Update 2:35 AM EDT: The Q&A is over.
Update 1:51 AM EDT: Updates seem to be coming in slow. Grab a snack!
#AskBrode - The Ben Brode Twitter Blue Room Q&A
Ben Brode was at the Twitter Australia Blue Room today to answer community questions using the hashtag #AskBrode. His answers have been formatted below.
Quote from Ben Brode
- Ben Brode is now in the Blue Room. Answers incoming. (Source)
- They come up with new themes by writing down ideas on a whiteboard. They then narrow it down at the end of the meeting by each picking their favourite ideas and getting a count. (Source)
- Writing developer blogs about each class would be cool (Source)
- Ben's favourite card back was Legacy of the Void, but now he loves the new disco card back. (Source)
- If they feel standard format doesn't change enough, they could remove or nerf more classic cards. (Source)
- No current plans for a public API. They've talked about it in the past though. (Source)
- We could see more effects like Foe Reaper 4000 in the future. Other new mechanics that effect combat in a fun way is also something they're looking at. (Source)
- Priests are the master healer in the game and extending that to other classes would ruin the uniqueness. [In response to will Paladins get cards that do something based on a heal] (Source)
- Rafaam showing up in the Kara cinematic is just for fun. They like to bring back old characters for them. (Source)
- They've been looking into ways to better balance arena without avoiding the creation of strong common minions for Mage and Rogue. Re-writing drop rates of individual cards could be a solution. (Source)
- Ben Brode's favourite Hearthstone Team 5 producer is everyone but Yong Woo. (Source)
- Ben thinks they're announcing some good cards for Priest (Source)
- Ben got started at Blizzard by getting to know people there while delivering pizzas to Blizzard. He was initially on their night QA team and was involved with Warcraft 3 editor testing - that got him into game design. Then he was working on the WoWTCG followed by Hearthstone for the past 8 years. (Source)
- Ben wants to fight 1 horse sized duck rather than 100 duck sized horses (Source)
- You can still use the Medivh hero skin in Karazhan. We might be surprised what happens. (Source)
- They considered doing Karazhan instead of the Curse of Naxxramas. (Source)
- They didn't want to do another spooky themed expansion right after Whispers of the Old Gods hence the party. (Source)
most hated comment on hearthpwn.
We Go Face?
Get out of here face-hunter/shaman/warrior! Its time for the not face meta(one can hope)!
I really care for this game so much and i believe that it's problems can be fixed if Blizzard cares... But does it???
balance in arena between classes, ranked system is old and boring, basic cards and power creeping, agro and zoo...
why would they care about something that takes a great deal of time and makes them a fortune... oh wait $.$
What problem? In 2013, for blizzcon, Kripp took a deck called "turn 8" or something, and it was considered hyper aggressive. If you aim for a turn 8 kill these days, you deck is way to slow...
The game was about getting value out of your cards, trading minions, making the best plays. Now it's who can vomit the most minions in the first 3 turns and aim at the opponents face the best.
Midrange decks used to be decks where most cards where 5 mana or less with still a good amount of expensive cards. Now you take aggro decks, add 2 5drops, and it's called "the slower midrange deck" (quote from liquidhearth in 2013 about midrange: "A midrange deck is characterized by trying to gain incremental value on every play: a prime example would be Argent Commander"; Try to start generating value at turn 6 these days). Gone are the days where the audience goes crazy from the turn 5 swing a "coin-black knight" would do against a sen'jin shieldmasta.
A card like nat pagle got nerfed because "coin - nat pagle" was almost impossible to beat, with a lot of RNG (hard to kill, drawing that 50% card could make or break your game). If you can't deal 4 damage on turn 2 these days, you have a bad deck or very bad draws. Random effect everywhere (damage on play, kill, summon; random minion/spell on play, kill, ...). Mindcontrol got increased from 8 mana to 10 because the tempo swing was too big. There isn't anything worth mindcontrolling these days, to make it viable again it should almost become 4 mana to counter flamewreathed faceless, and would probably still be to slow...
And those are just a few examples. 99% of the cool effects don't matter, since you probably never get to play the card, and the impact isn't big enough when you do.
Tournaments would upload vods to youtube, split per game, because the full best-of-3 would be too long. Now the player introduction takes longer than the full bo3...
Sorry for the rant :)
I see no rant man, these are all valid points and I can`t see how the current design team is anywhere capable of bringing the game into the right way back again. It literally started after the classic set with Goblin versus gnomes and their way too overpowered cards (plus the increase of random effects). After that you see miss step after miss step so they tried to break out of the circle with the introduction of standard. A constant cycle of new sets for the prime format was and is definitely a good idea but again they showed their incompetence with bad or missing nerfs as well as a format without the right tools for most classes.
How should the meta change without giving every class the right tools to deal with it? They don`t even thought about giving every class proper single and AoE spells to kill waves of minions. It shouldn`t have been a problem to rechange the classic set and balance all classes for the next years to come.
Statements by the design team that the "meta was never better" are really showing that they think it`s all good and they do a great job.
Great post. They've dug a hole that they cant get out of.
Not to be a troll, but you know beta testing comes after alpha testing right..?
That fact doesn't stop the original statement from making sense.
Honestly, without Call, hunter would be as good as dead. Shaman on the other hand...
I think Blizzard intentionally try to keep the game simple and stupid. They don't really care about the balance as long as they can make money. From their perspective more RNG is better.
when paladins are way better healers than priests i don't know why i'm bothering with this game anymore
Right? Do they even play the game. Unreal!
I hope you realize that he meant the healing mechanics.
Paladins can't draw cards with their healing powers
Paladins can't deal damage with their healing powers
Paladins can't buff minions with their healing powers
those mechanics are unique to priest, that's what he meant.
not to mention that paladins are not better healers than priest.
I would take the time to show you how and why you're wrong, but judging by your answer you are so full of yourself it wouldn't make a difference anyway.
Make pizza not HS
A interesting option to create more Arena diversity is to have the same approach WoW used when groups couldn't find Tanks....Offer above average rewards for players that pick the least played Arena classes that punch over 6 wins.