Hearthpwn

Intro

What is up guys, I am goudhout, and I am back with a new paladin guide for you all. Before the witchwood released I made a pretty detailed guide on dude paladin, now lets do the same for even paladin. The guide will contain the following:

1. Which cards I play and why?
2. Why is my deck different than other dude paladins and why this makes it better in my opinion?
3. What other techs can you play?
4. The mulligan
5. The strategies and the matchups.

Now first real quick why you should listen to me, I played the crap outta this deck and reached top 400 legend with it. Also pleas note: I do not, and will not claim anywhere in this guide that this deck was my own idea or that I own the credits for the deck. Other people have posted even palladin decklists before I even started playing it. This post is mainly about the guide.

Proof:

1. Which cards I play and why?

I will discuss all of the cards here shortly.

Acidic Swamp Ooze - First of all it is a 2-drop, and since this is an even paladin deck you need a lot of 2 drops because if you skip turn 1, 2 and 3 you're in a bad spot. Also the 3 attack is decent at killing of Mana Wyrm and Northshire Cleric. It also goes well with Call to Arms. Secondly the weapon removal aspect of it is pretty strong, use it vs warlock, tempo mage, other pally's and warriors. This card can be replaced if you choose so.

Amani Berserker - This is one of the cards that I was most unsure about, it is a 2-drop, so that's good. But it's maily good because it has a 2/3 body which is really usefull in the mirror, it can kill 2 knife jugglers, or 2 wolves. There are not really better 2/3 2 drops for an aggressive deck. This card can be replaced if you choose so.

Dire Wolf Alpha - We play a lot of early minions, this thing buffs 2 minions, more damage, better trades, its also a 2-drop. Pretty obvious. This is a core card.

Drygulch Jailor - gives a good board refill after an AOE and combines really well with Lightfused stegedon, this is a core card.

Equality - This card is really good in a lot of cases, you can combine it with a lot of dudes, or with Knife Juggler, Consecration or Avenging Wrath. I would always play 1, you can play 2.

Knife Juggler - Just really good in this deck. This is a core card. 

Vicious Scalehide - I have thought about it a lot before I put this card in my deck, but it is really good with Call to Arms, because you get the immediate impact. Without Vicious Scalehide you need to pull knife juggler from Call to Arms for that instant impact, but you have to run so many 2-drops that pulling juggler becomes inconsistend. This is not a core card and I would not recommend running 2 of them.

Blessing of Kings - Pretty obvious, buffs small dudes. Core card.

Call to Arms - Broken, Core card.

Consecration - this card can turn the tide in the mirror or when facing any aggro deck, since you only have the 1 mana hero power you will probably lose the early game to other aggro decks, that is why this card is needed, core card.

Lightfused Stegodon - we play a lot of dudes, this guy buffs the dudes and can make a board full off 1/1's very dangerous. core card.

Saronite Chain Gang - I often refer to it as mini Call to Arms, because it is just that, it is also really good at protecting Knife Juggler and Dire Wolf Alpha. Not a core card, but still really good.

Spellbreaker - There are warlocks on ladder, core card.

Truesilver Champion - Deals 8 dmg face or clears 2 minions, pretty good, the only thing you have to worry about when playing this card is weapon removal, so I recommend to always swing with it on the first turn. Core card.

Avenging Wrath - SMOrc dmg in aggro deck is really good, for the rest it also functions as a board clear espescially when combined with [card]Equality/card], this card can be replaced, althoug not recommended.

 Genn Greymane - Core card.

Sunkeeper Tarim - one of the strongest cards in the deck, ginving the ability to make any trade and also giving a good amount of damage. core card.

The Lich King - a really good late game card, can get more steam, more dmg more health anything, great a really flexible card. Not a core card, but still really good.

2. Why is my deck different than other dude paladins and why this makes it better in my opinion?

Lets say here that the standard deck is the deck that orange posted on his twitter. First of all we replaced one Drygulch Jailor with a Vicious Scalehide, I already explained this. Vicious Scalehide gives instant impact from Call to Arms, Drygulch Jailor does not. And then seconly we replaced Val'anyr with The Lich King, The Lich King is imo a more flexible card and therefore deserves the spot better, lich king can save you out of 90% of the scenario's you'll find yourself is. Val'anyr will only give you more dmg.

3. What other techs can you play?

Plated Beetle - Plated beetle could take the spot of Amani beserker. It has the same body and both of the cards do not have a really insane effect. Plated Beetle is better vs tempo mage and face hunter. 

Equality - A second Equality could be really good vs control and in the mirror, it helps you keep the board clear for your minions to SMOrc and win the game before they can get their threads online. 

Bonemare - You can play this card if you can not afford Sunkeeper Tarim or The Lich King, although it is strictly worse. 

Crystal Lion - If you can not afford a Sunkeeper Tarim or The Lich King then you can also consider using this. This card can also replace Avenging Wrath if you do not have the dust.

