Despite never having played Warcraft 3 or WoW, Arthas' downfall and the Wrath of the Lich King are some of my all-time favourite story arcs. Additionally, I've been pretty bored of HS as of late. If DK is indeed coming with next expansion (and given all the evidence here it probably will), you'd best believe I'm gonna be playing again.
Boy oh boy, I'm glad they decided to go with buffs. Good to see DH and Warrior get some much needed love. I, for one, really hope the Pally buffs pull the class out of its current slump; I've tried what feels like everything in the class to very little success. It's even sadder when the only other Pallys I match into are playing Sunken City decks, which aren't even particularly good now.
There's an important distinction to be made here between "Discover a card from your deck" and Dredge: the latter only puts the card on the top of the deck, whereas the former draws it. That's significant, because you aren't getting the card you've Dredged immediately, so the card with Dredge has no immediate effect.
This was the subject of much debate when Sightless Watcher was initially released; despite arguments that having the agency to choose what your next draw would be was a huge benefit, opponents argued that not drawing the card on play was so detrimental that it was difficult to justify running what was, in practice, a vanilla 2-mana 3/2. The debate was settled when the card rather quickly dropped off in play, demonstrating that choosing what you draw and not drawing the card is far inferior to just drawing a card.
The only way I can see Dredge as being significant in the coming expansion is if, as they already have, they print cards that shuffle powerful effects to the bottom of your deck, which you would then need to Dredge up.
TL;DR: These are my two times 100 cents. I've noted a number of changes to Big Paladin, but am not optimistic about its success. Similarly, the proposed Aggro Paladin could see some changes, but I don't see it being much better than existing aggressive Paladin lists. I believe Paladin is likely to stick to its well-established roots: Libram, Secret, Handbuff, maybe Stealth too.
Lokholar the Ice Lord, for instance, I think would be better substituted for Runaway Blackwing, which presents a huge threat with potential to completely swing the game in your favour, whereas the former would likely die or come close to dying upon summon. Whether or not Blackwing should be a two-of is a good question, and I suspect it likely will take a slot from Brasswing, which likely has a worse effect overall than Blackwing. I agree with all other minion choices.
As for other substitutions, Noble Mount makes way for Hold the Bridge, which this deck can better take advantage of as you summon a rather sizable number of big minions, and provides a way to stabilise as the game goes on better than Noble Mount does. Speaking of big minions, I've also added Hammer of the Naaru in for Wave of Apathy; it's just a solid card which creates a sizable minion while giving you three-damage pings, whereas the latter has no clear use other than stalling for a turn without offering any immediate way to deal with the board/take the initiative.
I've also substituted Lightbringer's Hammer for Ceremonial Maul which, while it is a worse weapon overall, can give you the same effect Protect the Innocent would have if you healed beforehand. Additionally, should you also stick a heal later in the game, you can get a whopping 15/15 stats in Taunt with the Maul equipped! The synergy with Barricade is also notable. Lightbringer's Hammer might end up being the better choice here, admittedly, but the inability to hit your opponent as well as the heal being conditional on your opponent having played some minion might render the weapon useless in certain matchups.
The biggest issue with my proposed list is the weapon redundancy. There are 7 different weapons in this list, which might lean towards the deck being too clunky. At the same time, the deck has the potential to make effective use of all of these weapons, so I'd want to try before dismissing some of them, if at all. Other, final notes on Big Paladin: Blessed Goods is the best substitution available for Desperate Measures used in Darkmoon Faire's Duel Paladin, and while not as good at providing immediate value, can give you even MORE weapons or other things to create value later on the game, so we'll see how it goes. Also, First Day of School and Hand of A'dal had not yet been nerfed in Darkmoon Duel Paladin, and we also lost Air Raid, so our early-game is overall much worse, and A'dal is much harder to stick early, but is retained due to it providing much needed card draw.
I will say that overall, Big Paladin probably won't succeed in the long run due to the clear difficulties in seizing early-game initiative, which Paladin usually wants to do as a means of contesting the early board, as well as the lack of high quality cards outside of the new additions from Alterac Valley, which are questionable at best (ex. Cavalry Horn takes two turns to activate, Brasswing's effect is mediocre at the mid-to-late game at best, a number of cards are conditional, either on having the big threats online or on healing). It won't stop me from trying, though, and I may be wrong!
