Hearthpwn

Overall I think the most important is "B" just like OP stated. At least some semblance of that and in a fashion were there traditional archetypes place in the meta helps punish certain archetypes and thus making way to counters of their own. 

To some degree I think we always have a bit of "A" if you go low enough in the rank, as I have taken crappy "fun" decks from some of the most unpopular classes to platinum and diamond in most if not all metas. I do however feel that in the more recent years the powerlevel of the "good" decks have increased so much more making subpar decks that much worse in comparison than earlier metas. However I feel this is natural power creep that is hard to combat without making expansions where a lot of the cards end up being unplayable due to being too low a powerlevel.

 The most important aspect to look at to hope to achieve what I feel is a more balanced meta is to make sure most decks have some sort of weakness. Like reducing the resource generation in more tempo oriented decks, try to lower the mana cheat possible for some decks, lower consistency by reducing drawing capabilities. I especially feel like the last year has given some absolutely bonkers drawing capabilities to most of the "top classes". 

I think it's too early to really know if the HoF'ed cards makes sense. They did say one of the reasons was because they didn't plan to further the support for either card in the future. I would have loved Shadowform to be an actual functional archetype, but that would need a card change and certain support for the card. 

Circle of Healing and Inner Fire might still have a place in a midrange priest deck, if it gets the right support. 

Overall I think a lot of what team5 have showed us so far is looking good, so I think I would wait at least a bit into the first expansion to see whether I think any of the cards was a clear mistake. 

Personally I really enjoy Highlander hunter, and my list is far from optimal at the moment but still  getting good results. Depending on the meta taunt warrior can do pretty well, but it has some gaping issues with bad draws in some games and can get out valued easily against some control decks.

 Once the meta settles a bit I do expect CC mage to still be a top tier deck, so having options of dealing with the giants is likely a thing every competitive deck needs. 

I love that Hearthstone really embraces that it's a digital game, cards like this is what the entire engine enables. Also it seems really powerful. Day 1 craft for sure. 

I can't call the card good, but I do hesitate to call it bad as well. It's simply too hard an effect to really wrap my head around without the context of the rest of the deck(s) and the meta it's in. I do think it has quite a few similarities to Dragoncaller Alanna although the timing of when to play the card is vastly different. 

The place I see this card shinning is a win-condition for a control deck vs control decks (another big board to outlast the enemies board clears) and sometimes (rarely) it can be a hail mary vs faster decks if your spells don't have the right effect to handle your situation. However we have seen a meta with less aggro and some over the top control mirrors, so I think it's worth trying out, but it might need a bit more support for most classes to utilize effectively. 

In terms of value I don't think it's hard to get plenty of board from it consistently (like 15 mana+ worth), but like Alanna you could often be in scenarios where turn 10 fill your board is a death sentence and thus not worth the build-around. 

Think a lot of people are rating it worse than it is. Love the design and I think the effect has the potential to be pretty strong in the right decks and the right meta. 

A lot of people are seeing it as a worse Frost Nova or Time Out, but I think there are several scenarios it might actually be better than those cards. On curve it's pretty much just frost nova (that also effects all potential chargers the opponent has, but together with Doomsayer it's often more reliable than doomsayer/ frost nova is (unless the opponent had 17 attack on board and is willing to "waste" that trading into a 3/10 and killing the doomsayer.

It's also pretty effective at developing minions behind it. Overall I think the card is easily 4/5 stars in terms of power and 5/5 for the concept.

Some good luck you had there. But the pity timer could be a factor, I'm pretty sure that each different pack is on their own pity timer. So you might have been on 20+ packs opened without a legendary for several of the expansions thus resulting in this grand result. 

Quote from GerritDeMan >>

Lower Harbinger Celestia's mana cost to 3. This is very unlikely to make her playable, but at least it will make her more playable.

 

I actually think this would make her strong enough to see play in several decks. The upside vs the downside would be much better. The only concern would really only be doomsayers. Other than that it would offer good AoE protection on certain turns or have the very likely chance of staying 3 mana 5/6 for one turn vs certain control decks.  

