I have to start by disclaiming that I am not a pro player by any means, and I have little to no interest in Wild. I have simply played this game for the last 3.5 years and have made it to legend. I frequently land on rank 5 or better every month and have gotten into a consistent grind of just camping rank 2-5 every month depending on how much fun I am having. I never just sit in rank and try to climb anymore, more on this later. I have my tag linked in my profile, and if you ever have questions, want to trade ideas, or are just looking for another HS friend I am totally there to have some fun, learn, and even coach casually.
This should be a post every new player visits. I see plenty of threads around expansions, rotation/HoF, and nerf seasons that lead me to believe there is no source on what to do and when with your collection/dust (at least currently and up to date). I want to start from the beginning and work downward.
The Collection:
In a Standard rotation you have the basic set, classic set, Year 1 (rotating), and Year 2 (staying). Basic is unlocked through class milestones, and classic is unlocked in general gameplay through packs, quests, bundles, and in-game currency: gold. My first piece of advice is play the game enough with basic cards to get a general feel of which class you enjoy. Maybe a hero power, art, design, class tribes and cards, or something else reaches out to you to really show you how fun Hearthstone is. From there the collection only grows, but we will continue to review. The cards are common, rare, epic, and legendary with costs: 40, 100, 400, and 1600 prospectively.
Standard Rotation:
I mentioned that two "years" are in every Standard. In these years, there have been 3 expansions that release every April, August, and December on average. The first year, currently the Year of the Raven containing: Witchwood, Boomsday, and Rumble released in Spring of 2018 through Winter 2018 and is playable until roughly spring of 2020. At that point those cards will join Wild and NOT be playable in Standard. Year 2 is currently the Year of the Dragon: Rise of Shadows, Saviors of Uldum, and an unknown expac. These cards are playable until the rotation of Spring 2021. Each year, the "Year 1" expansions will rotate out and the "Year 2" expansions become the "oldest" in Standard. For instance in Spring of 2020 a new year will rotate and the "Year 1" (Raven) cards will rotate to wild. "Year 2" (Dragon) will become the new "Year 1" and another will take its place. There are always 6 expansions alongside classic and basic in a Standard Rotation.
What This Means Immediately for Crafting:
In Standard, this means your safest crafts go in this order for longevity: Classic > Year 2 > Year 1. If you craft cards from the Year of the Raven now, for instance, they will only be playable for roughly 8 more months in Standard. If you are on a budget and prefer to stay in standard with the new cards that is a hard investment to make. Otherwise, Classic cards will be played (mostly) forever, and Year 2 cards will be playable for at least another 16 months (fall release 2019- Spring release 2021). Your dust is best spent on cards that will be in Standard as long as possible.
Hall of Fame and Nerf Patches:
Each new year (with a few exceptions) a Hall of Fame rotation takes some of the cards from Classic and moves them to the wild format. This is based, according to the developers, as a function to remove overpowered cards that block their design of new cards in expansions, create less systematic deck building, and overall freshen up the game and classes playstyles. Hall of Fame will generally effect a few classic cards, both class specific and neutral, and you will be rewarded full dust refunds AND keep the card in your collection. This allows for a DOUBLE DUST reward if done currectly (other posts always come up to discuss this). Nerfs on the other hand happen in the weeks following each expansion and generally happen just once an expansion. When a card is nerfed, the card will be dustable for the FULL COST of the card. This is a good time to decide if you need that card in your collection, or if you want to take advantage of the extra dust for getting rid of it.
Free Cards, Dust Opportunities, and Wild Format:
Each expansion there is usually an opportunity to get a free legendary at log in. If this applies to an expansion that opportunity is live for a limited time after release. Otherwise, a legendary may be gifted in solo-content or another promotional format of the developers choosing. See every release for their promotional legendary cards.
