Hearthpwn

Quote from Bulk »

I wouldn't give that comment that much credit. They are watching Undertaker closely as they are plenty of other frequently-used cards.

A direct hit to Undertaker would make the acquisition of Naxx adventure by new players a lot less appealing and that might be holding them back on changing it. 

I don't see it as a terribly overpowered card,but by nerfing it, aggro decks will take a definite hit and the meta will surely slow down. Not sure if that's intended by Blizzard as well.

 

as a F2P player on NA (not on EU) I got naxx not for undertaker, but for sludge belcher and loatheb... those were the cards I really wanted.

UT is broken and needs a fix, hope they realize it. It doesn't mean it needs to be nerfed into oblivion like buzzard was, but there are plenty of ways to fix it for real.

Quote from Sahgos »

As a follow up, perhaps some of the math whizzes here could correct me where I'm wrong but the chances of not getting at least one UT in your starting hand when you go first are as follows:

28/30*27/29*26/28*25/27*24/26*23/25 or 63.4%

The  chances of not getting him when going second are as follows:

63.4%*22/24*21/23 or 53.1%

Going first, if you mulligan for undertaker aggressively, you start with 3 chances not to get him: 28/30*27/29*26/28 as you said. Next you get another three picks if you mulligan all your cards. These cannot be the same as the first three so: 25/27*24/26*23/25. However, you then also draw a card at the start of your first turn. This can be one of the ones you threw out on your mulligan, but obviously not one of the ones you're still holding in your hand, so another: 25/27, for a total chance of 58.7% for no undertaker.

With coin, you also draw a card first turn for a factor of 24/26 added onto your number, so 49.0% for no undertaker.

In other words, with the con, if you mulligan for it aggressively, you are slightly more likely to have an undertaker to play on turn 1 than to not have it.

In much the same way that Auctioneer was eventually (finally?) nerfed when the spare parts mechanic was developed, I suspect Undertaker will be a strong nerf candidate as soon as an expansion adds a few more cheap/powerful deathrattle cards to the deck which push it into OP range.  They did a great job adding cards like Scarlet Purifier and Lil' Exorcist, consistent with their "add counter-cards instead of nerfing" philosophy, but I still worry we're a few cards away from seeing 4/5 Undertakers on turn 3 in every deck which would obviously force them to implement a direct nerf.

My thought is that Undertaker won't get more powerful with better Deathrattle cards, but it would get more powerful if even one more Aggro card interacted with Deathrattles itself.  Because if good Deathrattles are added at low mana costs, then they'd also fall in line with the Control philosophy of not committing anything to the board early unless it returns value when killed.

I also don't think that Blizzard is serious about handling Undertaker if what they're printing is Lil' Exorcist and Scarlet Purifier.  Those cards don't interact with Undertaker, they interact with Deathrattles.  It's as if they printed more answers to 3/2's for 2 mana in order to combat Shattered Sun Clerics.  It totally misses the mark.  What would be an answer to Undertaker is a single-shot defensive minion at 1 mana that scales up, something like a Patient Assassin.

Generally though, I don't take statements about internal testing with very much weight.  Obviously, the card has already passed through the most rigorous internal testing they could put it to, otherwise it wouldn't have been released.  It's when the competitive player base absorbs a card that it's maximum potential is discovered, and if at that point there is an unsolvable imbalance in the metagame, Blizzard redresses it.

As to whether that kind of imbalance exists, it clearly doesn't when the best performing class in the meta is Warlock.  On the contrary, there is no way at this point that it would be smart to harm a Hunter deck that is used as a counter to the Warlock.  If Blizzard sees it as fine, that's probably because it really is 100% fine.

Quote from wafffles43 »

They did a great job adding cards like Scarlet Purifier and Lil' Exorcist, consistent with their "add counter-cards instead of nerfing" philosophy, but I still worry we're a few cards away from seeing 4/5 Undertakers on turn 3 in every deck which would obviously force them to implement a direct nerf.

I gotta say though.. I have never once seen Scarlet Purifier played. And the only time I've seen Lil' Exorcist is when I played it myself.

