More terrible tickatus logic. Man it’s just daily isn’t it lol.
The stats on tickatus look bad because most of the meta is aggressive and tickatus warlock loses to those decks. But it beats anyone trying something else.
False. No matter how many times this lie is repeated, saying it doesn't make it so.
I will admit saying it probably convinces a bunch of players to whine without trying for themselves, but I have made it my business to get a statistically significant sample size this meta, and in my case, the matchup in question is Silas OTK Warrior vs. Tick Lock.
So far, 90 matchups in the Barrens meta, and the record stands at 57-34.
For those who insist they can't play control or combo against Tickatus, make sure you aren't one of the MANY players I've run into on ladder who has the win completely sewn up and walk into Tickatus milling your C'thun when you didn't have to. I've collected 5 replays now where mage players with all 4 C'thun pieces refuse to do the obvious thing that guarantees a win, instead completing C'thun with 5-8 cards left in the deck and giving me a better than 50-50 chance to mill the finished product. For the record, if you find yourself in that position, hold your last card draw (arcane int, cram session, refreshing spring water, etc), complete the C'thun after drawing the remains of your deck, and make sure you get him in your hand on the same turn. If you've properly managed the rest of your deck's resources, you'll be able to either wipe the board or get the Lock's minions down to low enough health that C'thun should punch thru for lethal.
And yes, I'm fully aware there will be plenty of times when you don't have all 4 C'thun pieces collected before the Tick gets played. However, if you're going to misplay the times when you get them all, what does it matter whether they get milled or just horribly misplayed? The result will be the same.
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More terrible tickatus logic. Man it’s just daily isn’t it lol.
The stats on tickatus look bad because most of the meta is aggressive and tickatus warlock loses to those decks. But it beats anyone trying something else.
False. No matter how many times this lie is repeated, saying it doesn't make it so.
I will admit saying it probably convinces a bunch of players to whine without trying for themselves, but I have made it my business to get a statistically significant sample size this meta, and in my case, the matchup in question is Silas OTK Warrior vs. Tick Lock.
So far, 90 matchups in the Barrens meta, and the record stands at 57-34.
For those who insist they can't play control or combo against Tickatus, make sure you aren't one of the MANY players I've run into on ladder who has the win completely sewn up and walk into Tickatus milling your C'thun when you didn't have to. I've collected 5 replays now where mage players with all 4 C'thun pieces refuse to do the obvious thing that guarantees a win, instead completing C'thun with 5-8 cards left in the deck and giving me a better than 50-50 chance to mill the finished product. For the record, if you find yourself in that position, hold your last card draw (arcane int, cram session, refreshing spring water, etc), complete the C'thun after drawing the remains of your deck, and make sure you get him in your hand on the same turn. If you've properly managed the rest of your deck's resources, you'll be able to either wipe the board or get the Lock's minions down to low enough health that C'thun should punch thru for lethal.
And yes, I'm fully aware there will be plenty of times when you don't have all 4 C'thun pieces collected before the Tick gets played. However, if you're going to misplay the times when you get them all, what does it matter whether they get milled or just horribly misplayed? The result will be the same.
Well, of course there are ways to mitigate Tickatus, and I'm impressed that you can keep a positive winrate with otk warrior, but that may just be a case where you are simply a better player than your opponent. in your 57 wins, how often did you win with your actual combo though ? That's what I'd like to know. Maybe your deck is naturally strong against control warlock, regardless of the OTK package. It's a genuine question I've no idea what otk warrior looks like.
My point is, I agree with you Tickatus isn't worthy of a nerf, but it is still very much designed to target and cancel decks such as yours or C'thun decks, and it will succeed often against slow decks, you can't just put all the blame on the player's skill.
I think we are in the same situation as pre-nerf Barnes. Card was fine statistically, but it was still causing a real sense of frustration and helplessness when it worked, and the community felt that it was working too consistently and shaping the meta in a way they disliked, so Blizzard nerfed Barnes anyway, despite being a balanced card. I forsee the same future for Tickatus.
And I honestly don't care, I like Tickatus, it's fun to play, but if I can't get cheap free wins against greedy or combo decks as a control deck anymore, then fine, I should'nt be able to anyway, OTK warrior should beat control warlock 80-20, not 57-34.
More terrible tickatus logic. Man it’s just daily isn’t it lol.
The stats on tickatus look bad because most of the meta is aggressive and tickatus warlock loses to those decks. But it beats anyone trying something else.
False. No matter how many times this lie is repeated, saying it doesn't make it so.
I will admit saying it probably convinces a bunch of players to whine without trying for themselves, but I have made it my business to get a statistically significant sample size this meta, and in my case, the matchup in question is Silas OTK Warrior vs. Tick Lock.
