I understand why a lot of people play super quick aggro decks: They either want to rank fast or mine gold. I'm not saying that is a good (or bad) reason; I'm just saying I understand why people do it, but what if Blizzard reworked how it awarded gold and ranks?
WHAT?!?! you say...
My suggestion: Rather than just a straight: 1 win = one star. 3 stars = 10 gold, what if there was a calculation that went into how involved the game was that determined how many stars you got? That could be the case for gold, but it could also work toward laddering.
Right now, there is a clear disincentive to play longer matches. I think Blizzard should tweak the reward system to say: sure, you can play fast games, but you'll get greater reward if you play a more involved game, then... maybe more people would be willing to play slower deck styles. You can still play lots of quick games and get rewarded, too (NOTE: I'm not talking about decrease the amount of reward from where it currently is, just upping it for more involved games).
Yes, this idea, is contingent on a good formula, but I think that can accomplished. It shouldn't just be the duration of a game, but maybe similar to how they calculate character rank experience...? The more spells and minions you play, the more minions you kill, the more damage to your opponent, the more you heal yourself, etc. the more 'valuable' the game becomes.
There was a topic a time ago with the same suggestion and even a couple more ideas where people elaborated why it wasn't a good proposal, you should search that one thread to give yourself an idea.
I'm not sure blizzard should try this. They should be more or less neutral to what the meta does and what decks archetypes people are playing. Also, it's not just a problem with rewards. MTG online doesn't offer rewards and there are still a large number of players playing red deck wins style decks. Aggro is a part of any meta. If you want to play slow decks you have to account for it. I don't want blizzard starting to try and encourage or discourage how the meta goes (outside of what cards they make and tools they give each archetype).
The grind of the ladder was anche issue adressed by Ben Brode himself during a Q&A sometimes ago: they're thinking about alternatives and the "floors" at 15-10-5 are a first step in that direction.
For sure I hope they'll completly get rid of the actual system for something that will not be optimized mainly by time per match.
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For what profit is it to a man, if he gains the world and loses his own soul?
I understand why a lot of people play super quick aggro decks: They either want to rank fast or mine gold.
Not only that. More often than not these decks are on the cheap side so they are more accessible to newer players with lesser collections. Everyone wants to play a competitive deck but no everyone can afford the premium ones.
Regarding the level of involvement the developers will have to come up with all kinds of complex algorithms which probably doesn't make much sense business wise considering they are aiming for more casual and faster games anyway.
Rounds played or match length alone is nowhere near a good solution. I doubt anyone would choose 30 minutes worth of roping just to lose because of other annoying factors such as RNG or random disconnects.
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Quote from dedoporno>>Quote from Splatacleze Not only that. More often than not these decks are on the cheap side so they are more accessible to newer players with lesser collections. Everyone wants to play a competitive deck but no everyone can afford the premium ones.
Regarding the level of involvement the developers will have to come up with all kinds of complex algorithms which probably doesn't make much sense business wise considering they are aiming for more casual and faster games anyway.
Rounds played or match length alone is nowhere near a good solution. I doubt anyone would choose 30 minutes worth of roping just to lose because of other annoying factors such as RNG or random disconnects.
Agreed with the length not being the best idea. I think length alone would lead to roping for sure. That's why I was thinking there would be a greater calculus that goes into it.
Re: aggro decks being cheaper so people play them, I get it, and support people playing them. I'm not saying aggro decks are bad. I'm just wondering if there is a way to incentivize control decks.
The problem with this- you're incentivized to BM. Lets say I have lethal in my hand. Assuming I know that your deck has no ways to pull the game back around, my goal would be to toy with you as long as possible, since I've basically already won.
Conversely, assuming stars gained = opponent's stars lost, people would just concede as soon as they felt like they were losing, since every turn they waited would lose them more and more stars. So now a major part of ranking up would be accurately guessing when you're going to lose, and conceding very early on to minimize your loss.