People not actually that bothered by mass deathrattle? Or those anti-deathrattle cards too weak?

Quote from Banquetto »

Quote from wafffles43 »

They did a great job adding cards like Scarlet Purifier and Lil' Exorcist, consistent with their "add counter-cards instead of nerfing" philosophy, but I still worry we're a few cards away from seeing 4/5 Undertakers on turn 3 in every deck which would obviously force them to implement a direct nerf.

I gotta say though.. I have never once seen Scarlet Purifier played. And the only time I've seen Lil' Exorcist is when I played it myself.

People not actually that bothered by mass deathrattle? Or those anti-deathrattle cards too weak?

No I agree, I'm just saying they've added theoretical options.  The issue, especially with Exorcist, is that it's way too weak when it doesn't hit in ideal situations.  Sure, it helps against rush decks with no silence, but it's ruined by Owl and it's worthless against decks without deathrattle.  At least Purifier can be combo'd with your own eggs and has good stats on its own.  

undertaker is fine, imo.

Quote from ishkaful »

undertaker is fine, imo.

This is something a huntard would say

The time when hunter was as annoying as it way, Undertaker was pretty much the main problem because of the insane starts aggro decks had

The way I see if, if aggro is the top deck....it punishes people who dont play anti-aggro cards. and makes the game less fun; and who honestly likes to play a game where you are dead by turns 4-5. 

Suggestions for a nerf to undertaker is make it like Mana Wyrm where it only increases its attack for each deathrattle

All classes don't have a way to deal with great Undertaker starts, and only owl mitigates the damage early (or playing Priest/Warrior/Druid), but is the problem Undertaker? Or is it the cheap minions that enable him?

Maybe it's the lack of removal for him since we can only run 2x of any card that isn't a legendary. 

It would be much easier to deal with him with a bigger pool of cards, but since we don't have that atm, a lot of people aren't happy with aggro starts.

What about late game finishes? A lot of win condition of control or attrition decks are a lot harder to play around and deal with than turn 1 Undertaker.

Early game aggro has been mean to me, it has won me games, but it's weird to complain about a viable card that makes a whole type of deck viable. Aggro and board control aggro decks were around before Naxx, but so was cheap Buzzard and all sorts of actual unfair cards. 

the biggest reason why blizzard does not want to nerf undertaker is that its in the nax set that is available for sale. if ppl read that undertaker is powerful, new players will tend to buy the nax expansion set to have undertaker to play.

My only problem with this whole situation is the inconsistencies in how they nerf cards.  They proactively nerf gadget before GvG release because they "think" the spare parts will make him OP, while they sit back and take a wait and see approach with undertaker.  The whole situation just reeks of agendas not related to actual game balancing.

Quote from magiuspaulus »

People who whine about Undertaker forget all the games that their opponents "topdecked" the card in mid-to-late game and conceded because they actually needed a card that did something at that moment.

Do you really expect to get value out of top decking a god damn 1 drop? It shouldn't be half as strong as it is on turn 2 let alone on turn 6. That's the whole point.

Clearly Brode's comments are an admission that a nerf is incoming, he's just trying to make out that more "research" was needed since that interview.

Feel free to eat your words when it happens, we are all so greatly amused by the apologists denying the need for every nerf whether it's Buzzard or Flare or UTH and now UT, but it always happens.. Once Blizzard has sold enough Naxx wings, this will too.

To be fair to Brode, maybe he really did think that Lil Exorcist and Scarlet Purifier were going to be worth a damn back when he gave that interview, now it's clear they aren't it's no surprise he's doing some damage limitation on that comment.

People talk about undertaker like they get to undertaker coin undertaker magic second coin leper gnome every game. It's been dozens of games since I last ran into an undertaker opening I couldn't stop with trading or early removal. And then they're out of cards and effectiveness at turn four because the whole deck is random deathrattle 2 drops. Statistically, undertaker just isn't that bad. Once you kill or debuff undertaker all that value is lost. Mechs are way more consistent. Not a single class doesn't have a response.