Hearthpwn

I think you've made a straw man out of what's been said here. I'm not arguing Lorewalker Cho works in every situation, just like a mill deck doesn't work against every single deck. I'm not even arguing that it's a consistent card. Yes, this card has no board presence, yes, people can kill it for free if it is unprotected. 

There is a class of cards in this game that will have extreme problems killing you. If your opponent gets a power word shield, a healing touch, a divine spirit, a tree of life, the situations in which they kill you with those cards are so remote, they will land you on a trolden video. Moonfire likewise, does such nominal damage that unless you're staring down a tempo mage or a Malylock, giving your opponent one is essentially giving him a "Congrats, you can do one damage next turn" card. 

Your opponent has a deck of thirty cards that, in one way or another, are designed to kill you. It may be with some bloated creature like Tirion Fordring, it may be a spell that does 6 damage like fireball. 

In a mill deck, the objective is always to fill up the opponent's hand. The big mill combo is Coldlight-Brewmaster-Coldlight, or Coldlight-shadowstep-Coldlight, which nets you 4 drawn cards. What I'm trying to state is Cho can match that amount of card draw, by artificially inserting Moonfire (a spell that uniquely DOESN'T HAVE A COST) and naturalizes (that has an extremely small cost, with a HUGE benefit to you if cast back at you, whether Cho is on the board or not).

So, if Cho's on the board, you cast moon fire, then naturalize, and then cold light-brewmaster-cold light. You've essentially filled up his hand and made him draw 8 different things. I'm not arguing that that's phenomenal against a face hunter who has two cards so you give him a complete hand. I AM arguing that it is phenomenal against a control deck that's holding on to 7 cards, so he draws 3 and then 5 of his cards, 1/6 of his deck, is burned. Burn the right cards, and that can bring an entire deck crashing down. Freeze mages are a joke without Alex, I also find myself laughing when a Thaddius component goes up in smoke. The reason Blizzard doesn't constantly print mill cards is because if the play style gets too efficient, or out of hand, it'll be OP, because BURNING CARDS so that you NEVER HAVE TO USE RESOURCES TO DEAL WITH THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE is VASTLY SUPERIOR to USING YOUR RESOURCES to deal with threats. 

The strategy's ridiculous is it? That's why me and people like me play it. It's entertaining, in a game I play for entertainment. I don't care if Reynad doesn't use it to beat Strifecro in the world finals, or even if it loses me half of my games and keeps me far away from legend. If you don't believe it can work, check out Wowhobbs on Youtube. He plays a priest, using buff cards and faceless manipulators to essentially protect Cho and amplify his effects. The usual result is he floods his opponent's hands with cards that can't be used to kill anything on the board, before he goes in for the kill with an inner fire or transforms the millions of power word shields that get shifted back and forth into legendaries with an Elise.

I read you homie. I thought this expansion didn't have a lot for mill, then laughed hard when I saw this card. Here's the problem as I see it. This two drop really isn't a two drop at all in a fair amount of situations, If you play it against a Priest, he's just going to Shadow word pain it, a net zero mill if his active doesn't work on the turn after you put him down.  It'd be far better to plop him down in the usual hyper-mill scenario, you know, cold light, youthful, then this guy. That is, after the guy's shadow word pains are exhausted. It's sad that this doesn't get the opportunity to share the limelight with Deathlord. Then priests would have to choose, take out this guy with their pains, miss out on a grove tender or a death lord. 

One thing you missed though, is that there are a lot of scenarios in which feeding your opponents cards without drawing them yourself can backfire hard. Face Hunter's the big example, the entire deck is designed to play two or three cards every turn, and I can honestly see such a deck going out of it's way not to kill this card. We've also got Tempo mage too, that Essentially stacks low cost spells and kills you not with board control, but rather an abundance of damage from cheap spell synergies with creatures. In the traditional mill you may draw the answers as they get the damage in healing and counter-spells. Relying on this card to mill your opponent maybe not.

