I'm gonna put my hands up real fast and make a quick disclaimer: I'm only here because I like discussing card/game design and I'm an advocate for what Tickatus as a card stands for; I don't play Warlock and I haven't enjoyed playing control(?) since Cube Hunter rotated.
That being said, the only person I saw addressing me directly, Carfusso, you're alright. I do wish you'd refrain from using some specific words when you make jabs at Tick, but I'll also say be as unkind to him as you want, he's a playing card. Just please be a little gentler for your readers, you never know who'll see that. Okay! I certainly agree that Fatigue is a great mechanic, and I do really fondly remember the card draw decision points back when it was more relevant to me as a player, it really felt skill intensive when I was making decisions. The more cards they make that cause Fatigue to matter less, the slightly crankier I get that a cool and skill challenging mechanic is being overwritten. I will say however that there does appear to be a huge bias against mill as a concept/mechanic that you have, that would make this conversation more difficult.
I simply don't have the power or time to convince anybody to change their minds about anything, I simply have my opinions and like to share them. Perhaps Tickatus being a card that packs as much power as it does is an issue, and the cards that exist around Tick certainly offer to pull or push him to a greater power level. But is there really no salvation for this? I don't want to tell anybody to do anything, and I refuse to glean any judgements about skill because of negative reactions to a card. Highlander Druid can shuffle what, 14? 18? Cards into your deck by playing and copying Ysera Unleashed. So there's at least 1 deck you can pick if you like control and hate Tick.
We'll be seeing the biggest changes in Hearthstone at the end of the month. I don't really feel Tick is a problem enough card that they'd change him until after Forged in the Barrens comes out if he continues posing an issue, though that's the real crux of my problem with stat-based arguments in this discussion; Tickatus isn't a problem in the case of win rates. He's played in a low tier-2 deck, sitting with all of the other control decks in that tier. The reason this is isn't even really related to Tick at all, it's because aggro (and one midrange list) decks are all at the tip-top, and speed shuts down greedy Galakrond Warlock.
There's an undeniable feelbad about losing cards in your deck, and I understand better that a larger part of the issue is that it's sourced from one card. I do feel that it's polarized when we get to this point, because it's either 1 card, multiple cards, or no cards. I'm sure most people who hate Tick would advocate for their being no cards that do this, which I understand. In my opinion, as someone who wants mill as an answer to control decks, it's probably better if it's just Tickatus. It would be way worse if a person was running anywhere from 2 to 5 mill cards in their deck, assuming Blizzard wanted it so bad they made a few cards to support it.
And as a final aside about LoR, a game I absolutely adore; currently a control deck is running around being very successful, using Lissandra and Trundle to generate multiple 8+ cost units to either threaten lethal with powerful trample/overwhelm units, or beat control matchups by cheating the Watcher out of their hand somehow. It uses board wipes and attack reduction effects to stay alive and control the board in the mean time. It's about as controlly as the game gets, in my opinion, and I also play casually. If anybody's curious, I play Deep Sea Monsters with Nautilus because big numbers make me smile.
If you have a problem with Tickatus you are simply incompetent, the current meta is really diverse and probably the best it's gonna be for a while since after rotation there will be less cards and less decks with only a few dominating. So stop complaining and enjoy it!
Ahh yes, the obligatory "git gud" post. Which completely failed to mention the fact the warlock has clears and health gain for days, as well as not mentioning the lock gets to play everything again for free with Yshaarj. Such a dumb card. That's my main problem, its just a dumb card and feels shitty when your opponent burns several of your cards and can refill with primes lol. Looking forward to tge nerf.
I agree, posts like this are reductive and don't actually contribute to conversations. It's not right to make judgement calls about a person or their skills simply because they like/dislike a card.
If instead, Warlock was given a suite of cards that did what Tickatus did, would that be an improvement? I think that it being a single card is what makes it far more safe than the alternative, honestly, I don't really understand what you mean by that.
Angry or not, it's awful and reprehensible to say things like that to people because you're mad about a card game. Please get some perspective and take a break if Hearthstone is making you that angry.
Tickatus threads are becoming really grating to me, honestly. Control decks having a win condition against other control decks is GOOD and NECESSARY for the game. The fact that we've gone for like 3 years with control decks only winning through attrition is not a good thing, and has lead to a weird sense of entitlement in control players, who expect that every game the play lasts for 40 minutes and drags to 10 fatigue AT LEAST (I'm projecting here, this obviously isn't true).
Decks having bad/polarizing matchups is also a normal and healthy thing for card games. Tickatus Warlock is good against Control decks. Control decks are bad against Tickatus Warlock. The Earth spins on its axis and plants photosynthesize to make oxygen. There's apparently now a deck, which is a control deck, and has a favorable matchup against Tickatus Warlock. You can choose to play that if you're desperately attached to playing Control Decks, or you can change pace entirely and play aggro (God forbid) to just bully greedy control/combo decks (which is something Tickatus was designed to do).
