I've been looking through several of the Druid decklists and I've noticed that nobody plays Malorne in any of their decks.
His stats are great for his mana cost, being a 9/7 for 7 Mana, and his deathrattle makes him playable multiple times throughout a long game. The card doesn't really have any downside yet he's hardly ever played, anyone have any ideas why?
Seems that he just doesn't fit in with the current Druid meta. Malorne is good in druid decks that rely on long games, and summoning lots of high-cost cards similar to old Control Warrior.
Currently, most Druids are running a more aggressive approach to ramp with the OG Combo as a finisher and not a lot of high-cost minions.
Also, drawing Malorne again after it's died could be a potentially bad draw, as it might take the spot of a card you really needed at the time.
This. Druid already has really good seven drops like Ancient of Lore which is in every deck, and Ancient of War which is in ramp druid, the only deck that would run Malorne besides mill. The problem with Malorne is that he just doesn't do anything. Games are not slow enough where playing a vanilla minion several times matters.
His downside is the fact that he costs 7 Mana, and has no immediate board impact. If your opponent does anything to stall him (Freeze, Sap, Freezing Trap, etc) you've used your whole turn doing a whole lot of nothing. The 7 Mana just means he competes with Ancient of Lore's drop timing.
If your ahead in the game, you probably don't need to play him. In fact, it would probably be better playing Lore to dig for your FON+Savage Combo.
If your behind, then playing him will just give your opponent another turn in which to maul you down. Again, it's probably better to play Lore to either dig for answers or heal up out of lethal range. (Probably it's a different play you have to make though. Like FoN+Swipe)
He is a big body, and will probably need attention drawn to him (Possibly 2~3 for 1). As well as having him when all 60 cards in the match are exhausted will lead to an easy fatigue war. But overall, it doesn't seem like a huge game changing card.
Oh, there's also the time where you DO summon him, only to have him killed. Then later in the game you are depending on a topdeck only to get him back... That's quite a large negative as well. Would be better if he returned to the hand on deathrattle instead of the deck.
Edit: Oh right, Dr.Boom is also a 7 drop, how could I forget? So yeah, nobody would play Malorne over Boom.
I kind of understand some of the points that people are making like that Druid's are already 7 drop heavy in class cards... But it still seems like he's a good enough card to include in Ramp style decks. Dr. Boom Is the Loatheb of this expansion and is played in pretty much every deck but I wouldn't see why you couldn't include Malorne and Dr. Boom solely because of Innervate. Being able to drop Malorne on Turn 5 (Or turn 4 if you've used Wild Growth can at the very least eat a Big Game Hunter or a hard removal, and make Dr. Boom a lot safer to play later in the game.
Maybe I'm just biased because I was lucky enough to get a golden malorne and I love the good ol' stag
I kind of understand some of the points that people are making like that Druid's are already 7 drop heavy in class cards... But it still seems like he's a good enough card to include in Ramp style decks. Dr. Boom Is the Loatheb of this expansion and is played in pretty much every deck but I wouldn't see why you couldn't include Malorne and Dr. Boom solely because of Innervate. Being able to drop Malorne on Turn 5 (Or turn 4 if you've used Wild Growth can at the very least eat a Big Game Hunter or a hard removal, and make Dr. Boom a lot safer to play later in the game.
Maybe I'm just biased because I was lucky enough to get a golden malorne and I love the good ol' stag
He's a 7 drop AND he's a vanilla body. He only has 1 more stat point than would be considered efficient for 7 mana. He just does nothing for you. You might as well be playing a War Golem.
If druid had more card draw It would be solid. You could focus less on high cost minions to do better in the first 5 or 6 turns. But if you get him out, and he's killed, you probably won't see him again.
.... Dr. Boom Is the Loatheb of this expansion and is played in pretty much every deck but I wouldn't see why you couldn't include Malorne and Dr. Boom solely because of Innervate. Being able to drop Malorne on Turn 5 (Or turn 4 if you've used Wild Growth can at the very least eat a Big Game Hunter or a hard removal, and make Dr. Boom a lot safer to play later in the game
I think the scary thing about Ramp is getting out large creatures early. Like, Innervating a Spectral Knight on T3.
