I absolutely love Hearthstone, been playing since open beta, but there is one thing I have observed, but never understood over the years, and that is that the overall player base has slowly and gradually started disliking playing control decks. There have been many versions of control decks through the years: Handlock, Freeze Mage, Control Priest with Thoughtsteal and Mind Control, Justicar Warrior, N'zoth Control Paladin, Deathrattle Control Shaman, Renolock, Grinder Mage, Raza Priest, just to name a few, to the Control Warrior and Control Shaman of today. I can understand the dislike of playing against uninteractive win conditions of certain control decks such as Freeze Mage and Raza Priest, but why do people dislike playing against value oriented control decks that try to play a longer game? For example, there were much less people complaining about playing against Justicar Warrior or playing that mirror-match in the past, when the fatigue-based matchup was the same as the Odd Warrior issue from last year.
I have also noticed people on ladder more commonly tech for control rather than aggro, such as putting Togwaggle's Scheme into their rogue deck, two copies of Dire Frenzy, or Arch-Villain Rafaamin Zoo when aggro is more rampant on ladder.
I understand Archivist Elysianais a huge factor at the moment, but that card only got implemented in the Year of the Dragon, where this observation has been over the past several years.
So my question is: If you hate playing against control decks, why?
And if you are a control player, Have you been enjoying playing control even with the amount of anti-control tools implemented in the last few years(i.e. Jades, Quest Rogue, Togwaggle, etc)? Or have you personally hated playing against control as well?
I was just curious about the community's view on this observation, as I see many Control Warrior hate posts lately.
Control Warrior is without a doubt the most boring deck to play against. I don’t mind control shaman and at least players using that have abit of skill but coming up against 5 boring Af control Warriors the other day just put me off playing the game
I'm fine with Control decks. I don't really have an issue with long games either.
My only gripe is when said Control deck has so much removal (even for a Control deck) that it feels almost pointless to play anything. And for me, it feels like that is currently the case with Warrior.
Obviously a Warrior won't use all of them in the same deck but it comes close. There is just *so* much removal available. And on top of all that, Warrior gets a ton of armor generation, a Hero card with a very powerful aura and stuff like Omega Assembly, which can find more Omega Devastators and Zilliax by the way.
Oh you've got an 8/8 giant and a 7/4 dragon on the board and Warrior has nothing? One Omega Devastator with Dr. Boom and both are gone thanks to a 10 damage Battlecry and rush on the Mech itself. For 4 mana. Supercollider can also clear it.
Individually (Omega Devastator excepted) the cards are all pretty much fine but Warrior having access to this much removal AND value generation AND armor generation at the same time feels frustrating to play against. It just feels like a bit too much. Not massively, but a bit.
I personally love control deck because I enjoy slightly longer games.
I feel like for Standard right now, Warrior gets so much hate because it is literally the only outstanding control deck. Some classes in the current meta have an issue, namely no healing [Zilliax being the main option] while Warrior can get up to 20+ armor easily, that and with its supreme board control ability.
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Petition for Jaina's boobs to return please. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Control decks are boring now. They used to be about resource management and getting away with risky plays, now they are all about playing removal on curve and get a guaranteed win in the late game. The difference between Control Warrior and a combo deck is honestly not much, they both accomplish the exact same goal by stalling until they get their win-condition.
Blizzard has completely ruined the control archetype by introducing flashy "i win LUL" cards into the game. Remove Dr. Boom, remove Elysiana, and remove Hagatha. These changes would make control decks much more enjoyable, but obviously they would also have to nerf other decks to compensate.
Edit: The reason why people hated Odd Warrior was because it super one-sided. If you played Aggro against an Odd Warrior, you would have a 25% chance to win at best. Also, the deck was just retarded, all you had to do was press the hero power button and pass 70% of the turns.
People on Hearthpwn complain about absolutely anything, but control decks probably generate the least hate. So many threads against aggro...
Last month I made it to legend with control warrior, but now to be honest the issue I have with the deck is that it prevents me from playing on my commute to work. I like to play couple of quick aggro games, but if I end up queuing against warrior, I'll be late for work or I'll have to concede...
