Hearthpwn

Quote from Alex_chr >>

Does anyone remember the good old days where shaman was the worst class? The days where you could play any deck and hit legend. PLEASE GIVE THEM BACK :((((

Another possibility that comes to mind is Kabal Courier into some sort of Priest card which allowed him to steal from you.

I highly disagree with some of the assessment that "stats don't matter."  I have spent a great deal of (frustrating) time these last few seasons trying to make handbuff Paladin work, and honestly it's not too far from being viable.  However, what others have pointed out is depressingly accurate: Shaman does everything you want to do, it just does it better.  The deck will definitely benefit from a slower meta, if that comes about due to the nerfs.

The frustrating thing is that if they had united the handbuff mechanics of Paladin with the actually useful handbuff minions of Hunter (Dispatch Kodo, Rat Pack) it might have actually worked.  

Quote from scorpyon >>

Removing Ice Lance is just pure bafflement, though

Quote from Hooghout >>

Spoken like a true aggro-player, defending Brode and consort for carddesign that favours a fast meta, which means cheap, low skill cap, easy winfix/laddering, focussing on expanding the playerbase, ergo increase revenues quickly (20 MILLION A MONTH). You can't deny and not justyfied angry, that carddesign is not focussed on a slower meta as that would mean less income by the very fact of a higher skill cap.

I'm grateful for the change.  I say this as somebody who has played more games as Rogue than any other class.  Early on I was really inspired by players such as Colma who built tempo Rogue decks that were designed to abuse the ability of Rogues to cheaply remove minions and put their own on the board in the same turn.  It was a delicate balance of aggression and value, where going all in too rapidly was costly and moving too slowly just as bad.  It also benefited greatly from elements of planning in which you had to be able to reliably trigger combos, sometimes forgoing a turn 2 play so you could combo better on 3, etc.  All in all, I really love the playstyle.

However, Miracle has been better since...forever.  It didn't take long for people to figure out that they could draw massive portions of their deck by combining Gadgetzan Auctioneer and Conceal, and the rest is history.  Expansion after expansion I feel like I've watched Rogues get interesting cards that end up being completely ignored due to their inability to fit into miracle, and Blizzard having to be excessively timid with adding any tools that could be used too well by miracle.

Obviously this is a bit of a step off the deep end, because I know that tempo Rogue decks have not been particularly viable in a long time and the class has had to cling tenaciously to miracle to stay afloat.  But I am optimistic that things will work out.

This post has been on my mind for some time, and in light of the recent nerfs to aggro it felt pertinent to make.  Much of this will be old news, but I hope to shed some insight into why Blizzard has not taken any steps to address the situation.

The Problem: The ladder system inherently favors aggro decks.  The reasoning is as follows:

• All victories are worth the same on ladder
• Shorter games give you more opportunities to win (and lose)
• Over the long run the greater number of games played results in faster leveling
• This effect can even outweigh an inferior winrate if the games are fast enough (e.g. a 53% win rate aggro deck is better/faster for leveling than a 56% win rate deck that is slower)

This is not a tirade against aggro decks.  If the opposite were to occur, and control decks were inherently favored by the system, this would also be a problem.  The issue is that factors outside of the actual game dictate which type of deck is best to play, regardless of personal preference, collection size, or the meta.  

The "Solutions": This is where the crux of the issue is: my goal is to demonstrate that even though there is a problem, there is no easy solution.

Let us then assume that if we want to counteract the bonus of short games that we should reward longer games more to compensate.  So how do we measure the length of a game?  There are at least three distinct possibilities: time spent in game, number of turns, number of cards played.

Time would clearly an utter failure.  It would make people rope every...single...turn to maximize their returns.  This would be a miserable experience.  We can safely discard it.  The second and third I am going to discuss together, because while they are appealing on the surface, they both share the same drawback: they change the way you play for rank.

In Hearthstone there is one surety: if you have lethal, you take it.  It does not take much effort to find clips of people who thought they could BM, only to cost themselves the game.  But now imagine that your reward for victory depends on the "length" of the game.  Now there is a new question: "How long is it possible to draw a game out safely to maximize rewards?"  Just think about that for a second.  Not only are you constantly asking yourself how to win, but also asking yourself if you are sure enough to win one turn (or three cards) later.  In this case you are no longer playing the game, you are playing the system.  

This is far worse than aggro simply having a statistical advantage, because it invades the way people interact in the game.  The savvy Hearthstone player will be encouraged to milk victories, never ending them until the opponent is forced to concede.  And speaking of those who concede...they would reduce their opponent's potential rating and so make it easier for them to climb.  Conceding would be an act of spite and expedience.  Again, take a minute to imagine this.  People, if they aren't feeling generous (and let's be honest: this is Hearthstone) would be encouraged to give up early just to make somebody else's victory worse.  This is an ugly dynamic, where both winners and losers are fully vindicated for their toxic behavior.

In summary, I know this post has not covered all possibilities.  I did not touch on the challenges of converting the current star system to a Legend-like ranking or of even more dubious suggestions to judging the "length" of games.  I merely wanted to give a bare discussion of why the commonly-suggested alterations to the ladder system would likely have unintended negative consequences, and hence why Blizzard has not adopted them.  Thank you for those who read this far.