Aggro Paladin
Regarding the Aggro Paladin, first: argh, I picked Alliance, so I can't play with the Aggro Pally theorycraft until I finish the honour chain!!! Nonetheless, I will say that I don't think Dun Baldar Bridge would ever see play in an aggro deck, as you're spending a whopping 4-mana for no immediate effect, which offsets any potential benefit the card provides thereafter. Similarly, as the deck tops out at 4-mana, corrupting Day at the Faire will be difficult, and playing its base form is mediocre at best.
I'd probably add the second copy of Goody Two-Shields as well as Saidan the Scarlet and two copies of Blessing of Authority for a bit of a larger buff package to support Saidan and potentially highroll the game to victory, with or without Drek'thar.
Because this deck is focused on Drek'Thar, there are parallels to Tax Paladin in Wild, which uses Call to Arms; I'm not sure that a similar idea would succeed in Standard, however, as you're lacking Call to Arms, and the given list, while I think can make minor improvements, contains a bunch of minions you'd rather not pull from Drek'thar. Notably, you can't run Murgur Murgurgle because, when it shuffles itself into your deck, it disables Drek'thar's effect!
The lack of high quality minions for Drek'thar to pull from suggests moving away from a Drek'Thar package altogether, and at the point, I'd rather be running the well-established Secret, Handbuff, or even Stealth packages that are already known to perform on ladder.
One final note: there are a few avenues for improvement to existing Libram, Secret, Handbuff, and Stealth lists that I won't go into here, but I feel already exhibit more potential than the proposed lists. Then again, we've seen these lists in action during Stormwind, and the new meta might be such that these archetypes disappear. Given how often Libram has stuck around, however, and the sheer power demonstrated by other aggressive lists this expansion, such as Secret and Handbuff, which have both been consistent laddering choices, they seem like the better lists to build on and improve rather than attempt anything novel offered by Alterac Valley.
If you actually read this whole post, which I made only because of my excessive devotion to and interest in Traditional Hearthstone and love for Paladin, then thanks!
Damnit, I picked the Alliance out of allegiance, but all of these competitive and cool Drek'Thar decks are now completely out of my reach as a result. It's a shame I don't get to experience any of this stuff now before the launch of the next expansion.
I absolutely agree, I don't like the way they phrased the change here nor in the tweet. The whole point of the "grind" is that you're working towards something; it's not inherently enjoyable or "engaging", the most "engaging" part is the speed at which you grind, and the faster it is, the faster you're going to be able to play the actually "engaging" content at an optimal level (i.e. PvP, more challenging Heroic PvEs). In essence, then, you're not making the experience anymore "engaging" when you slow down the grind, so there is no benefit to the change whatsoever, just more costs. The way they've framed the change is what leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
Ah well, I guess I won't be playing the mode until someone figures out some other optimal strategy to grind or the team does something to make tasks/coins more readily available, because I certainly didn't max my team before the fix went live.
Damnit, I was hoping they wouldn't change this. Welp, better finish my grind for the 1 PvP team (haven't PvP'd yet) I want to be able to play at max before they "fix" the Stranger. For the F2P grinder like me, this change absolutely blows. The grind already took forever spamming Heroic Air Elemental, it's probably only going to get way longer from here.
Yeah, definitely makes task grinding the better choice for coin accumulation on Mercs you already have.
Pro tip (kinda, and perhaps you already know this): if you grind up to and including task 17, don't obtain task 18 for any character you want to grind coins for. Then, fill your campfire with tasks for other mercs in your party. What happens is that every subsequent time you encounter a stranger, you get a guaranteed 15 coins for the character who doesn't yet have their task 18 complete per stranger. This is great because it's an easy, infinite source of coins that will allow you to pick up any skills/items you missed and want to level on a character where the last 80 or so coins from the final task wouldn't have been enough.
I believe the slower start will kill you before you get to take advantage of the reward in most games. While being able to press the button to get 2 3/3s every turn post-completion can most certainly wear even the greediest opponents down, it's getting to the point of completion that I think the deck will struggle with.
