you think that is an argument for hearthstone not being predatory? that Gatcha games are worse?? that is like saying kicking and hitting someone is not violence because shooting someone does more damage
if anything they are an inspiration, look at the c'thun package, another time limited purchase option that did not used to be there
Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you still get C'Thun when you open your first Whispers of the Old Gods pack? I believe that was the change they made back in 2017 or 2018. I just checked and WotOG packs are available for gold in the shop so its not a time-limited purchase. As for the Gatcha comparison, you misunderstood what I said and are trying to twist it. I never said Hearthstone wasn't playing into that. What I did say was that it it's nowhere as bad as the flood of Gatcha games on the market. To use a violence example like you did; Hearthstone is a slap to the face compared to the Gatcha games being a baseball bat to the knee asking you where their money is.
1) You wouldn't have a clue whether my "walls of text" (which frequently require less than a minute to read, but I know . . . you have depression) have substance because, as you've repeatedly and proudly said, you don't read them.
2) Of course it's relevant to compare a product to other products in the same industry. Of course these things are judged relative to the common business practices of the industry. And OF COURSE it's especially relevant that there are other more and less favorable examples within the same genre of game, thus bolstering the "if you don't like it, leave" message that very few of the complainers actually are able to embrace.
3) I have to compliment your choice of career, though. Seriously, given your level of interaction in this forum, a world where you often have 5 seconds or less to communicate seems right up your alley. Absolutely no sarcasm or shade meant.
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Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
I don't know about the last six years, but I posted in detail why, over the last 15-20 years, several areas of the process of making video games has dropped to zero. So unless there's a gigantic increase to offset all that, common sense says video games are significantly cheaper to produce today than they were 15-20 years ago.
There may, in fact, be such a gigantic increase, but I don't see it. It certainly isn't in hardware. Computers are significantly cheaper than they were back in the day, I remember vividly paying almost $3k for a slightly-above average model in the late 90s.
The way I read his drivel was that he was claiming that the production costs for HS have not gone up. His "logic" seems to be that, since costs have not risen, prices should not either. I was ignoring the broader idiocy of that idea and focusing solely on input costs.
Certainly, if one compares video games today to those of the 1990's, it's lower. My point (and I should have made this clearer, but I was trying not to write too much, since we know people complain about that) is that the total salary for HS development and production has almost certainly increased over the past 5-6 years. The development team has gotten much larger, if nothing else. You may very well be right that individual salaries in this field are stagnant, but in sheer numbers, I'm quite certain that total salary costs have gone up since 2014. Now, Blizzard has more than made up for that increase (either due to technological advances, increased productivity, and market power), which is (partly) why the game remains profitable.
for someone who has a bare minimum understanding of capitalism it sure is rich to call my simplistic take of the raise of product cost of games idiocy, what do you know about running a business? I assume bare minimum
blizzard is artificially increasing the price of their product with tactical, discreetly measures, something a simpleton who does not understand the game to its full effect will not catch on to due to community backlash.
legendary and epic cards have become more essential, fx what is a highlander deck without the legendaries? they are rotating the archetypes - making a class like hunter, known for aggro into combo and a class like shaman known for combo into aggro in hopes that the people who enjoy the archetype of lets say combo will start building a hunter deck to get his combo fix and the guy who likes aggro will build a shaman deck to get his aggro fix
I'm sorry, but that's bullshit. I'll just take your claim that legendaries and epics became more essential. To make it as simple as possible I'm going to compare the current top 10 decks (in the legend range) from VS' latest report to a report from nearly four years ago.
Control Warrior (10720 dust, 5 epics, 5 legendaries)
** Thaurissan, Finley, Brann, Barnes, Reno and the Curator are excluded from the dust calculation, since they came off of adventures which you had to unlock via gold or real money
avg. total cost of 7576 vs. 6406. And now consider the fact that we had more neutral legendaries back then such as Sylvanas or Rag, yet the amount of dust required to craft the top decks on average only went up by like three epics. Highlander decks are traditionally expensive to craft, that's nothing new. Also goes to show that Shaman has never been "known for combo", where did you get that idea?
I'm sorry, but that's bullshit. I'll just take your claim that legendaries and epics became more essential. To make it as simple as possible I'm going to compare the current top 10 decks (in the legend range) from VS' latest report to a report from nearly four years ago.
