I understand now what you were saying, though, and I completely agree. If all they have turn 6 is Mysterious Challenger and you shake the tree, you basically have a Mountain Giant/Fel Reaver on your hands. If they have more than Mysterious Challenger on the board, and Avenge procs on someone else, you have a worse version of the "perfect draw" turn 6 Handlock board to deal with, with the difference that you probably have a BGH target on turn 6 vs Handlock, and you may or may not against Secret Paladin.
Well, if they have that then it's a 6/6 + a 4/3. That's bad, but not an 'end game' bad.
If it's a 6/6, 4/3, and he can safely hit your face then that's... a Savannah Highmane + a houndmaster (assume he buffed something else earlier that you killed). Savannah hitting the face ends games just as well.
And that's the point. This is a Savannah Highmane. Instead of a deathrattle that is almost as deadly as the minion itself, you have a battlecry that is almost as bad as the minion itself. Meanwhile it's around a deck that's more powerful than Midrange Hunter but less consistent. Hunter doesn't hold the board as well before turn 6, but can safely not have tempo early on since it gains it back later and can burst you down if you stabilize. Paladin is much more powerful on it's good side, but flat out dies if it can't get early game Tempo.
Long-term, I htink the pros will stop worshiping it but WILL continue deeming it a top tier deck once it's fully stable. It's Midrange Hunter.. except in brighter colors.
For the rest of the meta, though, it's a very easy deck to wield and is Midrange in style. Thus you play it or its counter...aggro.
Basically, everyone has been demanding a Midrange deck, saying that it's the most fair and proper deck type, compared to those 'cancer' aggro decks, mightaswellbeaggro Tempo decks, P2W control decks, and no-fun combo decks.
Well here's what a Midrange meta looks like.
Which is why I stopped asking for a Midrange meta half a year ago.
Neither of them seemed OP at all when I met them on the ladder. I don't even recall meeting 5 patron warriors going from 25 to legend this season, but the paladins were everywhere but didn't seem like anything special.
I don't think secret pally is OP at all. I think druid is more powerful at the moment and even druid not powerful enough to nerf it. Patron was disguisting, and I so happy they finally nerf it (I say it despite my winrate vs patron was OK, how happy must be aggro deck players?).
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English is not my native language, so, with a high probability, mistakes were made.
There is a quite simple and objective criterion to decide:
people play decks that get them to high ranks,
best decks (= 'OP') are most effective and so chosen most often,
therefore at the end of a season the relative proportion of decks at high ranks are a good indication of relative strength (= 'OP-ness').
Currently between ranks 5 - legend the number of secret-pallys you encounter is much higher than Patron ever was.
=> in other words, objectively speaking at high ranks MC-pally is more effective (=OP) than Patron
I am willing to be that the majority of naysayers here know they abused MC to get to higher ranks themselves, and now try to convince each other that it really took a lot of skill to reach turn 6.
I've never reached Legend, even when I was playing Secret Paladin. I played the Aggro version (with Argent Squires and such instead of Dr. Boom and Tirion), and I hated it. I tried the Midrange version (which, as I've stated many times in these forums, is my preferred style of play) and I hated it.
Does that mean everyone hates it or that the deck isn't strong? Of course not.
That being said, comments like the one I've highlighted contribute absolutely nothing to discussions. It's just a brash statement with absolutely no fact behind it that people throw out because they think a deck is OP and that no one ever runs anything but said deck. Obviously, you're entitled to your opinion, however, and as the great Peter Griffin once said:
"While I may not agree with you have said, sir, I will defend to the death your right to say it."
I know everyone argues that "Secret Paladin is so mindless a bot can run it." I understand that. But I could almost guarantee that if you had made a bot to run Patron Warrior, it would have been even more successful. I could very well be wrong. But when I played Patron, it was a LOT more boring and required a LOT less thought than Secret Paladin on an average draw.
You are wrong. People did attempt to run patron with bots; they couldn't even get to rank 5.
Again, I acknowledge that patron was absolutely the stronger deck in theory, but very few people (and no bots) played it well. Even in the tournament meta, which was dominated by the deck, it had a sub-50% winrate; in ranked play it was essentially a non-factor (a very low winrate across all players, and a small proportion of players using it). Your anecdotal experience with the two decks isn't really germane, especially given that it's contradicted by hard data and the opinions of literally every expert in the game.
For what it's worth, I didn't enjoy playing patron (warrior is, in fact, my least-played class, and paladin my most-played) and I didn't much enjoy playing against it. I'm glad that its OTK form is dead; the new midrange patron warrior seems like a more interesting, balanced deck. I think that the nerf will genuinely open up interesting new design space and will improve the tournament meta. It was a good move on Blizzard's part.
