by OtakuMZ - 8 years ago     show comments

Disclaimer: You will find the rating used at the end of the article. The Evaluations made are for Standard play mode only. All evaluations are subjective.

Important Links:
All card evaluation articles
Karazhan Power Rankings by OtakuMZ
Spoiler Card List by Eldorian

Introduction

Welcome to our third installment of the Karazhan Card Evaluation, a series in which we review each and every card spoiled before the release of the whole adventure on August 11th. As always we appreciate comments below or via twitter @OtakuMZ1978 and/or @DannyDonuts_HS

Card Evaluation (10-13/45)

Book Wyrm

Danny: Now I feel this is a very interesting card. In my mind, Book Wyrm is the dragon equivalent to Stampeding Kodo but with a slightly better range of effect. For one mana more, it has a body that is one health point higher, but can destroy a minion with 3 attack rather than 2, as long as the condition of having a dragon in your hand is met. I feel that the breakpoint between 2 and 3 attack is huge. There are a significant number of cards being played that have 3 attack that are normally safe from the kodo effect, and this card will help get rid of them rather quickly. In a fast meta I can see this replacing Drakonid Crusher in tempo dragon decks to combat aggro better. Overall I really like this card, as it is not directly better than any card in a dragon deck, but it is an option that can be played based on how the meta is going. This card will bring a bit more skill into the deckbuilding component of the game.
Rating: 2

OtakuMZ: I am a bit more hesitant in evaluating this card than Danny. Traditionally, the 6-mana slot is one of high importance, containing heavy swing or tech cards like Sylvanas Windrunner or Emperor Thaurissan. Book Wyrm might loose against this competition and he might be even to highly costed to be relevant at this time of the game. The battlecry is superior to Stampeding Kodo and not random, but the conditional side of it might render this card worse. A lot depends on the meta and the kind of relevant dragon decks played once the adventure is out, which makes evaluating this card a diceroll.
Rating: 3, C

Moroes

OtakuMZ: This guy does not convince me in any way. He is just too easily cleared by AoE damage. The only circumstance he would be rather safe would be if he was played in conjunciton with a Steward of Darkshire providing him with a divine shield. ALso other buffs could pull him out of range of board damage. I do not think that this will help much either. To me he seems like a weaker Shade of Naxxramas, way weaker! He can only shine if your opponent has no AoE at all. Decks that have no AoE are normally aggro style decks which probably will kill you by the time this fella has given you any decent amount of value. I will go really go hard on Moroes calling him almost unplayable; but so did I with Whisps of the Old Gods which turned out to be a good niche pick. Maybe there is some card still hidden that will unleash his true power, who knows. Or maybe someone like J4CKIECHAN will proof me wrong. If a new card is released that helps him big time, you can find the adaptation to the rating in my Karazhan Power Rankings post.
Rating: 5

Danny: Unfortunately, this is the first card of this set that I feel is underwhelming. With so many warriors in the meta, and every single one of them running ravaging ghoul, I feel that this card only has a few decks where he could fit into, and when played in those decks he is highly conditional. I could see people trying to fit him into an aggro paladin list due to synergies with steward of darkshire, but in order for him to survive, you need to have steward of darkshire stick around for a turn, which is really hard to do. I think that this card will be experimented with, and if lightning strikes twice we might find him in a deck or two, but I highly doubt that it will happen.
Rating: 4

Prince Malchezaar

OtakuMZ: I like newly desinged card, but that is the only thing I like about the prince. Besides of fatigue matchups, inflating your deck might be counter productive. In most TCGs, you have the option to put more cards in your deck than the minimum amount. Here is my question: in MTG, how many players play a 65 or 70 cards deck in the place of a 60 card one? None, right! Atop, I have to admit that I am no huge fan of casino decks, I only play the 666 Casino games, but the additional legendary, mostly high-costed minions could mess up your early game and proof sub-par. Apart from that, the body of this royal draenei is only of vanilla stats without any other benefit. Sure, there will be a deck in which he gets his value but IMHO he will lose you more games than he will win you.
Rating: 4

