Hearthpwn

Blizzard as usual will completely miss the obvious: Big Beast Hunter is everywhere because Control Priest completely strangles the life out of absolutely every other deck in the entire format. Do you want to play ANYTHING that isn't Hunter or an ultra-greedy control deck? Fuck you. 5 Amun'Thuls backed up by 8 board wipes. It's completely impossible for any deck to go under Control Priest, so the only option you have is to go over them. Ohey, what goes over infinite board control? Instant death burn & 32 charge damage from nothing. What are all the most obnoxious decks that you're all talking about above right now? What do you know, they're all combo burn decks and Big Hunter. This has been true in every control meta that has ever existed in Hearthstone's history. The best control deck kills every fair deck in the format, and then the only thing left is that control deck and its counters: usually combo decks like Freeze Mage. Since they've taken Warlock out back and given it a good bonk, now it's time to break Priest's kneecaps so fair decks can actually come out and crack some Hunter skulls.

Honestly, if this card was in any class other than Paladin I'd put it in instant garbage category, but almost all Paladin spells function fine on their own (even if they're not all created equal), and some of them are downright disgusting (Crusader putting a Lay on Hands into your hand will likely straight win you the game in long matchups, to say nothing of Blessing of Kings or Another Challenger...) Even bad stuff like Secrets or Hand of Protection are... Fine. I mean you won't jump for joy to see them, but they're fine. Sure, I can maybe meme someone with Eye for an Eye. I didn't take any space out of my deck for it, so now that I have it it's just free value. It's fine. They're fine.

... Maybe. Using this in a mid-range shell as a card advantage machine and cutting Lay on Hands from the list could work. Emphasis on could. It is possible to build a Midrange Paladin list using only class cards that won't fold over instantly. However, Midrange Paladin is a deck that grinds out wins with value and board control. If the meta has a control deck that can't lose late no matter what (some kind of control Priest, or the next Jade Druid), then I don't think it will have a home, especially since Control Warrior exists to dump on aggro.

That being said, if Control Warrior becomes a Tier-1 deck because there's a lot of aggro out there, then Mid-range Paladin becomes about 5 times more viable since Control Warrior has historically been its best match-up by a country mile. Lot of ifs. That minion that obliterates dragon decks will be incredibly hard to deal with, so I'm not sure. Will have to be tested in the field. Call me cautiously optimistic!

Silence everywhere because of Cubelock, as everyone said, but ALSO, Cubelock makes all midrange decks unplayable unless they can burst the cubelock from 15 or have, like... 4 silences, or polymorph effects. Them's the shakes.

Shudderwock shaman is annoying to play against in the extreme for basically everybody, but I MOSTLY support it purely because I despise Cubelock that much. Anything that lowers the number of Cubelocks is fair game to me, as long as it too can be preyed upon by something. Ideally many somethings so the meta finally effing breaks open. There is one thing though that maybe Blizzard's developers should look at. Not the balance team, but the actual programmers. I don't know if this is always how it is, but there was this one game where the Shudderwock that was summoned was also activating its battlecry in the same turn. This obviously did infinite damage to me and locked me out of my turn even though I was full health with 20 armor. I don't think that's how Saronite Chain Gang was supposed to work with Shudderwock. If it is, I'd like to lodge a complaint. :P If it isn't, maybe somebody should work on that.

Faced this. I actually have no idea how it happened, but the other player locked me out of my turn and did literally infinite damage.  For some reason the cloned Shudderwocks continued the battlecry effect ad infinitum. Blizzard, if you knew this was going to happen, fuck you.

I'm going to give the new Midrange Warrior a spin on day 1 before everyone realizes Cubelock beats literally everything and its counters are all dead. So I predict about, say... Two hours of fun. But I will cherish it!

Good in the midrange warrior that might appear from the mists this expansion, decent in zoolock, possible highroll for aggro Paladin since they have Juggles and 1/1 Divine Shield minions to kill the drakeslayer with. I think it has potential!

Never before have I played a deck where I felt so much like I was about to lose any minute. Never before have I felt like that and still managed to win what feels like 70% of games. This deck is terrible for my nerves, but great for my winrate. 10/10!

Average dragon is pretty heavy. This thing gets pulled by Call to Arms and punishes your opponent for playing a board clear. You already run Dire Wolf Alpha because of CtA, so this is basically a way to put more weight in your deck as midrange paladin. With this in mind, is it good enough? Maaaaybe? In that kind of deck you won't be playing Cathedral Gargoyle, so you're playing the egg just to play it, but who knows.

Yes, sure. Why not make Warlock outright IMMUNE to early boards entirely? It's not like they are completely unbeatable in a value battle no matter what you do, on top of ALSO having 15+ damage OTK potential with Doomguards. No, truly Warlock is a beat upon class that has suffered greatly, and they NEED all these anti-aggro cards. Fuck every other class, by the way. They can be the victims of the decks desperately trying to counter Warlock with aggro, because they're not Warlock, and that means they're garbage that don't deserve to be viable. Is this what we're doing now Blizzard? You kill Freeze Mage so the natural counter to control Warlocks can't appear, then you make a deck that was already impossible for control to beat impossible for aggro and midrange to beat as well? This is it then, guys. I guarantee you that for the next two months until a nerf wave comes, this is ALL you will hear when queuing in ladder or casual:

"YOUR SOUL SHALL BE MINE"

"FOR LORDRAN"

"YOUR SOUL SHALL BE MINE"

"YOUR SOUL SHALL BE MINE"

"I WILL FIGHT WITH HONOR"

"YOUR SOUL SHALL BE MINE"

"LET'S HAVE SOME FUN"

"YOUR SOUL SHALL BE MINE"

"For doomhammer?"

Blyat...

So it's a buff to help you control the board, a "cycle" card to keep your hand topped off, a value card because it's generating extra minions from itself instead of drawing through your deck, and it's a quasi-tutor card, since it always gives you an elemental. Yeah this'll be a pretty good card!

Well, Bellringer Sentry is playable now. Kind of. Maybe!

 The hero Midrange Paladin needs. Whether or not it's enough to push a slower version of the deck into existence is up for debate. My gut instinct is probably not, but who knows! Sometimes cards are strange. Sometimes they appear out of nowhere. This could be that.

I'm sure others have said it already, but this card is apeshit in Exodia Mage. For 4 mana, you can either get one of your combo pieces into your hand, guaranteed, OR get a Doomsayer, which is vital to getting you to the point where you can play your combo at all. You can draw Frost Nova early on, play this on turn 4, then Frost Nova + Doomsayer on turn 5. This card + Cubelock's dominance could single-handedly make Exodia Mage competetive. Okay, option 3 is it pulls Arcanologist, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing either. Point is this card is dirty.