Hearthpwn

The brawl where the enemy Mountain Giant wins is a brawl that sucks.

I am feeling that although there is a good variety of decks right now, the matchups are not as interesting as they have been in previous formats. I'm still enjoying playing but less so than previously. I am one of the few who actually enjoyed the Genn/Baku meta because despite the high power level, everything was so jacked that you still had quite a balanced game, however limitation of future card design did mean they had to go regardless. Even Warlock made this format because it had interesting matchups across the board and 50/50 win rate against most decks, meaning you could climb the ladder with it easily because people had to rely on their ability in game instead of queuing a counter deck. I'd like to see more decks like this in the future that don't dominate anything particularly hard but don't have any matchups below 45%. Decks like these are good for ladder as they force players to make correct decisions in game rather than just queue the best deck for the local meta. We have Aggro Warrior at the moment which sort of fits the bill but its playstyle is a lot more one dimensional and it gets tired after a few games.

Quote from moon_of_venus >>

There is no such a thing like skill in this game. Let me explain why. (:

First of all, the game is BASED on LUCK and RANDOM EVENTS. Which means that skill can't change the game. You can't change the way the cards work or influence which cards you discover, etc. 

People who can reach legend every month use their OWN ABILITIES. Abilities related to THEM, not to Hearthstone. Analyzing, patience, thinking, etc. This is not an "in-game" skill. They are smart and can think well enough. They can analyze well enough. They KNOW and REMEMBER things. Let's say you have three minions on the board as Mage against Quest Shaman. Will you play the Power of Creation? No. Because your opponent might have MCT in their hand. Is that a skill? Yes. But not related to the game. It's related to your own self.

A skill is something that impacts the events and is produced by its "owner". For example, let's say two teams play a football/soccer game. One team starts with four goals advantage. The other team wins. Now that's a in-game skill. They used THEIR OWN ABILITIES BUT RELATED TO FOOTBALL to turn the game around. In Hearthstone it's not possible. (: If one player has advantage, the other can play only the cards they have in their hand. They're restricted to that. They can't make any impact. If they don't have the right cards, they lose. Simple.

I'm ranked 8. Give me a "better position" in a game against legend-ranked player. If they don't their best card, they'll lose. Luck!

Give me a better position in chess against higher ranked player. They'll win because they will make better moves. Skill!

This is possibly the worst attempt at explaining an incorrect concept I have ever had the misfortune of reading.

With the recent stagnation of the meta it has been quite refreshing to see some people on ladder tinkering with the Warlock Quest and Mecha'thun. It seems to do quite well against some of the popular decks at the moment. The unconditional destruction offered by Voodoo Doll and Plague of Flames are fantastic against Combo Priest, the alternative win condition annihilates Control Warrior (and the fringe Control Shaman), while the anti aggro tools do well to fend off a number of aggressive decks. Unfortunately it struggles with Quest Druid/Shaman, which are both very popular, but its appearance is certainly spicing things up a little and I believe the builds are far from optimised. It will be interesting to see where this goes and how it affects the meta.

To give you an idea of how game warping this effect is, lets slot it into the pre-patch SoU Meta and say for argument's sake that Sac Pact could be cast on Dr. Boom - Mad Genius to instantly destroy him. Being a classic card, Zephrys would offer this with impunity every time he was played against Dr. Boom - Mad Genius. Irrespective of "flavour" etc, would this interaction be acceptable?

Its all well and good to say it doesn't matter because Jaraxxus doesn't see play anyway (still a terrible argument), but what if he did? And what if he would with the next set release if this interaction didn't exist? The interaction is too restrictive on how players can build their decks and it serves absolutely no purpose in terms of promoting strategic game play.

Quote from Rainwulf >>

It is a rng-card after all.

No it isn't. It works to an algorithm and it is consistent - There is nothing random about it.

Quote from Dunscot >>

Quote from FortyDust >>

 I'm not dying on any hills for the sake of Zephrys, but I will certainly defend the status quo when people wrongly treat it as a mistake that needs to be corrected.

In the original release of the game, this interaction was known. It was allowed to go live. It has never been changed. This means it is intentional, not a mistake. Yes, it often catches newer players by surprise, but that's part of the fun for people who are aware of it.

Because of this interaction, Jaraxxus was always going to get worse over time, especially in Wild. As more ways of obtaining other-class cards enter the game, jaraxxus becomes more and more of a risky play. Anyone who understands the evolution of collectable card games would have been able to see this coming.

So now we've reached the point where Sacrificial Pact is easily obtainable by all classes, consigning Jaraxxus to Dumpster status temporarily in Classic and permanently in Wild. When Zephrys rotates out, Jaraxxus will be more playable again in Standard.

All of this is OK. It's just one of the many ways CCGs change over time. Individual cards get better or worse, and the players adapt.

