Like when you can spawn a board full whatever by turn five and win the game right then and there. Or drop huge minions that were not designed to see play on turn three until team whoever oversighted the support cards that could make it happen. Things like that.
What I’m saying is mana cheating in a game where there is a max of ten is kind of stupid and it should be eliminated in order to save this game from becoming a parody of itself, if it hasn’t already.
Ok, so at the middle of the design space of Hearthstone is the basic concept of tempo.
Tempo can best be defined for our purposes here as "what percentage of the total mana available to you gets used to generate threats or remove opponent's threats". If I don't have a turn one play, that's a tempo loss. If I play a 1/3 which manages to trade into an opponent's 2/1, that's a HUGE and sometimes game defining gain in tempo.
Now, the majority of the design space is taken up by tempo interactions. The types of interactions are diverse and varied, but when you get down to the numbers, most of these things are easily quantifiable. For example, the reborn mechanic and Houndmaster's battle cry are superficially unrelated, but they are EASILY comparable in terms of this semi-arbitrary trait of tempo.
A much smaller area of design revolves around the area of "value", but different professionals and game designers have varying definitions of the term. More on value in a minute.
The trouble is, it is incredibly difficult to keep the game particularly interesting without breaking out of this space. It is incredibly dangerous to try to seriously depart from the tempo framework, but Hearthstone MUST consider new and interesting options in design.
So far, there are three major areas where Blizzard has explored departing from the gospel of tempo.
1. Combos
Combo interactions are not definitionally divorced from the tempo framework, but some of the more popular combos throughout the years do not really fit into the basic models we take for granted in the game. Shudderwock was a recent example where the (sort of) OTK mechanic required a setup with very specific, non tempo-effecting interactions. In other words, this building of the battlecry list to include Saronites, Lifedrinkers, and bounce effects represented a whole new mechanic and did not easily fall into the rubrics of tempo or value. A quick look at Uther of the Ebon Blade shows another unique mechanic which cannot be understood in terms of 2/2 creature value in the least.
Other OTK combo decks such as the old Grim Patron charge interactions were not well understood in the tempo paradigm because there was no "playing the board" going on. Patron in particular was a simple mathematical exercise in generating a life total's worth of damage through particular card interactions.
Note that these decks have been some of the most controversial in the history of the game; lending credence to the notion that whenever we depart from the expected tempo building gameplay, there are those who immediately claim some sort of imbalance is at play. This is simply not de facto true; there is nothing inherently wrong with expanding design space.
2. Infinite Value generation
I'm a big fan of the streamer Zalae, particularly when he interacts with chat on the subject of "value". He has a very simple; very consistent message on the subject: Hearthstone is a tempo game, not a value game.
In terms of a one-sentence summary, this is absolutely correct. If you want to go deeper into it, a more fleshed out way of saying this is that you MUST survive the tempo contest before value will ever become relevant to the game. Take current day Control Warrior. Dr. Boom is a very slow but steady value generator via its "discover a mech" hero power, but that only becomes relevant towards the end of the game after you have spent a lot of time removing opponent's threats and generally shutting down his/her tempo play. Otherwise, you simply don't survive long enough for value generation to become relevant.
So, we come to the realm of infinite value generation. Honestly, 2017 and 2018 were the years in which this issue was in the spotlight. Jade Druid is an arguable inclusion because the ability to generate monstrously large creatures for 1 mana has severe tempo ramifications as well, but this deck was the introduction to the concept of unending value. Shortly thereafter, we got Frost Lich Jaina and Deathstalker Rexxar.
Because Jaina requires manipulating minion health to exactly one, sometimes at a deliberate tempo loss, it is difficult to claim that Jaina is consistently winning the tempo game. Rexxar, on the other hand, is DEFINITIVELY losing tempo because all his zom-beasts are full cost plus the HP activation. Nevertheless, these cards saw play in decks which could win the tempo game in other ways.
In the run up to the 2019 rotation, there was a hellacious amount of criticism towards these two DKs and the concept of infinite value, but what I find amusing about this is that both of those DKs were completely nonexistent in the meta for quite a while after their release. It took a massive nerf to Anduin Priest, a rotation which hurt Cube Lock, and several other meta changes before anyone touched Rexxar, and Big Spell Mage was a niche tournament option until the Witchwood rotation.
It turns out that infinite value is only an issue in a meta where we see quite a bit of control vs control matchups. When two decks are choosing to take the tempo game slow, the one which can run the other out of threats will generally win. That's why Warrior decks were basically nonexistent after the release of KnC; they had no value option that could compete with mage.
It is certainly true that infinite value generation can be an issue, but the remedy for this sort of thing has historically been a healthy meta with aggressive and combo-based options which render the value game moot.
3. Mana "Cheating"
First of all, the use of the term "cheating" is poisoning the well, and I'm not going to continue that practice. I prefer something a little more accurate and descriptive . . . let's call it Abrupt Tempo Acceleration Events (ATAEs). That sounds about right to me.
The issue with comparing ATAEs to infinite value or combo mechanics is that ATAEs are very much relevant to the traditional tempo structure of the game. Traditional understanding says you can't have a creature that costs six UNTIL TURN SIX. Except if you have a coin . . . or an innervate . . . or ramped as a druid . . . or any number of other things. So right off the bat, we can't avoid the conclusion that this is nothing new, and we are only considering a question of degree.
