Hearthpwn

Does this have anything to do with the rise of Aggro Paladin? Because let me tell you people: the answer to counter that deck lies in Healadin.

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Quote from CO1933 >>

There's a fun secret I use to countering meta decks: The hidden key lies in the same class that dominates. To give you a better understanding, I often used Control Shaman to defeat Midrange Shaman back in the old WoG meta. Tunnel Trogg? Lightning Bolt. Totem Golem? Stormcrack. And Midrange Shaman had absolutely no good options for dealing with Doomsayer other than Hex, which is an absolute waste of the card considering there's plenty more big drops in Control Shaman to use. Lava Burst could get rid of Thing from Below, and then your only real problem was Thunder Bluff Valiant - a very good target to save Hex for.

When Mean Streets of Gadgetzan dropped, I laughed my ass off every game I played my Taunt Warrior against Pirate Warrior. Of course I still ran into problems with Jade Druid, but we're talking about top of the meta decks here, not nearly top of the meta ones.

Now, there were some slight exceptions in KFT and Un'Goro. The secret powerhouse I actually used in Un'Goro to defeat Quest Rogue was Stampede Hunter, a hyper-fast aggro deck that, at least in the early stages of the game, could easily overpower Quest Rogue, Quest Mage and Pirate Warrior. But the deck got weaker as time went on, and I eventually dropped it. In KFT, I probably could've handled Jade Druid well enough with Aggro Druid if it wasn't for Spreading Plague.

So what it all comes down to is, I think the counter for Aggro Paladin this year comes in the form of Healadin. Paladin's Spellstone is a great anti-aggro tool, Benevolent Djinn is a good healing card, Call to Arms can be used for defense just as well as offense (especially if you pull Dirty Rat without needing to worry about the Battlecry,) along with Righteous Protector, Corpsetaker, Wickerflame Burnbristle, Spikeridged Steed, Consecration and all their other available tools.

I agree with you. But counter and play against aggro was never the issue.

With the last part you kind of acknowledge my thoughts: You are playing a counterdeck against aggro instead of another. So aggro influence the meta intensely and forces people to play a deck in order to not lose against aggro...

There's a fun secret I use to countering meta decks: The hidden key lies in the same class that dominates. To give you a better understanding, I often used Control Shaman to defeat Midrange Shaman back in the old WoG meta. Tunnel Trogg? Lightning Bolt. Totem Golem? Stormcrack. And Midrange Shaman had absolutely no good options for dealing with Doomsayer other than Hex, which is an absolute waste of the card considering there's plenty more big drops in Control Shaman to use. Lava Burst could get rid of Thing from Below, and then your only real problem was Thunder Bluff Valiant - a very good target to save Hex for.

When Mean Streets of Gadgetzan dropped, I laughed my ass off every game I played my Taunt Warrior against Pirate Warrior. Of course I still ran into problems with Jade Druid, but we're talking about top of the meta decks here, not nearly top of the meta ones.

Now, there were some slight exceptions in KFT and Un'Goro. The secret powerhouse I actually used in Un'Goro to defeat Quest Rogue was Stampede Hunter, a hyper-fast aggro deck that, at least in the early stages of the game, could easily overpower Quest Rogue, Quest Mage and Pirate Warrior. But the deck got weaker as time went on, and I eventually dropped it. In KFT, I probably could've handled Jade Druid well enough with Aggro Druid if it wasn't for Spreading Plague.

So what it all comes down to is, I think the counter for Aggro Paladin this year comes in the form of Healadin. Paladin's Spellstone is a great anti-aggro tool, Benevolent Djinn is a good healing card, Call to Arms can be used for defense just as well as offense (especially if you pull Dirty Rat without needing to worry about the Battlecry,) along with Righteous Protector, Corpsetaker, Wickerflame Burnbristle, Spikeridged Steed, Consecration and all their other available tools.

Because Lesser Emerald Spellstone has stupid amounts of value in a 5 mana card, something Hunter has needed for a long time. And they also got Flanking Strike, a strong single-target removal spell that Hunter needed, and even To My Side! carried a good amount of value with the deck's synergy. Not to mention the fact that it absolutely destroys most of the Secret Mage deck lists out there.

