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- lionoffrost
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10
class legendaries and how often they are seen / how well regarded they are:
Warrior
Rogue
Druid
Hunter
Warlock
Shaman
Mage
Paladin
Priest
So overall score:
Now admittedly, Prophet Velen can't be thrown into just any deck like... erm... very few class legendaries actually. Cards like Cenarius, Lord Jaraxxus, Tirion Fordring and Neptulon can be argued to be independently good. But actually none of them curve out anywhere near as low as Vol'jin and they are never seen in aggressive decks.
So overall, priest actually isn't doing that badly on legendaries. They may not be at the top of the pack, but they're certainly not hunter or druid. Talking about the class as a whole, you may have some valid concerns about its playability, as compared to, say, hunter or druid. But it certainly isn't about the legendaries.
Fun note: most lists of Grim Patron, the strongest and most popular deck on ladder, don't run any warrior class legendaries, only one neutral legendary (Emperor Thaurissan) and none or just one epic card (Shield Slam).
0
blackstarfa, in the future you can consider using something like www.heartharena.com so that you can link us not just the cards you got, but also the things they were up against. You can get much better feedback if we see not just what you ended up with, but also what choices you made along the way.
1
You don't get to 12 wins by nurturing and slowly playing a single draft. You do it by playing many games and learning from them. Statistically, unless you're an amazing player, no deck is expected to get to 12 wins. You can always get bad draws, unlucky counters or make stupid plays. (well, maybe a few decks are good enough for twelve wins in even incapable or unlucky hands, but they're a very small minority and this isn't one of them)
This deck is a great chance for you to learn, because if you loose, it will be for very specific reasons. Keep an eye out for where you misplay. And if you loose games, see if you can reconstruct what the turn was where you made the loosing play. So in short, don't play this deck for any number of wins in this one run. Play it to get better and average more wins in the next 10 or 100 runs. That will be worth way more in the long run. If you go 3-3, but you know why and you know how to avoid at least one of those losses next time, it'll have been a good run.
Good luck.
0
As IslaRika mentioned, adventures are a better investment that card packs. And the reason is simple: all the cards you can get from packs that you buy, you could also just find. Arena rewards, seasonal ranked rewards and crafting with dust allow you to create every non-adventure card you need without spending a dime, just by playing the game.
The only way to get the adventure cards is through the adventures. You cannot craft them, you cannot find them, you cannot get them from packs. Even if you grind out 700 gold per wing to buy Naxx from that, the gold price is relatively bad. Paying 3500GP compared to $24.99 for all five wings is 140GP per dollar. Meanwhile, you're paying no more than 100GP per dollar on packs even if you take special deals on packs like 50 for $49.99.
There will never be a time when you say "Too bad I payed for Naxx, because by now I have all those cards twice since I found them in different ways again", but if you go for packs, that may be exactly what you'll be thinking a month or two from now. You can dust and re-craft them at that point of course, but if we're talking about bad value, dusting four cards to make a single new one certainly springs to mind.
1
For those of us who've been playing patron warrior for a while, it can get a bit stale at times. There are obviously interesting turns and exciting choices to make during the game, but we know the deck by now. Some tech choices have been explored, like Shield Block and Shield Slam, Commanding Shout and the choice of whether to include Dread Corsair.
If you like something truly new and surprising though, here are some cards to try one of that are inherently weaker than the current cards, but that can get you ahead because of pure surprise factor. They are simply good because nobody knows how to deal with them or play around them in a patron deck.
1) Defender of Argus
Synergy with: Grim Patron, Acolyte of Pain, Armorsmith (Warsong Commander)
The main reason to run this card is because it can let your grim patrons spawn on 3-attack minions and it can re-activate your 1HP grim patrons. When people want to clear your grim patron board, they're rarely too worried about the 1HP ones, since those are "just 3/1's now". Well, they are, until defender of argus pumps them up again.
In a pinch though, the card is also good to get an extra draw/extra armor and a better trade off acolyte or armorsmith. On top of that, it can shore up the match-up against agressive decks by preventing them from going face when you are setting up for your combo. In some rare cases, you can use it to protect your Emperor Thaurissan or Warsong Commander for an extra turn and get insane value there. Even if you just use it to prevent your bursty opponent from killing your armorsmith without first going through 2 other things, it's fair value.
The reason this card is not normally run is of course its high cost for its stats. A 4-mana 2/3 on an empty board is horendous and any decent 2-card combo with it costs at least 7 mana. As long as nobody expects it though, this card can cause some crazy swings.
