DRAGODIN - Dragon-Ramp Control Paladin
- Last updated Apr 24, 2015 (Blackrock Launch)
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Wild
- 22 Minions
- 6 Spells
- 2 Weapons
- Deck Type: Ranked Deck
- Deck Archetype: Unknown
- Crafting Cost: 4260
- Dust Needed: Loading Collection
- Created: 3/27/2015 (Undertaker Nerf)
- Serology
- Registered User
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- 9
- 17
- 34
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Battle Tag:
N/A
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Region:
EU
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Total Deck Rating
2046
Intro
Thanks to FailCraft for this great preview of the deck, check out his great work on YouTube
Paladin is a class that has always excelled in late game domination and value trades. Until BRM, expansions in Hearthstone have basically served to make the late game harder and harder to reach and undermine trading. BRM looks to change that through rewarding the Paladin for keeping high cost control cards in it's hand by giving low and mid-cost minions buffs and battlecries.
Dragodin is a control Paladin that takes advantage of the particularly strong Dragon synergies available to the class. It is also a ramp deck that brings some powerful high cost control cards out earlier in the game. The aim is to control the board and survive into the mid-game before overwhelming your opponent with undercosted mid and late game minions like Volcanic Drake, Chromaggus and Ysera.
Strategy
This is a control deck that centres around two major synergies; minion/token deaths and dragon tribal synergies.
Muster for Battle is one of the central cards of the deck and rather than looking to buff your recruits with Quartermaster you are using them to liberally clear your opponents board with or without the use of Equality in order to reduce the cost of Volcanic Drake and Solemn Vigil.
In terms of Dragon synergy, Paladin is perhaps the class with the most of it. The second card this deck centres around is Dragon Consort, a classic specific Mechwarper for some of the most powerful cards in the game, further reducing the cost of Volcanic Drake, giving you a 2 mana Hungry Dragon and 7 mana Dragon aspects like Ysera. Note Chromaggus is also a Dragon. In addition to this, these higher cost Dragon cards likely to be sitting in your hand for some time will enable your Blackwing Technician and (Blackwing Corruptor) should you choose to run one.
Key Plays
1) The "dream start"
>>/
2) Board clear into cheap/free minions/card draw
+/>/
3) Dragon ramp into the late game
+>//
4) Chromaggus card draw plays
>
Sideboard
• If you're facing a lot of control then Big Game Hunter may be switched out for Rend Blackhand who is like to be significantly underrated in Dragon decks and may be invaluable in dealing with Ysera, Emperor Thaurissan etc.
• Ysera is typically the most valuable 9 drop Dragon and in a deck that benefits from Dragons in the hand and can play them for 2 or 3 mana less, there is likely room for two of them. There is more choice in the second 9 drop with Nefarian, Alexstrasza and Onyxia being reasonable choices depending on your choice of other sideboards.
• Tirion Fordring is notable by his absence and can likely be swapped back in from any other high cost minion without hurting the deck too much, but running 2 of Dragon Consort makes him less than necessary in comparison to the strong 8 drop inChromaggus
• A single Blackwing Corruptor may fit in this deck in place of a mid-range minion like Volcanic Drake or even a Consecration if you're facing mainly control decks
• One of the Solemn Vigils can be subbed for Harrison Jones if you're facing many weapon classes
If I don't have any of the neutral dragon aspects nor the dust to craft one is there any acceptable cards to replace Ysera and Alexstrasza?
They're pretty important as they are both win conditions and dragons, so you want replacements that fit those criteria. Nefarian will obviously do this, as you the other, possibly you could try running 2x Volcanic Drakes, or you could just run Tirion instead and accept the slightly lower chance of activating your dragon-synergy cards.
Sorry for being a noob...how can you run this deck since the Hidden Laboratory is not unlocked yet thus [card]Volcanic Drake[/card], [card]Blackwing Corruptor[/card] and Nefarian are missing?
Great! Thanks for the response. It makes sense :D
Very very nice deck!