Control Warrior (10720 dust, 5 epics, 5 legendaries)
** Thaurissan, Finley, Brann, Barnes, Reno and the Curator are excluded from the dust calculation, since they came off of adventures which you had to unlock via gold or real money
avg. total cost of 7256 vs. 6406. And now consider the fact that we had more neutral legendaries back then such as Sylvanas or Rag, yet the amount of dust required to craft top meta decks on average only went up by like two epics. Highlander decks are traditionally expensive to craft, that's nothing new. Also goes to show that Shaman has never been "known for combo", where did you get that idea?
Be careful: if you start giving him facts, he'll just call you a simpleton and tell you what an awesome chess player he is. If you're confused by that, join the club. The dude makes no sense.
Interesting Bone. That particular comparison snapshot makes a compelling case. I'd be interested to see a couple other samples from different metas to see if the relatively small difference holds up, but those particular numbers are convincing . . . to anyone who bothers to read them.
Some people are too depressed to read.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
I don't know about the last six years, but I posted in detail why, over the last 15-20 years, several areas of the process of making video games has dropped to zero. So unless there's a gigantic increase to offset all that, common sense says video games are significantly cheaper to produce today than they were 15-20 years ago.
There may, in fact, be such a gigantic increase, but I don't see it. It certainly isn't in hardware. Computers are significantly cheaper than they were back in the day, I remember vividly paying almost $3k for a slightly-above average model in the late 90s.
The way I read his drivel was that he was claiming that the production costs for HS have not gone up. His "logic" seems to be that, since costs have not risen, prices should not either. I was ignoring the broader idiocy of that idea and focusing solely on input costs.
Certainly, if one compares video games today to those of the 1990's, it's lower. My point (and I should have made this clearer, but I was trying not to write too much, since we know people complain about that) is that the total salary for HS development and production has almost certainly increased over the past 5-6 years. The development team has gotten much larger, if nothing else. You may very well be right that individual salaries in this field are stagnant, but in sheer numbers, I'm quite certain that total salary costs have gone up since 2014. Now, Blizzard has more than made up for that increase (either due to technological advances, increased productivity, and market power), which is (partly) why the game remains profitable.
for someone who has a bare minimum understanding of capitalism it sure is rich to call my simplistic take of the raise of product cost of games idiocy, what do you know about running a business? I assume bare minimum
blizzard is artificially increasing the price of their product with tactical, discreetly measures, something a simpleton who does not understand the game to its full effect will not catch on to due to community backlash.
legendary and epic cards have become more essential, fx what is a highlander deck without the legendaries? they are rotating the archetypes - making a class like hunter, known for aggro into combo and a class like shaman known for combo into aggro in hopes that the people who enjoy the archetype of lets say combo will start building a hunter deck to get his combo fix and the guy who likes aggro will build a shaman deck to get his aggro fix
I'm sorry, but that's bullshit. I'll just take your claim that legendaries and epics became more essential. To make it as simple as possible I'm going to compare the current top 10 decks (in the legend range) from VS' latest report to a report from nearly four years ago.
Control Warrior (10720 dust, 5 epics, 5 legendaries)
** Thaurissan, Finley, Brann, Barnes, Reno and the Curator are excluded from the dust calculation, since they came off of adventures which you had to unlock via gold or real money
avg. total cost of 7576 vs. 6406. And now consider the fact that we had more neutral legendaries back then such as Sylvanas or Rag, yet the amount of dust required to craft the top decks on average only went up by like three epics. Highlander decks are traditionally expensive to craft, that's nothing new. Also goes to show that Shaman has never been "known for combo", where did you get that idea?
/edit - I've noticed that some dust totals from the current report are incorrect so I had to doublecheck them
a lot of work you did there mate, you have looked at the amount of legendary and epics cards but that is not my point, the point I was trying to come forward with, and maybe iv failed at that because I get annoyed easily, is how key those epics and legendries are.
fx, imagine a libram deck without Libram of Hope and Lady Liadrin those cards are essential for the archetype is what I argue, however what other paladin decks do they fit in? Liadrin a 1600 dust craft is total waste outside of this 1 deck and libram of hope can maybe be played in duels paladin (which is a meme deck) which requires Nozdormu the Timelost and Duel! which does not see play in any other paladin archetype.
back in the days cards would have more overlap and be used more broadly across many deck types, this is a way which they have raised the price of hearthstone!