So far, 90 matchups in the Barrens meta, and the record stands at 57-34.
For those who insist they can't play control or combo against Tickatus, make sure you aren't one of the MANY players I've run into on ladder who has the win completely sewn up and walk into Tickatus milling your C'thun when you didn't have to. I've collected 5 replays now where mage players with all 4 C'thun pieces refuse to do the obvious thing that guarantees a win, instead completing C'thun with 5-8 cards left in the deck and giving me a better than 50-50 chance to mill the finished product. For the record, if you find yourself in that position, hold your last card draw (arcane int, cram session, refreshing spring water, etc), complete the C'thun after drawing the remains of your deck, and make sure you get him in your hand on the same turn. If you've properly managed the rest of your deck's resources, you'll be able to either wipe the board or get the Lock's minions down to low enough health that C'thun should punch thru for lethal.
And yes, I'm fully aware there will be plenty of times when you don't have all 4 C'thun pieces collected before the Tick gets played. However, if you're going to misplay the times when you get them all, what does it matter whether they get milled or just horribly misplayed? The result will be the same.
Well, of course there are ways to mitigate Tickatus, and I'm impressed that you can keep a positive winrate with otk warrior, but that may just be a case where you are simply a better player than your opponent. in your 57 wins, how often did you win with your actual combo though ? That's what I'd like to know. Maybe your deck is naturally strong against control warlock, regardless of the OTK package. It's a genuine question I've no idea what otk warrior looks like.
My point is, I agree with you Tickatus isn't worthy of a nerf, but it is still very much designed to target and cancel decks such as yours or C'thun decks, and it will succeed often against slow decks, you can't just put all the blame on the player's skill.
I think we are in the same situation as pre-nerf Barnes. Card was fine statistically, but it was still causing a real sense of frustration and helplessness when it worked, and the community felt that it was working too consistently and shaping the meta in a way they disliked, so Blizzard nerfed Barnes anyway, despite being a balanced card. I forsee the same future for Tickatus.
And I honestly don't care, I like Tickatus, it's fun to play, but if I can't get cheap free wins against greedy or combo decks as a control deck anymore, then fine, I should'nt be able to anyway, OTK warrior should beat control warlock 80-20, not 57-34.
He keeps bring up this deck but it’s a combo deck, and contrary to what people say tickatus and warlock in general are not anti combo, they’re anti control. It’s too reactive of a deck to do much against a combo deck with decent cycling. His success is not evident of control’s viability, it’s simply showing that combo decks are favored against control decks.
Tickatus Warlock is a bad deck period. It is a poor excuse of a control deck that loses to what control decks are supposed to beat, namely aggro (Hunter destroys them, but Token Druid and Secret Paladin also do very well). It also loses badly to any mid-range tempo deck that has ways of developing a board (stuff like Rush Warrior, Miracle Rogue, Mid-range Demon Hunter). It loses even more easily to combo decks like Il'Gynoth OTK Demon Hunter or Alex/Tenwu combo Rogue as it has no tools to disrupt their game plan for the first 7-8 turns and Tickatus himself comes too late at a moment when most combo decks have already assembled the full combo in hand (or perhaps already killed the Warlock). It only beats Priests right now and scores 50% in the mirrors. These are by the way the only matchups where Tickatus himself is a useful card, in every other instance where he is played (corrupted) versus another deck, it is a win-more move and the game was already decided 99% of the time.
Now the reason Tickatus Warlock is a bad control deck is because it has inadequate healing (a few spells that heal for 3 and whatever soul fragments you draw - while you often have to take damage from your hero power as the deck has effectively no other source of card draw) and all its removal is reactive. You can see how the healing is inadequate in the matchup against Hunter. Warlock keeps trying to remove the minions that hunter drops turn after turn, while the hunter keeps chipping away at the Warlock's health and eventually kills them usually around turn 7 or 8. In comparison, Priest is a great control class as it has a ton of healing (0-mana heal 5, 1-mana heal 5, 1 mana heal-3 discover a spell, a combo with Samuro and Apotheosis that can often heal for 20+ and a lot more stuff) and it also has some proactive removal tools (the Samuro combo mentioned earlier as well as a cheap heal spell in Xyrella) which remove the enemy board while developing some stats Warrior is the other class that has the potential to be good in control, but since the last rotation lost a lot of its ability to gain armor (which is effectively healing). But it could take as little as a buff to Rancor (which is currently quite situational for a 4-mana spell) to make Control Warrior viable again.
