Hearthpwn

I can almost swear there will come a time when Loatheb will be replaced in decks and people will wonder what was so special about him. Bloodmage Thalnos seems to have fallen out of favor. I think this card is perhaps worse. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Quote from Semioteric »

In my mind he is the best tempo card in the game when you are ahead or on even footing...

And why would this be? What if the best play for the opponent does not involve a spell or there is not much of a difference between a spell play and a minion play? An on the curve/normal card cannot be the best tempo card in the game. It needs something to distinguish it and I think too often Loatheb lacks that distinction. Run the invisible big cat.

Quote from Easyraider »

Quote from Banankake »

In this regard, one should see discourse as the air your breath (a bit far fetched, but it does the metaphorical job). Whether you use it or not, its quality is affected by a million factors, like pollution. Sure, you could live completely isolated, but if you look out the window you still see black smoke and coughing people.  

 

We agree 99%. =) Its just that the vast majority of HS players do not visit these forums. If you do not enable the chat, and do not visit the forums, then its like you are living in a house with active ventilation and closed shutters, wearing ear plugs. So the degree to which these people would be affected by the increased toxicity of discourse is really, REALLY, minute.

As such, these people should not be among the main considerations when assessing whether or not we as a community would benefit from having an optional ingame chat.

He/she is probably referring to people who will have chats enabled regardless whether they visit the forum or not, and there will be plenty of them. Their toxicity will spill over or somehow affect him and others, even in other places if I recall something from the first post correctly. I personally think he/she should get a grip. I just can't stand "linguistic science" being brought into this. Unnecessary and pretentious.

Some people are just more sensitive about chatting, Easyraider. Things bother them and the way they prefer to deal with them is to disregard them or not be exposed to them. People are indeed different. They also do not see much personal benefit to having a chat, perhaps in context. There is a personality difference. Engaging in further conversation can be a waste of time. The prospect of "toxic" chats being a reality is so unpleasant to them, and perhaps temptation is a factor (come to think about it, irrationality may be another factor when it comes to the toxic chats being a reality or not given their potential is certain :p; they somehow wish the bad stuff away like it doesn't exist), that we start talking about linguistic spillage.

For the record, this may be one of the dumbest things I've posted.

Maybe toxic chats are a form of indirect abuse. Something about them really bothers certain people and the problem is more on a personal basis with some internal conflict appearing when toxicity is encountered, regardless whether the person is involved or not. Maybe we just don't like certain kinds of people and feel impelled to do something about them but then there's a problem so at least we don't want to be reminded of their merry existence, I know I've got my types. One possibility. Maybe they just don't like seeing others abused, if it even objectively qualifies as that. Me not sure. Teinfein flow of thought science.

Hell no. Granted I don't have the success to back my opinion up I consider Loatheb a ridiculously overrated card at the moment. The battlecry affects only one turn, the value of which is quite a thorny topic, and his stats otherwise are "on the curve" or normal for a 5 mana minion. I'd rather have The Black Knight, Sylvannas, and Cairne to improve my chances of winning than run Loatheb. The people who have success using it as a situational card, a situation on which they then capitalize are the ones who can defend Loatheb.

Ironically Blizzard tolerates a lot of toxicity, if you've seen SC2 chats for instance. :p This may well be a big part of the reason why they're handling Hearthstone the way they are. You have to admit disabling chats because of toxicity means intolerance for toxicity. Regardless, it's beside the point. It's a matter of cost versus benefit and when chats are working well they are beneficial and more (chats have special qualities that cannot be quantified/approximated easily because of how significant they can be), which is part of the reason why other games have them and try to enforce standards for participation rather than exclude them. It's a matter of whether Blizzard would undertake systematic action to keep chats acceptable. This I don't know. It's hardly just undoable though.

Quote from Easyraider »

No, the fact to the matter is that not one major game developer tolerates toxicity. Every major game developer knows toxicity is contagious, and what kind of an effect few bad apples can have. Its basic social psychology that all community managers and developers in all major gaming houses have studied or learned by doing. 

This is pretentious tripe. There are different kinds of bad apples and different ways of handling communities. There is no good science on this. People who believe in something like this might belong and contribute to stunted communities where rules are stricter but the posters are half-wit, prideful children sustained by the appearance of substance. On the other hand you have runaway communities where immaturity is rampant. Neither is good and neither community managers nor developers have a solid understand that accommodates many different kinds of people and results in more harmonious communities. Both types of communities have emerged around Blizzard. By rule most community managers may not be the sharpest tools in the shed, which certainly applies to many a moderator. Everyone likes science though.

Bad apples also aren't lost causes, nor do they spoil the bunch unless there is something wrong with the bunch as well. The pervasive and incorrect use of "troll" is a case in point. The expression, even when rough, of many valid or genuine issues of people is labeled as trolling because many people are kind of dumb and cannot effectively handle challenges. In turn such communities are actually comprised of spoiled apples and wrongly identify what a spoiled apple is. They are afraid of the boat being rocked and may not evaluate things well.