2) Hobgoblin
Synergy with: Acolyte of Pain, Armorsmith, Unstable Ghoul
Don't run this card unless you also run all six of the above 1-attack cards. If you do though, this is the card that allows you to build a board to keep people busy if you're missing your Thaurissan or a patron combo around turn 6. And if they cannor deal with it, you can get insane pressure and value. Hobgoblin with unstable ghoul on turn 5 is one of the more powerful plays. Especially since if your opponent cannot deal with it, you have an extra whirlwind available on the board to trigger all your nice 'on damage' effects. And the taunt can protect your hobgoblin, allowing extra value from other 1-attack minions you may have.
The main reason to run this card though is simple: to confuse your opponent and draw out removal. Usually before turn 5, you won't have played anything that has shown your opponent what type of warrior you're running (the only possible exception is Gnomish Inventor). So when they see the Hobgoblin come out, they completely have to re-evaluate the deck and may think that it's Hobgoblin warrior instead of patron warrior. Crucially, this can be enough to draw heavy removal on the Hobgoblin, which will later not be used on patrons or Thaurissan. Especially against druids, this tech has improved my winrate massively.
The two reasons this card is not normally run are, first, that you need all 6 of those 1-attack minions to have it be reliable enough and depending on the meta, that may not be a good choice. Second, that it ultimately doesn't work towards your win condition. All you do is stall and put on some pressure, in the same way that Sludge Belcher might on 5-mana; another card that is hardly seen in patron anymore. Again, this is only worth it when it can convince your opponent you may not be running patrons and hobgoblin is really their high priority target.
3) Mana Addict
Synergy: your ~10 cheap spells, Warsong Commander
The question here is simple: isn't mana addict simply a slightly cheaper, but significantly worse Frothing Berserker? The answer is of course that yes, yes it is. The question then becomes though: how many frothing berserkers would you run if you could have more than 2. I think for most patron warrior players, they would like at least 4 of them, since the main problem with consistency against all but the most agressive decks is drawing into your frothings and warsong commanders quickly enough.
So here you have an extra frothing berserker to help you out if you cannot get the second one quickly enough or if you had to throw one out early to deal with a board state that was too threatening. It obviously won't be as insane as a frothing itself, but it is often enough to give you that extra bit of reach you need. On your big lethal turn, you can easily expect to play at least 3 spells (something like Inner Rage, Whirlwind, Execute. That means this card deals 7 damage, as well as being hit by one or two whirwind effects to give a frothing another 1 or 2. This can often be enough to reach lethal (for only 1 extra mana if you got emperor thaurissan off). If nothing else though, it can be enough to push through big taunts like Ancient of Lore, Tirion Fordring or Deathlord when you don't have an execute handy. Finally, like hobgoblin, if you just throw this out, it will draw removal like crazy. I've had druids swipe this card turn 5 on an empty board, warriors in the patron mirror use the second charge of their death's bite without proccing anything on their side of the board and mages fireball it. They don't know what exactly the card will do, but they know it is potentially scary enough that they won't save their removal for the Thaurissan or grim patron that may not even be coming.
The reason this card is normally not run of course is that frothing berserkers are so much better and when you do have both, that virtually always gives you enough reach. That's why it can be better to simply put in more draw to get to those insane cards faster, instead of settling for their weaker counterpart.
Finally, some other cards to think about if you're trying to get creative may include: Mind Control Tech, Raging Worgen, Questing Adventurer, Wild Pyromancer, Revenge.
Good luck on your deckbuilding and deck-teching. Let's keep the meta fresh.
0
It's nowhere near strong enough to be an auto-pick, but Crazed Alchemist is one of the most fun ones to play in arena for me, since it let's you warp the board in such interesting ways. I'll take a Reversing Switch from a spare part creature too. :-)
0
For the first game, not necessarily better, but things to consider:
Since you were setting up for a turn 5 bloodlust on turn 4, it might have been better to play the creeper over the whirling (or over the totem). It is more likely to stick on the board, makes it more likely for his giant to ignore it and go face (and it's worth paying 8 life to regain board control next turn at this point) and is fine to suicide into something with bloodlust since it leaves the tokens.
The main bad thing wasn't the quality of his cards, but how painfully his avenge's landed. Particularly in the first case, with a little more luck he would have been left with a 0/2 totem instead of a 3/3 MCT on board. For the second one, getting the buff behind the divine shield was horrible as well.
If the turn 7 2-drop had been anything other than a growing Micro Machine a different path would have been to go face and and tempt him to trade without you having to trigger the avenge. Consdering that it was growing with no silence in sight though, I don't see what you could have done.