I'm not even entirely sure why Secret Mage is so popular right now. The deck gets crushed by Spell Hunter, which has even better tempo and Secrets that are harder to counterplay. Not to mention that, for a Mage deck (in your version and a lot of others I've seen), the deck tends to have pretty bad board clears, so it even struggles against Aggro. And with Aggro Paladin on the rise, that's not a good thing for Secret Mage. And, as it's pretty much always been, Mage's secrets are incredibly easy to play around and predict. 

Quote from The_GoldenElf >>

Quote from CO1933 >>

Best card from every class:

 

For Rogue, it's actually Kingsbane imo. This new legendary weapon is so dang underrated, I honestly couldn't believe it. Not only is it a high value weapon when you play it in its base form in the early game, but if you give it enough power from buff cards it becomes a consistent healing tool, hard AND soft removal method with decently long-lasting power on board. As the game goes later and later, your opponent is going to hate it dearly when their enemy is constantly drawing a card that lets them heal for 5 HP each turn (from 2 Deadly Poisons, which is enough to make up for the health loss on a lot of minion's attack stats) and destroy any minion they want to that doesn't have Divine Shield. Now, I suppose there's some chance that you might end up using one of your weapon buffing cards on a hero power dagger for the sake of a tough situation, but all you need to do is run 1 copy of Leeching Poison and Envenom Weapon plus 2 Deadly Poisons and you've likely got enough tools to deal with your enemy's cards scaling into the late game.

 I don't know why you're not mentioning Cavern Shinyfinder. Kingsbane would be trash without it due to filling your deck with mediocre cards and trusting on drawing that one legendary. Shinyfinder is good on its on right, too; 2 mana 3/1 draw a card is amazing, see Arcanologist: people thought it was bad when compared to Mad Scientist. This is because scientist was broken, arcanologist a bit worse but still OP and shinyfinder will be very powerful. The card will make pirate rogue much stronger as well, and I can even see a "weapon package" of 2x Cavern Shinyfinder and 2x Shadowblade making its way to almost all Rogue decks. Even more of a meta-defining card than Kingsbane IMO.

Quote from Salohcin >>

Quote from CO1933 >>

I wouldn't say the new 4 mana Hunter spell alone makes Hunter a better class. The vast majority of the other class cards it got were absolute crap (although some of the neutral minions have a good chance of working well for it), and even with cards like Scorp-o-matic I still can't see how, in its current state, it could stand up to Priest or any of the other powerful control decks likely to rise up in the future meta.

 

I think the spell addressed a key weakness. Hunter is a strong class with an obvious weakness. If you clear them off the board then they have no way to come back. For the same reason control hunter has been unusable despite having strong late game threats.

But hey, it is only a guess and most guesses about the new meta will be wrong. Unless you guess boring stuff like tempo rogue will keep on tempoing (this is now a word) . 

I wouldn't say the new 4 mana Hunter spell alone makes Hunter a better class. The vast majority of the other class cards it got were absolute crap (although some of the neutral minions have a good chance of working well for it), and even with cards like Scorp-o-matic I still can't see how, in its current state, it could stand up to Priest or any of the other powerful control decks likely to rise up in the future meta.

Again, what is it with Hunter getting better neutral cards than class cards in this expansion? There's finally an actually good big-bodied beast other than Savannah Highmane and Corpse Widow that can be used in a deck! Its resistance to hard removal is really powerful, and there's value on top of value to be had when it's alive and dead.

So Warrior got their own version of Ironbark Golem. Cracks aside, this thing actually has good potential in Control Warrior for its overstated body and ability to consistently attack the opponent in most cases. I mean, if you don't have 5 armor or more while playing Control Warrior, you're doing it wrong. And a 5/9 taunt body for 6 will sure irritate a wide range of opponents trying to deal with it.

The hilarious thing is is that Hunter is actually getting better neutral cards this expansion than class cards. And with the constant threat of Doomsayer, this is one of them. Now, I understand Scorp-o-matic doesn't have the stats of Crazed Alchemist and its effect has less versatility, but hard removal is hard removal and being able to get rid of your opponent's early drop instantly is always good. Like most of the other neutral cards we've seen, I really like this little guy and I think it could easily see play.

Quote from istarbuck >>

Quote from CO1933 >>

Best card from every class:

For Priest, it's pretty obvious to everyone by this point. Psychic Scream beats the heck out of most Midrange decks by completely resetting the enemy's board and punishing any deck that overextends its hand to eternity. It's especially awesome in Purify Priest, because if you ever end up shuffling your own minions into the enemy's deck your enemy is just stuck with a ton of worthless junk (unless they can give those minions Taunt or silence them consistently.) It's also decently cheap compared to many other forms of hard board removal.