Primary effects:

• Makes it far easier for 1-damage hero power classes to deal with it efficiently
• Makes pirate openings much more vulnerable to Fan of Knives, Maelstrom Portal and Mortal Coil

Has no direct impact on the ability of already-susceptible classes such as Hunter or Paladin.  That said, the collective effect of the nerfs will likely be to make the pirate package less common since it is more easily countered by popular decks such as Reno Mage.  So indirectly we may see an increase in Paladin and Hunter, but this remains to be seen.

Personally I was hoping for a reduction in attack rather than health seeing as that more directly gave slower starts a chance and less selectively favors certain classes with the nerf over others.  However, as mentioned meta shifts may get the desired result.

...do you...do you seriously read Blizzard like that?

At this point I have to ask you honestly: has Blizzard ever replied to a comment about balance with "play another deck"?  I'm pretty sure that's what the forums tell you, not what Blizzard tells you.

Quote from KenjiiKidoo >>

I put all my hope in the next expansion and the upcoming "nerfs". But still i dont want the game to die...  Since i really started to enjoy the game. Do u think the game is dying?

As a student of Game Design, it'll be interesting to see if Gwent, allegedly skill-focused and balanced as it is, manages to reach or surpass the same level  of popularity as Hearthstone. It certainly sounds like it'd provide a better basis for a competitive game than Hearthstone. As much as I love the game, it's emphasis on emotional highs and lows delivered through random chance and big, swingy effects doesn't mesh well with a consistent competitive scene in my opinion. It does, however, make for an excellent spectator game, with it's clear, polished visuals and explosive moments, and that's something that even the biggest Esports have problems delivering. I should really try Gwent though, been seeing a lot of content about it crop up lately.

Pirate Warrior will just run this themselves and eat their own 1/1 for a 2 mana 3/4

Where's the link then? Not claiming your accusations are false, but a link to the deck that was "copied" would make sense with this accusation.

I'm actually a little disappointed with the Lore video. Maybe I'm a bit too old-school, but Larion and Muigin are not the only classic Nintendo reference in the zone. They're not even the best reference. No Un'Goro reference list can be considered complete without mentioning the source of the most epic quest chain in vanilla WoW... LINKEN! That quest line sent you all over Azeroth and alluded to multiple Zelda games. NEEDS MOAR LINKEN!!!

here we go again. I'm sure reno decks will be tons of fun to play without reno or kazakhus. Oh that new quest mechanic? Sorry bud, banned your quest card. Lol i love these ideas with no thought behind them.

You strongly agree with yourself? ahahahaaa. I love this post.

No. You lose the run.

Don't bother with it, it's not worth it for f2p players.

I think the feeling of simple and easy is because of the staleness of the meta. Some top tier deck and win rate is easy to figure out weeks after new expansion. Because the deck is discovered and shared to the net, everyone will race to make the top tier deck and rake in the win. The speed of this make the time between expansion feel the same. Everybody become "skilled" in the top tier deck because it is the deck they play the most to rake up some win.

Let's imagine the Patron meta if the dev didn't nerf the Patron deck. The meta will be filled with more and more Patron deck player because it is the highest win rate deck at the meta. The more skilled player will win more but the unskilled one will play the Patron again and again until they also become as skilled. Then what happend after that? The people will complain that the Patron deck is easy but in reality all people have the same relative skill in piloting the Patron deck.

 In my opinion changing the meta is more important then creating a complex deck or complex card. If the meta is always changing then the complexity is always be there. The complexity in this case is the one to figure out the meta, how to couter it and how you make your deck be the one that have a high win rate.

Imagine if next month the dev remove all the basic and classic neutral card (leaving only the class card for class identity) and then pick 3 expansions (for example only Naxx, BRM, and Ungoro) to become that month card pool. The player have to figure out the meta with in one month. Then the next month the dev will shake things out again by only limiting the card pool from 4 different expansions (for example: Ungoro, GVG, TGT, Karazan - No basic or classic card). This way the people will always busy too try new things that will or will not work in that month. This way there is complexity in figuring out how to build your deck.

But if the meta is too predictable everyone will be back to only play the easiest deck to play and win, because well in the end people have more fun in winning then experimenting on the meta. The evidence is in the way people play Pirate warrior on the first week of MSG.

Quote from Sheetrokzz >>

How about instead of you guys whining 24/7 try a different game??? Play shadowverse it's great. Even cards and castles and duelyst are alot fun. In a month hearthstone will be exciting and new again and then a month after that you same people will be crying about stale and unskilled meta .

Quote from Irock666 >>

Quote from Winterburn >>

 

We need a new dev team. Fresh brains that are not afraid to take risks.

 I agree with this.This is a digital card game by a billion dollar company,they should explore their creativity to the maximum and if they mess they can simply fix the problem.They have all the tools at their disposal and they still treat digital cards like printed ones.Their lack of balls and in worst scenario ability is disturbing.

Quote from Hooghout >>

 

How to bring the fun of casual to ranked? One take is to make creative cards cheaper qua manna cost. Think for instance what a cheaper Moat Lurker; Princess Huhuran; Herald Volazj would mean for board play as they would probably see play in competitive and make the respective classes more viable and diverse qua archetypes. Now these are just "fun cards."