Control Paladin was always considered a strong deck against Handlock due to Paladin being able to turn their bread and butter cards like Molten Giant and Mountain Giant that they love to taunt up into a glorified Mogu'shan Warden .
Just from my own theorycrafting I haven't been able to think of any real downside or terrible matchup a well put together Control Paladin deck would have.
It was refreshing, but that was a Control Paladin. I used to run a Controladin deck a couple seasons ago, and it just took FOREVER to grind the ladder. Plus, Eadric the Pure is gimmicky in my eyes. Though, Equality, plus Wild Pyromancer is still one of the best removal combos in the game, at least in my eyes.
That is just theory, but it doesn't work in reality. For example, against Patron Warrior, very usually, it can't stop the well know OTK from hand after the opponent played Emperor Thaurissan, and because of the fact that it is a very slow deck, the Patron Warrior player has all the time in the world to prepare for it.
Basically because of what has been said. It's still to slow and clunky in reality. It has answers, that often times are a turn to late to answer. It has lots of tech, that usually fall short on an already well established board from the opponent. The game just doesn't favor it.
Control paladin has always been, and undoubtedly remains, an extremely hard counter to control warrior and handlock, both of which are popular right now. What was arguably its worst matchup, oil rogue, has almost disappeared from the meta. Those factors alone should make it pretty good for today's meta.
I think the real reason it's not being played is a lot simpler: it's slower than secret paladin, but not noticeably stronger. Why play a good deck and have every game take ten minutes when you can play an equally good (or better) deck and have each game take five minutes?
Your theorycraft on patron is just wrong, and this is basically the reason: you need muster fo battle, even in control pala to keep up with the aggro and you have a hero power that makes 1/1s ... both of these feats just become a glorified patron spawning machine ... and if you just sit back and do nothing against patron... well, they are better at that, they just drop their thaurissan at a given point and otk you ...
Patron is btw also the reason why far fewer people are bringing any paladin deck (secrets included) to tournaments than it is played on ladder! Their prevalence on the ladder mainly stems from the fact, that people just suck at playing patron ;)
played slow paladin in september to rank 3( for epic rewards) , it was really easy (btw dont really try hard and didnt have Sludge Belchers and Zombie Chow ) ,most of the games lose to priest .
Control paladin was the first deck I tried after TGT, with Justicar TrueheartEadric the Pure and Tuskarr Jouster . I had 50%> winrate at rank 5. Eadric the Pure is so hard to use effectively. I managed to use him on a huge board with zoo minions, but it even that wasn't good enough (still died). Against control warrior he does nothing, the only time i got to use it was right before fatigue, but he didn't help me at all. Justicar Trueheart is good in theory, but you sacrifice too much tempo and the recruits don't do enough.
I wouldn't say control paladin is a bad deck, it's just not good enough. Warrior is still the king of control.
I wanna clarify that I didn't use Tirion Fordring because I don't have him, that might have contributed to the bad winrate.
Edit: Also Enter the Coliseum has terrible synergy with the minions you will be playing (tons of 1/1s). Why would you ever play this when you have Equality + Consecration
How is Control Paladin good against Patron? Your 1/1 just fill up your board and feeds Frothing Berserker and Grim Patron . If you get a chance to Equality + Consecration it won't matter because they have served their purpose (of clearing the board) and since you can't put enough pressure on the Patron player, they can just draw their entire deck and kill you with Emperor Thaurissan combo. It doesn't help that you can't go above 30hp either (although Patron is quite capable of killing even Control Warriors).
There is one of two things you need to be currently a tier 1 control deck. Either you have a reliable card draw like handlock or the ability to have more than 30 health like control warrior and control paladin has neither of that.
I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs. He's an 0/4 body that a warrior can't just Win Axe to clear on turn 2, granted It's a roll of the dice on whether you'll get any value from him but I find most of the time he'll survive for 2-3 turns and you'll get at least 1 draw from him, and it forces your opponent to spend a lot of effort into clearing it.
There is one of two things you need to be currently a tier 1 control deck. Either you have a reliable card draw like handlock or the ability to have more than 30 health like control warrior and control paladin has neither of that.
I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs. He's an 0/4 body that a warrior can't just Win Axe to clear on turn 2, granted It's a roll of the dice on whether you'll get any value from him but I find most of the time he'll survive for 2-3 turns and you'll get at least 1 draw from him, and it forces your opponent to spend a lot of effort into clearing it.
What? Nat Pagle is trash man, you can't compare it with the Warlock Hero power, what the hell... Also, Paladins have a lot of other card draw tools at their disposal, no need to use terrible bad cards...