Danny: This brand new effect is really cool, and I am really glad blizzard is branching out with new unique card effects. Prince Malchezaar will add variety to many matches. As we have seen previously from the Elise and the golden monkey, when it comes to the late game, random legendaries can be considered a win condition. This card offers a slightly different spin on the random legendary effect however, it will obey deck building rules when adding these legendries to your deck. Which means that it will not include duplicate legendries, or legendries from the other classes like the Golden Monkey does.
Looking at the power level of these legendries will be interesting, as they are not cards that you have put into your deck. Now there are some legendries that you will not run in your deck because they are just plain bad, such as Nat Pagle or Millhouse Manastorm. But on the other hand, there are some cases where you might want to run a legendary in your deck, but ultimately don’t play it due to the fact that the spot that you would normally put it into is already filled by a more powerful card. These will be really helpful inclusions when Malchezaar adds them to your deck. I feel that these legendaries will be slightly less powerful than five from Elise, as you will not be receiving some of the other powerful class legndaries, but still be pretty powerful due to the variance over five cards being pretty high.
A fatigue deck is the type of deck that would benefit from gaining five extra cards especially if they are of the legendary value. This puts this card to be typically run in control warrior and control priest, with the possibility of fitting in the elusive grinder mage deck that may appear after this expansion is released. Additionally, the card follows deckbuilding rules, so it may find itself in a Renolock deck, as the five cards will not be duplicates, and Reno will remain active no matter which cards are added to the deck. The 5/6 body for 5 is solid enough to justify using the card in these decks, and will add a big body that your opponent has to deal with in the midgame.
Overall I think this card will be really good, essentially having the same effect that Elise had on the meta in LOE for this adventure. Its going to be a lot of fun experimenting around with this card, and most fatigue games will be really intense after this adventure comes out.
Rating: 2

Protect the King

Danny: If warrior ever struggled against zoo (It never did really), it won’t ever again with this card. Being able to stop your opponent from attacking your face with a wall of taunts is extremely useful, and can let you stall out for a brawl, or to make better trades.
This card also has some obvious synergies with bolster, and could be run in a bolster warrior type deck. A wall of 3/3 or 5/5 taunts is really intimidating, but I don’t believe will be seen too commonly.
I feel that this card will be experimented with in a bolster warrior deck, but in the likely case that it falls through, it will be considered as an anti-aggro control warrior tool.
Rating: 4, C

OtakuMZ: At first glance, there comes one thing to my mind: 5 mana Bolster + Protect the King which might give you a board of 3/3s with taunt. Historically, warrior did struggle a bit against a lot of small, non 1-health minions. Not that warrior does struggle in general these days, but hell, let’s get rid of one of the remaining weak points, great! This card could give Garrosh and Magni the needed staying power in these scenarios. Apart from that, its a weaker Unleash the Hounds for Warrior but not a totally bad card by any means.
Rating: 3

Conclusion

Wow. We got some opposite of oppinions here. Intersting! I would like to know what you think. Please leave a comment or tweet us what you are thinking… See you soon for the next Karazhan review.

Rating Used

(1) Excellent: Cards that are top-notch or potentially overpowered. Most decks would like to run them, e.g. Dr. Boom.
(2) Good / Competitively Playable: Superior cards that will very likely see frequent play, e.g. Mire Keeper.
(3) Decent / No Competitive Staple: Cards that normally do not make the cut for competitive play but are overall well-designed and might fit into specific decks. These cards can be powerful in Arena though or really viable for newer players but you would not likely see them in tournaments.  Also vanilla cards such as Chillwind Yeti fall into this category.
(4) Poor / Too Situational: Underwhelming and/or overcosted cards. These cards have inferior stats and/or underwhelming effects and will not see competitive play, e.g. Voodoo Doctor. Grouped in this category are also cards that seem to be good at first glace, but their effect are so highly situational that most of the times you will not be able to pull them off, e.g. Ghaz’rilla. The latter can arguably be fun and even powerful IF their effect goes of, of course. In any case, these cards I like to call “what-if cards” are so unreliable that they render themselves unusable in competitive play. Feel free to raise these cards to a “build-around” card or just have fun with!
(5) Unplayable: Straight out bad stats, poor card design or simply useless cards that are even too bad for casual play? You have them in your deck? Delete Hearthstone! ? These cards you would not and should never put in your deck, e.g. Magma Rager. Okay, one exception here: you want to troll your opponent so that he thinks you are the worst Hearthstone player alive! ?
(A/B) Archetype Defining / Build-Around: Cards that are only viable if you build your deck around them, e.g. Grim Patron.
(C) Counter / Tech Choice: Cards that mostly have underwhelming stats but are highly useful to counter specific cards or to play against a very uniform meta, e.g. Eater of Secrets.