For Shaman, it's Unstable Evolution. Evolving a single minion twice can get you major amounts of value out of just two cards, and it makes up for Evolve Shaman's weakness to board clear effects. I mean, hey, we've all had those frustrating games where you fight a Control deck and watch miserably as your opponent just wipes out every minion you try to play before drawing Evolve at a super inconvenient time.

For Hunter, it's Lesser Emerald Spellstone. A lot of the Spellstone cards right now only give the most basic value in their current form, or just less value than what they're worth. This card, on the other hand, gets you 6 mana worth of stats on board for 5 when you play it in its basic form, and the boosting effect is incredibly easy to trigger with the wide range of Hunter secrets still entirely draftable. I'm not saying this card is gonna make Hunter viable again, I'm just saying that it has a lot of value and works very well as a 5-drop in Hunter decks (Corpse Widow is good too but it can be rather specific for Hunter decks mostly focused around Deathrattles. And the spellstone works well for both Midrange and Aggro decks, while Corpse Widow is much more of a Midrange Hunter card.)

For Mage, it's Leyline Manipulator. Not only does the card have awesome stats for the cost, its effect is incredibly powerful for OTK Mage and Mage in general. Used in tandem with Primordial Glyph, Cabalist's Tome and Lesser Ruby Spellstone, this card will get you so much more value out of your spells while also making it a breeze to trigger the Mage quest. All you even have to worry about is not over flooding your hand before the quest is completed.

For Rogue, it's actually Kingsbane imo. This new legendary weapon is so dang underrated, I honestly couldn't believe it. Not only is it a high value weapon when you play it in its base form in the early game, but if you give it enough power from buff cards it becomes a consistent healing tool, hard AND soft removal method with decently long-lasting power on board. As the game goes later and later, your opponent is going to hate it dearly when their enemy is constantly drawing a card that lets them heal for 5 HP each turn (from 2 Deadly Poisons, which is enough to make up for the health loss on a lot of minion's attack stats) and destroy any minion they want to that doesn't have Divine Shield. Now, I suppose there's some chance that you might end up using one of your weapon buffing cards on a hero power dagger for the sake of a tough situation, but all you need to do is run 1 copy of Leeching Poison and Envenom Weapon plus 2 Deadly Poisons and you've likely got enough tools to deal with your enemy's cards scaling into the late game.

For Warlock, it's Kobold Librarian. A 1 mana draw tool with next to no downside - need I say more? And it's gonna be stupid in Arena.

For Druid, it's Lesser Jasper Spellstone. Now, I know there's other cards like the two legendaries which likely could have a lot of impact or just be fun combo triggers. But this thing makes up for one of the biggest weaknesses Druid has ever struggled through in its history as a deck: its lack of single target removal. Between Wrath, Swipe and Ultimate Infestation, most Druid players often rely on overpowering their enemy with larger bodied minions or slowing down their enemy's minions with Taunt creatures, which grew much harder to do after the Spreading Plague nerf. So, if Druid ever gets overtaken by the enemy's value on board or there's a single hard-to-kill minion causing problems, there often isn't much Druid can do. This card helps make up for that because of the massively high scaling damage off a relatively easy combo trigger. I mean, hero powering alone could easily get you up to 3 armor at some point, and cards like Feral Rage, Gnash, Claw, Branching Paths and Oaken Summons can do the job just as easily (not saying Gnash and Claw are viable, just that they trigger the effect nicely.)

