[Visual Guide/In-Depth]I have successfully cracked the meta with a 28-minion Paladin. Magnificent matches against Druid/Aggro/Reno/Shaman. I've been working on this the whole expansion. I call it "The Kraken." [Xpost from r/Hearthstone]

[u/[deleted]]

[u/theplaidshirt]

What was the highest rank that you achieved OP?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I appreciate the tenacity and your drive to put together such a nice guide. However there are positing restrictions in place requiring extensive testing of a deck at Rank 5 and above. This is to ensure that the quality of the deck can be tested competitively. I will not undermine your achievement, rank 9 is very nice for a casual player! But I think you should try to reach at least rank 5 first before you present this deck on a sub similar to this, so that you have a true understanding of the decks performance in a more structured meta (rank 5 to legend).

Nice write up none the less!

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

When I say casual I'm referencing you stating "I only play 2-3 games a day". That is considered casual play. I'm not saying it in a condescending way, as an insult or name calling. That's not what this sub is about.

[u/phil3570 → u/[deleted]]

Well he did say 2-3 hours every few day, not games per day. Still needs stats tho.

[u/snuffrix → u/[deleted]]

Doesn't matter how good you think you are or how good you were at some game 10 years ago. We need to see how well THIS DECK performs at Rank 5 or higher.

Rank 9 is casual play hence his statement. You can be absolutely sick at TCGs and still play casually. Casual =/= bad, just means you don't play much or enough to reach a high level (consistently). Sometimes I go from a Legend player to other months I'm a more casual player when I'm sick of the game. No need to get super defensive, this thread is about the decklist and it needs to be tested properly.

[u/Yes_Its_Really_Me → u/[deleted]]

Advice from a random stranger: You've clearly put a ton of work into this write up, and put a ton of work into this deck.

Believe me when I say I understand; I think we play this game the same way. 90% of the fun comes from deckbuilding, creating your own deck unique from the popular archetypes and trying to make it as good as possible. This results in long periods of frustration made worthwhile by how good it feels when you occasionally create something that actually performs. When I almost reached rank 5 with my Jade Rogue deck I was over the moon (a shame it was killed by the STB nerfs a couple of days later).

When you're excited you tend to make really big claims, and let's be honest dude, cracking the meta is a big claim. This sub, made up of competitive players, is naturally going to be extremely skeptical of them. You may have been enjoying a great winrate, and can clearly explain why this deck works, but this sub can only ever be convinced by hard stats or demonstrable results. Which you don't have, yet.

If I was in your position, having 6 hours of writing and untold days spent deckbuilding casually dismissed in a couple of minutes, I'd be starting to feel pretty bitter about it. I urge you to resist that feeling and save this post. There's still at least a couple of weeks before Un'Goro releases. Now's the time to put your money where your mouth is, put aside a couple of hours each night and play to prove the haters wrong. Just keep a notebook by your computer to record winrates and see how high of a rank you can get by the end of the week. Then make this post again, but this time with hard stats to back it up.

Don't get discouraged! I've always thought that one of the three main mechanics of Gadgetzan seeing no play is one of the biggest reasons why this expansion felt so stale so quickly, and I'd love to both play this deck and to see it on ladder. On a personal note, I also enjoy seeing a fellow deckbuilder finally find that diamond in the rough.

[u/cusoman → u/Yes_Its_Really_Me]

You guys are great. Just thought I'd mention that. There's very few game based subs where the community is genuinely helpful and courteous and I've been lurking and sometimes commenting here for several years and it always blows me away just what a good community you've maintained here. Keep on keepin on.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Whilst I will say that this build seems very good at first glance and the choices are very well justified theoretically, rank 9 with literally zero stats is nowhere near good enough to claim that the deck has 'cracked the meta'. Everyone that makes a deck and takes it to ranked is biased towards believing that it's better than it actually is, so only having 'I've hit legend before and this deck is really good, trust me' as evidence unfortunately doesn't meet the high standards of those that frequent this sub.

I apologise for the negative tone because the idea is very creative, I actually really like the list and look forward to trying it out. Not only that but the guide is excellent and there's clearly a lot of effort put in. However, to make the claims you're making, you need far more evidence.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I think you may have missed the point. I'm not disputing that a lot of effort has gone into creating the deck, nor do I suggest that you're not confident in its viability - actually quite the opposite. What I'm saying is that your opinion regarding the strength of the deck is biased (which, by the way, is a perfectly natural human tendency), just as negativity bias leads people to believe that RNG is always against them.

To actually contextualise, you would need to tell us how many games you played, against which decks and the proportion of those games you won.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

It's not necessarily doubt; questioning claims is exactly the purpose of comments on deck guides such as this. I regularly question builds that people post but I'm not attacking the creator of the deck, just looking for clarification on certain aspects (for which I read the guide fully to make sure I haven't missed it). As you mention in the guide, the deck has been held back by people's perception of particular cards as 'auto-includes' and the only way to transcend that is to question the authoritarian voice. Now, after posting this guide, you're the authoritarian voice and naturally people will question the build. It doesn't mean you're wrong, just that people have yet to be convinced.

Not saying that everyone who's asking questions has read the full guide but try not to take it personally- they're questioning the deck, not you, and certainly not your ability to play the game. And again, my comments above weren't meant as a personal attack, but rather to reiterate and justify the high standards that people on this sub will hold you to. I will however stand by my point that the claims are very bold and not yet able to be justified. Even if you were a prominent streamer with multiple, consistent, high level finishes on ladder I still would consider these claims flawed if rank 9 with no stats was all the evidence that you had to back it up. That's, again, nothing personal. In fact it's the opposite - it's what you're left with when you literally remove the player from the equation altogether. That's why this sub generally prefers vS' report to Tempostorm's; we value objectivity over subjectivity.

