I would say theorycrafting with explanation of the cards you chose and why would be time better spent. This is just the lazy alternative.
Why not both? Also, if you knew the time these took, I don't think "lazy" would be the word to use.
I know, I'm trying my best to be positive about the whole idea. But it's just riddled with inconsistency and lack of depth. On the surface it looks like you spent about 15 minutes on the whole card review part of it. And about 2 hours on the setup.
I'm just being honest. I'll try to find some cards in there for discussion. I appreciate you taking the time to put the list together. A+ for effort.
I know, I'm trying my best to be positive about the whole idea. But it's just riddled with inconsistency and lack of depth. On the surface it looks like you spent about 15 minutes on the whole card review part of it. And about 2 hours on the setup.
I'm just being honest. I'll try to find some cards in there for discussion. I appreciate you taking the time to put the list together. A+ for effort.
They are usually a lot more detailed.
Unfortunately, this time, I lost the bulk of my original draft
I know, I'm trying my best to be positive about the whole idea. But it's just riddled with inconsistency and lack of depth. On the surface it looks like you spent about 15 minutes on the whole card review part of it. And about 2 hours on the setup.
I'm just being honest. I'll try to find some cards in there for discussion. I appreciate you taking the time to put the list together. A+ for effort.
They are usually a lot more detailed.
Unfortunately, this time, I lost the bulk of my original draft
Since it's a bunch of cards that nobody cares about, might I suggest picking out the legendaries and other notable cards and skipping the fillers.
I don't know why a couple people insist on making fun of this "review". Call it whatever you want to call it. He's just posting it for the sake of discussion. No need to post ding dong comments like Mr. Dunscot here, saying we can't call this a review, or someone else earlier who had their comment removed haha.
I'm not making fun of it, I just find it uninteresting. I criticise the approach, the method, less so the content. And here's another shocker for you: I don't like the star or number system either.
This sort of "expertise" tries to come to definite assessment, that at best lasts 4 months, sometimes even less if there's a mid-expansion balance patch. Cards are not rated for what they could do under specific circumstances, but for what they can't do against a given deck you play against right now. The focus is on Current Standard Constructed Rank 5+ and nothing else. There is no reflection on possible support in the future or the upcoming rotation, Arena, Wild or anything else.
It's how most people and streamers rate cards by now, which is fair and all, but I also find it short-sighted, unimaginative and unoriginal. In other words, it's boring to see the same style of ratings popping up everywhere, that all have the same focus, and with it the same flaws.
To me, this here takes just the same direction, and for that, I am criticising it. And I can say that, because I have read it. That's what a "review" is - commenting something after the experience, not beforehand. That's not an insignificant difference, which is why I point it out here.
I made suggestions for what I would find more interesting. That is contributive and constructive. The OP is free to accept or ignore or discuss that criticism.
If you think there is "no need" for that, if we should only argue the card ratings themselves, not the way how we do them, I would find that very problematic. Not to mention, that I consider "ding dong comment" pretty insulting, and somewhat ironic in a post where you essentially say "don't like it, don't comment it"; a rather silly and patronizing attitude, which I could also reply to you: Don't complain about comments you don't like.
Edit: I want to point out that I am not trying to talk shit here, just reminding people to take this review with a grain of salt. Even pros are often way off when they do card reviews.
If we go by the approach some people take in which card reviews are done on potential there is almost no card that we could definitively say is bad unless they are strictly inferior. It's a useless way to rate cards. Like Gurubashi Chicken could conceivably be good with some kind of support card, say. Like some buff that buffs health by 3 and gives it "heals back to full every turn," say, perhaps with an additional buff applying only to 1 attack minions. It becomes a useless stream of "what if this support card was printed in the next few expansions?"
No one knows what the hell Blizz is going to print; that's why that kind of speculative card review is in my opinion not helpful. There's literally 0 proof that Blizz are going to do ANYTHING to help ANY card.
The "potential" argument only imo holds any water if all people are trying to do is jam it into existing decks without theorycrafting new decks, because that is how you disregard possible new decks. Ben obviously has, because he seems to believe Control Paladin "will be a thing," while Control Paladin is practically nonexistent in terms of the Constructed meta rn. So no, that criticism isn't right there either.