TL;DR: Tickatus Warlock sucks, control is not dead, but is currently restricted to priest
Aegis, the vast majority of griping about Tickatus lumps combo and control decks together in the "strangled by the Tick" category. Several people have argued that Tickatus is MORE deadly to combo than control, so take that argument up with them.
@PetiteMouche
The answer to your question is a little nuanced. I often end up dealing lethal damage with the combo, but it's rarely the 20-30 damage OTK that the deck is designed to deliver. More often, Warlock gets itself down to lower life totals, thus making the finisher a little easier. Aegis brought up the distinction between combo and control, but with warrior especially, the game is played as a control matchup right up until the final turn most games.
For the record, the OTK is getting armor equal to or greater than opponent's life total, playing Soulbound Ashtongue, playing Silas Darkmoon to give the Ashtongue to your opponent, and shield slamming the Ashtongue to deal a one punch death to the opponent.
I only run one copy of Silas and Ashtongue (2 slams obviously), but one could significantly reduce the danger of the Tick by adding a 2nd Ashtongue if one was inclined. I don't do that, but I do assume that every warlock I meet is playing the Tick, and thus mulligan solely for combo pieces. The vast majority of wins are eventually achieved thru the combo, even if the slams generally aren't for as much damage than in other matchups.
On the subject of the feel of the meta, you're probably right, but that's why I keep posting my success with Silas Warrior. People keep making the blanket statement that control and/or combo decks are being strangled by Tickatus. It is my belief that they base this statement either on the current "played" stats on the ladder via V Syndicate or HSReplay OR on looking at Tickatus and assuming that control decks can't stand up to it.
What I'm almost certain they AREN'T basing that claim on is lived experience. I'm a fairly good player, and I rarely make game-swinging mistakes anymore, but even so, there is enough leeway in my win rate against the Tick for me to believe that the average player can at least break even against supposedly the worst matchup in the meta. However, just like with the folks who are clamoring for more nerfs to everything from Tickatus to Quick Shot, people would rather receive a wrote opinion from others about the control vs Tick state of affairs than learn for themselves it's not that bad.
Finally, the reason I brought up the replays where folks make catastrophic and easy-to-spot mistakes is that some people would be better served actually working on their play rather than sharpening their troll skills on Hearthpwn. When a group is complaining so fiercely about a balance issue, but there is serious question whether the player base even grasps how to play the matchup correctly, perhaps balance isn't the most pressing issue. Anyone can ultimately fall back to "it's no fun to play" or "It doesn't let me play my fun decks" and that's obviously an unanswerable opinion, but we can have that discussion as soon as folks back off from the balance claims. They just don't have merit.
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Tickatus Warlock is a bad deck period. It is a poor excuse of a control deck that loses to what control decks are supposed to beat, namely aggro (Hunter destroys them, but Token Druid and Secret Paladin also do very well). It also loses badly to any mid-range tempo deck that has ways of developing a board (stuff like Rush Warrior, Miracle Rogue, Mid-range Demon Hunter). It loses even more easily to combo decks like Il'Gynoth OTK Demon Hunter or Alex/Tenwu combo Rogue as it has no tools to disrupt their game plan for the first 7-8 turns and Tickatus himself comes too late at a moment when most combo decks have already assembled the full combo in hand (or perhaps already killed the Warlock). It only beats Priests right now and scores 50% in the mirrors. These are by the way the only matchups where Tickatus himself is a useful card, in every other instance where he is played (corrupted) versus another deck, it is a win-more move and the game was already decided 99% of the time.
Now the reason Tickatus Warlock is a bad control deck is because it has inadequate healing (a few spells that heal for 3 and whatever soul fragments you draw - while you often have to take damage from your hero power as the deck has effectively no other source of card draw) and all its removal is reactive. You can see how the healing is inadequate in the matchup against Hunter. Warlock keeps trying to remove the minions that hunter drops turn after turn, while the hunter keeps chipping away at the Warlock's health and eventually kills them usually around turn 7 or 8. In comparison, Priest is a great control class as it has a ton of healing (0-mana heal 5, 1-mana heal 5, 1 mana heal-3 discover a spell, a combo with Samuro and Apotheosis that can often heal for 20+ and a lot more stuff) and it also has some proactive removal tools (the Samuro combo mentioned earlier as well as a cheap heal spell in Xyrella) which remove the enemy board while developing some stats Warrior is the other class that has the potential to be good in control, but since the last rotation lost a lot of its ability to gain armor (which is effectively healing). But it could take as little as a buff to Rancor (which is currently quite situational for a 4-mana spell) to make Control Warrior viable again.
