Hearthpwn

I'm not some high tier player (~6500 currently), but have been consistently climbing when I get to play with very few drops in ranks, so maybe I can be of help?

It's clear above that you know the standard progression to TT4.

Making no further assumptions...

Are you keeping a close eye on your gold?  You want to make sure you are trying to spend it all, even those last few, often forgot about golds, from selling you last few minions.  Similar to Hearthstone or Starcraft, you want to be spending you money / mana every turn (within reason), and put it to use in the game (aka, not hold minions in you hand if you can avoid it).  Even a few coins left over in a recruit round can mean the difference in these games.  There will be times you'll be floating a gold or two when you want to freeze a board, but even when those happen, start looking at how you might sell minions to be able to spend those last 1-2 gold (it might be well worth it at times).

Also, based on the above, it sounds like you "have a game plan" before playing / you are trying to improve your "strategy".  Honestly, this isn't much of a strategic game; it is far more tactical.

From above, it sounds like you want to be guiding your decisions towards a particular build before the game even starts, but that isn't how this game works.  You can't force something the game never gives you.  Instead you are trying to make the best with what the game gives you.  Yes, there are times where you'll want to be thinking about what minions to shoot for in the next few rounds, as well as which minions on your board can be sold and aren't core to your comp.  But you shouldn't be thinking "what does my end comp need to be?" when you aren't even close to TT5 yet (just a heuristic there).  You want to be using your gold and minions in the most efficient form to maximize improving your board with what the game gives you.  And until you approach the endgame, I feel you should be minimizing rerolls within reason.

Generally, I also think that you shouldn't aim for doubles to have a chance for triples.  If you pick up a minion that improves your board while also getting a double, great!  But you don't want to spend three gold just for a chance of getting a triple.  Also, try not to hold minions in your hand: they represent gold / resources that you are not putting into play against your opponent (aka, they are effectively unspent gold).

Assuming too you aren't getting whooped on in the early game, I feel there is commonly a point in the game when I need to retool my comp or setup for a future round, and I'll be taking some damage to do so, but, assuming I survive, I'll be much stronger in 1 or 2 rounds.  After all, if get 1st with with 1HP or 40HP doesn't matter: HP is a resource at times.

Again, once you get into the late game (around top 4), I think things become much more situational.  But until then, there isn't a point in planning for that point of the game when you aren't sure you'll even get there.  And there are all sorts of particulars on how to play certain heros, but I think first, working on the stuff that applies to all heros is best, then honing hero specific play styles is next.

I agree / disagree with many others here (depending on your opinion) and am on the side that Hearthstone does involve skill.  After all, "skill" is defined as the ability to leverage knowledge to complete a particular goal (for those who wish to dispute that definition: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/skill), and since you can do that in this game (knowledge of the meta / decks, deck construction, hand tracking, knowing ones outs, etc, etc), it involves skill.

I do think that the OP's opinion that it takes "grit" to get towards the skill ceiling in Hearthstone is not only valid, but probably a good philosophy to have throughout various facets of life.  While, yes, just like in life, there are moments in games of Hearthstone that are unlikely to have happened but did, and are to your detriment.  But I think chalking it up to RNG and not giving it further thought can be to ones detriment.  Yeah, it's both unlikely and no fun when you have a board-less Quest Shaman against the wall, dead to your board next turn regardless of most things they could randomly "do"... and they double mutate a 3 drop into a Witchwood Grizzly... (yeah, I've been there).  But if I'm constantly facing Quest Shamans and want to still play aggro Warrior, I should probably think about how to tech my deck to still account for those rare situations.  After all, I can't control what I queue into, but there are things I can control, like choosing a different deck or making a tech choice to be more proactive or protective against such circumstances.  And while complaining may feel good (and be healthy at times for one's sanity), it ultimately won't improve anything (well, maybe your mood).

Though I will say, while I do find professional / tournament level Hearthstone entertaining at times, I'm curious if at that level (where the participants are at or near the HS skill ceiling), the difference in skill is so marginal that chance isn't the main determining factor in the outcome of tournaments.

No stealth nerf.  Just chance.