From around the time of Frozen Throne, Blizzard seemed to really want to push control as an archetype. I hadn't been playing all that long back then, but it was my perception that aggro/tempo decks had mostly ruled the meta up to that point, and a slower meta was welcomed by a lot of players.
Unfortunately, the control decks that came to the fore at that time weren't very much fun to play against. Jade Druid basically crushed other slow decks with infinite value, while Frost Lich Jaina just put the game out of reach for most faster decks if you couldn't kill her within a turn or two of being played. I think these infinite value decks are part of the reason for the anti-control feeling - if you queued into them with the wrong deck, it felt like there was nothing you could do to win the game. I think a lot of people were hoping the meta would look different after the rotation, but instead we got another very dominant control deck (Control Warrior), that is a very tough matchup for a lot of other decks. On top of that, aggressive decks (other than rogue), are in a pretty weak spot compared to decks of the past, with few powerful 1-drops, fewer chargers, and less ways of doing burst damage (with a couple of exceptions like rogue and some hunter decks).
In short, control has been a dominant archetype for a long time now - it took a brief hit when Rastakhan came out, but the combo decks that took its place often played a pretty controlly game in practice, with tons of heal and removal. And decks like these - OTK decks that go all in on a single win condition - aren't much fun to play against either. So basically, I think a lot of people are sick of playing against slow, grindy decks at this point.
I don't hate control decks in general, but I find that playing against fatigue-style decks, with no actual win condition other than running their opponents out of gas, gets old really fast. I also dislike playing against stall-and-cycle OTK decks that are all in on a single, game-winning combo. For me, a good control deck is one that tries to survive to the later turns and then starts dropping big threats, closing out the game quickly if you can't kill them first. I've played a lot of matches both with and against these sorts of decks, and I find them a lot of fun. These sorts of control decks are much healthier for the game in my opinion.
Your question makes an incorrect assumption. People haven't started hating Control decks, Control decks have just become stronger in the meta right now.
"Why has enjoyment of playing against control decks deteriorated?" - It hasn't. Whenever Control decks have been strong, there have always been people who hated playing against them, just as there are people who hate the strongest decks at any point in the game.
You assume that the same people complaining about Control decks now are people who complained about Aggro decks, or Combo decks, or whatever. Some of them probably are, sure, but most of them are just people who have always disliked some aspect of the Control gameplay style. Some people enjoy quicker games, so they will naturally dislike when games last longer; some people dislike when all of their cards seem to be answered without the opponent then pushing an advantage; some people just prefer minion trading to a more defensive game.
Now, to be clear, I'm talking about people complaining specifically about Control decks. You shouldn't conflate that with people who are, for example, complaining about the strength of Warrior right now. You can dislike how strong a meta deck is without necessarily disliking its gameplay, just as you can dislike how a deck plays without it actually being that strong - Shudderwock Shaman, for example, had a sub-50% winrate for I believe the entirety of its reign (apart from maybe right at the start, before people knew the gameplan of the deck), and yet people hated it because of how it played.
The reason it seems like more people hate Control decks now is because the people who hate Control decks now hate some of the strongest decks in the game, so their complaints are more likely to be listened to. Just as they were when they complained about Freeze Mage, or Big Priest, or Renolock, or Cubelock, or Wallet Warrior, or any other lategame-focused deck that was particularly strong at some point.
I absolutely love Hearthstone, been playing since open beta, but there is one thing I have observed, but never understood over the years, and that is that the overall player base has slowly and gradually started disliking playing control decks. There have been many versions of control decks through the years: Handlock, Freeze Mage, Control Priest with Thoughtsteal and Mind Control, Justicar Warrior, N'zoth Control Paladin, Deathrattle Control Shaman, Renolock, Grinder Mage, Raza Priest, just to name a few, to the Control Warrior and Control Shaman of today. I can understand the dislike of playing against uninteractive win conditions of certain control decks such as Freeze Mage and Raza Priest, but why do people dislike playing against value oriented control decks that try to play a longer game? For example, there were much less people complaining about playing against Justicar Warrior or playing that mirror-match in the past, when the fatigue-based matchup was the same as the Odd Warrior issue from last year.
