Just being able to put 10 more cards in your deck is NOT an upside.
If you are playing a midrange or tempo style of deck, there will only be so many cards that you can put in to play effectively to make strong board impact on curve. The more cards you add, the less consistent and weaker your deck will be because you are running the less optimal cards on curve, while also being forced to put a Spider Tank in your deck.
If you are playing control, you are far less likely to draw needed removal and survivability cards that you need to stabilize and will have a harder time reaching your late game win condition. Team 5 usually prints 1, maybe 2 good board clears for a control class each year. Bumping your deck size to 40 makes you less likely to draw these cards in times when the opponent’s board is so large that they can overrun your 10 extra health easily. You are also less likely to draw your early game defense and removal cards, which aren’t always easily available in the meta, which means you either put in more less effective options, or make your deck worse.
If you are playing combo, you will have far less consistency in your deck. Your draw spells will be less effective. Your discover spells that fetch for your win condition will be less effective. Your deck will be slowed down for at least a couple of turns. These one or two turns will be the turns that aggro draws their late game damage bomb, or when control draws their insane armor gain and huge defenses.
If you are playing value mill trying to deck out the opponent, your deck is just bad.
This means unless the meta is very specific with the 10 health being extremely important in many matchups, and the 10 extra card requirement being easily fulfilled, this card won’t really be seeing much competitive play.
Warlocks have enough removal for the extra 10.
Priest is having a good time.
Warrior was killed anyways last patch (thank god)
as a shaman I can add more card draw and removal I couldn’t fit before, I have not felt it being negative.
Paladin, no idea yet.
Mages have more HP, maybe they get hurt by it. but dragon mage seems stable since they can still draw their dragons.
Druid is experimenting but I think it’s not too optimal.
Prince Renathal is just a different take on Reno Jackson. Do you want a deck that is less consistent but can have more value thanks to a higher health pool that allows you to survive a few more turns than you could with only 30 health? Well now you can pick between 40 cards with 2 ofs, or 30 card singleton.
Agreed. Having a great time with Reno Priest. 10 HP has saved me a bunch already and it makes Reno a back breaker. Extra 10 cards kind of weakens it but I like being able to use more cards.
Absolutely not an upside but is a small price to pay for 10 extra health from the start especially for classes desesperately lacking in survavility like rogue.
Here’s why it’s a great card. It’s fun! Yes, it has disadvantages, but the game isn’t ONLY something we play to win, we also want to have fun doing it(which is why I don’t get aggro).
Often I agonize over what cards to include in a deck and what to leave out. Yes, with 40 cards I often find myself just adding stuff I don’t really need, but now I can actually use every card I like for a particular class. And while the decks aren’t doing well for me yet, at least I’m not getting crushed by turn 5 with aggro.
I wouldn’t say this is a control aggro card by any means. In fact I think it hurts control against fast decks because you are diluting your chances of needed cards significantly. I agree with AdamBomb - This is simply a fun card to have because you can increase your win condition options and see some normally rare outcomes play out. Definitely not a card which will be included in top tier decks. Tempo is too important and lets be honest 10 health usually amounts to not much help once you get to the latter stages of a game. Don’t get me wrong, it can be helpful but taking on 10 extra cards is not worth it in my opinion.
+10 health is the upside
+10 cards is the downside
The trick is getting the +10 cards to be an upside or at the very least making the downside negligible due to lots of cycling. And in some matches, the +10 cards is an upside, but those are very few and far between.
In the grand scheme of things, the card is not that great. It will be in some outlier decks for sure though. I’m expecting maybe 2 decks with it make it into tier 3 or higher. Holy/Control Paladin seems to be doing ok with it.
Exactly right. I think this is why Renathal/Prestor Druid is doing well; you’re quite likely to get Kazakusan, which then drastically thins your deck while stacking it with cards of general high quality. (They’re not all great, sure, but overall, it’s likely to be powerful.) Grab an Onyxia or Alexstraza or Ysera or Kalecgos along the way and you have a real shot. Might drop off if some worse dragons get added in future sets, but atm, it looks pretty solid.
I have to say, Prestor Druid almost feels like old Kaz Druid except… more oppressive, somehow? Possibly because you can pull multiple kaz and chain them for ridiculous effects.
A little confused by this comment so help me out if I’m being an ostrich with my head in the sand. How are you quite likely to expect anything using a transform luck card? Let alone draw it with a larger deck. Prestor is a gamble (which I am down with) but the fact is there are TEN more cards to draw from. If you stack a very heavy minion deck then I guess this could be solid but even then its a dice roll with no consistency. Fun times though