The Paladin hero ability is simply terrible, and their class cards are built around healing and buffing single targets.
Anything is possible if you're just playing for fun, but for ladder climbing, you just don't have the parts to make that particular machine run.
Having said that, Aggro Paladin is perfectly viable, and kind of close in theme.
Yeah, I made the mistake of thinking this thread was about tempo paladin when I first skimmed it. Frostwyrm lair is gonna make that deck sort of interesting. Still not as good as what other classes can do, but that's paladin for you.
Avenge is an incredibly dead card until hunters cycle out of the meta, though.
It's bad enough trying to run single one-off secrets in a control deck, decks that rely on secrets for serious momentum will fall apart consistently in the current meta. (Unless they are themselves hunters. Trollface here.)
It's probably better to just play shaman. Throwing out taunt and heal totems every turn and then bloodlusting/flametonguing for the easy win is always going to beat what paladins can manage.
I've been playing since closed beta. Thousands of ranked games, dating back to the days of the old Masters 3 star system and no ranking ladder. Pretty much all of those games spent playing paladin, and usually control. I'm currently Rank 7, but haven't been playing very much, waiting for naxx to shake out.
It's true of all classes, but it's especially important with paladin right now. How you play and your decisionmaking are much more important than decklists. You can't expect to pick up a pro's deck and play it to anywhere near its full potential after a few games. That's just not going to happen. Sure, some of the decks you see linked are tailored for a certain meta that doesn't exist on your part of the ladder, but a large part of getting value out of a deck is understanding why it's put together the way it is, how and what to mulligan against who, et cetera. This can be really hard to do if the decklist doesn't come with a ten-page article.
I know what you're thinking. "But Zeriel, pfft, people netdeck these rush decks just fine!" Yeah, because they take next to zero thought to play. Zoolock is bottable. Hunter isn't much better. If you want to netdeck, definitely netdeck these decks. They're pretty easy to play. If you're going to play control, though, there's no substitute for tinkering with your decks yourselves: not because your deck will be better than a pro's at the end of the day (it'll probably be slightly worse, even if it's really good), but because you'll understand exactly how to play it.
Play hundreds of games. Then play thousands. Figure out what works for you. Don't reinvent the wheel, but dig into the guts of the game and really understand what you're doing turn to turn. If you're losing against a certain matchup over and over again and there's an easy counter card to throw in but no one runs it because it's "not a good card", hell, try it anyway. Worst case scenario you go down a few ranks, take it out, go up. Best case scenario, you go on a streak.
My current deck is something like that. It has some common cards with the decks you'll see listed for control paladins, but it also has some they don't run. Every time I've tried to "netdeck" control paladin decks, I've gone down ranks, and said to myself, "What the hell are these guys thinking?" I'm sure if they played my decks, they'd say the same thing.
When someone claims to be a "professional SC2 player" do they just mean they play in tournaments that offer decent cash prizes, or are there people literally making a living (not parents' basement) year after year. I realize the top players who are on teams, sponsored, living in gaming houses, most popular super streamers, Korean, etc, do, but how many 20 somethings who call themselves professionals are pulling this off? Just curious.
A lot of "sponsored" players get their living expenses paid for. This may not sound like much to someone with an engineering degree or a white collar job, but considering most people in the world work all day just to afford housing + food, it ain't a bad deal. Can't speak to the guy's personal situation, though, have no clue who he is.
Only thing you really have to worry about is unlucky draws against a warlock deck (which admittedly makes up half the current meta, but w/e, these are tournaments.)
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Yeah, I made the mistake of thinking this thread was about tempo paladin when I first skimmed it. Frostwyrm lair is gonna make that deck sort of interesting. Still not as good as what other classes can do, but that's paladin for you.
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Avenge is an incredibly dead card until hunters cycle out of the meta, though.
It's bad enough trying to run single one-off secrets in a control deck, decks that rely on secrets for serious momentum will fall apart consistently in the current meta. (Unless they are themselves hunters. Trollface here.)
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It's probably better to just play shaman. Throwing out taunt and heal totems every turn and then bloodlusting/flametonguing for the easy win is always going to beat what paladins can manage.
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Poking my head in with some thoughts:
I've been playing since closed beta. Thousands of ranked games, dating back to the days of the old Masters 3 star system and no ranking ladder. Pretty much all of those games spent playing paladin, and usually control. I'm currently Rank 7, but haven't been playing very much, waiting for naxx to shake out.
It's true of all classes, but it's especially important with paladin right now. How you play and your decisionmaking are much more important than decklists. You can't expect to pick up a pro's deck and play it to anywhere near its full potential after a few games. That's just not going to happen. Sure, some of the decks you see linked are tailored for a certain meta that doesn't exist on your part of the ladder, but a large part of getting value out of a deck is understanding why it's put together the way it is, how and what to mulligan against who, et cetera. This can be really hard to do if the decklist doesn't come with a ten-page article.
I know what you're thinking. "But Zeriel, pfft, people netdeck these rush decks just fine!" Yeah, because they take next to zero thought to play. Zoolock is bottable. Hunter isn't much better. If you want to netdeck, definitely netdeck these decks. They're pretty easy to play. If you're going to play control, though, there's no substitute for tinkering with your decks yourselves: not because your deck will be better than a pro's at the end of the day (it'll probably be slightly worse, even if it's really good), but because you'll understand exactly how to play it.
Play hundreds of games. Then play thousands. Figure out what works for you. Don't reinvent the wheel, but dig into the guts of the game and really understand what you're doing turn to turn. If you're losing against a certain matchup over and over again and there's an easy counter card to throw in but no one runs it because it's "not a good card", hell, try it anyway. Worst case scenario you go down a few ranks, take it out, go up. Best case scenario, you go on a streak.
My current deck is something like that. It has some common cards with the decks you'll see listed for control paladins, but it also has some they don't run. Every time I've tried to "netdeck" control paladin decks, I've gone down ranks, and said to myself, "What the hell are these guys thinking?" I'm sure if they played my decks, they'd say the same thing.
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Oops, forgot to be helpful.
Here's two examples from fairly decent streamers:
Veev: http://i.imgur.com/BxxyH1d.jpg?1
Kolento: http://i.imgur.com/hVTWgah.jpg (Fair warning that I've never actually seen him use this deck, so it might be out of date.)
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You pretty much need every major legendary (6-7) as Paladin to be competitive at the highest level, so you sort of answered your own question.
It's not a bad class, but not particularly dominant right now either. Definitely can get you close to the top, though.
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A lot of "sponsored" players get their living expenses paid for. This may not sound like much to someone with an engineering degree or a white collar job, but considering most people in the world work all day just to afford housing + food, it ain't a bad deal. Can't speak to the guy's personal situation, though, have no clue who he is.
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Probably equality + pyromancer.
Only thing you really have to worry about is unlucky draws against a warlock deck (which admittedly makes up half the current meta, but w/e, these are tournaments.)
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Zeriel