understand? it is not just that they are epic or legendries it is that they are essential for certain archetypes which are strong and useless for others entirely
a lot of work you did there mate, you have looked at the amount of legendary and epics cards but that is not my point, the point I was trying to come forward with, and maybe iv failed at that because I get annoyed easily, is how key those epics and legendries are.
fx, imagine a libram deck without Libram of Hope and Lady Liadrin those cards are essential for the archetype is what I argue, however what other paladin decks do they fit in? Liadrin a 1600 dust craft is total waste outside of this 1 deck and libram of hope can maybe be played in duels paladin (which is a meme deck) which requires Nozdormu the Timelost and Duel! which does not see play in any other paladin archetype.
back in the days cards would have more overlap and be used more broadly across many deck types, this is a way which they have raised the price of hearthstone!
understand? it is not just that they are epic or legendries it is that they are essential for certain archetypes which are strong and useless for others entirely
So you're saying that Force of Nature, prior to its nerf wasn't integral to old-school token druid? Or that Mysterious Challenger wasn't a key part of Christmas Tree Paladin? How about Shudderwock in Shudderwock Shaman? Raza the Chained and Shadowreaper Anduin in Mono-priest? Kingsbane? All of these example made their archetype. its something that's been around since day-1 (in the case of Token druid). The broader the card pool, the more CCG's can expand the idea of set or block themes. It's not something unique to Hearthstone.
I'm actually glad you said that Yepapa. I was thinking that back in the day Sylvannas, Ragnaros, Cairne, and a couple others were in just about every deck.
So, those numbers can be a little misleading. Even if the overall numbers of legendaries are the same or close to it, it could be that each deck is using more class legendaries, and thus the pool of legendaries is actually bigger. I was thinking of Demon Hunter and all the class legendaries they use (Malcia, Ilgynoth, Kayne, Altruis). Pure Paladin has a few also, and those are hyper-specialized. Yrel can't even be used in the pen-flinger version of the deck.
Now that I think of it, the list is even longer. All the Highlander Priests have that triumvirate of 3-cost legendaries (Lazul, Illucia, and the guy that deathrattles to copy a minion, can't think of the name), as well as Moru . . . zund? Whatever the 8-cost priest dragon is. Shit, and Soul Mirror. Damn, the list does grow on you.
EDIT: @Wrathgood - those are all perfectly legit examples, but I'm just thinking it does seem to be the case that class legendaries are more represented than their neutral counterparts when compared to the old days. I suppose that's a function of power creep combined with the leeway they have to make class cards a little more powerful than neutrals.
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
wrath, stop trying to strawman me all the time, should be obvious to anyone not dead set on being ad odds that many of those cards you mention are also bad apples according to what iv already said already
not sure why you mention force of nature, shudderwock and kingsbane. seems to me that you still don't get it. Shudder can work just fine outside of the shudder combo deck same with force of nature, anduin, raza and kingsbane, mysterious challenger not so much
I'm actually glad you said that Yepapa. I was thinking that back in the day Sylvannas, Ragnaros, Cairne, and a couple others were in just about every deck.
So, those numbers can be a little misleading. Even if the overall numbers of legendaries are the same or close to it, it could be that each deck is using more class legendaries, and thus the pool of legendaries is actually bigger. I was thinking of Demon Hunter and all the class legendaries they use (Malcia, Ilgynoth, Kayne, Altruis). Pure Paladin has a few also, and those are hyper-specialized. Yrel can't even be used in the pen-flinger version of the deck.
Now that I think of it, the list is even longer. All the Highlander Priests have that triumvirate of 3-cost legendaries (Lazul, Illucia, and the guy that deathrattles to copy a minion, can't think of the name), as well as Moru . . . zund? Whatever the 8-cost priest dragon is. Shit, and Soul Mirror. Damn, the list does grow on you.
EDIT: @Wrathgood - those are all perfectly legit examples, but I'm just thinking it does seem to be the case that class legendaries are more represented than their neutral counterparts when compared to the old days. I suppose that's a function of power creep combined with the leeway they have to make class cards a little more powerful than neutrals.
