Quote from KingCarnage >>I'm the OP, here's my comment:
I thought the original portrait was overly sexualized, so I am in favor of the change. Suggestiveness is classier than semi-nudity. I don't play WoW, but I have read that the Jaina character was known for her wisdom, courage, and history of struggles, and her looks were secondary.
Full disclosure: I'm a gay man, and cleavage doesn't do that much for me. Another personal bias is that I think both men and women should dress modestly in public, like buttoned-to-the-top modest. (Edit, yes my avatar is Lucy Heartfilia, and yes I hate how she is dressed in the anime/manga even though I like her.)
Of course, there is a lot of idealization in fantasy art, for both men and women. As many have pointed out, several of the male portraits have pictures hyper-muscular half-naked fantasy humanoid men.
Blizzard should directly address the censorship of the portrait. I would like to know the reasoning. Had they received complaints? Did they foresee a future problem? Are they going to be stricter about sexiness in future art releases?
That's dumb. She's a mage who isnt afraid of the cold. More seriously, all the characters should look just like they do in WoW. It's too many layers. Looks bad.
In the real world no one cares about your "modesty". People dress exactly how they want and are comfortable. Your opinion on what anyone wears in public is just about as important as other's opinion on what you do in private.
*micdrop*
Hah. It is not true that people get to dress exactly as they want. Maybe in the Scandinavian utopia you inhabit clothing is optional, but not where I come from. There are plenty of places where "comfortable dress" won't get you in door.
Public decency is a big issue in a lot of places. It seems a lot of the discussion of modesty (in the United States at least) devolves into young men getting mad that someone is denying them their view of breasts and young women getting mad that someone is denying them the opportunity to show their breasts.
Personally I'm convinced that cleavage is a sexual display, and should be considered as such. Plunging necklines in women's fashion not present in men's fashion are basic evidence of this. Your society decides how much sexual display it can handle, and then you go from there. There are a lot of societies in which Jaina would get arrested for wearing that outfit. I like RavenSunHP's idea that the alteration was due to a business decision in order to appeal to the biggest market possible. I'm interested in hearing Blizzard's reasoning, but I guess that not saying anything is their wisest move.
This is so funny, comming from someone who admitted being gay... In the past (not so long ago), being gay was a crime in most countries, did you know that? Because it seems that you live inside of a bubble. Now you support shamelessly this change, as you said in your previous post, and you seem to be ok with Blizzard decision to appeal to the biggest market possible, even in places were woman are being arrested for wearing outfits similar to Jaina's one. Admitting it is not Blizzard's wisest move, doesn't change that fact.
How the hell that makes any sense? How dare you to support something like this, when it goes against everything those of your kind have fought in the past, so you can live a normal life in the present? Don't you have any respect for those who fought for your rights years ago? I guess the answer is no...
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Glory's Rogue deck was nutty af, but you can't really pin that on a single card (although VanCleef is an arguable culprit). Foxy Fraud and Swindle engine is something though.
Demon Hunter is still a bit of a mess right now, its like the developers forgot how to make pack filler cards when they built DH, they barely have an unplayable card. Skull of Gul'Dan is always going to be a problem so I guess that's a good place to start.
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Wait Tickatus decks can actually win games?
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It is only predictable in as much as it plays a pretty solved deck list, but you still have a lot of variations of Lackey/Spell generation to play around. It is also predictable that they might play Desert Hare > Evolve on turn 4. Predicting that doesn't mean you can beat it.
Aggro can beat Quest Shaman if it curves well, yes, but if you're beating them with Control decks consistently they have no idea what they are doing. Quest Shaman can generate about three deck's worth of resources and deal upwards of 20 burst in a turn - Control doesn't beat that.
Not sure how to answer your randomly generated quest completion statistic - obviously the deck's win rate doesn't plummet to 10% if they miss turn 5 quest completion. They might struggle with aggro if they have a slow draw on Quest but it doesn't really affect slower matchups.
Shudderwock is not there to hit the opponent's face in most cases (unless they are low and you have 3 or 4 lifedrinkers loaded) it it used to completely refill your hand (sometimes also board depending on the build). Its half the reason Control decks can't win against the deck.
Lackeys are 1/1 and easy to kill, correct, but they are also 1 mana and are a lot harder to kill when they're not on the board yet. It isn't hard for your opponent to wait a turn and play Lackey > Wasp on the same turn before you can react.
Mogu > Mutate is a moronic combo against almost everything because dealing with an 8 drop on turn 4 isn't easy for any deck. You've got the 1 of Polymorph in Reno Mage, a couple of Hexes in Control Shaman and some fringe Shield Slam scenarios. Even in these situations, you're forced to skip your turn 4 or 5 instead of developing on to the board, and the Mogu is a pretty expendable resource for the Shaman.
Win the board and don't die is pretty solid advice to win against any deck, but being limited to playing 3 decent minions at a time while the Shaman is free to develop wide boards whenever they want doesn't allow you to do this. Also MCT is a very strong play into N'Zoth, which most decks that can otherwise afford to not go wide are playing.
