Playing since Tgt, I have never seen a meta this bad. I thought that midrange shaman and raza priest was bad. This is truly the worst state that I have ever seen the game in. Every matchup is either an auto win, which is super boring and you don't even have to think about your plays as you win no matter what, or an auto lose, where no amount of thinking you do will win the game. Both scenarios are just not fun in any way. The way that this game should be is: Oh, its a hunter, I can do this to try and win. Instead of: Oh, its a hunter. I lose no matter what because of infinite value from rexxar. Might as well concede.
And I'm not blaming one deck, I'm blaming quite a few of them. I don't think I'm biased at all because I play a few of these decks, but Odd warrior, Quest rogue, any hunter deck with rexxar, zoolock, shudderwock shaman, odd rogue, basically any druid deck, and kingsbane rogue. What do all of these decks have in common? They're polarizing. Even if some aren't that powerful, it doesn't mean that it isn't polarizing. Look at hunter. Not the most powerful class by any means at all, but is such a pain in the ass to face for some decks. Look at warrior, and quest rogue, or any of the decks I mentioned above. All the same. No new decks can emerge because one deck can destroy anything.
But they can't nerf all of these decks, and they probably won't nerf most of them. So there will be polarizing decks at least until the next rotation. Blizzard claims that their stats don't show that the meta is more polarizing than ever, but then why is the game as boring as ever? And how come when I queue into half of my games wanting to instantly concede?
Literally almost every deck is so polarizing that I'm not even having fun playing my favorite decks. They just aren't fun to play because almost any good deck is pretty polarized with the exception of a few, and decks that aren't polarizing typically just aren't good. To get legend I feel like you just need to get a bit of luck with not facing your counter for a few games, and thats it.
Does anyone else agree me? Or is this game somehow still fun for people?
EDIT: I understand that there's a lot of these types of threads, but I just want to see what people think.
Yeah it’s a fact that this meta is the most polarizing one ever in hs history. Vicious Syndicate made calculations and said that this meta is 30% polarizing (30% of your chance to win is determed by matchup) while WotOG and kara have numbers like 10% on average.
I dont think i have the link to the article anymore but maybe someone else has it. The article was really interesting and supported by a lot of stats.
Yeah it’s a fact that this meta is the most polarizing one ever in hs history. Vicious Syndicate made calculations and said that this meta is 30% polarizing (30% of your chance to win is determed by matchup) while WotOG and kara have numbers like 10% on average.
I dont think i have the link to the article anymore but maybe someone else has it. The article was really interesting and supported by a lot of stats.
I have to say that this is the worst meta I have ever seen in this game. People say that the problem is coming from playing too much, but for me that is not the case. I can't even get through one match without hating myself, my opponent and Hearthstone in general. Imagine a fighting game where occasionally you are matched against an opponent who locks your character and you can do nothing but wait to lose, concede or jump around to make things a little more interesting for your opponent. That was Hearthstone before this meta. Now change the "occasionally" to "every other game" and that is Hearthstone now.
Folks often compare other card games to chess and Hearthstone to checkers. I don't agree with that. There is currently more counter play and skill in a game of tic tac toe than in Hearthstone. This game isn't even on checkers level. And that is heartbreaking for a game that I have played for 4 years and spent too much money on.
Zalae was asked on stream about what were good choices for high skill decks in this current meta game a couple of days ago. His reply was that most of the meta decks required a high degree of skill. And added that this “polarized matchup” stuff was just a cop out made by people who didn’t want to get better at the game.
But maybe Billy is right. Maybe the game has the same skill cap as tic tac toe. But boy oh boy, that Hunterace sure is a good TTT player.
It's hard for me to call this the worst meta ever when I'm seeing Zalae and Firebat win with Seaforium Bomber at rank 3 and Chump win with Star Aligner Warlock.
Zalae was asked on stream about what were good choices for high skill decks in this current meta game a couple of days ago. His reply was that most of the meta decks required a high degree of skill. And added that this “polarized matchup” stuff was just a cop out made by people who didn’t want to get better at the game.
But maybe Billy is right. Maybe the game has the same skill cap as tic tac toe. But boy oh boy, that Hunterace sure is a good TTT player.
To the first quote, I hate you so much for beating me to it.