There is one of two things you need to be currently a tier 1 control deck. Either you have a reliable card draw like handlock or the ability to have more than 30 health like control warrior and control paladin has neither of that.
I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs. He's an 0/4 body that a warrior can't just Win Axe to clear on turn 2, granted It's a roll of the dice on whether you'll get any value from him but I find most of the time he'll survive for 2-3 turns and you'll get at least 1 draw from him, and it forces your opponent to spend a lot of effort into clearing it.
What? Nat Pagle is trash man, you can't compare it with the Warlock Hero power, what the hell... Also, Paladins have a lot of other card draw tools at their disposal, no need to use terrible bad cards...
I never compared it to a Warlock Hero Power, where in my message did I state that? Also care to explain why a card is "trash" as you said? It's an early game card that your opponent has to deal with as soon as possible. Sure there's a chance you can get nothing from it, but there's the same odds that you'll get great value out of it. It's a card that your opponent cannot just ignore and more than likely will have to use multiple weapon charges or a spell to remove it.
The only other card draw options in terms of class cards a Paladin has is Divine Favor Which doesn't have a place in a control deck due to not emptying your hand as quickly as possible, and Solemn Vigil which is either a feast or famine card that gets extreme value, or just a very expensive version of Arcane Intellect and Lay on Hands Which has always been an auto include for many paladin decks.
There is one of two things you need to be currently a tier 1 control deck. Either you have a reliable card draw like handlock or the ability to have more than 30 health like control warrior and control paladin has neither of that.
I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs. He's an 0/4 body that a warrior can't just Win Axe to clear on turn 2, granted It's a roll of the dice on whether you'll get any value from him but I find most of the time he'll survive for 2-3 turns and you'll get at least 1 draw from him, and it forces your opponent to spend a lot of effort into clearing it.
What? Nat Pagle is trash man, you can't compare it with the Warlock Hero power, what the hell... Also, Paladins have a lot of other card draw tools at their disposal, no need to use terrible bad cards...
I never compared it to a Warlock Hero Power, where in my message did I state that? Also care to explain why a card is "trash" as you said? It's an early game card that your opponent has to deal with as soon as possible. Sure there's a chance you can get nothing from it, but there's the same odds that you'll get great value out of it. It's a card that your opponent cannot just ignore and more than likely will have to use multiple weapon charges or a spell to remove it.
The only other card draw options in terms of class cards a Paladin has is Divine Favor Which doesn't have a place in a control deck due to not emptying your hand as quickly as possible, and Solemn Vigil which is either a feast or famine card that gets extreme value, or just a very expensive version of Arcane Intellect and Lay on Hands Which has always been an auto include for many paladin decks.
He said: "There is one of two things you need to be currently a tier 1 control deck. Either you have a reliable card draw like handlock..."
You said: "I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs."
Also, I need to explain why a card that is very well know by the comunity as unplayable is bad? A card that can be considered most of the time just a two mana Shieldbearer?
And don't forget about Blessing of Wisdom for class card draw (wich is a lot more reliable for drawing cards than Nat Pagle and cheaper) or Hammer of Wrath (although it only draws one card and is a bit expensive).
Where did I make the comparison that Nat Pagle is the same thing as a warlock hero power? Nowhere did I make any comparisons between the two. He made a statement, I provided a reply. If you're looking for inaccurate comparisons, look at the one you made. Shieldbearer has no potential other than exactly what it is, meanwhile Nat Pagle has a 50% chance to draw a card every turn for 2 Mana. The only spells that can instantly remove it are Soulfire which you're getting a 2 for 1 trade for it even if you don't get any card draw out of it, and Flamecannon sure you may end up not getting any value out of it, but the odds are just as likely that you'll get value out of it. Randomness of a card has never been a reason to not include a card in a deck, look at cards like Unstable Portal that are used in the current Tempo Mage deck. You could get a Wisp out of it, but you could also get a Ragnaros the Firelord . And even that card in itself that is the epitome of random and still sees play in many decks.
There are plenty of cards in the history of hearthstone that everyone has stated was a useless card, until somebody thought to put it in a deck and try it, and it turned out to be amazing. Dr. Boom is a prime example of that. People said that the other GvG neutral Legendaries were going to be better than Dr. Boom, and yet he's an auto-include in pretty much every deck somebody makes while the others are not. Sometimes people can be wrong. Sure Nat Pagle may give you 0 card draw by the time it dies, but the card still has value in that it forces your opponent to deal with it as soon as they possibly can or they take the risk of you getting multiple cards from it and establishing a card advantage that they cannot come back from. The same cannot be said for the Shieldbearer you mentioned.