TL;DR: Tickatus Warlock sucks, control is not dead, but is currently restricted to priest
Reality check: Tickatus Warlock is #4 class, just below the top tier right now (top 3 Pally, Hunter, Rush Warrior). Priest is dead last. Source: hsreplay.
Tickatus Warlock is a bad deck period. It is a poor excuse of a control deck that loses to what control decks are supposed to beat, namely aggro (Hunter destroys them, but Token Druid and Secret Paladin also do very well). It also loses badly to any mid-range tempo deck that has ways of developing a board (stuff like Rush Warrior, Miracle Rogue, Mid-range Demon Hunter). It loses even more easily to combo decks like Il'Gynoth OTK Demon Hunter or Alex/Tenwu combo Rogue as it has no tools to disrupt their game plan for the first 7-8 turns and Tickatus himself comes too late at a moment when most combo decks have already assembled the full combo in hand (or perhaps already killed the Warlock). It only beats Priests right now and scores 50% in the mirrors. These are by the way the only matchups where Tickatus himself is a useful card, in every other instance where he is played (corrupted) versus another deck, it is a win-more move and the game was already decided 99% of the time.
Now the reason Tickatus Warlock is a bad control deck is because it has inadequate healing (a few spells that heal for 3 and whatever soul fragments you draw - while you often have to take damage from your hero power as the deck has effectively no other source of card draw) and all its removal is reactive. You can see how the healing is inadequate in the matchup against Hunter. Warlock keeps trying to remove the minions that hunter drops turn after turn, while the hunter keeps chipping away at the Warlock's health and eventually kills them usually around turn 7 or 8. In comparison, Priest is a great control class as it has a ton of healing (0-mana heal 5, 1-mana heal 5, 1 mana heal-3 discover a spell, a combo with Samuro and Apotheosis that can often heal for 20+ and a lot more stuff) and it also has some proactive removal tools (the Samuro combo mentioned earlier as well as a cheap heal spell in Xyrella) which remove the enemy board while developing some stats Warrior is the other class that has the potential to be good in control, but since the last rotation lost a lot of its ability to gain armor (which is effectively healing). But it could take as little as a buff to Rancor (which is currently quite situational for a 4-mana spell) to make Control Warrior viable again.
TL;DR: Tickatus Warlock sucks, control is not dead, but is currently restricted to priest
It’s not a bad deck, control just isn’t what it used to be. Face decks are far more powerful now and the power creep hasn’t been the same for control. And from personal experience, if you play token druid against it and you don’t have a good board by turn 4 you just lose. Their removal becomes really good after that and they can just stall you out. Soul fragments are incredibly powerful healing, just slow. I’ve done like 60 damage to a warlock and still lost the game. That being what it is I disagree with you that it loses to midrange, and it certainly stomps priest.
@Malfurius: Reality check: 'free' hsreplay stats from bronze to gold games do not translate to real world stats and power level of decks
@Aegis24: Token Druid vs Warlock is a bit of a tricky matchup the main problem is that you cannot auto-win with an early Gibberling or Glowfly Swarm turn due to School Spirits. So you need to wait till you can buff your board out of reach with something like Power of the Wild or Soul of the Forest, the latter being the best option as it also protects you against Twisting Nether as well. I went 5-3 with Token Druid vs Warlock and it felt that it is a slightly favorable matchup but not as great as other decks are vs Warlock. A big problem is that even if you get them down to 1-2HP, Druid doesn't have a single way to deal damage from hand via spells. So if you don't kill them by turn 8 and they get to clear your board it is game over. On the positive side, one of Warlock's best removal card, Hysteria, is quite innocuous in this matchup
As an aside an completely sort of unrelated to this post, does anyone know why Mindrender Illucia was nerfed? She's difficult to play, very situational and ( as far as I'm aware) no one was complaining about her when she got nerfed. The stats to mana ratio are now terrible (as they were before the nerf) and most of the cards you would want to be able to play are often now out of reach given the mana cost.
It seems wierd that TIckatus has survived without intervention and lots of people hate it yet she got nerfed out of the blue when no one expected it (and could be a reasonable counter to Tickatus)
Illucia was designed as a late-game disruption card, but at 2 mana many players would play it versus aggro on t2, followed by playing the opponent's Coin + some 1-drop. Then the aggro player would effectively be stuck with a useless hand on turn 2 that is probably full of expensive removal spells meaning he had no way to continue developing tempo and come back on t3 to a hand that is already missing some resources. Such a play was often game-ending at t2 and the devs thought that this was not the way Illucia was intended to be used when designed
Surely that can't be the genuine reason? Players thinking about other uses of cards that aren't what was intended!! And what's more, there's abosultely no way you could play around that either going second with the coin...none at all....\s. Imagine your opponents card messing up your game plan....it's just bloody rude!
p.s. Even though I tend to play Priest, I actually don't like the design of Illucia for Hearthstone for the same reasons I don't like Tickatus and Glide (no real way to play around it and not very fun). It just seems wierd they targeted an underwhelming, niche card no one was complaining about.
