I like every game to be a bit different. That's why I like things like Burgle Rogue and the Priest equivalents, Chaos Mage, highlander decks and cards like Deathstalker Rexxar. Aggro decks typically don't have that. Neither do most combo decks, which is why I usually stop playing them after pulling off the combo a couple of times.
I also like to win or lose because of decisions I made in the game, rather than cards I or my opponent did or did not draw. While there is certainly decision making in aggro decks at times (trade or face, for example), in quite a few games winning depends on drawing the right cards at the right time. That's inherent to aggro since games are short and you're burning through all cards in your hand, so each individual card you draw has a lot more impact.
Regarding game length, it's very rare that I think after a 5 minute game "this was a great game". That happens a lot more in longer games. It doesn't have to be super long, but 15 minutes per game is fine with me, that allows for some actual story to unfold.
I do always focus entirely on Hearthstone when playing. I may have music on, but no video or other visual distractions. Even then, there are some decks that I can't play when I'm tired, like Big Spell Mage, because the decisions about when to use what removal and when to become aggressive yourself matter a great deal for your chances of winning.
But... but... if a taunt is in my way, how is I going to hit der face?! 😢
much decisions; very impossible!
On the flipside when playing warlock I've literally had to throw away aoe against other control decks just so I avoid over drawing something that carried greater value. Throwing away aoe because my class has too much of it.
Honestly I can't play aggro properly. I feel this archetype more difficult than midrange/control or maybe is not fitted for me, always trade to much or think for plays aggro don't do.
Might be best to try it out and try to learn it. I had the same issue in the past. Eventually I decided to run an aggro deck and realized something: that lack of 'going face' was messing up my midrange/control game as well. In any deck that isn't pure fatigue, there's a point when you have to 'switch gears' and go to the face. It's not always easy to see what the point is to sending the opponent from 25 health to 17 health when you can clear but that WILL change the game in your favor at times*. Being comfortable with the aggro playstyle lets you identify those moments in your slower games.
I had the same experience watching Firebat play: no matter what deck he's playing, he's always calculating how soon he can kill the opponent. And I think it does get him more victories even with control and combo decks.
But... but... if a taunt is in my way, how is I going to hit der face?! 😢
much decisions; very impossible!
On the flipside when playing warlock I've literally had to throw away aoe against other control decks just so I avoid over drawing something that carried greater value. Throwing away aoe because my class has too much of it.
Much decisions indeed.
😮 Woah! Hold on! Surely just “throwing away” a card takes even less thought than choosing what to attack with it? 🤷♂️ heh! There are logically less choices involved in the decision. 🤔
I'm gonna say something that no many people will agree with but:
Playing aggro vs control is much harder than playing control vs aggro.
For some classes and match-ups I would tentatively agree. Not all aggro classes have strong reload mechanics that paladin has shown to have, similarly to how not every control class has the same reloading that warlock has.
In fairness he is not wrong. Take a matchup like (Any) Aggro Paladin vs a Cubelock.
The Lock just needs to look for Hellfires and Defiles, any healing cards and Twisting Nethers until he drops his Voidlords and Guldan to win. The paladin on the other hand has to navigate these cards, keep track of how many and what has played, not over commit but also keep up the pressure while simultaneoislu keeping his hand siZe up and running.
Edit: that said, there are also matchups where the reverse is true. Take a deck like Baku Rogue. Most matchups are play on curve, hit face and occasionally remove the odd minion thats ik the way. Its probably the easiest deck to pilot right now.
i think control players' self-righteousness is a little bit justified - both game design (attacker's choice) and card design generally privilege aggressive/tempo decks. control decks are basically harder to play because design makes them that way. and the designers seem more eager to print hard counters to control (QR, shudder) than hard aggro counters. aggro is of course fine in principal, and completely necessary for balanced game design. so that said, three things i'd like to see for the game: a) higher skill cap aggro/tempo decks. things like zoo can be pretty tricky to pilot correctly. but many recent aggro archetypes reward what would normally be misplays, like tempo mage and most paladin decks, with insane board refills and draw. b) the end of extreme high-roll decks. while all decks can high and low roll, decks like spiteful druid or barnes priest are just horrible for the game. instantly winning because you play a card on curve is not really fun to play nor to play against. these are even more toxic than things like pirate warrior. c) viable budget-ish control decks, in like the 3000-4000ish range. it'd be nice for new or f2p players not be basically forced into playing curve or face decks. marin could have been a card to help facilitate this (as cthun was), but they went too meme-y with him.