For Paladin, it's either Call to Arms or Crystal Lion. Call to Arms is highly powerful in both Arena and Standard, and it's very likely going to give you at least 6 mana worth of stats on board as long as you draft your deck right. The only problem is, cards like Grimestreet Outfitter, Hydrologist and Argent Protector need their battlecries to be most effective and you waste a good amount of value if you pull them out of your deck. Similarly, Primalfin Champion needs its Deathrattle, but if Drygulch Jailor becomes viable it could work with this card. In terms of neutral cards, Knife Juggler is pretty good on a recruit draw but Wild Pyromancer is the kind of thing you want to save to combo with Equality or Adaptation. Also, you'd never want to play this card in a Prince Keleseth deck out of fear of losing his Battlecry, even if you can get buffed minions on the recruit draws. In terms of the 1-drops, Selfless Hero and Righteous Protector are both good, but Meanstreet Marshal needs its buffs for full effectiveness and Vilefin Inquisitor does lose some value, even if it stays pretty strong. As such, you'd have to run more strong-bodied 2 drops most likely and see if they really work in your bigger lineup to make the card work, even if some of the 1-drops can help. In Arena, though, these weaknesses are negated and the card is still most likely gonna be a must-draft. Just don't play it if your deck has Doomsayer in either case. And as for Crystal Lion, it all depends on how viable Silver Hand decks end up becoming in the future. Between Level Up!, Drygulch Jailor, Vinecleaver, Lightfused Stegodon, Lost in the Jungle, Stand Against Darkness and Crystal Lion, things aren't looking too bad for the prospect of a Silver Hand Paladin deck rising up. There's still a lot of competition in its way though.

For Warrior, it was a really tough choice because a lot of the better Warrior cards are comparable in terms of viability. Overall though, my favorite is Drywhisker Armorer because it has good stats for the cost and works incredibly well as a cheap defensive tool against Aggro and Midrange decks. It has heavy combo potential with all the other Armor-based cards and its value as a card peaks over everything else released so far imo.

 

 

 

 this is too longgg

They finally released a tech card for dealing with Priest. Not much point in trying to repeatedly summon Doomsayers in a deck where they'll get consistently wiped off the board. In addition, it makes Obsidian Statue much easier to kill while also making it so you can kill it without losing value from its Deathrattle. (Not to mention all the other high health and low attack cards Priest is known for running, especially in Purify Priest where your opponent's giant bodies will easily die to this card plus a board clear if they don't Inner Fire in time.) It's also combinable with Priest cards that have high health as effectively a more viable version of Confuse, and other classes can easily use it for combo potential too. Kobolds and Catacombs is really shaping up to be one of the more fun expansions, and this card is just another great piece of the puzzle.

I didn't even click in the vote section and my screen says I still voted for Dust It!...lol. Seriously, though, this shit had better make some kind of underground comeback like Gadgetzan Ferryman did in Quest Rogue or else this is just going to be a repeat of Toxic Arrow. Any Hunter deck made 100% of spells is going to be trash. You only have limited minion generation from cards like Cat Trick, Wandering Monster, Animal Companion, Call of the Wild and this crap, your soft removal will be absolute garbage, your hard removal methods will only be sub-par most of the time and your board clears won't do jackshit! Even if you can still run the Hunter DK in the deck (since it's a playable hero, not a minion), your board clears will suck and you won't be able to generate enough value over the whole course of the game. If Blizzard wants to push new archetypes for Hunter, they shouldn't push trash.

Best card from every class:

For Priest, it's pretty obvious to everyone by this point. Psychic Scream beats the heck out of most Midrange decks by completely resetting the enemy's board and punishing any deck that overextends its hand to eternity. It's especially awesome in Purify Priest, because if you ever end up shuffling your own minions into the enemy's deck your enemy is just stuck with a ton of worthless junk (unless they can give those minions Taunt or silence them consistently.) It's also decently cheap compared to many other forms of hard board removal.

For Shaman, it's Unstable Evolution. Evolving a single minion twice can get you major amounts of value out of just two cards, and it makes up for Evolve Shaman's weakness to board clear effects. I mean, hey, we've all had those frustrating games where you fight a Control deck and watch miserably as your opponent just wipes out every minion you try to play before drawing Evolve at a super inconvenient time.

For Hunter, it's Lesser Emerald Spellstone. A lot of the Spellstone cards right now only give the most basic value in their current form, or just less value than what they're worth. This card, on the other hand, gets you 6 mana worth of stats on board for 5 when you play it in its basic form, and the boosting effect is incredibly easy to trigger with the wide range of Hunter secrets still entirely draftable. I'm not saying this card is gonna make Hunter viable again, I'm just saying that it has a lot of value and works very well as a 5-drop in Hunter decks (Corpse Widow is good too but it can be rather specific for Hunter decks mostly focused around Deathrattles. And the spellstone works well for both Midrange and Aggro decks, while Corpse Widow is much more of a Midrange Hunter card.)