I have also noticed people on ladder more commonly tech for control rather than aggro, such as putting Togwaggle's Scheme into their rogue deck, two copies of Dire Frenzy, or Arch-Villain Rafaamin Zoo when aggro is more rampant on ladder.
I understand Archivist Elysianais a huge factor at the moment, but that card only got implemented in the Year of the Dragon, where this observation has been over the past several years.
So my question is: If you hate playing against control decks, why?
And if you are a control player, Have you been enjoying playing control even with the amount of anti-control tools implemented in the last few years(i.e. Jades, Quest Rogue, Togwaggle, etc)? Or have you personally hated playing against control as well?
I was just curious about the community's view on this observation, as I see many Control Warrior hate posts lately.
Control players were respected back then because resource management was hard and you had some very hard turns. The current iteration of warrior doesn't really have that.
The reason for this is that when strong removal is so overpresent using one is not a particularly hard choice, often an automatic play, and even mistakes get hardly punished. Also fatigue battles have been completely eliminated by the existence of elysiana.
Old odd warrior felt more fair than current control warrior.
I think the real situation is not people hating control decks, but control decks becoming unfun to play against.
Back in the days, hand lock had to take lots of risk tapping, and freeze mage relies on ice block. They had clear weakness than faster decks can look to counter.
However, odd warrior doesn't have a game plan, other than tanking up. Highlander priest also had uninteractive screams and otk potential.
There were times when aggro or midrange decks were getting uninteractive (hi secret paly and pirate warrior), but the problem was just easier to understand.
The saving grace is that blizzard is printing more interactive control cards like defile and mass hysteria. May be the "kill all threats and not lose" game plan will become difficult enough eventually.
because noobs see an aggro deck that has over 56% win rate, they copy it and expect to win every single game, butt when they encounter control deck that eveentually beats them they storm to the forums to cry about it...
I play since beta and enjoy every type of deck especially control ones. they are more fun to play and require some thought - when to use board clears, when to tempo a tech card or value trades
I don’t hate playing against control decks. Control Shaman has been my favorite deck to play since the start of this meta and it’s a deck I enjoy playing against as well. Even the mirror requires interesting decisions and I enjoy playing against it when I’m playing other decks. And there’s plenty of room for customization, improvisation and adaptation in the archetype. It’s an example of a creative control deck where games play out differently every time and the pilot can be punished for mistakes.
But like a lot of other players, I find Control Warrior to be tedious in the current standard meta. The games are always the same, the power level of their core cards makes control easy to play, etc. Everything that’s ostensibly interesting or challenging about control is neutered by the fact that Warrior has access to the perfect tools for any situation. And because of its armor gain and access to removal, it has a higher margin for error than a control deck should.
Need to clear a single minion? Shield Slam, Execute and Omega Devastator have you covered. Yes, the last one is only playable after turn 10, but are you worried about getting to turn 10?
Need to clear a wide board? Warpath has you covered. The Shaman analogue, Lightning Storm, only guarantees 2 damage per minion and has overload.
Need to clear every minion on the board? Brawl has you covered. Yes, there’s a chance the one big scary minion is left over, but then you can drop Omega Devastator, Execute or Shield Slam.
Running out of minions? Don’t worry, Omega Assembly and Delivery Drone have you covered. Bonus points because those minions have rush! Yes, you’re not guaranteed to get the most useful minion, but you’re guaranteed a rush minion if Dr. Boom has been played.
And when you’re floating mana, just armor up! Or better yet, play a Shield Block, draw a card and boost your Shield Slam. 4-mana, draw a card, deal 5 damage to a minion. Sounds good.
For any conceivable board state, Warrior has an efficient answer that requires no thought or creativity. It’s boring. And if your deck isn’t built to withstand its defenses, you’re sinply going to lose. That’s not how HS should work.
because noobs see an aggro deck that has over 56% win rate, they copy it and expect to win every single game, butt when they encounter control deck that eveentually beats them they storm to the forums to cry about it...
I play since beta and enjoy every type of deck especially control ones. they are more fun to play and require some thought - when to use board clears, when to tempo a tech card or value trades
Seriously, no matter what your play is, warrior has a no-brainer removal for everything you played (and possibly leave a mech or three on their side). That's infuriatingly boring to play against, as you often feel as your resources are limited and you have to think of an optimal play, but no matter what, the warrior will have removal for it.