The requirement of running so many 1-drops means you're more likely to run out of steam faster while getting to the completion phase, and Paladin's lack of draw means it can't provide itself with the resources needed to go all the way.
Because of this, other tempo-focused decks will likely take advantage of the lack of initiative from you and kill you before the Questline is complete, and I imagine even more value-oriented decks are probably going to be able to go over top of you before you can get to the final reward (and probably still can even if you do so unless you complete the Questline earlier than average).
Don't get me wrong, I'm looking forward to messing around with this deck in the first week. I just can't see it being a meta contender in the long run.
I'm of the mindset that Questlines and aggression don't mix. One less card in the mulligan and passing on turn 1 despite being tempo-focused will, in my mind, almost certainly leave Questline Paladin dead in the water.
Handbuff, on the other hand, looks to be very intriguing. That's a deck I'm looking forward to trying. If that fails, there's always the older Libram and Secret archetypes to fall back on. I can only hope that Paladin can recover from the recent Barrens nerfs and get back on its feet!
Ivory Knight never took off, and I don't think any existing Paladin archetypes need this sort of added value, even if it whiffs on said value most of the time. With that being said, perhaps a slower/Menagerie type build might appreciate this? Even there I'm skeptical.
My hopes for a menagerie Paladin deck are slim at this point... I see how this could potentially fit into that deck, but man oh man is the Murloc Dragon stuff a turn-off. Perhaps someday.
Just as FrostyFeet said, I'm actually quite eager to see if this replaces Steward of Darkshire in Odd Pally. Honestly, I think it will; I'd happily pay the 1-Health tax if it means summoning larger 1-Health minions.
Only downside is that it's weaker to drop solo, but you weren't really doing that with Steward anyway. Maybe find a way to run this alongside Steward? Tough call.
Any effect that lasts for the rest of the game is going to be dangerous. This will definitely be played in Odd Paladin, and it may see play in other midrange lists that are able to summon multiple Recruits in a turn.
it defenitly will NOT.
Its to slow,doesnt help in matchups they need help against and is just winmore in ones theyre good in already.
And its to freaking slow a doesnt set up lethal and doesnt effect CURRENT board
I'm actually in total agreement with Zyella. I thought long and hard about what this card has to offer to current lists, and while initially the effect looks really flashy and dangerous given its Odd cost, I'm actually leaning on the side towards it being too weak.
I'm a bit of an Odd Paladin junkie myself, so these are my two cents about it. 5-mana 5/5 that has no immediate board impact is INCREDIBLY slow in an archetype like Odd Paladin. For comparison, Loatheb is much more impactful on the same turn with any semblance of a board (which Odd Paladin often has by then), and it doesn't even see play in every Odd list, but rather as a tech option. Quartermaster is also a signficantly better option on the same turn should you even have just a couple of dudes on board. You also have cards like Blessing of Authority and Faceless Corruptor, both of which impact the board way more than this card does on the same turn.
Sure, this card might be able to strengthen your boards post-turn 5 should your previous ones have been wiped out, but I think even then this would only benefit you in slower matchups, and not by much given how insane Reno and other control decks tend to be with their sustain/removal/Taunts. In these matchups, you're better off with cards such as Quartermaster and/or Blessing of Authority in order to push current boards into a winning state. I think there's also something to be said about Steward of Darkshire, a card which already provides what is basically the same effect, albeit for a lower cost. Additionally, I can't ever see this being a good card in Aggro matchups because of how slow it is.
I'm definitely on the side of this card being overhyped by almost everyone on here with regards to Odd Pally. I'd love to be wrong, but I'm highly skeptical of the card becoming anywhere near a staple as other people have suggested.
Silver Hand Recruit Pally in Standard, on the other hand, seems to be well on its way to becoming an archetype given Blizz's pushing of it. I don't think Lothraxion does enough for the archetype (Standard just needs more ways to summon dudes), so I'm still not incredibly optimistic, but we'll see how it shapes out. I wouldn't be surprised if it takes a few expansions for the deck to kick in.
Odd Paladin certainly doesn't need this card, it's a powerful list as is and Muster for Battle is far superior on turn 3. Corrupting the card would require playing something along the lines of Loatheb, Quartermaster, or Leeroy Jenkins, all of which come down on power turns where, beyond that point, a card like this wouldn't be needed. The density of cards worth 5-mana or higher in the deck is also rather low, so Corrupting this card would be a difficult task as is.