There is no question that hitting a turn 3 Mountain Giant with a Conjurer's Calling is ever so slightly more abrupt than casting Wild Growth and getting your 4-cost minion on turn 3. But Blizzard agreed and nerfed CC as a result, and it is worth noting that Conjurer's Calling has become amazingly rare on the ladder despite its explosive potential. Meanwhile, you see other similar effects which no one seems to want to complain about. Certainly Oasis Surger after completing the Druid quest constitutes some form of ATAE, as does Starfall. But we aren't seeing anywhere near the outcry. Is it because it's simply a lesser degree of the same phenomenon, or do people just like to bitch about the flavor of the month decks?
I can't write with as much familiarity about ATAEs because the issue is ongoing and not as fleshed out as the other two categories presented here. But regardless, I want to reiterate an important point. Be VERY careful when you find yourself advocating for Blizzard to restrict its own creativity. Constructed formats are dull as hell if they are restricted to traditional tempo battles.
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Mogu fleshshaper into mutate/evolve lackey killing your 3/3 and getting a 8/9 drop is pretty obnoxious to me. It's the one combo when playing against Shaman I'm most afraid of even over their double battlecries and mcts.
Ok, so at the middle of the design space of Hearthstone is the basic concept of tempo. ... Constructed formats are dull as hell if they are restricted to traditional tempo battles.
Very nice writeup, and I agree with the sentiment.
I think as you mention, it is a matter of degree. Small tempo boosts (ATAEs) are generally accepted, while the big ones are frowned upon (if they are too easy/consistent).
In general, ATAEs should have a reasonable cost to be "balanced" - e.g. spending cards to generate mana (Innervate) or skipping turns / losing tempo to reduce cost / gain tempo later (Untapped Potential, Warlock Mountain Giant on T4). The problem arises when the cost is too small, or the condition too easy, for the benefit obtained (e.g. Barnes is the first thing that comes to mind, but also Mana Wyrm, Undertaker, or any other similar cards that were indeed in the end nerfed). The common thread in all of these is getting too much out too early, and without any significant downside.
If one double innervates a 4/3 on T1, and it can be answered via a 2-mana card like Frostbolt or Wrath, it is a gamble. It can pay off, but it can also be brutally punished in terms of value IF the opponent has an answer. If such things have no downside, and become safe plays instead (no cost in terms of cards, life, tempo loss...), then we have a problem.
Imho, the concept of tempo gain (at a cost) is a good thing and should certainly be in HS. Without that, we have basically only value trading left, and that would indeed be boring.
Personally, I'd love to see more (competitive) cards that explore additional concepts like other TCGs too, e.g. discard and mana destruction. There are a few (e.g. Gnomeferatu, Dirty Rat, Skulking Geist, Mojomaster Zihi), Blizzard is obviously testing the waters, and I would love them to continue to expand on this with a bit more courage.
Mogu fleshshaper into mutate/evolve lackey killing your 3/3 and getting a 8/9 drop is pretty obnoxious to me. It's the one combo when playing against Shaman I'm most afraid of even over their double battlecries and mcts.
My thoughts aswell!
As soon as they nerf Priest, the next thing that will annoy players will be Mogu Fleshshaper. Why does Blizzard had to make him so strong? The highroll potential with mutate/Lackey ( yes I admit it’s a combo but not that unlikely) is just too damn high.
As Shadowrisen wrote generally we expect to get x-mana minion on the board for x- mana . Generally until turn 6 . With 2card combos this can be achieved a bit sooner ( especially statwise with Priest) , but Mogu by himself is like a 2 mana deal 3 dmg spell and then he becomes a 8 drop, often on turn 4 or something. That’s way too fast for a lot of classes to deal with and will be a problem in the future. I don’t see a reason why Blizzard wants to enforce these highroll kind of playstyle.. sure people whined about long Control Warrior games.. But this doesn’t seem like a healthy solution to me.
This has been Hearthstone for a long time. Basically, any deck that is "fair" will be hopeless in ranked play. Every deck that reaches Tier 1 or 2 has to have some mechanic that lets it do unfair things to be competitive. The game is literally who can pull off their OP plays before the other one can.
The list could go on for days, do you see my point? If all we had are cards like Chillwind Yeti and Fireball, the game would be really boring to play. Thats why we need cards that can break the normal tempo rules, cards that I call interesting cards. Except when I lose to them, thats when they suddenly become mana cheating cards.
I've been playing Jambre's token Shaman deck and you can can ridiculous things... Fleshshapers and Sea Giants on the board by turn 3 or 4. Mutate into something insane early as well. These cards always seem to exist. They're just a part of Hearthstone.
Ok, so at the middle of the design space of Hearthstone is the basic concept of tempo.
Tempo can best be defined for our purposes here as "what percentage of the total mana available to you gets used to generate threats ....
Agreed. However, it's worth highlighting that some interactions are ridiculous and need to be adressed. You've touched on a few for Druid, but Mogu Fleshshaper into Mutate is the biggest culprit. It's stupid.