By Turn 5, there's either board presence, card draw, and/or mana to take out an innervated Malorne quite easily. Besides, if I had another strong 5 drop (Spectral/DoTC), I might just get that out instead. Or if I had a better 7 drop (Lore/Boom) I think I'd pick that to innervate instead.
If I really just wanted to bait BGH before Boom, I'd probably T6 Ragnaros with the Innervate. Let's me curve out T5, T6-Innervate, T7 nicely. Also Rag has an immediate board impact, and is pretty good in many situations that call for it. (And if Rag isn't an "auto-include" in druid decks, what chance do you think Malorne has?)
It's just that in the current quick/face Meta, Malorne doesn't generally fit.
I think the key part of what a lot of folks are saying is "in this meta" and "in current decks". Malorne could be a great card but it just doesn't fit the objectives that people have in mind whilst playing Druid. I personally have a few things that I want to experiment with when I get closer to a full GvG set that he might work in. However at the moment people just haven't figured out how to use him yet.
I think the key part of what a lot of folks are saying is "in this meta" and "in current decks". Malorne could be a great card but it just doesn't fit the objectives that people have in mind whilst playing Druid. I personally have a few things that I want to experiment with when I get closer to a full GvG set that he might work in. However at the moment people just haven't figured out how to use him yet.
Malorne will never fit in any meta until most games go into fatigue.
I love Malorne as a wow character. I also found it has awesome animation upon landing the board through webspinner before GVG. So I crafted it and included it in my ramp druid deck just because I like it.
If you take an objective review on this card, it is not played by competitive decks majorly thanks to its competitor Dr.Boom. Both of them have intimidating stats, and both of them don't have an immediate impact. However, there is literally no single card in current card pool that can deal with Dr.Boom efficiently with one shot. This means that the best part of Dr.Boom is that it is resistant to disruption such as removal. Therefore it's a one for two plus a minimum of two random damage to enemy characters. According to Blizzard's logic, since it's becoming an auto-include for almost all midrange and control decks, it is highly likely that Dr.Boom will be nerfed. Imo, they're probably making his boom bots 0/1 and deal damage to random characters instead.
On the other hand, Malorne is weak to removal. When it is removed by destruction effect, you do have it back in your library, which means you can get a card advantage around half of a card. But druids are not specialized in card draws. What it actually does is thickening your deck in late game, unless it's almost fatigue. This can be particularly horrible if you're relying a certain top deck in late game. Overall, its effect is medicore compared to Dr.Boom's.
Still, with these said, you can play Malorne in your deck if you love it. HS is about fun isn't it?
I think the key part of what a lot of folks are saying is "in this meta" and "in current decks". Malorne could be a great card but it just doesn't fit the objectives that people have in mind whilst playing Druid. I personally have a few things that I want to experiment with when I get closer to a full GvG set that he might work in. However at the moment people just haven't figured out how to use him yet.
Malorne will never fit in any meta until most games go into fatigue.
Thanks for the insightful and complex look at the card. It's clear you are a progressive deckbuilder who helps shape the meta on a daily basis.
/sarcasm off
It's a big threat who may make people misplay (Over value the deathrattle and silence it) and/or trade 2/3 for one; even if it doesn't ever get drawn again it can be good. Any deck that has a longer gameplan could use this card. You don't need to play this multiple times to get value. It doesn't need to prevent fatigue damage to get value. all it needs to do is be a lategame threat. Clearly it's not an amazing card or it would have broken into the meta already; however it is still a card that can be valuable. There are not many new archetypes yet after GvG and that seemed to be one of the main mission statements of the set. Someone will figure out a use for this card. We just don't have a deck design that it works in at the moment.
If you ask me, he's very underrated. For 7+ drops, you can have AoL x 2, Malorne, and Dr. Boom (and still have room for Ragnaros if you so wish). Ramp druid has never really had a hard counter. The only archetype you could make an argument for is handlock, and Malorne helps in that matchup SO MUCH, and he doesn't really hurt your matchup anywhere else. Ramp druid already fares well against aggro, so dropping an AoW for Malorne makes sense because he helps your control matchup a lot more than it hurts your aggro matchup.