There is always going to be this huge contingent of players who get reasonably good at the game, decide with no particular evidence that they have reached the pinnacle of play, and attribute any troubles to matchup . . . because after all, what else could it be? I've said it before, I'll say it again: Out of the 20,000 or so games I've played, I can count on two hands the number of games that lasted more than six turns in which I am certain I played perfectly. I haven't finished out of top 200 legend since early 2017. If you are giving yourself credit for perfect play when reeling off personal experiences of "game decided by matchup", you are playing yourself.
Zalae has it absolutely correct and I'm sorry I missed that live broadcast. You watch or commit blatant, black and white mistakes in unfavorable matchups and then come up with, "Well, I can't win that matchup". People have the nerve to suggest Shudderwock and Quest Rogue are "brainless" decks while making egregious errors with and against them. Here's a secret for you: There is no brainless deck. If you truly think there is, go take it to rank 10 or higher legend and post your screenshot. I say you can't do it.
Kibler has made some videos about meta stagnation, and in this there is some truth. Most of the top decks were top decks in Witchwood as well. But "stagnant" and "worst" aren't remotely close to synonyms. And on top of everything else, the OP actually mentions midrange shaman. I have no idea what VS said about the polarization of that time period, but I know it matters less than zero. There was literally exactly one tier 1 deck. To compare that time to this one and suggest we had it better then is beyond ridiculous.
And on top of everything else, you really want to start this shit again immediately before nerfs are announced? Michael Caine had it right. Some men want to watch the world burn. Fortunately, the gentleman I quoted above has it right. The next meta is destined by tautology to be worse, so at least there's that.
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While I don't know about worst meta ever (As that's subjective) it statistically is the most polarizing meta to date. Certain decks like Odd Warrior have up to a 30% polarization rating. The real question can we have a diverse meta that doesn't have higher polarity levels. I think polarization sparks with poor card design (Jade idol) and single cards that absolutely change matchups (DK Rexxar, Rogue Quest), and the extremely polarizing hero powers Baku can offer. Without these cards deck diversity may suffer but I feel the overall enjoyment of playing HS may increase.
While I agree with your comment that their are no such thing as skilless decks and deck diversity is high I disagree with the notion that deck polarity has an almost 0% effect on the game. Statistically this is by a fair margin the most polarizing meta in HS ever. Polarization doesn't mean low skill cap nor does it mean that matchups are 100-0 in favor of a deck. Polarity simply means that certain decks have ridicously skewed matchups against certain decks/archetypes and really poor wr's against other decks/archetypes. High polarity no matter how you spin it is ultimately bad for the game. Decks that have polarity levels of over 20% mean matchups become to one sided and no matter how skilled you may be as a player those games you talked about "playing perfectly and dying on turn 6" quadruple in number. Not only is high polarization detrimental to higher skill players (as you have higher chances of losing games to matchups and not how you play) it's also worse for ladder, as the game becomes less who's the better player and more rock-paper-scissors.
“The game will be so much better when x y z rotates out”
Problem is Blizzard always manages to add in new cards which break the game even more.
Until they significantly start to reduce the power level of new expansions, the game will always have a bad meta. The thing is though, they won’t because they want the preorders and too much of the community complain when expansions aren’t powerful enough.
@OP: the only truly polarizing decks are odd warrior and quest rogue. The former destroys any form of aggro and midrange deck, the latter destroys any control deck. And both lose to the exact opposite. The other decks aren't nearly as bad as those two.
I will never get how people say this meta is fine. More decks being played =/= healthy meta, that's why there will be balance changes even if the devs said they wanted to skip this expansion's nerfs. I'm not gonna talk about the super polarized match ups, the VS article is there and good enough.
For people saying "don't concede". I play big spell mage and never concede against quest rogue, mill druid, mecha'thun priest etc. and I almost always lose even if I try my best and plan my game 10 turns ahead. The only way I could possibly win is if my opponents draw like sh*t or if they discard combo pieces. How is this fun? Hoping your opponents mess up/draw too bad? That's how you expect to win in this meta?
Oh, and some say every meta is the worst and the next meta will win this title? Well, of course. As long as ungoro, kotft and knc are in standard every meta is the worst. If you say every meta is bad then why WotOG was so good? Right, because we didn't have stupid things like quests, recruit, mana cheat, powerful heroes etc.
Many viable decks and polarizing matchups go hand in hand.
If you want closer matchups, the best decks will be harder to counter and squeeze half of the metagame and entire classes out. Cubelock, evendin and many other decks have had that commanding position in the past.