For the second game:
On turn 4 I would have gone for the yeti. Warlock has no removal for it at that mana cost, nor obvious buffs for the harvest golem to trade. With one axe charge left it contests the golem really well. More importantly though, with your two 2-drops gone, you have no clean turn 5 play left except razorfen + totem. If you dropped your yeti, you would have had your choice of razorfen+2-drop based on the situation being a but more flexible.
On turn 7 you set up your board to be really vulnerable to hellfire (and yes, I noticed that before I saw he actually played it). It is a common warlock card and a fairly popular card. With him having a reasonably large hand, but you having a solid advantage on board, it might have been better to trade in the spider just to make hellfire much weaker.
On turn 9, I am not sure if this is better but you could have played the yeti with a piloted shredder to bait him into trading his 3-2 into it. If he doesn't, the shredder is a better card. If he does, you prevent him from rushing you down. He ends up trading anyway, but that's seems to be a misplay, especially since with him going face there, a lepper gnome suicide would have been lethal for him and it is unlikely for a shaman with 4 cards none of which are 1 mana (you floated 1 mana a few times) to have 6 reach. I guess he was playing around bloodlust?
In general: I notice you didn't include your decklist. Although it isn't the most important piece of information, the fact that you didn't include it is important for two reasons. First, knowing your decklist is essential for knowing what to mulligan. I assume from that that you usually just mulligan to just get turn 2 and 3 plays (or 2-2-3 with the coin)? That's fine as a guideline, but if you know your decklist, sometimes you can make different choices based on what you might get. Second, knowing the decklist means you know what you can expect to draw or topdeck, which can also be relevant for your plays. In particular, knowing how much reach you have in your deck (with cards like fire elemental, bloodlust and direct damage spells) can determine how agressively you want to play the game and how soon you want to go face.
0
Just did a check of the 37 beast cards from current and unreleased so far and the average stats are 3.4 attack and 3.7 health, with all kinds of upsides, from charge, taunt and stealth to the highmane deathrattles and the new +2 attack when you use hero power. The only beast with a downside is The Beast, and you'd still be pretty happy to get that. This average means you get an average of over 13 stats for 5 mana, more than Boulderfist Ogre, with guaranteed beast synergy and almost exclusively positive effects. So this card is really good value on average.
Just like with Animal Companion or Piloted Shredder though, the problem is variance and unpredictability, but to a much larger extend. Where normally the uncertainty is mostly within a fair range, this card can be either a huge swing or a dud. As said though, the average result is pretty darn good.
PS For those interested, the median attack and health are 3/3, with Ironfur Grizzly landing right in the middle.
0
Fair enough, and that is way easier too.
0
With Zombie Chow and Master Jouster, I am now one card away from summarizing my game from the plays on turns 1, 4 and 7 by saying:
"I played turn 1 2/3; 4 5/6; 7 8/9. 0% chance of loosing after that. :-)"
To be fair it would need some shenanigans like turn 2 and 3 Pint-Sized Summoner, but it would be so sweet. :-)
PS Yes, I am a nerd.
3
Spice weasel, let us get back to the actual question you asked: when is it time for Blizzard to step in and nerf something? I think in general, according to Blizzard's philosophy, it is time to nerf something when:
Now those 3 points are pretty abstract, so let's look at them one by one for the patron warrior
1. the fun of playing the game
From the posts in this thread and my own experience, patron warrior is not as dominant on the ladder as to make it 'the thing you keep running into', which would decrease the fun of facing diverse and interesting decks on ladder. Despite what is suggested in the original post, the deck rarely feels mindless or simple when playing against it; and similarly, it is not particularly top deck reliant, since the focus is high draw potential and a big hand size to choose from. In short, this is not a deck of luck over skill, at least not any more than other decks. Finally, the deck is surprisingly non-dominant in the tournament scene. Although it sports a solid win rate, it is certainly not dominant in play between the top players.
There are however two main things that do hurt the fun of playing against the deck. First, it is fairly non-interactive. In many ways, it doesn't matter what you play except: is it fast enough to out-pace them before they combo me down. There are absolutely some subtle plays you can make to prevent more patrons from spawning, to play around the warrior's removal suite and to conserve or use your own removal effectively. Compared to other decks though, it can feel like solitaire a lot of the time. In particular, sometimes you simply sit there waiting for a minute while the person on the other side of the table is counting up their damage only to either kill you instantly or pass with virtually no play with the rope already burning. Second, the deck limits your power and abilities. In the same sense that Unleash the Hounds was nerfed partly because it punished you for playing minions on the board; patron could see a nerf because it can punish both playing minions with less than 3 attack against possible patrons, or really any minions at all against Frothing Berserker with whirlwind effects. A deck that makes you feel like you cannot use the cool tools you have is certainly anti-fun in Blizzard's vision.
