Hearthpwn

I just wanted to come here and say that DisguisedToast's latest stream from the Bahamas was one of the most entertaining and interesting streams I have seen in some time.

First, if for nothing else, it was a parade of Hearthstone personalities.  I'm not really one to get excited over "star power", but it was genuinely enjoyable to see Firebat, Kibler (and Natalie, who was a highlight), Trump, Kripp, Savjz, several Hearthstone developers, and probably some others I'm forgetting just chilling together.  The games where they co-played to...um...victory were just fun.

Second, while the developers were obviously trying to avoid accidental leaks, they did have several off the cuff comments:

1. (Dean Ayala) No, they don't expect Golakka Crawler to be widely played as a Pirate Warrior counter.  They anticipate cards such as Tar Creeper will be the go-to for that.  They would consider it a failure if it became widely played and games commonly came down to whether you have Golakka Crawler or not.
   
   
2. (Dean Ayala) They thought "a lot" during developing Un'goro about not making snowball-y cards in the early game.  When asked if there was a scaling 1-drop this time, he replied he did not think so (he was hesitant to say "no" because he didn't want his statement to be misconstrued).
   
   
3. (Dean Ayala) They will do cards with wide possibilities such as Babbling Book more rarely in favor of cards that pull from a smaller subset (such as your opponent's deck, or with the new Adapt mechanic).
   
   
4. (Mike Donais) They frequently discuss the balance between making curve decks and cards that are too swingy and let people reverse momentum of those curve decks.  It's a problem because they recognize many people like both, and that they can't please everybody.
   
   
5. (Dean Ayala) The developers don't think the game is very interesting when slow decks become too common because it becomes more of a contest of who can fit more 9-drops into their list.  Although they certainly regard it as a balance with faster decks.
   
   
6. (Dean Ayala) Finally, one comment that I know people are going to freak out on is that Iksar regards Pirate Warrior as a reasonably skill-intensive deck, citing that he can easily tell when his opponent is "crazy skilled" versus simply average.

I know many of these things are not completely new but I thought it was nice to hear them directly from Blizzard themselves rather than implied.

In any case, I just truly enjoyed the stream this evening and really wanted to share that with people in hopes that others derived the same pleasure I did from the experience.

While I don't really agree with the tone of the OP, I don't think his core concern is a bad one.  On-curve synergy decks in which you simply play the biggest and best of the type and hope to overpower your opponent are not terribly interesting.  I didn't think it was interesting in midrange Hunter with beasts or in (midrange) Priest with Dragons.  The decks feel mostly pre-built by Blizzard, with only a few flex spots.

I have very high hopes that elementals may not feel quite the same way due to the way their requirement works.  If your opponent plays an elemental you have an idea of what (s)he may be planning.  For instance, let's take the case of Fire Elemental on turn 6.  You know that your opponent will likely want to follow up with Stone Sentinel.  This is an invitation for you to immediately play a must-remove threat, such as Emperor Thaurissan (yes, I know he's rotating; just an example).  Now the elemental player has to make a choice: do they remove it and potentially ruin their elemental "chain" or just push with their minions and hope for the best?  I think this is an interesting dynamic that has more potential than standard on-curve play.  It is also key that arguably the strongest elemental card shown so far (Tol'vir Stoneshaper) is not an elemental itself, and so breaks the "perfect" curve chain.  I hope that a similar treatment is given to other on-curve power plays.

That said, my biggest fear is that elemental decks will simply run such a high density of elementals that such choices are meaningless.  But that remains to be seen, and I will be optimistic.

"Target X of your own minions with spells."

Blizzard has periodically tried to support this playstyle, mostly with no success.  But a quest that awards something that compensates you for your efforts could be interesting.

Quote from FortyDust >>

 There will always be aggro decks. There will always be midrange (curve) decks. There will always be control decks.

And there will always be people hating and complaining about every part of the spectrum.

But it's only really a problem when one part of the system oversteps its boundaries and pushes other parts into the dusty, faraway corners of the meta. (Of course, the bigger problem is, that seems to happen a LOT and takes forever to get fixed.)

That is a fairly fearsome anti-aggro tool; the fact that it naturally follows Tar Creeper seems like you could almost auto-win the game against aggro decks if you pulled them in a row.  My only concern is that unlike the Tar Creeper this card is good in every matchup (slightly less beneficial in some) and as people have already commented I don't want to replace Dragon curve-based decks with Elemental curve-based decks.

