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He says imprisoned, his husband says lazy.
Quote From Noxious With Northshire Cleric bowing out of Standard, this wee Homunculus here could become a powerful replacement. It's certainly weaker overall, lacking the powerful card draw that made Cleric so popular, but it's useful in its own way. Disregard the dormancy; what this minion was made for is endurance. The 2/5 stats are there to make sure it has a fighting chance to survive past its "awakening" turn, and live long enough to get buffed. On curve, this can be achieved with the new basic Priest card, Power Infusion, boosting your Homunculus up to a sweet 4/11 stat line.
Priest has lost Divine Spirit, but it hasn't lost Inner Fire. While card draw will be harder to pull off with the new changes, this minion does theoretically make it possible to still dish out a huge, strong minion very early in the game. Whether it can still be reliably pulled off, we'll have to see.
Well, this sort of makes the other three Rs redundant.
Quote From ShadowsOfSense This is a sneaky little powerhouse of a card. While the healing is mediocre at best, the real utility of the card comes in that extra spell generation. The fact that it itself already costs so little is just an added bonus should you want to combo it with Lyra the Sunshard or the new Sethekk Veilweaver.
That's not to say the healing is worthless, of course. It makes it a targeted spell - important for the aforementioned Sethekk - and it's enough to ensure you get a slightly better trade, which is a position I like Priest to be in. Being able to make good, efficient trades should be what the class is about, and this helps it with that goal, while giving those who like wacky combos a fun new toy as well.
Waiting for a minion to play this on? Divine Intermission.
Quote From ShadowsOfSense Another simple but strong buff. Think back to a card like Velen's Chosen - this absolutely dominated Arena when it first debuted, and it pushed Priest forward into better midrange gameplay. While you do lose out on a point of health - a not insignificant loss - I think that the Lifesteal boon is better in general than Spell Damage, at least for Priest. It makes sure that it has its uses later in the game, helping you swing back into safe territory much more easily to stabilise the game.
This isn't a fancy card, but it'll be a strong one for a more midrange-focused Priest. I wouldn't quite go as far as to say aggro, though.
Get over here!
Quote From Noxious The spiritual successor to Wyrmrest Agent for this new Hearthstone Year. For the same condition, gain the same +1 attack, but instead of Taunt, you are granted Lifesteal. Compared to the Agent, I'm not sure this card is an upgrade. Priest is the class with most/easiest access to heals, and Lifesteal is less necessary to the class' success than Taunt. If you're in a bind, however, this minion can be a great receiver of stat buffs. If played early in the game, it probably won't do much with its Lifesteal effect, but if things get rough in the endgame and you need more healing than your Hero Power can dish out, a buffed up Dragonmaw Sentinel can work well.
But wouldn't you rather use a dependable spell instead? Renew is releasing with Ashes of Outland as well, and it has the great bonus of being able to get another heal from its discover effect.
Nonetheless, it has decent stats and might see some play in Dragon Priest decks, however its stats seem more attractive than its effect.
This boot wasn't made for walking.
Quote From Noxious Good, dependable card that can save your minions from certain removal. Similar to Shadow Ascendant, but costing one more mana, for the same effect but doubled. All in all a very useful card if your deck is looking to take board control. It might not be too useful in the early game if you're fighting against an opponent that can effectively remove minion, however there is an interesting play that could be done with this card on curve.
Imprisoned Homunculus is coming into the game, and its Dormant effect makes sure it cannot be destroyed until the opponent's third turn (if you play it on turn 1). Once the Homunculus wakes up, dropping a Dragonmaw Overseer on the board will make it very hard for your opponent to remove the now 3/7 taunt minion. It essentially turns into a Deathlord, without the negative effect of giving your opponent extra board presence. Inner Fire is not out of the game yet, so if this combo can be pulled off, you might see yourself with a 7/7 Taunt minion on turn 4.
While Dragonmaw Overseer might not do much on its own, it has the potential to become a great support card in several Priest decks, and it's certainly something I would include in Dragon Priest decks, especially ones which make use of very sticky minions like Faerie Dragon and the other "Evasive" type dragons like Evasive Drakonid
With two of us on the job, we can slack off twice as hard!
Quote From ShadowsOfSense Greetings, fellow human!
You are going to absolutely despise playing against this card. A Faceless Manipulator that also increases the total stats by +2/+4? Sounds good to me. Whether on a Deathrattle minion or to further some sort of combo enabler, this just screams annoying. You're going to want to keep Priest's board as clear as possible, because not only can they now copy things and buff them at the same time, but they've got great options to heal things up a bit first, too.
This isn't going to break anything, but no matter if Priest is Tier 1 or a dumpster fire, you aren't going to enjoy playing against them any time soon.
Veil, weave got to be going.
Quote From Noxious Sethekk Veilweaver is discount Lyra the Sunshard. Same effect, with the bonus condition that the spell needs to be cast on a minion. Lyra has seen a varied amount of play throughout the years, but pulling the effect off with a 5-cost card is harder than with the Veilweaver's cost of 2! I think this is a great card generator; bonus points for being able to stash two of them into your deck. These are exciting times for Priests, and I can't say what the future holds for them, but this card seems good enough to even make the nerfed Power Word: Shield good! With Ashes of Outland, I have counted that Priests will have 15 spells they can cast on minions in Standard alone; 15 spells that cost 4 or less; the total number is even higher. A Priest deck based around minion buffs can do a lot with this card.
It died of boredom - the lectures would just dragon and on.