So I think those are the three problems with the card:

1. Countered by early game control spells during the ideal time to play it, has a lot of new counters with over budgeted minions and shadow word horror this expansion

2.  In no way serves as an adequate replacement for gang up, death lord, poison seeds, and a lot of the mill cards that will be unplayable in standard.

3. Milling both decks is not always the same as opponent card draw.

Look at it like this. In the common thinking about this game, A card is usually qualified in three ways: "Bad": A card that actively harms you, provides no benefit to you, or an easily countered benefit to you. (Majordomo, Magma Rager, a lot of cards with high mana cost that are simply unplayable given current meta and tempo) "Good": A card that provides a benefit to you (Senjin Shieldmasta, Frostbolt), and "Great" A card that provides 2 unique benefits to you. (Dr. Boom, Defender of Argus, Abusive Sergeant.)

This card, for 4 mana, a very reasonable costs, gives you 4 unique benefits. Not only can you utilize the card to attack twice, it also heals you twice.  2 health doesn't seem like a lot, but it's actually exceptional. It assures anything you hit with two attack or less is no net loss to your health, anything you hit with 3, 4, or 5 attack gives you a nominal loss, and that anything you hit between say 6-8 attack does damage to you, but a "normal" amount of damage you'd expect attacking a creature. 

The card's only counters are Harrison (a utility legendary that is a counter, but not a brutal counter, you could literally play your other Truesilver to take care of it) and Acidic Ooze, both of which, given the mana which you can play this card for, will speak for a majority of the mana of your opponent's next turn. Plus, he can't play them on your turn. You've already gotten your 2 unique benefits out of this card if you attack the turn you play it.

Another vote up for you bud. While thought-steal, mind vision, and mind control were bad, this card is an all-time low in the "steal from opponent" family of priest-cards. You literally steal an opponent's card of your choice, at the reasonable cost of 6 mana. It feels like a middle finger from Blizzard. "You spent 5 months grinding the dust so your opponent can play a golden Dr. Boom on turn 7." I mean, where is the guaranteed counter play to this card currently in the game? I have to play a deck with all charge creatures? A deck that kills them pre turn 6? Force Savage? Some of us like playing control decks, decks that take skill. Assuming all of my big creatures are of equal strength, with 2 shadow word deaths, 2 mind controls, 2 entombs, I literally have to pack 10 creatures of 5+ attack to fight off my own big creatures and the opponent's control when facing a priest. Does that sound like a good deck to you? A good curve? I'm hoping at some point Blizzard makes a card that states: "All cards in hand and in play are shuffled into the deck of their original owner." I'd pay 10 mana 5 overcharge to play a card like that.

"Look at you, the picture of serenity."

I actually thought mill paladin might be possible with this card. Sure, a paladin doesn't have gang up, nor naturalize to push your opponent ahead in cards, but one could include dancing swords and death lords to get slightly ahead. The trade off would be that with this card in duplicate and consecrate-equality, the paladin would have DOUBLE the board clear of your average mill deck. Pally has heals that don't suck and that can indeed provide tempo swings, and dragons to facilitate the rarer mill support dragons, Chromaggus and Ysera.

It didn't work, and the failings of this card as board clear were a major part of why it didn't work. The fact of the matter is, if you're trying to clear the board, the largest creature on their side is generally the LAST creature you want to preserve if board clear is your game plan. That's Nefarion in a control deck, a Murlock Knight in Shockadin, and versus a face hunter it'll end up being something buffed by a beast master, or an indeed dinky minion that the hunter has already drained the use out of. It also starts an odd game. You can't have a deck with lots of small creatures with this card, because this card would directly counter your game plan, but if you play a deck of big, hard-hitting creatures, generally they will be zapped by removal that pretty much every deck holds these days, outpaced by decks that do aggression better, or out traded by priests and warriors that do control and healing better.