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Currently playing Dragon Galakrond Priest, Dragon Galakrond Warrior and Highlander Dragon Hunter.
The whole point of the new rotation system was to try and level off the power level/creep in cards, but people complain way too much when news card sets are 'weak', so now we get entire decks revolving around a busted gamplan that orignal hearthstone with its 30hp, 1 mana per turn system can't really cater for and offer fair, tactical and decent gameplay.
Every so often the devs come out and and say something along the lines of "we'd like to pull it in a bit"...like with the deathknights in frozen throne, or after the corridor creeper fiasco.... but they can't bring themsleves to do it, and just print cards that do more or less, the same broken shit all over again.
The list could go on for days, do you see my point? If all we had are cards like Chillwind Yeti and Fireball, the game would be really boring to play. Thats why we need cards that can break the normal tempo rules, cards that I call interesting cards. Except when I lose to them, thats when they suddenly become mana cheating cards.
Those examples are not really accurate in my opinion.
Flame imp, although I can see how this could be considered mana cheating ( a Vanilla 3/2 wouldn’t pass the test for a 2 mana minion i guess), it’s still not that busted as a turn 4 removal + 8 drop.
Murloc Warleader is a bad example for mana cheating. Nobody would consider Bloodlust a 15 mana cheat , just because it can deal worth of 2 Pyroblast of damage (21 to be exactly with 7 minions on the board).To have a board of X- minions is a requirement and those minions could almost be included in the mana cost . You kinda payed X- mana upfront to establish these minions.
I agree with Overload, but the downside has to be calculated in. This way it’s not really a clear ( plus X) mana cheat.
Questing Adventurer. Similar to Warleader you have to build your deck in a specific way to get those stats. It’s kinda a reverse Warleader. With Murlocs you have to stick a lot of them and then with the buff they can finish the opponent. With Adventurer you have to play cheap spells to protect and buff him.
Cairne Bloodhoof is more like a 4/5 with another 4/5 that is sleeping until the first minion dies. That’s quite worse than a regular 4/5.
The list could go on for days, do you see my point? If all we had are cards like Chillwind Yeti and Fireball, the game would be really boring to play. Thats why we need cards that can break the normal tempo rules, cards that I call interesting cards. Except when I lose to them, thats when they suddenly become mana cheating cards.
Those examples are not really accurate in my opinion.
Flame imp, although I can see how this could be considered mana cheating ( a Vanilla 3/2 wouldn’t pass the test for a 2 mana minion i guess), it’s still not that busted as a turn 4 removal + 8 drop.
Murloc Warleader is a bad example for mana cheating. Nobody would consider Bloodlust a 15 mana cheat , just because it can deal worth of 2 Pyroblast of damage (21 to be exactly with 7 minions on the board).To have a board of X- minions is a requirement and those minions could almost be included in the mana cost . You kinda payed X- mana upfront to establish these minions.
I agree with Overload, but the downside has to be calculated in. This way it’s not really a clear ( plus X) mana cheat.
Questing Adventurer. Similar to Warleader you have to build your deck in a specific way to get those stats. It’s kinda a reverse Warleader. With Murlocs you have to stick a lot of them and then with the buff they can finish the opponent. With Adventurer you have to play cheap spells to protect and buff him.
Cairne Bloodhoof is more like a 4/5 with another 4/5 that is sleeping until the first minion dies. That’s quite worse than a regular 4/5.
I think you dont get the point.
All of the examples I gave could be considered as "mana cheating" but they are not since they are not overpowered. As soon as something like this is OP its considered "mana cheating".
Its like Flame Imp vs Kabal Crystal Runner. The latter is considered as a mana cheat because its in a tier 1 wild deck. It requires to build a deck around it, but its so powerful in the right deck that it could be considered as a mana cheat. While Flame Imp doesnt need any deckbuilding around it, its just powerful, but the decks that use it are not that powerful, so its not a mana cheat.
Sometimes, the issue is less about the ATAE and more about the risk vs reward of powerful multi-card interactions.
In our last round of nerfs, we saw Extra Arms nerfed to 3 mana. I'm fairly comfortable stating that this decision was made as a direct result of the cancerous gameplay resulting from a turn 1 Cleric into a turn 2 Extra Arms. A Cleric in the opening hand by itself has been repeatedly judged not powerful enough to warrant a balance change, and presumably everyone would agree that Extra Arms in hand by turn 2 is not particularly scary without a turn one play on the board first. However, even though having both by turn 2 is statistically rare, the power that chance represented was judged game breaking.
It's hard to draw a direct comparison with Mogu/Mutate because there isn't a clear turn X we're talking about, and obviously the later the interaction is played, the less impactful the combo is to the game. Furthermore, you are either going to require more cards to flood your board and lower the cost of Mogu, or you are going to need your opponent to help the mana "cheat" with his own creatures. Either way, you are introducing a third variable which must align to fully power the combo.
You'd also have to take a good look at all the "tech" cards different classes could use to address this combo and see how realistic it is that the deckbuilders out there simply change things up a bit. For example, how many 8 cost minions have attack greater than 6 and how realistic to the meta is it for folks to start adding Big Game Hunter into a bunch of decks. Can warriors spare an Execute slot or two? Shadow Word: Death? Hex? Poly? It is a lazy job to merely look at how decks are being played now, and not consider how easy it would be to address the popularity of this two-card combo with adjustments to other decks.