It is just really unfun to play against certain types of control decks biggest offender that comes to my mind is Odd Warrior. I hate playing against that deck.
Odd Warrior was a deck that could simply get away with hero power and pass for the majority of the game. When playing any board centric or limited burn combo deck it felt like an autoloss. And the worst part is, playing a deck that beats it, doesnt feel satisfying because the Odd warrior is just sitting there letting themselves get OTKed it loses because it was such a stupidly polarising deck.
I personally dislike playing against decks that just have so much removal they can just throw them away that easy. Added frustration when they claim the deck is skillful while all they do is armour up, heal and removal on curve. They dont play to win, they play not to lose. Again like Odd Warrior, it was just removal and tank up.
In this meta that is less so the case but still an issue, mainly because Warrior got a lot of strong control cards in a class that already has strong control tools in the basic and classic set. I think the current Control Warrior is not so extreme as odd warrior, but it has an obscene amount of removal, it just has less ways to gain armour. I actually like bomb warrior a lot more to play against even in a control shell. Yes the bombs hurt, yes it rng dependent. But it feels like you are playing against an opponent that actually tries to do something. Control (or big) Shaman is less of an issue, as it doesnt have so much removal.
As for playing control myself. Archivist Eleysiana is the sole reason why I dont want to. I dont feel like doing 40 minute matches that boil down to did I get the right cards or did we hit the turn timer because we had to bounce it 2 times.
I second the general impression that Control is ok to play with or against.
It's just SOME Control decks that are supported with such obvious and strong tools that they become obnoxious to encounter, even if their wr is ok or even subpar.
I don't really "hate" control decks, but I oftentimes dislike playing against them. Actually, most control decks these days (the few there are) are relatively fair and I don't mind them too much, honestly. Warrior has a bit too much randomness going on and a few too many removal options, but I don't really hate the deck. Just after the last 2 years... yeah, I still don't like seeing them.
After KFT, and definitely after Kobolds, there have been soooo many games where my opponents did nothing but clearing the board, killing minions, stalling and drawing cards until the combo/the hero card arrived to seal the deal. Big Spell Mage, Razakus Priest, Odd Warrior, Control Warlock, Control Priest, Shudderwock... I really got sick of this playstyle. Some had 6-8 board clearing effects, on top of multiple cards to take out threats. Hearthstone is just boring to me when I play against a deck mostly made out of spells that either gain armor, draw cards or kill things, and minions that kill even more things. Not to mention that the game gets a bit tiring when each match lasts more than 10 minutes.
It's not the same as older Control decks. They had two, maybe four board clears in their deck, along with maybe four cards to take out threats, and situational tech cards like BGH or MCT. Aside from that, they had to play minions and find a way to turn the game around. There was an actual back and forth. Also, there was a lot less if any card generation in the past, and the value game was mostly limited to the 30 cards you started with. That drastically changed over the years too.
Again, in all honesty, it's not as painful anymore as it used to be, but I still prefer to play against decks that try to be a bit more proactive, because I have had WAY too many games where my opponent was essentially playing solitaire.
I myself rarely play Control decks, because these decks oftentimes require 5 and more legendaries, several epics, and most of the cards are essential and hard to replace, so the deck cost is oftentimes around 10k and higher. Unless I happen to have most/all the cards for a decent control-oriented deck, I'm not gonna spend 5000 and more just to play one single deck.
When I do play them, I can enjoy them and I definitely see the appeal. But I think control-oriented decks shouldn't be too grindy, just as aggressive decks shouldn't be too fast.
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Hey guys, Veteran beta player here.
I absolutely love Hearthstone, been playing since open beta, but there is one thing I have observed, but never understood over the years, and that is that the overall player base has slowly and gradually started disliking playing control decks. There have been many versions of control decks through the years: Handlock, Freeze Mage, Control Priest with Thoughtsteal and Mind Control, Justicar Warrior, N'zoth Control Paladin, Deathrattle Control Shaman, Renolock, Grinder Mage, Raza Priest, just to name a few, to the Control Warrior and Control Shaman of today. I can understand the dislike of playing against uninteractive win conditions of certain control decks such as Freeze Mage and Raza Priest, but why do people dislike playing against value oriented control decks that try to play a longer game? For example, there were much less people complaining about playing against Justicar Warrior or playing that mirror-match in the past, when the fatigue-based matchup was the same as the Odd Warrior issue from last year.
