People have to understand that blizzard is a company though. They employ a lot of people and they need to make money. They probably started doing that and making epics and legendaries more powerful as the expacs went on solely to make money. If anyone remembers back in the day, it was actually a meme how bad most legendaries and epics were. In the classic set, only a couple still see play, and it's loaded with worthless cards like Cho, Millhouse, and The Beast. It's no coincedence that they upped the power level of legendaries over the years. People are way too harsh on blizz for wanting to make money though. Remember the days when it cost 50$ (in 1990s money) to buy an N64 game? Games have way higher quality now, and are a lot cheaper. Look at games like Subnautica. That game cost 19.99$ and it would've been the greatest and most played game ever if it came out in 1999. The video game industry is struggling now because of things like piracy, and companies need to make money.
Sorry, but that is huge BS. To get full expansion you need to spend $450-500 on packs (135 virtual cards!). That is the equivalent of a new PS4 Pro! To get 4 full expansions per year, you have to spend $1800-2000. A normal game, with a budget usually exceeding $300 million, costs $60. Poor Blizzard indeed...
There are only THREE expansions per year. Learn to count before you whine.
Sure, my bad and that completely changes the perspective! Instead of $1800-2000 you have to spend "only" $1350-1500. So it turns out that everything is fine, Blizzard is great and there is basically no problem, right? Why would you pay $60 for, I don't know, game like Cyberpunk 2077 or God of War, if you can have 135 virtual cards (half of which are rubbish) for $500? Only moron would do that!
Ahahah yes. And the worst morons will also buy the new single player contents. Like now with this prices/cost of decks, the purchases in Hearthstone are really becoming a thing for morons.
People have to understand that blizzard is a company though. They employ a lot of people and they need to make money. They probably started doing that and making epics and legendaries more powerful as the expacs went on solely to make money. If anyone remembers back in the day, it was actually a meme how bad most legendaries and epics were. In the classic set, only a couple still see play, and it's loaded with worthless cards like Cho, Millhouse, and The Beast. It's no coincedence that they upped the power level of legendaries over the years. People are way too harsh on blizz for wanting to make money though. Remember the days when it cost 50$ (in 1990s money) to buy an N64 game? Games have way higher quality now, and are a lot cheaper. Look at games like Subnautica. That game cost 19.99$ and it would've been the greatest and most played game ever if it came out in 1999. The video game industry is struggling now because of things like piracy, and companies need to make money.
Sorry, but that is huge BS. To get full expansion you need to spend $450-500 on packs (135 virtual cards!). That is the equivalent of a new PS4 Pro! To get 4 full expansions per year, you have to spend $1800-2000. A normal game, with a budget usually exceeding $300 million, costs $60. Poor Blizzard indeed...
There are only THREE expansions per year. Learn to count before you whine.
Sure, my bad and that completely changes the perspective! Instead of $1800-2000 you have to spend "only" $1350-1500. So it turns out that everything is fine, Blizzard is great and there is basically no problem, right? Why would you pay $60 for, I don't know, game like Cyberpunk 2077 or God of War, if you can have 135 virtual cards (half of which are rubbish) for $500? Only moron would do that!
Since you can't count, it seems likely that your basic arithmetic is suspect too. I spend far less than $1350 per year, and I have every card in both Standard and Wild.
You should probably avoid using the "M" word. People in glass houses ... you know.
Been playing f2p since before Nax was out and never had a problem having fun with hearthstone.
For the first few years I would put all my resources in to just a few decks that I wanted to play and got by and had fun.
I play about 2-3 nights a week now, play one arena and a bunch of ranked games on those nights and still end up with 3000+ gold every expension.
I dust any extra card that isn't golden and have a good 8k dust come expansion.