I understand the frustration of getting milled. It's a bad feeling, and it's the reason that Pot of Desires is such a polarizing subject in YuGiOh to this day. Magic players also hate being milled. Legends of Runeterra recently has had very grindy control decks pop up recently (with a win condition other than attrition, please take notes Hearthstone) and hey, it has a hard matchup against the one champion that can mill their deck from X to 4. Maybe Tick should have his stats toned down, but ultimately I think his effect is important for the game.
I think Tick is fine. I understand that it feels bad to have cards in your deck messed with, cards you want to play or cards you might need. It's a solid late game card that actually presents a threat to Control decks by denying them resources. Control players don't like being told "no" by anything, be it successful aggro strategies or mill strategies, so it makes people really salty when they can't do what they want to.
There *needs* to be cards like this to give an option to counter combos and present a win condition against control matchups.
edit: alright now that I've read the whole thread I have more thoughts.
A lot of people I saw comparing Tickatus to Coldlight Oracle and there's a reason those two aren't the same, and Coldlight being HoF'd and Tick being printed is not hypocrisy. Coldlight not only milled the opponent, but it also drew the Mill Player into answers because the draw effect was symmetrical. A Mill player would then draw into more bounce enablers and defensive cards, and was extremely difficult to play against. Tick just mills 5 cards the one time and is an 8/8 that provides no advantage when played. Players often make more Tickituses (Tickiti? Tickipeople?), but the amount of setup required to do so takes a long time and is easily punished via board presence. There's no real comparison, it's apples to oranges.
And other people are saying they preferred Rin, the First Disciple over Tick. Of course you did! Rin is really, really bad compared to Tick. First, Rin has to die. Next, you need to invest how much mana? 20? 25? In these mana sink cards that summoned dinky demons and ate board clears, then you played the big guy who ate the deck. But the deck gets ate so late in the game that it only eats like, 8 cards. Usually less. Tick is a faster version of that, they do essentially the same thing. What's nice about Rin is she gives you cards to play that aren't your precious board clears, so the mana sink is valuable, but the final effect, the talking point here, isn't good. It wasn't even that good in K&C, where Death Knights and Voidlord were kings.
If you're losing to Tick, I don't know what to tell you. Play more aggressively in the Control Matchup to threaten them and limit use of the button. Don't give them room to play their stupid do-nothing card. I don't usually play Control, I'm busy and work a lot during the day, so long control games are exhausting and unsatisfying to me. We're getting big news tomorrow and big changes a month later. Let's see where things go.
I'm gonna put my hands up real fast and make a quick disclaimer:
I'm only here because I like discussing card/game design and I'm an advocate for what Tickatus as a card stands for; I don't play Warlock and I haven't enjoyed playing control(?) since Cube Hunter rotated.
That being said, the only person I saw addressing me directly, Carfusso, you're alright. I do wish you'd refrain from using some specific words when you make jabs at Tick, but I'll also say be as unkind to him as you want, he's a playing card. Just please be a little gentler for your readers, you never know who'll see that.
Okay! I certainly agree that Fatigue is a great mechanic, and I do really fondly remember the card draw decision points back when it was more relevant to me as a player, it really felt skill intensive when I was making decisions. The more cards they make that cause Fatigue to matter less, the slightly crankier I get that a cool and skill challenging mechanic is being overwritten. I will say however that there does appear to be a huge bias against mill as a concept/mechanic that you have, that would make this conversation more difficult.
I simply don't have the power or time to convince anybody to change their minds about anything, I simply have my opinions and like to share them. Perhaps Tickatus being a card that packs as much power as it does is an issue, and the cards that exist around Tick certainly offer to pull or push him to a greater power level. But is there really no salvation for this?
I don't want to tell anybody to do anything, and I refuse to glean any judgements about skill because of negative reactions to a card. Highlander Druid can shuffle what, 14? 18? Cards into your deck by playing and copying Ysera Unleashed. So there's at least 1 deck you can pick if you like control and hate Tick.
We'll be seeing the biggest changes in Hearthstone at the end of the month. I don't really feel Tick is a problem enough card that they'd change him until after Forged in the Barrens comes out if he continues posing an issue, though that's the real crux of my problem with stat-based arguments in this discussion; Tickatus isn't a problem in the case of win rates. He's played in a low tier-2 deck, sitting with all of the other control decks in that tier. The reason this is isn't even really related to Tick at all, it's because aggro (and one midrange list) decks are all at the tip-top, and speed shuts down greedy Galakrond Warlock.