Have fun with your fast food gaming. I prefer using my brain once in a while.
Then why are you playing Hearthstone and not some other game that is far less simple?
Sorry, I didn't read it earlier.
With a full time job it is hard to find the time for more strategic games. Furthermore I am already 30 years old, so the FPS games are not really an option anymore as the reflexes start dropping at around 23 years. I feel okay with this compromise.
I play aggro because i usually do several other things beside HS. Like watching a stream/TV/series and/or study. HS is a good background activity for me, never played it like its a serious thing, i figure its better to play control and stuff like that if u take the game seriously.
That's totally fine. It is just that your post looks a lot like you'd never understand how people can enjoy playing long games and think about their turns. When I play I don't do anything else besides listening to music. And for so much attention aggro decks are just too boring.
Yeah thats true maybe i was a bit harsh. Maybe because i grow out of gaming or something, when i was younger i played A LOT. like at least 6+ hours a day. i did grind for the most meaningless things ever and i enjoyed it, thinking i was hot shit or something :DD so i know what its like to play long games for a long time. Nowadays i start the biggest & best AAA games on the market and get bored of them in like an hour and never play them again. Last game i played through was Dark Souls 3. I miss games sometimes but i can rarely sit down to actually play with something with full attention.
Got your point, your excused :D
I don't really play any other games besides HS because of limited time. But I do enjoy grinding some flash games on armorgames.com once in a while. Or some well-done point-and-click. But my conclusion was that HS gives me enough to keep my gamer's soul alive and I managed to get beyond being salty about the relatively high amount of RNG. The games are still short enough in HS and as a former League of Legends player I had to get used to auto-losses and learn a deal about anger management, haha.
I've kinda found that my favorite matchups are aggro vs aggro. Control vs control can be annoying just because of the length of the game haha. And of course, control is very frustrating to play these days thanks to the increasing presence of Quest priest and Shudderwock shaman haha. At least when you play an aggro/midrange deck, you have a shot at winning vs any matchup (you should be teched against tough control decks anyways).
I'm still having fun in this meta. I just have more fun sticking to aggro or midrange because as a control deck, it's just hopeless against some of those combo decks (as it should be, I know, I just don't like complete hopelessness lol).
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Twitch name: Anatak15 NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
I'm gonna say something that no many people will agree with but:
Playing aggro vs control is much harder than playing control vs aggro.
It's honestly all about the matchup.
The point to choosing your deck and hitting the right matchup is to try to hit on the weaknesses of the opponent. If they are weak in the early game, you strike then. If they are weak in the late game, you strike then. So forth.
When you hit that weak spot, then your deck is operating exactly as it should. By then it's just following the instructions your deck has applied. If your deck is aggressive and your opponent is weak to aggro, you just go face. If your deck is strong in fighting the board then you just hit any place where they have a skull and you don't. When you have the advantage, you simply have to play to your win condition, something anyone can easily do.
The point when the game actually brings choices are when things DON'T go as planned. You face an opponent that's strong when you're strong. RNG puts a wrench in your plans. You screw up. Those types of things. That's when you have to go off-script and improvise. That's when those 'decision making' situations come up.
Aggro, control, whatever. It's mindless so long as you stick to the script of the deck. A LOT of players just play that way then shrug when they lose attributing it to 'luck' or 'bad balance' or 'a bad deck'. They won't figure out how to drag out a match with strategic trades to new more overall damage or to choose which minions to play for maximum benefit. They won't figure out which removal tools to use and when and what to mulligan to hold out during a bad situation if they are control. Then they sit at rank 5 and go "this game is a children's card game that's all about luck and greed" because the game doesn't handhold you into showing your mistakes.
