Considering that many people (mainly those who play Wild) ask for nerfs on Flametongue Totem or Thing from Below I think it's time to discuss the possibility of a class overhaul. Let's be honest, if Flametongue would be changed to 3 mana or had its health lowered to 2 it'd be unlikely to ever see a viable Totem-related archetype again (not counting the fact that Even Shaman, the only powerful Shaman deck at the moment would be crippled). The basic Totems are nice to have but when you don't have any kind of meaningful support (Primal Talismans, Kobold Hermit or Windshear Stormcaller are just bad) then where's the point of the HP? Thunder Bluff Valiant is a thing from the past, the same goes for Wicked Witchdoctor. Yea, back then there was Draenei Totemcarver which got 'replaced' by Totem Cruncher but it's obviously better to keep your board...
According to the latest VS report Shaman is the least played class out there: https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-119/ and it has the lowest class winrate in Standard, even lower than Druid post-nerf. Those numbers are comparable to the Frozen Throne to Catacombs era where Shaman together with Warrior had been literally sent to the retirement home. The VS staff has stated multiple times that T5 seems to be unable to find the right balance regarding new, interesting Shaman archetypes in order to attract more players.
So I'm wondering, do we just have to wait for the upcoming rotation? Or, in case the aforementioned nerfs went live, should we talk about ways to make the class more accessible without killing its RNG-driven theme? Your opinions are welcome.
I think the Shaman hero power is a terrible, terrible design, but I really don't know how Blizzard could even begin to change it. Making it Dr.Boom-like does not fix the RNG issue, but it makes it more predictable to both players, I guess.
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
In Wild, part of the strength of Even Shaman, is not just the insane synergies, but also the fact that Basic Totems are incredibly sticky for their (1) cost. The result is that Even Shaman can swarm the board pretty easily. Compare with Even Paladin for example: you can't simply ping totems away.
Maybe, a nerf on basic totems to 0/1 could fix many things on the long run?
Together with 2/1 recruits for Odd Paladin maybe?
Not sure. This kind of changes require some extensive testing in order to be properly judged.
In Wild, part of the strength of Even Shaman, is not just the insane synergies, but also the fact that Basic Totems are incredibly sticky for their (1) cost. The result is that Even Shaman can swarm the board pretty easily. Compare with Even Paladin for example
Maybe, a nerf on basic totems to 0/1 could fix many things on the long run?
Together with 2/1 recruits for Odd Paladin maybe?
Not sure. This kind of changes require some extensive testing in order to be properly judged.
Nerf shaman hero Power? No way. It would kill the class. Even shaman is strong but it is not broken.
the thing about shaman is that the hero power is random, not reliable, in my opinion it is just about the worst hero power. but i dont know how we could just 'fix' that. you would have to revamp the whole power, and that is very risky.
also one of the big reasons shaman is bad is because of the totem archetype. that is the worst tribe ever. its so bad for 2 reasons, one, its very expensive. all of the totem synergies require a plethora of totems, or a kind of miracle style deck. and it is just to much mana to make all the totems, have the stick, then have the totem synergy.
two, totems have no attack. in real life, totems are just small wooden pillars. and in the game, they are small wooden pillars with small magic. therefor, it makes no sense thematically to give them attack, or much stats. so if your opponent wants to kill them, they will. they are just to easy to get rid of, and the totem synergy's are also just plain bad.
and the last big weakness for shaman, is the RNG. not just with making totems, but with things like evolve, deal 2-3 dmg, 3-6 dmg, gain 2-4 attack, or deal X damage randomly assigned. not to mention the number of random cards you are getting from hagatha. and hagatha is made worse with all the spells from poor archetypes for shaman (freeze, totem, murloc).
so to make a long post short, shaman is random, totems suck, and hero power is bad.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Rejoice, for even in death, you have become children of Thanos.
I think people misunderstand what the totem tribe is. It is most often viewed in the same light as other tribes in that the apparent aim is to build the core of a deck around them. Certainly there has been support for this in the past, but that was not so until TGT. The devs then decided to dabble in totem-centric archetypes that completely lost what totems were originally designed to do.
With the exception of Totem Golem (Nightmare Amalgam is not really a totem card in the same sense so I'll ignore it) the only totem with non-zero attack is Searing Totem, and that one is purely so the hero power has an outcome that always does something. All the rest are support minions with a wide range of jobs.
So far I have said nothing new, but the key is that totems support other plans. It is not like dragons needing dragons, or elementals needing elementals. Wrath of Air Totem needs spells, Healing Totem needs damaged minions, Flametongue Totem needs a reliable board presence etc. They do not need a raft of totem-synergy cards to be meaningful because they are already the synergy.
