Hearthpwn

Vicious Syndicate data is based on serious players; Blizzard has the stats on all games, and they probably see much more balanced numbers.

Bad/new players are going to hop on the flavor of the month and drag down the aggregate win rate. This is why Blizzard is going to be less concerned than the community, and why they are patient about balancing.

However, the belief that we can have 9 balanced classes is mistaken. Blizzard has made fundamental design choices that makes Hearthstone an excellent casual game, as evidenced by the size of the player base. But those decisions make ranked play almost impossible to balance. Furthermore, we are not back in the early 1990s, when Magic players had to read about decks in monthly magazines; the meta settles out within a couple of weeks, and everyone gravitates towards the consensus best decks.

The only way to even things out is to add variance - the dreaded RNG that everyone rages about. Since there is no variance in the mana system, every deck is going to gravitate to playing the best spells/minions on curve (or stall until a high mana "combo" is assembled in hand - which can always be cast by a specific turn, or a specific sequence, like Blizzard-Flamestrike-Alextrasza(?)-<burn>, or Dr, 6, Dr. 7, Dr. 8.) In such an environment, there is no way that there will be 9 top tier decks; only a few will make the cut. The decks that have the highest odds of assembling their "combo" earlier is going to dominate less reliable, slower "combos".

You either need to play casually (my choice), or just accept that you need to play one of the three currently overpowered decks in the format, and that Blizzard will keep rotating which are the favored classes to keep the complaints under control. A player who is used to a particular deck than the top three might get a better win rate than the official matchup odds, but they are choosing to play with a handicap, which is not what you should be doing if you want to be competitive.

I have not been playing much in the past few seasons, but even when I did play more, I just played enough to clear quests. Even with a good win rate, I ended up at rank 15, given the small number of games played. This meant that a good percentage of my games played will be at ranks 19-21. However, I have a big collection, and typically play top tier decks.

Other players who fit my play time profile might be part of the people you are running into at ranks 19-20.

However, I agree that the quality of decks is very high now at ranks 18-20; I rarely run into obvious beginners any more. This kills my win streaks, meaning that I have an even greater percentage of my play time at 19-20.

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

Quote from DeadlyKittenMtl >>

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

Quote from DropDeadCynical >>

We condensed all the whiny threads into one super-big whiny thread which meant we could then lock all the newly created whiny threads and redirect them there and those who didn't want to read whiny threads could just ignore that one thread.

Can we please do the same for 'complaints about aggro' threads?

 Braindead aggro player spotted.

Nice job of proving DropDeadCynical right, Plato...

 How so sir?

 People who "whine"about threads they consider to be whining act just as braindead as aggro is. Let me explain.

1. Such People don't read threads, don't think about answers given. Don't give answers to meaningfull questions. They just spamm their pretheorised emotions without even considering the facts.

2. Such people don't see the problem of disbalance between control and aggro. Answers given are evasive ( there's is no problem, or look at the viable control tier 1 decks, or tech-in to counter, don't be greedy).

3. Such people don't contribute to a meaningfull debate about the issue at hand.

Well sir are you in for a meaningfull debate or are you just as braindead?

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

Quote from DropDeadCynical >>

We condensed all the whiny threads into one super-big whiny thread which meant we could then lock all the newly created whiny threads and redirect them there and those who didn't want to read whiny threads could just ignore that one thread.

Can we please do the same for 'complaints about aggro' threads?

 Braindead aggro player spotted.

Quote from LiangHuBBB >>

aggro decks were always stronger in any meta, so nothing has changed at all

WiseAsPlato,

You talk about scientific evidence. Do you have any evidence that control cannot beat aggro in Standard? I pointed out the Tempo Storm rankings, which argued that many control decks were favoured against Aggro Shaman.

If people thought that aggro had an advantage, they would just tech in more anti-aggro cards. Since they see no need to do that, the people building those control decks think your theory is dead wrong.

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

When compared to Magic, they did increase the life total - from 20 to 30, but aggro still exists. The life total does not matter, rather how it relates to the published cards

 Right but if the current aggro published cards are that powerfull as they are right now (councelman and the 4./7/7) health matters. Since important heals has been taken away the problem just got bigger.

You still have not dealt with the observation that most top tier decks are control. Those decks have tools to deal with aggro

(1)  Finaly someone thinking in line with the problem at hand. Here's the answer:

For some reason people start playing controle after rank 10. So they rankup with aggro and start playing control. The result is that tier 1 (legend) decks are control decks. Fair enough, so it's a meta thing. But even those tier 1 control decks can lose hard against aggro because the problem at hand remains: the disbalance in speed en power en the shortage of (neutral) removals to keep aggro in check.

Team 5 does not want games going to fatigue. They want control decks to finish the game off around turn 10, which is why they have created all the flashy 10 drops. If winning on turn 10 is your idea of "aggro", the problem is your expectations about the game.

(2) ? I can't follow you on this one.

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

Quote from DerivativePox >>

Quote from silvsilvsilv >>

 

Again, you can't just pretend like aggro and control are the only two deck types that exist. 

 Oh, I assure you, 'ol Plato here might not seem as though they're capable of much. But if there's anything they can do, it's pretend.

So you don't have a solution to the problem of disbalance between aggro and control in a 30 health enviroment in terms of speed and power. Your only 'solution' is circumventing the problem through siccor/paper. Well that is not solving a problem, it is just a detour leaving the problem alive.

You don't wat to equip control with measurements that not weaken the archetype, because team 5 doesn't do that (yet)? Why control has to suffer from "greed" and other (insufficient) techins against aggro while aggro doesn't have those problems, can spamm and go face?

Please don't respond: you dont have the answer.

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

Quote from DeadlyKittenMtl >>

Quote from WiseAsPlato >>

Midrange still beats aggro most of the time. Just because aggro is the most popular, that does not mean there's something wrong with it. And how exactly does aggro "win team 5 money?" You'd think that if control was what you claim aggro is, everyone would be spending more money to get the expensive legendaries.

Please read the post more carefully. We are not talking about midrange vs aggro but control vs aggro and the problems of disbalance it brings with it. And for the money thing, it has been multiple times explained in other posts. Read, think and then respond. There's already enough mindless spamming of words here.

 Aggro is the fastest deck in the meta. Any viable deck has to have tools to survive against that deck. 

Your theory is that it will be possible to design a card game in which the meta does not have a fastest deck. Really?

 The discussion is about balance between aggro and control. Not about not having fast decks. It's about counter measures against fast decks from a control standpoint.

It's unhealthy for the game, and it's lousy behaviour. What else do you expect someone to say?

Luckily, there does not appear to be enough farmers to damage new player retention.