Today in my free brawl pack I got Barongeddon, then I had a cup of fresh green tea. As a result of that, I think Priest is OP because my keyboard is not a mechanical one. I hope Blizzard will address this issue.
I think it would be nice if they tried to limit the best aggro decm to tier 2. I don't like when the best deck is also the fastest. Just stopping releasing stupid strong 1 and 2 drops would be a good first step.
The problem with this- you're incentivized to BM. Lets say I have lethal in my hand. Assuming I know that your deck has no ways to pull the game back around, my goal would be to toy with you as long as possible, since I've basically already won.
Conversely, assuming stars gained = opponent's stars lost, people would just concede as soon as they felt like they were losing, since every turn they waited would lose them more and more stars. So now a major part of ranking up would be accurately guessing when you're going to lose, and conceding very early on to minimize your loss.
I definitely don't see it as a matter of losing stars. I would keep a loss fixed like it is now. Maybe that means there are more people who make it to rank 5-Legend. ...Uh... ok, but maybe not.
I hear you on the BMing potential. Some people will be jerks/game the system, but a) sometimes that would backfire: you hold off on lethal thinking your opponent can't get you until they surprises you with lethal, and b) if you feel like/know you're being toyed with you can always concede.
I'm not saying my idea is perfect by any means, but I do thin something needs to change. So, fair shots any my idea. Any ideas of how to make it better?
An idea I had a few days ago, which doesn't necessarily target slower decks but greater diversity, is for the game to present each player with a choice of 3 cards from their collections that aren't in any of their decks at that time. The player then picks 1 and for a week any gold earned with decks using that card will be doubled. Next week, new card to pick.
What I most like about this is that a) it presents options from your collection, so f2p players don't struggle, and b) everyone gets different cards so there will be a huge range of cards played suddenly.
Of course you could just put the card into a refined deck and the meta stays roughly the same, but then it at least the decks are weaker.
Note even a 30% win rate deck with double gold earns more than a 55% tier 1 deck with normal gold, so it has some promise.
I understand why a lot of people play super quick aggro decks: They either want to rank fast or mine gold.
Not only that. More often than not these decks are on the cheap side so they are more accessible to newer players with lesser collections. Everyone wants to play a competitive deck but no everyone can afford the premium ones.
But the thing is, in almost every single meta, cheap and easy to play aggro decks are top tier. IMO, a deck that is cheap, easy to play, and aggro should never be allowed to be a tier 1 deck. There ought to be some price to pay to be a top player, whether that's because you crafted expensive and powerful cards, or you piloted a cheap aggressive deck with extreme skill, or because you played a slower deck but you played it well. A control deck played well should beat any cheap aggro deck misplayed, almost every time.
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Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination.
I understand why a lot of people play super quick aggro decks: They either want to rank fast or mine gold.
Not only that. More often than not these decks are on the cheap side so they are more accessible to newer players with lesser collections. Everyone wants to play a competitive deck but no everyone can afford the premium ones.
But the thing is, in almost every single meta, cheap and easy to play aggro decks are top tier. IMO, a deck that is cheap, easy to play, and aggro should never be allowed to be a tier 1 deck. There ought to be some price to pay to be a top player, whether that's because you crafted expensive and powerful cards, or you piloted a cheap aggressive deck with extreme skill, or because you played a slower deck but you played it well. A control deck played well should beat any cheap aggro deck misplayed, almost every time.
However, any time we get a deck like that (old school miracle rogue or patron warrior) everybody complains that it's too oppresive. Those decks were more challenging than most other decks at the time, but there's really a ceiling on how much skill any deck takes to pilot. They also had a really good chance when played really well to beat aggro decks. They got nerfed because ppl were up in arms that "too stronk!"