That over on on that related point, I'm curious why Ben thinks Control Paladin is going to be viable. I see no reason to suggest it will be.
I wouldn't say discussing potential is entirely pointless; it's not just wild speculation with every card having some potential in a possible world. Gurubashi Chicken, for example, is a card that I think doesn't look very promising no matter how you look at it. For it's effect to matter, you have to play it, buff it, overkill something and survive for another turn to benefit from it, and potentially overkill more minions. That's a lot of IFs for the card to shine, and it is relatively save to say that there is little to look out for outside of some fringe Zombeast-creation. To say the least, Angry Chicken is likelier to benefit from its attack-buff since it's easier to activate.
Similarly, I would say that High Priestess Jeklik is not too promising. As a standalone minion, she is ok, nothing overwhelming, the duplicating effect sounds interesting, but to get a lot ouf of it, you have to discard her every time before playing her. Utilizing the targeted discard (cheapest card in your hand) is rather hard to accomplish with a 4 mana card, and the longer the game lasts, the less impact she has. So, it requires a pretty good setup for her to shine. If we should have that, she'll keep you alive in the mid-game, but she won't stop big threats realiably. Having a sort-of infinite minion sounds cool, but it's a defensive minion that still costs 4. Unless you use something like Summoning Portal, you won't be able to play her more than twice per turn. I think the card might help as a stabilizer for the quest, along with Cataclysm; allowing you to complete the quest and get the portal out before you are overrun, and have her as a means to stay alive and slowly gain board control. But then, I don't expect we see another card like Lakkari Sacrifice, that might benefit from a discard-related defensive support, so I'm rather skeptical about her future in Standard. Regardless of how good a Discard-themed deck can become, I can't really imagine her to carry such a deck singlehandedly. By the time she can overwhelm an oppononent, her cost and statline still won't win you the games quickly.
Spirit of the Raptor, however, would be quite good if Druid ever had a solid cheap weapon. Maybe this won't ever happen, maybe the card will never see play anyway, but hypothetically speaking, a 1 mana minion with stealth that will likely draw you one or two cards is nothing to sneeze at. Earthen Might did not look very impressive, but when people realized that Even Shaman can always summon a minion for 1 mana, even a lackluster +2/+2 buff wasn't too shabby. When Hadronox came out, people could already agree that the effect was very powerful, just that the support was lacking at the time, with few good taunt minions and no good gameplan to build a deck around her. That changed eventually.
Seeing a cards potential, saying that there is a possible combo that maybe lacks support of some sort, is perhaps irrelevant for the time being, but in my opinion, it's more interesting than the same old "can't beat XYZ, doesn't fit into this or this deck, too slow, won't see play".
It only took a bunch of time because you were drunk and messed up. Just sayin. :)
I know, I'm trying my best to be positive about the whole idea. But it's just riddled with inconsistency and lack of depth. On the surface it looks like you spent about 15 minutes on the whole card review part of it. And about 2 hours on the setup.
I'm just being honest. I'll try to find some cards in there for discussion. I appreciate you taking the time to put the list together. A+ for effort.
They are usually a lot more detailed.
Unfortunately, this time, I lost the bulk of my original draft
Since it's a bunch of cards that nobody cares about, might I suggest picking out the legendaries and other notable cards and skipping the fillers.
I'm not making fun of it, I just find it uninteresting. I criticise the approach, the method, less so the content. And here's another shocker for you: I don't like the star or number system either.
This sort of "expertise" tries to come to definite assessment, that at best lasts 4 months, sometimes even less if there's a mid-expansion balance patch. Cards are not rated for what they could do under specific circumstances, but for what they can't do against a given deck you play against right now. The focus is on Current Standard Constructed Rank 5+ and nothing else. There is no reflection on possible support in the future or the upcoming rotation, Arena, Wild or anything else.
It's how most people and streamers rate cards by now, which is fair and all, but I also find it short-sighted, unimaginative and unoriginal. In other words, it's boring to see the same style of ratings popping up everywhere, that all have the same focus, and with it the same flaws.
To me, this here takes just the same direction, and for that, I am criticising it. And I can say that, because I have read it. That's what a "review" is - commenting something after the experience, not beforehand. That's not an insignificant difference, which is why I point it out here.
