How does this and Shadow Madness result in an instant loss against Priest? The reduced attack will still remain with the minion while you control it, and it’s not returning to its full attack until the beginning of the Priest’s next turn after control had already shifted back.

Wall Priest is not going to be at all viable in the coming season. Every card that makes the deck able to achieve the combo, Shadow Visions, Diamond Spellstone, Eternal Servitude, Psychic Scream, etc, is leaving Standard.

Even then, this card is not absolutely god awful. There are potentially reasonable combos that can be done with the card as is. It probably won’t be competitive or anything, but unless you’re preparation, zero cost cards are rarely impact.

Oblivitron does seem particularly weak, especially after Play Dead and Terrorscale Salker rotate. Mech Hunter is only a fully formed deck in Wild, and this is far too slow to see play in that deck.

Coffin Crasher in Priest really hasn’t done much without being legendary and having a full +3/+1 on Oblivitron’s statline. While abviously Priest and Hunter are very different classes, unless there is some big mech theme in Hunter, there is no chance this sees play.

This can be decent and much like Twilight Acolyte, can allow for easy minion stealing with Cabal Shadow Priest. Granted, unlike with Twilight Acolyte, the stolen minion will return to it’s full attack by the time you can use it.

For a zero cost Aldor Peacekeeper effect, even if its temporary, it could be far, far worse.

I’d hardly call this outright better than Kazakus. While there is no deckbuilding requirement, there a 5/5 for seven is worse than a 3/3 for four, and the average Kazakus potion is capable of doing a lot more than the average pair of Shaman spells.

Obviously, a seven mana 5/5 with Discover a good to great minion is pretty good. The initial 5/5 is a bit underwelming for seven mana, but for a midrange or control oriented Shaman deck, it shouldn’t be much of an issue.

Swampqueen Hagatha should see a fair bit of play throughout its career in Standard and maybe could be good enough to see Wild play.

It’s not. It’s a call back to the League of Explorers, which is still cool.

As long as there are a ton of small yet efficient minions to be played, Zoo Warlock will find a way to work out. Sure, Doomguard may be rotating out of Standard, but Leeroy should still give the deck enough reach to at least still be theoretically viable on ladder.

In fact, Rafaam should be more impactful for a Zoo Warlock deck than control given given how much more valuable an average Legendary minion is over most of the cards in Zoo Warlock for the late game.

Yes. That means a Control Warlock can run more anti-aggro tools, cards that are also useless in the late stages of the control match-up. Additionally, Warlock’s Hero power also makes is so it almost certainly cannot win the fatigue game at least without a copy of Rin or Bloodreaver Gul’dan.

Even then, recent iterations of control decks such as Odd Warrior, Big Spell Mage, and Control Priest currently favor playing a bunch of answers overplaying a bunch of draw to find those answers.

This iteration of Rafaam will allow a Standard Control Warlock (and Zoo Warlock) to keep the pressure up when the the Warlock player starts running low on threats and is pretty clearly not going to win the fatigue win.

A Lorewalker Cho on turn eight is better than a Void Walker on turn eight when in the control match-up.

If you’re playing Zoo Warlock, the synergy between say Soul Infusion and Doubling Imp doesn’t exactly have much of an impact after turn six or seven.

Likewise, if Control Warlock is in the control mirror, they are probably going to lose the fatigue game due to the nature of Life Tap. As such, it’s better to replace many of the answer cards, especially those there for aggro, with threats even if they aren’t the best threats out there.

Yeah. If the Zoo Warlock does drop this card, it will mean they were unable to close the game efficiently, but this will improve the Zoo Warlock’s win rate much like Aluneth in Secret Mage or Deathstalker Rexxar in Hunter.

In neither deck will Rafaam prove to be necessary, but builds including it will have a noticeable increase in winrate compared to builds without it. If I had to guess, Zoo Warlock would win at least an extra three games in one hundred and Control Warlock would win an extra two games in one hundred if Rafaam is brought to the table.

I would rather make my deck lean heavily into the aggressive or the control role rather than having a watered down mixture of both. Midrange may exists, but the best midrange decks simply play the best cards in a vacuum with little concern over synergies between cards like Even Paladin right now.

Midrange Hunter may be able to efficiently shift into a control/value oriented right now, but Deathstalker Rexxar is only one card in the deck rather than almost a full third.

I am not convinced at all a Tempo Rogue playing Myra’s Unstable Element would then actively use this and Chef Nomi as a win condition when Leeroy and double Eviscerate will be able to close out games in one turn rather than having to wait.

I mean, sure, this card does seem rather exciting, but the sort of decks that will use this as part of a win condition will be easily preyed upon by aggressive decks.

I know this can be played in the same turn as Myra’s Unstable Element and a Pogo Hopper in the same turn, but other than trying to out value a control deck and recreate Jade Druid as a result, it won’t really do a whole lot in Standard.

Of course, it could also do something with Chief Nomi, but, again, such a strategy would quite easily be weeded out of viability by aggressive leaning decks.

Warlock has never been a class to be concerned with lasting into fatigue. It’s hero power prevented it.

I guess, but Wispering Woods into Soul of the Forest is generally a better combo.

It’s hardly an issue. I don’t mind.

Dreampetal Florist only hits minions with its discount.

It’s been alright. I’m also on r/hearthstone now as SoupAndSalad911 if you’re interested.

I don’t think giving every aggressive deck a good curve topping option that will almost certainly replace their low value cards with quite often serious threats would be a good idea. There is a reason why Prince Liam is a fairly common choice in Odd Paladin and Deathstalker Rexxar is known for being able to single-handedly transition the aggressive leaning Midrange Hunter to a full on control role.