As a side note on this tangent, I was always shocked how loudly people moaned about Mech Hunter and Mech Paladin in the meta prior to Saviors of Uldum release. The one and only time I hit #1 Legend on NA, I did it with a Control Warrior deck running 2 Spellbreakers and 1 Ironbeak Owl. It was insane in that everyone knew exactly what cards you had to run to beat mech (namely, silence mechanics), but something in the brain just took for granted, "surely you can't run TWO silence effects . . . you'll lose to (insert X deck)" when in fact, half the damn meta was mech and other silence-vulnerable targets.
None of the above should be read as dismissing concerns about the Mutate combo, but I'm extremely unconvinced that interaction is worth its own nerf. Admittedly, Warrior is my next golden hero, and thus I am currently running the deck most capable of brushing an early 8-coster aside, so I may be a bit biased.
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Mana cheating had been a thing for quite some time. What cards are you referring to as the main culprits?
"Quite some time" is quite an understatement. Mana cheating had been a thing since the start of HS: Edwin, Giants, Frothing, old Warsong, Preparation, Innervate, Wild Growth, Nourish,old Mana Wyrm etc. all are classic/basic cards. Almost all top decks in HS history had some sort of mana cheating mechanic. Although the concept is as old as the game, it only became popular buzzword with weekly threads on how bad it is due to Cube decks, especially Taunt Druid and Cube Warlock.
People should stop dreaming of playing yeti on 4, ogre on 6 and golem on 7 gameplay because it never existed.
No Psychopomp is the worst thing to happen to the game. I'm tired of this card highrolling a good res and costing me a game I otherwise would have won. It can fuck right off and so can combo priests.
This has been Hearthstone for a long time. Basically, any deck that is "fair" will be hopeless in ranked play. Every deck that reaches Tier 1 or 2 has to have some mechanic that lets it do unfair things to be competitive. The game is literally who can pull off their OP plays before the other one can.
Not only in HS but in any card game. Even in other competitive games, like fighting games, the best characters have unfair moves or unfair stats/properties.
As mentioned I think small amounts of mana cheating are ok when they come with some kind of requirement or drawback. For example there's a plethora of 5 mana 8/8s in HS's history with a drawback and cards like mountain giant only get particularly cheap when you meet a, typically inconvenient, requirement of some kind.
That's fine imo, the problem lies in cards that give too big a benefit at too low a cost (cost referring more to something other than mana). For example Possessed Lackey and Skull of the Man'ari's only requirements were that you had demons in your deck/ hand and it was pretty easy to both strengthen their effect and mitigate how much you weakened your deck by only playing a few VERY powerful demons in the deck. The pre-nerf conjurer's calling could get 16/16 in stats out for as little as 6 mana depending on how many cards they played/ how much of their draw they found. Pre-nerf Luna's had the drawback of losing your turn 5 but unless you were against a fast aggro deck that's easily survivable for such a massive upside. Wild Growth could put you 1 mana ahead of your opponent for multiple turns for just 2 mana and a card from your hand. Mysterious Challenger could simultaneously get a 6/6 and 5 extra mana of secret value out for 6 mana as well as somewhat negating the negative requirement of having a lot of secrets your deck by thinning the 'bad' cards out for you.
You might notice all of these examples have been nerfed with the exception of 2 because Blizzard also felt they were too strong. The other 2 either had counterplay available already (weapon removal for Skull) or they introduced a hard counter of sorts (Secret Eater for MC which even directly references it in its voice line). In fact the presence and power of Mysterious Challenger, at least imo, contributed significantly to the introduction of standard format in order to make maintaining game balance easier.
That's all well and good but what about "mana cheat" cards that never saw any changes? Well off the top of my head I can think of a few that are in the game that people don't typically feel are an issue currently. I put the requirement/ cost in brackets after each one, I'm sure you can tell what's what.
-0 mana 7/5 divine shield lifesteal rush (play 25 mana's worth of spells first) -7 mana 42/42 in stats (your deck and board must both be empty) -10 mana deathrattle: win (your deck, board, and hand must be empty) -0 mana 7/8 taunt (play 12 mana's worth of spells first) -1 mana draw 2, 2 mana 3/4 rush minion (have a card from a different class in your hand) -10 mana 5/5 battlecry: summon 60 mana's worth of stats (have 6 x 10 mana spells in hand) -2 mana 4/5 (this minion can't attack) -0 mana 3/3 taunt (have a weapon with 3+ attack equipped) -1 mana draw 3 cards (discard those cards at the end of your turn) -3 mana 2/6 taunt (discard your cheapest card or have no other cards in hand) -9 mana 8/8 deal 15 damage (your opponent must have taken no hp damage before playing this) -2 mana draw up to 8 cards (have 8 damaged friendly characters) -2 mana a minion deathrattle: summon a random 8, 9, or 10 drop (have a 7, 8, or 9 drop alive on board) -7 mana 4/4 battlecry: summon any 2 minions in the game (have those 2 minions in play and adjacent on your side of the board already)
These are all effects that exist in the game at that mana cost but the important thing is that the drawbacks and/ or requirements are proportional to the impact they have. A 0 mana 3/3 taunt that typically comes out turn 3 or 4 isn't game breaking so it has a fairly mild requirement of just having a powerful enough weapon equipped (and if you don't do this it's just an extremely sub-par 4 drop). At the opposite end of the spectrum a minion with deathrattle: win needs serious costs and requirements so that's what it has.
