Some mechanics are still there, some are of times long gone, but what we can all agree on is that certain mechanics simply didn't make the cut. What could Blizzard have made to make them better, in your opinions?
Here is the list of mechanics that never really took off;
Inspire Lifesteal (Okay, it somewhat works with Obsidian Statue and some warlock cards, but in total the amount of viable lifesteal cards is about the same as viable inspire cards, it feels like.) Windfury Poisonous (at least somewhat. You'll see a bit of dude paladin shennanigans with it, but you never see druids pick weabweave, or the poison spiders from the DK for instance) Stealth (I'm still waiting on my viable stealth deck, Blizzard!)
Poisonous works for in many cases, just not druid that already has better defensive minions.
Windfury seems fine when you actually see it.
Inspire really can't be fixed because of the awkward interaction that arises from needed to HP on the same turn as you play the card to realize any value. It was a cool idea but it should not have made it out of early testing.
I personally, think all mechanics that Blizzard has introduced since Day one of HS have all been fine mechanics. The biggest issue is they have failed to figure out ways to implement some mechanics as well as others.
Notice how the most commonly used mechanics Battlecry and Deathrattle, aren't as specific as the rest of the mechanics? That allows them to write whatever they want to balance the cards perfectly. The same can be said for Start of Turn/End of Turn effects. All of these other mechanics including Inspire, could be great if they simply spent the time to fine tune the minions with these abilities better. Including buffing old cards, not just nerfing, to show people how they really hoped each card would pan out.
I would like to change discard mechanic and self damage effects like doomguard or flame imp in just one keyword called pact.
With pact when you play a minion/spell yoy can choose if accept the pact and gain bonuses only if you have the cards/health.
For example with soulfire 1 mana deal 2 damage pact discard a choosen card deal 4 damage instead.
Doomguard a demon with 3/5 pact discard 2 choosen cards gain +2/+2 and charge.
Of course it only affects minions played and its different to a battlecry because you choose if you want to accept the pact or no and only works if you have the requeriment for example you cannot use 4 damage soulfire with an empty hand.
I feel Joust would have been better if it did something little and did something BIG if you won the joust.
For example: Master Jouster could have been a 6 mana 5/6 with Taunt, that read "Reveal a minion in each deck. If yours costs more, gain Divine Shield."
Feels like this could have been a little more fair if the cards that relied 100% on winning did not have to relies as much on it.
Obliviously this does not work for all joust cards, but it would have been interesting to see a few done like this!
In general, most of those effect go unused because Team 5 overestimates them and sets the mana cost way too high or gives the minion a body that's far too scrawny to take advantage of its own keyword.
An exception is Obsidian Statue, which should probably cost 10.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Why, you never expected justice from a company, did you? They have neither a soul to lose nor a body to kick." -- Lady Saba Holland
The problem isn't the keywords themselves but the power level that the minions with those keywords are allowed to have. Lifesteal is actually great in my opinion, there may not be that many good minions with the keyword but I don't think it's something you want to give to too many minions anyway (plus it's great on some spells). Poisonous is also fine, if you make too many good poisonous minions then high cost minions will become even worse (right now they're basically only good if you can cheat them out in some way). Stealth is also something you don't want to push too much. Too many good stealth minions make the game much less interactive. I kinda see it as a slightly more balanced version of charge but it still has it's problems. And again the same thing goes for windfury, if windfury minions are too strong they can be exploited really easily with buffs and get out of control real fast. And finally inspire is again something which is hard to balance, since the stronger an inspire minion is, the more it'll activate it's effect and the more it snowballs out of control.
I'd also like to say about a keyword that I personally don't really like: adapt. Though sometimes adapt is skill testing when you have to choose between for example stealth and can't be targeted or health and deathrattle: summon two 1/1's, I feel like it mostly comes down to someone winning or losing a game based on wether they got the exact thing they needed or not. Did his crackling razormaw give poisonous to his 1/1 so could bypass your giant taunt? too bad you lose. Did his gentle megasaur give +4 attack to his board full of murlocs? too bad you lose. Did his vicious fledgeling get windfury and then stealth or can't be targeted? Too bad you lose! etc. etc.
A half-decent way of making Inspire less terrible is just giving it to minions with low attack, high health (and make the effect useful of course). So they can actually stick on the board and you don't have to play them only if you can get a Hero Power IMMEDIATELY afterwards.
The issue for Inspire, Windfury, and Poisonous has always been the Hearthstone team's overvaluing of the effects. There are too few viable cards with these effects because they over budgeted pretty much all of the ones that were printed. This is pretty evident with druid where a 1/2 poisonous, that is extremely easy to clear without touching it with a minion, is essentially valued the same as a 1/5 taunt that is highly useful in most meta iterations.
