Ok so Deathknight's plagues have always been strong and very annoying. But with the removal of SteamCleaner, WHAT IS THE COUNTER PLAY? I play Reno decks and I just lose instantly. I've been thinking about instantly conceding because the stupidity of the balance team deciding that Plagues need to dominate the meta. Also, the plagues are definitely glitched/bugged. The amount of times ONE plague card is put in your deck and THE VERY NEXT TURN YOU TOP DECK THE PLAGUE IS LIKE HIGHER THAN 50%. It is such a high chance of drawing plagues, that it's obvious that the rng isn't fair. And that the numbers are skewed to draw plagues way more often than you should. BRING BACK STEAMCLEANER OR GIVE US SOME WAY TO COUNTER PLAGUES. IM TIRED OF DRAWING THE PLAGUE THAT INCREASES THE COST OF MY CARDS RUINING MY ENTIRE CURVE AND ENDING THE GAME. I AM ALWAYS TRYING TO SURVIVE UNTIL TURN 6,7,OR 8, AND WHEN I GET TO THE TURN I DRAW THE PLAGUE WHICH INCREASES THE COST OF MY CARDS BY 1. Like how is this still not either nerfed, or given a way to counter??? The second you run into death knight as a reno you just lost. I understand there are counter matchups but, atleast give me ONE CARD (Steam cleaner), that I can put in my deck to give me even A FIGHTING CHANCE. It isn't fair that I just insta lose to deathknight. PLEASE DO SOMETHING FFS!!!
Is it OP in the current hearthstone world where games end by turn 6 or 7 and you rarely draw more than half your deck? I don't think it is.
The real question should be "is it fun?" and to me the answer is a resounding no. There's nothing fun about any inevitable, uninteractive death in hearthstone, whether it's curses, plagues or watching your opponent assemble their OTK. You have no meaningful interaction with any of these win conditions other than "kill them first". This is a superb strategy unless (and this is a bit of a biggy), you brought a deck which falls more into the control side of the game, then I guess you just lose. There's also nothing fun about the main benefit of your highlander deck being irreversably deactivated on turn 4.
Should have played around it by bringing a different deck I suppose...
To get back to the original point, imo plagues are conceptually fine except when Helya gets played - then it's not fun at all.
Things I would chang:
1) Change Helya - make the plagues more powerful or gain an additional effect, but don't make them infinite.
2) Make Highlander pay-offs a start of game effect. This would tone down some of the power levels of decks which can draw through their duplicates to enable "highlander" cards and would also prevent an instant "counter" to a whole style of deck.
Personally I think we need to encourage the Hearthstone devs to move towards a game where the decisions during the game matter more than the deck you brought. As it stands, the biggest factor in winning or losing is which deck you bring and which one you're matched against. I'm not saying it shouldn't matter, but it shouldn't be a garaunteed loss or win.
Plague DK is a common deck, and quite effective. Sadly, this means the Highlander Legendary cards we all invested in are nearly junk now. All it takes is Helya to show up early in the game, and you lose those cards’ abilities. Great job, Blizzard.
before this expansion i played plague dk sometimes and i cant tell you how often i lost matches because my opponent didnt ever draw his 10+ plagues i put into his deck, making me lose the 50/50... but i agree in this meta plague DK with infinite plagues shouldnt exist
Make plagues somehow interact with a 12 attack Leeroy that gets +6 attack when he attacks and windfury. When that happens, then we can say they are OP. Until then, they aren’t even relevant.
A counter to highlander just so happens to be plagues, in addition to removal cards such as movement of envy, boomboss, dirty rat, and a couple of other cards. Seems it would be fair to have at least 1 card that counters plagues. Or as someone already mentioned, plagues could at least not be infinite. Hearthstone devs are more about shock and awe than balance.
People in this thread keep talking about a "counter" to highlander. Highlander (for most classes) isn't a win condition, and even for warrior and druid (where it can be argued that it is) it's very much a control-value oriented win condition.