If they one day decide to buff Jaraxxus by removing the interaction, that will be fine, too, but I would not expect it unless there's some major Demon-themed event they are trying to promote. Outside of that, the interaction is not really going to affect the meta either way, so it's simply not worth changing. That's why the "Jaraxxus is bad anyway" argument is actually relevant.

 The interaction between Sacrificial Pact and Jaraxxus was intentional in the original release but not as a weakness that was destined or even meant to get worse over time. Outside of your prophetic wisdom, generating cards out of thin air was not part of normal card game evolution, since Hearthsthone was one of the first that even made such things possible as a purely digital card game. The concept of classes was used specifically to limit what each player could and couldn't do. And it wasn't until BRM, a year after the initial release and about 2 years after the beta phase, that Nefarian made it possible for the first time to obtain entirely random spells from another class during a match, and now, 5 years after the release, we have a card that discovers "the perfect card" beyond class limitations.

The dozens of changes to the core set indicate that many parts of the original version of Hearthstone were more or less fine at launch but needed to change as the game moved on. I don't see why the Sacrificial Pact interaction shouldn't be one of those cases, when the card turned from "hardly worth a slot in your Warlock deck" to "can get reliably discovered by any class at a most opportune moment and in some rare cases wins you the game instantly". 

Indeed, the game keeps changing, and cards can get worse. This is where we are right now, one of the two cards is getting worse: It's either Lord J remaining borderline unplayable for the time being because of Zephrys, or SacPact losing its instant win potential. And I think the little viability of a class defining late game card is worth preserving over a fringe case in which a highly situational spell can end the game out of nowhere.

The interaction isn't a "mistake", it's not a glitch or anything like that, but it is unintuitive and feels off, and now it creates a situation where it makes the game less fun by heavily discouraging Warlock players from using one of their most iconic legendaries, and might impact the classes' potential moving forward. There is no good reason to keep it that way.

 

And the "it's a bad card anyway" argument is plain stupid. Even worse than the very similar "Nobody cares about Wild" argument that I've heard too many times during the Barnes discussions. 

Meta-relevance (or Standard, for that matter) isn't and shouldn't ever be the only thing to consider when discussing card changes, because "the meta" or "Standard" isn't the entire game. It might not affect the hardcore competitive Standard players, but they are just a fraction of all players. If you only care about the meta, then it's irrelevant to YOU, and to YOU, it's not worth changing. You might as well say "it doesn't concern me, so it doesn't matter", which is a ludicrous argument in any public debate.

Whatever you deem a "significant number of affected players" for it to matter is entirely arbitrary, both the number (what would be significant?) and the very concept of a large enough number of affected players as a prerequisite for intervention. Besides, there is no way of telling how many players are affected and would benefit from it anyway. Team5 probably can find out how many players used Jaraxxus before and after the release of Uldum, but they won't be able to tell how many players don't play Jaraxxus anymore now and in future releases because of Zephrys.

Maybe you remember Tess Greymane, a card that was certainly not part of any serious meta deck, and one day it was changed in a similar fashion to Yogg-Saron for "consistency". Some people were upset about it, because they actually liked and used the card, and saw it getting worse. And the developers changed the card back. They deemed the fun of a few players more important than their own understanding of consistency. Regardless of how many people were affected by it in the end, this was the best solution for everyone.

That's how such things should get handled.

This post pretty much got it spot on, only bit I disagree with is "It might not affect the hardcore competitive Standard players, but they are just a fraction of all players. If you only care about the meta, then it's irrelevant to YOU, and to YOU, it's not worth changing." Actually I think the competitive HS player is always considering Jaraxxus' viability when deck building. I very much care for competitive play and it is for this reason that I want to see Jaraxxus be competitively viable. It opens up options for Warlocks to deal with grindy control strategies.

Quote from thebitterfig >>

Alternate option: remove Sacrificial Pact from the Zephrys pool of cards.  Maybe always, but certainly when Jaraxxus is on board.

I mean, I think the SacPact/Jaraxxus interaction is kinda funny, but it should be relegated to the realm of silly and rare, rather than consistently available.

I prefer removing the Jaraxxus interaction because efficiently dealing with a large demon on the board is actually a fair use of Sac Pact as "the perfect card" and aside from this stupid ass interaction with Jaraxxus, it is exactly the kind of card that should exist in the Zephrys pool.

Quote from Xeze >>

I would play it in Quest Shaman so I could win the game twice.

How to win streak after rank 5.

Quote from mortoz >>

Zephyr is a skilled card if part of true highlanders deck (i met hunters and even face warriors with that, fine with it)

But when you cheat the card draw with card you would already use (druid and murloc paladin) it became a OP AI help to win or save your ass. or both.

your strategy is not around the card, is the card that by  coincidence give you an extra help to win without using your skils or even your luck (like all the rng cards that MIGHT save your ass)

 

Zephrys is the same whether you obeyed the Highlander restriction or not. Some players just realised that their decks were fast/durable enough to go the distance and play Zephrys as a finisher or combo piece when they are low on cards without restricting themselves to 1 copy of each card. This isn’t coincidence or luck, the decks are designed like this on purpose - they didn’t just randomly throw Zephrys in and hope he’d be active sometimes.