Basically, no matter what blizzard does we will complain about things. There's no perfect solution. Sure rank is kinda meh, I hope they add more tournament modes and those can add additional rewards as well. Outside of that, anything done will be hated. The currently system isn't all that bad as far as how it affects the meta, you can be punished for being greedy with deck building and you can build to counter different archetypes. There are a few OP decks that are really hard to beat, but at the moment they aren't super oppresive as far as representation on the ladder. Maybe next month will be different now that the meta is more figured out.
I understand why a lot of people play super quick aggro decks: They either want to rank fast or mine gold.
Not only that. More often than not these decks are on the cheap side so they are more accessible to newer players with lesser collections. Everyone wants to play a competitive deck but no everyone can afford the premium ones.
But the thing is, in almost every single meta, cheap and easy to play aggro decks are top tier. IMO, a deck that is cheap, easy to play, and aggro should never be allowed to be a tier 1 deck. There ought to be some price to pay to be a top player, whether that's because you crafted expensive and powerful cards, or you piloted a cheap aggressive deck with extreme skill, or because you played a slower deck but you played it well. A control deck played well should beat any cheap aggro deck misplayed, almost every time.
However, any time we get a deck like that (old school miracle rogue or patron warrior) everybody complains that it's too oppresive. Those decks were more challenging than most other decks at the time, but there's really a ceiling on how much skill any deck takes to pilot. They also had a really good chance when played really well to beat aggro decks. They got nerfed because ppl were up in arms that "too stronk!"
Basically, no matter what blizzard does we will complain about things. There's no perfect solution. Sure rank is kinda meh, I hope they add more tournament modes and those can add additional rewards as well. Outside of that, anything done will be hated. The currently system isn't all that bad as far as how it affects the meta, you can be punished for being greedy with deck building and you can build to counter different archetypes. There are a few OP decks that are really hard to beat, but at the moment they aren't super oppresive as far as representation on the ladder. Maybe next month will be different now that the meta is more figured out.
Those didn't get nerfed merely because they were "too strong." They got nerfed because they were incredibly uninteractive and could produce a massive amount of damage out of nowhere.
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@ShruteBucks; and in almost every single meta, slow decks have been top tier and preying on the Aggro decks. The best deck (arguably) in this format appears to be Midrange Paladin running 3 8-drops and 2 7-drops, and right alongside it is Taunt Warrior who really only loses to a nuts start from Pirate Warrior. As long as those kind of decks are eating Aggro for breakfast I don't think there's a single issue in having an Aggro deck at the top.
The price for being a top player is picking a deck, teching and piloting it well against the meta, and beating other good players. Dust cost and archetypes should ultimately be ignored for that design, outside of making all archetypes viable in some capacity. If you're losing to a "mindless aggro" player, fix your deck. We have far too many tech options right now for people to have a legitimate complaint in that regard, at least in my opinion.
Keep in mind I'm also extremely adamant that I don't think every class should beat every class, that every archetype should beat another archetype by default, that it's fine to have hard counter decks, and that Aggro is far less brainless of an archetype than people circlejerk about (especially considering how often ladder will be Aggro vs Aggro).
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I'm not losing to "mindless aggro," and idk where you're getting this nonsense about slow decks being always top tier. One specific slow deck has been near the top (pre Un'Goro, there was Renolock), whereas multiple aggro decks have always been top tier.
You completely missed my point. An aggro deck that is cheap, easy to play, and not punished by misplays should never be able to consistently beat the rest of the meta. How can that possibly be a healthy state of the game?
An interesting thing to note that has relevance - to give you an idea of how fast the current meta is, there is a Secret Mage list floating around that is considered "tempo." Over 2/3 of the deck is 3 mana or less.
editing to add one more thing, I think it's really terrible and not good for the game that right now, if you want to play an aggro deck, you have many options....if you want to play something more midrange, you have many options....if you want to play control, you have, well, one option really, and that's tied to a quest. Maybe two if you want to play Paladin.
I don't like your poll options. Just because I don't agree with your suggestion (and I don't and I'll explain why) doesn't mean I think things are "fine the way they are".