Now for Wild format... As I don't enjoy/play wild too often I will suggest that you dust all the "Year 1" cards you dislike or don't use as they rotate to wild at the first release of each year in April. This is a great way to build dust to play the new year that will come out, BUT WITH CAUTION. DUSTING CARDS OUTSIDE OF HoF and NERF SEASONS WILL ONLY NET 1/4TH OR LESS OF THE COST. DUSTING IS RELATIVELY INEFFICIENT TOWARDS PLAYING CARDS YOU WISH TO PLAY, AND IS ONLY RECOMMENDED WHEN YOU ARE DESPERATE FOR DUST AND KNOW YOU WILL NOT ENJOY OR WANT THE CARD(S) YOU ARE GETTING RID OF. In the case of Wild, for me, this is next to no loss. You as a player will have to decide if you love the cards from a set enough to keep them alive in Wild.
When to Craft the Meta:
Considering all the previous information, playing ranked and climbing for better rewards each month is the goal of many players both veteran and novice. Your ranked rewards CAP at Rank 5. If you make it to Legend rank you will earn the Legend Card back and get the ranked rewards a Ranked 5 player also receives. Outside of your first trip to Legend, there is no additional benefit to make it passed rank 5 every month from a reward perspective. With this in mind, the meta is something all players try to unravel as fast as possible each expansion. You will see decks online, in forums, and in game with frequency very soon to the start of the first day of an expansion. If it is your goal to be competitive, utilizing a strong deck in a class you enjoy is likely your goal. However, a word of advice is to wait for nerfs to craft expensive cards: epics and legendaries, and make budget decks with new cards in the meantime. After the nerfs go live, and even when they are announced, key decks that performed well will continue to be strong and now you know they are untouched. For the life of that expansion at the least, they will be powerful.
Final Considerations:
If I don't buy an expansion's pre-order bundle I save my gold for as long as possible, and then on release of the expansion buy packs with 100% of my gold. I then continue to buy packs for that expansion with gold from quests and play during the following days/weeks of the expansion until I open another Legendary. At that point I stop and then hoard my gold until the next expansion and repeat.
Once again, I do not value Wild. For those who love that format I am sorry to disappoint you and turn new players away from it. From a cost perspective, it is generally not worth it for new players. Meta to meta wild does stay relatively consistent, so a decent deck you build will still likely be usable in the next meta. However, the cost of decks in wild generally outweigh the cost of decks in standard. This is a value decision each player will have to make, but I highly encourage dusting the whole sets that rotate. I have done this for 2 years now and have dust in the bank and love my ability to play virtually whatever I want in Standard.
My dust priorities go to: Decks I really want to try in classes I love, legendaries that will be "must-crafts" for the sets (think Zephrys and Siamat for this expansion), rares used in multiple instances, commons used in multiple instances, epics, then legendaries.
Collecting all of Classic is generally a good goal to have. Most of the cards will eventually or currently be used in strong decks across a variety of decks. Epics from the Classic set are EXTREMELY valuable, so don't dust them if you can avoid.
AS OF A PATCH FROM 2017 YOU CANNOT OPEN DUPLICATE LEGENDARIES. ABSOLUTELY DO NOT DUST A LEGENDARY CARD UNLESS IT ROTATES AND YOU DON'T WANT IT, OR YOU ARE DESPERATE FOR THE DUST. THERE IS A CHANCE YOU WILL OPEN THE SAME LEGENDARY YOU DON'T WANT AGAIN AND YOU WILL FEEL BAD.
I would like to add that if you want to maximize your dust, you never ever want click "Disenchant Extra Cards" button because cards that dust refund from nerfed cards include extra copies. If you really want dust to craft some deck i recommend checking if that card is played in meta. If not (and if it is from Year 1 expansion, basically you don't want to disenchant any card from Year 2) feel free to dust it. - Credited to SkullFirst
GL;HF and add me if you want to discuss further :)
I would like to add that if you want to maximize your dust, you never ever want click "Disenchant Extra Cards" button because cards that dust refund from nerfed cards include extra copies. If you really want dust to craft some deck i recommend checking if that card is played in meta. If not (and if it is from Year 1 expansion, basically you don't want to disenchant any card from Year 2) feel free to dust it.