Quote from FortyDust >>

Quote from KingCarnage >>

 when you handbuff jaraxxus, you do not get increased attack and health. Only idiots think the interaction makes sense.

 It's not even about making sense, though. It's just a fun interaction that once provided an Achilles' heel in an archetype that could feel a bit oppressive. It's been a long time since those days, of course, but making this change would not create any real benefit to any significant number of players. It simply doesn't make sense to do it.

It makes sense to do it because it improves the QoL of the card and therefore the game. It’s actually highly detrimental to the player experience that a card, particularly such an interesting one, effectively cannot be played because about half the decks in Standard have access to a spell that wins the game on the spot if you play it. As stated previously, counters are fine, even hard counters, but “destroy the enemy hero” is when the counter has become too hard. If your turn 4 giant gets shot up by a Big Game Hunter it’s kind of annoying but at least you are still alive and can continue playing.

You mention that “Jaraxxus is bad anyway” is a valid argument but I challenge that. For one, Jaraxxus being good or bad is dependent on the shifting meta. Granted right now he can’t be top tier because Warlock is severely lacking in late game, but a single new set release or card buff could flip that on its head. The problem presented by Zephrys > Pact is that Jaraxxus CANNOT be good until Zephrys rotates out in 2021. There should be room for players to slot Jaraxxus into their decks in control heavy metas (in which he is good) but there will not be, because Zephrys will still be everywhere in the meta and even played in the very control decks Jaraxxus is there to counter. Not only that but considering Jaraxxus is significantly weaker than he was in vanilla because other cards now exist, he doesn’t need this weakness any more (which was only available to other Warlocks anyway).

Don’t get me wrong, I believe there should be a punish for every card, but instant defeat is too harsh. Remove the interaction for a better game. 👍

Quote from Motions >>

This deck is tier 2. I assume there are better things to worry about...
There are 2 hunter and 2 murloc decks getting better results than combo priest. 

It is the best deck in the game beyond doubt lol. 

I would craft and play this hypothetical card, obviously, because it is statistically incorrect not to if you have the means to do so. I would build a deck around this specific card and drawing/playing it as fast a possible, because this is clearly a completely broken strategy with zero counter play. Would I play it for long? Unlikely. It would get boring very fast and Hearthstone would effectively become a game of Snakes and Ladders.

Anyway please explain what the point in this thread is? Tip the Scales and Zephrys don't remotely compare to the card in the thread title on any level. Murloc Paladin is a pretty low skill ceiling deck, I agree, but it is also weak as piss against players who have a clue. Zephrys on the other hand is so versatile that you can't really declare it a low skill card. There are so many possibilities that playing it optimally is obviously skill testing.

It doesn't matter who is/isn't playing him. The option to do so should be there and it no longer is. I'm all for counters existing, even relatively hard counters, but "win the game" is when a counter becomes TOO hard. The only reason Jaraxxus doesn't see play, aside from Zephrys, is that since Bloodreaver Gul'Dan rotated, Warlock has been blessed with abysmal late game cards. If there was a viable slow Warlock strategy, Jaraxxus would pretty much be a must to deal with Control Warrior. So using our foresight, given the possibility that Warlocks get some late game cards in the next set, Jaraxxus should be fixed so that this (completely pointless btw) interaction is no longer in place.

It should be noted that when the game was first released there was no way to generate a Sacrificial Pact unless at least one player had it in their deck. This meant other Warlocks could include a copy as a tech that was completely dead outside of the mirror but otherwise you would never run into it. Now a days there are plenty of cards that can generate random spells and Zephrys, which will offer Pact against Jaraxxus 100% of the time.

A final note re: "Jaraxxus is bad." Jaraxxus' stock changes with the meta. He's a great anti-control tool when slower Warlock decks are also viable but as mentioned previously - Jaraxxus spent a year and a half being overshadowed by the drastically overpowered Bloodreaver Gul'Dan, and since the last rotation Warlock hasn't had any real late game. However, just because he is a bad card now doesn't mean he's doomed to be bad forever (look at Cenarius) or that he should be. Fixing this shitty Sac Pact interaction would be a good step towards making Jaraxxus viable again, and as far as I'm concerned, more cards being viable = a healthier game.

Yes it is broken and something in it needs fixing. The deck can be hard to navigate if you don't get the nut hand (but it still usually finds the win if you know what you're doing) and mirrors tend to be very draw focused, but if you can play at a semi competent level this deck is easy legend. There's a reason the majority of GMs are shielding this deck every match.

The issue with the current iteration of Priest is although it functions primarily as an aggro/tempo deck that snowballs the board, it also has the outs to randomly kill you from full at any point if you leave a minion up. A deck shouldn't be able to do both.

Yeah Gold Titanic Lackey has had this bug since the discover patch.