The beginning isn't great if you want to play all your favourite decks but for me those were some of the best times when every craft mattered and had something to look forward to. Just don't spend your gold on packs. Arena runs are your mid-expansion packs ALWAYS
EDIT - "I dust any extra card that isn't golden and have a good 8k dust come expansion." - I should mention I dont use all my dust come expansion. Just create 1-2 good decks with the cards I open
Since you can't count, it seems likely that your basic arithmetic is suspect too. I spend far less than $1350 per year, and I have every card in both Standard and Wild.
You should probably avoid using the "M" word. People in glass houses ... you know.
So I ask you kindly to share following informations with us: 1. How much real money do you spend each year on the Hearthstone? 2. How many packs do you buy for gold each expansion? 3. How much dust do you spend on creating missing cards each expansion (how many cards do you usually lack up to 135)?
Since you can't count, it seems likely that your basic arithmetic is suspect too. I spend far less than $1350 per year, and I have every card in both Standard and Wild.
You should probably avoid using the "M" word. People in glass houses ... you know.
So I ask you kindly to share following informations with us: 1. How much real money do you spend each year on the Hearthstone? 2. How many packs do you buy for gold each expansion? 3. How much dust do you spend on creating missing cards each expansion (how many cards do you usually lack up to 135)?
I also recommend you an interesting video:
1. About $500
2. About 50 when the expansion first hits, and about 120 more during the expansion.
3. About 3200 (two legendaries) dust. I never craft the common or rare cards, and try as hard as possible to craft epics. I don't have to have the entire set on day 1. I will get there by the end of the expansion.
Sorry, but that is huge BS. To get full expansion you need to spend $450-500 on packs (135 virtual cards!). That is the equivalent of a new PS4 Pro! To get 4 full expansions per year, you have to spend $1800-2000. A normal game, with a budget usually exceeding $300 million, costs $60. Poor Blizzard indeed...
There are only THREE expansions per year. Learn to count before you whine.
Sure, my bad and that completely changes the perspective! Instead of $1800-2000 you have to spend "only" $1350-1500. So it turns out that everything is fine, Blizzard is great and there is basically no problem, right? Why would you pay $60 for, I don't know, game like Cyberpunk 2077 or God of War, if you can have 135 virtual cards (half of which are rubbish) for $500? Only moron would do that!
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
First, you're assuming zero gold, which is never the case with any player, ever.
Also, as others have pointed out, you do not need a full collection.
But if you do insist on having a full collection, it actually costs right around $200 per expansion, assuming a reasonable stash of dust and gold, plus taking advantage of promotional bundles. Sometimes you have to wait a bit for post-release promos, but my point is that even a completionist does not need to spend more than $600 per year on this game.
P.S. The guy in that video suffered some extremely improbable bad luck and took his own misfortune as normal. He also doesn't talk about how he used his dust reserves. Dust is an important factor in this equation, and you don't get to talk about the cost of the game without addressing it.
Like there is no need to grind beyond rank 5 unless you are a try-hard "pro".
Or you are someone who plays Hearthstone because you enjoy playing Hearthstone and not because you want to earn free content.
Bro seriously learn the difference between "grind" and "playing for fun". Once you hit the rank 5 floor there is not need to "netdeck" and break an arm just to hit legend unless you are working for that goal and "e-sports pro" or whatever, otherwise I am saying you can play for FUN, got it now?
I don’t consider playing 5-legend a grind. I find it fun. I don’t consider going for top 100 a grind. I find it fun. I don’t want to become a pro player, I just enjoy playing good Hearthstone. It is a hobby of mine. It is fun.
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
And no, that guy isn't "just unlucky", because things for many of us looks exactly the same (me included). By the way, I don't know how you can defend a system that humiliates you and treats you like a moron. Is this a Stockholm Syndrome? Blizzard certainly loves you!
So you spend $170 and 18000 gold (180 packs) each expansion! Good for you, I have no problem with that, but remember that some of us also have a normal life outside of Hearthstone and can't spend 6-8 hours a day on it (I don't know how else you can get so much gold in about 4 months).
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
And no, that guy isn't "just unlucky", because things for many of us looks exactly the same (me included). By the way, I don't know how you can defend a system that humiliates you and treats you like a moron. Is this a Stockholm Syndrome? Blizzard certainly loves you!