There's an undeniable feelbad about losing cards in your deck, and I understand better that a larger part of the issue is that it's sourced from one card. I do feel that it's polarized when we get to this point, because it's either 1 card, multiple cards, or no cards. I'm sure most people who hate Tick would advocate for their being no cards that do this, which I understand. In my opinion, as someone who wants mill as an answer to control decks, it's probably better if it's just Tickatus. It would be way worse if a person was running anywhere from 2 to 5 mill cards in their deck, assuming Blizzard wanted it so bad they made a few cards to support it.
And as a final aside about LoR, a game I absolutely adore; currently a control deck is running around being very successful, using Lissandra and Trundle to generate multiple 8+ cost units to either threaten lethal with powerful trample/overwhelm units, or beat control matchups by cheating the Watcher out of their hand somehow. It uses board wipes and attack reduction effects to stay alive and control the board in the mean time. It's about as controlly as the game gets, in my opinion, and I also play casually. If anybody's curious, I play Deep Sea Monsters with Nautilus because big numbers make me smile.
please don't bully my son
I agree, posts like this are reductive and don't actually contribute to conversations. It's not right to make judgement calls about a person or their skills simply because they like/dislike a card.
please don't bully my son
If instead, Warlock was given a suite of cards that did what Tickatus did, would that be an improvement?
I think that it being a single card is what makes it far more safe than the alternative, honestly, I don't really understand what you mean by that.
please don't bully my son
Angry or not, it's awful and reprehensible to say things like that to people because you're mad about a card game. Please get some perspective and take a break if Hearthstone is making you that angry.
Tickatus threads are becoming really grating to me, honestly. Control decks having a win condition against other control decks is GOOD and NECESSARY for the game. The fact that we've gone for like 3 years with control decks only winning through attrition is not a good thing, and has lead to a weird sense of entitlement in control players, who expect that every game the play lasts for 40 minutes and drags to 10 fatigue AT LEAST (I'm projecting here, this obviously isn't true).
Decks having bad/polarizing matchups is also a normal and healthy thing for card games. Tickatus Warlock is good against Control decks. Control decks are bad against Tickatus Warlock. The Earth spins on its axis and plants photosynthesize to make oxygen. There's apparently now a deck, which is a control deck, and has a favorable matchup against Tickatus Warlock. You can choose to play that if you're desperately attached to playing Control Decks, or you can change pace entirely and play aggro (God forbid) to just bully greedy control/combo decks (which is something Tickatus was designed to do).
I understand the frustration of getting milled. It's a bad feeling, and it's the reason that Pot of Desires is such a polarizing subject in YuGiOh to this day. Magic players also hate being milled. Legends of Runeterra recently has had very grindy control decks pop up recently (with a win condition other than attrition, please take notes Hearthstone) and hey, it has a hard matchup against the one champion that can mill their deck from X to 4. Maybe Tick should have his stats toned down, but ultimately I think his effect is important for the game.
please don't bully my son
I think Tick is fine. I understand that it feels bad to have cards in your deck messed with, cards you want to play or cards you might need. It's a solid late game card that actually presents a threat to Control decks by denying them resources. Control players don't like being told "no" by anything, be it successful aggro strategies or mill strategies, so it makes people really salty when they can't do what they want to.
There *needs* to be cards like this to give an option to counter combos and present a win condition against control matchups.
edit: alright now that I've read the whole thread I have more thoughts.
A lot of people I saw comparing Tickatus to Coldlight Oracle and there's a reason those two aren't the same, and Coldlight being HoF'd and Tick being printed is not hypocrisy. Coldlight not only milled the opponent, but it also drew the Mill Player into answers because the draw effect was symmetrical. A Mill player would then draw into more bounce enablers and defensive cards, and was extremely difficult to play against. Tick just mills 5 cards the one time and is an 8/8 that provides no advantage when played. Players often make more Tickituses (Tickiti? Tickipeople?), but the amount of setup required to do so takes a long time and is easily punished via board presence. There's no real comparison, it's apples to oranges.
And other people are saying they preferred Rin, the First Disciple over Tick. Of course you did! Rin is really, really bad compared to Tick. First, Rin has to die. Next, you need to invest how much mana? 20? 25? In these mana sink cards that summoned dinky demons and ate board clears, then you played the big guy who ate the deck. But the deck gets ate so late in the game that it only eats like, 8 cards. Usually less. Tick is a faster version of that, they do essentially the same thing. What's nice about Rin is she gives you cards to play that aren't your precious board clears, so the mana sink is valuable, but the final effect, the talking point here, isn't good. It wasn't even that good in K&C, where Death Knights and Voidlord were kings.
If you're losing to Tick, I don't know what to tell you. Play more aggressively in the Control Matchup to threaten them and limit use of the button. Don't give them room to play their stupid do-nothing card. I don't usually play Control, I'm busy and work a lot during the day, so long control games are exhausting and unsatisfying to me. We're getting big news tomorrow and big changes a month later. Let's see where things go.
please don't bully my son