It might also be the fact that when they transitioned to 2 class legendaries per set back in Frozen Throne and Un'Goro they removed neutral legendary minions in the process so that the Legendary count stayed between 20 and 25 (Classic is an outlier with 32 Legendary cards as is DoD with 28 due to Galakrond). Which also opened up a bigger design space to play with the class fantasy's and pursue some different avenues of play that didn't have to be balanced around multiple classes having access to them.
HS is going to continue to make money for a long while despite many claims of individuals leaving the game.
Let's be clear, if you are a F2P player or someone who has maybe spent a few hundred dollars on expansion passes over the past couple years then Blizzard does not care about retaining you despite this grouping of players making the VAST majority of HS's player base. F2P and people who maybe spend $100 a year on the game do not keep the numbers in the black - whales do. While we're on the subject, buying every expansion each year does NOT make you a whale (despite a lot of people on the internet thinking it does). The whales are the ones who buy EVERYTHING HS puts forward and then some and it's this grouping of money - despite making up only a sliver of players - which keep the lights on for games such as this.
The fact is, these people aren't going anywhere and Blizzard knows it. These people are in too deep whether it's from addiction, an OCD need to collect everything or maybe they just really enjoy the game but nobody who has spent tens of thousands of dollars over the past 5 years is just going to walk away because they don't get their daily 60g quests anymore.
Oh yeah Wrath, I fully acknowledge there can be good things that come from the switch.
I just wanted to affirm the point that one can't necessarily look at a number of legendaries per deck in two different years because it's impossible to know the number of overlapping legendaries over multiple decks, and that could potentially throw off numbers.
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Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you still get C'Thun when you open your first Whispers of the Old Gods pack? I believe that was the change they made back in 2017 or 2018. I just checked and WotOG packs are available for gold in the shop so its not a time-limited purchase. As for the Gatcha comparison, you misunderstood what I said and are trying to twist it. I never said Hearthstone wasn't playing into that. What I did say was that it it's nowhere as bad as the flood of Gatcha games on the market. To use a violence example like you did; Hearthstone is a slap to the face compared to the Gatcha games being a baseball bat to the knee asking you where their money is.
1) You wouldn't have a clue whether my "walls of text" (which frequently require less than a minute to read, but I know . . . you have depression) have substance because, as you've repeatedly and proudly said, you don't read them.
2) Of course it's relevant to compare a product to other products in the same industry. Of course these things are judged relative to the common business practices of the industry. And OF COURSE it's especially relevant that there are other more and less favorable examples within the same genre of game, thus bolstering the "if you don't like it, leave" message that very few of the complainers actually are able to embrace.
3) I have to compliment your choice of career, though. Seriously, given your level of interaction in this forum, a world where you often have 5 seconds or less to communicate seems right up your alley. Absolutely no sarcasm or shade meant.
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
I'm sorry, but that's bullshit. I'll just take your claim that legendaries and epics became more essential. To make it as simple as possible I'm going to compare the current top 10 decks (in the legend range) from VS' latest report to a report from nearly four years ago.
* Altruis and Galakrond were added for free
** Thaurissan, Finley, Brann, Barnes, Reno and the Curator are excluded from the dust calculation, since they came off of adventures which you had to unlock via gold or real money
avg. total cost of 7576 vs. 6406. And now consider the fact that we had more neutral legendaries back then such as Sylvanas or Rag, yet the amount of dust required to craft the top decks on average only went up by like three epics. Highlander decks are traditionally expensive to craft, that's nothing new. Also goes to show that Shaman has never been "known for combo", where did you get that idea?
Source: https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-180/ and https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-30/
/edit - I've noticed that some dust totals from the current report are incorrect so I had to doublecheck them
Be careful: if you start giving him facts, he'll just call you a simpleton and tell you what an awesome chess player he is. If you're confused by that, join the club. The dude makes no sense.
Interesting Bone. That particular comparison snapshot makes a compelling case. I'd be interested to see a couple other samples from different metas to see if the relatively small difference holds up, but those particular numbers are convincing . . . to anyone who bothers to read them.
Some people are too depressed to read.