I have to start by disclaiming that I am not a pro player by any means, and I have little to no interest in Wild. I have simply played this game for the last 3.5 years and have made it to legend. I frequently land on rank 5 or better every month and have gotten into a consistent grind of just camping rank 2-5 every month depending on how much fun I am having. I never just sit in rank and try to climb anymore, more on this later. I have my tag linked in my profile, and if you ever have questions, want to trade ideas, or are just looking for another HS friend I am totally there to have some fun, learn, and even coach casually.
This should be a post every new player visits. I see plenty of threads around expansions, rotation/HoF, and nerf seasons that lead me to believe there is no source on what to do and when with your collection/dust (at least currently and up to date). I want to start from the beginning and work downward.
The Collection:
In a Standard rotation you have the basic set, classic set, Year 1 (rotating), and Year 2 (staying). Basic is unlocked through class milestones, and classic is unlocked in general gameplay through packs, quests, bundles, and in-game currency: gold. My first piece of advice is play the game enough with basic cards to get a general feel of which class you enjoy. Maybe a hero power, art, design, class tribes and cards, or something else reaches out to you to really show you how fun Hearthstone is. From there the collection only grows, but we will continue to review. The cards are common, rare, epic, and legendary with costs: 40, 100, 400, and 1600 prospectively.
Standard Rotation:
I mentioned that two "years" are in every Standard. In these years, there have been 3 expansions that release every April, August, and December on average. The first year, currently the Year of the Raven containing: Witchwood, Boomsday, and Rumble released in Spring of 2018 through Winter 2018 and is playable until roughly spring of 2020. At that point those cards will join Wild and NOT be playable in Standard. Year 2 is currently the Year of the Dragon: Rise of Shadows, Saviors of Uldum, and an unknown expac. These cards are playable until the rotation of Spring 2021. Each year, the "Year 1" expansions will rotate out and the "Year 2" expansions become the "oldest" in Standard. For instance in Spring of 2020 a new year will rotate and the "Year 1" (Raven) cards will rotate to wild. "Year 2" (Dragon) will become the new "Year 1" and another will take its place. There are always 6 expansions alongside classic and basic in a Standard Rotation.
What This Means Immediately for Crafting:
In Standard, this means your safest crafts go in this order for longevity: Classic > Year 2 > Year 1. If you craft cards from the Year of the Raven now, for instance, they will only be playable for roughly 8 more months in Standard. If you are on a budget and prefer to stay in standard with the new cards that is a hard investment to make. Otherwise, Classic cards will be played (mostly) forever, and Year 2 cards will be playable for at least another 16 months (fall release 2019- Spring release 2021). Your dust is best spent on cards that will be in Standard as long as possible.
Hall of Fame and Nerf Patches:
Each new year (with a few exceptions) a Hall of Fame rotation takes some of the cards from Classic and moves them to the wild format. This is based, according to the developers, as a function to remove overpowered cards that block their design of new cards in expansions, create less systematic deck building, and overall freshen up the game and classes playstyles. Hall of Fame will generally effect a few classic cards, both class specific and neutral, and you will be rewarded full dust refunds AND keep the card in your collection. This allows for a DOUBLE DUST reward if done currectly (other posts always come up to discuss this). Nerfs on the other hand happen in the weeks following each expansion and generally happen just once an expansion. When a card is nerfed, the card will be dustable for the FULL COST of the card. This is a good time to decide if you need that card in your collection, or if you want to take advantage of the extra dust for getting rid of it.
Free Cards, Dust Opportunities, and Wild Format:
Each expansion there is usually an opportunity to get a free legendary at log in. If this applies to an expansion that opportunity is live for a limited time after release. Otherwise, a legendary may be gifted in solo-content or another promotional format of the developers choosing. See every release for their promotional legendary cards.