Lifesteal is extremely powerful but there aren't nearly enough cards/abilities using it. Obsidian Statue, LK Gul'dan, buffed rogue dagger, and LK Mage are examples of this ability becoming very very good.
Joust is really the only mechanic that fails based on what it is. The others could all be great but Team 5 refuses to print them and generally overvalues them.
Poisonous works for in many cases, just not druid that already has better defensive minions.
Windfury seems fine when you actually see it.
Inspire really can't be fixed because of the awkward interaction that arises from needed to HP on the same turn as you play the card to realize any value. It was a cool idea but it should not have made it out of early testing.
the issue isnt the need of using the HP, the issue is the overcosted card, for example.
Wilfred Fizzlebang costs 6 and has a 4/4 body why 6 ? why not cost 4 ? because you need to pay that 2 mana. kinda strange and weird, at least 5, 6 is too much.
There is nothing inherently wrong with any of the keywords the OP mentioned. The window of design space is just smaller when designing these cards compared to other mechanics like Battlecry or Deathrattle. Minions with inspire or windfury in a vacuum tend to be too weak or way too strong. Blizzard should be doing a better job in finding the middle ground though. For example, how about a minion that says: " Inspire: Gain Windfury this turn." Just stat the minion properly based on the cost (probably 5 or more to be safe) and you have a dynamic minion on the board that changes the way both players will pilot their deck.
I have been waiting for this minion since I started playing. Blizzard's problem is that instead of fixing a broken mechanic, they just abandon it. I want Blizzard to continually revisit old mechanics so they are constantly filling in the massive hole of design space they created when they came up with the concept. Right now they have barely gone past the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Inspire. Would it kill them to put 1 or 2 new Inspire minions in each expansion until at least half of that hole is filled? I also want them to combine keywords more often than they do now.
There is nothing inherently wrong with any of the keywords the OP mentioned. The window of design space is just smaller when designing these cards compared to other mechanics like Battlecry or Deathrattle. Minions with inspire or windfury in a vacuum tend to be too weak or way too strong. Blizzard should be doing a better job in finding the middle ground though. For example, how about a minion that says: " Inspire: Gain Windfury this turn." Just stat the minion properly based on the cost (probably 5 or more to be safe) and you have a dynamic minion on the board that changes the way both players will pilot their deck.
I have been waiting for this minion since I started playing. Blizzard's problem is that instead of fixing a broken mechanic, they just abandon it. I want Blizzard to continually revisit old mechanics so they are constantly filling in the massive hole of design space they created when they came up with the concept. Right now they have barely gone past the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Inspire. Would it kill them to put 1 or 2 new Inspire minions in each expansion until at least half of that hole is filled? I also want them to combine keywords more often than they do now.
well played. I forgot that bugger existed. Maybe next time Blizzard could make a later game minion with a little more impact that would be harder to remove.
Some mechanics are still there, some are of times long gone, but what we can all agree on is that certain mechanics simply didn't make the cut. What could Blizzard have made to make them better, in your opinions?
Here is the list of mechanics that never really took off;
Inspire
Lifesteal (Okay, it somewhat works with Obsidian Statue and some warlock cards, but in total the amount of viable lifesteal cards is about the same as viable inspire cards, it feels like.)
Windfury
Poisonous (at least somewhat. You'll see a bit of dude paladin shennanigans with it, but you never see druids pick weabweave, or the poison spiders from the DK for instance)
Stealth (I'm still waiting on my viable stealth deck, Blizzard!)
What would you do to improve these?
Sorry, but we can't all agree.
Stealth is fine as is.
Poisonous works for in many cases, just not druid that already has better defensive minions.
Windfury seems fine when you actually see it.
Inspire really can't be fixed because of the awkward interaction that arises from needed to HP on the same turn as you play the card to realize any value. It was a cool idea but it should not have made it out of early testing.
Free to try and find a game, dealing cards for sorrow, cards for pain.
I personally, think all mechanics that Blizzard has introduced since Day one of HS have all been fine mechanics. The biggest issue is they have failed to figure out ways to implement some mechanics as well as others.
Notice how the most commonly used mechanics Battlecry and Deathrattle, aren't as specific as the rest of the mechanics? That allows them to write whatever they want to balance the cards perfectly. The same can be said for Start of Turn/End of Turn effects. All of these other mechanics including Inspire, could be great if they simply spent the time to fine tune the minions with these abilities better. Including buffing old cards, not just nerfing, to show people how they really hoped each card would pan out.
Your missing joust
I would like to change discard mechanic and self damage effects like doomguard or flame imp in just one keyword called pact.
With pact when you play a minion/spell yoy can choose if accept the pact and gain bonuses only if you have the cards/health.
For example with soulfire 1 mana deal 2 damage pact discard a choosen card deal 4 damage instead.