@Malfurius: Reality check: 'free' hsreplay stats from bronze to gold games do not translate to real world stats and power level of decks
@Aegis24: Token Druid vs Warlock is a bit of a tricky matchup the main problem is that you cannot auto-win with an early Gibberling or Glowfly Swarm turn due to School Spirits. So you need to wait till you can buff your board out of reach with something like Power of the Wild or Soul of the Forest, the latter being the best option as it also protects you against Twisting Nether as well. I went 5-3 with Token Druid vs Warlock and it felt that it is a slightly favorable matchup but not as great as other decks are vs Warlock. A big problem is that even if you get them down to 1-2HP, Druid doesn't have a single way to deal damage from hand via spells. So if you don't kill them by turn 8 and they get to clear your board it is game over. On the positive side, one of Warlock's best removal card, Hysteria, is quite innocuous in this matchup
You have to tune your token druid accordingly. Think of ways to put in some finishers. After I did that, my WR went way up against mages and warlocks… get their health down early with tokens, but as it gets harder to keep your board from dying around turn 7 (mage flame strike) or 8 (warlock twisting nether), you put some alternate ways of finishing them off. These changes got me out of the D5-D1 and into legend.
Most players have a difficult time playing control decks well, as they tend to go for the Stall gameplan everytime which is not the plan you should choose against a greedy high end control deck or a control, specially ones with an Inevitable plan. You need to put pressure on them to disrupt their plan. Tick is not the first of their kind and all past instances of this gameplan also a bunch whiners complaining about it just as much as right now.
Rock paper scissors. Deck that beats aggro/midrange tends to lose to control which tends to lose to aggro
name me current example, or stop just saying words without thinking
I think they're just speaking conceptually. In terms of how metas normally operate, they're not completely incorrect. Control has the board clears and sustain to deal with aggro > Combo has the finishers to destroy control > Aggro wins too early for combo to deal with. That's just how it *would* be.
Granted in standard right now Control appears to be "not doing well", though Clown Druid (is that a control deck?) and Control Warlock are tier 2 with positive winrates, so there's something at least. From what I can tell, it's just because most control classes don't have "good enough" control tools to compete with how good aggro is at the moment. I'd say we buff up some of the weaker/lackluster control cards that classes aren't playing/have low "played" winrates to give control a better fighting chance.
That being said, a lot of people in the thread have pointed out personal experiences playing their own control brews with relative success - which leads me to believe that things aren't as bad as people are saying it is.
@Malfurius: Reality check: 'free' hsreplay stats from bronze to gold games do not translate to real world stats and power level of decks
@Aegis24: Token Druid vs Warlock is a bit of a tricky matchup the main problem is that you cannot auto-win with an early Gibberling or Glowfly Swarm turn due to School Spirits. So you need to wait till you can buff your board out of reach with something like Power of the Wild or Soul of the Forest, the latter being the best option as it also protects you against Twisting Nether as well. I went 5-3 with Token Druid vs Warlock and it felt that it is a slightly favorable matchup but not as great as other decks are vs Warlock. A big problem is that even if you get them down to 1-2HP, Druid doesn't have a single way to deal damage from hand via spells. So if you don't kill them by turn 8 and they get to clear your board it is game over. On the positive side, one of Warlock's best removal card, Hysteria, is quite innocuous in this matchup
You have to tune your token druid accordingly. Think of ways to put in some finishers. After I did that, my WR went way up against mages and warlocks… get their health down early with tokens, but as it gets harder to keep your board from dying around turn 7 (mage flame strike) or 8 (warlock twisting nether), you put some alternate ways of finishing them off. These changes got me out of the D5-D1 and into legend.
Sure, the deck is good enough for climbing to legend, but the problem is that there are literally no possible finishers in some cases. With the loss of Swipe and other direct damage spells, the only source of direct damage left to Druid comes from hero attacks (a bunch of spells that give anything between +2 and +4 attack to your hero), which means that a board clear + a big taunt completely shut down token druid, even if the enemy is left with 1HP
Rock paper scissors. Deck that beats aggro/midrange tends to lose to control which tends to lose to aggro
name me current example, or stop just saying words without thinking
I think they're just speaking conceptually. In terms of how metas normally operate, they're not completely incorrect. Control has the board clears and sustain to deal with aggro > Combo has the finishers to destroy control > Aggro wins too early for combo to deal with. That's just how it *would* be.