So you spend $170 and 18000 gold (180 packs) each expansion! Good for you, I have no problem with that, but remember that some of us also have a normal life outside of Hearthstone and can't spend 6-8 hours a day on it (I don't know how else you can get so much gold in about 4 months).
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
And no, that guy isn't "just unlucky", because things for many of us looks exactly the same (me included). By the way, I don't know how you can defend a system that humiliates you and treats you like a moron. Is this a Stockholm Syndrome? Blizzard certainly loves you!
So you spend $170 and 18000 gold (180 packs) each expansion! Good for you, I have no problem with that, but remember that some of us also have a normal life outside of Hearthstone and can't spend 6-8 hours a day on it (I don't know how else you can get so much gold in about 4 months).
Well, who want a "normal life" don't should be so obsessed to "complete each expansion"... wtf do you need this? Ask how many players have complete each expansion. Probably 0,01%. So for 99,99% your question don't make sense.
People have to understand that blizzard is a company though. They employ a lot of people and they need to make money. They probably started doing that and making epics and legendaries more powerful as the expacs went on solely to make money. If anyone remembers back in the day, it was actually a meme how bad most legendaries and epics were. In the classic set, only a couple still see play, and it's loaded with worthless cards like Cho, Millhouse, and The Beast. It's no coincedence that they upped the power level of legendaries over the years. People are way too harsh on blizz for wanting to make money though. Remember the days when it cost 50$ (in 1990s money) to buy an N64 game? Games have way higher quality now, and are a lot cheaper. Look at games like Subnautica. That game cost 19.99$ and it would've been the greatest and most played game ever if it came out in 1999. The video game industry is struggling now because of things like piracy, and companies need to make money.
Sorry, but that is huge BS. To get full expansion you need to spend $450-500 on packs (135 virtual cards!). That is the equivalent of a new PS4 Pro! To get 4 full expansions per year, you have to spend $1800-2000. A normal game, with a budget usually exceeding $300 million, costs $60. Poor Blizzard indeed...
Oh, you need every card in your collection? Is that needed to play competitively? Realistically you’ll need maybe a quarter of the expansion to play in high end ladder with every deck if you keep up on every expansion.
Personal experience is I spend 60-100$ every year on HS. I think this is more than fair considering the time I enjoy playing it. I normally steer clear of meta decks as I really enjoy playing weird home brews but I could probably craft up anything I needed for those decks in a few weeks after the expansion drops. I hit the new expansions with 4-6k gold and 3-5k dust.
If you do your dailies and sensibly dust at appropriate times you can easily make any deck you want.
You don't understand my point. I am not saying that every player needs the entire collection of every expansion, but:
The system is based on greedy and random lootboxes, which do not allow you to affect the content of the packs in any way. This means that you have absolutely no control over when you accumulate all the cards you want and need. Sometimes 300 packs are enough, and sometimes 500 is still not even close to your goal.
Rainbow Six Siege is a high-budget AAA game for which you have to pay $60 to get access to ALL the basic content. Additional content is issued every year and you can buy it separately or purchase a $30 annual season pass to access ALL the content from that year (you get everything without additional effort or grind!). Now please compare it to Hearthstone, which costs about 50 times more...
And why is that? Because morons without self-respect will buy anything from Blizzard, for any price...
You don't understand my point. I am not saying that every player needs the entire collection of every expansion, but:
The system is based on greedy and random lootboxes, which do not allow you to affect the contents of the packs in any way. This means that you have absolutely no control over when you accumulate all the cards you want and need. Sometimes 300 packs are enough, and sometimes 500 is still not even close to your goal.
Rainbow Six Siege is a high-budget AAA game for which you have to pay $60 to get access to ALL the basic content. Additional content is issued every year and you can buy it separately or purchase a $30 annual season pass to access ALL the content from that year (you get everything without additional effort or grind!). Now please compare it to Hearthstone, which costs about 50 times more...