Where did I make the comparison that Nat Pagle is the same thing as a warlock hero power? Nowhere did I make any comparisons between the two. He made a statement, I provided a reply. If you're looking for inaccurate comparisons, look at the one you made. Shieldbearer has no potential other than exactly what it is, meanwhile Nat Pagle has a 50% chance to draw a card every turn for 2 Mana. The only spells that can instantly remove it are Soulfire which you're getting a 2 for 1 trade for it even if you don't get any card draw out of it, and Flamecannon sure you may end up not getting any value out of it, but the odds are just as likely that you'll get value out of it. Randomness of a card has never been a reason to not include a card in a deck, look at cards like Unstable Portal that are used in the current Tempo Mage deck. You could get a Wisp out of it, but you could also get a Ragnaros the Firelord . And even that card in itself that is the epitome of random and still sees play in many decks.
There are plenty of cards in the history of hearthstone that everyone has stated was a useless card, until somebody thought to put it in a deck and try it, and it turned out to be amazing. Dr. Boom is a prime example of that. People said that the other GvG neutral Legendaries were going to be better than Dr. Boom, and yet he's an auto-include in pretty much every deck somebody makes while the others are not. Sometimes people can be wrong. Sure Nat Pagle may give you 0 card draw by the time it dies, but the card still has value in that it forces your opponent to deal with it as soon as they possibly can or they take the risk of you getting multiple cards from it and establishing a card advantage that they cannot come back from. The same cannot be said for the Shieldbearer you mentioned.
Give me a break dude, do you know that Nat Pagle used to be different in the past (you had a 50% chance to draw an extra card with it at the end of your turn), it was actually considered a good card, used in a lot of decks, but when it got nerfed, everyone realised that it was crap and disappeared from the meta (a meta that was a lot slower than the current one)?. Also, should I repeat myself again? if you are playing Paladin and want a cheap card draw "engine", just use Blessing of Wisdom, a lot better than Nat Pagle, and it can even be used in a defensive way, if you target an enemy minion with it.
Midrange pally is just better as it can establish board control earlier. Cards like eadric the pure, enter the Colosseum, and guardian of kings are just a bit too clunky, and then you have secret pally which is also more streamlined. The meta has slowed down, face hunters are a lot less common, but we are still too fast for control pallies. We are in a tempo meta.
I mean it's been said a bunch here already but in the current meta it's too slow versus aggressive and mid-range decks, it's pretty bad versus Patron, and it's fairly combo dependent to deal with other control decks.
I ran my version a few times last night at rank 5 and went 3-0 for my quest but honestly it still felt super clunky. The biggest drawback to playing Controladin versus CW or Control Priest is you can't reliably dig yourself out from aggressive onslaught. A facehunter doesn't really care that you're going to go turn 7 Boom into turn 8 Tirion into turn 9 Ysera when they can just ping you down. At least CW and CP can effectively negate (or heal through with Justicar) hunter's power with their own. This means Controladin is almost obliged to run something like Healbot or Tuskarr Jouster both of which are pretty horrible versus other control decks and often are still tempo losses versus aggressive decks (a 3/3 for 5 isn't going to help stabilize you too much and a 5/5 that might "oops Zombie Chow/shielded minibot" and get you nowhere aren't impressive to turn the tide). Hell, Must for Battle is like one of the only actual 3-drops in the deck and it's bad versus face hunter because UTH.
It's like viable but fringe viable. It's a deck with a lot of great but more niche answers to diverse problems. As such a card like Shield Slam or SW:P are often going to be more consistently good than a card like Aldor Peacekeeper or Pyro+Equality combo.
To me it seems like Control Paladin would be very strong at countering the most popular "meta" decks that are currently being played.
Cards like Equality and Wild Pyromancer and even Eadric the Pure and Aldor Peacekeeper are great for nullifying Patron Warrior, being able to efficiently remove a board of Grim Patron or provide a hard reset on the attack of their Frothing Berserker . Not to mention the great synergy of Stampeding Kodo with Peacekeeper. Paladins have even received their own version of Brawl with Enter the Coliseum to board clear.
Control Paladin was always considered a strong deck against Handlock due to Paladin being able to turn their bread and butter cards like Molten Giant and Mountain Giant that they love to taunt up into a glorified Mogu'shan Warden .