Quote From linkblade91 This is probably what Nightscale Matriarch should have been: a nice beefy Taunt, with card generation to boot. It's a decent minion all-around, and you know it will most likely create something good for you (the Dragon pool is pretty decent, what with Descent of Dragons being just a few short months ago). Plus it can always generate more Skeletal Dragons; perfect for those Trolden highlight-reel moments. Emerald Explorer is arguably better, but I still like this card. My only gripe is that the name is bland.
Had to talk to 32 people to fill this up.
Quote From ShadowsOfSense The perfect target for all those annoying new buffs! While you might be concerned that the base card itself would be a detriment to a Resurrect game plan, I think the final product more than makes up for that additional low-roll, at least in Standard.
The base body is actually interesting in itself - the fact that it's a 1 mana 1/3 makes it the perfect target for early game buffs, with a little Lifesteal cherry on top. Northshire Cleric has shown us in the past how good it can be to stick an early buff in Priest, and that it just gets better when it dies - eventually, anyway - makes me excited to play around with this one.
It's becoming very clear why Spellbreaker was rotated out - pushing these fun designs is a joy, and if every class could invalidate them fairly easily it wouldn't lead to those exciting moments. Ironbeak Owl is still here as an emergency button, but other than that we're free to roam.
Self-reflection can be a messy process.
Quote From linkblade91 "Oh look another Priest mass-removal spell; such interesting, much wow." Yeah, I hear ya, but this card is actually interesting, so shut up. Several people have made a comparison to Lightbomb, and that's an apt description: on a basic level, because the enemy minions will be attacked by copies of themselves, it will be functionally the same as if they had just taken the Attack damage straight-up. However - and this is where thing can get diabolical - the minions might not necessarily die. If any survive, you've just created new minions for yourself on top of the damage/removal possibilities. You can use this to exploit enemy Deathrattles or end-of-turn effects, restore Health via Lifesteal, or put up what's left of a Taunt. Creative thinkers will look beyond what they can simply remove, and look for what they can gain simultaneously. Lightbomb also hits your side of the board whereas Soul Mirror does not, so…yeah. Point: Soul Mirror.
Comments
In my opinion, priest has some good cards in the expansion, but that shouldnt surprise anyone with the class's transition into a more tempoish class similar to paladin.
A few short thoughts;
- Imprisoned Homunculus curves into Apotheosis, which is why I think both cards will feature in a tempo priest. But I'm more interested in Imprisoned Vilefiend into Power Infusion. Can there be room for both? I dont see why not.
- Dragon tempo priest can actually do well, with cards like Skeletal Dragon and Dragonmaw Sentinel being very good synergy cards. The sentinal in particular since it has lifesteal and therefore every aggro class will proceed to waste resources on this card instead of hitting your face.
- Dragonmaw Overseer, [Hearthstone Card (Sethekk vielweaver) Not Found], and Renew, I'm much less optimistic. Dragonmaw overseer in particular is very slow and will die to anything more than a poke in the arm. Buffing something with 2/2 is very strong, especially with cards like Dragonmaw Sentinel, but that doesnt change the fact that Dragonmaw Overseer is just a 3 mana 2/2 that needs a board to work and doesnt allow a potential value trade the same turn you play it. In other words, just play Apotheosis instead.
- I think zetalot, pro priest player, remarked that he is impressed with Psyche Split. Not for me to doubt the priest king himself, but I dont see it. Perhaps he already has something in mind every one else cant see. I look forward to seeing if he's right on this one.
- Soul Mirror will cause quite a lot of raging and computer smashing to happen at some point.
Edit: Removed my opinion that priest having one of the best sets. Seriously, they have some good cards, but no way best.
I don't agree with you.
Priest looks bad. Really bad. It would be better if the Year of the Dragon expansions actually provided some serious support to this class' inner shift, but unfortunately it appears that it's not the case.
Just take Skeletal Dragon and Coilfang Warlord, or Winged Guardian if you want to stick with the same mana cost. Wanna talk about dragons? Emerald Explorer trades 1 mana and 1 health less for the chance to discover your dragon and to be able to play it immediately. It's so unfair that it's not even funny.
I don't think it's fair to compare Druid and Priest given how vastly different their playstyles are.
Druid has no way to clear boards or big minions so in return they get better stats on their stuff.
Coilfang Warlord also doesn't hold up because it's so blatantly overpowered that it most certainly gets nerfed down the line.
The point of Priest, at least conceptually, is to keep your own minions alive while controlling the board. They enforce this by giiving Priest way more assymetrical boardclears (such as Breath of the Infinite, Soul Mirror, Buffed Holy Nova, and even Shadow Word:Ruin). Skeletal dragon is just another cog in the machine. You play it with the intetion of keeping it alive for multiple turns in order to get more value out of it than Emerald Explorer ever could.
I pretty much agree that priest isnt going to be tier 1, but there's a place in tier 2 for it. I am in particularly thinking that priest has a decent chance against dhunters, which is going to be everywhere, which was I why I thought dragon tempo priest can do well.
Initially I wasnt so impressed with Skeletal Dragon for its decent-ish statline with taunt, but priest has more dragon synergy cards and can actually do something about the board in a way that druid cannot, so a 4/7 taunt value generator is decent. There's pontential, but I can see your reasoning why this is just unplayable.
Coilfang Warlord is out of the spectrum. Let's not compare anything to that. This makes me want to run Faceless Manipulator so I can get him into as many decks and class as I can.
Apart from viability discussions, Apotheosis has a stunning art and I think it competes for the best one in the whole set.
Much agreed! That's a lovely Priest card.
That has a big arena potential