Quote from Easyraider »

All other developers are willing to make the effort to both allow chatting while also being committed to remove abuse though reporting (as in wow) or community tribunals (LoL) or through some other manner. I don't think it is unreasonable to expect the same kind of dedication with HS as well.

 This may be what rescues the idea of chats. It seems to be a demanding task though and a problematic one too. But it ultimately can work. Depends on the will behind having chats in the game. (I took it for granted Blizzard would be unwilling to try and enforce things based on precedent elsewhere.) By the way, I think a good solution would allow for different standards depending on the participants.

I'm someone who rages over emotes and I would like a chat to cure my butthurt, for one. I see putting punk kids in their place as fine too. But if you have many players who will overreact or be unable to handle themselves resulting in some stopping or playing less then that's certainly an issue and chats could be described as toxic. This coming in addition to some level of obscenity and indecency. Even with disabling chats the cost of HS chats having that image could be too high. This sucks. It really does speak to the overall lack of maturity of the Blizzard community, on both ends, in comparison to other communities where this stuff isn't prohibitive. I'd still be interested in an experiment but can see how this would actually be detrimental.

First of all, it's then. Second, I would like a chat to cure my but... I guess if the community as a whole is quite immature then I see your point. A pity, really. I guess I'm biased toward chats. :( You can't really tie chats on ranked to the age submitted on your account, can you? Another idea is just experimenting with chats to see what would happen, but it seems unlikely Blizzard would do that.

Nvm.

Quote from Asuryan »

Quote from Easyraider »

So what you are talking about here, really, is not about those who do not enable the chat, but about those who do enable the chat. 

Not necessarily.  I think the whole point of the discourse thing is that it spreads beyond just the chat itself.  For example, even if I don't enable chat, I could still be affected by people on this forum whining about chat toxicity.

This should mean the pro chat side has won. Who are you people? :D You can't suck it up? And people who enable chats would come to persistently "whine" about chat toxicity? Maybe, I guess. Individuals wouldn't do it persistently but there could be a whining train. I like some of the words you use too. Just ridiculous. You sound like more of a whiner yourself.

What's the real reason some people don't want chats, even ones that can be disabled? Non-essays would suffice.

Quote from Easyraider »

I really honestly wonder why would HS be seen as the exception to the rule that positive outcomes of chatting are bigger than the negative ones. But if that really was the case (which I do not believe), it would have really sordid implications.

Blizzard is very popular. A very popular company can attract a disproportionate number of less mature "toxic" chatters relative to other companies. There probably is a volume of examples. Still not good enough of an argument in my opinion. Hence why you enable and disable. Spilling toxicity like Asuryan suggested I find ridiculous, and I'm not sure what the other guy was claiming. How does it spill? Just singular exposure to people who experiment really tainting their experience? The fact of there being an option exposing people, younger players in particular? Hmmm...

Quote from ahhyiss »

There is a chat interface. Friend request works just fine. If they deny your request then they don't want to chat with you. What am I missing?

Are you serious?

I've gone over for the month and for the patch, which you suggested. Ironically the patch group seems the most ridiculous. It would strongly surprise me if the netdecks weren't on Hearthpwn, so indulge me and tell me exactly how I should look for them as conveniently and consistently as possible. Also, don't concern yourself with why I'm asking for convenient and consistent access to netdecks. You sound like you're 14.

Of the top 6 on the patch one passes for a standard netdeck. "Hydra - Naxx Handlock".

The top 6 decks of the month include Razor's Math Warrior, a Chinese Priest (check this one out), and a Suicide Trollock? Are you kidding me?

And what is this crap on the patch option?

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/88306-heroic-patchwerk-easy-win

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/97184-can-magma-rager-be-good

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/84313-rad-bomber

I know tournament decks tend to be different and my first point was about what I see on ladder. Tournament decks aren't so unique either, but anyway. And I also don't think it's a problem of getting up to speed. If anything I figured it's the opposite. Here are the top 6 decks on Hearthpwn currently:

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/110522-legend-hunter-zoo-killer-control-warrior

Not standard.

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/110360-spark-snake-bite-s7

Not standard.

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/112562-wuaschtsemmes-accept-ur-god-rogue-tempo-deck

Wouldn't encounter often.

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/110879-amazs-priest-viagame-house-cup-october-2014

Ok but still different.

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/111288-legend-top-50-66-winrate-what-is-the-funnest

Not standard.

http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/111059-conquest-rogue

Not standard.

Come again? So do you have to search for the netdecks? If these are the top decks how would you search? Is there a better source for netdecks in particular than Hearthpwn? Clearly these aren't the netdecks you would think of so please don't give it a shot.

What's popular here doesn't seem to be what I see on the ladder or in tournament play for that matter too and I'm sure I see netdecks, but that's based on my lazy recollections. Have you determined what sorts of decks achieve popularity here? Just want to confirm.