Hearthpwn

So guys, I'm browsing through my recommended videos on Youtube, and I come across a Disguised Toast video that explains how the Shudderwock deck combo works.

It's a great video, with some pretty funny moments, but even funnier than the gameplay is Toast's innocent suggestion that, "The idea is you play lifedrinker, and then kill your opponent by sucking him off!" :D 

Perhaps killing your opponent by sucking him off means something entirely different here in the UK, but wowser - Toast's suggestion has been my highlight of the week so far :D 

Here's the exact moment in his video for you guys to enjoy! https://youtu.be/C2Zjj-3iN6E?t=32m3s   

I wonder if there are any other creative ways of killing your opponent? Perhaps our Australian friends might root him to death? :) 

Today I faced a Warlock who had a golden hero - that means they’ve won 500 ranked games? - in casual playing a fully refined cubelock.

Then I faced a golden paladin playing odd dudeladin.

Why? Why are these people there? 

If a deck has been known to win X games in stats it simply shouldn’t be allowed to be played in CASUAL. 

The player should receive a pop-up innkeeper stating, “Whoa dude. That deck’s been played too many times to be classed as casual. You’re a great net decker, so how about you play this in ranked and put yourself to the test? Or shall we go back and make a different deck that’s a bit more...well...casual with your awesome collection?”

If you aren't playing arena, I'd probably say the pack quest, as that's guaranteed dust for 5 cards in exchange for 50 gold, rather than grinding for another 50 gold (15 more wins)...to buy a pack which might also be 5 dusted cards?

Of course, if you've no other packs than classic, you may as well go for 50 gold and start expanding your collection :)  

Just something I'm wondering, following my experiences with both K&C and WW?

Both sets were pre-ordered, and both times, I saw more legendaries in the first 40 cards than I usually ever do?

I'm just wondering if they 'pre-set' the amount of legendaries (and specifically the amount of each) they'd like to see in the meta as a new season begins...you know...to increase the competitiveness between players, and to reveal lots of new play styles immediately?

Let's say they have (to make it easy) 100 pre-orders for 70 packs each? That's 7000 cards going into the game on day one. Knowing that, they could easily temporarily set the legendary drop rate at X, and not only that, but of that X figure, they could set it for each legendary card too...so Hagatha is 3% of the X, Shudderwock is 2% etc.? They'd know exactly how many of each game changing card would be getting released into the game at any one time, and probably predict how many users would need to purchase more packs in order to counter that deck?  

Business wise it would make sense...but then again, I'm the guy who over-salted fries on purpose in Roller-Coaster Tycoon in order to make my peeps buy more drinks! ;) 

But I do wonder if this has been thought about before?

Quest warrior is terrible against Shudderwock - infact any warrior is terrible against Shudderwock!

The quest can't do anything for you when you've 7 Shudderwocks against your face! :o

https://hsreplay.net/replay/4AYDSPKWgvCZBhmgeRA3oG 

Me against a taunt quest warrior...I was nice...I clicked on each card to speed up the animation! :) 

Shudderwock is crazy when you play aggro first! All those guides telling you not to play battlecries that could be random...are simply wrong!

You need to play control cards all the way to the end. Freeze your enemy, destroy your enemy, control the board...then finally...make them SHUDDER! ;) 

https://hsreplay.net/replay/WUr9HmNSLC93oy9dVEmuGD

I got 7 legendaries in my pre-order pack if you include the free one we all got. Pretty pleased with that. I then opened 4 more in the 40 packs I purchased.

My best pack opening had to be this one:

I'm actually thrilled with what I opened from my pre-order pack, plus the extra 3 packs we got.

I've opened 5 legendaries + the one we got for logging in!

Logging in got me Houndmaster Shaw.

Opening my packs got me Duskfallen Aviana (the only disappointing one), Toki Timetinker, Prince Liam, Shudderwock and Genn Greymane.

Never opened so many legendaries at once in this game!

Have fun everyone - let's go build some fun decks :) 

Midday for Mexico City timezone! 

But we also have the new “Dark Possession” card coming in on Friday folks. 2 of those could finish off the cube on your turn. 

Actually, 2 of those plus a 1 mana destroy allows Warlock to discover 2 more Void taunt/Charge and heal 8 health via 5 mana.

So should they nerf the new card too?

By the end of the week, N'Zoth leaves the building.

Many players still remain fearful of Cubelock.

