Hearthpwn

Been watching this stream for the last bit - very talkative, entertaining stream, and who can say no to a swarm of angry chickens?!

Quote from modded »

Because it dies to everything, you can't protect it. At least patient assassin has stealth, but his hp is too low.

To counter this point - The majority of 3 drops die to anything, the only really reasonable exception is Harvest Golem.

The difference? Aside from dealing with 2 drops, Harvest Golem is, at best, a 1-for-1, and outright dies (0-to-1) to higher cost drops. For instance, it dies to a Chillwind Yeti (over two turns, maybe, but it does). If you're top decking and draw one on, say... turn 9, it's going to feel like a semi-weak draw.

Emperor Cobra may die to everything, but it's very close to a guaranteed 1 for 1. It doesn't die to most AoE (Blizzard, Holy Nova, Consecration, etc - one of the big things it has over Patient Assassin), will trade for anything at the same rate that Harvest Golem does, can actually be useful later in the game (unlike Harvest Golem), and to top it off, provides an amazing amount of control if you can drop it on an empty board... it throws a threat down that Harvest Golem can't even begin to compete with.

Again, I'm not saying it's even close to a top-tier card, but in the 3 drop slot, I think it's actually one of the better minions (in any stall/control deck at least, as it actually has some late game presence). Especially against Young Priestess/Blood Imp-pumped low cost taunters.

Anyways, just my thoughts, interested in hearing some counterpoints - honestly, I'm just trying to see the card from all angles, to make sure I'm not missing a weakness (or a better card for the slot) elsewhere. I've been playing it in my Paladin deck, and it's provided me with some incredibly strong trades in combination with some protection and Argent Protector.

Hey guys,

I wanted to have a bit of a discussion centered around Emperor Cobra.

I've seen a lot of negativity surrounding this card, and I've been trying to figure out why. I've seen it declared "significantly worse" than all other 3 drops in the game, and a lot of people suggest disenchanting it, right along side Kidnapper. I can't see Emperor Cobra being even *close* to as worthless as Kidnapper...

I can understand it not fitting in every deck, but why does this card get such a bad rap? It's got a fair bit of potential, especially in the right deck.

As far as I'm aware, Commanding Shout + Angry Chicken will not enrage it. You need to get it's health less than it's max health, just taking damage isn't enough, which means that you need to buff it's health first...

Quote from Poghy »

Alrighty, this is my 1st post in the forumz. I couldnt believe noone mentioned this before, but you had some bad choices, especially in the priest deck. 

Pick #3 Mind Vision over  Amani berserker

Amani is a solid 2-drop, nothing fancy, but you need some of those. Mind vision is so bad, you actually have to pay 1 mana to replace it with something that *MIGHT* be useful. Sometimes you get an ok card, sometimes you get something thats absolutely useless, like deadly poison, shield slam, or blade flurry, or you get a card that isnt good for your conception, like equality or bloodlust.

Pick #4 Frostwolf Warlord over Gurubashi berserker

Frostwolf is better in paladin/shaman decks, but in mage/priest Gurubashi is absolutely superior.

Pick #8 Lightwell over.. pretty much anything

Lightwell is bad. Peroid. On the other hand, you could pick Crazed alchemist, a very underrated card, especially in priest decks. He can help you to trade better, he can help to use Shadow Word Pain/Death, and in a Priest deck with PW: shield, Gurubashi, Temple Enforcer, etc. you have high health minions, so a Crazed Alchemist can help you to finish the game.

I dont have a very good winrate in arena, i know i have to work on my gameplay, so im not a pro player. But i wanted to point out some of the obvious mistakes. I hope it helps you. Cheers!

I'd argue that Gurubashi Berserker is actually a mediocre card at best in anything other than a Mage (and *rarely* a Warrior) deck... Even with the ability to heal it, it gives the opponent at *least* two turns to react to it (first turn at 2/7, second turn "enraged" at 5/something) before it can actually do 5+ damage in an attack. That means it takes 5 mana (your full turn if you play it early), and won't do any serious board controlling for another 2 turns after that... Whereas a Frostwolf Warlord will (almost always) be a minimum of 5/5 immediately when it hits the table, and has the potential to be higher in the right situation.

