Hearthstone Deck Guide: Shaladrassil Paladin - A Fun, Unusual Strategy!

The Into the Emerald Dream meta is quite stable now, as many tier-1 lists have been standing out in the last couple of weeks. That's the case for Shaladrassil Paladin, for instance. According to HSReplay on April 23rd, 2025, this deck has a 58.90% win rate.

Another interesting detail is that this list is a bit unusual for this class. It is different from other Paladin lists we've seen in the past, namely the ones that only focus on buffing minions. Instead, it focuses on surviving the first few turns and controlling the board until it can play a nearly unstoppable combo. It has become a strong, but also very fun option in the meta!

We, at Cards Realm, decided to bring you a full guide on how to play this list. We'll cover each card, the mulligan, win condition, and much more. Let's go!

The card that names this list is Shaladrassil. This spell creates 5 Dream cards in your hand, which is simply incredible.

When you play a card that costs more than Shaladrassil before you cast it, you'll corrupt these Dream cards, and make them even stronger. Check out below how absurdly powerful these resources can be:

The main game plan is to play Ursol while Shaladrassil is in your hand. This way, you'll use this last spell as an aura for three turns, and get three times as many Dream cards as you usually would.

If you manage to do this, you'll hardly lose. After all, you'll have so many completely broken spells and minions, that you'll easily be able to build boards like the one below:

Cards

As our main cards are quite expensive, we'll have to play a few small defensive minions to survive until we can cast these expensive spells on later turns. Tar Slime's and Righteous Protector's Taunt and Glacial Shard, which Freezes an enemy minion, will be critical.

Another useful tool to stay alive is Divine Brew. This spell gives you up to three Divine Shields, so you can make one of your Taunt minions or your own hero immune to the next attack.

To play Ursol as early as possible, you'll use resources like Metal Detector and Oh, Manager!, which will give you Coins, and, as such, give you more mana for a turn.

However, we need to do more to play Ursol and Shaladrassil than just save mana and stay alive. We also need to draw them. So, this list plays a lot of card draw: Ursine Maul, Robocaller, and Grillmaster. Most of these cards draw the most expensive card in your deck, so you'll always get the resources you need with them.

Mixologist and Griftah, Trusted Vendor are very flexible options, as they can deal with the board by Freezing or removing enemy minions, and also draw cards.

As you'll have many ways to draw or create resources in your hand, Moonstone Mauler will be viable, as you'll most likely be able to draw Asteroids. In fact, you will draw them when you activate Dragonscale Armaments, for instance. Wisp is also interesting because, besides drawing lots of cards, we also need a smaller hand when we create Dream cards. Because Wisp costs 0, we won't have any trouble playing it just before we create our Dream cards.

Another minion that benefits from the interactions in this deck is Dread Corsair. As this list plays a few weapons, Corsair will always cost less than it usually does, and its Taunt will be very useful when we need to defend ourselves.

Finally, as this list plays so many Coins and cheap spells - including a few Dream cards and the ones created by Mixologist and Griftah, Trusted Vendor - Sunsapper Lynessa makes sense. She'll make these effects a lot stronger.

This list's win condition is quite clear, as most cards only pave the way so we can play Ursol and Shaladrassil. They either keep you alive, draw these cards, or give you Coins so you can play this combo faster. If you can't draw and play this combo, this deck doesn't work.

Even though the Ursol / Shaladrassil combo is your only way to win, you don't need to keep them in your starting hand, particularly as Ursine Maul will already draw them for you. I also highly recommend you look for one or two minions with Taunt and Robocaller, which will give you more resources and, as such, widen your possibilities.

This is one of the best starting hands for this list:

It has everything you need: protection with Taunt, a removal spell, Coins, and card draw through the two weapons.

Aggro

Aggressive lists are your biggest enemies. This list may play many defensive spells, but you'll nearly always struggle against enemy pressure. Your Dream cards won't give you a huge minion with Taunt, so, even if you can survive until you can play the main combo, if you don't have a lot of life, you'll die.

Assuming you can play Ursol on turn 7, you'll still only be able to play the cards created by Shaladrassil in the next round. Many of them won't be efficient until one turn later, considering you need to wait a turn before you attack with a minion after you play it.

As such, you'll need many more turns than usual to win. So, I highly recommend you look for your removals and small minions to fight for the board, so don't focus a lot on Coins and card draw.

Control

You'll be more comfortable against slower decks because they'll usually give you enough time to play your combo. In these matchups, you should try to play your combo faster: try to draw the cards you need and save as many Coins as you can as fast as you can.

Shaladrassil Paladin isn't the usual Paladin list we're used to seeing, as it doesn't only buff minions. It is certainly a great option if you enjoy Paladin, and we should all give it a chance in this Into the Emerald Dream meta.

What did you think of this list? Tell us your thoughts in our comment section below.

Thank you for reading, and see you next time!