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
a lot of work you did there mate, you have looked at the amount of legendary and epics cards but that is not my point, the point I was trying to come forward with, and maybe iv failed at that because I get annoyed easily, is how key those epics and legendries are.
fx, imagine a libram deck without Libram of Hope and Lady Liadrin those cards are essential for the archetype is what I argue, however what other paladin decks do they fit in? Liadrin a 1600 dust craft is total waste outside of this 1 deck and libram of hope can maybe be played in duels paladin (which is a meme deck) which requires Nozdormu the Timelost and Duel! which does not see play in any other paladin archetype.
back in the days cards would have more overlap and be used more broadly across many deck types, this is a way which they have raised the price of hearthstone!
understand? it is not just that they are epic or legendries it is that they are essential for certain archetypes which are strong and useless for others entirely
So you're saying that Force of Nature, prior to its nerf wasn't integral to old-school token druid? Or that Mysterious Challenger wasn't a key part of Christmas Tree Paladin? How about Shudderwock in Shudderwock Shaman? Raza the Chained and Shadowreaper Anduin in Mono-priest? Kingsbane? All of these example made their archetype. its something that's been around since day-1 (in the case of Token druid). The broader the card pool, the more CCG's can expand the idea of set or block themes. It's not something unique to Hearthstone.
I'm actually glad you said that Yepapa. I was thinking that back in the day Sylvannas, Ragnaros, Cairne, and a couple others were in just about every deck.
So, those numbers can be a little misleading. Even if the overall numbers of legendaries are the same or close to it, it could be that each deck is using more class legendaries, and thus the pool of legendaries is actually bigger. I was thinking of Demon Hunter and all the class legendaries they use (Malcia, Ilgynoth, Kayne, Altruis). Pure Paladin has a few also, and those are hyper-specialized. Yrel can't even be used in the pen-flinger version of the deck.
Now that I think of it, the list is even longer. All the Highlander Priests have that triumvirate of 3-cost legendaries (Lazul, Illucia, and the guy that deathrattles to copy a minion, can't think of the name), as well as Moru . . . zund? Whatever the 8-cost priest dragon is. Shit, and Soul Mirror. Damn, the list does grow on you.
EDIT: @Wrathgood - those are all perfectly legit examples, but I'm just thinking it does seem to be the case that class legendaries are more represented than their neutral counterparts when compared to the old days. I suppose that's a function of power creep combined with the leeway they have to make class cards a little more powerful than neutrals.
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.
wrath, stop trying to strawman me all the time, should be obvious to anyone not dead set on being ad odds that many of those cards you mention are also bad apples according to what iv already said already
not sure why you mention force of nature, shudderwock and kingsbane. seems to me that you still don't get it.
Shudder can work just fine outside of the shudder combo deck same with force of nature, anduin, raza and kingsbane, mysterious challenger not so much
It might also be the fact that when they transitioned to 2 class legendaries per set back in Frozen Throne and Un'Goro they removed neutral legendary minions in the process so that the Legendary count stayed between 20 and 25 (Classic is an outlier with 32 Legendary cards as is DoD with 28 due to Galakrond). Which also opened up a bigger design space to play with the class fantasy's and pursue some different avenues of play that didn't have to be balanced around multiple classes having access to them.
HS is going to continue to make money for a long while despite many claims of individuals leaving the game.
Let's be clear, if you are a F2P player or someone who has maybe spent a few hundred dollars on expansion passes over the past couple years then Blizzard does not care about retaining you despite this grouping of players making the VAST majority of HS's player base. F2P and people who maybe spend $100 a year on the game do not keep the numbers in the black - whales do. While we're on the subject, buying every expansion each year does NOT make you a whale (despite a lot of people on the internet thinking it does). The whales are the ones who buy EVERYTHING HS puts forward and then some and it's this grouping of money - despite making up only a sliver of players - which keep the lights on for games such as this.
The fact is, these people aren't going anywhere and Blizzard knows it. These people are in too deep whether it's from addiction, an OCD need to collect everything or maybe they just really enjoy the game but nobody who has spent tens of thousands of dollars over the past 5 years is just going to walk away because they don't get their daily 60g quests anymore.
Oh yeah Wrath, I fully acknowledge there can be good things that come from the switch.
I just wanted to affirm the point that one can't necessarily look at a number of legendaries per deck in two different years because it's impossible to know the number of overlapping legendaries over multiple decks, and that could potentially throw off numbers.
Helpful Clarification on Forbidden Topics for Hearthstone Forums:
Enjoying Americans winning in the Olympics is forbidden because it is political. A 14 plus page discussion of state-sponsored lawsuits against a multi-national corporation based on harassment, discrimination, and wrongful death allegations is apparently not political enough to raise an issue.