What can be done to steer priest away from just the rez/big strat?

Regardless of how you feel about the playstyle it is hard to argue that the class has not been tethered to this strategy for a long time now. Classes are supposed to have some variety but it seems that right now priest is tethered to the 'Big'/Rez poster child image.

Perhaps if the class had a new midrange archtype pushed its way it might shake the class up.

What do you think?

I'm not sure how it would be done, but I'd be glad to see any change like this. Big priest has scared me away from wild games since the start of the year of the dragon. Seeing a priest in wild is almost an instant concede for me. 

Well, i think they should change the spellstone, as their almost instant win card: I don't think a lot of decks can deal 4 rezzed minion twice in a game(or three, dependnon the upgrade), and the regular ress ([Hearthstone Card (Ressurect) Not Found] ,Eternal Servitude) in the same time.

The best solution imo should be a reduced ress nunmber (3 instead of 4 with greater amethyst), and remove the UNIQUE effect: then screwing up their ressurect pool should work better.

It does need to change.. I recently tried a stupid meme deck and got like 3-5 concedes just cause I was a priest in wild. I had no resurrect card at all in my deck!!  =<

As long as Big archetype is viable, no other archetype will ever contest its dominance within the Priest and meta population.

BP is  just too broken not to play it. I mean, it's not just its meta power (barely t2), it is exactly its brokenness that makes it extremely appealing: it's the pleasure of sh1tting in your opponent's face, regardless of the norms of the game (= a meme), and still win 1 of 2 games (= a meta deck).

And they should have learned by now that a Meme Meta Deck is a toxic paradox to keep in existance 

No matter if a more efficient Priest deck ever exists (which should also compete against other t1 decks, in order to be decently appealing, and it's not easy), as long as BP is viable, it will dominate and warp the whole Wild population.

BP needs to be nuked to t4 (and it would still be an incredibly popular deck), either with a massive mana nerf on several cards AND/OR a complete rework of the broken Graveyard mechanics.

Then, and only then, other Priest will naturally emerge and develop (probably starting from Dragon Priest).

i really want see dragon priest make a return somehow.

but as long as big/rezz priest is viable no other priest archetypes will shine in the light

One way to nerf the archetype without completely nuking it from orbit would be to have the game actually resurrect the dead minion rather than a copy of it. That is to say, if you resurrect your big dude and it's on the board, you can't resurrect it *again*, considering it's not dead, it's on the board. You'd have to wait for it to die before you can Res it again. While this wouldn't stop the deck entirely it would prevent it from turning one Lich King into many via Resurrect, Eternal Servitude& Mass Resurrect.

Alternately, if you just want to murder big priest, you could change resurrection effects so that a minion can only be brought back once.

How about bringing back exact copies of the Minion that died? So for instance, if you get a Lich King down to 1 Health when it dies, that's how it comes back. Still annoying, but a damn sight easier to deal with. 

Well, let me shamelessly share my deck. 

It's not entirely new to both Thief Priest and Nomi Priest players, it's actually a hybrid that is made viable by good ol' Radiant Elemental + the recent buffs to Extra Arms and Cloning Device.

Not the replacement to Big Priest we're looking for, but surprisingly good and satisfying to play. If you could give it an upvote, it could maybe hit some popularity as to enter the meta.

Let's make Priest Great again (not Big, just Great).

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High-roll decks should be meme decks: Playable and fun, but not consistent enough to be competitive. The problem with big Priest (at least in Wild) is that it has so many tools that the you get the high roll most of the time. That's why its so unstoppable---It's too consistent.

As far as a fix? I'd start with counters that affect the dead pool (similar to Exile in Magic). This could be a card the simply empties the deadpool, turns all minions in the deadpool to sheep, etc. Also more (playable) cards that summon garbage for the opponent. I think Bliz has tried to do this recently, but the cards are too slow and not otherwise playable except as a hard counter to res decks.

Quote From EndlessTides

How about bringing back exact copies of the Minion that died? So for instance, if you get a Lich King down to 1 Health when it dies, that's how it comes back. Still annoying, but a damn sight easier to deal with. 

I like that.. it keeps the Y'shaarj high roll but everything else is easier to deal with. 

Real copy brought back (1/1, 5/5, etc), and once a card is brought back from graveyard, the card is removed from there, until killed again (so no duplicates from GY, unless multiple copies are actually dead together, for some reason).

No nerf, just an entire rework, and BP would probably become the t4 deck it should be, as a meme deck.

While also not granting dust refund (/evilgrin).

Big Priest is almost the only viable deck for the class in Wild: there is no other archetype that have a decent win rate for the class. Reno Priest and Dragon are worst and others variant are plain terrible (VS report April-May 2019). People play Big Priest because it's the only deck you can play to have a decent climb with the class (at last until Rank 5, while from there aggro decks are make it harder to have a smooth run).

People don't play Big Priest because it's fun or because they want to slap their opponents in the face with a meme/meta deck (of course someone want that, but I think that they're just few), but because it's the only choice if you want to play as Priest. It's also pretty simple to play, so even a novice can reach a decent Rank with it without much efforts.

Actually the popularity of Big Priest is so high because the whole class is missing a good alternative. Priest has almost always lacked a decent finisher, leaving each archetype a less than effective deck. The only exception were Razakus (that deserved a nerf, but imho it was a bad one) and Dragon midrange (when they printed Drakonid Operative when midrange decks were strong archetypes for many classes). If Blizzard will never print a decent win condition, Priest will always remain an "attrition" class that can just stall the game exhausting its opponent resources while hoping they won't find their own finisher. The old Inner Fire + Divine Spirit combo has never been too good on the Wild Ladder.

