Hearthpwn

Quote from C_A_W >>

I am glad that we didn't get characters like Mecha Jaraxxus as legendary and instead got iconic TBC raid bosses as legendaries. Last year was full of HS originals. 

I agree that raid bosses do make better cards, but from a story point of view it made little sense to have your big bad villain which was the main focus of the single player made not impact on the main set of cards. Even if he was not a legendary, he could have had a card referenced to him. 

Like Imagine have Rafaam not become a card in the whole Year of the dragon, yet constantly be the villain in the single players. Thematically it makes not a huge amount of sense. 

What made it amazing:

1: The story and characters were really good: 

I thing it was one of the best solo adventure story wise in a while when it came to single player content. With dungeon runs the story seems to be told alot less in chronological order and it is not until the last boss you start to understand what the full story is about. However, Trial by felfire felt really easy to follow and had a really nice set of characters that upgraded over time which felt like you were going on an adventure with them. I would rate the story a (8/10) 

2: It was Free and Felt like it had some different levels of challenges:

Being F2P I was happy to see the adventure was free and I could save a large amount of my gold. The difficult level in both the story and challenge side of the adventure felt pretty fair and had some range of easier to harder bosses which required some thinking, however did not live up the expectations of a final boss in a dungeon run. I would rate the hardness of the adventure a (6/10)

3: It felt like it had a good level of content:

When looking at the whole adventure, there are 26 bosses in both modes which was REALLY pretty good! Plus apart from a few, every boss was original and had different hero powers in both modes which made each fight feel different and fresh. For a free adventure, I would say 26 bosses is a Really generous amount, not as good as a Dungeon run, but compared to other free adventures with only half the amount of bosses, I will have to give the rating for content a solid (7/10).

4: Those sick Rhymes

When you feeling down, Illidan will turn that frown upside down! I rate his mad songs, 100/10

What made it feel bad:

1: Most of the Adventure used premade decks which felt kind of boring:

The whole adventure was just playing hunter and demon hunter cards basically and it felt a bit stale after a while, especially when your deck just become 100% Demon hunter cards. I think pre-made decks are fine every now and then, but how the deck changed everything single encounter and without knowing what was in my deck, it felt like some boss encounters I won just as I was like "Oh I have an animal companion in my deck" or "Oh I just top decked a demon hunter card I did not know I had".  I think the fun and replay-ability of a dungeon run is alot more than a pre made deck adventure,  I think the challenge mode when you make your own decks is more re-playable so I will rate is a for replay-ability 4/10.

Challenge mode was fun (ish) but Standard Ladder decks crushed the full fun:

When Quest priest was winning 7 out of 9 of the challenges without a single decision to make, you know there is a problem. Normally you have to make really quirky decks to beat heroic bosses, but the challenge mode let it down this time. The bosses thematically were really cool, but the power of just a normal netdeck just felt like it took away the fun. Why would I made a quirky deck, when control priest won me the game every time within 15 mins? I rate the creative aspects of the challenge mode a 5/10 

The story and flavor was not upheld in the expansion, but was in the adventure: 

I said it once, but will say it again overall THE ADVENTURE HAS GREAT STORY TELLING! However,I think this may be one of the weakest expansions when it comes to flavor and story telling apart from Primes. Like Why was Mecha Jaraxxus not a card, but was the main Villain of the single player? Imprisoned demons felt weak and the single player expansion never really explained why on earth they were imprisoned or any significant to them being imprisoned which lacked flavor from the main set, Lady Vashj played a heavy overload deck mostly in the single player, but main theme for her and shaman in the expansion was Spells, which made zero sense? Wild cards were not allowed, but nearly every boss played wild cards which again felt unfair a bit, Illidan was the end boss of BOTH of the adventures which felt a little repetitive just to fight a demon hunter twice as the end boss and many more things which kind of did not really get explained or made sense from a story or flavor point of view between the expansion and adventure. Overall I would link the story telling from both of the expansion and adventure with a 3/10.

Overall I would rate the entire Adventure a 6/10. It had ALOT of good parts and good aspects, but Just too much bought it down IMO to really be classed as much above average. I hope they take all the good parts and make the next adventure even better. With Harder bosses, better flavor linked between the expansion and adventure and More deck building challenges etc