We haven't had a 100% pure mindless face deck in the high tiers since 2014. Every other deck has been zooish or tempo or honestly a midrange deck, all with contengencies for bad situations and ways to take advantage if you can find it. ALL decks have been far more strategic in bad situations than what we had in the past. They have also been more streamlined to have more good situations (when you CAN go mindless and on script).
This game isn't MTG, or Go, or Chess. We know. But there's reasons why we never updated the "Face Song". We ask for more out of you. If you are willing to try. If not, the game is willing to let you think it's out of your hands.
Unless you play tempo. Then you're a brainless fool.
I'm gonna say something that no many people will agree with but:
Playing aggro vs control is much harder than playing control vs aggro.
It's honestly all about the matchup.
The point to choosing your deck and hitting the right matchup is to try to hit on the weaknesses of the opponent. If they are weak in the early game, you strike then. If they are weak in the late game, you strike then. So forth.
When you hit that weak spot, then your deck is operating exactly as it should. By then it's just following the instructions your deck has applied. If your deck is aggressive and your opponent is weak to aggro, you just go face. If your deck is strong in fighting the board then you just hit any place where they have a skull and you don't. When you have the advantage, you simply have to play to your win condition, something anyone can easily do.
The point when the game actually brings choices are when things DON'T go as planned. You face an opponent that's strong when you're strong. RNG puts a wrench in your plans. You screw up. Those types of things. That's when you have to go off-script and improvise. That's when those 'decision making' situations come up.
Aggro, control, whatever. It's mindless so long as you stick to the script of the deck. A LOT of players just play that way then shrug when they lose attributing it to 'luck' or 'bad balance' or 'a bad deck'. They won't figure out how to drag out a match with strategic trades to new more overall damage or to choose which minions to play for maximum benefit. They won't figure out which removal tools to use and when and what to mulligan to hold out during a bad situation if they are control. Then they sit at rank 5 and go "this game is a children's card game that's all about luck and greed" because the game doesn't handhold you into showing your mistakes.
We haven't had a 100% pure mindless face deck in the high tiers since 2014. Every other deck has been zooish or tempo or honestly a midrange deck, all with contengencies for bad situations and ways to take advantage if you can find it. ALL decks have been far more strategic in bad situations than what we had in the past. They have also been more streamlined to have more good situations (when you CAN go mindless and on script).
This game isn't MTG, or Go, or Chess. We know. But there's reasons why we never updated the "Face Song". We ask for more out of you. If you are willing to try. If not, the game is willing to let you think it's out of your hands.
Unless you play tempo. Then you're a brainless fool.
yes that's a joke
You pretty much hit the nail on the head haha. Lots of people straight up blame matchups for their bad luck and refuse to take responsibility for maybe a few misplays. A couple months ago I played a zoolock which was supposed to fail against the cubelocks that were running rampant (I crushed the aggro paladins who were also everywhere, so that helped).
Lots of people in the community have a very "poor me" attitude which doesn't get anybody anywhere, honestly haha.
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Twitch name: Anatak15 NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
You can achieve a 50% winrate with aggro decks while being relatively new or bad to the game. This makes them easier to play. However, in order to achieve a 60%+ winrate you actually have to be a skilled player. People who dismiss aggro decks are simply ignorant and inexperienced.
Control decks are typically harder to achieve a 50% winrate with, since they hold more complex interactions. The reason control decks require such thinking is because aggro exists. It it didn't the game length would raise to a 30min average and the person that would win, would be the one with the greediest control deck.
All archetypes whether it be control, aggro, midrange or combo are needed and they all require critical thinking if you want an overwhelmingly positive winrate.
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Experienced Deckbuilder, Legend Player, Wild Expert, TCG Veteran and Contributing Author toWildHS & Vicious Syndicate. Any and all support is greatly appreciated as it helps me make further quality content. 🐺 ➣Twitter ➣Decks ➣Patreon
But... but... if a taunt is in my way, how is I going to hit der face?! 😢
much decisions; very impossible!