Playing since Tgt, I have never seen a meta this bad. I thought that midrange shaman and raza priest was bad. This is truly the worst state that I have ever seen the game in. Every matchup is either an auto win, which is super boring and you don't even have to think about your plays as you win no matter what, or an auto lose, where no amount of thinking you do will win the game. Both scenarios are just not fun in any way. The way that this game should be is: Oh, its a hunter, I can do this to try and win. Instead of: Oh, its a hunter. I lose no matter what because of infinite value from rexxar. Might as well concede.
And I'm not blaming one deck, I'm blaming quite a few of them. I don't think I'm biased at all because I play a few of these decks, but Odd warrior, Quest rogue, any hunter deck with rexxar, zoolock, shudderwock shaman, odd rogue, basically any druid deck, and kingsbane rogue. What do all of these decks have in common? They're polarizing. Even if some aren't that powerful, it doesn't mean that it isn't polarizing. Look at hunter. Not the most powerful class by any means at all, but is such a pain in the ass to face for some decks. Look at warrior, and quest rogue, or any of the decks I mentioned above. All the same. No new decks can emerge because one deck can destroy anything.
But they can't nerf all of these decks, and they probably won't nerf most of them. So there will be polarizing decks at least until the next rotation. Blizzard claims that their stats don't show that the meta is more polarizing than ever, but then why is the game as boring as ever? And how come when I queue into half of my games wanting to instantly concede?
Literally almost every deck is so polarizing that I'm not even having fun playing my favorite decks. They just aren't fun to play because almost any good deck is pretty polarized with the exception of a few, and decks that aren't polarizing typically just aren't good. To get legend I feel like you just need to get a bit of luck with not facing your counter for a few games, and thats it.
Does anyone else agree me? Or is this game somehow still fun for people?
EDIT: I understand that there's a lot of these types of threads, but I just want to see what people think.
Yeah it’s a fact that this meta is the most polarizing one ever in hs history. Vicious Syndicate made calculations and said that this meta is 30% polarizing (30% of your chance to win is determed by matchup) while WotOG and kara have numbers like 10% on average.
I dont think i have the link to the article anymore but maybe someone else has it. The article was really interesting and supported by a lot of stats.
https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/meta-polarity-and-its-impact-on-hearthstone/
19%.
English is not my native language, so, with a high probability, mistakes were made.
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I have to say that this is the worst meta I have ever seen in this game. People say that the problem is coming from playing too much, but for me that is not the case. I can't even get through one match without hating myself, my opponent and Hearthstone in general. Imagine a fighting game where occasionally you are matched against an opponent who locks your character and you can do nothing but wait to lose, concede or jump around to make things a little more interesting for your opponent. That was Hearthstone before this meta. Now change the "occasionally" to "every other game" and that is Hearthstone now.
Folks often compare other card games to chess and Hearthstone to checkers. I don't agree with that. There is currently more counter play and skill in a game of tic tac toe than in Hearthstone. This game isn't even on checkers level. And that is heartbreaking for a game that I have played for 4 years and spent too much money on.
Every Meta is declared the Worst Meta ever by someone forum person.
Learning how to give yourself the best chance to win a bad match up is what separates the good players from the scrubs. A couple of hints:
1) Don’t concede,
2) Don’t come to cry if you fail.
Hey! If it's any comfort the next meta will probably be the worst again.
Zalae was asked on stream about what were good choices for high skill decks in this current meta game a couple of days ago. His reply was that most of the meta decks required a high degree of skill. And added that this “polarized matchup” stuff was just a cop out made by people who didn’t want to get better at the game.
But maybe Billy is right. Maybe the game has the same skill cap as tic tac toe. But boy oh boy, that Hunterace sure is a good TTT player.
Well, it appears that the meta is unusually polarised, but there is no such thing as autoloss or autowin.
Learning how to mulligan and pilot, depending on the matchup, is what you need to face this kind of meta.
You can't expect to play the same strategy every game.
While polarisation is dangerous, it is not even remotely as bad as Shamanstone.
It's hard for me to call this the worst meta ever when I'm seeing Zalae and Firebat win with Seaforium Bomber at rank 3 and Chump win with Star Aligner Warlock.
Bomber Druid - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNQDTMpAoTE
Star Aligner - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cGJfFGXsBM
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To the first quote, I hate you so much for beating me to it.
There is always going to be this huge contingent of players who get reasonably good at the game, decide with no particular evidence that they have reached the pinnacle of play, and attribute any troubles to matchup . . . because after all, what else could it be? I've said it before, I'll say it again: Out of the 20,000 or so games I've played, I can count on two hands the number of games that lasted more than six turns in which I am certain I played perfectly. I haven't finished out of top 200 legend since early 2017. If you are giving yourself credit for perfect play when reeling off personal experiences of "game decided by matchup", you are playing yourself.