Doomguard a demon with 3/5 pact discard 2 choosen cards gain +2/+2 and charge.
Of course it only affects minions played and its different to a battlecry because you choose if you want to accept the pact or no and only works if you have the requeriment for example you cannot use 4 damage soulfire with an empty hand.
The shaman mech 3/2 windfury for 2 manas see play and is fine, the problem with windfury is come to overcosted minions...
I feel Joust would have been better if it did something little and did something BIG if you won the joust.
For example: Master Jouster could have been a 6 mana 5/6 with Taunt, that read "Reveal a minion in each deck. If yours costs more, gain Divine Shield."
Feels like this could have been a little more fair if the cards that relied 100% on winning did not have to relies as much on it.
Obliviously this does not work for all joust cards, but it would have been interesting to see a few done like this!
In general, most of those effect go unused because Team 5 overestimates them and sets the mana cost way too high or gives the minion a body that's far too scrawny to take advantage of its own keyword.
An exception is Obsidian Statue, which should probably cost 10.
"Why, you never expected justice from a company, did you? They have neither a soul to lose nor a body to kick." -- Lady Saba Holland
The problem isn't the keywords themselves but the power level that the minions with those keywords are allowed to have. Lifesteal is actually great in my opinion, there may not be that many good minions with the keyword but I don't think it's something you want to give to too many minions anyway (plus it's great on some spells). Poisonous is also fine, if you make too many good poisonous minions then high cost minions will become even worse (right now they're basically only good if you can cheat them out in some way). Stealth is also something you don't want to push too much. Too many good stealth minions make the game much less interactive. I kinda see it as a slightly more balanced version of charge but it still has it's problems. And again the same thing goes for windfury, if windfury minions are too strong they can be exploited really easily with buffs and get out of control real fast. And finally inspire is again something which is hard to balance, since the stronger an inspire minion is, the more it'll activate it's effect and the more it snowballs out of control.
I'd also like to say about a keyword that I personally don't really like: adapt. Though sometimes adapt is skill testing when you have to choose between for example stealth and can't be targeted or health and deathrattle: summon two 1/1's, I feel like it mostly comes down to someone winning or losing a game based on wether they got the exact thing they needed or not. Did his crackling razormaw give poisonous to his 1/1 so could bypass your giant taunt? too bad you lose. Did his gentle megasaur give +4 attack to his board full of murlocs? too bad you lose. Did his vicious fledgeling get windfury and then stealth or can't be targeted? Too bad you lose! etc. etc.
A half-decent way of making Inspire less terrible is just giving it to minions with low attack, high health (and make the effect useful of course). So they can actually stick on the board and you don't have to play them only if you can get a Hero Power IMMEDIATELY afterwards.
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The issue for Inspire, Windfury, and Poisonous has always been the Hearthstone team's overvaluing of the effects. There are too few viable cards with these effects because they over budgeted pretty much all of the ones that were printed. This is pretty evident with druid where a 1/2 poisonous, that is extremely easy to clear without touching it with a minion, is essentially valued the same as a 1/5 taunt that is highly useful in most meta iterations.
Lifesteal is extremely powerful but there aren't nearly enough cards/abilities using it. Obsidian Statue, LK Gul'dan, buffed rogue dagger, and LK Mage are examples of this ability becoming very very good.
Joust is really the only mechanic that fails based on what it is. The others could all be great but Team 5 refuses to print them and generally overvalues them.
Joust could have been used in so many different ways. I’m surprised blizzard has done anything more.
Like joust if ur card is lower do something
Or
Joust if its below 5 mana do something.
I like the concept it encourages deck building if the reward is worth it.
Add echo to the failed mechanics.
There is nothing inherently wrong with any of the keywords the OP mentioned. The window of design space is just smaller when designing these cards compared to other mechanics like Battlecry or Deathrattle. Minions with inspire or windfury in a vacuum tend to be too weak or way too strong. Blizzard should be doing a better job in finding the middle ground though. For example, how about a minion that says: " Inspire: Gain Windfury this turn." Just stat the minion properly based on the cost (probably 5 or more to be safe) and you have a dynamic minion on the board that changes the way both players will pilot their deck.
I have been waiting for this minion since I started playing. Blizzard's problem is that instead of fixing a broken mechanic, they just abandon it. I want Blizzard to continually revisit old mechanics so they are constantly filling in the massive hole of design space they created when they came up with the concept. Right now they have barely gone past the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Inspire. Would it kill them to put 1 or 2 new Inspire minions in each expansion until at least half of that hole is filled? I also want them to combine keywords more often than they do now.
well played. I forgot that bugger existed. Maybe next time Blizzard could make a later game minion with a little more impact that would be harder to remove.
Joust: Say the card gains +3/+3 if you win, +1/+1 if you lose. Something like that could have worked. Or, if you lose the joust you draw the card.