For Mage, it's Leyline Manipulator. Not only does the card have awesome stats for the cost, its effect is incredibly powerful for OTK Mage and Mage in general. Used in tandem with Primordial Glyph, Cabalist's Tome and Lesser Ruby Spellstone, this card will get you so much more value out of your spells while also making it a breeze to trigger the Mage quest. All you even have to worry about is not over flooding your hand before the quest is completed.

For Rogue, it's actually Kingsbane imo. This new legendary weapon is so dang underrated, I honestly couldn't believe it. Not only is it a high value weapon when you play it in its base form in the early game, but if you give it enough power from buff cards it becomes a consistent healing tool, hard AND soft removal method with decently long-lasting power on board. As the game goes later and later, your opponent is going to hate it dearly when their enemy is constantly drawing a card that lets them heal for 5 HP each turn (from 2 Deadly Poisons, which is enough to make up for the health loss on a lot of minion's attack stats) and destroy any minion they want to that doesn't have Divine Shield. Now, I suppose there's some chance that you might end up using one of your weapon buffing cards on a hero power dagger for the sake of a tough situation, but all you need to do is run 1 copy of Leeching Poison and Envenom Weapon plus 2 Deadly Poisons and you've likely got enough tools to deal with your enemy's cards scaling into the late game.

For Warlock, it's Kobold Librarian. A 1 mana draw tool with next to no downside - need I say more? And it's gonna be stupid in Arena.

For Druid, it's Lesser Jasper Spellstone. Now, I know there's other cards like the two legendaries which likely could have a lot of impact or just be fun combo triggers. But this thing makes up for one of the biggest weaknesses Druid has ever struggled through in its history as a deck: its lack of single target removal. Between Wrath, Swipe and Ultimate Infestation, most Druid players often rely on overpowering their enemy with larger bodied minions or slowing down their enemy's minions with Taunt creatures, which grew much harder to do after the Spreading Plague nerf. So, if Druid ever gets overtaken by the enemy's value on board or there's a single hard-to-kill minion causing problems, there often isn't much Druid can do. This card helps make up for that because of the massively high scaling damage off a relatively easy combo trigger. I mean, hero powering alone could easily get you up to 3 armor at some point, and cards like Feral Rage, Gnash, Claw, Branching Paths and Oaken Summons can do the job just as easily (not saying Gnash and Claw are viable, just that they trigger the effect nicely.)

For Paladin, it's either Call to Arms or Crystal Lion. Call to Arms is highly powerful in both Arena and Standard, and it's very likely going to give you at least 6 mana worth of stats on board as long as you draft your deck right. The only problem is, cards like Grimestreet Outfitter, Hydrologist and Argent Protector need their battlecries to be most effective and you waste a good amount of value if you pull them out of your deck. Similarly, Primalfin Champion needs its Deathrattle, but if Drygulch Jailor becomes viable it could work with this card. In terms of neutral cards, Knife Juggler is pretty good on a recruit draw but Wild Pyromancer is the kind of thing you want to save to combo with Equality or Adaptation. Also, you'd never want to play this card in a Prince Keleseth deck out of fear of losing his Battlecry, even if you can get buffed minions on the recruit draws. In terms of the 1-drops, Selfless Hero and Righteous Protector are both good, but Meanstreet Marshal needs its buffs for full effectiveness and Vilefin Inquisitor does lose some value, even if it stays pretty strong. As such, you'd have to run more strong-bodied 2 drops most likely and see if they really work in your bigger lineup to make the card work, even if some of the 1-drops can help. In Arena, though, these weaknesses are negated and the card is still most likely gonna be a must-draft. Just don't play it if your deck has Doomsayer in either case. And as for Crystal Lion, it all depends on how viable Silver Hand decks end up becoming in the future. Between Level Up!, Drygulch Jailor, Vinecleaver, Lightfused Stegodon, Lost in the Jungle, Stand Against Darkness and Crystal Lion, things aren't looking too bad for the prospect of a Silver Hand Paladin deck rising up. There's still a lot of competition in its way though.

For Warrior, it was a really tough choice because a lot of the better Warrior cards are comparable in terms of viability. Overall though, my favorite is Drywhisker Armorer because it has good stats for the cost and works incredibly well as a cheap defensive tool against Aggro and Midrange decks. It has heavy combo potential with all the other Armor-based cards and its value as a card peaks over everything else released so far imo.