Reno is an 8 mana board swing/tempo swing card. It's an excellent (probably OP) card and would almost certainly be run in all decks. But it isn't. You know why? Running a highlander deck is a drawback. You lose consistency and you (in theory) only have one of each of your powerful class cards. You end up with much poorer synergy in your deck as a result. Without a highlander pay-off, no one would ever consider running decks with only one of each card.
Imo they dont need an "in-game" counter - they already have a downside due to the inherant limitations of deck design.
p.s. I still think they shouldn't have printed Bran as he is though, but that's a Bran problem, not a highlander problem imo.
p.p.s I also think highlander should be a start of game effect so that a) it cant be countered, b) classes with good draw and tutoring don't get the best of both (as is currently one of the problems with DH).
If plagues were no longer infinite, there would still be a counter to highlander: Plagues. That's right. They would still disrupt highlander game play without being infinite.
If plagues were no longer infinite, there would still be a counter to highlander: Plagues. That's right. They would still disrupt highlander game play without being infinite.
That's true, but at least you would sometimes get a window to play the cards you put in your deck and there might even be a strategy using your own discover/draw cards to deliberately pull extra duplciate plagues just to enable your Reno cards.
Personally,I don't think the infinite plagues is a good design, not because it directly counters highlander, but because any infinite, inevitable death that you can't directly interact with isn't fun (imo).
I also think highlander should be a start of game effect. Look at Demon Hunter - it's gets to play both it's powerful cards in duplicate (the weapon and Window Shopper) and consistently still has the option to use Reno. Same was true with Druid back when Zephrys the Great was in standard. Playing a normal highlander deck should be enough of a draw-back without the deck needing "in game" counters as well. Imagine if Highlander was a start of game effect. There's no way DH would play the Highlander version because it would be far too inconsistent, and the strength of the deck comes from weapon into cheap Window Shopper into cheap Maggy.
Ok so Deathknight's plagues have always been strong and very annoying. But with the removal of SteamCleaner, WHAT IS THE COUNTER PLAY? I play Reno decks and I just lose instantly. I've been thinking about instantly conceding because the stupidity of the balance team deciding that Plagues need to dominate the meta. Also, the plagues are definitely glitched/bugged. The amount of times ONE plague card is put in your deck and THE VERY NEXT TURN YOU TOP DECK THE PLAGUE IS LIKE HIGHER THAN 50%. It is such a high chance of drawing plagues, that it's obvious that the rng isn't fair. And that the numbers are skewed to draw plagues way more often than you should. BRING BACK STEAMCLEANER OR GIVE US SOME WAY TO COUNTER PLAGUES. IM TIRED OF DRAWING THE PLAGUE THAT INCREASES THE COST OF MY CARDS RUINING MY ENTIRE CURVE AND ENDING THE GAME. I AM ALWAYS TRYING TO SURVIVE UNTIL TURN 6,7,OR 8, AND WHEN I GET TO THE TURN I DRAW THE PLAGUE WHICH INCREASES THE COST OF MY CARDS BY 1. Like how is this still not either nerfed, or given a way to counter??? The second you run into death knight as a reno you just lost. I understand there are counter matchups but, atleast give me ONE CARD (Steam cleaner), that I can put in my deck to give me even A FIGHTING CHANCE. It isn't fair that I just insta lose to deathknight. PLEASE DO SOMETHING FFS!!!
👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Is it OP in the current hearthstone world where games end by turn 6 or 7 and you rarely draw more than half your deck? I don't think it is.
The real question should be "is it fun?" and to me the answer is a resounding no. There's nothing fun about any inevitable, uninteractive death in hearthstone, whether it's curses, plagues or watching your opponent assemble their OTK. You have no meaningful interaction with any of these win conditions other than "kill them first". This is a superb strategy unless (and this is a bit of a biggy), you brought a deck which falls more into the control side of the game, then I guess you just lose. There's also nothing fun about the main benefit of your highlander deck being irreversably deactivated on turn 4.
Should have played around it by bringing a different deck I suppose...
To get back to the original point, imo plagues are conceptually fine except when Helya gets played - then it's not fun at all.
Things I would chang:
1) Change Helya - make the plagues more powerful or gain an additional effect, but don't make them infinite.