I have also noticed people on ladder more commonly tech for control rather than aggro, such as putting Togwaggle's Scheme into their rogue deck, two copies of Dire Frenzy, or Arch-Villain Rafaam in Zoo when aggro is more rampant on ladder.
I understand Archivist Elysiana is a huge factor at the moment, but that card only got implemented in the Year of the Dragon, where this observation has been over the past several years.
So my question is: If you hate playing against control decks, why?
And if you are a control player, Have you been enjoying playing control even with the amount of anti-control tools implemented in the last few years(i.e. Jades, Quest Rogue, Togwaggle, etc)? Or have you personally hated playing against control as well?
I was just curious about the community's view on this observation, as I see many Control Warrior hate posts lately.
Control Warrior is without a doubt the most boring deck to play against. I don’t mind control shaman and at least players using that have abit of skill but coming up against 5 boring Af control Warriors the other day just put me off playing the game
I'm fine with Control decks. I don't really have an issue with long games either.
My only gripe is when said Control deck has so much removal (even for a Control deck) that it feels almost pointless to play anything. And for me, it feels like that is currently the case with Warrior.
Warrior removals/clears:
Shield Slam
Execute
Warpath
Brawl
Omega Devastator
Dyn-o-matic
Supercollider
Reckless Flurry
Militia Commander
Smolderthorn Lancer
Obviously a Warrior won't use all of them in the same deck but it comes close. There is just *so* much removal available. And on top of all that, Warrior gets a ton of armor generation, a Hero card with a very powerful aura and stuff like Omega Assembly, which can find more Omega Devastators and Zilliax by the way.
Oh you've got an 8/8 giant and a 7/4 dragon on the board and Warrior has nothing? One Omega Devastator with Dr. Boom and both are gone thanks to a 10 damage Battlecry and rush on the Mech itself. For 4 mana. Supercollider can also clear it.
Individually (Omega Devastator excepted) the cards are all pretty much fine but Warrior having access to this much removal AND value generation AND armor generation at the same time feels frustrating to play against. It just feels like a bit too much. Not massively, but a bit.
I personally love control deck because I enjoy slightly longer games.
I feel like for Standard right now, Warrior gets so much hate because it is literally the only outstanding control deck. Some classes in the current meta have an issue, namely no healing [Zilliax being the main option] while Warrior can get up to 20+ armor easily, that and with its supreme board control ability.
Petition for Jaina's boobs to return please. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Control decks are boring now. They used to be about resource management and getting away with risky plays, now they are all about playing removal on curve and get a guaranteed win in the late game. The difference between Control Warrior and a combo deck is honestly not much, they both accomplish the exact same goal by stalling until they get their win-condition.
Blizzard has completely ruined the control archetype by introducing flashy "i win LUL" cards into the game. Remove Dr. Boom, remove Elysiana, and remove Hagatha. These changes would make control decks much more enjoyable, but obviously they would also have to nerf other decks to compensate.
Edit: The reason why people hated Odd Warrior was because it super one-sided. If you played Aggro against an Odd Warrior, you would have a 25% chance to win at best. Also, the deck was just retarded, all you had to do was press the hero power button and pass 70% of the turns.
People on Hearthpwn complain about absolutely anything, but control decks probably generate the least hate. So many threads against aggro...
Last month I made it to legend with control warrior, but now to be honest the issue I have with the deck is that it prevents me from playing on my commute to work. I like to play couple of quick aggro games, but if I end up queuing against warrior, I'll be late for work or I'll have to concede...
Exactly this^
Your question makes an incorrect assumption. People haven't started hating Control decks, Control decks have just become stronger in the meta right now.
"Why has enjoyment of playing against control decks deteriorated?" - It hasn't. Whenever Control decks have been strong, there have always been people who hated playing against them, just as there are people who hate the strongest decks at any point in the game.