He's underrated because people just don't play druid, so their experience with or against Malorne is very limited.
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Twitch name: Anatak15 NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
Just pulled him from Unstable Portal yesterday. Making him a permanent 4 is pretty powerful if you manage to redraw him after death.
Does he really stay 4 mana when you redraw him later? That's disgusting haha. I'd be pretty salty if my opponent got him from Unstable Portal hah, thankfully I've never faced it yet.
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Twitch name: Anatak15 NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
I've been looking through several of the Druid decklists and I've noticed that nobody plays Malorne in any of their decks.
His stats are great for his mana cost, being a 9/7 for 7 Mana, and his deathrattle makes him playable multiple times throughout a long game. The card doesn't really have any downside yet he's hardly ever played, anyone have any ideas why?
Why would you ever play him over Dr.Boom?
Seems that he just doesn't fit in with the current Druid meta. Malorne is good in druid decks that rely on long games, and summoning lots of high-cost cards similar to old Control Warrior.
Currently, most Druids are running a more aggressive approach to ramp with the OG Combo as a finisher and not a lot of high-cost minions.
Also, drawing Malorne again after it's died could be a potentially bad draw, as it might take the spot of a card you really needed at the time.
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This. Druid already has really good seven drops like Ancient of Lore which is in every deck, and Ancient of War which is in ramp druid, the only deck that would run Malorne besides mill. The problem with Malorne is that he just doesn't do anything. Games are not slow enough where playing a vanilla minion several times matters.
His downside is the fact that he costs 7 Mana, and has no immediate board impact. If your opponent does anything to stall him (Freeze, Sap, Freezing Trap, etc) you've used your whole turn doing a whole lot of nothing. The 7 Mana just means he competes with Ancient of Lore's drop timing.
If your ahead in the game, you probably don't need to play him. In fact, it would probably be better playing Lore to dig for your FON+Savage Combo.
If your behind, then playing him will just give your opponent another turn in which to maul you down. Again, it's probably better to play Lore to either dig for answers or heal up out of lethal range. (Probably it's a different play you have to make though. Like FoN+Swipe)
He is a big body, and will probably need attention drawn to him (Possibly 2~3 for 1). As well as having him when all 60 cards in the match are exhausted will lead to an easy fatigue war. But overall, it doesn't seem like a huge game changing card.
Oh, there's also the time where you DO summon him, only to have him killed. Then later in the game you are depending on a topdeck only to get him back... That's quite a large negative as well. Would be better if he returned to the hand on deathrattle instead of the deck.
Edit: Oh right, Dr.Boom is also a 7 drop, how could I forget? So yeah, nobody would play Malorne over Boom.
I kind of understand some of the points that people are making like that Druid's are already 7 drop heavy in class cards... But it still seems like he's a good enough card to include in Ramp style decks. Dr. Boom Is the Loatheb of this expansion and is played in pretty much every deck but I wouldn't see why you couldn't include Malorne and Dr. Boom solely because of Innervate. Being able to drop Malorne on Turn 5 (Or turn 4 if you've used Wild Growth can at the very least eat a Big Game Hunter or a hard removal, and make Dr. Boom a lot safer to play later in the game.
Maybe I'm just biased because I was lucky enough to get a golden malorne and I love the good ol' stag
He's a 7 drop AND he's a vanilla body. He only has 1 more stat point than would be considered efficient for 7 mana. He just does nothing for you. You might as well be playing a War Golem.
If druid had more card draw It would be solid. You could focus less on high cost minions to do better in the first 5 or 6 turns. But if you get him out, and he's killed, you probably won't see him again.
I really want Pirates to be a playable theme.
I think the scary thing about Ramp is getting out large creatures early. Like, Innervating a Spectral Knight on T3.
By Turn 5, there's either board presence, card draw, and/or mana to take out an innervated Malorne quite easily. Besides, if I had another strong 5 drop (Spectral/DoTC), I might just get that out instead. Or if I had a better 7 drop (Lore/Boom) I think I'd pick that to innervate instead.
