Hearthpwn

Intro

Paladin deck focusing on use of divine shield minions and in hand buff cards.

Basic strategy

This deck is, as you may have guessed, all about divine shields. Rallying blade buffs your divine shield minions on board, while a well timed blood knight can provide you with a seriously strong minion for very little mana. Not only this, but the in hand buffs can make your low cost cards into serious threats, especially an unchecked grimestreet enforcer. Divine favour can fill your hand after you play multiple cards in one turn to avoid desperate top-decking.

How to play

You want to mulligan for argent squire, argent protector and rallying blade to get an early board presence. Essentially you just want to play on curve, drop a blood knight if you have a few divine shields on board and bring out the grimestreet enforcer when you have several minions in hand. Divine shields make your minions incredibly sticky and can result in a huge blood knight, but don't be afraid to use them to trade into the enemies minions to maintain board presence for very little cost. You want to dominate with superior minions until your opponent runs out of ways to get rid of them. Between the in hand buffs and blood knight and blessings of kings providing big threats on board, your opponent will typically burn through their hard removal quickly, which will allow you to play buffed Tiron, Ragnaros or grimestreet protector without a counter. If you hit late game and your grimestreet enforcer has had a few turns on board, even something like a sunwalker becomes an insurmountable threat. Treat forbidden healing like a mini reno, producing an enormous heal late game to nullify all your opponents work whittling you down, or in a pinch it can be used to heal up an important minion who is low. Divine favour is great to replenish your hand if you've spent a turn throwing everything at the board and need more cards.

Hints and tips

Don't be afraid to rallying blade on turn 3 if you already have an argent squire or other divine shield minion down, its a decent weapon in its own right and the buff is still nice.

Similarly it is better to play a bloodknight for a definite 6/6 rather than waiting another turn and trying to get another divine shield on board. Your enemy is likely to get rid of them quickly if they can and you might end up with no shields on board to buff your bloodknight at all.

A good turn 10 combo if you have 2 minions on board would be to grimestreet protector into bloodknight for a guaranteed 9/9 minion. Potentially game ending if not dealt with.

If you're playing ragnaros lightlord hoping to heal yourself, consider trading any weaker damaged minions into the enemy minions if possible to maximise the chances of a heal to face.

People will normally focus down the grimestreet enforcer, so try to play it when you have a few minions in hand that will benefit from the buff even if it only lasts a turn (similar to how you would treat a thaurrisan).

Replacements

Ragnaros and Tirion are optional but are very strong late game cards if you have the dust and really empower the deck. Bloodknights are expensive but they are vital to get the most out of the divine shield synergy.

Forbidden healing is not strictly necessary but an 18 or 20 heal late game can simply be too much for a lot of decks to deal with, its almost a reno. A good replacement would be smuggler's run as an early in hand minion buff.

Argent protector can be swapped out for a grimestreet outfitter, this mostly comes down to personal choice.

Blessings of kings can be swapped out for silvermoon portal, again this is really a personal choice whether to go for the extra 2/2 buff or the random minion.

Scarlet crusader can replace silent knight, and psychotron can replace sunwalker. Essentially the divine shield minions that you play come down to personal taste. Wickerflame can of course be swapped out for an argent horserider or equivalent.