Andy why is that? Because morons without self-respect will buy anything from Blizzard, for any price...
This is the crux of the issue. Modern Hearthstone has found the sweet spot of overcharging while its base of whales are not deterred by the cost of the game. It's a shady business practice, but the entire mobile game industry is built on this tactic. I heartily laugh when these misguided fools defend such practices, there really is no cure for ignorance in most people. You can show someone a fact right infront of their eyes, people will just shift their vision and divert the discussion away from how hard the average Hearthstone player is getting screwed over.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
If you thought you knew what you think I know, then you'd know I knew you knew I know.
There IS something wrong with the economy. With one extra full expansion, there are 135 extra cards, around 23-24 extra legendaries, around the same number of epics, I guess? That's double from what adventures used to add, I think?
So decks become more powerful thanks to the extra power added in those extra legendaries and epics.
No duplicates, a legendary on first 10 packs and adding 10 extra gold on quests sadly (and obviously) will barely cover a fraction of the extra full set added.
Add to that the uncertainty of Team 5, now intend on being more active on balancing, nerfing cards and destroying whole decks - and only returning the investment on one, two cards (worse if they are common/rare) and things escalate quickly.
If pity timers were reduced and dust costs adjusted (like a legendary costing 1200 and an epic 300), maybe it would get better.
Even more sad is that there were some concerns raised about it when they announced they would release a full extra exp, but apparently nobody cared enough. Now that we are almost reaching a full circle with 6 full exp, people are seeing how ridiculously expensive decks have become.
And we are not even talking about competitive decks, but just stuff to have fun and meme around, which should be the bread and butter of the game. I had Fel Lord Bertrug, went to check if there was something going on with Plot Twist Lock, and lo and behold, over 10k dust for like a tier 6 deck on competitive rankings (if that).
What do you mean it doesn't feel good to spend 50 bucks? Keep spending, when you keep netdecking enough, you'll eventually get out of double digit ranks.
You don't understand my point. I am not saying that every player needs the entire collection of every expansion, but:
The system is based on greedy and random lootboxes, which do not allow you to affect the content of the packs in any way. This means that you have absolutely no control over when you accumulate all the cards you want and need. Sometimes 300 packs are enough, and sometimes 500 is still not even close to your goal.
Rainbow Six Siege is a high-budget AAA game for which you have to pay $60 to get access to ALL the basic content. Additional content is issued every year and you can buy it separately or purchase a $30 annual season pass to access ALL the content from that year (you get everything without additional effort or grind!). Now please compare it to Hearthstone, which costs about 50 times more...
And why is that? Because morons without self-respect will buy anything from Blizzard, for any price...
I understand and respect. Just disagree. I played MTG for more than ten years and I know who have spend $100.000 in the game, Money is not a problem to him, but the other players that I know have spend between $100/$1.000.
Card games usually are expensive games, since the most players want have your own deck, own collection... Anyway, is possible to chose another more cheapest card games or with less RNG (another example of one usual complain). I played a little of MTG Arena and is much more easier to get cards. So, I think that expensive cost work to avoid that 99% have difficult to get all cards that they want and keep the interest in the game. If you get all cards in a way much easier, probably you don't will care about this.
This thread has boiled down to what I was afraid of. Badly written, poorly thought-out and misinformed OP means any chance of decent conversations goes out the window. Whenever threads discuss money/cost issues, it comes down to small children bickering about whether or not Hearthstone is expensive.
I believe it's OP's desire to hear the dust-system is bad, but I believe it's not. As with all games that run a big amount of collection-based aspects, it takes either money or time to actually 'collect'. If someone is F2P, then that's fine, but you cannot expect to have the same collection as people who pay for the game in terms of pre-orders and adventures. Likewise, the paying folks need to realize not everyone has the same financial freedom or time on their hands. Anyone's standard is not everyone else's standard.
