I want to climb from 20 to possibly Legend, however, I am afraid that I’ll often queue into Big Priest decks, which would ruin my mood.
So how often are Big Priest players in Wild ?
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Less common than it used to be.
Low rank could be anything.
15-5, they were common enough to be a problem. Not every match, but last I climbed, it was maybe every fifth deck.
5-L, they become less common again.
Big Priest beats almost anything control, but suffers against aggro, burn, and certain specific cards like Hex, Poly or Sap. As a result, the top ranks only have a couple Big Priests hanging out, but it’s pretty common amongst the mid ranks where not everyone is running a refined Kingsbane list.
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Surprisingly, not that often anymore actually…
But, there are definitely Big Priest roaming here and there. I think once RoS meta is settled, it might spike up again (new tools to empower Big Priest). But that’s just speculation.
I think ranking up from lets say 20-15, you can face 3 - 6 Big Priests at least. But that’s based on my pure experience. And imo that’s already too much Big Priest…
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But still one of the most common decks. While far from conclusive, sample sizes in wild etc, just watch hsreplays live data at the bottom of the home page. Its rare not to see a card all but exclusive to BP in the top 10 played cards last 5 mins.
Once I’m home I can check my data from 7 - 2 the past two months but my guess is 8%ish
I thought they’d be a bit more common.
What does the meta look like from 5-Legend ?
My anecdotal evidence in the scrub ranks (20-15) is its more a “first & last week” deck, spikes at each end of the season while dropping in popularity through the middle. You’ll likely blast through those ranks anyway, theres a fair bit of janky crap down there as well (like the decks I’m known to play).
I’m guessing Even Shammy/Lock, Aggro KBR are likely to be the most common, with honorable mentions to Odd Pally & Cubelock. But this is based on what I’ve seen on streams not personal exp, obv.
BP is one of those Quest Rogue type of decks. Popular enough to be annoying and make you hate your life when you face them.
E: Also Lyko, out of curiosity could you also include representation for the decks like KBR and Even Shammy to see where that x% actually falls? 8% doesnt sound like much on paper, but given deck options it could be higher than it looks comparative to the meta.
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Tbh, Big Priest doesn’t suffer from all aggro decks, its worst matchups are Kingsbane Rogue, Mech Hunter and Burn Mage. However, it can steal an easy win against those unfavored matchup with an early Barnes into Obsidian Statue or Yshaarj.
About other aggro decks, Big Priest destroys Even Shaman and Odd Paladin.
About Control, if there is no Barnes turn 4 into Yshaarj, Odd Warrior and Jade Druid can keep up with the resurrection.
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I’m currently at rank 13 and right now it’s about 60% of the decks but that’s very likely because Vargoth was just released and everyone is Big Priesting it up.
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I see in wild in more than just priest in ranks 20 to 15 anyways.
Somewhat common r10-5
Here are my stats:
8% Druid: Mainly Mecha’thun Miracle
6% Hunter: Mech Aggro Hunter, I think this is too low and Druid is too high
12% Mage: Mainly Burn Mage
14% Paladin: 70% Anyfin, 30% Odd
10% Priest: 90% Big, 10% Dragon Control
20% Rogue: 80% Kingsbane, 20% Baku
16% Shaman: 80% Even, 20% Shudderwock or Jade
12% Warlock: About even split in Even, Mecha’thun, and Cubelock
2% Warrior: Pirate!
Even Shaman is either slightly favored or slightly unfavored depending on if the Even Shaman deck is running Hex + Burst or running Devolve + Burst. It isn’t destroyed at all by Big Priest. Even my version which lacks as much burst (designed for KB rogue) is still 47% or so against Priest in general (just checked) and it isn’t the best designed for Big Priest
To add, if we’re calling Jade Druid ‘Control’ in this deifnition Jade Shaman can also keep up.
Dragon Control Priest can also beat Big Priest as PoM can ruin Barnes and you can then delay major turns until you hit your win condition. I’d call it a 50/50 match.