As for Lightwell, it's actually a strong card with the right setup. If you have a taunt or control-heavy deck, it can very easily make a huge difference. You just need to know when you can protect it, and when it'll actually make a difference on the board. Crazed Alchemist would be a decent pick here too, it's a tossup really, but I don't think Lightwell is nearly as bad as you say it is.

If you're interested in improving, your best bet is to FRAPS some of your matches, watch them again later, and see if there's anything you notice about how you played it.

I'm sure there's people here that would be more than willing to watch the matches and give you tips as well, if you wanted.

The first draft looks good to me, didn't look at the other two... I'd say you could make an easy 6 - 7 wins minimum with that.

If you didn't make it over 3 wins with any of those drafts, you may want to watch more carefully for little mistakes you're making - not saying you're a bad player, you may have just been faced up against ridiculously strong decks (it happens), but there is also the potential that you're making mistakes you're not aware of.

This can occur when you alt-tab while the match is loading, it's been around since the start of beta unfortunately. :(

When you say "basic decks only", do you mean the basic, preconstructed decks you have to use before you build your first deck? Or a deck built only of "basic" (non-Expert) cards?

EDIT: The reason I ask is because I assumed it was any cards from the "basic" set allowed, but the link you posted for "allowed cards" (http://gamintafiles.wordpress.com/2013/08/29/hearthstone-basic-decks-card-list/) is the list of preconstructed decks, not all basic cards.

Quote from hessian58 »

Maybe consider crafting a sword of justice to help your dudes stay alive a little longer? 

I'd also think about getting a wild pyromancer you can use as a small aoe board wipe to help combat the mages that keep dropping mirror images.

Sword of Justice feels too slow to me, though. It takes my entire third turn to drop, which means I'm not dropping a 3-cost minion, and also means I can't use a Truesilver Champion on turn 4 (or for a couple turns after that). It feels like I'd be giving up early game board control, which is where I feel I might be weak at the moment.

Wild Pyromancer might be an option... I considered him at one point, but felt he was too damaging to myself (negates all of my Divine Shields). However, I've added some cards that work well with him (Raging Worgen and Amani Berserker) since then, so it may be worth trying. Most of my spells are high cost, though, so minus an early Redemption, I'd have trouble triggering him enough to deal with Mirror Image... I'll play with it a bit, maybe.

Switched out 2 x Defender of Argus for 2 x Argent Protector... They serve *somewhat* similar roles, but Argent Protector is better in the first few turns and, generally, better late game (and doesn't take your entire 4th turn to drop).

Hey guys,

Been playing Hearthstone for a while now, done a lot of Arena, but up until a few days ago never really took constructed seriously. Just started playing ranked 3 days ago, using solely this deck, and am now Master 3 (fairly easily... I think my record is 30-6 now, about 15-5 of that is after hitting Master 3).

However, now that I'm Master 3, I've been running into a couple decks that just stomp all over me. I'll admit, it only feels really bad when they have an incredibly strong hand, but I'm looking for some input on how to negate the utter hopelessness of those matches a little bit.

Here's the deck:

It's very mid-game focused, and rather reactive. It tends to counter the opponent's plays, rather than being overly aggressive.

I recently changed 2xAcidic Swamp Ooze, 2xKnife Juggler and 2xShattered Sun Clerics for the Amani Berserker, Sunfury Protector and Harvest Golem to help negate board wipes a tad (Well-timed Blizzard, Holy Nova and Consecrates were hitting me incredibly hard)... Haven't played enough with the changes yet to see how helpful they'll be.

Anyways, the main issues I'm having are with two decks in particular...

Incredibly strong early-game Mage decks (Mana Wyrm, Mirror Image and Sorcerer's Apprentice in their opening hand, followed by board controlling anything I drop), and rushdown Rogue decks (Defias Ringleader, SI:7 Agent, Assassin's Blade and Deadly Poison, Spellpower'd Backstab/Fan of Knives, etc).

Both of them manage to kill everything I drop with ease (especially considering how well their hero powers work VS Divine Shield), and usually rush me down by turn 5 or 6. Despite hitting every drop with a relatively strong minion. Rogue may not be as bad after the changes to Amani Berserker and Sunfury Protector, they tend to work better against Backstab, Defias Ringleader and Fan of Knives, but I haven't tested enough yet to know.

So... Coming to you guys for advice and input. Any thoughts on things to change?