If I really just wanted to bait BGH before Boom, I'd probably T6 Ragnaros with the Innervate. Let's me curve out T5, T6-Innervate, T7 nicely. Also Rag has an immediate board impact, and is pretty good in many situations that call for it. (And if Rag isn't an "auto-include" in druid decks, what chance do you think Malorne has?)
It's just that in the current quick/face Meta, Malorne doesn't generally fit.
I think the key part of what a lot of folks are saying is "in this meta" and "in current decks". Malorne could be a great card but it just doesn't fit the objectives that people have in mind whilst playing Druid. I personally have a few things that I want to experiment with when I get closer to a full GvG set that he might work in. However at the moment people just haven't figured out how to use him yet.
Malorne will never fit in any meta until most games go into fatigue.
I love Malorne as a wow character. I also found it has awesome animation upon landing the board through webspinner before GVG. So I crafted it and included it in my ramp druid deck just because I like it.
If you take an objective review on this card, it is not played by competitive decks majorly thanks to its competitor Dr.Boom. Both of them have intimidating stats, and both of them don't have an immediate impact. However, there is literally no single card in current card pool that can deal with Dr.Boom efficiently with one shot. This means that the best part of Dr.Boom is that it is resistant to disruption such as removal. Therefore it's a one for two plus a minimum of two random damage to enemy characters. According to Blizzard's logic, since it's becoming an auto-include for almost all midrange and control decks, it is highly likely that Dr.Boom will be nerfed. Imo, they're probably making his boom bots 0/1 and deal damage to random characters instead.
On the other hand, Malorne is weak to removal. When it is removed by destruction effect, you do have it back in your library, which means you can get a card advantage around half of a card. But druids are not specialized in card draws. What it actually does is thickening your deck in late game, unless it's almost fatigue. This can be particularly horrible if you're relying a certain top deck in late game. Overall, its effect is medicore compared to Dr.Boom's.
Still, with these said, you can play Malorne in your deck if you love it. HS is about fun isn't it?
Thanks for the insightful and complex look at the card. It's clear you are a progressive deckbuilder who helps shape the meta on a daily basis.
/sarcasm off
It's a big threat who may make people misplay (Over value the deathrattle and silence it) and/or trade 2/3 for one; even if it doesn't ever get drawn again it can be good. Any deck that has a longer gameplan could use this card. You don't need to play this multiple times to get value. It doesn't need to prevent fatigue damage to get value. all it needs to do is be a lategame threat. Clearly it's not an amazing card or it would have broken into the meta already; however it is still a card that can be valuable. There are not many new archetypes yet after GvG and that seemed to be one of the main mission statements of the set. Someone will figure out a use for this card. We just don't have a deck design that it works in at the moment.
Moved to Card Discussion.
It dies to bgh and doesn't do anything. No charge no taunt it's horrible against hunters and zoo...
If you ask me, he's very underrated. For 7+ drops, you can have AoL x 2, Malorne, and Dr. Boom (and still have room for Ragnaros if you so wish). Ramp druid has never really had a hard counter. The only archetype you could make an argument for is handlock, and Malorne helps in that matchup SO MUCH, and he doesn't really hurt your matchup anywhere else. Ramp druid already fares well against aggro, so dropping an AoW for Malorne makes sense because he helps your control matchup a lot more than it hurts your aggro matchup.
He's underrated because people just don't play druid, so their experience with or against Malorne is very limited.
Twitch name: Anatak15
NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
Just pulled him from Unstable Portal yesterday. Making him a permanent 4 is pretty powerful if you manage to redraw him after death.
I really want Pirates to be a playable theme.
Does he really stay 4 mana when you redraw him later? That's disgusting haha. I'd be pretty salty if my opponent got him from Unstable Portal hah, thankfully I've never faced it yet.
Twitch name: Anatak15
NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
I never got to check it, but he SHOULD.
I really want Pirates to be a playable theme.
I can almost guarantee he isn't