These...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_truly_large_numbers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinite_monkey_theorem

... along with the knowledge that (1) your 34 DBMG button presses are an exceedingly small number within the totality of DBMG button presses, and (2) that you "cherry picked" those 34 presses ex post facto, should help elucidate why this thread (and others like it) are silly.

You mean they are deciding not to dedicate resources to content that doesn't affect the play or state of the game at all?  More of that please!

Power level doesn't necessarily have anything to do with fun.  I only care the RR is fun.  I think it looks like it will be fun, but predictions are usually crap shoots.  Actual play and experience will vet out the power level and fun of the expansion.

On this back-and-forth of K&C "broken" cards, since no one has bothered to give some reasonable definition to "broken", and you could easily have several reasonable definitions that conflict, retrospective analysis of "broken" should really just be about whether the card was nerfed.  If so, the blizzard considered it a problem.  That's about as good a retrospective definition as we'll get.

But, seriously, if you can't admit that the original Corridor Creeper was a problem and needed a nerf, then you have major analysis deficiencies.  Many pre-nerf K&C games were about who drew their CC's first.  And, as others mentioned, decks that wouldn't normally include such cards were including 2 CC's, because it was about the only way to efficiently deal with 5/5's that could come down at stupid early times in the game... for free...  I think the best case study of CC's absurdity is the Trinity series that took place shortly after K&C's release.  Chakki, Muzzy, and Zalae won because, they self admit, they realized the "broken" nature of CC before anyone else, and had 2 copies in every deck they brought to the tournament.  That was their tournament strategy: 2 CC's in each deck...  Interviews with Zalae reveal that, before the tournament (and K&C release) when doing play testing with the cards, they would just laugh when playing CC's due to how unfair it was.

Golden Betrayal

The goldern animation is just adds so much to the original card art, and works so well for the overall flavor of the card.

Quote from TheFubar >>

While playing the matchup more often would almost certainly increase his winrate against it, the question is strictly about the amount of time being invested.  If he is only winning 3 out of 10 games and those games each last roughly 30 minutes regardless of the outcome, then I would say conceding is reasonable as long as you are not facing it too often.  I haven't played spellhunter or deathrattle rogue myself so I'm not certain how long on average those game last. 

Another factor that should be considered is fun/enjoyment.  Facing shudderwock shaman every few matches last expansion became quite annoying.  Knowing I had very little chance of beating it did nothing to improve my mood and I likely played poorly as a result.  Would those many hours I spent losing been better spent if I conceded and tried again?  

 I basically address this above, in a poorly organized post.

 [Stars gained / minute for always playing the match] > [Stars gained / minute for always conceding]

From a mathematical bend (not a rigorous proof), I'm going to say you should play the games and try to win.

It all depends on the particular numbers, but lets try this reasonable scenario.

Your win rate (WR) vs Odd Warrior (OW): 30%.  Your WR vs not-OW: 55%.  OW game time: 30 minutes.  Not-OW game time: 10 minutes.  OW is 6% of the meta (from 1-4 or legend VS data in report 103).

Now play 100 games, and see what the expected stars / minute are under two scenarios: "fight!" or "roll over" when you encounter OW.

"Fight!": Expected stars = 6(-0.4) + 94(0.1) = 7.  Expected time = 6(30) + 94(10) = 1120 minutes.  Expected stars / minute = 0.00625.

"Roll over": Expected stars = 6(-1) + 94(0.1) = 3.4.  Expected time = 6(0) + 94(10) = 940 minutes.  Expected stars / minutes = 0.00362.

So from the above you should try to win the games vs odd warrior.  I ran a quick simulation similar to the above layout for 10,000 games in each scenario (with random game times as well), and the results are consistent with the above; fight stars / minute > roll over stars / minute.

Plus, the other stuff people have mentioned about improving in the match up are also very valid.  So overall, don't just roll over; fight them warriors!

Necrium Vile x2

Supercollider x1 (I opened 1 first day)

Supercollider is a superb card if you are a fan of warrior at all.

Thinking of crafting some missing death knights; Boom and/or Jaina are what I might do soon.