You assume that the same people complaining about Control decks now are people who complained about Aggro decks, or Combo decks, or whatever. Some of them probably are, sure, but most of them are just people who have always disliked some aspect of the Control gameplay style. Some people enjoy quicker games, so they will naturally dislike when games last longer; some people dislike when all of their cards seem to be answered without the opponent then pushing an advantage; some people just prefer minion trading to a more defensive game.
Now, to be clear, I'm talking about people complaining specifically about Control decks. You shouldn't conflate that with people who are, for example, complaining about the strength of Warrior right now. You can dislike how strong a meta deck is without necessarily disliking its gameplay, just as you can dislike how a deck plays without it actually being that strong - Shudderwock Shaman, for example, had a sub-50% winrate for I believe the entirety of its reign (apart from maybe right at the start, before people knew the gameplan of the deck), and yet people hated it because of how it played.
The reason it seems like more people hate Control decks now is because the people who hate Control decks now hate some of the strongest decks in the game, so their complaints are more likely to be listened to. Just as they were when they complained about Freeze Mage, or Big Priest, or Renolock, or Cubelock, or Wallet Warrior, or any other lategame-focused deck that was particularly strong at some point.
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Control players were respected back then because resource management was hard and you had some very hard turns. The current iteration of warrior doesn't really have that.
The reason for this is that when strong removal is so overpresent using one is not a particularly hard choice, often an automatic play, and even mistakes get hardly punished. Also fatigue battles have been completely eliminated by the existence of elysiana.
Old odd warrior felt more fair than current control warrior.
I think the real situation is not people hating control decks, but control decks becoming unfun to play against.
Back in the days, hand lock had to take lots of risk tapping, and freeze mage relies on ice block. They had clear weakness than faster decks can look to counter.
However, odd warrior doesn't have a game plan, other than tanking up. Highlander priest also had uninteractive screams and otk potential.
There were times when aggro or midrange decks were getting uninteractive (hi secret paly and pirate warrior), but the problem was just easier to understand.
The saving grace is that blizzard is printing more interactive control cards like defile and mass hysteria. May be the "kill all threats and not lose" game plan will become difficult enough eventually.
because noobs see an aggro deck that has over 56% win rate, they copy it and expect to win every single game, butt when they encounter control deck that eveentually beats them they storm to the forums to cry about it...
I play since beta and enjoy every type of deck especially control ones. they are more fun to play and require some thought - when to use board clears, when to tempo a tech card or value trades
I don’t hate playing against control decks. Control Shaman has been my favorite deck to play since the start of this meta and it’s a deck I enjoy playing against as well. Even the mirror requires interesting decisions and I enjoy playing against it when I’m playing other decks. And there’s plenty of room for customization, improvisation and adaptation in the archetype. It’s an example of a creative control deck where games play out differently every time and the pilot can be punished for mistakes.
But like a lot of other players, I find Control Warrior to be tedious in the current standard meta. The games are always the same, the power level of their core cards makes control easy to play, etc. Everything that’s ostensibly interesting or challenging about control is neutered by the fact that Warrior has access to the perfect tools for any situation. And because of its armor gain and access to removal, it has a higher margin for error than a control deck should.
Need to clear a single minion? Shield Slam, Execute and Omega Devastator have you covered. Yes, the last one is only playable after turn 10, but are you worried about getting to turn 10?
Need to clear a wide board? Warpath has you covered. The Shaman analogue, Lightning Storm, only guarantees 2 damage per minion and has overload.
Need to clear every minion on the board? Brawl has you covered. Yes, there’s a chance the one big scary minion is left over, but then you can drop Omega Devastator, Execute or Shield Slam.
Running out of minions? Don’t worry, Omega Assembly and Delivery Drone have you covered. Bonus points because those minions have rush! Yes, you’re not guaranteed to get the most useful minion, but you’re guaranteed a rush minion if Dr. Boom has been played.
And when you’re floating mana, just armor up! Or better yet, play a Shield Block, draw a card and boost your Shield Slam. 4-mana, draw a card, deal 5 damage to a minion. Sounds good.