But Hearthstone is a product. And a product, you can either buy or not. You can afford it, or you can't. You can see its value, or you can't. But an inability to stand behind one of these three measurements, does not, ever, mean that the producer has to change its own perception of its product's value.
Ahahah yes. And the worst morons will also buy the new single player contents. Like now with this prices/cost of decks, the purchases in Hearthstone are really becoming a thing for morons.
Op does not seem To know what inflaation means.
So many comments before this obvious remark shows up.
I'm saddened.
Since you can't count, it seems likely that your basic arithmetic is suspect too. I spend far less than $1350 per year, and I have every card in both Standard and Wild.
You should probably avoid using the "M" word. People in glass houses ... you know.
You and C_A_W are the worst users in this site.
This is why I'm generally moving to other games. I stopped giving blizz my money, and found a game without the randomized packs part.
Been playing f2p since before Nax was out and never had a problem having fun with hearthstone.
For the first few years I would put all my resources in to just a few decks that I wanted to play and got by and had fun.
I play about 2-3 nights a week now, play one arena and a bunch of ranked games on those nights and still end up with 3000+ gold every expension.
I dust any extra card that isn't golden and have a good 8k dust come expansion.
The beginning isn't great if you want to play all your favourite decks but for me those were some of the best times when every craft mattered and had something to look forward to. Just don't spend your gold on packs. Arena runs are your mid-expansion packs ALWAYS
EDIT - "I dust any extra card that isn't golden and have a good 8k dust come expansion." - I should mention I dont use all my dust come expansion. Just create 1-2 good decks with the cards I open
So I ask you kindly to share following informations with us:
1. How much real money do you spend each year on the Hearthstone?
2. How many packs do you buy for gold each expansion?
3. How much dust do you spend on creating missing cards each expansion (how many cards do you usually lack up to 135)?
I also recommend you an interesting video:
1. About $500
2. About 50 when the expansion first hits, and about 120 more during the expansion.
3. About 3200 (two legendaries) dust. I never craft the common or rare cards, and try as hard as possible to craft epics. I don't have to have the entire set on day 1. I will get there by the end of the expansion.
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
First, you're assuming zero gold, which is never the case with any player, ever.
Also, as others have pointed out, you do not need a full collection.
But if you do insist on having a full collection, it actually costs right around $200 per expansion, assuming a reasonable stash of dust and gold, plus taking advantage of promotional bundles. Sometimes you have to wait a bit for post-release promos, but my point is that even a completionist does not need to spend more than $600 per year on this game.
P.S. The guy in that video suffered some extremely improbable bad luck and took his own misfortune as normal. He also doesn't talk about how he used his dust reserves. Dust is an important factor in this equation, and you don't get to talk about the cost of the game without addressing it.
"Why, you never expected justice from a company, did you? They have neither a soul to lose nor a body to kick." -- Lady Saba Holland
I don’t consider playing 5-legend a grind. I find it fun. I don’t consider going for top 100 a grind. I find it fun. I don’t want to become a pro player, I just enjoy playing good Hearthstone. It is a hobby of mine. It is fun.
@FortyDust
You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
And no, that guy isn't "just unlucky", because things for many of us looks exactly the same (me included). By the way, I don't know how you can defend a system that humiliates you and treats you like a moron. Is this a Stockholm Syndrome? Blizzard certainly loves you!
@TardisGreen
So you spend $170 and 18000 gold (180 packs) each expansion! Good for you, I have no problem with that, but remember that some of us also have a normal life outside of Hearthstone and can't spend 6-8 hours a day on it (I don't know how else you can get so much gold in about 4 months).
Well, who want a "normal life" don't should be so obsessed to "complete each expansion"... wtf do you need this? Ask how many players have complete each expansion. Probably 0,01%. So for 99,99% your question don't make sense.
Oh, you need every card in your collection? Is that needed to play competitively? Realistically you’ll need maybe a quarter of the expansion to play in high end ladder with every deck if you keep up on every expansion.
