Hearthpwn

What's a good substitute for Sphere?

This deck still rocks the meta pre-expansion.
I'm using an altered version: AAECAaoICIoHuZkDhp0D47QD08ADk8ID4MwDnM4DC/4F/wWtkQOKlAPFmQOQpwPQrwOTuQPhzAOh0QOu0gMA

Just got legend with pretty cool stats:
VS DH 8/1
VS Hunter 7/2
VS Rogue 7/1
VS Warrior 1/0
VS Priest 3/0
VS Mage 2/1
VS Paladin 3/0
VS Warlock 3/0
VS Druid 2/0
VS Shaman N/A

86% WR total and all matchups are favorable except OTK mage.

i hate this 9458952934% winrate bull*shit.

Trash like always

More dustbait, be careful

proud to say that after a long, grueling battle against so many paladins and rogues, i hit legend for the first time with this deck. feels good man. i tweaked the list a little though - i took out Sphere and Swampqueen and added Silas and Kobold Stickyfinger instead. Those two cards saved the day many, many times. i highly recommend them both. 

Quote from C4lm_123 >>

I'm using a slightly tweaked list, one that is more akin to Galakrond board flooding playstyle:

- 1x Instructor Fireheart (don't have it)
- 1x Lightning Storm & 1x Tidal Wave (imho this much small-AoE is just overkill & I just generally dislike L.Storm for Overload and the RNG in it)
- 1x Swampqueen Hagatha (pretty sure Dekks took this out too, feels too slow & doesn't really win you the games)

I made the deck bit more proactive with following changes:

+ 1x Marshspawn (Fireheart placeholder, not too sure of this one tbh... could do with another Gala card perhaps)
+ 1x Devoted Maniac (mostly as L.Storm replacement, doesn't Overload you and puts bodies on the board)
+ 1x Shield of Galakrond
+ 1x Dragon's Pack (activates Groundskeeper & great value with Notetakers in control matchups)

Currently at 71% winrate 10-4 (two losses vs ResidentSleeper Priests). Very favorable matchups vs DH, Hunter and Rogue, haven't encountered yet Bomb Warriors and Paladin is favored if you get to neutralize Librams.

EDIT: After 70 matches, still at 71% WR (50-20). Haven't seen many Paladins (which I consider the worst MU along with Gala Rogue), but generally this deck seems to have decent matchup spread across the board. Res Priest is manageable with Notetaker + Hex, Bomb Warrior with Sphere (keep placing bombs at the bottom & Elysiana them outta there), aggro Rogue & Hunter & DH is very favored and Mage is winnable if you manage to outheal their burst.

I took this suggestion.  I'm 1-0 against a soul shard demon hunter thus far.  He burned through his deck like a mad bastard, but couldn't outmatch my healing.  I didn't get full value out of the Dragons Pack through invocations, but it did proc a heal from Groundskeeper, which was clutch.  Nice changes to the deck.

The meta shifted back to a little more aggro and more Paladins playing broom instead of pure so I was able to hit legend with this deck:

https://ibb.co/WsCYjnM

Here's the list I used:

https://ibb.co/hRnPdFw

I got down to 3 diamond (I think) using aggro Hunter and then went 10-4 with this deck:

https://ibb.co/0DxvTsb

All Paladin losses were pure Paladins

Can’t win against gala rogue.... the value difference gets bigger and bigger

that matchup is winnable if the rogue does not play with Togwaggle's Scheme and very few rogue play

I'm using a slightly tweaked list, one that is more akin to Galakrond board flooding playstyle:

- 1x Instructor Fireheart (don't have it)
- 1x Lightning Storm & 1x Tidal Wave (imho this much small-AoE is just overkill & I just generally dislike L.Storm for Overload and the RNG in it)
- 1x Swampqueen Hagatha (pretty sure Dekks took this out too, feels too slow & doesn't really win you the games)

I made the deck bit more proactive with following changes:

+ 1x Marshspawn (Fireheart placeholder, not too sure of this one tbh... could do with another Gala card perhaps)
+ 1x Devoted Maniac (mostly as L.Storm replacement, doesn't Overload you and puts bodies on the board)
+ 1x Shield of Galakrond
+ 1x Dragon's Pack (activates Groundskeeper & great value with Notetakers in control matchups)

Currently at 71% winrate 10-4 (two losses vs ResidentSleeper Priests). Very favorable matchups vs DH, Hunter and Rogue, haven't encountered yet Bomb Warriors and Paladin is favored if you get to neutralize Librams.

EDIT: After 70 matches, still at 71% WR (50-20). Haven't seen many Paladins (which I consider the worst MU along with Gala Rogue), but generally this deck seems to have decent matchup spread across the board. Res Priest is manageable with Notetaker + Hex, Bomb Warrior with Sphere (keep placing bombs at the bottom & Elysiana them outta there), aggro Rogue & Hunter & DH is very favored and Mage is winnable if you manage to outheal their burst.