I've got things I'd like to consider putting in (Argent Protector, Silvermoon Guardian, Shattered Sun Cleric, Hogger, Faceless Manipulator, Sen'jin Shieldmasta, and others), but I'm not certain what I would replace, or if any of them would even really be all that helpful against my problem matchups.

Generally speaking, if I survive to turn 6 and the opponent doesn't have an overwhelming board advantage, I feel fairly confident in my ability to win the game... So it's just against opponents that have incredibly strong early-game board control that I run into problems.

Quote from SajT »

Argue that Leper Gnome doesn't have a home in the rush decks if you will, few would agree with you however. Leper Gnome or go home.

I never said Leper Gnome doesn't have a place, I've said all along it's a good card. All I've said is that *removing* Bloodfen Raptor for anything other than a 2-mana 3/2 drop is likely a mistake.

If you want to suggest something else to remove for Leper Gnome, go for it. :p

Otherwise... since I'm curious now, and want to compare, can you show me a situation that Leper Gnome is always a better card to have in your opening hand than, say, Knife Juggler? With this particular deck, that is.

I'm not asking because I don't think there is one, I genuinely want to compare the two cards... I'm curious now.

Quote from SajT »

Quote from Durandil »

Quote from SajT »

I'd much rather play a card like Leper Gnome than Bloodfen Raptor. If you insist on having a 2-drop then I'd rather play Amani Berserker or something along those lines.

Bloodfen Raptor is much better than Leper Gnome (in the majority of decks).

Leper Gnome can't deal with things like Northshire Cleric, Amani Berserker, Raging Worgen, Mana Wyrm, etc. In fact, it actually helps the opponent against those first 3.

However, you are correct in that Bloodfen Raptor is, in general, a sub-par card. It'd be better to play Acidic Swamp Ooze, Knife Juggler, Youthful Brewmaster, Faerie Dragon, or Amani Berserker.

 

Except you know, priest matchup is ridiculously easy for a rush warlock deck and you don't need any hate versus Northshire clerics (which are often PW:shielded anyway) and you have means to buff his attack power and using cards like knife juggler and elven archers you can make him even more relevant of a card. You certainly do not have a shortage of 3 power minions anyway and missing your turn-1-play is baaaad.

Only beef I have with leper gnome is the mage ability, really. 

There's good reason for leper gnome being found in both the top rush warlock and mage decks. It's just a great card.

There's a problem, though - his deck isn't the typical Warlock rush deck you keep interpreting it as. He actually does have a shortage of low-cost 3 power minions, and doesn't have any Elven Archers. Aside from Flame Imp, which he will only get in some games, he won't have any 3-power drops before hitting 3 mana if he replaces Bloodfen Raptor with Leper Gnome, and loading up on 1-health minions will, as you mentioned, make him incredibly susceptible to Mage, Rogue and Druid hero powers early on.

As an example...

Turn 1 (You): Leper Gnome
Turn 1 (Opp): The Coin, River Crocolisk (note that Northshire Cleric, Voidwalker, Amani Berserker, Mana Addict, Mana Wyrm, Master Swordsmith and a bunch of others would have the exact same impact here - so this scenario is more likely than you think)

Turn 2 (You): Unless you have a Flame Imp or Mortal Coil, since you've taken out the Bloodfen Raptor, you have zero answers to his 3 health minion. Can maybe play a Voidwalker to slow him down, but it won't change board position overall, and will likely be throwing a card away in the process (depending on the hero you're facing).
Turn 2 (Opp): If the opponent is a Priest, he can kill your Gnome and heal his minion. Mage/Druid/Rogue kills Gnome for free with hero power. The rest take your minion and still leave theirs on the board. He takes your turn 1 play at a cost of a few health points, and if he elected not to use his hero power, can play a 3/2 drop, and he now has board control. He has a 3/2 (which can kill any of your turn 3 drops), a 2/1(ish), and your side of the board is clear.

You're now severely behind on board control and card advantage.

Leper Gnome IS a great card, but I'm not convinced it's the right fit for this particular deck. This deck isn't the same as the low-cost Warlock rush deck you mentioned in your original post.

Have you considered Mana Wraith?

I haven't tried the deck so I can't comment on what to replace, but as a turn 2 drop (or turn 1 with coin), it can slow down early pressure from the opponent relatively significantly.