Not to detract from your question, but my own personal suspicion is that Blizzard wants the game to be fast-paced and proactive in nature.  They want counters to exist, but ultimately would prefer that the game is defined by decks which actively pursue victory rather than those which simply seek to counter the opponent.

As Hearthstone and the development team have "matured," it seems that we are seeing a greater number of cards which feel "pre-designed", with the synergies already planned out and understood.  While this limits the possibility of unanticipated abuses, it also seems to put classes at greater risk because when their pre-planned designs fail, the class as a whole fails.  

For example, when the Goons mechanic was unsuccessful in MSoG the Hunter and Paladin classes languished because they had received so many cards dedicated to it.  By comparison if the class happened to have an effective theme (Kazakus, Pirates, etc.) then it worked out.  Next expansion, I fear that the singular success of the legendary quests will dictate which classes will be played.

I was wondering if this concern has ever been discussed among the team.  And if it has, how is it addressed?  Or is it not considered a concern?

I think this card is quite good, but not as good as the OP thinks it is.

Essentially it continues what Equality always threatened: no matter how small the minions on the Paladin's board are, they are potentially a threat to enemy minions.  It is fundamentally different from Eadric the Pure.  Eadric is purely a defensive card that allows you to neutralize large attackers, but is completely useless when facing minions you need to actually kill (such as Emperor Thaurissan).

What makes this potentially better in many situations is its Quartermaster-like effect on your 1/1's.  If you're running a more midrange Paladin deck (those did exist once upon a time), this is the card a card that lets you buff up your board rather than simply being a reactive tool like Equality or Eadric the Pure.

How reliable is Shifter Zerus for you?  He seems so hit-or-miss, and so far he's mostly just sat in my hand and once gave me an on-curve Infested Wolf which was nice.  It is a neat interaction to see the buffs hold over, but I still question him versus a single Second-Rate Bruiser or even a discover card like Grimestreet Informant.

On an unrelated note, a card I'm a little curious to try is Darkspeaker.  Not convinced it's good, but it would the minion-equivalent of Blessing of Kings which can sometimes be nice to turn the board.

Well, I don't know if it's any good yet but first game against Water Rogue I Dirty Rat/Mind Control Tech'd into his Leeroy Jenkins and stole it.  That was rather pleasing.

Quote from WhatAChamp >>

 I'd like to see discard moved to midrange as well or even control (Deathwing amirite?). And a legendary that puts cards back in your deck would be one way to do it. However, it would have to be a pretty powerful effect or very cheap stats for it to work. If it only happened while it was on board, you'd only get 2-3 cards max back in your deck which normally isn't that useful. I would love to see a legendary with a battlecry that put all your discarded cards back into your deck. Or even "if this card is discarded, add all other discarded cards back into your deck". Without something like that, it would be hard to justify playing a midrange/control deck with 24 or less cards.

Quote from SockMonkeyJr >>

 To answer your question, it was added in the expansion pretty late. Yesterday during the live stream Day9 asked if it was there since the beginning. The guy from blizzard (I'm not good with names :P, sorry) said it was added in pretty late. I think it was post gadgetzan.

The one question I am most curious about is whether this card was designed 6 months ago or 1 month ago.

Everybody seems to be assuming that Blizzard saw pirates as a problem, panicked, and put a counter-pirate card into the next set.  And maybe that's what they did, I don't know.  But it has been explained that Blizzard is 1-2 expansions ahead of us in development.  They aren't working on Post-Un'Goro Expansion right now.  They're working on Post-Post-Un'goro Expansion.  So it makes sense that maybe at this point Blizzard is just naturally anticipating the powerful archetypes and putting counters into the next set: give them one expansion to shine, then bring the other shoe down to keep things fresh.

But again, the simple problem is nobody knows on these forums ("A friend of mine said..." doesn't convince me as a source).

Quote from Slydie >>

 Remember one thing though. Zoo and discolock generally start snowballing from strong 1-drops like Flame Imp and Voidwalker. Playing Lakkari Sacrifice is a 1-mana do-nothing, and that does change the tempo and play style quite a bit! This is a built-in weakness makes me a bit less worried that this is broken.

Quote from thazud8D >>

My biggest problem is that control decks are still screwed against Jades and I honestly can't see how they are going to turn this around.