Whether or not this card works in Standard in the coming months depends on how much Silver Hand support they introduce THIS expansion, and I'm not particularly optimistic there. I'm not even certain a card like this would be that good in those lists; 3-mana for 3/3 in stats is underwhelming, and Corrupting it just to play this card later off-curve doesn't seem particularly enticing either. Notably, though, it works well with the new Balloon Merchant on- and off- curve, so we'll just have to wait and see.
It might be difficult to Corrupt this card in existing lists, so I don't see it being included in them. Notably, it's a 5-mana 5/5 with Divine Shield on its own, but I can't help but think that even that's too fair for the current Standard metagame.
The moment I saw this after seeing Hammer of the Naaru though, I instantly thought of a Menagerie archetype featuring N'Zoth, God of the Deep. Should this deck become viable, I would expect to see this card in that list. This card synergises with Y'Shaarj, the Defiler as well, so there are some interesting implications there.
I would like to know though if N'Zoth would bring back the Corrupted or non-Corrupted version of this card though, because that would have significant implications for the archetype. I would imagine the Corrupted form is the one that gets resurrected.
I think the card's a bit too fair for its cost, given the broken stuff that can happen on turn 6 these days. I can't see this slotting into existing meta archetypes for Paladin, but if a Menagerie archetype gets enough support courtesy of N'Zoth, God of the Deep, Paladin would probably run this card in it. Whether or not that ends up being a good archetype remains to be seen.
Though I can't speak to its flavour, I don't see why something like this won't be run in Pure Paladin. It's a very high-impact card for the cost in that deck.
Despite never having played Warcraft 3 or WoW, Arthas' downfall and the Wrath of the Lich King are some of my all-time favourite story arcs. Additionally, I've been pretty bored of HS as of late. If DK is indeed coming with next expansion (and given all the evidence here it probably will), you'd best believe I'm gonna be playing again.
Boy oh boy, I'm glad they decided to go with buffs. Good to see DH and Warrior get some much needed love. I, for one, really hope the Pally buffs pull the class out of its current slump; I've tried what feels like everything in the class to very little success. It's even sadder when the only other Pallys I match into are playing Sunken City decks, which aren't even particularly good now.
There's an important distinction to be made here between "Discover a card from your deck" and Dredge: the latter only puts the card on the top of the deck, whereas the former draws it. That's significant, because you aren't getting the card you've Dredged immediately, so the card with Dredge has no immediate effect.
This was the subject of much debate when Sightless Watcher was initially released; despite arguments that having the agency to choose what your next draw would be was a huge benefit, opponents argued that not drawing the card on play was so detrimental that it was difficult to justify running what was, in practice, a vanilla 2-mana 3/2. The debate was settled when the card rather quickly dropped off in play, demonstrating that choosing what you draw and not drawing the card is far inferior to just drawing a card.
The only way I can see Dredge as being significant in the coming expansion is if, as they already have, they print cards that shuffle powerful effects to the bottom of your deck, which you would then need to Dredge up.
What about Face Hunter with Irondeep Trogg? Though the data may not show it, it's a transition people ought to be making.
TL;DR: These are my two times 100 cents. I've noted a number of changes to Big Paladin, but am not optimistic about its success. Similarly, the proposed Aggro Paladin could see some changes, but I don't see it being much better than existing aggressive Paladin lists. I believe Paladin is likely to stick to its well-established roots: Libram, Secret, Handbuff, maybe Stealth too.