All that said, and speaking as a non-tournament player who does a lot of constructed and regularly reaches high legend ranks, secret paladin has much more of a presence in the ranked meta than patron ever did. It's not wildly overpowered in theory, and it does have plenty of counters, but so what? In practice, it's extremely strong even when piloted by a bot—how is that not overpowered? What satisfaction is there in playing with or against a deck so undemanding that a flowchart can pilot it to legend? It's not fun to beat a bot, it's certainly not fun to lose to a bot, and it saps the fun out of games where, even if your opponent actually is a human, they might as well be a bot.
So a few opinions (full disclosure: played several versions of Secret Paladin main this season, though I do have a few other decks).
On bots: I don't get why total game abuse should be factored in at all. You can also likely make bots for Face Hunter. Does that mean we should just kill off any decks because it can be abused by a banned program that just relies on draw and mass game volume which means you need just anything over 50% (even 50.1%) win rate?
Here is the difference with Patron and Secret Paladin. Patron has been out for over half a year. The meta has constantly shaped around it and was in fact created to counter the deck. The reason players had sub-50% win rate in tournaments? The decks were either Patron or anti-Patron. The fact that people used Patron and won so often (very small amount less than 50%) against an entire field of decks specifically created to be anti-Patron says something.
The meta by contrast hasn't changed yet after Warsong nerf. Keep in mind decks that were suppressed by Patron have yet to come back. When they do there will be more answers: Ex. Midrange Paladin, Freeze Mage, Control Warrior (new techs)
Also Dr. 6 is strong as a tempo swing card (11 mana worth of cards for 6, at the sacrifice of cards in deck) but...
He doesn't have an immediate effect on the board (compare to Patron 1-hit KO or Patron spam)
He is countered by board presence (compare to Patron where you literally couldn't create board presence)
He requires board presence for maximum effect (compare to Patron where you combo from empty board)
Also...
Almost all decks have an answer to him: Aggro decks - get the Paladin low before Turn 6, so he has to survive. Since Dr. 6 doesn't give you HP or Armor or immediate board presence, even if the Paladin lives to play it, you can burst him down after. Control decks - proc the secrets then use a board clear (Equality + Consecrate, Brawl, Lightbomb, etc.) to answer. Don't forget class-specific (Flare).
Secret Paladin like all tempo decks can be hampered by bad draw. This isn't as significant with cycling decks such as Patron (while it was possible they drew poorly, it was way less likely).
Patron in the right hands (or brains) is much better. Secret paladin requires a little of thought and a lot of luck
here is how bad secret paladin is (picture above). I hate it cz i cant play the decks i love so i have to play to counter it. but to say it is OP. I dont think so. the loss btw was against a control paladin. im like 5/5 against secret in last 40 games
Patron Warrior played at a top level was better. Secret Paladin is perhaps the lowest skill competitive deck to ever exist though as the bot data proves. The latter is actually much worse for the game. Not that harder to play should be better, but that a mindless simple program bot can get a 50+% win rate with a deck not a good look for what is supposedly a strategy game.
The possibility to easily control the battlefield of weenies that paladin produces is what made the match so much favorable to GPW.
Post nerf, its harder to measure, because GPW its not as played as it was. But with the results in the world championship, i think GPW will make a return.
Pre-nerf Patron is more powerful, it stomps secret pally and it was the deck that kept it at bay. Secret Pally is more cancerous though, around half of the games i play on ladder today are secret pally. At least when Patron was King it was not an easy deck in to play. You can easily punish bad players for making sub-optimal plays. Thats why the deck was not as rampant and it wasn't as cancerous.
There's absolutely no question as to which is/was more powerful.
Patron Warrior hands down was more powerful than Secret Paladin is. It ran enough removal to deal with your early game (generally), had enough draw to have their entire deck cycled by turn 10 (I'm exaggerating obviously, but that's how it felt), had multiple cards that did one of the above AND gave card draw, and then had seemingly infinite triggers to throw down a board full of Grim Patrons that DIDN'T include the fact that they could trigger themselves if you had even one minion with less than 3 attack. On top of that, if you had a full board, and they dropped the combo, the only question was "How sated is the Frothing Berserker blade's thirst going to get?"
You had basically two choices. Aggro the crap out of it in hopes that they didn't have timely answers or cards to give them Armor, or play Handlock.