Zalae has it absolutely correct and I'm sorry I missed that live broadcast. You watch or commit blatant, black and white mistakes in unfavorable matchups and then come up with, "Well, I can't win that matchup". People have the nerve to suggest Shudderwock and Quest Rogue are "brainless" decks while making egregious errors with and against them. Here's a secret for you: There is no brainless deck. If you truly think there is, go take it to rank 10 or higher legend and post your screenshot. I say you can't do it.
Kibler has made some videos about meta stagnation, and in this there is some truth. Most of the top decks were top decks in Witchwood as well. But "stagnant" and "worst" aren't remotely close to synonyms. And on top of everything else, the OP actually mentions midrange shaman. I have no idea what VS said about the polarization of that time period, but I know it matters less than zero. There was literally exactly one tier 1 deck. To compare that time to this one and suggest we had it better then is beyond ridiculous.
And on top of everything else, you really want to start this shit again immediately before nerfs are announced? Michael Caine had it right. Some men want to watch the world burn. Fortunately, the gentleman I quoted above has it right. The next meta is destined by tautology to be worse, so at least there's that.
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
When youre not adding interactivity, youre wrecking the game. Bring back dirty rats.
While I don't know about worst meta ever (As that's subjective) it statistically is the most polarizing meta to date. Certain decks like Odd Warrior have up to a 30% polarization rating. The real question can we have a diverse meta that doesn't have higher polarity levels. I think polarization sparks with poor card design (Jade idol) and single cards that absolutely change matchups (DK Rexxar, Rogue Quest), and the extremely polarizing hero powers Baku can offer. Without these cards deck diversity may suffer but I feel the overall enjoyment of playing HS may increase.
While I agree with your comment that their are no such thing as skilless decks and deck diversity is high I disagree with the notion that deck polarity has an almost 0% effect on the game. Statistically this is by a fair margin the most polarizing meta in HS ever. Polarization doesn't mean low skill cap nor does it mean that matchups are 100-0 in favor of a deck. Polarity simply means that certain decks have ridicously skewed matchups against certain decks/archetypes and really poor wr's against other decks/archetypes. High polarity no matter how you spin it is ultimately bad for the game. Decks that have polarity levels of over 20% mean matchups become to one sided and no matter how skilled you may be as a player those games you talked about "playing perfectly and dying on turn 6" quadruple in number. Not only is high polarization detrimental to higher skill players (as you have higher chances of losing games to matchups and not how you play) it's also worse for ladder, as the game becomes less who's the better player and more rock-paper-scissors.
There's a thing called Wild mode.
We say the same thing every meta...
“The game will be so much better when x y z rotates out”
Problem is Blizzard always manages to add in new cards which break the game even more.
Until they significantly start to reduce the power level of new expansions, the game will always have a bad meta. The thing is though, they won’t because they want the preorders and too much of the community complain when expansions aren’t powerful enough.
You're kidding, right?
@OP: the only truly polarizing decks are odd warrior and quest rogue. The former destroys any form of aggro and midrange deck, the latter destroys any control deck. And both lose to the exact opposite. The other decks aren't nearly as bad as those two.
Yes, the Combo Druid meta.
--Alfi--
I will never get how people say this meta is fine. More decks being played =/= healthy meta, that's why there will be balance changes even if the devs said they wanted to skip this expansion's nerfs. I'm not gonna talk about the super polarized match ups, the VS article is there and good enough.
For people saying "don't concede". I play big spell mage and never concede against quest rogue, mill druid, mecha'thun priest etc. and I almost always lose even if I try my best and plan my game 10 turns ahead. The only way I could possibly win is if my opponents draw like sh*t or if they discard combo pieces. How is this fun? Hoping your opponents mess up/draw too bad? That's how you expect to win in this meta?
Oh, and some say every meta is the worst and the next meta will win this title? Well, of course. As long as ungoro, kotft and knc are in standard every meta is the worst. If you say every meta is bad then why WotOG was so good? Right, because we didn't have stupid things like quests, recruit, mana cheat, powerful heroes etc.
Many viable decks and polarizing matchups go hand in hand.
If you want closer matchups, the best decks will be harder to counter and squeeze half of the metagame and entire classes out. Cubelock, evendin and many other decks have had that commanding position in the past.
Pick your poison.
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