What's the chances of Blizzard nerfing Carnivorous Cube, from "Battlecry: Destroy a friendly minion. Deathrattle: Summon 2 copies of it." to something more like Skelemancer; i.e. "Battlecry: Destroy a friendly minion. Deathrattle: If it's your opponent's turn, summon 2 copies of it."?

And would this make people who are playing against the Cubelock deck over and over slightly happier/more satisfied with the balance?

Just a thought?

P.S. Full disclosure - I have the cards that make up the full Cubelock deck, but I choose not to play it, as I find it kinda boring to play tbh.

This is the thing though...it is too slow for the average gamer.

Yet Hearthstone is not.

Other games make you wait for 30 minutes after your 5 lives are used up. Or they make you ask 5 friends for a ticket to progress. Hearthstone doesn't. It doesn't slow you down like those other games do. So why does the tutorial?

My friends who uninstalled are all strategic players (Monopoly, Gin Rummy, Spider Solitaire, Carcasonne, Powergrid, Peurto Rico etc. as well as their mobile counterparts)...and I know if the HS tutorial represented this gameplay strategy, they'd be having a blast with us right now.

But it seemed, "Basic".

When it's actually far from it! 

I almost gave up myself...and now I have every adventure, a ton of cards, and have to delete my "Your month in HS" email before the other half sees how many games I've played :D  

Hey folks,

I've been meaning to strike up a conversation about this for a couple of weeks, and as we're all sat here waiting for the Quests to start at 23.59 (somewhere in the world), maybe now's a good time?

I'm loving Hearthstone, and I've been playing almost daily for around 8 months now. My latest venture has been into Wild, which is even more fun.

But based on my enthusiasm for the game, I've had 6 friends all try the game out (these are 6 people who I know would love the game - competitive, already playing mobile games on a daily basis etc.) and to my astonishment, all bar 1 have uninstalled the game before completing the tutorial stages. They all complained that they "just didn't get it...it seemed really boring".

I could kind of understand where they were coming from; I first found Hearthstone when it was an editor's pick in the App Store. I downloaded it (at the time I was into games such as Clash of Clans etc.) ready for a blast. But after a good half an hour, I was bored. It seemed pointless?

It was a good month or 2 later, when I was clearing out apps on my phone during a sleepless night, that I reopened Hearthstone and continued playing through the tutorial. I'm so glad I did.

This evening, I logged on to the Asian server for the first time (to see if their quest had started) and was met with...the tutorial! So I played it through one level...and boy is it dull! I can see why my friends have uninstalled it - it takes too long, and too many levels to explain what to do simply. It captures none of the fun of hearthstone, none of the creative deck building, none of the 'just got there by the skin of my teeth' moments.

I honestly think it needs reworking to capture new players. How? I haven't really thought about that, but just off the cuff, a simpler format where you play one game, and each turn a new concept is introduced - hero power, spell card vs minion to choose from, attack vs health etc. Have an animated Innkeeper walking you through the board, reminding you that when you play against real people, they will have chosen 30 cards to play against you that will be a surprise to you when they're played...just as yours will be to them! You know...get people excited about playing against other people from the outset?

When you open Hearthstone at the minute, as a new player, it doesn't even tell you what it is. You play through level 1 of the tutorial, and it seems like a game where you'll be playing against AI where you either have to play cards against the AI cards or the AI face. And if you win a battle? You win a couple of more cards to play against the next AI opponent who might be a bit harder. It really feels like, "So I place a card on the battlefield, hit another card or hit the other AI hero, and then repeat the same over and over...'for what exactly?', begs the question?"

And that question is never answered until you hit multiplayer some 10-20 games later and discover it when the game truly begins! 

What do you folks think? Have you played the tutorial lately? What are your thoughts? 

Thanks for reading!  

1st card reveal: Battlecry - Send a minion to go looking for the next expansion. It returns to the board after 3 turns.

;)

Since the latest update, something strange has begun happening to me in Hearthstone!

About 2 days ago, after playing a great game against my opponent, I added them as a friend.

Their message came back to me looking all gobbledegook, so I used Google to translate. It detected it being Russian, and the message was, "Do you speak Russian?"

Being the kind English gentlemen that I am, I used Google translate to write a reply, and we ended up having a nice little conversation in Russian.

Since then, almost every player I'm matched with is Russian! No lie. 

I now have 3 new Russian friends too, one of whom speaks basic English!

So is this a new thing in the update? i.e. Blizzard detects which language you are speaking in the messages, and matches you up with people who also speak that language?  

It never happened to me before? Just wondering if it's a new thing?

Thanks.