Proposed changes to Big Paladin:
- 1x Runaway Blackwing for Lokholar the Ice Lord
- 2x Hold the Bridge for 2x Noble Mount
- 2x Hammer of the Naaru for 2x Wave of Apathy
- 2x Ceremonial Maul for 2x Lightbringer's Hammer
Proposed changes to Aggro Paladin:
- 1x Goody Two-Shields and Saidan the Scarlet for 2x Dun Baldar Bridge
- 2x Blessing of Authority for 2x Day at the Faire
Big Paladin
On the Big Paladin theorycraft, I've made a number of substitutions to consider. I've based my theorycraft on the old Darkmoon build of Duel Paladin that popped up for a time, and taken some inspiration from the theorycraft listed here. For reference, here's my theorycraft: https://playhearthstone.com/deckbuilder?deckcode=AAECAZ8FAuCLBJTkAw72pASLjQT4pAT3pAT0pAT34wOezQPS0QPzuwPKwQP1pASF3gOV%2BQOQ0AMA
Lokholar the Ice Lord, for instance, I think would be better substituted for Runaway Blackwing, which presents a huge threat with potential to completely swing the game in your favour, whereas the former would likely die or come close to dying upon summon. Whether or not Blackwing should be a two-of is a good question, and I suspect it likely will take a slot from Brasswing, which likely has a worse effect overall than Blackwing. I agree with all other minion choices.
As for other substitutions, Noble Mount makes way for Hold the Bridge, which this deck can better take advantage of as you summon a rather sizable number of big minions, and provides a way to stabilise as the game goes on better than Noble Mount does. Speaking of big minions, I've also added Hammer of the Naaru in for Wave of Apathy; it's just a solid card which creates a sizable minion while giving you three-damage pings, whereas the latter has no clear use other than stalling for a turn without offering any immediate way to deal with the board/take the initiative.
I've also substituted Lightbringer's Hammer for Ceremonial Maul which, while it is a worse weapon overall, can give you the same effect Protect the Innocent would have if you healed beforehand. Additionally, should you also stick a heal later in the game, you can get a whopping 15/15 stats in Taunt with the Maul equipped! The synergy with Barricade is also notable. Lightbringer's Hammer might end up being the better choice here, admittedly, but the inability to hit your opponent as well as the heal being conditional on your opponent having played some minion might render the weapon useless in certain matchups.
The biggest issue with my proposed list is the weapon redundancy. There are 7 different weapons in this list, which might lean towards the deck being too clunky. At the same time, the deck has the potential to make effective use of all of these weapons, so I'd want to try before dismissing some of them, if at all. Other, final notes on Big Paladin: Blessed Goods is the best substitution available for Desperate Measures used in Darkmoon Faire's Duel Paladin, and while not as good at providing immediate value, can give you even MORE weapons or other things to create value later on the game, so we'll see how it goes. Also, First Day of School and Hand of A'dal had not yet been nerfed in Darkmoon Duel Paladin, and we also lost Air Raid, so our early-game is overall much worse, and A'dal is much harder to stick early, but is retained due to it providing much needed card draw.
I will say that overall, Big Paladin probably won't succeed in the long run due to the clear difficulties in seizing early-game initiative, which Paladin usually wants to do as a means of contesting the early board, as well as the lack of high quality cards outside of the new additions from Alterac Valley, which are questionable at best (ex. Cavalry Horn takes two turns to activate, Brasswing's effect is mediocre at the mid-to-late game at best, a number of cards are conditional, either on having the big threats online or on healing). It won't stop me from trying, though, and I may be wrong!
Aggro Paladin
Regarding the Aggro Paladin, first: argh, I picked Alliance, so I can't play with the Aggro Pally theorycraft until I finish the honour chain!!! Nonetheless, I will say that I don't think Dun Baldar Bridge would ever see play in an aggro deck, as you're spending a whopping 4-mana for no immediate effect, which offsets any potential benefit the card provides thereafter. Similarly, as the deck tops out at 4-mana, corrupting Day at the Faire will be difficult, and playing its base form is mediocre at best.
I'd probably add the second copy of Goody Two-Shields as well as Saidan the Scarlet and two copies of Blessing of Authority for a bit of a larger buff package to support Saidan and potentially highroll the game to victory, with or without Drek'thar.
Because this deck is focused on Drek'Thar, there are parallels to Tax Paladin in Wild, which uses Call to Arms; I'm not sure that a similar idea would succeed in Standard, however, as you're lacking Call to Arms, and the given list, while I think can make minor improvements, contains a bunch of minions you'd rather not pull from Drek'thar. Notably, you can't run Murgur Murgurgle because, when it shuffles itself into your deck, it disables Drek'thar's effect!
The lack of high quality minions for Drek'thar to pull from suggests moving away from a Drek'Thar package altogether, and at the point, I'd rather be running the well-established Secret, Handbuff, or even Stealth packages that are already known to perform on ladder.