Granted in standard right now Control appears to be "not doing well", though Clown Druid (is that a control deck?) and Control Warlock are tier 2 with positive winrates, so there's something at least. From what I can tell, it's just because most control classes don't have "good enough" control tools to compete with how good aggro is at the moment. I'd say we buff up some of the weaker/lackluster control cards that classes aren't playing/have low "played" winrates to give control a better fighting chance.
That being said, a lot of people in the thread have pointed out personal experiences playing their own control brews with relative success - which leads me to believe that things aren't as bad as people are saying it is.
yes that is my point, they are not thinking before they are talking...
Of all the threads with complainers and complainers complaining about the complains there are two steady, rock solid asumptions.
You complain about complainers: signal: I am good at the game.
The meta is constructed by the player base.
About the first. Signaling to be on the bandwagon of Blizzard gives a natural ego boost. Residing with the devs, the ones in power runs a deep history not seldom to be exposed as collaborators with the enemy.
The second one is more interesting. The assumption that the base is constructing the meta, is as deep and well entrenched. The devs premeditates the meta, the base just executes it. Thinking to the contrary have far reaching consequences for the quality of comments as it assumes that complaining about the meta signals bad play, unrefined decks etc. Further consequence is that comments and evaluations of cards are subpar at best, but brought as 'this is how it works'. Even being a mediocre player and the right net deck legend is within grasp. It blurs a good analysis of political cards like Tickatus and other meta defining cards from days past.
False. No matter how many times this lie is repeated, saying it doesn't make it so.
I will admit saying it probably convinces a bunch of players to whine without trying for themselves, but I have made it my business to get a statistically significant sample size this meta, and in my case, the matchup in question is Silas OTK Warrior vs. Tick Lock.
So far, 90 matchups in the Barrens meta, and the record stands at 57-34.
For those who insist they can't play control or combo against Tickatus, make sure you aren't one of the MANY players I've run into on ladder who has the win completely sewn up and walk into Tickatus milling your C'thun when you didn't have to. I've collected 5 replays now where mage players with all 4 C'thun pieces refuse to do the obvious thing that guarantees a win, instead completing C'thun with 5-8 cards left in the deck and giving me a better than 50-50 chance to mill the finished product. For the record, if you find yourself in that position, hold your last card draw (arcane int, cram session, refreshing spring water, etc), complete the C'thun after drawing the remains of your deck, and make sure you get him in your hand on the same turn. If you've properly managed the rest of your deck's resources, you'll be able to either wipe the board or get the Lock's minions down to low enough health that C'thun should punch thru for lethal.
And yes, I'm fully aware there will be plenty of times when you don't have all 4 C'thun pieces collected before the Tick gets played. However, if you're going to misplay the times when you get them all, what does it matter whether they get milled or just horribly misplayed? The result will be the same.
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.
Well, of course there are ways to mitigate Tickatus, and I'm impressed that you can keep a positive winrate with otk warrior, but that may just be a case where you are simply a better player than your opponent. in your 57 wins, how often did you win with your actual combo though ? That's what I'd like to know. Maybe your deck is naturally strong against control warlock, regardless of the OTK package. It's a genuine question I've no idea what otk warrior looks like.
My point is, I agree with you Tickatus isn't worthy of a nerf, but it is still very much designed to target and cancel decks such as yours or C'thun decks, and it will succeed often against slow decks, you can't just put all the blame on the player's skill.
I think we are in the same situation as pre-nerf Barnes. Card was fine statistically, but it was still causing a real sense of frustration and helplessness when it worked, and the community felt that it was working too consistently and shaping the meta in a way they disliked, so Blizzard nerfed Barnes anyway, despite being a balanced card. I forsee the same future for Tickatus.
And I honestly don't care, I like Tickatus, it's fun to play, but if I can't get cheap free wins against greedy or combo decks as a control deck anymore, then fine, I should'nt be able to anyway, OTK warrior should beat control warlock 80-20, not 57-34.
He keeps bring up this deck but it’s a combo deck, and contrary to what people say tickatus and warlock in general are not anti combo, they’re anti control. It’s too reactive of a deck to do much against a combo deck with decent cycling. His success is not evident of control’s viability, it’s simply showing that combo decks are favored against control decks.