Idk what rank you are playing at but it sounds like all the Quest Shaman players there are morons.
Practice more. The only one of these matchups that's unfavoured is Combo Priest.
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Its the Conquest/Shield system that makes these decks better in GM than on Ladder, not the skill of the players. Not that I think HSR is necessarily indicative of a deck's performance at high level (although Vicious Syndicate does this very well), but you won't see Holy Wrath Paladin perform particularly well at top 100 ladder in any region despite the fact that it was a very solid pick at GM due to the tournament format and it queuing favourably into the most highly represented decks - they were almost guaranteed a Combo Priest match every series.
Don't forget that Masters and Grandmasters players all play on ladder as well, and there are plenty of non-pro ladder only players that have a similar skill level to those who compete in tournaments. The tier lists are generally geared towards ladder where your build has to be good against a much wider variety of decks, and can't get by simply by having a good matchup against Combo Priest and Quest Shaman, for example.
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I like it the way it is. Adds an extra layer of strategic depth to combo decks, particularly in mirror matches. Doesn’t really affect the game in aggro match ups as the game won’t often go long enough to activate him - he’ll just be a Bloodfen Raptor. I’m also happy with Tirion being a 10 mana neutral in control matchups. If you really want to nerf Zephrys just hit his stat line so when your deck isn’t built specifically around him he is an actual dead draw in the early game and not a reasonably statted 2 drop.
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I am really enjoying this event. Been a long time since I could find control mirrors on ladder that weren’t warrior vs warrior. Refreshing.
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Questing is your best play on 2. Worth keeping in just for how solid it is pre-quest completion. Personally I feel 2 is optimal. I wouldn’t cut MCT at all, in fact I’d definitely also play 2 given how much they swing a N’Zoth board. Swamp Queen is pretty dead, you can also afford to cut Former Champ, Gigglings and one Bog Slosher, was well as the Storm Bringer and second mutate to fit in the Desert Hare Evolve BS that Shaman is now all about.
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I accept the friend request and usually that’s it. If they have something constructive to say I’ll talk, otherwise I’ll just let them vent their frustration or whatever it is they’re trying to do and ignore it. They usually block me after they’ve sent their messages anyway.
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Then I don’t know what else to say. Tempo Mage is kinda weak, but that list happens to have no counterplay to it. Crack on and good luck.
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In terms of playing Shaman against Mage, you should actually be favoured most of the time, although I did watch the first replay and I think deckbuilding could have been a major factor. I can see that you've built this as a control/fatigue variant of Quest Shaman, and its an interesting concept, but unfortunately it just isn't competitive compared to the standard Quest list, please see my explanation below.
You've got Plague of Murlocs, Walking Fountain and Earthquake stuck in your hand as well as an Omega Mind that wasn't played. These cards are not necessary in a Shaman deck running Corrupt The Waters. Heart of Vir'Naal does absolutely broken things with cheap cards and doesn't need a high curve, spell-based removal or tons of healing outside of Hero Power > Lifedrinkers to compete with slow decks in the late game (obviously Shudderwock is still played because it is bonkers but you don't need all the other high end stuff). Consider the implications of double battlecry - playing three or four 1-mana lackeys and getting six or eight battlecries is generally going to be superior value to playing one 7-mana Swampqueen Hagatha and getting two battlecries, or playing a Walking Fountain and getting no battlecries at all - the Quest is at its most powerful when thoroughly abused. Also in the case of this matchup, more early game cards means more pressure on the Mage to respond to your board so he can't hoard spells, more minion health on board to soak up Flamewaker damage when he does pop off, and faster Quest completion to hit your power spike.
Given his hand you may have lost anyway with a more standard list - it isn't always possible to win - but you have a much greater chance when you're able to present "must kill" threats like EVIL Totem, or threaten a wide board into Mogu Fleshshaper > Mutate, for a blisteringly fast 8 drop (likely presenting a serious threat and a lot of minion health) or a turn 4 Desert Hare into evolve for three 4-drops (again big pressure and likely upwards of 9 health on board). There's a lot of snowballing and butterfly effect in Hearthstone, if you allow a deck like Tempo Mage to sit back and draw cards, it is going to blow you up quite consistenly, but the tiniest bit of pressure to force their hand earlier than they'd like can have massive implications further down the line.
Regarding your deck itself, it would be wise to choose a direction (Quest or Control/Fatigue) and stick with it. Quest Shaman is hands down the better option for ladder and has a decent matchup into pretty much anything - happy to discuss decklists if you would like. Control/Fatigue Shaman is going to be significantly weaker as anything attempting to win by fatigue in this meta is going to have close to 0% matchups against most builds of Druid and almost anything capable of cycling N'Zoth a couple of times, while also not dealing well with combo decks like this Mage build. If your heart is set on this strategy however, again I'm happy to discuss deck building if you feel like you might benefit.