If the face plays taunt, me still go face.
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
I’m fast AND furious! In your faaaace! 😭😭😭
I like every game to be a bit different. That's why I like things like Burgle Rogue and the Priest equivalents, Chaos Mage, highlander decks and cards like Deathstalker Rexxar. Aggro decks typically don't have that. Neither do most combo decks, which is why I usually stop playing them after pulling off the combo a couple of times.
I also like to win or lose because of decisions I made in the game, rather than cards I or my opponent did or did not draw. While there is certainly decision making in aggro decks at times (trade or face, for example), in quite a few games winning depends on drawing the right cards at the right time. That's inherent to aggro since games are short and you're burning through all cards in your hand, so each individual card you draw has a lot more impact.
Regarding game length, it's very rare that I think after a 5 minute game "this was a great game". That happens a lot more in longer games. It doesn't have to be super long, but 15 minutes per game is fine with me, that allows for some actual story to unfold.
I do always focus entirely on Hearthstone when playing. I may have music on, but no video or other visual distractions. Even then, there are some decks that I can't play when I'm tired, like Big Spell Mage, because the decisions about when to use what removal and when to become aggressive yourself matter a great deal for your chances of winning.
On the flipside when playing warlock I've literally had to throw away aoe against other control decks just so I avoid over drawing something that carried greater value. Throwing away aoe because my class has too much of it.
Much decisions indeed.
I had the same experience watching Firebat play: no matter what deck he's playing, he's always calculating how soon he can kill the opponent. And I think it does get him more victories even with control and combo decks.
😮 Woah! Hold on! Surely just “throwing away” a card takes even less thought than choosing what to attack with it? 🤷♂️ heh! There are logically less choices involved in the decision. 🤔
That is the very nature of Aggro (Agression) 🤗
Good luck and have fun. And dont forget to count to ten after every loss before you jump into another one! :-)
I'm gonna say something that no many people will agree with but:
Playing aggro vs control is much harder than playing control vs aggro.
*Gasp!*. Burn the witch!
For some classes and match-ups I would tentatively agree. Not all aggro classes have strong reload mechanics that paladin has shown to have, similarly to how not every control class has the same reloading that warlock has.
In fairness he is not wrong. Take a matchup like (Any) Aggro Paladin vs a Cubelock.
The Lock just needs to look for Hellfires and Defiles, any healing cards and Twisting Nethers until he drops his Voidlords and Guldan to win. The paladin on the other hand has to navigate these cards, keep track of how many and what has played, not over commit but also keep up the pressure while simultaneoislu keeping his hand siZe up and running.
Edit: that said, there are also matchups where the reverse is true. Take a deck like Baku Rogue. Most matchups are play on curve, hit face and occasionally remove the odd minion thats ik the way. Its probably the easiest deck to pilot right now.
i think control players' self-righteousness is a little bit justified - both game design (attacker's choice) and card design generally privilege aggressive/tempo decks. control decks are basically harder to play because design makes them that way. and the designers seem more eager to print hard counters to control (QR, shudder) than hard aggro counters. aggro is of course fine in principal, and completely necessary for balanced game design. so that said, three things i'd like to see for the game:
a) higher skill cap aggro/tempo decks. things like zoo can be pretty tricky to pilot correctly. but many recent aggro archetypes reward what would normally be misplays, like tempo mage and most paladin decks, with insane board refills and draw.
b) the end of extreme high-roll decks. while all decks can high and low roll, decks like spiteful druid or barnes priest are just horrible for the game. instantly winning because you play a card on curve is not really fun to play nor to play against. these are even more toxic than things like pirate warrior.
c) viable budget-ish control decks, in like the 3000-4000ish range. it'd be nice for new or f2p players not be basically forced into playing curve or face decks. marin could have been a card to help facilitate this (as cthun was), but they went too meme-y with him.
Sorry, I didn't read it earlier.
With a full time job it is hard to find the time for more strategic games. Furthermore I am already 30 years old, so the FPS games are not really an option anymore as the reflexes start dropping at around 23 years.