If they're going to kill Big Priest, then the whole class will probably be kicked out from Tier 1 and 2 on Wild (I don't really know the Standard meta since I don't play it).

I was a Priest main, but I've turned away from the class since it's plain terrible how Devs have decided to just leave it in such an awfull condition for so much time. To properly play control while being at last competitive I've choose Warlock and I've discovered how it's so more structured under every aspect. The gap between the two is so plain that it's almost painfull.

Quote From Lightspoon

[...]

Actually the popularity of Big Priest is so high because the whole class is missing a good alternative. Priest has almost always lacked a decent finisher, leaving each archetype a less than effective deck.

[...]

I was a Priest main, but I've turned away from the class since it's plain terrible how Devs have decided to just leave it in such an awfull condition for so much time. 

[...]

I think you just contradicted yourself there, at least partly. You were a Priest main, but abandoned it, because you found it lackluster. You didn't dig into BP, even if you could.

Similarly, I seriously doubt the current Big Priest population is so large because most of them are Priest mains.

I also seriously doubt people move according to their main class at all. I would argue the meta populations are more defined by how the decks work and perform, much more than the class they belong to.

ie. I am a Rogue main, yet I use Even Shaman to climb, even if I could use an equally top tier Rogue deck (Odd Rogue). I just feel more confident with Even Shaman, and so that's my most used deck for ladder. Despite my main class.

Note: What I'm about to write below concerns wild. Priest's state in standard is abysmal because of its terrible classic set. If Blizzard want to fix priests awful standard state during the start of each year, they should either buff some of their classic cards, or introduce some new, strong, not broken classic cards.

People saying priest only has a single archetype in wild are plain wrong. What needs to happen for priest to shy away from their resurrect bullshit is a nuke. Nuke big priest, nerf it so hard that no one will ever want to play it again and the actual priest mains will show the rest of the community that the class is far from a one trick pony.

Control priest is still a strong deck that could easily reach tier 2 depending on the meta.

And dragon inner fire priest is a dark horse in my opinion. The deck has already been tier 1 multiple times but has always had an extremely small sample size. Not because of its matchup against big priest. But, in my opinion, because people just don't want to play priest because everyone dislikes the class in wild because of a single deck. And because of that, people will never see that there are still other strong priest decks and thus the only priest deck you ever see is big priest. Kind of a vicious cycle, really. And the only solution is a big, fat kaboom on Barnes and the resurrect cards.

Unnerf Raza.

I have honestly tried to do the Weenie Control with Surrender to Madness and Spirit of the Dead.  Needless to say, I'm eyeballing crafting that stupid Golden Barnes now.

Quote From RavenSunHS

I think you just contradicted yourself there, at least partly. You were a Priest main, but abandoned it, because you found it lackluster. You didn't dig into BP, even if you could.

I played Big Priest in different forms in the hope to find something interesting, but I failed: that archetype is awfully boring and pretty brainless. I changed class because other archetypes of Priest are not even close to Tier 2 in the actual meta. In order to play a control or combo deck I've turned to something else, not without sadness.

About the BP's population what I was trying to say is that it is dominating the entire Priest's popultion in Wild: almost everyone that is actually playing Priest, is doing so with Big Priest. If you want to use the class for a climb, you don't have many choice: go Big or prepare for an awfull time on Ladder.

Sorry if I wasn't very clear, but I don't "main" english :(

Sure you were clear, maybe i wasn't: my point is a large portion of BP players are actually "intruders", not really Priest players, just people who like memes and stomping with phat minions.

So that even if there is a different Priest t1 deck, the BP population would remain mostly the same (unless that t1 deck could also counter BP).

Ofc i have no proof, but your own case, plus an analysis of how Priest historically works, compared with BP, suggest the two things are only loosely related within the Priest population.

I think Blizzard should finally introduce proper Graveyard interactions into the game. Not only does it increase the complexity of the game, but also at the same time - gives us, players - a way to interact with BIG Priest.

The main attraction of BIG Priest is - it's super easy (if you full mulligan for Barnes, that's mostly enough...) and unfair at the same time (opponent can't interact with resurrects effectively).

My opinion (maybe a little unpopular) - resurrect can be a Priest-defining (iconic) mechanic. As in - Druid has mana ramp... Rogue has complex combo or bouncing (minion) mechanics... Priest can have a resurrection mechanics in a Basic set. HOWEVER - Blizzard should definitely provide us multiple interactions, to deal with opponent Graveyard.

We can also keep a resurrect mechanics mostly untouched (maybe only nerfing Barnes)... as long as there exists counter-play to resurrect.

Quote From ShotgunSoul

Unnerf Raza.

I think this is one of the most reasonable post here. Give more alternatives and we'll see less big priest around.

You want a real answer or a fantasy about a perfect world were everything is perfect? 

There are a feel ways and all involve create powerfull strategies.

You could unnerf Raza for example.

While it was really powerfull the nerf was arbitrary and did not consider that it is good for wild in the long term that powerfull decks get a decent skill ceiling.

Wild metagame not moves fast and sometimes stop for a long time.

So you need alternative ways to change it like put big learning curves for example. That way people change but cards not and it still produce meta shifts.