Given infinite time, taunts aren't a problem.  But you don't have much time for the number of spell casts and animations you would need to get through to get through even a few taunts, let alone something like a taunt druid board.  The problem isn't inherently the taunts, its the clock, and the taunts will eat away at the clock.

While this is a cool combo, I don't see it being prominent in the new meta (or any meta) for one big reason.

The Mage non-quest fireballs OTK

Mage can already do "infinite" fireballs combo, and that combo takes fewer cards (6), is less card order / time sensitive than this combo, has fewer weaknesses / obstacles to get through than this combo does (more secrets that pose issues **coughexplosivetrapcough**, dealing with many taunts), mage has more stalls, mage usually runs 9 cards max in deck to make this happen whereas this requires up to 12 just for the combo pieces, and mage doesn't require all the combo pieces wait in hand until you want to use the combo.

Granted, this priest combo requires less total mana for truly large amounts of damage (8 by my count... so turn 7... if on coin; 10 mana for mage) and all happens in 1 turn (mage does need the setup turn at least, if all cards are in hand), but I don't see those being good enough reason to run the priest combo over mage combo in any meta that would be conducive to either.

...and this mage combo is not exactly big in the current meta... but taunt druid and hunters are.

Ha, I love these threads.  Many have pointed out the terrible analysis, but my favorite part is the faulty logic. 

If there is a 50% winrate algorithm in operation, how does this promote spending on cards?  I believe the effect would be to dissuade spending, as your more costly collection and my cheap collection would be weighted to perform similarly well within the game, thus reducing any need to gain additional cards in order to improve one's winrate.

I'll give it to the OP for at least providing some fun and congenial discussion.

I personally don't think KFT neutrals are problem, but I can understand the sentiment.  If neutrals are so powerful that they eclipse class cards, whats the point of class cards? (Again, I don't think this is the case here).  But the flip-side is also true.  The hard part from a design point is balancing both power level and unique effects and interactions between the class and neutral cards such that it promotes a healthy and diverse meta (different viable classes, deck archetypes, builds within deck archetypes, etc).  I actually think people commonly underestimate how hard this is to actually do in any game, but CCG / TCG type games specifically, due to the coarseness of differences within the design space (e.g. changing one integer on the card to the next closest integer can be a huge change; see fiery war axe, call of the wild, ancient of lore, etc.).

But as to this "proof"?!  No.  It doesn't prove anything, as others have stated.  Outside of the whole hasty generalization problem present, there is a different issue entirely.  While you said the climb was "easy" (which isn't specific), you did eventually provide context for this climb (rank 20-7).  But one can "easily" climb up to rank 5 with winrates at or even under 50%.  To a large degree, ladder position is function of how much you've played, not how good the deck or your are.  And this still holds true past rank 5, but to a lesser extent.

How's about we look at this Spreading Plague card mentioned in the initial post.

"...Spreading Plague sits much further outside of the normal range. It's in a league of its own when it comes to absorbing damage."

"Given how good it is at defense, you could argue the card would see play even if it had zero capacity to deal damage."

"The data suggest that for Spreading Plague to be more in line with the rest of the card pool, the scarabs it generates would need to be closer to 1/2’s (60% lower base stats)."

You know who said all that?  Hsreplay themselves, yesterday.

https://hsreplay.net/articles/28/deep-dive-into-spreading-plague

Quote from Lysenko >>

As you point out, hsreplay's contributors are self-selected.  Also, Blizzard's much larger data set gives them options for analysis that are a lot more interesting than just "what percentage of games where this card is played," particularly when they're looking at a specific card.  The question I'd start with would be to compare overall win rates in various match-ups between otherwise identical decks with and without the card in them, which hsreplay doesn't answer.

Now, this won't necessarily tell you the difference between the card's actual power and its perceived power, because it's very possible that if the card is perceived to be very strong, not running it will end up a marker of lower skill even if its actual performance diverges from the community expectation.  But, it's a more targeted analysis than that statistic you posted, which just looks at the card in the context of that specific deck.

(One might imagine a quirky card that were not generally useful but set up a particular powerful combo.  That card would have really nice numbers on those per-card win rates on hsreplay, but only in the specific context of the deck that relies on that combo to succeed.)