This guy is pretty much your trooper of success in a Mill-based deck, but you have to be intelligent about using him. Here's the really bad part of this card, that makes it advantageous to your opponent and not you. It conveys an EXTREME BENEFIT to both you and your opponent, at a mana cost to you, and none for him. This reverses if your opponent is overdrawing, but usually this card is a tempo loss, and if your opponent has a deck of low cost spells and creatures, essentially you are making him much more efficient if you play this card too early (he'll never overdraw, and because of a creature you put on the board, he is 2 cards ahead of where he would be without this card.) So against a face hunter, I wouldn't mulligan for this, I'd save it until the time where playing it literally does damage to the opponent. Unless you're gang up rogue. Then drop 20 of these guys, and get your cards that heal.

Quote from Empyrium77 jump

Quote from Azk29 jump

A face hunter player expecting sympathy. We have seen it all

Sure, sure, the card is perrrrfectly balanced indeed. Obviously there's nothing wrong with spending 3 mana, getting 14 heal, a spell-effect, and info about opponent's deck. Perhaps they should even make it 2! Keep joking and fooling yourself. I'm not even "a face hunter", was just testing cards for all classes.

Actually, this card is the first card that heals and feels balanced. First off, that 14 health isn't guaranteed owed to the joust mechanic, and if you lose the joust, you get 7 health, less than healing touch, which nobody would argue is OP. Why would nobody argue it's OP? Well, you play it, and then the hunter undoes your playing it with a kill command, a leper gnome, and a hero power. Or you play it, drop a robo-cub, and it gets to square off against a boulder fist ogre because you spent half of your turn on something that did NOTHING to the board state and your opponent kept derping along, dropping his brainless aggressive creatures. Similarly, Tree of life can heal you up from 1 HP,  but it takes your entire turn. I've played over 1000 games with that card. I'm sure 20 or so had me tree of life, then die the next turn because the opponent had two turns to play big stuff (often incapable of being cleared) without retribution. There's gotta be some sort of payoff to having a defensive card. Healing for (potentially) a lot on a decent budget is one way of going about it. 

"Info about opponent's deck" is of great value? Not really. These days, the meta is so stale, I know what the deck is from the first creature played. Mechwarper? Mech mage. Leper Gnome? Face hunter, Oil Rogue. Armorsmith's likely a patron warrior. Information about 1 card of a deck of 30 isn't worth 5 mana. I wouldn't pay half a mana crystal for it, in fact.

Here are the pros and cons of running Malorne in a mill druid deck.

Cons: He's expensive in a meta in which games usually end around the time that he would be dropped.

If not in your hand, he's a card in rotation in your deck, that can potentially be drawn before cards you need.  Success against an aggro deck as a mill druid usually depends on three things, when you get your milling cards, when you get your board clears, when you get tree of life. Malorne is none of these, and you can potentially draw him 3 times while needing the stuff behind him.

He's a win condition for your opponent if faceless, thought stolen, or mind controlled without a silence.

Pros:  He could be more expensive, and he gets great value against decks that don't silence or transform him. 

He can potentially put a ton of strain on your opponent's removal if drawn consecutively or close together.

Having a constant threat that just won't go away suits the milling play-style.

I like this card in Mill. The thing is, you can always opt not to play it in priest match ups, and it is a 29/30 chance this card won't be thought stolen. Faceless Manipulator is fairly uncommon these days, most decks are tightly wound in terms of composition. Mill decks put so much into utility, two cold lights, two brews, two naturalizes, that often they lose out on raw stats of the creatures they bring to the table. Malorne's the stag in this sort of scenario, he brings potentially limitless stats to your deck, and is a durable, repeating threat in situations where the opponent can't deal with him permanently. I've enjoyed him in my deck for a little while.

Care to elaborate? In a burgle rogue deck I've got that uses Blingtron,  I get this a fair amount.  It's one of my favorite things to see pop up. The Rogue hero power isn't that strong, and this is essentially a Mage hero power a fallen hero that will never die. The Rogue hero power just isn't that strong, and whatever IS strong about it is all in how it's modified (oil, so on.) Just in the fact that you don't have to touch your opponents with this hero power makes it trump a 1 damage dagger, in my opinion.