For any conceivable board state, Warrior has an efficient answer that requires no thought or creativity. It’s boring. And if your deck isn’t built to withstand its defenses, you’re sinply going to lose. That’s not how HS should work.
This is why we need more reliable OTK decks.
You can say it about any deck.
Seriously, no matter what your play is, warrior has a no-brainer removal for everything you played (and possibly leave a mech or three on their side). That's infuriatingly boring to play against, as you often feel as your resources are limited and you have to think of an optimal play, but no matter what, the warrior will have removal for it.
It's not rng if you call - Amaz
It is just really unfun to play against certain types of control decks biggest offender that comes to my mind is Odd Warrior. I hate playing against that deck.
Odd Warrior was a deck that could simply get away with hero power and pass for the majority of the game. When playing any board centric or limited burn combo deck it felt like an autoloss. And the worst part is, playing a deck that beats it, doesnt feel satisfying because the Odd warrior is just sitting there letting themselves get OTKed it loses because it was such a stupidly polarising deck.
I personally dislike playing against decks that just have so much removal they can just throw them away that easy. Added frustration when they claim the deck is skillful while all they do is armour up, heal and removal on curve. They dont play to win, they play not to lose. Again like Odd Warrior, it was just removal and tank up.
In this meta that is less so the case but still an issue, mainly because Warrior got a lot of strong control cards in a class that already has strong control tools in the basic and classic set. I think the current Control Warrior is not so extreme as odd warrior, but it has an obscene amount of removal, it just has less ways to gain armour. I actually like bomb warrior a lot more to play against even in a control shell. Yes the bombs hurt, yes it rng dependent. But it feels like you are playing against an opponent that actually tries to do something. Control (or big) Shaman is less of an issue, as it doesnt have so much removal.
As for playing control myself. Archivist Eleysiana is the sole reason why I dont want to. I dont feel like doing 40 minute matches that boil down to did I get the right cards or did we hit the turn timer because we had to bounce it 2 times.
I second the general impression that Control is ok to play with or against.
It's just SOME Control decks that are supported with such obvious and strong tools that they become obnoxious to encounter, even if their wr is ok or even subpar.
because my enjoyment is more important than yours.
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People, do you realize that control warrior has so many counters right now? There are other decks which are more problematic.
Yes, that is why I picked it is unfun to play against, not difficult.
I don't really "hate" control decks, but I oftentimes dislike playing against them. Actually, most control decks these days (the few there are) are relatively fair and I don't mind them too much, honestly. Warrior has a bit too much randomness going on and a few too many removal options, but I don't really hate the deck. Just after the last 2 years... yeah, I still don't like seeing them.
After KFT, and definitely after Kobolds, there have been soooo many games where my opponents did nothing but clearing the board, killing minions, stalling and drawing cards until the combo/the hero card arrived to seal the deal. Big Spell Mage, Razakus Priest, Odd Warrior, Control Warlock, Control Priest, Shudderwock... I really got sick of this playstyle. Some had 6-8 board clearing effects, on top of multiple cards to take out threats. Hearthstone is just boring to me when I play against a deck mostly made out of spells that either gain armor, draw cards or kill things, and minions that kill even more things. Not to mention that the game gets a bit tiring when each match lasts more than 10 minutes.
It's not the same as older Control decks. They had two, maybe four board clears in their deck, along with maybe four cards to take out threats, and situational tech cards like BGH or MCT. Aside from that, they had to play minions and find a way to turn the game around. There was an actual back and forth. Also, there was a lot less if any card generation in the past, and the value game was mostly limited to the 30 cards you started with. That drastically changed over the years too.
Again, in all honesty, it's not as painful anymore as it used to be, but I still prefer to play against decks that try to be a bit more proactive, because I have had WAY too many games where my opponent was essentially playing solitaire.
I myself rarely play Control decks, because these decks oftentimes require 5 and more legendaries, several epics, and most of the cards are essential and hard to replace, so the deck cost is oftentimes around 10k and higher. Unless I happen to have most/all the cards for a decent control-oriented deck, I'm not gonna spend 5000 and more just to play one single deck.
When I do play them, I can enjoy them and I definitely see the appeal. But I think control-oriented decks shouldn't be too grindy, just as aggressive decks shouldn't be too fast.