Now for Wild format... As I don't enjoy/play wild too often I will suggest that you dust all the "Year 1" cards you dislike or don't use as they rotate to wild at the first release of each year in April. This is a great way to build dust to play the new year that will come out, BUT WITH CAUTION. DUSTING CARDS OUTSIDE OF HoF and NERF SEASONS WILL ONLY NET 1/4TH OR LESS OF THE COST. DUSTING IS RELATIVELY INEFFICIENT TOWARDS PLAYING CARDS YOU WISH TO PLAY, AND IS ONLY RECOMMENDED WHEN YOU ARE DESPERATE FOR DUST AND KNOW YOU WILL NOT ENJOY OR WANT THE CARD(S) YOU ARE GETTING RID OF. In the case of Wild, for me, this is next to no loss. You as a player will have to decide if you love the cards from a set enough to keep them alive in Wild.
When to Craft the Meta:
Considering all the previous information, playing ranked and climbing for better rewards each month is the goal of many players both veteran and novice. Your ranked rewards CAP at Rank 5. If you make it to Legend rank you will earn the Legend Card back and get the ranked rewards a Ranked 5 player also receives. Outside of your first trip to Legend, there is no additional benefit to make it passed rank 5 every month from a reward perspective. With this in mind, the meta is something all players try to unravel as fast as possible each expansion. You will see decks online, in forums, and in game with frequency very soon to the start of the first day of an expansion. If it is your goal to be competitive, utilizing a strong deck in a class you enjoy is likely your goal. However, a word of advice is to wait for nerfs to craft expensive cards: epics and legendaries, and make budget decks with new cards in the meantime. After the nerfs go live, and even when they are announced, key decks that performed well will continue to be strong and now you know they are untouched. For the life of that expansion at the least, they will be powerful.
Final Considerations:
If I don't buy an expansion's pre-order bundle I save my gold for as long as possible, and then on release of the expansion buy packs with 100% of my gold. I then continue to buy packs for that expansion with gold from quests and play during the following days/weeks of the expansion until I open another Legendary. At that point I stop and then hoard my gold until the next expansion and repeat.
Once again, I do not value Wild. For those who love that format I am sorry to disappoint you and turn new players away from it. From a cost perspective, it is generally not worth it for new players. Meta to meta wild does stay relatively consistent, so a decent deck you build will still likely be usable in the next meta. However, the cost of decks in wild generally outweigh the cost of decks in standard. This is a value decision each player will have to make, but I highly encourage dusting the whole sets that rotate. I have done this for 2 years now and have dust in the bank and love my ability to play virtually whatever I want in Standard.
My dust priorities go to: Decks I really want to try in classes I love, legendaries that will be "must-crafts" for the sets (think Zephrys and Siamat for this expansion), rares used in multiple instances, commons used in multiple instances, epics, then legendaries.
Collecting all of Classic is generally a good goal to have. Most of the cards will eventually or currently be used in strong decks across a variety of decks. Epics from the Classic set are EXTREMELY valuable, so don't dust them if you can avoid.
AS OF A PATCH FROM 2017 YOU CANNOT OPEN DUPLICATE LEGENDARIES. ABSOLUTELY DO NOT DUST A LEGENDARY CARD UNLESS IT ROTATES AND YOU DON'T WANT IT, OR YOU ARE DESPERATE FOR THE DUST. THERE IS A CHANCE YOU WILL OPEN THE SAME LEGENDARY YOU DON'T WANT AGAIN AND YOU WILL FEEL BAD.
I would like to add that if you want to maximize your dust, you never ever want click "Disenchant Extra Cards" button because cards that dust refund from nerfed cards include extra copies. If you really want dust to craft some deck i recommend checking if that card is played in meta. If not (and if it is from Year 1 expansion, basically you don't want to disenchant any card from Year 2) feel free to dust it. - Credited to SkullFirst
GL;HF and add me if you want to discuss further :)
I would like to add that if you want to maximize your dust, you never ever want click "Disenchant Extra Cards" button because cards that dust refund from nerfed cards include extra copies. If you really want dust to craft some deck i recommend checking if that card is played in meta. If not (and if it is from Year 1 expansion, basically you don't want to disenchant any card from Year 2) feel free to dust it.
@ SkullFirst excellent point it will be added to the bottom considerations! Thank you.