Hearthpwn

Am I missing something? Isn't this guy like...turbo broken? (at least in wild...I guess secret mage is back) 

I won't lie...you sound rather confusing there friend:

First you say "How can you say OTK invalidates archetypes" and then proceed to bring up example of multiple archetypes that get run over by the desease that are mill/OTK/infinite decks AND you bring up archetypes that basically autowin vs them (so you prove that those decks are ALSO polarizing as hell). I believe that a WAY less confusing way to phrase your first paragraph is: mill/OTK/infinite decks practically autowin vs ANY deck that doesn't have constant, good earlygame pressure and basically autolose vs ANY deck that does have constant, good earlygame pressure.

The second paragraph is even weirder (somehow):

First of all you don't even quote me properly given that you conveniently left out the examples I gave of midrange decks that (when they were in the meta) beat control, THEN you "agree" with me while saying the opposite of what I said (I'm saying midrange BEATS control). ANYWAY midrange is a VERY flexible archetype that can be built in different ways, the midrange decks YOU are talking about are the ones that lean more onto the aggro side and so they lose to control because aggro loses to control in HS (this apparently is not true in other games though from what I heard), the midrange decks I'm talking about are on the "heavier" side of midrange, the ones that can put constant, meaningful pressure that is hard to remove or stop like big priest, hadronox/clown druid, cubelock, deathrattle hunter (with DKRexxar mostly) ...THESE are the ones that beat control (maybe I should have mentioned it, I thought it was clear given the examples I gave).

Anyways your "rock/paper/scissors" argument is just horrible to me, let me explain;
There are 2 alternatives here:

1) (this is your supposed "rock/paper/scissors") Aggro>midrange>control>aggro where ">" means "usually wins the matchup but it's 100% possible for the losing side of the matchup to win"

2)Aggro(and "faster" midrange)>>>>>>>>>>>>>>OTK/mill/infinite>>>>>>>>>>>>>>control>aggro>"heavier" midrange>control here ">" means the same as in point 1 and ">>>>>>>>>>>>>>" means "you're not winning lol"

Now....1 of these options is balanced and healthy while the other is a clusterfuck of uncounterable BS where playing the game is basically irrelevant in some matchups. No prize for guessing. (I do admit the "uncounterable BS" option can definitely be balanced but it will NEVER be healthy as it removes archetypes from the equation completely)

I diagnose you with the big wrong...the OTK/mill/infinite idiocy is NOT what keeps control in check, midrange is the archetype for the job (deathrattle hunter/cubelock/hadronox druid/etc) as they have a clearly winning matchup vs it that, however, isn't just "lol nice reactive deck...thx for the free stars idiot" . The OTK/mill/infinite idiocy is the flaw in the system that (as long as it exists with a semi-relevant playrate) completely eliminates ANY form of control from the meta...1 of these options is healthy, the other is toxic and stupid from a design/marketing standpoint...let's see if we find out which one is which

First of all... not a single combo deck will see itself get thrown out of the meta because of this card, MAYBE the winrate will drop by like...nothing%...booohooo

Secondly in the impossible case that they did....GOOD RIDDANCE, not only have they been at least prevalent, if not dominant, for a long time, but they are also the ONLY playstyle that invalidates other archetypes for no reason (the same thing you wrongly say this card will do)

Well I mean...I've been "tired of all otk/combo(and mill....and infinite) decks" ever since I bercame aware of their existence (courtesy of a friend of mine talking about Yu-Gi-Oh's very own Exodia while on our way to school) so we agree on that one.
Blizzard curing the symptoms instead of the sickness is exactly what I said in my post, exept they are curing them with another (slightly less toxic) sickness.

OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE...I mean...yea I'm playing it but that's only because I have to otherwise all the fUn AnD iNtErEsTiNg OTK/mill and similar idiocy will beat the shit out of me (unless I'm missing something this seems like a strictly stronger Dirty Rat) but come on...disruption is NOT the answer...it's a problem that just so happens to counter another, bigger problem

Though VERY likely not nearly good enough, in terms of design anything able to punish the immense stupidity of "powerdraw" decks can only be  the best card in the set, no contest 

Quote from PetiteMouche >>

 

Some tech cards are also running rampant and ruining some archetypes but that's ok

 I don't really see how that can ever be classified as ok but from what I'm gathering the immense(ly stupid) OTK/mill/infinite craze that was going on sort of slowed down a bit correct?

Quote from ankha >>

Wild's at a pretty healthy spot right now. The only infuriating deck I saw the most (played up to D4) was Pirate Rogue, and that's because I was playing Druid which falls behind in removal. Due to the wide range of decks, I rarely see the same deck(s) over and over, it's quite nice right now. As for relevant OTKs, no, not really. I've been running a homemade OTK deck that I'm surprised nobody else has come up with because of its really good winrate. And mill still exists, but you fight them here and there, it's not toxic.

 well while I don't enjoy playing aggro I'm usually ok playing vs it...that may be a good sign (also I'm VERY glad to hear the "less OTK" part)

Quote from Mackie264 >>

1. Wild meta is pretty fine rn definitely the best it has been in a long time. I'd say the meta is warped around Pirate Rogue (Aggro Rogue) and Quest Mage/ Some sort of late game druid (C'thun or Togg) to a smaller degree. So the other decks must be able to counter these decks. Stuff like Evenlock and Freeze Shaman have ways to deal with aggro boards and set up their own while having enough powerful threats to also fight against the slower decks and some others like Pillager Rogue or Big Priest (both lower tiers) try to bust out opponents with explosive turns.

2. Depends on what you call toxic. Pirate Rogue kills you stupid fast and they have a 3 mana weapon that can do 12 damage while also buffing a pirate. Evenlock has hordes of huge minions that be played very early and do 16 damage on turn 6 or 32 if they have 2 giants on board. Quest mage literally skips your turns. Late game druid variants have 20 mana and do shit that you could call unfair given how quickly they are able to cycle through their deck. Pillager rogue can OTK you from very high amounts of health (it can do well over 30 easily) and something like Big Priest doesn't do anything but clear your board most of the game and then it goes brrr and starts revivng minions over and over and locks you out. So yeah, you could say the main strategies have toxic components.

3. I think that you keep the star bonus for the last season you played. I don't play classic every month but when I do, I usually have pretty much the same star bonus as before. Not sure if there's any decay as in if you don't play 2 months in a row, maybe you'll go from an 8-star bonus to a 7 one but I'm not sure at all about that, you'd have to check it yourself. 

 1 yea, quest mage and BS druid are the only things that sound scarily toxic in that part

2 strong is one thing (like aggro rogue, evenlock...though coul you explain the 32 dmg part?), it means the deck does powerful things, toxic is another (quest mage and, from what I can tell, some druids), it can meaan many things but usually it means it's basically impossible to beat it as a specific archetype while others run over it

3 probably you do, I don't however because my "stopped playing" was a slow burn where I'd play less and less each season resulting in less bonus stars

Quote from YourPersonalGuru >>

For standard. The most efficient otk's only dealt about 30 damage, so renenthal has done a good job. You can still play quest priest, but I don't think that deck is too prevalent for now. 

 good to hear

Quote from Amaranthus >>

Concerning mostly standard: If you didn't like Tickatus, you might hate Immolate, a card I see being played a lot in Curse Warlock (a deck which is pretty toxic to begin with), that does nothing against aggro or midrange, but single-handedly kills a lot of Combo or Control. If you play a 40 card deck though, the loss of some of your hand might not be as terrible if you have enough redundancy in your win conditions and enough draw.

Just realized you probably weren't talking about Tickatus at all, nevermind. I got thrown off by the keyword corrupt.