My point being that just because a card does more than it should for the mana you pay does not necessarily make it overpowered or gamebreaking. Arguably the deckbuilding side of Hearthstone is all about finding ways to have your cards work together to be more impactful than they normally would be. To broadly say mana cheating cards are bad and shouldn't exist is daft. Perhaps pick a more specific area of mana cheating or, better yet, highlight which cards you believe are an issue and maybe examine the similarities they have.
Like when you can spawn a board full whatever by turn five and win the game right then and there. Or drop huge minions that were not designed to see play on turn three until team whoever oversighted the support cards that could make it happen. Things like that.
What I’m saying is mana cheating in a game where there is a max of ten is kind of stupid and it should be eliminated in order to save this game from becoming a parody of itself, if it hasn’t already.
Or something
It is sad that Snip Snap Warlock is flooding Wild and that cancer deck diminishes the Wild experience.
Mana cheating had been a thing for quite some time. What cards are you referring to as the main culprits?
Ok, so at the middle of the design space of Hearthstone is the basic concept of tempo.
Tempo can best be defined for our purposes here as "what percentage of the total mana available to you gets used to generate threats or remove opponent's threats". If I don't have a turn one play, that's a tempo loss. If I play a 1/3 which manages to trade into an opponent's 2/1, that's a HUGE and sometimes game defining gain in tempo.
Now, the majority of the design space is taken up by tempo interactions. The types of interactions are diverse and varied, but when you get down to the numbers, most of these things are easily quantifiable. For example, the reborn mechanic and Houndmaster's battle cry are superficially unrelated, but they are EASILY comparable in terms of this semi-arbitrary trait of tempo.
A much smaller area of design revolves around the area of "value", but different professionals and game designers have varying definitions of the term. More on value in a minute.
The trouble is, it is incredibly difficult to keep the game particularly interesting without breaking out of this space. It is incredibly dangerous to try to seriously depart from the tempo framework, but Hearthstone MUST consider new and interesting options in design.
So far, there are three major areas where Blizzard has explored departing from the gospel of tempo.
1. Combos
Combo interactions are not definitionally divorced from the tempo framework, but some of the more popular combos throughout the years do not really fit into the basic models we take for granted in the game. Shudderwock was a recent example where the (sort of) OTK mechanic required a setup with very specific, non tempo-effecting interactions. In other words, this building of the battlecry list to include Saronites, Lifedrinkers, and bounce effects represented a whole new mechanic and did not easily fall into the rubrics of tempo or value. A quick look at Uther of the Ebon Blade shows another unique mechanic which cannot be understood in terms of 2/2 creature value in the least.
Other OTK combo decks such as the old Grim Patron charge interactions were not well understood in the tempo paradigm because there was no "playing the board" going on. Patron in particular was a simple mathematical exercise in generating a life total's worth of damage through particular card interactions.
Note that these decks have been some of the most controversial in the history of the game; lending credence to the notion that whenever we depart from the expected tempo building gameplay, there are those who immediately claim some sort of imbalance is at play. This is simply not de facto true; there is nothing inherently wrong with expanding design space.
2. Infinite Value generation
I'm a big fan of the streamer Zalae, particularly when he interacts with chat on the subject of "value". He has a very simple; very consistent message on the subject: Hearthstone is a tempo game, not a value game.
In terms of a one-sentence summary, this is absolutely correct. If you want to go deeper into it, a more fleshed out way of saying this is that you MUST survive the tempo contest before value will ever become relevant to the game. Take current day Control Warrior. Dr. Boom is a very slow but steady value generator via its "discover a mech" hero power, but that only becomes relevant towards the end of the game after you have spent a lot of time removing opponent's threats and generally shutting down his/her tempo play. Otherwise, you simply don't survive long enough for value generation to become relevant.
So, we come to the realm of infinite value generation. Honestly, 2017 and 2018 were the years in which this issue was in the spotlight. Jade Druid is an arguable inclusion because the ability to generate monstrously large creatures for 1 mana has severe tempo ramifications as well, but this deck was the introduction to the concept of unending value. Shortly thereafter, we got Frost Lich Jaina and Deathstalker Rexxar.
Because Jaina requires manipulating minion health to exactly one, sometimes at a deliberate tempo loss, it is difficult to claim that Jaina is consistently winning the tempo game. Rexxar, on the other hand, is DEFINITIVELY losing tempo because all his zom-beasts are full cost plus the HP activation. Nevertheless, these cards saw play in decks which could win the tempo game in other ways.
In the run up to the 2019 rotation, there was a hellacious amount of criticism towards these two DKs and the concept of infinite value, but what I find amusing about this is that both of those DKs were completely nonexistent in the meta for quite a while after their release. It took a massive nerf to Anduin Priest, a rotation which hurt Cube Lock, and several other meta changes before anyone touched Rexxar, and Big Spell Mage was a niche tournament option until the Witchwood rotation.