Even if you forced them to use the combo pieces to try to handle your board, or they were silly enough to drop both Berserkers before they went for the kill, there was always the Grim Patron/Armorsmith combo. I can't tell you how many times I'd use the usual finishing combo with Armorsmith on the field instead of Frothing Berserker and raised my armor to 40+.
If you get board control and know how to (and have the tools to) cut down the turn 6 tree properly without it falling on your head, you pretty much auto-win from there, and even if you're behind, you still have a chance to catch back up over the next couple of turns (though it IS significantly harder to do).
Against Patron Warrior, it pretty much didn't matter how far ahead you were. A lot of Patron pilots played it like Handlock: just when you think you've got it won, they puke a bunch of cards on the field. Then you get to listen to Grim Patrons screaming "EVERYONE! GET IN HERE!" and "PILE ON!" for what seems like an hour, then you watch your own picture explode as the Warrior spams "Sorry" emotes as quickly as possible.
For those that think Secret Paladin is more powerful, just remember this.
Secret Paladin is arguably the best deck in the meta currently, yet it wasn't seen hardly at all pre-Warsong nerf.
Most of complains about Patron warrior come from the people who never knew how to play this deck and what it was all about. Patron was literaly the most non-agressive deck in the game not counting freeze mages. As a Patron you would spend your early game fighting of enemy minions and trying to draw. Compare this to today paladins routine spamming gaybots, knife jugglers and gayparades into shredders into belchers or BoK into Doctor 6.
Patron struggled to survive against most agro or midrange decks. He relied on combos, was vulnerable to missing key pieces and had to manage his not infinite resources wisely. As a compensation patron had the most powerfull late game combo-wombos. A bit to powerfull in my opinion.
Patron Warrior deck was definitely OP but also very risky to play. Compare this to today's ladder dominant creatures like Druid or Secret Paladin, who have their decks filled with just the most OP cards possible, when Patron had loot hoarders and unstable ghouls. Yeah...
patron was more OP pre-nerf because even if you were losing by a mile you could just pull 70 damage out of no where. but now Dr. 6 is way more OP.
patron is still a great deck now though, and requires an even higher skill cap than it did before. but secret paladin just dishes out huge threats turn after turn and you lose no matter what is in your hand. there is really no way to combat a perfect curve from a secret paladin. you just have to hope they draw badly
You know how people say huntard? Bots can't get anywhere near the 50%+ win rate with Face Hunter the most notorious of hunter decks. Yet Secret Paladin can, what should paladins be called I wonder?
If you are playing Control Warrior Secret Paladin is the most OP deck in the game, I don't know why I was such a masochist last season :D Overall though Patron was stronger, however whenever I faced someone with it they were either bad or average at playing it. I think the new Patron list is still really strong though and it's a more tempo based deck which fits into the meta quite well without having broken OTK/flood potential.
I played secret paladin for a while, and still do, and I must say the deck is not really as OP as people say. Sure if it gets the perfect curve it's completely insane but I must say that is ultra rare. Countless games you end up top decking secrets and loose the game because of it. The deck is inconsistent. You either are top decking crap or you win by completely destroying your opponent. And a lot of times you just win because your opponent does an unreal misplay playing around secrets.
personally, I think secret less midrange paladin is a better deck and it's what i play right now (for weeks), because I got tired of secret inconsistency.
patron was at another level.
I hope you are joking, you rarely get a bad starting hand as Secret Paladin, sure there are mulligans where you do, but they are few and far between. It's not as if this doesn't happen to almost every other deck type though, you can't expect to always have a strong start.
Patron Warrior required a considerably higher level of skill and planning (essentially a mid-range control deck) in order to win consistently. Secret Paladin requires very little in that way for the average player, and it's reward value is high for the low risk it runs, which is why to me at least, Secret Paladin feels way more oppressive than Patron Warrior ever did on the ladder. Competitive play is another story however, and you can see this nerf was aimed at that scene.
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Well, if they have that then it's a 6/6 + a 4/3. That's bad, but not an 'end game' bad.
If it's a 6/6, 4/3, and he can safely hit your face then that's... a Savannah Highmane + a houndmaster (assume he buffed something else earlier that you killed). Savannah hitting the face ends games just as well.
And that's the point. This is a Savannah Highmane. Instead of a deathrattle that is almost as deadly as the minion itself, you have a battlecry that is almost as bad as the minion itself. Meanwhile it's around a deck that's more powerful than Midrange Hunter but less consistent. Hunter doesn't hold the board as well before turn 6, but can safely not have tempo early on since it gains it back later and can burst you down if you stabilize. Paladin is much more powerful on it's good side, but flat out dies if it can't get early game Tempo.