Made a few substitutions, like boom for alex, and right now i am 4-1 in ladder (2 of those wins were against face hunter too)
Definitely my favorite deck right now, hopefully it gets better next week with nef
I've been using the exact same replacements, except I run a Cult Master instead of a Drake.
I find the only weakness of the deck to be the usual Paladin weakness of card draw. I'm wondering if a single Solemn Vigil will be enough.
The issue is that Paladin doesn't have great removal so it relies on things like equality and BGH where other classes have tons of burn and removal they can pop off whenever. You gotta really use your BGH and equality wisely, so not having a BGH could hurt.
I'd run Rend instead as he takes card of your Dr Booms and whatnot.
Who do I must craft first? Alextraza or Ysera
And can I replace one of these two with Nefarian?
I'd advise Ysera but either can be replaced with Nef
Three big dragons, one of which being 8 mana (Chromaggus) works very well for the deck so I would consider crafting one if possible!
Love the decklist, but it's honestly just hopeless against face hunter. I had Zombie Chow, Shielded Minibot, and Muster for Battle in my opening hand and still got rocked. Such a shame. This deck has been doing well against Druids for me, though. Was thinking about ways to combat this, I think Coghammer would do well but I don't have any. Was considering Holy Light but I don't think it's worth a spot in the deck.
Love the list! Currently running with Lay on Hands.
I have to say I honestly haven't lost to a face hunter with this deck yet, and not because of any new BRM cards, purely because if you mulligan hard enough for the Chow > Bot > Muster sequence (now BWT too ofc) then you can usually shut them down without too much difficulty.
Coghammer and Lay on Hands shouldn't be necessary, the former is ok but not essential and the latter is too slow and too much of a tempo loss to be that good against aggro anyway. If you lost with the holy trifecta in your opening hand then your opponent must have had a godly draw that no deck in the entire game could likely beat.
I would go so far to say that this deck, like midrange pala, has a favourable matchup against hunter. Perhaps even moreso than midrange pala because the chunkier minions and ramp can allow you to race them in a way midrange couldn't. BWT is also pretty much the anti-Mech Mage card.
I think 2x is too much, you can probably squeeze one in though.
You "forgot" Dr.Boom! :)
Deck looks like fun, will give it a try. Will use Nefarian/Tyrion/Dr. Boom on behalf of Ysera, because I havent drawn her in my 18 month of playtime -_-
Neither had I haha, I had to craft her for this deck, but she is quite worth it. That said, the others you mention will substitute fine.
With the current composition of dragons you very rarely have a dragon-activated card without a dragon in your hand, and I think it's clear now that 2x 9 cost dragons is absolutely not too much in this deck.
It's also a deck people will look at and think is greedy and focused on the late game, but the early game Chow, Minibot, Muster, Technician and Hungry Dragon is incredibly incredibly strong and can win games before you even need the late drops.
The only thing I feel it lacks is a bit of come back and a bit of removal, I'm hoping that when the Corruptor and Volcanic Drake are released and added as per the deck list, this will be the icing on the cake.
The more I test this deck as cards get released, the more I realise that my "temporary" substitution of Alex for Nef should probably be permanent. She fits this deck better than any other Paladin deck I've played, I really didn't favour her in control Paladin but playing a turn 7 Alex is sickening.
The deck is looking really quite strong. Currently I'm running the above with Alex for Nef, a Belcher for a Corruptor (I still think the Corruptor could be better here), a Cult Master for a Solemn Vigil and Sylvanas for a Volcanic Drake.
It's a very fun deck because there are so many win conditions that we haven't been able to play in so long. Sera, Alex, now Chromaggus etc. etc. it's just awesome.
No probs man, glad you're having success too, it's great to see this having success on the ladder.
Your deck looks very strong against control but I think it's weak to aggro because the early game doesn't contend the board reliably, so I would drop a Coghammer for an extra Chow and find somewhere to fit in Muster. Muster is a great anti-aggro card and a great pre-Hungry Dragon card!
Could Azure Drake be included? If not why?
It can be, but superpower does little for this deck. Why not run Belchers in it's place, now that Hungry Dragon provides the needed dragon synergy?