One final note: there are a few avenues for improvement to existing Libram, Secret, Handbuff, and Stealth lists that I won't go into here, but I feel already exhibit more potential than the proposed lists. Then again, we've seen these lists in action during Stormwind, and the new meta might be such that these archetypes disappear. Given how often Libram has stuck around, however, and the sheer power demonstrated by other aggressive lists this expansion, such as Secret and Handbuff, which have both been consistent laddering choices, they seem like the better lists to build on and improve rather than attempt anything novel offered by Alterac Valley.
If you actually read this whole post, which I made only because of my excessive devotion to and interest in Traditional Hearthstone and love for Paladin, then thanks!
Damnit, I picked the Alliance out of allegiance, but all of these competitive and cool Drek'Thar decks are now completely out of my reach as a result. It's a shame I don't get to experience any of this stuff now before the launch of the next expansion.
I absolutely agree, I don't like the way they phrased the change here nor in the tweet. The whole point of the "grind" is that you're working towards something; it's not inherently enjoyable or "engaging", the most "engaging" part is the speed at which you grind, and the faster it is, the faster you're going to be able to play the actually "engaging" content at an optimal level (i.e. PvP, more challenging Heroic PvEs). In essence, then, you're not making the experience anymore "engaging" when you slow down the grind, so there is no benefit to the change whatsoever, just more costs. The way they've framed the change is what leaves a sour taste in my mouth.
Ah well, I guess I won't be playing the mode until someone figures out some other optimal strategy to grind or the team does something to make tasks/coins more readily available, because I certainly didn't max my team before the fix went live.
Damnit, I was hoping they wouldn't change this. Welp, better finish my grind for the 1 PvP team (haven't PvP'd yet) I want to be able to play at max before they "fix" the Stranger. For the F2P grinder like me, this change absolutely blows. The grind already took forever spamming Heroic Air Elemental, it's probably only going to get way longer from here.
Yeah, definitely makes task grinding the better choice for coin accumulation on Mercs you already have.
Pro tip (kinda, and perhaps you already know this): if you grind up to and including task 17, don't obtain task 18 for any character you want to grind coins for. Then, fill your campfire with tasks for other mercs in your party. What happens is that every subsequent time you encounter a stranger, you get a guaranteed 15 coins for the character who doesn't yet have their task 18 complete per stranger. This is great because it's an easy, infinite source of coins that will allow you to pick up any skills/items you missed and want to level on a character where the last 80 or so coins from the final task wouldn't have been enough.
I believe the slower start will kill you before you get to take advantage of the reward in most games. While being able to press the button to get 2 3/3s every turn post-completion can most certainly wear even the greediest opponents down, it's getting to the point of completion that I think the deck will struggle with.
The requirement of running so many 1-drops means you're more likely to run out of steam faster while getting to the completion phase, and Paladin's lack of draw means it can't provide itself with the resources needed to go all the way.
Because of this, other tempo-focused decks will likely take advantage of the lack of initiative from you and kill you before the Questline is complete, and I imagine even more value-oriented decks are probably going to be able to go over top of you before you can get to the final reward (and probably still can even if you do so unless you complete the Questline earlier than average).
Don't get me wrong, I'm looking forward to messing around with this deck in the first week. I just can't see it being a meta contender in the long run.
I'm of the mindset that Questlines and aggression don't mix. One less card in the mulligan and passing on turn 1 despite being tempo-focused will, in my mind, almost certainly leave Questline Paladin dead in the water.
Handbuff, on the other hand, looks to be very intriguing. That's a deck I'm looking forward to trying. If that fails, there's always the older Libram and Secret archetypes to fall back on. I can only hope that Paladin can recover from the recent Barrens nerfs and get back on its feet!
Ivory Knight never took off, and I don't think any existing Paladin archetypes need this sort of added value, even if it whiffs on said value most of the time. With that being said, perhaps a slower/Menagerie type build might appreciate this? Even there I'm skeptical.
My hopes for a menagerie Paladin deck are slim at this point... I see how this could potentially fit into that deck, but man oh man is the Murloc Dragon stuff a turn-off. Perhaps someday.
