Synergy Picks in the Arena are Being Removed
Mike Donais briefly mentioned the removal of synergy picks over on reddit. This will occur in an upcoming Hearthstone patch, but not alongside the incoming balance update.
Quote from Mike DonaisThis won't be removed in the Balance patch as that was added as a quick bonus patch.
It will be removed in a patch after that though. (Source)Hey Mike thanks for the quick response! Could you please clarify, what exactly is being changed? Are you removing all the synergy picks? Changing the list of synergy cards offered? Trying a new system?
The first 2 picks will be the same as all the other picks. It is being removed. (Source)
This. Or at least fix the damned discover tables so some stonehill toad won't be a "discover tirion/tarim/white eyes/ ..."-type card.
It's a good idea, it just needs to be reworked. Hopefully the patch will fix more than just synergy picks.
Remove Deathknights. Remove Flappy Bird.
IMO, do something to force people to take weak cards if you want to balance arena - I don't know how exactly but you are clearly playing with idea of card pools, so maybe try that....pool all the 'bad' cards and force them into peoples decks, with say, 5 picks where you only get sub-par cards. Yes, people complain about getting bad picks right now - but that's because they fear they'll be matched against someone with no bad cards. BUT it's the bad cards that create they interesting play situations that you just don't see in constructed. We want to avoid curvestone, we want to avoid broken win-more cards, we want to avoid cards that are simply busted in arena format (DKs), we want to avoid power creep so that games end so fast decision making is reduced. Bringing all decks down in power level is good for arena, period.
So, looking back at my last few Arena runs.
Choice 1-Tol'Vir Stoneshaper, Roll the Bones, Gadgetzan Auctioneer
Choice 2- Jade Shuriken, Menagerie Magician, Netherspite Historian
I guess Gadegt/Jade was synergy? But, my choice of Tol'vir had no synergy with options in choice 2.
11-3 run
Choice 1- Tol'vir Stoneshaper, Servant of Kalimos, Gadgetzan Auctioneer
Choice 2-Tomb Lurker, Southsea Captain, Murloc Warleader.
6-3 run, again, no synergy. Tol'vir is the pick, and no synergy for choice 2.
Choice 1 Steam Surger, Servant of Kalimos Tol'vir Stoneshaper
Choice 2 Rockpool Hunter, Primalfin Lookout, Menagie Magician
2-3 Run, no synergy. I grabbed Steam surger, and got no synergy option on 2.
The system just did not seem to be working, so losing it is no problem...lol
The purpose of the synergy picks wasn't to have synergy with _each other,_ but rather to influence the rest of your draft.
Say for example your 2 synergy picks ended up being Tol'vir Stoneshaper and Rockpool Hunter. Now, elementals and murlocs are more attractive to you than normal for the rest of your draft. This way, arena decks had a better chance of being skewed in a certain synergistic direction (like building an elemental deck or a deathrattle deck) rather than just being the same amorphous arena deck over and over. That was Blizzard's objective, anyway.
The only problem with that was, picking the synergy card in no way guaranteed any actual synergy for it. So you were generally just left with a weak minion.
Arena is dead. Team 5 apparently didn't notice that.
are you saying Arena is dead because you yourself no longer play....valid
SO glad I don't play arena. One less cluster fuck to deal with.
Well never really understood what the point was with the synergy pick anyway, so happy to see it gone - Seemed to me that just made arena worse since my winrate went down from 7+ to 5+ on average.
What is Synergy?
Cards that work well together. Like if you choose a pirate card, you will get more pirate cards. But that should be for construction only. Arena should be more random. That's sort of the point.
TY captain!
They aren't removing any cards, you don't understand what he is talking about.
One day like Half life 3 the arena will be skill based and good players will have consistent wins but lets hope it hapens sooner than later.
Well I do hope they remove DK if they were thinking about it since they just win preety much every marginal game or even behind one, new draft system more picks from options instead of 3 perhaps, wild and standard arena like in play mode, solo arena smaller entry fee smaller rewards, faster responce to those win more type cards in way reduction of rate it apears in draft like they did to some cards hopefully it will be worth the weight.
That idea is so good that blizzard might Thoughtsteal it.
So no Gadgetzan Auctioneer on first pick anymore? God bless you Mike.