Tickatus Warlock is a bad deck period. It is a poor excuse of a control deck that loses to what control decks are supposed to beat, namely aggro (Hunter destroys them, but Token Druid and Secret Paladin also do very well). It also loses badly to any mid-range tempo deck that has ways of developing a board (stuff like Rush Warrior, Miracle Rogue, Mid-range Demon Hunter). It loses even more easily to combo decks like Il'Gynoth OTK Demon Hunter or Alex/Tenwu combo Rogue as it has no tools to disrupt their game plan for the first 7-8 turns and Tickatus himself comes too late at a moment when most combo decks have already assembled the full combo in hand (or perhaps already killed the Warlock). It only beats Priests right now and scores 50% in the mirrors. These are by the way the only matchups where Tickatus himself is a useful card, in every other instance where he is played (corrupted) versus another deck, it is a win-more move and the game was already decided 99% of the time.
Now the reason Tickatus Warlock is a bad control deck is because it has inadequate healing (a few spells that heal for 3 and whatever soul fragments you draw - while you often have to take damage from your hero power as the deck has effectively no other source of card draw) and all its removal is reactive. You can see how the healing is inadequate in the matchup against Hunter. Warlock keeps trying to remove the minions that hunter drops turn after turn, while the hunter keeps chipping away at the Warlock's health and eventually kills them usually around turn 7 or 8.
In comparison, Priest is a great control class as it has a ton of healing (0-mana heal 5, 1-mana heal 5, 1 mana heal-3 discover a spell, a combo with Samuro and Apotheosis that can often heal for 20+ and a lot more stuff) and it also has some proactive removal tools (the Samuro combo mentioned earlier as well as a cheap heal spell in Xyrella) which remove the enemy board while developing some stats
Warrior is the other class that has the potential to be good in control, but since the last rotation lost a lot of its ability to gain armor (which is effectively healing). But it could take as little as a buff to Rancor (which is currently quite situational for a 4-mana spell) to make Control Warrior viable again.
TL;DR: Tickatus Warlock sucks, control is not dead, but is currently restricted to priest
Aegis, the vast majority of griping about Tickatus lumps combo and control decks together in the "strangled by the Tick" category. Several people have argued that Tickatus is MORE deadly to combo than control, so take that argument up with them.
@PetiteMouche
The answer to your question is a little nuanced. I often end up dealing lethal damage with the combo, but it's rarely the 20-30 damage OTK that the deck is designed to deliver. More often, Warlock gets itself down to lower life totals, thus making the finisher a little easier. Aegis brought up the distinction between combo and control, but with warrior especially, the game is played as a control matchup right up until the final turn most games.
For the record, the OTK is getting armor equal to or greater than opponent's life total, playing Soulbound Ashtongue, playing Silas Darkmoon to give the Ashtongue to your opponent, and shield slamming the Ashtongue to deal a one punch death to the opponent.
I only run one copy of Silas and Ashtongue (2 slams obviously), but one could significantly reduce the danger of the Tick by adding a 2nd Ashtongue if one was inclined. I don't do that, but I do assume that every warlock I meet is playing the Tick, and thus mulligan solely for combo pieces. The vast majority of wins are eventually achieved thru the combo, even if the slams generally aren't for as much damage than in other matchups.
On the subject of the feel of the meta, you're probably right, but that's why I keep posting my success with Silas Warrior. People keep making the blanket statement that control and/or combo decks are being strangled by Tickatus. It is my belief that they base this statement either on the current "played" stats on the ladder via V Syndicate or HSReplay OR on looking at Tickatus and assuming that control decks can't stand up to it.
What I'm almost certain they AREN'T basing that claim on is lived experience. I'm a fairly good player, and I rarely make game-swinging mistakes anymore, but even so, there is enough leeway in my win rate against the Tick for me to believe that the average player can at least break even against supposedly the worst matchup in the meta. However, just like with the folks who are clamoring for more nerfs to everything from Tickatus to Quick Shot, people would rather receive a wrote opinion from others about the control vs Tick state of affairs than learn for themselves it's not that bad.
Finally, the reason I brought up the replays where folks make catastrophic and easy-to-spot mistakes is that some people would be better served actually working on their play rather than sharpening their troll skills on Hearthpwn. When a group is complaining so fiercely about a balance issue, but there is serious question whether the player base even grasps how to play the matchup correctly, perhaps balance isn't the most pressing issue. Anyone can ultimately fall back to "it's no fun to play" or "It doesn't let me play my fun decks" and that's obviously an unanswerable opinion, but we can have that discussion as soon as folks back off from the balance claims. They just don't have merit.
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.
Reality check:
Tickatus Warlock is #4 class, just below the top tier right now (top 3 Pally, Hunter, Rush Warrior). Priest is dead last. Source: hsreplay.
Tick is a horrible card, should never of been made. Make it discard 3 cards maybe then id say its balanced.