Just as FrostyFeet said, I'm actually quite eager to see if this replaces Steward of Darkshire in Odd Pally. Honestly, I think it will; I'd happily pay the 1-Health tax if it means summoning larger 1-Health minions.
Only downside is that it's weaker to drop solo, but you weren't really doing that with Steward anyway. Maybe find a way to run this alongside Steward? Tough call.
I'm actually in total agreement with Zyella. I thought long and hard about what this card has to offer to current lists, and while initially the effect looks really flashy and dangerous given its Odd cost, I'm actually leaning on the side towards it being too weak.
I'm a bit of an Odd Paladin junkie myself, so these are my two cents about it. 5-mana 5/5 that has no immediate board impact is INCREDIBLY slow in an archetype like Odd Paladin. For comparison, Loatheb is much more impactful on the same turn with any semblance of a board (which Odd Paladin often has by then), and it doesn't even see play in every Odd list, but rather as a tech option. Quartermaster is also a signficantly better option on the same turn should you even have just a couple of dudes on board. You also have cards like Blessing of Authority and Faceless Corruptor, both of which impact the board way more than this card does on the same turn.
Sure, this card might be able to strengthen your boards post-turn 5 should your previous ones have been wiped out, but I think even then this would only benefit you in slower matchups, and not by much given how insane Reno and other control decks tend to be with their sustain/removal/Taunts. In these matchups, you're better off with cards such as Quartermaster and/or Blessing of Authority in order to push current boards into a winning state. I think there's also something to be said about Steward of Darkshire, a card which already provides what is basically the same effect, albeit for a lower cost. Additionally, I can't ever see this being a good card in Aggro matchups because of how slow it is.
I'm definitely on the side of this card being overhyped by almost everyone on here with regards to Odd Pally. I'd love to be wrong, but I'm highly skeptical of the card becoming anywhere near a staple as other people have suggested.
Silver Hand Recruit Pally in Standard, on the other hand, seems to be well on its way to becoming an archetype given Blizz's pushing of it. I don't think Lothraxion does enough for the archetype (Standard just needs more ways to summon dudes), so I'm still not incredibly optimistic, but we'll see how it shapes out. I wouldn't be surprised if it takes a few expansions for the deck to kick in.
Odd Paladin certainly doesn't need this card, it's a powerful list as is and Muster for Battle is far superior on turn 3. Corrupting the card would require playing something along the lines of Loatheb, Quartermaster, or Leeroy Jenkins, all of which come down on power turns where, beyond that point, a card like this wouldn't be needed. The density of cards worth 5-mana or higher in the deck is also rather low, so Corrupting this card would be a difficult task as is.
Whether or not this card works in Standard in the coming months depends on how much Silver Hand support they introduce THIS expansion, and I'm not particularly optimistic there. I'm not even certain a card like this would be that good in those lists; 3-mana for 3/3 in stats is underwhelming, and Corrupting it just to play this card later off-curve doesn't seem particularly enticing either. Notably, though, it works well with the new Balloon Merchant on- and off- curve, so we'll just have to wait and see.
It might be difficult to Corrupt this card in existing lists, so I don't see it being included in them. Notably, it's a 5-mana 5/5 with Divine Shield on its own, but I can't help but think that even that's too fair for the current Standard metagame.
The moment I saw this after seeing Hammer of the Naaru though, I instantly thought of a Menagerie archetype featuring N'Zoth, God of the Deep. Should this deck become viable, I would expect to see this card in that list. This card synergises with Y'Shaarj, the Defiler as well, so there are some interesting implications there.
I would like to know though if N'Zoth would bring back the Corrupted or non-Corrupted version of this card though, because that would have significant implications for the archetype. I would imagine the Corrupted form is the one that gets resurrected.
I think the card's a bit too fair for its cost, given the broken stuff that can happen on turn 6 these days. I can't see this slotting into existing meta archetypes for Paladin, but if a Menagerie archetype gets enough support courtesy of N'Zoth, God of the Deep, Paladin would probably run this card in it. Whether or not that ends up being a good archetype remains to be seen.
Though I can't speak to its flavour, I don't see why something like this won't be run in Pure Paladin. It's a very high-impact card for the cost in that deck.