Amazing thing just happened. I was playing my Summoning Stone Mage deck in Wild and beat my Dragon Priest opponent on ladder due to some awesome summons and a well timed Primordial Glyph, not to mention he broke my Ice Block and I bluffed putting on a second one (when in reality it was Ice Barrier). He concedes and immediately adds me before the match is over. I reluctantly accepted, ready to be chewed out about RNG - here is where the amazing part comes to play - but he actually was civil and complemented my deck!
Did this one guy just restore my faith in humanity, Hearthstone Community? Well at least for the day.
2
You'd think that, naturally, but Face Shaman relies on minions that are either above curve already (Totem Golem, Flamewreathed Faceless) or cards that buff themselves or other cards (Tunnel Trogg, Flametongue Totem). Evolving these cards into baseline cards that don't get their battlecry will have as much chance of making them weaker as it does to improve them.
1
Meh. Deathlord doesn't stop Pirates from stomping over you a lot of the time and I imagine this would be a similar story. The 1-attack really lets it down. You can buff it with a Mark but still... It'll be in the "annoying but not usually effective" category.
1
I like this card. The stats are great, the effect is unique, useful and gives it a lot of character. I don't think it'll see too much play in constructed but I think it's more than reasonable for arena.
-7
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
Horrendous card, which will still win games it shouldn't. Seems to be the theme of the set.
3
Urgh. I figured they'd have learned from Jade Idol to not print cards that just mean you can never fatigue. Really sucks.
1
I'm not sure Anomolus would work. It would work in Magic the Gathering because of last known information, but in Hearthstone Anomolus will be off the board prior to its Deathrattle trigger resolving so I'm not sure if the lifelink would trigger too? Think poisonous + fiery bat, which would also work in MtG but doesn't in HS.
I still think the card is good. If you have any elementals out at all then it turns into a massive lifeswing and if you get the turn back afterwards there's no way an aggro deck can ever win, barring going face and praying. Also, the card actually costs 5, you just have to pay for the Water Elemental too.
6
I'm against this nerf (not that it matters; Blizzard have announced it and they're not going to change now), but what I really don't get is the line of talk in this thread about how the deck is "hard to interact with" or "boring to play with".
Quest Rogue, in its current form, is one of the most tricky decks to pilot I've seen in Hearthstone. Ok, you occasionally get the absolute nuts hand with both Shadowsteps, a Prep and stuff and go off on turn 4. That's no different from how often you got the Tunnel Trogg -> Totem Golem -> Totem Golem line in Shaman last year, and both of these could still lose games; I lost to Druid last night with a nuts hand because he had 10 power on board at the end of his turn 2. Most games though, you don't get these insane hands and you need to work how the path to victory, using your available resources (cards, health, mana) to slow down the opponent's board state long enough that you get to complete the quest and not die. Vanish acting as both a delayer and a "super Shadowstep" adds yet another layer to the strategy, and then there are those games that the only viable way you have to complete the quest is Panda your Panda to Panda your Panda. The deck has come so far since Dog's initial list with Moroes and Violet Teacher back when the set first came out, and 90% of the games I lose I see a better line I could have taken afterwards.
Playing against Quest Rogue as an aggro player is easy: you punch them in the face and they die horribly. My Druid story above isn't a one-of, it's happened a lot of times and even when I'm playing Standard Midrange Hunter or Wild Aggro Shaman, the plan is still the same for me: their most precious resource is time, and you just make sure they have as little of that as possible.
If you're the control deck though, it's a different story. Counterspell slows them down a lot (plus you get free wins because people take chances they shouldn't, even now that there are fewer spells in the deck than ever) but during my Reno Priest days playing against the deck, if they managed to go off then my plan immediately turns into "kill absolutely everything they play until they run out of cards". It's pretty intense and if your opponent plays perfectly and never overextends even slightly then it's one of the hardest matches you'll ever play, but they usually don't and you'll be just fine. :)
Nerfs are needed when the game gets unhealthy. Force/Savage needed to get nerfed: it was unfun to play (OMG ONE DAMAGE OFF LETHAL) and it was horrible to play against, especially with Shades and stuff too. Spirit Claws needed to get nerfed because the game could be won instantly off the back of a 25% random event, which just shouldn't happen. Undertaker needed to get nerfed because it made it impossible to catch up if it got too big (which I still maintain isn't true, not that it matters now). Quest Rogue doesn't do any of these things. You might feel that it's the modern day equivalent of Leeroy -> Shadowstep -> Leeroy -> Shadowstep -> Leeroy, but Quest Rogue needs the whole game and their draw to go a specific way to do powerful things, while the other things mentioned above just need you to draw two or three specific cards. To me, they aren't comparable.
My biggest pet peeve in Hearthstone is still the existence of the Jade Golem mechanic, which reminds me far too much of Slivers in Magic but without the inherent weakness to board clears, and Jade Idol specifically because LAWL FATIGUE. If you want to talk about uninteractive cards and unfun decks, I would say Jade Druid is far, far worse than Quest Rogue, but maybe I'm just biased.
Oh, and Pirate Warrior is fine. It still feels horrible when you get crapped on by the nuts hand or when you lose to someone who's absolutely dreadful but you had nothing to punish them with because you drew badly, but it's an aggro deck; survive until they're out of gas and they die. Welcome to Magic for the last 8 years.
Thanks for listening all, I'm going back to grinding Rogue wins until the nerf hits.
2
Got murdered by this deck the other day. I figured I could easily beat two Brawls since I was playing Quest Rogue and had gas for days, but the Sleeps wrecked me.
3
If you don't have much dust and you're unsure about a deck then you should hold off on investing, unless you have the means, resources and/or incentive to replace the dust (i.e. buying packs). There are many other competitive decks out there if you're just looking to progress on ladder, plus crafting something which you then open is one of the worst feelings in HS.
4
Notably, TempoStorm just published their first meta snapshot for the new expansion and, as you can predict, they put Pirate Warrior as the top deck to beat. This will inevitably mean more pirates in the meta, especially at high ranks, which means this deck can potentially get a lot worse going forward.
Bear in mind that the TS article is just one viewpoint and you should continue to base opinion on your own experiences, not those of a specific article.