4. The mulligan

Here I will write how I would normally mulligan vs different classes, do note that this is not set in stone, imagine you face a lot of zoo warlocks at your rank, well then you will probably not keep silence in you mulligan when facing warlocks, please consider these types of things before listening to me.

Against Warlock: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker, Blessing of Kings, Call to Arms, Spellbreaker. The most questionable card here will probably be Blessing of Kings, But I have noticed that a lot of warlocks will mulligan for their AOE when facing paladin, not for their spellstone, this means that a big minion can really screw them up, so we do just that.

Against Mage: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker, Dire Wolf Alpha, Call to Arms, Truesilver Champion. Truesilver Champion is the only card in your deck that does not activate any secret, that means it is save to play, also many tempo mages do not run weapon removal. 

Against Priest: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker, Dire Wolf Alpha, Call to Arms, Blessing of Kings, Lightfused stegedon. Lightfused stegedon might be a bit questionable, but a lot of times priest do not want to AOE 2-3 dudes even though they have 100000 AOE, but with Lightfused stegedon you can punish them pretty hard.

Against Druid: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker, Dire Wolf Alpha, Knife Juggler, Call to Arms.

Against Hunter: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker, Dire Wolf Alpha, Knife Juggler, Call to Arms, Saronite Chain Gang, Truesilver Champion.

Against Paladin: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker, Dire Wolf Alpha, Knife Juggler, Call to Arms, Consecration.

Against Rogue: First of all watch their mulligan, do they mulligan quest card, if yes then it is odd rogue and you never keep  Dire Wolf Alpha or Knife Juggler. If not then you probably still do not keep it, go for: Acidic Swamp Ooze, Amani beserker and Call to Arms.

5. The strategies and the matchups

This is a graph showing what I think are the winpercentages in every matchup based on my own stats and the stats from vicious syndicate, Hsreplay.net and tempostorm's metasnapshot.

Against spitefull Druid - Now spitefull Druid is a favored matchup, but it is also really easy to play it since your opponent has no AOE, so we just extend into the board and kill him with a bunch of minions, not a lot he can do about it. As a general tip make sure that you kill his Crypt Lord as fast as possible. 

Against odd Hunter - Also favored, you need to make most of the trades coz that hunter is just gonna smack your face, just control the board and clear his minions if you have to. If you have played Saronite Chain Gang and you opponent has no way to deal with it then you can start smacking him in the face, because you need to setup a counter lethal quick enough. You control the board first and then you kill him as quick as possible because you cannot survive that hero power for a long time.

Against odd Paladin - The reason this is unfavored is that he has better refill than you have, so be carefull with you AOE. Also make as many free trades as you can, this matchup is about board control and you opponent has more ways to buff his minions than you have. Another thing that is worth noting is that he play Divine Favor, so if your jailor dies you would rather play the cards from hand than from your hero power.

Against murloc Paladin - Pretty simple, you have to kill his murlocs, so he can not buff his murlocs, so he can not win. You have AOE, he doesn't, that gives you a great edge in this matchup, sometimes you want to also make unfavorable trades in this matchup because otherwise he just buffs his dudes and makes even worse trades for you. 

Against control Priest - This matchup is really hard. Try to layer your threads in a very good way to have a chance. Priest just runs 100000000 AOE's and it is really hard to play around it. If you spread your board to thin, pyro will kill it, to big and he can play scream or drake. Just get blessing, play it fast, and hope he doesn't have death.

Against quest Rogue - Really easy to play, smack him in the face, if you leaves his quest minion on board, you need to kill it. Also you need to kill Novice Engineer and Vicious Scalehide whenever you get the chance. 

Against odd Rogue - This is a hard matchup to play because you need to constantly play around his dagger, T2 you cannot play a 2 health minion. For the rest it remains a board matchup, play for board hard, in the later turns you can try and smack face to close out the game. 

Against tempo Mage - You need to control the board early or your opponent will get too much early dmg face, also play around his secrets as save as you can. Do not just risk a Call to Arms on T4 if you do not have, counterspell will mess you up. Also make sure to not take too much dmg from runes, letting a small minion die and getting a big minion is good. But not if that makes you lose the game.

Against cube/control Warlock - This basiclly plays out the same. Do not go to wide on the board, your opponent will almost always have AOE, just layer your threads correctly. Make sure that you play Blessing of Kings on T4, and play around his spellstone. If his spellstone can do 5 dmg then do not buff you 1/1 dude. For the rest just get silence for his taunt and go face a lot. The longer the game lasts the worse it is for you.

Final words

First of all I want to give a special thanks to Andre, he helped me a lot with laddering and with understanding all of the matchups in the last few days of the season. I hope you guys really appreciate this guide and that I have provided enough information for all of you to play this great deck. I really whish you all the best of luck with laddering, share your succes in the comments!

Also if any of you still have questions, then you can throw them in the comments or add me on Hearthstone, Goudhout#2717, I mainly play on europe but also on na and asia sometimes.