2. no good counters
There are definitely cards and decks that are stronger or weaker against patrons. Some are straight up solid counter cards like Harrison Jones and any AoE that deals 3 or more damage. Similarly, as people mentioned, solid decks like handlock and control warrior are especially good against patron warrior, particularly if you tech in the right amount of Brawls, Hellfires and Shadowflames. While on the other hand some cards have less value because of patron. Things like 2 damage concecration and cards that enable patrons like the back end of Sludge Belcher and a number of small zoo cards are weaker because patron exists.
The real question though is: is it so hard to counter the deck that certain decks are becoming unplayable because of how badly patron stomps on them? Or are certain cards like Harrison Jones becoming auto-includes because of how much you need them against patron? And to that question I can only say: I don't know, but it is essential to know. Because we should always ask: how much is a deck warping the meta around it, limiting our play and design space and forcing us to put cards in our deck that leave less room for what we actually want in there?
3. a fun and balanced alternative to nerfs
From Deathlord, Sludge Belcher and Antique Healbot against agro to Kezan Mystic against secrets and Loatheb against spell-combo decks, Blizzard has always tried to provide answers to currently powerful decks that don't require a nerf. Some have been successful and others less so, but blizzard certainly wants to try a soft solution before they try the nerf bat. Lil' Exorcist failed before Undertaker was nerfed and Hemet Nesingwary certainly wasn't the way to keep face hunters in check.
Succeed or fail though, I am sure Blizzard will at least wait to see what the massive amount of new expansion cards (due before the end of the month) will do to the meta before they decide on a nerf one way or another. If none of those cards help to make other decks more dominant or provide good anti-patron tech, then they might consider those first two points again. Until then, I doubt we will see any drastic action.
0
With the lukewarm response to the recently released shado-pan cavalry, which can quite easily be a 5 mana 6/7 and the very limited interest in the Frost Giant, I was wondering: are expensive cards with good stat lines ever playable in the current meta?
In particular, if we are just looking at vanilla cards with A attack and B defense, but with no effects, tribes, taunts etc.: how good would they have to be to be playable in constructed?
4 mana
As far as I can recall, the highest mana cost where we saw vanilla creatures was the 4-slot, where some players used Chillwind Yeti until Piloted Shredder replaced it. That card is no longer good enough, but probably a 4/6 or 5/5 would still see play in some decks. Right?
5 mana
Let's start from the 5-mana slot then, where no straight up playable vanilla cards exist. The closest are Salty Dog which has the pirate tag to make it *cough* 'better' *cough*; and the Silver Hand Knight which gives you 6/6 worth of stats. Neither is ever played. What sees some rare play in constructed in the 'close to vanilla' spot are Stranglethorn Tiger and Spectral Knight. Both of which are only played because they can't be targeted by removal.
So would you play a 5/6 on 5 mana, the yeti's big brother? Probably not. How about a 6/6 or a 6/7? Would a 5-mana Boulderfist Ogre be good enough for constructed?
6 mana
In the 6-mana slot, it gets even hairier. Boulderfist Ogre obviously sees no play. and the close-to-vanilla Dread Infernal is only ever played because it is a demon that can be called out by Voidcaller. Temple Enforcer sees no play and Shieldmaiden is only played because of the immediate effect. More shockingly, Trade Prince Gallywix and Toshley are both unplayed even though they have good stats combined with good abilities.
First of all, most people are probably scared of playing anything vanilla here that dies to Big Game Hunter. So if we stick the baseline at 6 attack, how much health would you need for a vanilla card to be playable? would you play a 6/9? How about a 6/10? 6/11?
7+ mana
At this point, it seems to me that anything without an immediate impact on the board or a crazy benefit like Dr, Boom (9/9 of stats with upside) is simply not seeing play. Would it be possible though? Would you consider playing a 7-mana 10/10? or a 6/14? Or would a card here only truly be playable if it had an absurd "answer this or I win" 15/15 type statline?
0
Shanksyo, Ignoring the fact that Assassinate is for a different class (in the same sense that we can't compare Frostbolt with Darkbomb for example), there are a few edge cases where Flame Lance is better than assassinate. For example:
The short answer though is that there is no situation where this works that is anywhere near as common as the situations where it sucks compared to assassinate.
0
To be fair though, mages did already get some solid arena-worthy reveals with Fallen Hero and Effigy. On top of that Spellslinger is fair in arena too, just for being a 3/4 body and depending on the spell synergy in your deck it can be well above average to draft.
0
Those cards are what Polymorph is for. A card that also deals way better with things like Sneed's Old Shredder, Sylvanas Windrunner, Ysera and Malygos.