I'm currently rocking control rogue lol. C'thun rogue alive and well. Does well against a lot of stuff in the meta
It’s not a bad deck, control just isn’t what it used to be. Face decks are far more powerful now and the power creep hasn’t been the same for control. And from personal experience, if you play token druid against it and you don’t have a good board by turn 4 you just lose. Their removal becomes really good after that and they can just stall you out. Soul fragments are incredibly powerful healing, just slow. I’ve done like 60 damage to a warlock and still lost the game. That being what it is I disagree with you that it loses to midrange, and it certainly stomps priest.
@Malfurius: Reality check: 'free' hsreplay stats from bronze to gold games do not translate to real world stats and power level of decks
@Aegis24: Token Druid vs Warlock is a bit of a tricky matchup the main problem is that you cannot auto-win with an early Gibberling or Glowfly Swarm turn due to School Spirits. So you need to wait till you can buff your board out of reach with something like Power of the Wild or Soul of the Forest, the latter being the best option as it also protects you against Twisting Nether as well. I went 5-3 with Token Druid vs Warlock and it felt that it is a slightly favorable matchup but not as great as other decks are vs Warlock. A big problem is that even if you get them down to 1-2HP, Druid doesn't have a single way to deal damage from hand via spells. So if you don't kill them by turn 8 and they get to clear your board it is game over. On the positive side, one of Warlock's best removal card, Hysteria, is quite innocuous in this matchup
Surely that can't be the genuine reason? Players thinking about other uses of cards that aren't what was intended!! And what's more, there's abosultely no way you could play around that either going second with the coin...none at all....\s. Imagine your opponents card messing up your game plan....it's just bloody rude!
p.s. Even though I tend to play Priest, I actually don't like the design of Illucia for Hearthstone for the same reasons I don't like Tickatus and Glide (no real way to play around it and not very fun). It just seems wierd they targeted an underwhelming, niche card no one was complaining about.
You have to tune your token druid accordingly. Think of ways to put in some finishers. After I did that, my WR went way up against mages and warlocks… get their health down early with tokens, but as it gets harder to keep your board from dying around turn 7 (mage flame strike) or 8 (warlock twisting nether), you put some alternate ways of finishing them off. These changes got me out of the D5-D1 and into legend.
Most players have a difficult time playing control decks well, as they tend to go for the Stall gameplan everytime which is not the plan you should choose against a greedy high end control deck or a control, specially ones with an Inevitable plan. You need to put pressure on them to disrupt their plan. Tick is not the first of their kind and all past instances of this gameplan also a bunch whiners complaining about it just as much as right now.
name me current example, or stop just saying words without thinking
I think they're just speaking conceptually. In terms of how metas normally operate, they're not completely incorrect.
Control has the board clears and sustain to deal with aggro > Combo has the finishers to destroy control > Aggro wins too early for combo to deal with. That's just how it *would* be.
Granted in standard right now Control appears to be "not doing well", though Clown Druid (is that a control deck?) and Control Warlock are tier 2 with positive winrates, so there's something at least. From what I can tell, it's just because most control classes don't have "good enough" control tools to compete with how good aggro is at the moment. I'd say we buff up some of the weaker/lackluster control cards that classes aren't playing/have low "played" winrates to give control a better fighting chance.
That being said, a lot of people in the thread have pointed out personal experiences playing their own control brews with relative success - which leads me to believe that things aren't as bad as people are saying it is.
please don't bully my son
Sure, the deck is good enough for climbing to legend, but the problem is that there are literally no possible finishers in some cases. With the loss of Swipe and other direct damage spells, the only source of direct damage left to Druid comes from hero attacks (a bunch of spells that give anything between +2 and +4 attack to your hero), which means that a board clear + a big taunt completely shut down token druid, even if the enemy is left with 1HP
yes that is my point, they are not thinking before they are talking...
Thats why i play wild ;)
Of all the threads with complainers and complainers complaining about the complains there are two steady, rock solid asumptions.
About the first. Signaling to be on the bandwagon of Blizzard gives a natural ego boost. Residing with the devs, the ones in power runs a deep history not seldom to be exposed as collaborators with the enemy.
The second one is more interesting. The assumption that the base is constructing the meta, is as deep and well entrenched. The devs premeditates the meta, the base just executes it. Thinking to the contrary have far reaching consequences for the quality of comments as it assumes that complaining about the meta signals bad play, unrefined decks etc. Further consequence is that comments and evaluations of cards are subpar at best, but brought as 'this is how it works'. Even being a mediocre player and the right net deck legend is within grasp. It blurs a good analysis of political cards like Tickatus and other meta defining cards from days past.
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