Hearthpwn

As the title states, using Deckbuilder on the mobile site on any iOS device is futile, as when you’ve added a card to the deck, you cannot remove it. Right click (tap-and-hold) functionality is broken in the deckbuilder and merely highlights the text of the card.

Tested on all iOS browsers that I can think of (Safari, Chrome, Firefox). Extremely frustrating and time-wasting. Have to redo any deckbuilder session if I misclick. I know this subject has been broached multiple times (I looked at other threads before posting this), but many are years old and I wanted to reiterate on it in case the problem was forgotten about.

Nerfing Barnes’ effect won’t “destroy” Big Priest, they just won’t include the card anymore, and it will retool the archetype for exactly what it should be: a greedy late-game control deck. It still has the ability to cheat the mana curve on turn 6. Changing Barnes’ effect will do nothing to harm its utter dominance over similar control decks.

I’m plenty open-minded to ideas surrounding changes or nerfs to Big Priest, it just seems as though you aren’t, considering you’re utterly convinced Barnes is the main problem. There’s plenty of problems with Big Priest. The only other archetype that cheats the mana curve as hard as it does would probably either be Evolve Shaman or Ramp Druid, and neither have the consistency that Big Priest has *even without* Barnes. The entire archetype is flawed and needs some serious retooling. Plenty of problem cards, and I will reiterate that I include Barnes on that list.

Personally, his mana cost isn’t the problem, it’s his actual effect and the insanity surrounding it. Nerfing him to 5 does nothing but delay the same egregiously one-sided gameplay by a single turn. That’s absolutely nothing. Either the effect needs to be targeted or other aspects of the Big Priest need to be considered.

Quote from danklesminky >>

There are plenty of counters and tech cards for big priest. I've been playing Reno priest in wild lately and teched in a lot of ways to deal with big threats and a potion of madness to deal with Barnes on turn 4 and haven't lost against one since.

 Let’s go through some of the “counters” and “tech cards” for Big Priest, shall we?

1. Hard removal. The only class with enough hard removal to comfortably deal with every single one of Big Priest’s major threats is Rogue, and that’s provided the Rogue specs every Assassinate, Walk the Plank, Vilespine Slayer, and Spellstone available to them, as well as draws them all in time. Other than that, most other classes have mostly soft removal, and good luck trying to find, and draw, enough soft removal to deal with 4 Y’Shaarj in a row. 

2. Gravelsnout Knight/Saronite Taskmaster/Hungry Dragon/ any minion that summons another minion for your opponent. Nullified by Eternal Servitude’s Discover mechanic, unless you run as many as possible and hope to god they fill that Discover panel.

3. Polymorph/Devolve/Hex/Potion of Polymorph/ any transform effect. Nullified by Eternal Servitude’s Discover mechanic.

4. Potion of Madness/ Cabal Shadow Priest/ any minion steal effect. This is literally the only viable counter, and even then, they have more big wincon minions in their deck unless you stuff yours with answers. Noticing a pattern here?

Alright, so one class has an effective/viable answer, and it’s the problem class in the first place. A single class in the entire roster can viably deal with Big Priest’s game plan. You don’t consider that a problem?

I’d say a real fix for Barnes would be to restrict his effect to minions that cost 4 or less. The effect would still be strong, but would be much less polarizing. You could even make it “Discover a 1/1 copy of a minion in your deck that costs 4 or less and summon it” and I think it would still be balanced.

However, I still stand by my point that Eternal Servitude is the real issue with the deck, in the early and the late game. Delaying their power spike by two turns does not reduce their ability to get to that turn 6.

Quote from DiamondDM13 >>

Quote from TTVdark4tress >>

Even Shaman is insanely strong, but no one card in its list (besides Genn and the Even mechanic in general) cramps the design space. This is completely different in regards to cards like Eternal Servitude, or Barnes, or Jade Idol, or Kingsbane, or any other card you could argue has a game-limiting effect.

 Just out of curiosity, what do you mean with limiting design space, specifically about the cards you mention in the second sentence?

Eternal Servitude doesn't limit design, Barnes technically should have limited designed, but has not limited and that is the reason we have Big Priest and the sole problematic card in that deck. Jade Idol didn't limit design space at all, there is no card design that cannot be considered because it exists, and on top of that, it created space for specific designs against it. Kingsbane somewhat limits design space solely with regards to what kind of Weapon enchantments can be printed. They cannot print any insanely powerful enchantment which breaks the game in fatigue mode, since otherwise, Kingsbane's ability is not even relevant, solely in fatigue mode.

Genn and Baku do seriously limit design space for anything in it's respective restriction that creates broken combinations cannot therefore be given that cost.

 Eternal Servitude limits the design space in that there is only so much you can introduce in terms of Deathrattle before the effect becomes overbearing (hint: it already is). No other resurrection effect has this problem, besides maybe the Spellstone. If, for example, they were to print a very strong 3 Mana Deathrattle card, you wouldn’t even need to play the Big Priest archetype to take advantage of how disgusting Servitude is, you could just play a tempo or midrange Deathrattle Priest and pop Servitude on curve. 