I made suggestions for what I would find more interesting. That is contributive and constructive. The OP is free to accept or ignore or discuss that criticism.
If you think there is "no need" for that, if we should only argue the card ratings themselves, not the way how we do them, I would find that very problematic. Not to mention, that I consider "ding dong comment" pretty insulting, and somewhat ironic in a post where you essentially say "don't like it, don't comment it"; a rather silly and patronizing attitude, which I could also reply to you: Don't complain about comments you don't like.
I just want to remind everyone that this dude rated Ultimate Infestation 2 and Spreading Plague 1
Edit: I want to point out that I am not trying to talk shit here, just reminding people to take this review with a grain of salt. Even pros are often way off when they do card reviews.
If we go by the approach some people take in which card reviews are done on potential there is almost no card that we could definitively say is bad unless they are strictly inferior. It's a useless way to rate cards. Like Gurubashi Chicken could conceivably be good with some kind of support card, say. Like some buff that buffs health by 3 and gives it "heals back to full every turn," say, perhaps with an additional buff applying only to 1 attack minions. It becomes a useless stream of "what if this support card was printed in the next few expansions?"
No one knows what the hell Blizz is going to print; that's why that kind of speculative card review is in my opinion not helpful. There's literally 0 proof that Blizz are going to do ANYTHING to help ANY card.
The "potential" argument only imo holds any water if all people are trying to do is jam it into existing decks without theorycrafting new decks, because that is how you disregard possible new decks. Ben obviously has, because he seems to believe Control Paladin "will be a thing," while Control Paladin is practically nonexistent in terms of the Constructed meta rn. So no, that criticism isn't right there either.
That over on on that related point, I'm curious why Ben thinks Control Paladin is going to be viable. I see no reason to suggest it will be.
I wouldn't say discussing potential is entirely pointless; it's not just wild speculation with every card having some potential in a possible world. Gurubashi Chicken, for example, is a card that I think doesn't look very promising no matter how you look at it. For it's effect to matter, you have to play it, buff it, overkill something and survive for another turn to benefit from it, and potentially overkill more minions. That's a lot of IFs for the card to shine, and it is relatively save to say that there is little to look out for outside of some fringe Zombeast-creation. To say the least, Angry Chicken is likelier to benefit from its attack-buff since it's easier to activate.
Similarly, I would say that High Priestess Jeklik is not too promising. As a standalone minion, she is ok, nothing overwhelming, the duplicating effect sounds interesting, but to get a lot ouf of it, you have to discard her every time before playing her. Utilizing the targeted discard (cheapest card in your hand) is rather hard to accomplish with a 4 mana card, and the longer the game lasts, the less impact she has. So, it requires a pretty good setup for her to shine. If we should have that, she'll keep you alive in the mid-game, but she won't stop big threats realiably. Having a sort-of infinite minion sounds cool, but it's a defensive minion that still costs 4. Unless you use something like Summoning Portal, you won't be able to play her more than twice per turn. I think the card might help as a stabilizer for the quest, along with Cataclysm; allowing you to complete the quest and get the portal out before you are overrun, and have her as a means to stay alive and slowly gain board control. But then, I don't expect we see another card like Lakkari Sacrifice, that might benefit from a discard-related defensive support, so I'm rather skeptical about her future in Standard. Regardless of how good a Discard-themed deck can become, I can't really imagine her to carry such a deck singlehandedly. By the time she can overwhelm an oppononent, her cost and statline still won't win you the games quickly.
Spirit of the Raptor, however, would be quite good if Druid ever had a solid cheap weapon. Maybe this won't ever happen, maybe the card will never see play anyway, but hypothetically speaking, a 1 mana minion with stealth that will likely draw you one or two cards is nothing to sneeze at. Earthen Might did not look very impressive, but when people realized that Even Shaman can always summon a minion for 1 mana, even a lackluster +2/+2 buff wasn't too shabby. When Hadronox came out, people could already agree that the effect was very powerful, just that the support was lacking at the time, with few good taunt minions and no good gameplan to build a deck around her. That changed eventually.
Seeing a cards potential, saying that there is a possible combo that maybe lacks support of some sort, is perhaps irrelevant for the time being, but in my opinion, it's more interesting than the same old "can't beat XYZ, doesn't fit into this or this deck, too slow, won't see play".