It turns out that infinite value is only an issue in a meta where we see quite a bit of control vs control matchups. When two decks are choosing to take the tempo game slow, the one which can run the other out of threats will generally win. That's why Warrior decks were basically nonexistent after the release of KnC; they had no value option that could compete with mage.
It is certainly true that infinite value generation can be an issue, but the remedy for this sort of thing has historically been a healthy meta with aggressive and combo-based options which render the value game moot.
3. Mana "Cheating"
First of all, the use of the term "cheating" is poisoning the well, and I'm not going to continue that practice. I prefer something a little more accurate and descriptive . . . let's call it Abrupt Tempo Acceleration Events (ATAEs). That sounds about right to me.
The issue with comparing ATAEs to infinite value or combo mechanics is that ATAEs are very much relevant to the traditional tempo structure of the game. Traditional understanding says you can't have a creature that costs six UNTIL TURN SIX. Except if you have a coin . . . or an innervate . . . or ramped as a druid . . . or any number of other things. So right off the bat, we can't avoid the conclusion that this is nothing new, and we are only considering a question of degree.
There is no question that hitting a turn 3 Mountain Giant with a Conjurer's Calling is ever so slightly more abrupt than casting Wild Growth and getting your 4-cost minion on turn 3. But Blizzard agreed and nerfed CC as a result, and it is worth noting that Conjurer's Calling has become amazingly rare on the ladder despite its explosive potential. Meanwhile, you see other similar effects which no one seems to want to complain about. Certainly Oasis Surger after completing the Druid quest constitutes some form of ATAE, as does Starfall. But we aren't seeing anywhere near the outcry. Is it because it's simply a lesser degree of the same phenomenon, or do people just like to bitch about the flavor of the month decks?
I can't write with as much familiarity about ATAEs because the issue is ongoing and not as fleshed out as the other two categories presented here. But regardless, I want to reiterate an important point. Be VERY careful when you find yourself advocating for Blizzard to restrict its own creativity. Constructed formats are dull as hell if they are restricted to traditional tempo battles.
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Mogu fleshshaper into mutate/evolve lackey killing your 3/3 and getting a 8/9 drop is pretty obnoxious to me. It's the one combo when playing against Shaman I'm most afraid of even over their double battlecries and mcts.
Very nice writeup, and I agree with the sentiment.
I think as you mention, it is a matter of degree.
Small tempo boosts (ATAEs) are generally accepted, while the big ones are frowned upon (if they are too easy/consistent).
In general, ATAEs should have a reasonable cost to be "balanced" - e.g. spending cards to generate mana (Innervate) or skipping turns / losing tempo to reduce cost / gain tempo later (Untapped Potential, Warlock Mountain Giant on T4).
The problem arises when the cost is too small, or the condition too easy, for the benefit obtained (e.g. Barnes is the first thing that comes to mind, but also Mana Wyrm, Undertaker, or any other similar cards that were indeed in the end nerfed). The common thread in all of these is getting too much out too early, and without any significant downside.
If one double innervates a 4/3 on T1, and it can be answered via a 2-mana card like Frostbolt or Wrath, it is a gamble. It can pay off, but it can also be brutally punished in terms of value IF the opponent has an answer.
If such things have no downside, and become safe plays instead (no cost in terms of cards, life, tempo loss...), then we have a problem.
Imho, the concept of tempo gain (at a cost) is a good thing and should certainly be in HS. Without that, we have basically only value trading left, and that would indeed be boring.
Personally, I'd love to see more (competitive) cards that explore additional concepts like other TCGs too, e.g. discard and mana destruction. There are a few (e.g. Gnomeferatu, Dirty Rat, Skulking Geist, Mojomaster Zihi), Blizzard is obviously testing the waters, and I would love them to continue to expand on this with a bit more courage.
My thoughts aswell!
As soon as they nerf Priest, the next thing that will annoy players will be Mogu Fleshshaper. Why does Blizzard had to make him so strong? The highroll potential with mutate/Lackey ( yes I admit it’s a combo but not that unlikely) is just too damn high.
As Shadowrisen wrote generally we expect to get x-mana minion on the board for x- mana . Generally until turn 6 . With 2card combos this can be achieved a bit sooner ( especially statwise with Priest) , but Mogu by himself is like a 2 mana deal 3 dmg spell and then he becomes a 8 drop, often on turn 4 or something. That’s way too fast for a lot of classes to deal with and will be a problem in the future. I don’t see a reason why Blizzard wants to enforce these highroll kind of playstyle.. sure people whined about long Control Warrior games.. But this doesn’t seem like a healthy solution to me.
This has been Hearthstone for a long time. Basically, any deck that is "fair" will be hopeless in ranked play. Every deck that reaches Tier 1 or 2 has to have some mechanic that lets it do unfair things to be competitive. The game is literally who can pull off their OP plays before the other one can.
"Mana cheating" LOL, I hate this term. You can call mana cheating almost every interesting card in the game.
Flame Imp: You get a 2-drop for 1 mana.
Murloc Warleader: If you have 5 murlocs on the board, its basically a 3 mana Pyroblast.