I'm a free to play player, somewhat out of economical need, but at this point also out of pride, so it's been a long month of saving up gold to play Grand Tournament. It was my moment similar to casters,  the chance at buying 20 or so packs in one burst, that doesn't come often. I wasn't sure what I was hoping for, two copies of mulch, or two Astral Communions to make a deck out of it. I got neither. And I only got one legendary. It was this one.

And boy is it the legendary to have. I usually play mill, and this card is all about a similar form of late game trolling. First of all, let me tell you what this card has synergy with. You won't expect it. A. Nefarion, B. Any card that generates spare parts.

This card is another one of those cards that is useless against Face Hunter, and Patron Warrior. It's in good company in that regard. You can mitigate this weakness, with any sort of creature that reduces mana cost (Shadowfiend, Thaurissan, ext.) It's essentially a 9-drop. I consider it a 10 drop. 7 for the chick, 2 for the inspire effect, and 1 for the cloaking spare part. If you pull this off, let me tell you, the board is about to go crazy in your favor. 

My first game, I got mill house, good thematically because it was a face hunter that was about to end the game in his favor. The next game, I got a similar combo as to above. Got Rend Blackhand, kinda weak, but he was out of answers for either legendary. The next turn, I got Tirion Fordring. Game over. 

But by far the highlight of my games today came when I first played Nefarion, against a rogue, and then played this chick. I canceled my usual inspire combo, optioning instead to gang up my lady here, and he didn't have any answers. Kel'thuzad came out next, then Jarraxxus. My second Nefarion spell happened to be vanish, so essentially the game went over-time, the result long decided, me wanting to draw it out to see how crazy the board could get. I ended the game as a Jarraxxus Priest with a board full of Infernals and Legendaries. But the combination of Nefarion and this chick meant that, as a priest, I could literally have any spell or legendary in the game on my board.

Is this card OP? No, I don't think so. It's another Kel'Thuzad, Essentially a coin flip that says you win if the opponent has a late game deck without board clear, you lose if the enemy deck is overagro. Bolvar and some other legendaries make this a real anticlimax of an endgame,  and the girl herself can in most instances be taken out by a swipe or a huffer. What this card is though, is fun, and if you're not playing Hearthstone for fun, I don't know what to tell you.

I'm with you bro. The thing is, hunters can use this "beast" through a web spinner far more efficiently than a druid ever could. Mind vision? Mirror Image? Thoughtsteal? All good, it's just a web spinner to start. 1/1, dinky little thing. Until it violates the rule of probability and becomes Malorne. The hunter, who makes it very careful to not include any card that costs over 3 mana, now has an unbeatable late game as well, as this card has to be killed over, and over, and over, unless you happen to have a silence or a mind control (my deck personally has one silence, keeper of the grove,  and you can bet I'm using it on a huffer turn four if one's up.) Also important, hunters get to entirely skip the deck construction aspect of this card. Druid players have to either A. Get it from a pack (I don't know what the odds are, but I would guess it's below a thousand to one, given that it has to be a GvG pack, it has to have a legendary, the legendary has to be this one, the player has to actually play druid, ext.) or B. craft it, costing you say, 80 days of religious quest-doing with dust put aside for ONLY this card. Hunters essentially skip both of those unlikely scenarios, and get Malorne for free when they get it. And yippee, it just so happens to have the mana cost that it can be put down alongside all those 3 mana spells and hero powers hunter like to use. 1/50 sounds like bad odds, but so many web spinners are put on the board daily, that it's bound to happen in a lot of games and it's bound to be unpleasant for the opposing player when it does happen.

Lorewalker Cho is probably my favorite out of my 30 cards in my mill druid deck. I believe in certain circumstances he can be as OP as any other legendary, but A. The deck has to be built around him, and B. You have to have intelligence and a good sense of humor to utilize him.

