Hearthpwn

Lately, I've seen a lot of discussion about Refreshing Spring Water and why it should be nerfed. In the posts, people compare the card to the iconic Pot of Greed card from Yugioh. Pot of Greed allowed the user to draw 2 cards, without any requirements. Despite being an iconic card (even showing up a lot of times in the anime), the card was quickly to be banned from the Yugioh scene. Because of this comparison between Pot of greed and the spring water card, I've done a quick search to find out why Pot of Greed was quickly banned:

"The Spell card allows the player that draws it to take two extra cards. However, this comes at no cost to the cards in their hand. Other cards that let players draw additional cards come with risks, conditions or sacrifice. Or, to paraphrase: the key to making games fun is filling them with interesting decisions. The “Pot of Greed” card involves no interesting decision: if you play it, you always benefit. Therefore, it does nothing to make the game more interesting."

Coming back to the refreshing spring water card, it is clear that it has similarities to pot of greed, except that it has the condition that the player plays a deck (mostly) filled with spells. Keeping this in mind, the card does feel a lot like a free draw machine in most mage decks, making the fuzz on the forums. 

What are your thoughts about the card and the comparison with Pot of Greed? Are the cards similar enough to claim a rework on the spring water card? 

Well, in a certain mage decks it would have the same effect, but I don't think you can compare Hearthstone to Yu-gi-oh. And because of that one card can be fair in one game and not fair in another.

Now I do think that the card should be nerfed, either by nerfing the card, or other cards making no minion mage stronger than a build with minions. I would nerf the card itself to either cost 5 mana or refresh 1 mana per spell drawn. Though i would think nerfing incanters flow to reduce cards to a minimum of one also would help a lot towards balancing this card

Imagine healing yourself completely for just 6 mana!! And with a decent body as a gift!! And it being a neutral card!! That is an outrage and needs to be nerfed ASAP!!

Well, many people consider Refreshing Spring Water an outrage because it allows you to draw 2 cards at no cost... however, they don't seem to be aware that this is only true if your deck is built in a specifically restrictive way (spells only, without minions). So why do they simplify it so much? I'll tell you: because those people are clearly biased.

By that rule of three, I guess those people also considered Reno Jackson an outrage and wanted it to be nerfed/destroyed back then... But what about its restriction of unrepeated cards in the deck? Silly, no one has repeated cards in their deck anymore, just like mages don't have minions in their decks either.

Anyway, the data shows that Refreshing Spring Water is not a problem, in fact, Blizzard has recently said that they have no intention of changing anything about it.

You have oversized a non-existent problem. All these overreacted complaints fall on deaf ears because they just aren't real. Don't insist, move on.

I keep saying it, Refreshing Spring Water isn't the problem.

The problem isn't that mage can draw their entire deck, it's that they can play their entire deck of free spells with Incanter's Flow and Sorcerer's Apprentice.

Those two need to be nerfed, not by cost increases, but by making them read: but not less than (1)

(Also, funny that the first response is from someone with an Exodia profile picture.)

I agree to issue a nerf on the card. I did not expect for the development team to bring such a card into production since it obviously puts the power weight of Mage into the Pure Spell archetype. Throughout every expansion, drawing cards in Hearthstone has always been in parallel with some sacrifices taken. Some classic examples are Arcane Intellect and Sprint. It is understandable that those spells come with a high mana cost just to show how powerful drawing card is. In Hearthstone, topdecking has always been a big factor to decide who wins the match. And with Refreshing Spring Water it seems the card has crossed that line. Drawing cards with no cost are simply unfair and not to mention the cost reduction from Incanter's Flow, makes the match feels overly favored to the Mage player. If there's a nerf solution, I would propose its cost moved to (6) or each spell drawn recover (1) mana. Otherwise, if the developer's team feels Mage is okay with how it is, then each other class should also have their own ability to draw a card without a cost, just to make it fair.

I still think that the card should say "refresh 1 mana per spell drawn". By doing that, it becomes a 2-mana draw 2 in spell mage, which is totally reasonable, if no Incanter's Flow was played. You also aren't gaining mana unless you discovered a 3rd Flow.

The comparison with Pot of Greed is obviously not the best way to go about it because Pot of Greed is playable on turn 1 and YGO game mechanics/tempo work different to HS. You could, for instance, play 3 Magicians of Faith and have access to a total of 6 Pot of Greeds by turn 4 with no banned/limited lists whatsoever (no rng needed).

I only use PoG as ironic comparison to express the brokenness and lack of mana cost of Spring Water (or cards like Cutting Glass).

How can people even defend something that draws 2 for 0, and often refreshes your mana crystals. 

But what does Pot Of Greed do??????????????????????????????????????????

This card is oppressive, simple as that

btw. i love Refrehsing Springwater into Refreshin Springwater. Draw 4 Cards for Zero Mana turn 4.

Love it also when Mage plays Refreshing Springwater for just 2 Mana thx to Incanter's Flow, 2 mana draw 2 Cards and refrehs 4 Manacrystals.

Nefiret and Schnitzel are correct.