 

 As expected, the card is toxic (the 6 mana 8/8 design mistake was 100% contributing in lowering my enjoyment dw)

Ty everyone, I have now started getting my older decks "up to snuff" based on what you said, if what you said is true then I'm back to playing regularly, we'll see

Ok so, hi, it's been a while
I had dropped Hearthstone for a couple of months for several reasons like:
1) The critical mass of offensively toxic cards/decks being played, printed and even supported lately, with the announcement of the "corrupt and later discard opponent hand" card being the straw that broke the camel's back (even though I don't know how good it turned out to be, it's mere existence is an inexcusable, objective flaw of the game)
2)University stuff
3)Me creating the most deliciously infuriating (for the opponent) Pokémon showdown team in history
4)Smash ultimate
5)My computer overheating just by playing HS, forcing me to play on the phone (which I don't really like)
6)Other random BS

After the new expansion announcement however, I got some hype back in me (mainly thanks to the "40 health/40 cards guy" , even though adding this many cards can make games WAY longer, the fact that both players can run it in any class seems to make him ok, for now at least) but I wanted to be reassured that coming back would be a good idea so I'm asking:
How's the meta looking? (Mainly in wild as I almost only play there, but I'm also interested in standard)
How are we doing in terms of toxic decks/cards? A.K.A. Are there any new (or old) OTK/mill/infinite BS decks and cards that are even semi-relevant in the meta?
One last thing: this is a question regarding ALL ranks from bronze upwards since I "paused" for more than a month I'm going to have to play my way back up so literally ANY input can be valuable as long as it's...you know...true.

Ty to everyone that took time to respond and even to those who didn't but still read the whole thing.

Quote from FortyDust >>

Quote from SirJohn13 >>

In fact, I'm pretty sure all classes have at least one OTK available at this time.

 Dark times...VERY dark times indeed

well...it would be pretty good...if it wasn't for the fact that it ALREADY worked like this when it came out in barrens b4 they decided "hey...this reactive deck kinda works....we can't have that" and changed the interaction without even mentioning it in the patch notes.

Because of this I cannot find it in me to give them even the slightest bit of credit for "fixing" something that should have never been a problem to begin with

(nevermind the fact that it's pretty much useless since warlock quest/ignite/[REDACTEDTUS]/owl/any other OTK/mill/infinite BS that I'm currently forgetting make even thinking about playing any reactive deck completely unviable)

I guess so.

I'm just going to add that the reason I find inevitabilty to be toxic for HS is that there is NO way to interact with them that isn't limited to "just kill them lol".... this is the part where Dirty Rat and similar cards are mentioned and to that I say...sure...you can also randomly win or lose from those cards...because it feels fun,earned and interesting when you play them, flip a coin and either win or lose on the spot depending on the outcome of the cointoss.

On the fatigue bit...that's exactly the point...you shouldn't mess with a core part of the gameplan of an archetype unless you want said archetype to burn in hell 

Ok so

1)Well fine, I could have worded that one better, still simply "choose another target" would be enough without going into Echo.
There is quite a lot of wrong with the current version, infinite cards (as in: never end+never fatigue) are ALWAYS bad for HS, same with immense burst dmg (no way to stop burst from hand...why do you think charge rotated out completely?).

2)The hate towards Ice Block only came from the fact that (as I said earlier) it was mostly played in the fUn decks that force a "you are under extreme pressure to end the game because you know your opponent WILL win whituot you being able to do anything about it if he doesn't die NOW" situation. Also that card can be played by turn 3, THIS one needs a quest to be completed...again, Idk how I'd change the requirement but I believe you are thinking about a "questline requirement" which is stupidly easy to complete...I'm NOT referring to that, it would obviously not be as easy/fast to complete. So from an aggro player's prospective you have the time so you should have killed him earlier (and also...it's not like it's a sure way to survive) and from a "I need to kill him or else his FuN aNd InTeRaCtIvE OTK WILL destroy me" prospective... this card is VERY unlikely to fit in a deck like that if the requirement isn't extremely simple to complete. Maybe Amara, Warden of Hope would have been a more accurate comparison: you build your deck around this defensive thing that isn't going to win you the game BUT it helps you with not losing said game.