The problem is not Barnes, because with previous Resurrect cards you could just remove Barnes as well and screw the Priest if they low-rolled Barnes on their Res. The problem is Eternal Servitude’s consistency. The problem is Priest’s low-cost value plays. Shaman’s resurrection mechanics, for example, basically require you to stick Big minions on the board for at least one turn, or lose some of their value in order to get them to return (see: Sylvanas into Reincarnate).

A possibility could be that you could have Eternal Servitude only able to discover a minion that died *last turn*. That would reduce the consistency somewhat and open opportunities to hinder Big Priest’s ability to steamroll at all points in the game.

I included the fact that just because a deck is or is not meta, and is or is not the top-winrate deck, does NOT implicate it as healthy/unhealthy to the game state. Jade Druid, as a deck, was only Tier 1 for a very short time, and yet Jade Idol as a card is completely unhealthy for the game and will remain that way. The winrate of Jade Druid in Wild continues to drop, but this does not change the fact that Jade Idol is an effect that thins the design space. This is an argument that I will always hold to, as cards that have polarizing and egregiously strong effects will remain that way, regardless of the deck winrates that include them.

Regardless, your counterpoint that “nobody complains about Even Shaman/Odd Rogue/insert deck here” is flawed, since I happen to have seen PLENTY of discussion surrounding the Even/Odd mechanics as a whole and how they harm competitive diversity. Even Shaman is insanely strong, but no one card in its list (besides Genn and the Even mechanic in general) cramps the design space. This is completely different in regards to cards like Eternal Servitude, or Barnes, or Jade Idol, or Kingsbane, or any other card you could argue has a game-limiting effect.

Barnes is a problem, sure, but I think the main problem is Eternal Servitude. The effect is overtuned.

Barnes is completely based on RNG, whereas Eternal Servitude can guarantee a 10-Mana wincon minion for 4 Mana, after you already had to remove it. That’s disgusting levels of value. Eternal Servitude is a cool card, but has way too many problem spots in its current form to stay how it is.

If they want to keep it at 4 mana, they need to change the effect in some way, or they need to up the Mana cost for the effect it has. At least 7 Mana, in my opinion.

I must be doing something wrong, because every Jade Druid deck I play can’t hope to outvalue Big Priest if they can get their Eternal Servitude shenanigans rolling. How can Jade Druid hope to beat 3 Lich King/Y’Shaarj/Obsidian Statue/Velen in a row? There aren’t enough solid removal options available to Druid if Big Priest gets what they want off of Barnes, and even if they don’t you need to at least tech in both Naturalize and Mulch to even hope to keep up, and that’s if you even draw them.

In Wild normal Play mode, depending on the day, about 1/3 to 1/4 of my games are against some form of Big Priest. It peaked yesterday when about 10/13 of my games were against Big Priest. This is a real glaring issue with Wild right now.

I’d like to clarify that I have nothing against (most) meta decks and the people that play them. However, I hold a  definite grudge against people who play the Solitaire archetypes: Mill Rogue, Freezemage, Big Priest, Mecha’Thun Warlock, etc. These decks usually have sufficient counters to keep their winrates and playrates down. Big Priest really does not. It shits on everything: control, aggro, midrange. There is no definable counter to the archetype, in fact, it’s completely down to their Barnes rolls, or their opening hand if they get enough early removal versus aggro. There is no counterplay to it and no viable tech for it.

In my opinion, the main problem is *not* the Resurrect mechanic in itself, or Priest’s ability to stall to drop a shit ton of large minions. Resurrect, as a card and as an effect, used to be for the most part random. Then Eternal Servitude came out. The glaring issue with Eternal Servitude is that you can *pick* what to bring back. So even if you manage to hold on to both of your Hexes as Shaman, for example, and you Hex their biggest targets, if they can stick at least one of their big minions to the board, you’re still skewered by the ability for them to decide what to bring back. The Hexes mean nothing, whereas, Hex was extremely strong against earlier forms of the Res Priest. Eternal Servitude is *too* consistent, and with the rest of the tools offered to the archetype, allows way too much of a suffocating force for Priest to use in an archetype that should be fully about late game. Big Priest no longer needs to stall out as long, and they no longer need to rely on complete RNG.

I know that Blizzard cares little for the sanctity of the Wild format, but this archetype is a serious, serious problem. It’s unhealthy, it’s stale, and it’s just plain unfun to play and to face. Especially when so much of the recent Wild format is *just* Big Priest. I’m extremely sick of it.

I edited the deck, thanks for catching that. Test out the Loot Hoarders, because I think this deck does need more card draw.

Aaaand, I am dumb. The central idea in the deck was surrounding what I thought was a powerful synergy between Genn Greymane and Justicar Trueheart. Upon further inspection, however, the cards do not work together at all, as Genn only affects your *starting* hero power. That is very disappointing and invalidates the entire deck. Going to leave it up as a testament to my stupidity, however. Hopefully you all get a kick out of seeing overenthusiastic theorycrafting in action.

Yeah, I am definitely having fun with it myself. Nothing like having a hand of extremely cheap, extremely strong, randomly generated spells. I outburned a Burn Mage yesterday, which still makes me chuckle.

Thanks for checking out and upping the deck, much appreciated :)