Hearthpwn

Golden version please with flying  carrots!

Justicar is the real problem here, it's simply too good for warrior in anything but a very aggro meta. The mirror match has long been decided by who draws her first, now with a secondary random draw around c'thun if you're playing that flavour. Shield Slam is just the icing on the cake.

The meta should always prefer multi-minion, board control, mid-range decks, with control and aggro being valid but less popular options around the periphery, anything else is a failure in game design.

The increase in cost was a good move but it's not the change required.

I drop big but slow fatty on turn 7/8/9/10, you BGH it. I have nothing, you have a body, you got the value and tempo.

Hard removal (hex, polymorph etc) may be cheaper in terms of mana, but it's still one card for one card for one card (and often I'm left with some kind of token to compensate).

Not a bad nerf, but not the right nerf.

I'm going to give Fireguard another go, there's plenty of other four drops (Evolution, another Fireguard or a reduced cost Thing) to follow up at 4 mana, before hitting 6 the turn after. 

Good points about doomhammer, but personally with no sludge Belcher about I'm going to try the old finisher combos for a while.

Here's my not entirely dissimilar list, I'm struggling for early drops at present and wondering if trying to manhandle a totem deck, overload deck and combo finisher into 30 cards is just silly.

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/464718-next-gen-shaman

Worth trying to fit in Chillmaw here?

Tundra Rhino working well, played a couple of games where they couldn't remove it on turn 5 as I had board control and it's pretty tough, dropped Savannah on six and it was pretty much over after that, either charged for face or traded and then had the Hyena's charge for face - amazing combo.

Thanks for the deck and a very Merry Christmas Spark!

Quote from DMaster2 >>

I really like this card, it makes turn one (especially if you go first) not auto-pass. And it's actually nice to have anytime of the duel to excavate something you need. The 1 mana loss is covered if you get a good or great card.

If you pick minions you are going to get random, like your arena picks (and usually there there is at least a decent card especially in the common slots).

But it really shines when you pick spells.

Must pick [4/27]:

Wrath, Savage Roar, Swipe, Force of Nature

Good picks [6/27]:

Innervate, Living Roots, Wild Growth, Mulch, Nourish, Starfall

Average picks [7/27]:

Claw, Mark of the Wild, Power of the Wild, Mark of Nature, Bite, Starfire, Raven Idol

Bad/Very Situational picks [10/27]:

Moonfire, Naturalize, Savagery, Healing Touch, Astral Communion, Poison Seeds, Soul of the Forest, Dark Wispers, Recycle, Tree of Life

Considering you are picking between 3 cards you have a nice chance to get a must have or good card in the pool (sorry but i sucks at probability so no precise percentage).

Thanks for the feedback, a couple of good tech options there.

Though I'm mainly concerned about whether those Crackles will do enough to justify inclusion.

No Unbound Elemental as he's simply too slow, a 2/4 for 3 mana with no instant effect is a terrible 3-drop in the current game which is full of better 3/4 3-drops.

Worth having some fun with in decks with deathrattle combos - Feign Death or Reincarnate - but if you want to edge up your winrates by a few percent by running only the most competitive decks (which is understandable) then there's nout for you here in the forseeable future. Personally I'd keep him, he's solid if slow.

The meta isn't currently expensive, you can compete with relatively cheap decks if you concentrate your resources. The key is completing your daily quests.

Play casual not ranked, build your card collection intelligently, dust anything that no one ever uses (most cards) and buy the rares you need. Cancel out any quest that doesn't fit the 2-3 classes you've chosen to learn, you can build a backlog of three quests, so you shouldn't need to play many games with any other classes. If you get stuck then play the tavern brawl, preferably when it's a pre-made deck challenge.

Build towards this for starters in Paladin (it only has one epic in it, the rest is rare at best):

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/270278-budget-aggro-paladin-aggrodin-legend-grinder

Yes, you may need to buy Naxx if this proves too tough or too time consuming, but it's really a small cost compared to most console/PC games you might buy, play for 20 hours and then never touch again. 

I wouldn't suggest a nerf, just a kezan-style neutral minion that could counter the effect to some extent as a possible check/balance. After all, Sylvanas is already a top tier legendary.

If it's not OP then no one would play the counter. Just seems a sensible design precaution. 

It looks like Blizzard is keen to give us a slower meta with more big fatties played.

If this works out will Mind Control and Sylvanas become simply too powerful.

Maybe a hard counter that kills mind controlled minions might be needed? Or will more powerful board clears be enough to prevent any problem?

The card has the potential to hugely increase your damage output for just 2 mana. If you use minions with a lot more health than attack, which priest often does and could arguably do more of.

In that respect it's a lot like Savage Roar and Bloodlust.

Savage Roar sees play because of Force of Nature, which creates an instant board, Bloodlust has a lot less play as you have to build a board  before it's effective.

However, with the use of Deathlord and its like, you not only get a hard to remove board (and one that provides defense through taunt), but also a board that receives an attack buff of up +6,  far more than Bloodlust provides.

The sheer presence of this card will also force players into bad plays, as they'll have to calculate the impact of Confuse if it's played in the next turn, which will take up valuable thinking time too.

I'd be amazed if this doesn't create a new kind of priest deck, it may not end up being super-competitive, but as with Reincarnate for Shaman there's going to have to be a lot of experimentation before we know that, and in a shifting meta it's impossible to write it off.

Most interesting card to date I'd say.

Inspire cards so far look weak/slow individually, but a number of them we've seen are quite sticky and with two or more on the board their effects will snowball quickly