After playing a lot of control shaman this month, I can tell that this deck not just works, but it is REALLY STRONG against the meta. I reached legend and played about 32 games with it going 24-8, and I think half of the losses I messed up.

I tried many thinks as control shaman before this deck... quest, highlander, pure control etc... but I couldn't imagine that adding galakrong +  only 3 synergetic cards (kronx and 2 invocation of frost) would help that much! (I tried galakrond shaman with all the pack of cards as well).

Frost works really well... this deck has a lot of expensive AOE, so buying a turn with the freeze effect (+ the 2/1 rush) helps a lot. And improving the hero power with galakrond is good because control shaman plays really long games and totens are almost useless.

I agree with MartinQuentin (a few post below) about the matchups... The "secret" on many matchups is to understand what you need to duplicate with notetaker... VS pally u need more hex or devolve missiles, VS DH or bomb warrior more witch brew (dh actually is almost free win), VS rogue you need to keep (sometimes duplicade) devolve and hex to clear cleef/questing. 

Another tip is to look for Scheme on muligan. You want to start building it from turn 1.

DH/Priest are really easy, hunter this deck is favored (70-30 or 60-40 depending the hunter build), warrior/rogue I do think this deck is favored (maybe on the 60-40 range), mage I think it is 50-50 and Paladin I had no problem vs the Pen variation (focus on silencing the libram of wisdom), but I think pure paladin is slightly ahead (maybe 40-60). Druid/shaman/warlock are rare to face but I won every time I faced them.

Finally, this is not an easy deck to pilot, but I do think this deck is awesome vs the meta. If you are losing u probably had a bad streak or u r making some misplays. The only problem is that the games are looooong. So not the best deck if you want to climb the ladder fast.

Ow, and the only card I dont like in this list is sphere of sapience... It is def not a core card... I do think anyone trying this deck should replace it (as I did, I added one marshspawn, but there are many other candidates). Sphere helps vs bomb warrior but many decks are using anti-weapon cards so it wont be good on many matches.

Super fun and so far so good. 😎

Peace ✌

Does this deck works?? i d say most of the times. BUT it is the most boring deck i ever played. You just sit there clearing the board time after time and wait for your opponent to  run out of cards. Soooo 30 rounds of pure boredom for a second of joy, (when the opponent quits after he sees Archivist Elysiana showing up). Does it worth it?? its up to you.

It's a ultra control deck. That's what is supposed to happen.

not every game goes until fatigue matchups that end before fatigue: stealth rogue, all demon hunter, all hunter, all warlock, aggro shaman, all warrior, all paladin, all druid

matchups that goes until fatigue: all priest, most mage, mirror match, secret/galakrond rogue

in my prectice i play Elysiana once in every ~5 match and it wins on the spot

Just made it to legend with a slightly tweaked version of the deck. Here's a short list of matchups.

DH is easy, you should be at 100% WR or close enough.
Priest is easy as long as he can't steal your elysiana. Even if he galakrons early, you can outvalue him; it happened to me twice.
Rogue is okay, you have nice answers to threats like van cleef/questings. Even if he galakrons early, you can outvalue him; it happened to me once.
Big Warrior is easy, just duplicate your hexes.
Bomb warrior gave me a few complications with boom, so I added 1xooze and sphere of sapience.
Hunter has sometimes been too fast for me, on the whole the WR was positive.
Mage is okay since the nerf
Only faced one warlock which was easy to beat (galakrond zoo)
Paladin is okay as long as you can duplicate your hexes
Faced zero druid
My last game to legend was a mirror which I won due to a better elysiana.

Tldr; deck is awesome in the meta, has no negative matchups and can beat 'infinite' games against gala priest and rogue.

So I agree this deck WAS perfect for the meta but the meta is shifting or at least has been for me.  All of my games recently have been against super greedy value-based decks that keep continually pumping out huge threats and leave me with an inability to clear the board.  There's a lot of pure libram Paladin and even a few value shaman decks.  For example, I just got done playing a Highlander Shaman at 3 diamond that play FIVE Dragonqueen Alextrazsas, 3 of which were affected by double battlecries.  There's no way this deck could keep up with that.

I still think the deck is "good" right now but it's definitely not great anymore.

the diamond meta is much better to this deck that low level meta, i started from bronze 10 on US server (on EU im legend) and random greedy value decks outvalues this the exact same way you described big minion after big minion after big minion constantly, but on diamond everybody plays the "meta decks" against which this deck is really good

Right but I'm 3 diamond atm and the only decks I'm playing are those greedy value decks I mentioned right now.