

www.hearthpwn.com/news/2209-ben-brode-on...a-balance-and-shaman

I'm still goofing off with Shaman on Wild (Control and Jade Evolve builds) and Priest OTK on Standard. Tried the Paladin deck above for some quests and ~eh~. I am just not into this class.

Been trying to dial in that Anyfin PIrate buff deck. Took out one equality for Argent Blade for more early board and being able to hit the pirate bonus more often. It's very squirrelly deck. Some games it annihilates, some it fizzles. The dream is
Turn 1 - pirate
Turn 2- weapon
Turn 3- draw weenies with small time recruits
Turn 4- buff weenies and play a couple
Turn 5- Finja
Turn 6- play whatever Murloc are in hand and attack with a Finja. Not uncommon to have all the murlocs out after his attack.

The draw this deck has is unprecedented for me. I have made it to turn 10 with 4 cards remaining. The deck thinning of Patches Small time recruits and Finja means you are 75% holding Tirion turn 8. So I if I was Firebat I could make some YouTube videos edited to show you me getting turn 6 wins etc. But the bad beats. Hate hate hate priest. Drakkonid invariably steals Anyfin from your deck and you get killed by your own murlocs. One game I had Smorced Jade Shaman down to 6 health turn 6, murlocs on board. Devolve, AOE.... then next turn Brann with the Jinsu heal guy. Then endless taunts in front of Tyrion. I am mired at 20 on the ladder and can't seem to get off with this inconsistent deck. It's not good enough. Maybe if I had the 2/2 heal taunt guy? Maybe try all murlocs off Small time recruits. Basically if you are playing a Murloc deck the winrate doubles if you play Finja on curve. Always always always mulligan for Finja is my advice. The way things have been going for me though, I draw the other murlocs before Finja.

I have limited experience with evolve. It seems like it's something that works well in a game you are already winning. From Firelands, Moonglade, and the warrior portal I see so many crappy random 4,5,6 drop minions. Evolve is awesome if you have a few damaged minions on board. But when you evolve you are mostly in it for the stats, and it seems crazy how often you wind up with worse stats. I can respect the fun factor though.

A friend of mine was convinced I would get some free packs by winning a couple of games in Wild yesterday. I'd never heard of this, nor had I ever even played a single game in Wild since I dusted everything last year. He was wrong about the packs, but boy was the deck I played broken. It's basically Pirate Warrior with Ship's Cannon. I think somebody mentioned this a few pages back but I was too lazy to look. Needless to say I went from 25 to 15 in no time at all. So broken, but it did make me regret dusting so much. It made me realize I could be playing Demon Warlock decks or Blade Flurry Rogues with Burgles and fun control priest or insane N'Zoth decks. I broke my own rule, but damn, now I want to play Wild. Guess I'll be doing some crafting.