:))))))))))

Any reasonable human being see that Refreshing Spring Water doesn't need nerf. The restriction it has is enough of a drawback as it is.

Quote from user-100026942 >>

Any reasonable human being see that Refreshing Spring Water doesn't need nerf. The restriction it has is enough of a drawback as it is.

Pretty much this, drawing 2 cards for 0 honestly isn't even that good (it's good just not really good). Memory jar draws 7 and and ancestral recall draws 3 in MTG. Classes like shaman and priest would play it if they had access since they lack card draw but I doubt most other classes would run the card themselves

Cue us wild players laughing about having to deal with 0 mana draw 2 from kingsbane rogue since scholomance. And they get to play minions too!

Quote from Tycon >>

 

Pretty much this, drawing 2 cards for 0 honestly isn't even that good (it's good just not really good). Memory jar draws 7 and and ancestral recall draws 3 in MTG. Classes like shaman and priest would play it if they had access since they lack card draw but I doubt most other classes would run the card themselves

 I agree with the point you are trying to make, but your comparisons are really bad!

Ancestral Recall was printed at a time when the game designers did not understand the significance of card draw (remember, it was considered an equivalent of a 1 mana heal or prevent 3 on the same cycle), while Memory Jar is a card so powerful that afaik it got banned within days of print, before even appearing in any official tournament.

Spell mage is toxic and Refreshing Spring Water is a problem along with Incanter's Flow.  Spring water might not even be so horrible if Incanter's flow didn't reduce cards to 0.  Anyone who plays ladder knows they just get scammed by mages playing incanter's flow on 2.  Cheap clears, throw all burn to the enemy face and win. 

Quote from schnitzel >>

I keep saying it, Refreshing Spring Water isn't the problem.

The problem isn't that mage can draw their entire deck, it's that they can play their entire deck of free spells with Incanter's Flow and Sorcerer's Apprentice.

Those two need to be nerfed, not by cost increases, but by making them read: but not less than (1)

(Also, funny that the first response is from someone with an Exodia profile picture.)

 I can imagine them nerfing Incanter's Flow to "reduce the cost of the next 5 spells in your deck by (1)"

Quote from D_Lord >>

I still think that the card should say "refresh 1 mana per spell drawn". By doing that, it becomes a 2-mana draw 2 in spell mage, which is totally reasonable, if no Incanter's Flow was played. You also aren't gaining mana unless you discovered a 3rd Flow.

The comparison with Pot of Greed is obviously not the best way to go about it because Pot of Greed is playable on turn 1 and YGO game mechanics/tempo work different to HS. You could, for instance, play 3 Magicians of Faith and have access to a total of 6 Pot of Greeds by turn 4 with no banned/limited lists whatsoever (no rng needed).

I only use PoG as ironic comparison to express the brokenness and lack of mana cost of Spring Water (or cards like Cutting Glass).

 I do prefer to compare to MTG's Gush - that's generally T2 playable, which compares, roughly, to T4 HS with some squinting because metas are stupid where gush can be played. Refreshing 2 mana if you draw a spell is also a fair variant, IMO.

Quote from Tycon >>

Quote from user-100026942 >>

Any reasonable human being see that Refreshing Spring Water doesn't need nerf. The restriction it has is enough of a drawback as it is.

 

Pretty much this, drawing 2 cards for 0 honestly isn't even that good (it's good just not really good). Memory jar draws 7 and and ancestral recall draws 3 in MTG. Classes like shaman and priest would play it if they had access since they lack card draw but I doubt most other classes would run the card themselves

 Jar and recall are broken by most MTG standards - particularly Recall. So is Gush, which is a great comparison to this from MTG - blue only, with minimal deckbuilding cost, 0 mana draw two, can sometimes produce mana, and was banhammered at the time, iirc. By the 'not as good as recall' argument, you can say that recall ain't really good because contract from below is a 1 mana draw 7 (yes, contract is banned in all formats, even Vintage, but it exists). 

It's worth noting that it's a reliably free draw even with minions. I've got five minions (Mozaki in STD - Mozaki, Taelan, rider, nova on a stick, and inconspicuous rider), and Water's still either good or very good, rarely a 4 mana draw 2, sometimes a 2 mana draw 2, sometimes a 0 mana draw 2.

Quote from Bengalaas >>

Quote from Tycon >>

 

Pretty much this, drawing 2 cards for 0 honestly isn't even that good (it's good just not really good). Memory jar draws 7 and and ancestral recall draws 3 in MTG. Classes like shaman and priest would play it if they had access since they lack card draw but I doubt most other classes would run the card themselves

 I agree with the point you are trying to make, but your comparisons are really bad!

Ancestral Recall was printed at a time when the game designers did not understand the significance of card draw (remember, it was considered an equivalent of a 1 mana heal or prevent 3 on the same cycle), while Memory Jar is a card so powerful that afaik it got banned within days of print, before even appearing in any official tournament.

 I know nothing of MTG, but how could card game designers not understand the significance of card draw ? Genuine question I'm just curious