Overload in general: You shouldnt get a 6-drop on turn 4.
Questing Adventurer: Its stats are unlimited for 3 mana.
Cairne Bloodhoof: You get 2 4-drops for 6 mana.
The list could go on for days, do you see my point? If all we had are cards like Chillwind Yeti and Fireball, the game would be really boring to play. Thats why we need cards that can break the normal tempo rules, cards that I call interesting cards. Except when I lose to them, thats when they suddenly become mana cheating cards.
I've been playing Jambre's token Shaman deck and you can can ridiculous things... Fleshshapers and Sea Giants on the board by turn 3 or 4. Mutate into something insane early as well. These cards always seem to exist. They're just a part of Hearthstone.
Agreed. However, it's worth highlighting that some interactions are ridiculous and need to be adressed. You've touched on a few for Druid, but Mogu Fleshshaper into Mutate is the biggest culprit. It's stupid.
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Currently playing Dragon Galakrond Priest, Dragon Galakrond Warrior and Highlander Dragon Hunter.
The whole point of the new rotation system was to try and level off the power level/creep in cards, but people complain way too much when news card sets are 'weak', so now we get entire decks revolving around a busted gamplan that orignal hearthstone with its 30hp, 1 mana per turn system can't really cater for and offer fair, tactical and decent gameplay.
Every so often the devs come out and and say something along the lines of "we'd like to pull it in a bit"...like with the deathknights in frozen throne, or after the corridor creeper fiasco.... but they can't bring themsleves to do it, and just print cards that do more or less, the same broken shit all over again.
Those examples are not really accurate in my opinion.
Flame imp, although I can see how this could be considered mana cheating ( a Vanilla 3/2 wouldn’t pass the test for a 2 mana minion i guess), it’s still not that busted as a turn 4 removal + 8 drop.
Murloc Warleader is a bad example for mana cheating. Nobody would consider Bloodlust a 15 mana cheat , just because it can deal worth of 2 Pyroblast of damage (21 to be exactly with 7 minions on the board).To have a board of X- minions is a requirement and those minions could almost be included in the mana cost . You kinda payed X- mana upfront to establish these minions.
I agree with Overload, but the downside has to be calculated in. This way it’s not really a clear ( plus X) mana cheat.
Questing Adventurer. Similar to Warleader you have to build your deck in a specific way to get those stats. It’s kinda a reverse Warleader. With Murlocs you have to stick a lot of them and then with the buff they can finish the opponent. With Adventurer you have to play cheap spells to protect and buff him.
Cairne Bloodhoof is more like a 4/5 with another 4/5 that is sleeping until the first minion dies. That’s quite worse than a regular 4/5.
prismatic lense summoning portal bloodbloom and cards like that are the mana cheating cards that need be to changed in some way but rest are fine imo
I think you dont get the point.
All of the examples I gave could be considered as "mana cheating" but they are not since they are not overpowered. As soon as something like this is OP its considered "mana cheating".
Its like Flame Imp vs Kabal Crystal Runner. The latter is considered as a mana cheat because its in a tier 1 wild deck. It requires to build a deck around it, but its so powerful in the right deck that it could be considered as a mana cheat. While Flame Imp doesnt need any deckbuilding around it, its just powerful, but the decks that use it are not that powerful, so its not a mana cheat.
Regarding Fleshshaper and Mutate,
Sometimes, the issue is less about the ATAE and more about the risk vs reward of powerful multi-card interactions.
In our last round of nerfs, we saw Extra Arms nerfed to 3 mana. I'm fairly comfortable stating that this decision was made as a direct result of the cancerous gameplay resulting from a turn 1 Cleric into a turn 2 Extra Arms. A Cleric in the opening hand by itself has been repeatedly judged not powerful enough to warrant a balance change, and presumably everyone would agree that Extra Arms in hand by turn 2 is not particularly scary without a turn one play on the board first. However, even though having both by turn 2 is statistically rare, the power that chance represented was judged game breaking.
It's hard to draw a direct comparison with Mogu/Mutate because there isn't a clear turn X we're talking about, and obviously the later the interaction is played, the less impactful the combo is to the game. Furthermore, you are either going to require more cards to flood your board and lower the cost of Mogu, or you are going to need your opponent to help the mana "cheat" with his own creatures. Either way, you are introducing a third variable which must align to fully power the combo.
You'd also have to take a good look at all the "tech" cards different classes could use to address this combo and see how realistic it is that the deckbuilders out there simply change things up a bit. For example, how many 8 cost minions have attack greater than 6 and how realistic to the meta is it for folks to start adding Big Game Hunter into a bunch of decks. Can warriors spare an Execute slot or two? Shadow Word: Death? Hex? Poly? It is a lazy job to merely look at how decks are being played now, and not consider how easy it would be to address the popularity of this two-card combo with adjustments to other decks.
As a side note on this tangent, I was always shocked how loudly people moaned about Mech Hunter and Mech Paladin in the meta prior to Saviors of Uldum release. The one and only time I hit #1 Legend on NA, I did it with a Control Warrior deck running 2 Spellbreakers and 1 Ironbeak Owl. It was insane in that everyone knew exactly what cards you had to run to beat mech (namely, silence mechanics), but something in the brain just took for granted, "surely you can't run TWO silence effects . . . you'll lose to (insert X deck)" when in fact, half the damn meta was mech and other silence-vulnerable targets.
