Hearthpwn

I don't have time to get into a lot of details, but there were a number of classes that, despite having perfectly competent hero powers and planned keywords, had basic sets that fell apart for me because they weren't functional on their own. By that I mean, their Basic Sets were clearly intended to support particular strategies, but those strategies don't have any viable payoff within the Basic Set alone. Like, they were built to preemptively support strategies that won't be viable until Classic Set. The Basic Set should be functional on its own. In the same vein, a lot of Basic Sets had all or nearly all of their cards clearly channeled in exactly one direction, and that gave the impression that the class was too one-dimensional.

But yeah, I also have to admit there were a bunch of entries where their Hero Powers or Keywords were ones I think shouldn't have made it past the first round, so I didn't even bother to look at their basic sets. Mostly those were Hero Powers that depended on outside minion presence just to basically function and Keywords that were minion-limited, as I'm of the view class keywords, as those in the actual game, should be able to apply to all card types. There were a couple of exceptions here and there, like keywords that represented entirely unique card types.

Quote from Viridian >>

Opinion: Phase I and II should've been merged together; or at least, we should only have to show the basic set in conjunction with the classic set, as you can't forge a consistent class identity without the classic set cards and keywords/mechanics available. Imagine how shitty Hearthstone would be if all the classes only had their basic sets??

Quote from Asylum_Rhapsody >>

Quote from Viridian >>

Opinion: Phase I and II should've been merged together; or at least, we should only have to show the basic set in conjunction with the classic set, as you can't forge a consistent class identity without the classic set cards and keywords/mechanics available. Imagine how shitty Hearthstone would be if all the classes only had their basic sets??

But that's the reality. New players DO only have Basic Sets, and you have to make sure that those Basic Sets are going to be enough to support the class concept on their own, because people at one point DO have to play with just those and have fun doing so. The Basic Set phase has been the most complained-about phase of every CCC, but it's absolutely necessary. If a designer can't build an interesting, exciting, distinctive, competant Basic Set (and most people can't), then they need to revisit whether their class concept is actually a whole class concept on par with the existing class concepts or whether they just have one build concept or one mechanic concept that they're trying to build a whole class around.

Bluntly, the Basic Set phase is a real early test of whether a class deserves to exist. Look back at past CCC winners and finalists. Most ARE able to forge consistant and intriguing class identities with just their Basic Sets.

Quote from Asylum_Rhapsody >>

But yeah, I also have to admit there were a bunch of entries where their Hero Powers or Keywords were ones I think shouldn't have made it past the first round, so I didn't even bother to look at their basic sets. Mostly those were Hero Powers that depended on outside minion presence just to basically function and Keywords that were minion-limited, as I'm of the view class keywords, as those in the actual game, should be able to apply to all card types. There were a couple of exceptions here and there, like keywords that represented entirely unique card types.

Quote from BoomShroom >>

I wonder if anyone comes into Class Competitions as favourites-ie: to what extent do past performances affect votes? 

Sorry if this comes off as salty-I strongly believe that popular classes is a result of good design (and the favourites are probably all really good designers) , but I'm curious about the said impact. 

Quote from BoomShroom >>

Quote from nurgling13 >>

Quote from BoomShroom >>

I wonder if anyone comes into Class Competitions as favourites-ie: to what extent do past performances affect votes? 

Sorry if this comes off as salty-I strongly believe that popular classes is a result of good design (and the favourites are probably all really good designers) , but I'm curious about the said impact. 

I don't think anyone gets votes just because they did well last time. Claims of favoritism are way overblown. A good portion of voters come here from the front page advertisement and probably aren't that familiar with the history of the competition. When people continually do well, it's because they're good at designing cards.

 There were claims of favouritism? 
Also I should probably go and try a few WCDCs to get my design fix. It'll be good practise for the bigger CCCs anyways. 

Quote from Asylum_Rhapsody >>

Quote from Viridian >>

Opinion: Phase I and II should've been merged together; or at least, we should only have to show the basic set in conjunction with the classic set, as you can't forge a consistent class identity without the classic set cards and keywords/mechanics available. Imagine how shitty Hearthstone would be if all the classes only had their basic sets??

But that's the reality. New players DO only have Basic Sets, and you have to make sure that those Basic Sets are going to be enough to support the class concept on their own, because people at one point DO have to play with just those and have fun doing so. The Basic Set phase has been the most complained-about phase of every CCC, but it's absolutely necessary. If a designer can't build an interesting, exciting, distinctive, competant Basic Set (and most people can't), then they need to revisit whether their class concept is actually a whole class concept on par with the existing class concepts or whether they just have one build concept or one mechanic concept that they're trying to build a whole class around.

Bluntly, the Basic Set phase is a real early test of whether a class deserves to exist. Look back at past CCC winners and finalists. Most ARE able to forge consistant and intriguing class identities with just their Basic Sets.

Last day rankings!

Without disquals:

With disquals (I noticed that TrickyBeast has a non-basic keyword on a token card after the last one):

Quote from CheeseEtc >>

Last day rankings!

Without disquals:

With disquals (I noticed that TrickyBeast has a non-basic keyword on a token card after the last one):

I observe that some submissions are frequently losing votes. I don't know if it's strategic voting or the upvote button bug.

Quote from Sinti >>

Quote from Broeck1 >>

Quote from Demonxz95 >>

So, update. I started college today, and it has long days (I left shortly after 8:00 AM and I got home at about 5:30 PM). So, I definitely will have less time to compete in these, but I'm not dropping out because I'm absolutely positive I can still do this and I'm only going there on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I'll still have plenty of time to come here.

First off: good luck with college!

Second: No way you're even going to give quitting a single thought! I leave for work at 07:00 AM and get home at around 07:00 P.M., five times a week. And those are the days I don't go to the gym (I try 2 times a week). I am a projectmanager of TWO projects at the moment. In the weekends I have to do stuff in my house, my girlfriend needs things, my friends and family want to see me, AND I AIN'T QUITTING EITHER! YOU GOT THIS DEMON, LET'S DO THIS!

 Having school only two days a week :D Oh, those were the days!