3)Yes it does...again, you are thinking that quest warlock will be built and played exactly the same, obviously that's not the case, you'll need more survivabilty and less self harm, instantly improving your chances vs aggressive decks (and AGAIN, depending on how it goes, it may be changed to be easier to complete, which could mean less self dmg, more healing or something like that). You are NOT going to FINISH the quest with a higher health than your opponent but (news flash) warlocks also have a GREAT deal of healing.
It's more interactive for both players as BOTH feel the effect of your dmg so YOU have to consider your own health when trying to kill the opponent...and he has to do the same since all dmg he does to you will be reflected at him as well.

As a (stupid) sidenote, the voiceline goes "All of Stormwind will feel MY pain" and guess what, in order for someone to feel YOUR pain...YOU have to feel it as well...not to mention that a warlock's whole shtick is sacrificing something from himself for the power to hurt someone else and well...you aren't sacrificing shit with the current questline.

BONUS
Not many recently I know, but still ANY card that delays fatigue by more than 4/5 cards is a mistake, as it lets you ignore fatigue (or at least...it WAS when fatigue was actually treated for what it is a.k.a. the unquestionably best "end of deck" feature ever created in ANY card game. Now you don't even see past half your deck most of the time)
Now you may say "well doesn't this guy do the exact same?" well yes, and I still think it's a mistake...just slightly less than the current one since at least it's a symmetrical effect, so in "reactive" mirrors (the only place where it was ever useful) it's no longer an autowin but in OTHER matchups it gains SOME amount of utilty. Don't get me wrong...it STAYS just as much of a meme card as it always was, this change simply makes it less "polarizing".

As I already said, I don't agree with these takes:

(Ignite)
1) Who lied to you? the damage would ALWAYS be targeted, yes, it's not as easy to chain as Defile but it can be used to clean some boards (since it's cheap it can be used after another boardclear) AND get some face dmg in (also I made as a "quest mage card" so it benefits from spell dmg quite a lot), I also considered letting it target anything so you can blow up your minions as well if you need to increase the dmg (yea...thinking back at it..that's probably a decent idea)

(Open the Waygate)
2)It wouldn't be NEARLY as toxic as the current one, I'd place it into the ballpark of something like Ice Block a.k.a "it's only toxic if you are under extreme pressure to end the game because you know your opponent WILL win without you being able to do anything about it if he doesn't die NOW". The point of the card is exactly to give the player a second chance after knowing what the opponent has at his disposal, still the opponent ALSO knows it's been played so he can strategize on how to win in 2 different ways to "trick" you...WAY more interactive than the current version of this card.
Your last point is why I said it probably needs a different requirement, one that isn't THAT big of a deckbuilding restriction.

(The Demon Seed)
3)Before I argue I'd like to remind you that I DID say "it may need to be easier/harder to complete".
With this change it would only require you to change playstyle a bit and juggle self harm and healing a bit more (which warlock has TONS of either so not like it's that big of a problem),slowing down the quest a bit for more safety is exactly what can turn the aggro matchup around (to an extent). Also you are ignoring the fact that, if at ANY point after you played the reward, you happen to be higher health than your aggro opponent...they instalose (offset by the fact that it's VERY difficult to make happen) so...NO it would NOT be unplayable vs aggro...quite the opposite actually, I'd argue it may even be better... what ACTUALLY changes is that the card is now something both players can interact with AND it's less polarizing.

BONUS
You are underestimating the mayhem that can be caused by this new Archbishop Benedictus, you shut down higlander AND get some of their own synergy cards, you pollute the draw of faster decks (offset by the fact that you played a 7 mana do nothing vs something that wants to kill you by turn 6)...I'm a bit iffy about it as the games would drag on quite a lot but at least this time they aren't decided by the better Archivist Elysiana rolls.
Also all this was meant to do is let him STAY a meme card, just taking away the toxic "I win fatigue" part

Quote from FortyDust >>

The cards in question were already interesting, though. Why not just imagine new cards you personally find interesting instead of tinkering with existing ones?

 well that's what I said in the disclaimer:

I personally don't find the design/playstyle of any of those cards interesting