First, your suggestion would be immensely complicated to implement and I'm not sure how it'd function. What makes a game more "involved"? Number of turns? Number of cards played? Total converted mana cost expended over a game? I just think it'd be potentially abused if it went towards ranking, and if it's for gold I don't think the majority of people grinding aggro are doing it for the 100g/day.
With that being said, I don't think the game is "fine". I don't think it's broken, either, but it does feel like controlling decks tend to be punished more harshly than aggro/mid-range, and even worse, traditional control (i.e. packed with removal/board wipes and then a number of bomby finishers) are often demolished by OTK combo decks and things like Jade Idol that absolutely punishes opponents for playing a long game.
As a MTG player, I think there's really two possible solutions for these issues. The first is remove Health cap for Heroes (and likely have to buff Armor Up! to +3 to compensate) and anything like Reno have its language changed to something like "Restore your Hero to 30 Health". Not only does that help in many cases versus aggro, but also would help controlling decks combat some variants of OTK that are looking to do 24-35 damage in a single bursty turn but then peter out.
The second option would be to make a ranked system that mirrors what MTG does with a best of 3 games match with side boarding between games from a limited pool. This would be unlikely to work for a "casual" game like Hearthstone, but maybe make it a third option for laddering style play. Part of the controls that a game like Magic has to fix the issues that constantly get talked about in HS, is that there are techy cards that help combat a certain deck/style of decks but are generally bad versus the majority of decks. This allows you to sub-in a small number of cards from your list by subbing out others. An example in HS would be a card like Eater of Secrets which you would like to side-in versus Freeze mage, but it's garbage versus like every other match-up. Being able to set aside maybe 3-5 cards as your sideboard might help the diversity of HS as slower decks can then side-board into more defensive early cards versus aggro, or side out some of their earlier cards in a more control vs control match-up for some kind of added threat (like taking out a copy of Fiery Waraxe to put in a Ysera in CW vs Control Priest or something).
I think that encouraging strong slow decks start and ends with one thing, making them better. But I don't think that is the goal. I want all decks to be thoughtful, token druid, quest rogue, hemet mage, and silence priest are all faster decks with thoughtful turns and higher skill requirements. these are good for the meta, things like pirate warrior are not. I have had very involved games with all four of these decks, that ended on turn 7. I have also had very uninteresting games with control decks that ended on turn 30.
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Just fill your deck with one drops, that is creative deck design, right?
They just need to reward not playing terrible dumb decks. Decks should have a "difficulty" score and that should tie into rewards. It wouldn't be perfect ... but it allows people to play dumb decks if you want, but you will get more rewards / climb the ladder faster for using harder decks.
They just need to reward not playing terrible dumb decks. Decks should have a "difficulty" score and that should tie into rewards. It wouldn't be perfect ... but it allows people to play dumb decks if you want, but you will get more rewards / climb the ladder faster for using harder decks.
I understand why a lot of people play super quick aggro decks: They either want to rank fast or mine gold. I'm not saying that is a good (or bad) reason; I'm just saying I understand why people do it, but what if Blizzard reworked how it awarded gold and ranks?
WHAT?!?! you say...
My suggestion: Rather than just a straight: 1 win = one star. 3 stars = 10 gold, what if there was a calculation that went into how involved the game was that determined how many stars you got? That could be the case for gold, but it could also work toward laddering.
Right now, there is a clear disincentive to play longer matches. I think Blizzard should tweak the reward system to say: sure, you can play fast games, but you'll get greater reward if you play a more involved game, then... maybe more people would be willing to play slower deck styles. You can still play lots of quick games and get rewarded, too (NOTE: I'm not talking about decrease the amount of reward from where it currently is, just upping it for more involved games).
Yes, this idea, is contingent on a good formula, but I think that can accomplished. It shouldn't just be the duration of a game, but maybe similar to how they calculate character rank experience...? The more spells and minions you play, the more minions you kill, the more damage to your opponent, the more you heal yourself, etc. the more 'valuable' the game becomes.