Even against the popular Druid decks that are reliant on being able to get you to 14 life for the Force of Nature + Savage Roar OTK can struggle to get you that low with Paladin's powerful late game healing cards like Guardian of Kings , Lay on Hands , the risky Tuskarr Jouster or even the Neutral Antique Healbot . Not to mention them being forced to hold onto a Keeper of the Grove the entire game just in case you play Tirion Fordring
Just from my own theorycrafting I haven't been able to think of any real downside or terrible matchup a well put together Control Paladin deck would have.
It was refreshing, but that was a Control Paladin. I used to run a Controladin deck a couple seasons ago, and it just took FOREVER to grind the ladder. Plus, Eadric the Pure is gimmicky in my eyes. Though, Equality, plus Wild Pyromancer is still one of the best removal combos in the game, at least in my eyes.
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That is just theory, but it doesn't work in reality. For example, against Patron Warrior, very usually, it can't stop the well know OTK from hand after the opponent played Emperor Thaurissan, and because of the fact that it is a very slow deck, the Patron Warrior player has all the time in the world to prepare for it.
Basically because of what has been said. It's still to slow and clunky in reality. It has answers, that often times are a turn to late to answer. It has lots of tech, that usually fall short on an already well established board from the opponent. The game just doesn't favor it.
Control paladin has always been, and undoubtedly remains, an extremely hard counter to control warrior and handlock, both of which are popular right now. What was arguably its worst matchup, oil rogue, has almost disappeared from the meta. Those factors alone should make it pretty good for today's meta.
I think the real reason it's not being played is a lot simpler: it's slower than secret paladin, but not noticeably stronger. Why play a good deck and have every game take ten minutes when you can play an equally good (or better) deck and have each game take five minutes?
Your theorycraft on patron is just wrong, and this is basically the reason: you need muster fo battle, even in control pala to keep up with the aggro and you have a hero power that makes 1/1s ... both of these feats just become a glorified patron spawning machine ... and if you just sit back and do nothing against patron... well, they are better at that, they just drop their thaurissan at a given point and otk you ...
Patron is btw also the reason why far fewer people are bringing any paladin deck (secrets included) to tournaments than it is played on ladder! Their prevalence on the ladder mainly stems from the fact, that people just suck at playing patron ;)
My friend plays it and he always end the season around 1-5 rank. The deck is really strong, but it doesnt counter patron warrior....
And is also slow, like control warrior.
f2p, playing for fun ^^
played slow paladin in september to rank 3( for epic rewards) , it was really easy (btw dont really try hard and didnt have Sludge Belchers and Zombie Chow ) ,most of the games lose to priest .
Control paladin was the first deck I tried after TGT, with Justicar Trueheart Eadric the Pure and Tuskarr Jouster . I had 50%> winrate at rank 5. Eadric the Pure is so hard to use effectively. I managed to use him on a huge board with zoo minions, but it even that wasn't good enough (still died). Against control warrior he does nothing, the only time i got to use it was right before fatigue, but he didn't help me at all. Justicar Trueheart is good in theory, but you sacrifice too much tempo and the recruits don't do enough.
I wouldn't say control paladin is a bad deck, it's just not good enough. Warrior is still the king of control.
I wanna clarify that I didn't use Tirion Fordring because I don't have him, that might have contributed to the bad winrate.
Edit: Also Enter the Coliseum has terrible synergy with the minions you will be playing (tons of 1/1s). Why would you ever play this when you have Equality + Consecration
GP warrior, and that's it. Any deck that struggles that hard against the strongest deck in the meta just isn't viable.
How is Control Paladin good against Patron? Your 1/1 just fill up your board and feeds Frothing Berserker and Grim Patron . If you get a chance to Equality + Consecration it won't matter because they have served their purpose (of clearing the board) and since you can't put enough pressure on the Patron player, they can just draw their entire deck and kill you with Emperor Thaurissan combo. It doesn't help that you can't go above 30hp either (although Patron is quite capable of killing even Control Warriors).
I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs. He's an 0/4 body that a warrior can't just Win Axe to clear on turn 2, granted It's a roll of the dice on whether you'll get any value from him but I find most of the time he'll survive for 2-3 turns and you'll get at least 1 draw from him, and it forces your opponent to spend a lot of effort into clearing it.
What? Nat Pagle is trash man, you can't compare it with the Warlock Hero power, what the hell... Also, Paladins have a lot of other card draw tools at their disposal, no need to use terrible bad cards...
I never compared it to a Warlock Hero Power, where in my message did I state that? Also care to explain why a card is "trash" as you said? It's an early game card that your opponent has to deal with as soon as possible. Sure there's a chance you can get nothing from it, but there's the same odds that you'll get great value out of it. It's a card that your opponent cannot just ignore and more than likely will have to use multiple weapon charges or a spell to remove it.