Personal experience is I spend 60-100$ every year on HS. I think this is more than fair considering the time I enjoy playing it. I normally steer clear of meta decks as I really enjoy playing weird home brews but I could probably craft up anything I needed for those decks in a few weeks after the expansion drops. I hit the new expansions with 4-6k gold and 3-5k dust.
If you do your dailies and sensibly dust at appropriate times you can easily make any deck you want.
@Taarverbrul
You don't understand my point. I am not saying that every player needs the entire collection of every expansion, but:
And why is that? Because morons without self-respect will buy anything from Blizzard, for any price...
This is the crux of the issue. Modern Hearthstone has found the sweet spot of overcharging while its base of whales are not deterred by the cost of the game. It's a shady business practice, but the entire mobile game industry is built on this tactic. I heartily laugh when these misguided fools defend such practices, there really is no cure for ignorance in most people. You can show someone a fact right infront of their eyes, people will just shift their vision and divert the discussion away from how hard the average Hearthstone player is getting screwed over.
If you thought you knew what you think I know, then you'd know I knew you knew I know.
There IS something wrong with the economy. With one extra full expansion, there are 135 extra cards, around 23-24 extra legendaries, around the same number of epics, I guess? That's double from what adventures used to add, I think?
So decks become more powerful thanks to the extra power added in those extra legendaries and epics.
No duplicates, a legendary on first 10 packs and adding 10 extra gold on quests sadly (and obviously) will barely cover a fraction of the extra full set added.
Add to that the uncertainty of Team 5, now intend on being more active on balancing, nerfing cards and destroying whole decks - and only returning the investment on one, two cards (worse if they are common/rare) and things escalate quickly.
If pity timers were reduced and dust costs adjusted (like a legendary costing 1200 and an epic 300), maybe it would get better.
Even more sad is that there were some concerns raised about it when they announced they would release a full extra exp, but apparently nobody cared enough. Now that we are almost reaching a full circle with 6 full exp, people are seeing how ridiculously expensive decks have become.
And we are not even talking about competitive decks, but just stuff to have fun and meme around, which should be the bread and butter of the game. I had Fel Lord Bertrug, went to check if there was something going on with Plot Twist Lock, and lo and behold, over 10k dust for like a tier 6 deck on competitive rankings (if that).
What do you mean it doesn't feel good to spend 50 bucks? Keep spending, when you keep netdecking enough, you'll eventually get out of double digit ranks.
I understand and respect. Just disagree. I played MTG for more than ten years and I know who have spend $100.000 in the game, Money is not a problem to him, but the other players that I know have spend between $100/$1.000.
Card games usually are expensive games, since the most players want have your own deck, own collection... Anyway, is possible to chose another more cheapest card games or with less RNG (another example of one usual complain). I played a little of MTG Arena and is much more easier to get cards. So, I think that expensive cost work to avoid that 99% have difficult to get all cards that they want and keep the interest in the game. If you get all cards in a way much easier, probably you don't will care about this.
This thread has boiled down to what I was afraid of. Badly written, poorly thought-out and misinformed OP means any chance of decent conversations goes out the window. Whenever threads discuss money/cost issues, it comes down to small children bickering about whether or not Hearthstone is expensive.
I believe it's OP's desire to hear the dust-system is bad, but I believe it's not. As with all games that run a big amount of collection-based aspects, it takes either money or time to actually 'collect'. If someone is F2P, then that's fine, but you cannot expect to have the same collection as people who pay for the game in terms of pre-orders and adventures. Likewise, the paying folks need to realize not everyone has the same financial freedom or time on their hands. Anyone's standard is not everyone else's standard.
But Hearthstone is a product. And a product, you can either buy or not. You can afford it, or you can't. You can see its value, or you can't. But an inability to stand behind one of these three measurements, does not, ever, mean that the producer has to change its own perception of its product's value.
Dad, husband, gamer, fueled by coffee.
Currently playing Dragon Galakrond Priest, Dragon Galakrond Warrior and Highlander Dragon Hunter.