Duplication of your opponent's spells is an obvious upside for Cho. It literally grants you a 31st, 32nd, ext. card to your deck, based on what your opponent is playing, kind of like an active mind vision. Put behind a large taunt, you're essentially changing the nature of that creature. A deathlord 2/8 or a fen creeper 3/6 is one thing, and a deathlord/fen creeper with the subtext "your opponent gains the spell you use to get this creature off the board" is quite another.

I'm here to talk about what people really haven't talked about. Duplication of your spells into your opponent's hands. Players in hearthstone are limited to a 10 hand size, and if they overdraw, whatever card they overdraw is wasted, burned. Say your opponent is holding 8 cards. If you have 2 spells (particularly weak ones or naturalize) It is well worth it to shoot them off with Cho on the board, filling your opponent's hand. You'll A, burn incoming cards, and B. HAVE KNOWLEDGE OF TWO OF THE CARDS IN YOUR OPPONENT'S HAND. You have to ask yourself, would you rather your opponent have (potentially) a Ragnaros, a Mind control, or a Sneed's Old Shredder, or a Moonfire and a healing touch (that you know for certain he has). The answer is obvious, but these are the things you have to be thinking about when a Cho is on the board.

People treat Cho like he's a joke of a legendary. When you see him torch the opponent's Sneed's and Tirion Fordring, that it would take 3 or 4 cards to entirely counter, because he was too busy carrying a coin and a spare part for you, you won't care about 0/4 stats or what's going on on the field. You'll be too busy saying "this is awesome." One good aspect to him having such a weak body is that it counters Mirror Entity and thought stealing effects quite well, although Cho is SUCH a non-fighter that the spare part reversing switch will bring his time with you to a swift and unfortunate close. If you have two creatures aside from Cho, Cho also counters mind control. Whatever gets mind controlled, just steal it right back, and attack with the other creature. The priest will have to give up fighting for possession of the first creature, or the second creature will eventually kill him as you waste entire turns fighting for control.

I've gotten to the point where I won't hesitate to use a naturalize with a Cho on the board. The reason is, the spell itself takes up a space in the hand, and it makes the opponent draw two cards, enough to fill up their hands from 7. Naturalize is a mixed bag as a spell, it gets you reverse card advantage you need to win as mill druid, but often you need card draw and card velocity too, so it really doesn't hurt you too hard if one is used upon you either, provided that BOTH of your naturalizes aren't used against you. Yeah, it'll zap one of your big creatures, but as mill, you're not really playing to win the board, you're playing to burn cards and get to the fatigue stage of the game. Often, your opponents will misplay, targeting Cho with the naturalize, killing him, but essentially giving you a third naturalize, one of mill druid deck's best cards in triplicate. All of this plays into a very simple truth that people forget about when dealing with this card. If you cast fireball on me, and I cast fireball back at you, and Cho duplicates both, we haven't traded evenly.  Yes, the cards and the six damage have been traded evenly, but we've also each wasted 4 mana and maybe two creatures, as well as that percentage of the turn in question. If my goal is to waste time, keep a clear board, and stall the game out, that may be more opportune for me.

Realized something today, this guy is OP as all hell when paired with youthful brewmaster. He doesn't even need to be on the field. I was playing mill druid, vs a murloc shaman, and he plops this guy down. OK, I faceless, naturalize, get him, have 4 spare mana, so I figure, hell, seems like a fun card, I'll play with it. Drop a youthful brewmaster, back into my hand it goes. This kicked off a portion of the game where I ended up with more murlocs than my opponent, and that includes all the synergy that comes with those cards. After I picked him up and dropped him a second time, my opponent conceded, the board looking like I was the one with the arranged deck of murlocs. 8 cheap, very playable cards is pretty much guaranteed to wipe out at least a huge portion of whatever is in his hand and get you board control, and in the meanwhile you'll be drawing your own normal stuff as "Reinforcements" to all this craziness.

With moon fire this works.