Even shaman masks this because it normally just uses the hero power for cheap minions and nothing much more, but play odd shaman and it will become obvious what the hero power (and the totem tribe as a whole) is for.
A very good change to shaman would be a class redesigne with totems, like secrets to be counted elsewhere, not as minions. This plus a brand new hero power would make shaman competitive in the long run. Just my 2 cents
two, totems have no attack. in real life, totems are just small wooden pillars. and in the game, they are small wooden pillars with small magic. therefor, it makes no sense thematically to give them attack, or much stats. so if your opponent wants to kill them, they will. they are just to easy to get rid of, and the totem synergy's are also just plain bad.
WTF did I just read? Did you suddenly forget about the existence of Searing Totem?
In Wild, part of the strength of Even Shaman, is not just the insane synergies, but also the fact that Basic Totems are incredibly sticky for their (1) cost. The result is that Even Shaman can swarm the board pretty easily. Compare with Even Paladin for example
Maybe, a nerf on basic totems to 0/1 could fix many things on the long run?
Together with 2/1 recruits for Odd Paladin maybe?
Not sure. This kind of changes require some extensive testing in order to be properly judged.
Nerf shaman hero Power? No way. It would kill the class. Even shaman is strong but it is not broken.
In Wild, part of the strength of Even Shaman, is not just the insane synergies, but also the fact that Basic Totems are incredibly sticky for their (1) cost. The result is that Even Shaman can swarm the board pretty easily. Compare with Even Paladin for example
Maybe, a nerf on basic totems to 0/1 could fix many things on the long run?
Together with 2/1 recruits for Odd Paladin maybe?
Not sure. This kind of changes require some extensive testing in order to be properly judged.
Nerf shaman hero Power? No way. It would kill the class. Even shaman is strong but it is not broken.
71% winrate is not broken? uhh what?
Even shaman has a 52 % WR from r5 to legend. You are naive if you think the decks overall winrate is 71 %.
two, totems have no attack. in real life, totems are just small wooden pillars. and in the game, they are small wooden pillars with small magic. therefor, it makes no sense thematically to give them attack, or much stats. so if your opponent wants to kill them, they will. they are just to easy to get rid of, and the totem synergy's are also just plain bad.
WTF did I just read? Did you suddenly forget about the existence of Searing Totem?
WTF did we just read indeed. Forgetting about searing totem is the least of the crimes in this paragraph
Much like how totems are just small wooden pillars In real life, shamans don't conjure the elements or evolve things in real life. Or exist, for that matter. By this logic, we should just delete the shaman class and half of the other ones with it :D
Considering that many people (mainly those who play Wild) ask for nerfs on Flametongue Totem or Thing from Below I think it's time to discuss the possibility of a class overhaul. Let's be honest, if Flametongue would be changed to 3 mana or had its health lowered to 2 it'd be unlikely to ever see a viable Totem-related archetype again (not counting the fact that Even Shaman, the only powerful Shaman deck at the moment would be crippled). The basic Totems are nice to have but when you don't have any kind of meaningful support (Primal Talismans, Kobold Hermit or Windshear Stormcaller are just bad) then where's the point of the HP? Thunder Bluff Valiant is a thing from the past, the same goes for Wicked Witchdoctor. Yea, back then there was Draenei Totemcarver which got 'replaced' by Totem Cruncher but it's obviously better to keep your board...
According to the latest VS report Shaman is the least played class out there: https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-119/ and it has the lowest class winrate in Standard, even lower than Druid post-nerf. Those numbers are comparable to the Frozen Throne to Catacombs era where Shaman together with Warrior had been literally sent to the retirement home. The VS staff has stated multiple times that T5 seems to be unable to find the right balance regarding new, interesting Shaman archetypes in order to attract more players.
So I'm wondering, do we just have to wait for the upcoming rotation? Or, in case the aforementioned nerfs went live, should we talk about ways to make the class more accessible without killing its RNG-driven theme? Your opinions are welcome.
Even Shaman is a solid Tier 2 deck in Standard with only Paladin, Hunter and Cleric having better decks.
--Alfi--
Nah, shaman was top tier 1 a few times in the last 2 year. It will be again somewhere in the future, thats how it is and always will be.
.
I think the Shaman hero power is a terrible, terrible design, but I really don't know how Blizzard could even begin to change it. Making it Dr.Boom-like does not fix the RNG issue, but it makes it more predictable to both players, I guess.