I feel okay with this compromise.
Got your point, your excused :D
I don't really play any other games besides HS because of limited time. But I do enjoy grinding some flash games on armorgames.com once in a while. Or some well-done point-and-click. But my conclusion was that HS gives me enough to keep my gamer's soul alive and I managed to get beyond being salty about the relatively high amount of RNG. The games are still short enough in HS and as a former League of Legends player I had to get used to auto-losses and learn a deal about anger management, haha.
I've kinda found that my favorite matchups are aggro vs aggro. Control vs control can be annoying just because of the length of the game haha. And of course, control is very frustrating to play these days thanks to the increasing presence of Quest priest and Shudderwock shaman haha. At least when you play an aggro/midrange deck, you have a shot at winning vs any matchup (you should be teched against tough control decks anyways).
I'm still having fun in this meta. I just have more fun sticking to aggro or midrange because as a control deck, it's just hopeless against some of those combo decks (as it should be, I know, I just don't like complete hopelessness lol).
Twitch name: Anatak15
NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
Quest priest or big spell mage? Love control deck
It's honestly all about the matchup.
The point to choosing your deck and hitting the right matchup is to try to hit on the weaknesses of the opponent. If they are weak in the early game, you strike then. If they are weak in the late game, you strike then. So forth.
When you hit that weak spot, then your deck is operating exactly as it should. By then it's just following the instructions your deck has applied. If your deck is aggressive and your opponent is weak to aggro, you just go face. If your deck is strong in fighting the board then you just hit any place where they have a skull and you don't. When you have the advantage, you simply have to play to your win condition, something anyone can easily do.
The point when the game actually brings choices are when things DON'T go as planned. You face an opponent that's strong when you're strong. RNG puts a wrench in your plans. You screw up. Those types of things. That's when you have to go off-script and improvise. That's when those 'decision making' situations come up.
Aggro, control, whatever. It's mindless so long as you stick to the script of the deck. A LOT of players just play that way then shrug when they lose attributing it to 'luck' or 'bad balance' or 'a bad deck'. They won't figure out how to drag out a match with strategic trades to new more overall damage or to choose which minions to play for maximum benefit. They won't figure out which removal tools to use and when and what to mulligan to hold out during a bad situation if they are control. Then they sit at rank 5 and go "this game is a children's card game that's all about luck and greed" because the game doesn't handhold you into showing your mistakes.
We haven't had a 100% pure mindless face deck in the high tiers since 2014. Every other deck has been zooish or tempo or honestly a midrange deck, all with contengencies for bad situations and ways to take advantage if you can find it. ALL decks have been far more strategic in bad situations than what we had in the past. They have also been more streamlined to have more good situations (when you CAN go mindless and on script).
This game isn't MTG, or Go, or Chess. We know. But there's reasons why we never updated the "Face Song". We ask for more out of you. If you are willing to try. If not, the game is willing to let you think it's out of your hands.
Unless you play tempo. Then you're a brainless fool.
yes that's a joke
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
You pretty much hit the nail on the head haha. Lots of people straight up blame matchups for their bad luck and refuse to take responsibility for maybe a few misplays. A couple months ago I played a zoolock which was supposed to fail against the cubelocks that were running rampant (I crushed the aggro paladins who were also everywhere, so that helped).
Lots of people in the community have a very "poor me" attitude which doesn't get anybody anywhere, honestly haha.
Twitch name: Anatak15
NA Legend Season 48, 49, 52, 53, 54, 74
You can achieve a 50% winrate with aggro decks while being relatively new or bad to the game. This makes them easier to play. However, in order to achieve a 60%+ winrate you actually have to be a skilled player. People who dismiss aggro decks are simply ignorant and inexperienced.
Control decks are typically harder to achieve a 50% winrate with, since they hold more complex interactions. The reason control decks require such thinking is because aggro exists. It it didn't the game length would raise to a 30min average and the person that would win, would be the one with the greediest control deck.
All archetypes whether it be control, aggro, midrange or combo are needed and they all require critical thinking if you want an overwhelmingly positive winrate.