The only other card draw options in terms of class cards a Paladin has is Divine Favor Which doesn't have a place in a control deck due to not emptying your hand as quickly as possible, and Solemn Vigil which is either a feast or famine card that gets extreme value, or just a very expensive version of Arcane Intellect and Lay on Hands Which has always been an auto include for many paladin decks.
He said: "There is one of two things you need to be currently a tier 1 control deck. Either you have a reliable card draw like handlock..."
You said: "I've been putting Nat Pagle into the Control Paladin decks I've experimented with and It's been really helpful in assisting with card draw that Paladin desperately needs."
Also, I need to explain why a card that is very well know by the comunity as unplayable is bad? A card that can be considered most of the time just a two mana Shieldbearer?
And don't forget about Blessing of Wisdom for class card draw (wich is a lot more reliable for drawing cards than Nat Pagle and cheaper) or Hammer of Wrath (although it only draws one card and is a bit expensive).
Where did I make the comparison that Nat Pagle is the same thing as a warlock hero power? Nowhere did I make any comparisons between the two. He made a statement, I provided a reply. If you're looking for inaccurate comparisons, look at the one you made. Shieldbearer has no potential other than exactly what it is, meanwhile Nat Pagle has a 50% chance to draw a card every turn for 2 Mana. The only spells that can instantly remove it are Soulfire which you're getting a 2 for 1 trade for it even if you don't get any card draw out of it, and Flamecannon sure you may end up not getting any value out of it, but the odds are just as likely that you'll get value out of it. Randomness of a card has never been a reason to not include a card in a deck, look at cards like Unstable Portal that are used in the current Tempo Mage deck. You could get a Wisp out of it, but you could also get a Ragnaros the Firelord . And even that card in itself that is the epitome of random and still sees play in many decks.
There are plenty of cards in the history of hearthstone that everyone has stated was a useless card, until somebody thought to put it in a deck and try it, and it turned out to be amazing. Dr. Boom is a prime example of that. People said that the other GvG neutral Legendaries were going to be better than Dr. Boom, and yet he's an auto-include in pretty much every deck somebody makes while the others are not. Sometimes people can be wrong. Sure Nat Pagle may give you 0 card draw by the time it dies, but the card still has value in that it forces your opponent to deal with it as soon as they possibly can or they take the risk of you getting multiple cards from it and establishing a card advantage that they cannot come back from. The same cannot be said for the Shieldbearer you mentioned.
Give me a break dude, do you know that Nat Pagle used to be different in the past (you had a 50% chance to draw an extra card with it at the end of your turn), it was actually considered a good card, used in a lot of decks, but when it got nerfed, everyone realised that it was crap and disappeared from the meta (a meta that was a lot slower than the current one)?. Also, should I repeat myself again? if you are playing Paladin and want a cheap card draw "engine", just use Blessing of Wisdom, a lot better than Nat Pagle, and it can even be used in a defensive way, if you target an enemy minion with it.
Midrange pally is just better as it can establish board control earlier. Cards like eadric the pure, enter the Colosseum, and guardian of kings are just a bit too clunky, and then you have secret pally which is also more streamlined. The meta has slowed down, face hunters are a lot less common, but we are still too fast for control pallies. We are in a tempo meta.
I mean it's been said a bunch here already but in the current meta it's too slow versus aggressive and mid-range decks, it's pretty bad versus Patron, and it's fairly combo dependent to deal with other control decks.
I ran my version a few times last night at rank 5 and went 3-0 for my quest but honestly it still felt super clunky. The biggest drawback to playing Controladin versus CW or Control Priest is you can't reliably dig yourself out from aggressive onslaught. A facehunter doesn't really care that you're going to go turn 7 Boom into turn 8 Tirion into turn 9 Ysera when they can just ping you down. At least CW and CP can effectively negate (or heal through with Justicar) hunter's power with their own. This means Controladin is almost obliged to run something like Healbot or Tuskarr Jouster both of which are pretty horrible versus other control decks and often are still tempo losses versus aggressive decks (a 3/3 for 5 isn't going to help stabilize you too much and a 5/5 that might "oops Zombie Chow/shielded minibot" and get you nowhere aren't impressive to turn the tide). Hell, Must for Battle is like one of the only actual 3-drops in the deck and it's bad versus face hunter because UTH.
It's like viable but fringe viable. It's a deck with a lot of great but more niche answers to diverse problems. As such a card like Shield Slam or SW:P are often going to be more consistently good than a card like Aldor Peacekeeper or Pyro+Equality combo.
Balancing busted cards version 1.0.
Lacks good removal spells in my opinion