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
In Wild, part of the strength of Even Shaman, is not just the insane synergies, but also the fact that Basic Totems are incredibly sticky for their (1) cost. The result is that Even Shaman can swarm the board pretty easily. Compare with Even Paladin for example: you can't simply ping totems away.
Maybe, a nerf on basic totems to 0/1 could fix many things on the long run?
Together with 2/1 recruits for Odd Paladin maybe?
Not sure. This kind of changes require some extensive testing in order to be properly judged.
Nerf shaman hero Power? No way. It would kill the class. Even shaman is strong but it is not broken.
the thing about shaman is that the hero power is random, not reliable, in my opinion it is just about the worst hero power. but i dont know how we could just 'fix' that. you would have to revamp the whole power, and that is very risky.
also one of the big reasons shaman is bad is because of the totem archetype. that is the worst tribe ever. its so bad for 2 reasons, one, its very expensive. all of the totem synergies require a plethora of totems, or a kind of miracle style deck. and it is just to much mana to make all the totems, have the stick, then have the totem synergy.
two, totems have no attack. in real life, totems are just small wooden pillars. and in the game, they are small wooden pillars with small magic. therefor, it makes no sense thematically to give them attack, or much stats. so if your opponent wants to kill them, they will. they are just to easy to get rid of, and the totem synergy's are also just plain bad.
and the last big weakness for shaman, is the RNG. not just with making totems, but with things like evolve, deal 2-3 dmg, 3-6 dmg, gain 2-4 attack, or deal X damage randomly assigned. not to mention the number of random cards you are getting from hagatha. and hagatha is made worse with all the spells from poor archetypes for shaman (freeze, totem, murloc).
so to make a long post short, shaman is random, totems suck, and hero power is bad.
Rejoice, for even in death, you have become children of Thanos.
I play only wild and I'm yet to see anyone ask for Flametongue Totem and Thing from Below nerfs.
I think people misunderstand what the totem tribe is. It is most often viewed in the same light as other tribes in that the apparent aim is to build the core of a deck around them. Certainly there has been support for this in the past, but that was not so until TGT. The devs then decided to dabble in totem-centric archetypes that completely lost what totems were originally designed to do.
With the exception of Totem Golem (Nightmare Amalgam is not really a totem card in the same sense so I'll ignore it) the only totem with non-zero attack is Searing Totem, and that one is purely so the hero power has an outcome that always does something. All the rest are support minions with a wide range of jobs.
So far I have said nothing new, but the key is that totems support other plans. It is not like dragons needing dragons, or elementals needing elementals. Wrath of Air Totem needs spells, Healing Totem needs damaged minions, Flametongue Totem needs a reliable board presence etc. They do not need a raft of totem-synergy cards to be meaningful because they are already the synergy.
Even shaman masks this because it normally just uses the hero power for cheap minions and nothing much more, but play odd shaman and it will become obvious what the hero power (and the totem tribe as a whole) is for.
The shaman class overall is in good shape right now.
I also don't think *any* hero powers should get changed.
A very good change to shaman would be a class redesigne with totems, like secrets to be counted elsewhere, not as minions.
This plus a brand new hero power would make shaman competitive in the long run.
Just my 2 cents
Excuse me?
WTF did I just read? Did you suddenly forget about the existence of Searing Totem?
You should open your eyes then because there's been a LOT of nerf requests for even shaman already, most of them targeting Thing from Below.
AHHAAHAHAHA nice joke, shaman is op AS FUCK IN WILD
71% winrate is not broken? uhh what?
Did he mean Wizard?
Free to try and find a game, dealing cards for sorrow, cards for pain.
I hope they don't touch Flametongue Totem. That would kill the class completely in standard.
Even shaman has a 52 % WR from r5 to legend. You are naive if you think the decks overall winrate is 71 %.
WTF did we just read indeed. Forgetting about searing totem is the least of the crimes in this paragraph
Much like how totems are just small wooden pillars In real life, shamans don't conjure the elements or evolve things in real life. Or exist, for that matter. By this logic, we should just delete the shaman class and half of the other ones with it :D
Legend with : S65 Freeze Mage, S57 Maly Gonk Druid, S57 "Okay" Shaman, S53 Boom-zooka Hunter, S53 Maly Tog Druid, S52 Wild Tog Druid ft.Blingtron, S50 Quest Rogue, S49 Dead Man's Warrior, S41 Wild Clown Fiesta Druid, S41 Hadronox Jade Druid, S40 Wild OTK Dragon Druid, S35 SMOrc Shaman, S33 Jade Druid, S22 Control Priest, S19 Control Priest