Thoughts?
how about elo
playing wild
~nomad
There was a topic a time ago with the same suggestion and even a couple more ideas where people elaborated why it wasn't a good proposal, you should search that one thread to give yourself an idea.
I'm not sure blizzard should try this. They should be more or less neutral to what the meta does and what decks archetypes people are playing. Also, it's not just a problem with rewards. MTG online doesn't offer rewards and there are still a large number of players playing red deck wins style decks. Aggro is a part of any meta. If you want to play slow decks you have to account for it. I don't want blizzard starting to try and encourage or discourage how the meta goes (outside of what cards they make and tools they give each archetype).
The grind of the ladder was anche issue adressed by Ben Brode himself during a Q&A sometimes ago: they're thinking about alternatives and the "floors" at 15-10-5 are a first step in that direction.
For sure I hope they'll completly get rid of the actual system for something that will not be optimized mainly by time per match.
For what profit is it to a man, if he gains the world and loses his own soul?
If you say LUL in Twitch chat you are a moron. If you do it outside of Twitch - even more so!
The problem with this- you're incentivized to BM. Lets say I have lethal in my hand. Assuming I know that your deck has no ways to pull the game back around, my goal would be to toy with you as long as possible, since I've basically already won.
Conversely, assuming stars gained = opponent's stars lost, people would just concede as soon as they felt like they were losing, since every turn they waited would lose them more and more stars. So now a major part of ranking up would be accurately guessing when you're going to lose, and conceding very early on to minimize your loss.
#gNOmeferatu
I think it would be nice if they tried to limit the best aggro decm to tier 2. I don't like when the best deck is also the fastest. Just stopping releasing stupid strong 1 and 2 drops would be a good first step.
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An idea I had a few days ago, which doesn't necessarily target slower decks but greater diversity, is for the game to present each player with a choice of 3 cards from their collections that aren't in any of their decks at that time. The player then picks 1 and for a week any gold earned with decks using that card will be doubled. Next week, new card to pick.
What I most like about this is that a) it presents options from your collection, so f2p players don't struggle, and b) everyone gets different cards so there will be a huge range of cards played suddenly.
Of course you could just put the card into a refined deck and the meta stays roughly the same, but then it at least the decks are weaker.
Note even a 30% win rate deck with double gold earns more than a 55% tier 1 deck with normal gold, so it has some promise.
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Basically, no matter what blizzard does we will complain about things. There's no perfect solution. Sure rank is kinda meh, I hope they add more tournament modes and those can add additional rewards as well. Outside of that, anything done will be hated. The currently system isn't all that bad as far as how it affects the meta, you can be punished for being greedy with deck building and you can build to counter different archetypes. There are a few OP decks that are really hard to beat, but at the moment they aren't super oppresive as far as representation on the ladder. Maybe next month will be different now that the meta is more figured out.
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@ShruteBucks; and in almost every single meta, slow decks have been top tier and preying on the Aggro decks. The best deck (arguably) in this format appears to be Midrange Paladin running 3 8-drops and 2 7-drops, and right alongside it is Taunt Warrior who really only loses to a nuts start from Pirate Warrior. As long as those kind of decks are eating Aggro for breakfast I don't think there's a single issue in having an Aggro deck at the top.
The price for being a top player is picking a deck, teching and piloting it well against the meta, and beating other good players. Dust cost and archetypes should ultimately be ignored for that design, outside of making all archetypes viable in some capacity. If you're losing to a "mindless aggro" player, fix your deck. We have far too many tech options right now for people to have a legitimate complaint in that regard, at least in my opinion.
Keep in mind I'm also extremely adamant that I don't think every class should beat every class, that every archetype should beat another archetype by default, that it's fine to have hard counter decks, and that Aggro is far less brainless of an archetype than people circlejerk about (especially considering how often ladder will be Aggro vs Aggro).
