Seafloor Savior
A 2 mana 2/2 with dredge is worse than a neutral available to all classes, so the buff needs to be worth the investment. Savior works particularly well with Sunken Mooncatcher in a Mech Paladin deck or in a Handbuff Paladin deck to leverage its stats transfer harder. We could also hit a game changer like Shimmering Sunfish or Blademaster Samuro with it. A slightly delayed 2 mana 4/4 with further potential upside is pretty good.
Score: 3
Bubblebot
It’s enough to land the buff on a single mech for the Bubblebot to represent value above the curve, so it doesn’t need to do much to be a worthwhile play and landing the buff on multiple mechs can be devastating in different matchups. This can completely stop other aggressive decks in their tracks, or alternatively, build a board that’s very difficult to clear with AOE. The issue is that we’ve seen plenty of these cards over the years, and what happens in practice is that the opponent makes every effort to deny Paladin the board, and without a board, these cards do nothing. Still, if you don’t clear the Paladin board, you are screwed.
Score: 2
Immortalized in Stone
This spell is a massive, unconditional stabilizer that develops taunt bodies for about a 2-mana discount. It’s a holy spell, which is a spell school that’s getting a push in the class set. It’s a strong enabler for The Garden’s Grace. With Librams gone, Paladin decks are very likely to opt for this card to survive into the late game.
Score: 3
Holy Maki Roll
Forbidden Healing that’s more flexible and can be cast on minions. Works well with Lightforged Cariel, like all healing effects, and fits the Holy spell package that seems to be getting pushed with this set. The addition of Wild Pyromancer to the core set turns this card into a massive, scaling board clear too. Slower Paladins will run this to survive against aggression, no question.
Score: 3
Azsharan Mooncatcher
Goody Two Shields with sunken synergy. Sunken Mooncatcher is a powerful minion that has great synergy with handbuffs akin to Saronite Chain Gang. Paladin has access to one of the better ‘dredge’ engine in the format in Radar Detector. Alongside Seafloor Savior, Mooncatcher should be a strong choice in Mech Paladin as its sunken version will be consistently found, but it can see no play elsewhere.
Score: 2
Shimmering Sunfish
Sunfish is a strong taunt when activated, so we want to drop it on-curve whenever we can. Paladin has great tools to make it a consistent turn 3 play with Knight of Anointment. This card seems like a major defensive piece that doesn’t cost us much in terms of deckbuilding–all it’s asking us to do is play Holy spells, which is basically what Paladin already does. Paladin decks may want this to stall aggression and set up buffs.
Score: 3
Radar Detector
Massive draw engine for Mech Paladin. If the archetype works, it’ll be primarily thanks to the reload potential this spell offers. This is extremely reliant on a mech-dense build to work, and that does feel like a very one-dimensional deck in the making, especially considering that the quality of mechs in the upcoming format isn’t particularly high.
Score: 2
The Garden’s Grace
This might be the biggest payoff for a Holy Paladin deck in Voyage. Thanks to Immortalized in Stone, we can very reliably discount this card to 0-mana, at which point it could offer a huge board swing. But what makes us particularly excited about the potential of The Garden’s Grace is that it could enable a new OTK finisher for Paladin, which you’ll see in the theorycrafting article. A powerful build-around card that can help swing a matchup against a faster deck, but can also act as a major combo piece to finish off a slower opponent? Sign us up.
Score: 4
Kotori Lightblade
This card would have been great to have this year, but it enters the format in a bit of an awkward spot when many of the Holy spells that would work perfectly with it are rotating out. There’s a dearth of holy buff spells that we would want to use with Kotori, with the main prize looking like The Garden’s Grace… but we have bigger plans for that card and keeping Kotori around just for one strong utilization isn’t very enticing. This card should get better over the next year, but we’re not feeling it right now.
Score: 1
The Leviathan
This card is just a massive pile of stats capable of producing a big board swing. A 4/5 rusher and a 4/2 rusher, both with divine shields, seems like a powerful play for 7 mana in terms of board impact. Compare this to Faceless Corruptor and it looks quite good, but the icing on the cake is the combined abilities of the bodies which allow you to dredge and then draw a specific card from the bottom of your deck. There’s a high likelihood that every Paladin deck will seriously consider including this card. Just a very good standalone card without any additional synergies.
Score: 4
Final Thoughts
Voyage to the Sunken City Set Rank: 4th
Overall Power Ranking: 6th
What will Paladin do without Librams, one of the most memorable package of cards in the class’ history? Well, it should do just fine!
Paladin will do Paladin things, which is spitting out stats on the board, buffing those stats and ramming their minions down the opponent’s throat. It’s good ol’ fashioned Hearthstone. Mech Paladin is exactly that kind of deck. It’s a deck we wouldn’t be surprised to see topping win rate charts, but its one-dimensional gameplay could also keep it somewhat limited from truly dominating ladder. It could also just flop.
Buff Paladin decks look a bit more stable and well-rounded. Losing Blessing of Authority is big, but Lightforged Cariel is a card we need to respect, especially if “board-based gameplay” becomes more common. The Garden’s Grace should be extremely powerful in combination with Immortalized in Stone to completely shut down decks.
Speaking of The Garden’s Grace, this is the kind of card that can allow Paladin to play very differently. Is a combo Paladin deck finally brewing again? The buff to Equality, as well as the return of Flash of Light, Wild Pyromancer and Acolyte of Pain are major steps on that front. We also adore Holy Maki Roll for this kind of archetype.
And then, we’ve got Reno Jackson. Reno Paladin is a very competitive deck in Wild, so could the synergy between Cariel and Reno cause grief in Standard too? We’re concerned with its ability to close out games.
We’ll have to ask Ragnaros the Lightlord for an answer. Live, insect!