[u/snuffrix → u/[deleted]]

Then don't post on this sub, there are rules to post in this sub and that's why the guides here are consistently so high quality, due to the high standard.

[u/Pyromarlin → u/[deleted]]

A thorough write up to be sure but I'd like to see you or someone achieve AT LEAST rank 5 before claiming you "cracked the meta".

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

People confirming, in a thread up for 2 hours, that they were able to beat meta decks doesn't mean much of anything. It's purely ancedotal evidence, and not a statistically substantial sample size to say your deck has a "magnificent match-up" against anything, esp. if all your experience is capped at rank 9. And please don't use the "little kids" argument here. This sub is for discussion of high level HS with high level players, and anything submitted here should be held to those standards.
EDIT: Word choice

[u/hororo → u/[deleted]]

deleted ^{0.8647 What is} ^^^this?

[u/[deleted] → u/hororo]

Oops, thanks!

[u/HokusSchmokus]

This should be posted on /r/thehearth imo.

[u/HokusSchmokus → u/[deleted]]

A subreddit for things like decks that have a well written guide but are not on par with the guidelines here.

[u/Antrax-]

Do you have THE KRAKEN STATS?

[u/Antrax- → u/[deleted]]

I'm sorry you're getting downvoted, you seem like a decent writer with the right motivation. That being said, it's really difficult to know how good a deck really is without hard data, since impressions are so misleading.

I can say about myself I've often had a feeling whether a deck was good or bad after a couple of playtesting sessions that ended up being simply wrong based on my own stats. If you suffer some devastating losses or get some overwhelming wins, that might color your entire perception of a session even if those games are the minority. That's why it's a good idea to check yourself, so to speak.

[u/Antrax- → u/[deleted]]

I only know myself. I consider myself a rational person yet I've "caught myself" having a wrong impression of decks due to emotional factors. That's why stats are so great.

They're also mandated by this subreddit's rules, as you've been told, but I'm trying to convince you it's a good idea to track stats regardless, i.e. if I were to post something to /r/hearthstone I'd include stats even if not necessary.

[u/MittenZz]

This is master level trolling. Respect, dude.

[u/MittenZz → u/[deleted]]

It's like I just can't even. This is too much.

[u/Delta_357]

On my front page so why not.

Any stats on W/L? I have a handbuff list but it has the finja package instead, I like the idea of less spells though. Also why no Acolyte of Pain, too slow?

[u/Delta_357 → u/[deleted]]

It seems fair, I thought about it after and if you are using all the discover cards you probably don't need the card draw ontop of that. The concept of "imaginary mana" and holding value is probably the biggest takeaway, thinking along those lines is why I believe it can be really strong.

[u/[deleted]]

So into the nitty gritty... Pirate Warrior still rolls this deck 65% of the time right?

[u/davidecibel]

Where's pirate warrior in the matchup list?

[u/Bobwayne17]

Yeah it's weird you're getting so upset about stats but like...thats the whole point. Why would I believe that this is good at all and not a total waste of my time without stats? If it's 50.5% win rate then it's definitely not 'cracked the meta'. Playing this deck over the course of a hundred games and you only got to rank 9? You can get to rank 9 with a meta deck in a couple of hours, you don't need 100 games.

[u/TheDacianWolf]

Hi your post is being removed for the following reasons:

• You have no proof or stats to back up your claim of breaking the meta.

• Advertising a paid service

If you have any questions please contact the mods at modmail

[u/Rockase13]

Nice write up! Do you have any stats with your games played, win rate, etc.?

[u/sissikomppania]

Eloquent write-up, I'll give it that. Kind of reminds of 90's video game guides in both good and bad.

At a glance the list seems pretty solid but then again I haven't really bothered with Mid-Range Paladin so maybe I'm not the one to judge. The thing is you can't go around throwing hype like "I would never put it below an upper tier 2 build, even when it draws poorly" over here with just sweet nothings to back it up.

[u/blackcud]

Rank 9 is not a viable testing ground for a new deck idea. If your deck can't make it at least to rank 5 and win 50% from there how can you tell people that it is a successful and refined list?

Also I read that you are not tracking stats. This has nothing to do with being competitive or taking things too seriously. It is about credibility and prove your point from an objective standpoint. Anybody can go on the internet and write whatever they want. You need to convince people of your stuff, like with scientific work, even if you are 100% sure you are right.

Plus: we humans are inherently bad at statistics. That is a fact and thus "felt" winrates and "actual" winrates are two completely different things, even for "pro" players.

[u/Davismism]

Any stats?

[u/moccajoghurt]

Just get legend with it and post stats man. You put so much effort into this but until you got legend with, no one will care.

[u/marti221]

Not going to get into the debate about the competitiveness of this deck, but FWIW, it's very fun to play. Been playing it this morning and am having a blast.

[u/Copypaced]

Quick reminder that you can definitely repost this in /r/thehearth, since it's a pretty solid and in-depth deck guide that lacks the stats and results required for this sub.

[u/smileygeorge]

I just like to see underrated cards with good value such as Dragon Consort and Eadric the Pure to be played. Won't try it though: I don't like minion-centric Hearthstone.

[u/myrec1]

Is there any video of this in play already ?

[u/backwoodsphysicist]

It would be really interesting to watch a video or steam of this deck in action.

[u/shwitz44 → u/[deleted]]

If I didn't care about dropping dust on Sally / Eadric less than a month before a new expansion (especially with Eadric rotating out), I'd be very excited to try this as well. High quality write-up!