Quote from Omicron_Persei >>

Quote from Wraivin >>

Quote from Live4vrRdieTryn >>

A lot of Hearthpwn people just like to disagree with anything that OP says, I've noticed...

 

Guess it's empowering or something

 OR perhaps a lot of Hearthpwn people have more awareness of how balancing works compared to the OP. Buffing cards, especially frequently, is just going to result in inflation / power creep and eventually, everything becomes way too good. Think about the strongest cards right now. Now imagine the weakest cards in the game eventually being that good. That means good cards now have to be that much better.

Then they'll have to either increase each player's health total drastically so that all these overpowered cards aren't instantly killing players in <5 turns. Then we're back where we are now except with everything having a higher number.

Huh, thinking about this... I wonder why Blizzard chooses to nerf cards instead of buff them. Sure, buffing cards would be more "exciting", for a bit. But at least they understand that you don't buff cards to deal with overpowered cards...

 

 Sorry but thats a total falacy. If you Buff lets say heal druid into a t1-2 deck Rogues are going to be less dominant, and the meta is going to be more diverse. There is no powercreep. There is not op cards, only more viable options.

 

 Okay, which buffs would that require? And are you certain that won't change the meta for the worse either in this expansion or in the next couple of expansions?

My main concern with buffing over nerfing is the extra time it takes to get it "right", which would likely take time away from other areas, like creating new cards. So the only buffs I would really like to see is to utterly unplayable cards, but then again either the buffs would be so minor that the cards are still unplayable or you risk the cards becoming a problem. 

Btw while most, like me, might think it would be most likely for the rogue to pick Explosive rather than Misdirection, the way Hunterace played the turn before didn't telegraph it was explosive. Actually it might seem more likely to be Misdirection. However I still stand by my post that Viper could've played the turn better for an overall higher chance of winning the matchup. But then again on that stage after so many hours you are bound to make plays that are less than optimal from time to time. 

I think he misplayed that turn. While I think it's quite fair to choose to play around Misdirection instead of Explosive Trap he should at least have waited to play the second Witchwood Imp to after the attack in case of Explosive Trap. It would only increase the risk of destroying your minions with misdirection from 20% to 25% and it would most likely set up lethal next turn. 

Quote from Gershelf >>

Honestly, I feel the only real loser is Priest. I don't care how idealistic it looked in stream, having to rely on silencing your own cards just to make them useful are lame.

 Well Priest also got several quite useful cards not geared towards the silence deck but with a much broader application. I don't know how well priest will handle the rotation overall but based on the cards giving this expansion alone I honestly think they got a lot of the better ones. 

Seems too slow. Sure the Zilliax synergy is nice albeit slightly overrated. I have a hard time seeing decks that doesn't have additional mech synergy using this card.

I think Zola the Gorgon should get a spot somewhere, it works so well with Jan'alai, the Dragonhawk and can do stuff with other cards as well.  Speaking of Jan'alai, the Dragonhawk, I am concerned on whether or not you can get it activated fast enough, maybe a single copy of Spirit of the Dragonhawk could be helpful (it's also a semi board clear that can help the lack of Dragon's Fury)

I actually really like Conjurer's Calling and until now I hadn't realized the perfect interaction it has with Voodoo Doll for a 6 mana minion clear that leaves 2x 3 cost minion on board. I am not too sure about including Splitting Image. Safeguard also seems like a weak card to me, so I would likely remove them to include some of the cards previously mentioned and maybe another Voodoo Doll, if you are more concerned about aggro/midrange then a cheaper taunt like Proud Defender or Belligerent Gnome might be a better option. 

It's hard to know whether there is a place for control mage in the new meta, but with these changes I think it's a pretty solid foundation to build on and adapt to the meta. 

 EDIT: Whoops, missed that Zola was rotating, thanks for pointing that out. 

Hi. I have come up with an idea for a spin-off on miracle questing rogue and would love to get some input on the deck. 

If someone has a lot of experience with current miracle questing rogue I would love to hear from you on issues like whether the deck can do without SI:7 Agent and how to avoid "bad" hands with too many situational spells. 

I would also love to hear some thoughts on Walk the Plank vs Sap