Hearthpwn

Odd Paladin has a very flexible shell right now, looking through all the suggestions for replacements. A very cool deck to try & then adapt to your playstyle, preference, and local meta. Thanks for posting & including the guide.

Cheap replacements are -2 Creeper +2nd Stormwind Champion +2nd Vinecleaver. If that is too much top end, add Raid Leaders instead.

Me neither, a slightly different version adds back a second Stormwind Champion and Vinecleaver. Overall winrate will not change much (in fact Creeper scores below average (!) when played according to HSReplay) and the deck will just have a little more top end (good against midrange decks).

Yeah it's interesting how they seriously answered a completely ridiculous question about Rexxar needing to cost 9 and the HP to cost 4. Should have just ignored the hater.

Very nice to read (for once) from someone in much the same position as myself. More of these please Hearthpwn!

I also rarely get above 100-ish games per month and usually end up in the rank 13 region, but I do consider myself a good player (technically). Generally end up with a ~60% win rate unless I piss about (like you did) with homebrew or poorly-chosen decks, or for fun at rank 15.

My tuppence:

1. I would say that the advice of sticking to one deck... I don't agree. Sometimes your local meta is just against you and even top pro players switch decks at high legend if that is the case. I understand the reasoning (get to know the weaknesses and strenghts of your deck in and out, get routine, etc) but if you play a deck regularly it's not so hard to switch & adapt quickly. What you lose in fluency might be more than made up in deck power in the local meta.
2. At lower ranks there's always a lot of Hunter (it's cheap to build) so choosing a deck that is good against Hunter (and by extension, other Aggro) is usually a good call. Switch when you start hitting other styles.

I thnik there is a lot of self-selection. If 90% of people like you and me never get past 4-7, they won't go on forums much to state this. Not something you'd be proud of.

OTOH the 10% of those who luck through and beat at first attempt feel it's of course all down to their superior skill, they'll come here and be all smug about it.

To me it feels like walking through a minefield, there's a lot of 'hoser' bosses. And of course if you just walk through a minefiled without stepping on anything you're gonna be like "what's all the fuss about"?

edit: no idea why this is not attached to the post I replied to :/

I do agree the deck feels not nearly as favoured against aggro as maybe the blurb makes it out to be.

You have hardly any board control or board clear before t4 - by which time most Pally decks have gotten 5,6,7 minions out and are hitting you in the face for 15 points per turn. I understand that Pyromancer + spells is supposed to sub for Shadow Word Pain but having Pyro plus spells is a lot more fickle than just having SW:P.

So far my games have essentially been 1) opponent discovers 2 and 3 cost minions 2) I don't 3) slow death from not having board control.

What a load of tedious crap,

Cards obtained from the Lich King are also replayed (happened to me). Bug or feature...?

Continuing in Team 5's history of making top tier decks even stronger. They really are unwilling to hit the brake pedal once a class reaches critical mass.

No, I think you're confusing with the free dust for "Hall of Faming". Extra copies of nerfed normal cards usually give you full dust for every copy (it did in this case!).

At this particular moment it's hard to tell exactly how good this card will be, as it will all depend on finding a home in an even deck - notice that there has been only 1 even-costed neutral minion revealed from the expansion.

Maybe there will be support for even Shaman, maybe not.

All I know is that Shaman is losing a ton of great cards upon rotation with so far not actually that much in return. There is still a distinct lack of identity or direction for Shaman continuing on from the previous expansions. Now it seems to be "let's try and see if random spells work".

I think I know how the conversation at Team 5 went...

"We can't keep giving Shaman these embarrasingly bad meme cards"

"OK we'll make it neutral instead"

"Oh great idea"

Compare to Prince Malchezaar. That at least had decent statlines, gave you not one but 5 Legendaries, and made them available from the start of the game. It was still never played in constructed. Random legendaries (in your hand or on the board) are generally bad because there is no synergy with your deck. And, on average, they are simply not great on their own either.

This will not see play in constructed.

One thing this does show is that Brian Kibler (and everyone else saying the same thing) is right when pointing out that classes that have weak Basic & Classic cards will become increasingly OP over time as Blizz has to release a constant stream of powerful expansion cards to compensate.