2) Make Highlander pay-offs a start of game effect. This would tone down some of the power levels of decks which can draw through their duplicates to enable "highlander" cards and would also prevent an instant "counter" to a whole style of deck.
Personally I think we need to encourage the Hearthstone devs to move towards a game where the decisions during the game matter more than the deck you brought. As it stands, the biggest factor in winning or losing is which deck you bring and which one you're matched against. I'm not saying it shouldn't matter, but it shouldn't be a garaunteed loss or win.
Plague DK is a common deck, and quite effective. Sadly, this means the Highlander Legendary cards we all invested in are nearly junk now. All it takes is Helya to show up early in the game, and you lose those cards’ abilities. Great job, Blizzard.
So you want counterplay for plagues but not for highlander cards?
That’s almost always been the sentiment of the Hearthstone community at large. “Nerf this thing I hate, but buff this thing I love!”
Exactly. These people don't even know how ridiculous they look from the side.
I mean, there's already highlander counterplay in the form of Snake Oil Seller.
Plague DK? What? Game is over in turn 6-7 who survives long enough for such a slow mechanic.
There are some really degenerate decks on the ladder right now, Plague DK is not one of them!
before this expansion i played plague dk sometimes and i cant tell you how often i lost matches because my opponent didnt ever draw his 10+ plagues i put into his deck, making me lose the 50/50... but i agree in this meta plague DK with infinite plagues shouldnt exist
Make plagues somehow interact with a 12 attack Leeroy that gets +6 attack when he attacks and windfury. When that happens, then we can say they are OP. Until then, they aren’t even relevant.
A counter to highlander just so happens to be plagues, in addition to removal cards such as movement of envy, boomboss, dirty rat, and a couple of other cards. Seems it would be fair to have at least 1 card that counters plagues. Or as someone already mentioned, plagues could at least not be infinite. Hearthstone devs are more about shock and awe than balance.
MS about to take over ... "OG" blizz employees not happy, so they're tanking the game trying to get as many people to quit.
-DadamE
People in this thread keep talking about a "counter" to highlander. Highlander (for most classes) isn't a win condition, and even for warrior and druid (where it can be argued that it is) it's very much a control-value oriented win condition.
Reno is an 8 mana board swing/tempo swing card. It's an excellent (probably OP) card and would almost certainly be run in all decks. But it isn't. You know why? Running a highlander deck is a drawback. You lose consistency and you (in theory) only have one of each of your powerful class cards. You end up with much poorer synergy in your deck as a result. Without a highlander pay-off, no one would ever consider running decks with only one of each card.
Imo they dont need an "in-game" counter - they already have a downside due to the inherant limitations of deck design.
p.s. I still think they shouldn't have printed Bran as he is though, but that's a Bran problem, not a highlander problem imo.
p.p.s I also think highlander should be a start of game effect so that a) it cant be countered, b) classes with good draw and tutoring don't get the best of both (as is currently one of the problems with DH).
If plagues were no longer infinite, there would still be a counter to highlander: Plagues. That's right. They would still disrupt highlander game play without being infinite.
That's true, but at least you would sometimes get a window to play the cards you put in your deck and there might even be a strategy using your own discover/draw cards to deliberately pull extra duplciate plagues just to enable your Reno cards.
Personally,I don't think the infinite plagues is a good design, not because it directly counters highlander, but because any infinite, inevitable death that you can't directly interact with isn't fun (imo).
I also think highlander should be a start of game effect. Look at Demon Hunter - it's gets to play both it's powerful cards in duplicate (the weapon and Window Shopper) and consistently still has the option to use Reno. Same was true with Druid back when Zephrys the Great was in standard. Playing a normal highlander deck should be enough of a draw-back without the deck needing "in game" counters as well. Imagine if Highlander was a start of game effect. There's no way DH would play the Highlander version because it would be far too inconsistent, and the strength of the deck comes from weapon into cheap Window Shopper into cheap Maggy.
The fact that you have to play a deck without any duplicates IS the counter play for highlander cards. 🙄
Try to play Plague DK, so your opponent will never draw them.
40+ Trades in Challenge a Friend! quest.
Best solution to that: don’t play plague DK.