Long-term, I htink the pros will stop worshiping it but WILL continue deeming it a top tier deck once it's fully stable. It's Midrange Hunter.. except in brighter colors.
For the rest of the meta, though, it's a very easy deck to wield and is Midrange in style. Thus you play it or its counter...aggro.
Basically, everyone has been demanding a Midrange deck, saying that it's the most fair and proper deck type, compared to those 'cancer' aggro decks, mightaswellbeaggro Tempo decks, P2W control decks, and no-fun combo decks.
Well here's what a Midrange meta looks like.
Which is why I stopped asking for a Midrange meta half a year ago.
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
Pre nerf Patron Warrior > Secrets Pally
That said, Xmas Pally is far more annoying because the deck basically plays itself. Fortunately my Dreadsteed control deck runs circles around them.
I know the first three numbers.
Neither of them seemed OP at all when I met them on the ladder. I don't even recall meeting 5 patron warriors going from 25 to legend this season, but the paladins were everywhere but didn't seem like anything special.
I don't think secret pally is OP at all. I think druid is more powerful at the moment and even druid not powerful enough to nerf it.
Patron was disguisting, and I so happy they finally nerf it (I say it despite my winrate vs patron was OK, how happy must be aggro deck players?).
English is not my native language, so, with a high probability, mistakes were made.
If at first you don't succeed, skydiving isn't for you.
So a few opinions (full disclosure: played several versions of Secret Paladin main this season, though I do have a few other decks).
Also Dr. 6 is strong as a tempo swing card (11 mana worth of cards for 6, at the sacrifice of cards in deck) but...
Also...
Patron in the right hands (or brains) is much better. Secret paladin requires a little of thought and a lot of luck
here is how bad secret paladin is (picture above). I hate it cz i cant play the decks i love so i have to play to counter it. but to say it is OP. I dont think so. the loss btw was against a control paladin. im like 5/5 against secret in last 40 games
Patron Warrior played at a top level was better. Secret Paladin is perhaps the lowest skill competitive deck to ever exist though as the bot data proves. The latter is actually much worse for the game. Not that harder to play should be better, but that a mindless simple program bot can get a 50+% win rate with a deck not a good look for what is supposedly a strategy game.
Patron without a doubt.
The possibility to easily control the battlefield of weenies that paladin produces is what made the match so much favorable to GPW.
Post nerf, its harder to measure, because GPW its not as played as it was. But with the results in the world championship, i think GPW will make a return.
How is secret paladin op it has many strong counters is it op because it has a unfair aspect to it like pretty much all competitive decks?
Pre-nerf Patron is more powerful, it stomps secret pally and it was the deck that kept it at bay. Secret Pally is more cancerous though, around half of the games i play on ladder today are secret pally. At least when Patron was King it was not an easy deck in to play. You can easily punish bad players for making sub-optimal plays. Thats why the deck was not as rampant and it wasn't as cancerous.
Secret paladin for ladder. I was shocked how easy it is to play secret paladin to legend.
Though pre-nerf patron was more prominent in tournament.
patron was more OP pre-nerf because even if you were losing by a mile you could just pull 70 damage out of no where. but now Dr. 6 is way more OP.
patron is still a great deck now though, and requires an even higher skill cap than it did before. but secret paladin just dishes out huge threats turn after turn and you lose no matter what is in your hand. there is really no way to combat a perfect curve from a secret paladin. you just have to hope they draw badly
You know how people say huntard? Bots can't get anywhere near the 50%+ win rate with Face Hunter the most notorious of hunter decks. Yet Secret Paladin can, what should paladins be called I wonder?
If you are playing Control Warrior Secret Paladin is the most OP deck in the game, I don't know why I was such a masochist last season :D Overall though Patron was stronger, however whenever I faced someone with it they were either bad or average at playing it. I think the new Patron list is still really strong though and it's a more tempo based deck which fits into the meta quite well without having broken OTK/flood potential.
Patron Warrior ofc. But it also required more skill to play it. Once you learned how to play with it, you could only lose from your own draws.
'There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact'
Sherlock Holmes
Patron Warrior required a considerably higher level of skill and planning (essentially a mid-range control deck) in order to win consistently. Secret Paladin requires very little in that way for the average player, and it's reward value is high for the low risk it runs, which is why to me at least, Secret Paladin feels way more oppressive than Patron Warrior ever did on the ladder. Competitive play is another story however, and you can see this nerf was aimed at that scene.
"Right team we need a tank."
"Ok (locks Sgt Hammer)."