This is key, yesterday I saw A LOT of Big Priest because of Vargoth but today I haven’t seen one yet (less games)
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Its just common in forum. In ladder it isnt that reliable.
This sounds totally-correct.
I hover around R19 Wild on a strong-day, and I could imagine climbing with some meta-core you’d have to run into 3 big priests from 20-15 at a minimum.
Usually I face shadowstep light and big priest for what seems like 2/3 matches at 20-19. Basically at these ranks see Priest? It’s big. See Valeera? She’s Shadowstep. Once in a while you get a DSIF Priest, or an Esp Valeera.
The nice part about Shadowstep is you just play into it. Deckbuild with early spells, so they can’t react or sap them, and you watch them struggle to mill.
Usually it’s some suboptimal play to mill 1 card. They’ll go all in like poker just to mill you one card as if that’s game-winning…they’ll shuffle and emote…but without being able to mill your deck their shuffles just end up milling their own deck and not-yours.
Big Priest on the other hand doesn’t really have to think. Just play essence or barnes if you hit it. Res rinse repeat. It’s beyond-simple. Deck banks on you not-playing-aggro, not-playing OTK, and not playing Mage or Shaman.
One thing I’ve learned is trying to dilute their res pool is totally ineffective w current cards (6 mana RoS Summoner just-might-change-that tho…it looks definitely good enough w AoE same-turn so unconditional-draw-class-required).
Like the point of diluting is to screw up servitude…which is not-easy to do by turn-6. But screwing up Diamond w Summoner looks to be very-simple 2 card combo. Does that matter though? Bc Servitude is the like critical win-card…Diamond is just like win-more.
The dream is to find a deck that succeeds at beating Big Priest and Mill Rogue…while having a shot at aggro-hunter odd-paladin aggro-valeera and company.
As a fairly experienced player in Wild, i would say Even Shaman has a bad matchup against Big Priest if 2 players are on the same level. You can check my name on the Wild legend leaderboard.
With the nerf to Flametongue totem, it’s even harder for Even Shaman to quickly kill Big Priest before turn 7, when Psychic Scream confirms the win for the Priest.
I think the best version of Even Shaman doesn’t run Hex to had better winrate against Rogue and Odd Paladin. Maybe the Hex version is slightly favored against Big Priest but it can be a bad draw in aggro matchup that make the non-Hex version better overall.
About Jade Shaman and Dragon Control Priest, i only saw about once or twice of them in the last two months so i didn’t include them.
About Control, I think Warlock is the worst victim against Big Priest. Other class can be OK if they add enough board clear and heal. And they must use them wisely. Most important for them, No turn 4 Barnes.
You’re fully correct that Hex versions are not the best right now as Even Shaman not running Hex, but Devolve, is better against Kingsbane and Kingsbane > Big Priest in terms of popularity.
The lack of good data in Wild is a bit annoying so since you have more experience in Wild than I fo right now I’ll concede Even Shaman as unfavored to Big Priest. To be honest for whatever reason right now I’m finding Jade Shaman to be better than Even Shaman which doesn’t sound right in theory but through 30 games with each since getting my rank back down to 5 it lower it has been./shrug
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That screams common. Not overflowing, but totally run into them almost every Priest match.
On my even shaman I’m running both devolve and hex and im about 40% win rate vs big priest. When you have to hex or devolve a copy of the minion, it doesn’t really do much in the long run because they can still play the minions and they have all the removal tools needed to stop you from snowballing.
I went from R25 to R5 wild last season because I was a bit bored of standard. From my experience basically the low end of the ladder has less control decks (the most common control deck in wild is reno) and the upper hand more of it.
Overall compared to standard wild has very polarized matchups, generally aggro obliterate combo, combo obliterate control and control obliterate aggro.
If having sometime auto-losses is something that bother you too much you probably shouldn’t play wild because it might be a frustrating experience.
Im r3 in wild atm.
Big priest is probably the most popular deck here (at least it feels like it is). Only today played about 10 matches, 5 of them were big priests.