Articles I suggest every player reads to improve at the game;
MTG/Hearthstone biases to avoid
Reframing negative Hearthstone experiences to improve at the game
Who's the Beatdown?
I'm not losing to "mindless aggro," and idk where you're getting this nonsense about slow decks being always top tier. One specific slow deck has been near the top (pre Un'Goro, there was Renolock), whereas multiple aggro decks have always been top tier.
You completely missed my point. An aggro deck that is cheap, easy to play, and not punished by misplays should never be able to consistently beat the rest of the meta. How can that possibly be a healthy state of the game?
An interesting thing to note that has relevance - to give you an idea of how fast the current meta is, there is a Secret Mage list floating around that is considered "tempo." Over 2/3 of the deck is 3 mana or less.
editing to add one more thing, I think it's really terrible and not good for the game that right now, if you want to play an aggro deck, you have many options....if you want to play something more midrange, you have many options....if you want to play control, you have, well, one option really, and that's tied to a quest. Maybe two if you want to play Paladin.
Kaladin's RoS Set Review
Join me at Out of Cards!
I don't like your poll options. Just because I don't agree with your suggestion (and I don't and I'll explain why) doesn't mean I think things are "fine the way they are".
First, your suggestion would be immensely complicated to implement and I'm not sure how it'd function. What makes a game more "involved"? Number of turns? Number of cards played? Total converted mana cost expended over a game? I just think it'd be potentially abused if it went towards ranking, and if it's for gold I don't think the majority of people grinding aggro are doing it for the 100g/day.
With that being said, I don't think the game is "fine". I don't think it's broken, either, but it does feel like controlling decks tend to be punished more harshly than aggro/mid-range, and even worse, traditional control (i.e. packed with removal/board wipes and then a number of bomby finishers) are often demolished by OTK combo decks and things like Jade Idol that absolutely punishes opponents for playing a long game.
As a MTG player, I think there's really two possible solutions for these issues. The first is remove Health cap for Heroes (and likely have to buff Armor Up! to +3 to compensate) and anything like Reno have its language changed to something like "Restore your Hero to 30 Health". Not only does that help in many cases versus aggro, but also would help controlling decks combat some variants of OTK that are looking to do 24-35 damage in a single bursty turn but then peter out.
The second option would be to make a ranked system that mirrors what MTG does with a best of 3 games match with side boarding between games from a limited pool. This would be unlikely to work for a "casual" game like Hearthstone, but maybe make it a third option for laddering style play. Part of the controls that a game like Magic has to fix the issues that constantly get talked about in HS, is that there are techy cards that help combat a certain deck/style of decks but are generally bad versus the majority of decks. This allows you to sub-in a small number of cards from your list by subbing out others. An example in HS would be a card like Eater of Secrets which you would like to side-in versus Freeze mage, but it's garbage versus like every other match-up. Being able to set aside maybe 3-5 cards as your sideboard might help the diversity of HS as slower decks can then side-board into more defensive early cards versus aggro, or side out some of their earlier cards in a more control vs control match-up for some kind of added threat (like taking out a copy of Fiery Waraxe to put in a Ysera in CW vs Control Priest or something).
Balancing busted cards version 1.0.
I think that encouraging strong slow decks start and ends with one thing, making them better. But I don't think that is the goal. I want all decks to be thoughtful, token druid, quest rogue, hemet mage, and silence priest are all faster decks with thoughtful turns and higher skill requirements. these are good for the meta, things like pirate warrior are not. I have had very involved games with all four of these decks, that ended on turn 7. I have also had very uninteresting games with control decks that ended on turn 30.
Just fill your deck with one drops, that is creative deck design, right?
They just need to reward not playing terrible dumb decks. Decks should have a "difficulty" score and that should tie into rewards. It wouldn't be perfect ... but it allows people to play dumb decks if you want, but you will get more rewards / climb the ladder faster for using harder decks.
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