Hearthpwn

With the release of GvG a new midrange paladin deck became really popular, the so called winstreakdin made by strifecro. This new midrange paladin playstyle became possible because GvG introduced a lot of strong midrange cards for paladin. Unfortunately, with an update in Hearthstone, a lot of cards are not really tried and forgotten pretty quick.

My name is Thijs, and seeing the addition of coghammer and scarlet purifier got me thinking about what combo's would be really strong with these cards. They are both value by itself, but comboed with certain cards you can gain so much early game board control. The cards i'm talking about are Ancient Watcher with Coghammer, and Nerubian Egg with Scarlet Purifier. Imagine a turn 3 sunwalker with a 2/3 weapon, or a turn 3 4/3 and 4/4.

Now if you build a deck around two seperate 2-card combo's, there's a very big chance you're not gonna draw them. Therefore there are more cards in this list that combo really well with each other. For example: Defender of Argus is great on both Ancient Watcher and Nerubian Egg, Ironbeak Owl is strong with the Watchers, and Spectral Knight is game-winning if you can taunt him up. A 5/7 with taunt or a 4/6 with taunt and divine shield that can't be targeted by spells gives you so much tempo. Your opponent has to probably trade his entire board into it, while you can keep building your board with strong midrange minions, or it gives you time to play Lay on Hands.

Other notable plays are Scarlet Purifier to kill your Sylvanas for a mind control, or blow up your boom bots. Don't forget SP deals damage to opponents minions as well, so when trading up this card can act like a Dark Iron Skulker sometimes.

Also think about minions placement. Ask yourself: If i had a Defender of Argus next turn, which minions do i want to get the buff?

Still, with a midrange deck like this, card draw is really important. Paladin never had a good source of draw, and that made this deck unreliable. I used to play one copy of Acolyte of Pain, and took the deck to legend with it. I would argue this deck is even stronger now due to the reliable draw Paladin got with BRM. Solemn Vigil is a really good card in a midrange deck like this. This is not only much more reliable then the Acolyte, but you also don't need to draw the one acolyte in order to start drawing, and the draw with Solemn Vigil is instant. With your hero ability and lots of midrange minions you can usually play Solemn Vigil for 3 or less every game.

Mulligan guide and general matchups:

Mulligans with this deck can be tricky, since if you draw an ancient watcher and no activators, you're gonna have a bad time. If you have an ancient watcher and a scarlet purifier in your hand for example, it's better to keep the activator, the purifier. This is because the activators like scarlet purifier, ironbeak owl, and coghammer are all pretty solid cards by itelf, even if you don't combo with watcher or eggs.

The general idea is, if you have a watcher and a coghammer/silence, or an egg and a purifier, always keep the combo. Don't keep defender of argus, it's usually to slow. The only time keeping a degender is if you have 2 watchers/eggs. Against specific decks you may need to think about mulligans when you don't draw a combo at the start though.

Against hunter: Always keep Scarlet Purifier and Ironbeak Owls, these cards are really important to get rid of some early game aggresion and slow the game down. Coghammer is really great against face hunter, since they need to attack whatever you taunt up twice while you get a weapon that can take out their small stuff like haunted creepers.

Against fast decks like Mage, Druid, Shaman: You need to draw for a combo here. In this matchup getting a strong early game board presence is really important. Try to play watcher + coghammer on turn 2 and 3, or egg and purifier. Try to keep board control after this. Don't let their board get out of hand too much, because once you lose to much tempo it's very hard to win. These decks usually have an answer to a big taunt as well so unlike aggro, playing a big taunt isn't going to swing the tempo by a lot.

Against control warrior and priest the same thing counts, go for early game board presence and keep the pressure up. In these matchups you are the aggressor. Play lot's of taunts and make favourable trades, but you need to do a lot of face damage to win this.

Against zoo: Play tempo based, you have the heals, the taunts, and great value minons. You can outlast them and take the board. Getting a concecration is great here. Pretty good matchup, not much too say.

Against Handlock: Cry in a corner, this matchup is almost unbeatable. They have to much taunt and big stuff for you to answer, and you have no burst so it's hard to kill them. pressure the board a lot and play taunts. Try to get a solid board and deal a lot of damage in one turn to kill him. don't let him play molten giants for less then his entire turn.

Rogue is hard, you have to keep the pressure up, try to swarm the board. They can burst you down so be careful.

I think that's about it. This deck is really fun to play, and actually very strong right now. Give it a try and tell me what you think about it!