None of the above should be read as dismissing concerns about the Mutate combo, but I'm extremely unconvinced that interaction is worth its own nerf. Admittedly, Warrior is my next golden hero, and thus I am currently running the deck most capable of brushing an early 8-coster aside, so I may be a bit biased.
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"Quite some time" is quite an understatement. Mana cheating had been a thing since the start of HS: Edwin, Giants, Frothing, old Warsong, Preparation, Innervate, Wild Growth, Nourish,old Mana Wyrm etc. all are classic/basic cards. Almost all top decks in HS history had some sort of mana cheating mechanic. Although the concept is as old as the game, it only became popular buzzword with weekly threads on how bad it is due to Cube decks, especially Taunt Druid and Cube Warlock.
People should stop dreaming of playing yeti on 4, ogre on 6 and golem on 7 gameplay because it never existed.
No Psychopomp is the worst thing to happen to the game. I'm tired of this card highrolling a good res and costing me a game I otherwise would have won. It can fuck right off and so can combo priests.
Not only in HS but in any card game. Even in other competitive games, like fighting games, the best characters have unfair moves or unfair stats/properties.
As mentioned I think small amounts of mana cheating are ok when they come with some kind of requirement or drawback. For example there's a plethora of 5 mana 8/8s in HS's history with a drawback and cards like mountain giant only get particularly cheap when you meet a, typically inconvenient, requirement of some kind.
That's fine imo, the problem lies in cards that give too big a benefit at too low a cost (cost referring more to something other than mana). For example Possessed Lackey and Skull of the Man'ari's only requirements were that you had demons in your deck/ hand and it was pretty easy to both strengthen their effect and mitigate how much you weakened your deck by only playing a few VERY powerful demons in the deck. The pre-nerf conjurer's calling could get 16/16 in stats out for as little as 6 mana depending on how many cards they played/ how much of their draw they found. Pre-nerf Luna's had the drawback of losing your turn 5 but unless you were against a fast aggro deck that's easily survivable for such a massive upside. Wild Growth could put you 1 mana ahead of your opponent for multiple turns for just 2 mana and a card from your hand. Mysterious Challenger could simultaneously get a 6/6 and 5 extra mana of secret value out for 6 mana as well as somewhat negating the negative requirement of having a lot of secrets your deck by thinning the 'bad' cards out for you.
You might notice all of these examples have been nerfed with the exception of 2 because Blizzard also felt they were too strong. The other 2 either had counterplay available already (weapon removal for Skull) or they introduced a hard counter of sorts (Secret Eater for MC which even directly references it in its voice line). In fact the presence and power of Mysterious Challenger, at least imo, contributed significantly to the introduction of standard format in order to make maintaining game balance easier.
That's all well and good but what about "mana cheat" cards that never saw any changes? Well off the top of my head I can think of a few that are in the game that people don't typically feel are an issue currently. I put the requirement/ cost in brackets after each one, I'm sure you can tell what's what.
-0 mana 7/5 divine shield lifesteal rush (play 25 mana's worth of spells first)
-7 mana 42/42 in stats (your deck and board must both be empty)
-10 mana deathrattle: win (your deck, board, and hand must be empty)
-0 mana 7/8 taunt (play 12 mana's worth of spells first)
-1 mana draw 2, 2 mana 3/4 rush minion (have a card from a different class in your hand)
-10 mana 5/5 battlecry: summon 60 mana's worth of stats (have 6 x 10 mana spells in hand)
-2 mana 4/5 (this minion can't attack)
-0 mana 3/3 taunt (have a weapon with 3+ attack equipped)
-1 mana draw 3 cards (discard those cards at the end of your turn)
-3 mana 2/6 taunt (discard your cheapest card or have no other cards in hand)
-9 mana 8/8 deal 15 damage (your opponent must have taken no hp damage before playing this)
-2 mana draw up to 8 cards (have 8 damaged friendly characters)
-2 mana a minion deathrattle: summon a random 8, 9, or 10 drop (have a 7, 8, or 9 drop alive on board)
-7 mana 4/4 battlecry: summon any 2 minions in the game (have those 2 minions in play and adjacent on your side of the board already)
These are all effects that exist in the game at that mana cost but the important thing is that the drawbacks and/ or requirements are proportional to the impact they have. A 0 mana 3/3 taunt that typically comes out turn 3 or 4 isn't game breaking so it has a fairly mild requirement of just having a powerful enough weapon equipped (and if you don't do this it's just an extremely sub-par 4 drop). At the opposite end of the spectrum a minion with deathrattle: win needs serious costs and requirements so that's what it has.
My point being that just because a card does more than it should for the mana you pay does not necessarily make it overpowered or gamebreaking. Arguably the deckbuilding side of Hearthstone is all about finding ways to have your cards work together to be more impactful than they normally would be. To broadly say mana cheating cards are bad and shouldn't exist is daft. Perhaps pick a more specific area of mana cheating or, better yet, highlight which cards you believe are an issue and maybe examine the similarities they have.