I've just read what Ben Brode had to say about HS ladder, and many of the aspects he felt like were wrong with it, and one of those was that climbing felt like a grind. But is climbing really supposed to be "fun"?
Note that I am by no means a climbing expert, given that I average rank 12-10 and never try to go above that, but I honestly still have to find a single game where ranking up is "fun" or not repetitive. I see my brother frustrating over League of Legends and his slippery rank, I hear people bitching about Overwatch or CS:GO and all the noobs that cost them their precious hard-earned rank, and even during the last week of the month that I use to climb, I am certainly not having a blast.
Different lengths of seasons aside, a rank is supposed to be something you fight for, and, of course, risk losing what you've already earned the further you go, regardless of game or platform. How can it not be grindy?
The meta in ladder consists, of course, of the most powerful (and probably repetitive) decks you can find, but you can't expect people not to tryhard when there's a reason to sacrifice fun in order to win. What exactly is the alternative to a grindfest for your ranks?
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Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health. - Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
Ranked is supposed to be "Play to win", if you want fun, go to casual. I highly doubt you'd climb with Purify Priest, at least if your aim is high.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health. - Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
I don't understand why people play Pirate Warrior or Midrange Shaman in casual. The decks aren't fun, and they don't require practice before going to the ladder. Casual was meant to be the alternative to the "grindfest", but really it is just ladder decks with people to afraid to play on ladder. Tryhards in casual. FailFish
Casual was meant to be the alternative to the "grindfest", but really it is just ladder decks with people to afraid to play on ladder.
That is certainly true, but I find plenty more janky decks in casual than on ladder, despite the more than occasional Spikes that plague it with their proudly copied Tier 1s. I'm talking about Wild though, so there might be some discrepancies between my experience and yours.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health. - Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
Ranked is supposed to be "Play to win", if you want fun, go to casual. I highly doubt you'd climb with Purify Priest, at least if your aim is high.
There are fun competitive decks. Miracle Rogue and Reno decks are immense fun.
This doesn't change the fact that the amount of decks you will play/face will always be limited to the best ones, or the whole purpose and concept of ranking in general being related to a grind.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health. - Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
Ladder being a grind for players who have not hit Legend makes sense. It's also actually "fun" to grind for legend if you haven't been there before.
The problem is that each month the ladder is reset and you start from the beginning and it takes too much time to get to legend and once you're legend that's where the fun starts for most people. Legend rank is like casual+ranked combined, but you only play against really good players. The problem again is that it takes too much time to get there. Lets say you get there 3 days before the season ends, you can have fun for only 3 days in the legend rank and then you have to go back to grinding next month and grind for over 3 weeks again to get to the fun part of the game.
So the biggest complaint that people have is that if you've hit legend last month, it shouldn't feel so grindy anymore, you should start closer to legend and have a locked rank you can't fall down from, so getting legend wouldn't be a grind to those who got there the previous month.
Imagine you are playing WoW or any other theme-park MMO and each month you start at level 1 again and the only way to get to the endgame is by reaching max level and you can't buy "instant level up". The only way to get to max level is by doing the same boring "Kill 3 boars" quests every single month.
Welcome to the 21st century, where everyone wants everything without putting in any effort. The ladder system is fine mechanically. It should have better rewards, but the way it functions is completely reasonable.
I've often said that ladder is too heavily weighted on endurance versus aptitude. The reaction video from Day9 when he hit legend for the first time is a great example - how does he feel? Freakin' exhausted. Honestly, I don't know what the solution to that is. But it's almost always been the case that there isn't a good outlet for strong skill-based play to be rewarded, but taking the best/usually easiest deck in the game will inevitably get someone to legend if they can stomach grinding it for six hours a day for the better part of the month.
The problem is that each month the ladder is reset and you start from the beginning and it takes too much time to get to legend and once you're legend that's where the fun starts for most people.
That, I agree with, mainly because of our short seasons. However, that still leaves out plenty of people that are most likely not legend and that will still complain about the grind.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health. - Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
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I've just read what Ben Brode had to say about HS ladder, and many of the aspects he felt like were wrong with it, and one of those was that climbing felt like a grind. But is climbing really supposed to be "fun"?
Note that I am by no means a climbing expert, given that I average rank 12-10 and never try to go above that, but I honestly still have to find a single game where ranking up is "fun" or not repetitive. I see my brother frustrating over League of Legends and his slippery rank, I hear people bitching about Overwatch or CS:GO and all the noobs that cost them their precious hard-earned rank, and even during the last week of the month that I use to climb, I am certainly not having a blast.
Different lengths of seasons aside, a rank is supposed to be something you fight for, and, of course, risk losing what you've already earned the further you go, regardless of game or platform. How can it not be grindy?
The meta in ladder consists, of course, of the most powerful (and probably repetitive) decks you can find, but you can't expect people not to tryhard when there's a reason to sacrifice fun in order to win. What exactly is the alternative to a grindfest for your ranks?
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health.
- Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
Is the game supposed to be fun? Yea. Climbing the ranks should certainly be entertaining, and not feel like a chore.
Ranked is supposed to be "Play to win", if you want fun, go to casual. I highly doubt you'd climb with Purify Priest, at least if your aim is high.
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health.
- Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
I don't understand why people play Pirate Warrior or Midrange Shaman in casual. The decks aren't fun, and they don't require practice before going to the ladder. Casual was meant to be the alternative to the "grindfest", but really it is just ladder decks with people to afraid to play on ladder. Tryhards in casual. FailFish
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health.
- Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health.
- Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished
Really all I want is to reach legend once for the cardback and then never aim for it again
Ladder being a grind for players who have not hit Legend makes sense. It's also actually "fun" to grind for legend if you haven't been there before.
The problem is that each month the ladder is reset and you start from the beginning and it takes too much time to get to legend and once you're legend that's where the fun starts for most people. Legend rank is like casual+ranked combined, but you only play against really good players. The problem again is that it takes too much time to get there. Lets say you get there 3 days before the season ends, you can have fun for only 3 days in the legend rank and then you have to go back to grinding next month and grind for over 3 weeks again to get to the fun part of the game.
So the biggest complaint that people have is that if you've hit legend last month, it shouldn't feel so grindy anymore, you should start closer to legend and have a locked rank you can't fall down from, so getting legend wouldn't be a grind to those who got there the previous month.
Imagine you are playing WoW or any other theme-park MMO and each month you start at level 1 again and the only way to get to the endgame is by reaching max level and you can't buy "instant level up". The only way to get to max level is by doing the same boring "Kill 3 boars" quests every single month.
I didn't have a signature so Flux added one for me.
Welcome to the 21st century, where everyone wants everything without putting in any effort. The ladder system is fine mechanically. It should have better rewards, but the way it functions is completely reasonable.
I've often said that ladder is too heavily weighted on endurance versus aptitude. The reaction video from Day9 when he hit legend for the first time is a great example - how does he feel? Freakin' exhausted. Honestly, I don't know what the solution to that is. But it's almost always been the case that there isn't a good outlet for strong skill-based play to be rewarded, but taking the best/usually easiest deck in the game will inevitably get someone to legend if they can stomach grinding it for six hours a day for the better part of the month.
CCGing since '98.
Start of Year: Provoke the failure of 3 expansions, force nerfs on otherwise balanced cards, bring deckbuilding to an all-time low and get rotated one year earlier for being such a threat to the game's health.
- Genn and Baku's historical entry on the White Book of Shit Design, shortly before retiring unpunished