Hearthstone Tavern Talk: Bringing Back Heroes, Balance Frequency, Community Card Art
The Tavern Talk series continues!
- They still hope to bring back some old heroes you can't get anymore. Very fluffy answer here.
- There are disadvantages to changing cards too often.
- They want you to play decks you enjoy and make you feel that your cards are still going to be there tomorrow.
- The art team accepts portfolios if you think your art matches the Hearthstone theme.
Quote from Jesse HillEver wondered what’s goes on behind the closed doors of the tavern? Ava and the crew’s antics aside, the Hearthstone development team works hard on a myriad of tasks to bring you the game you know and love so well. More than that, we also make the time to read about the different issues and questions the community brings to light each day.
Welcome to Hearthstone Tavern Talk, where we’ll share with you answers to some of the questions we see in our community!
What is the Hearthstone’s team stance on adding more or bringing back past Heroes?
We want to keep adding more cosmetic Heroes to the game. Along with card backs, they give players more visual options on how they want to play. We’re also hoping to bring back some of the ones we’ve featured in the past to give a wider audience a chance to get them. We’ve always got something in the works, but for various reasons it does take time to get them out into the game. Meanwhile we’re hard at work ensuring more valiant (and diverse) Heroes can join you on your Hearthstone adventures!
Why doesn’t Team 5 do more frequent balance changes?
Balance changes do some great things for Hearthstone. They reinvigorate the whole meta: people start experimenting with all kinds of decks and trying to find out which ones are strong or fun for them. In addition, there usually are a lot more decks and classes that people can play after balance changes, and this provides a lot more freedom to players to do what they like best.
However there are some disadvantages to frequently changing cards.
- Some people enjoy a meta that has settled down so that they can build a deck to counter the meta. When people are all experimenting with different classes, it is a lot harder to build a deck to counter the meta.
- Frequent changes make your collection feel less solid. This makes it harder to get excited about a specific card or deck you have.
- If things changed every week, players will not have enough time to explore all the nuances of a certain card.
- People grow accustomed to a favorite deck and when that deck is frequently changed up due to balance changes, the player often feels less inclined to trust the game as a whole.
Would you ever be open to receiving card art submissions from players or the community?
We love admiring community artwork for Hearthstone or the Warcraft universe in general. Many of the images you see in the game have been created by artists directly employed by Blizzard, but many more are created by our external art partners. We have reached out to artists like Monica Langlois and received permission from her to publish her Fen Creeper art in the game. We also discovered artists like Wei Wang and Tooth via fanart submissions.
If you feel your art style matches Hearthstone’s, we encourage you to submit your portfolio to the Hearthstone team at artsubmissions@blizzard.com. Remember to have “Hearthstone Art Submission” in the email title!
See you at the next edition of Hearthstone Tavern Talk!
Cheers!
So, i saw some people here suggest MONTHLY changes. That's just ridicolous.
How long ago were the most recent changes? Two months? And the meta still hasn't been entirely 'solved' with new decks like Heal Zoo Lock popping out of nowhere.
And how the fuck should pro players prepare for tournaments ?
And how many more people wouldn't know what to craft and be hesitant to craft any deck at all ?
And i can already here the screams for dust, because you crafted a legendary and AGAIN a vital part of the deck it fits in has been nerfed.
And you finally found a deck you really like, BOOM, ded.
Not all people agree to your definition of fun. I'm not competitive player, but to me monthly changes sound chaotic and dull. I still like to learn a deck and experience it playing well. Maybe play it to legend. And I don't have the time to play it every day. Meta is pretty good right now and really diverse. Even a bit much. So you can't even play against it.
Pr talk, just what I like. On a serious note, make balance changes WHEN THEY ARE NEEDED, we don't need some weird mandatory balance changes every week/month or something, we need them when the game becomes barely playable because of cards like Patches, Raza Anduin combo, Corridor Creeper, good old Undertaker, etc. So just do it when it is needed not when it's too late anyway.
why would someone who startet playing a year ago get a chance to get the S1 card back? That is unfair - its your loss.
I rather use my S1 card back than my legend card back due to the fact that s1 card back is a lot rarer.
I think they meant that along with card backs, Heroes bring more visual options for a player to play. The question was about bringing old heroes back for newer players, not card backs.
I really feel you. And I don't want all the players to get the same collection, as mine... But on the other side I really want Pirates card back. But I got into the game a bit late - may 2015.
What do you think guys? Should I send my portfolio? It matches quite well.
It's a dragon! It's a beast! The background is green! Control Hunter confirmed!
I'd hire you! :D
The new Witchwood Grizzly art looks great!
A b s o l u t e l y !
There are at least as many reasons why more frequent balance changes would be good. Not as often as every week, of course. That was mentioned just because they know that would be ridiculous. Once a month would probably be reasonable.
Personally I think it would be very fun to play with Witchwood Hunt heros, (Shaw, TimeTinker, Tess Greybane) since the emotes are already set for them and they were some of the most enjoyable to try out. Imagine them in ranked and if you Summoned themselves as a legend you could have a special interaction
one week balance change is called being ridiculous, nobody asked for that,
However you should at least do monthly balance changes, at the very least end of the month kill the broken card called and look at player deck usage and etc.
1. past hero = not interested
3. blizzard art ( from or not fans not interested. )
monthly is also to frequently, maybe as a new format.
BUT there should be a balance patch after a month after a new exp, so we dont have to deal with another undertaker/lackey/chrismas tree/...
I can understand why they don't want to change cards every week, that's clearly understandable. But there is a two things I would like to see more when it comes to changes:
1) If there is a card which is clearly broken, it should be fixed a little faster than 6-8 weeks. I know, for example, that I liked using Spiteful Summoner when it was just 6 mana. However that said, I knew that it was broken, so much so that when they fixed it, I was kinda glad they did. I know that sounds odd, but I do prefer have cards which are powerful, but at the same time have a way for your opponent to counter if needed. After all, if a game is based on who draws a certain card first, that to me isn't entertainment.
2) So this is more of a maybe and I think some may disagree with me here. But maybe they should change some cards between expansions. We know an expansion comes out every four months, however what can happen is that it can get to the two month period and the meta is pretty much set in place. Now I know that when the new Arena cards were made available, it changed the Arena gameplay in a way that normal Arena doesn't play. So the idea which I have in mind is that, if you change some of cards which aren't used a lot within that expansion, it could create different options for people to use those cards.
Still that said I know that when it comes to changing cards, you have to be careful. As much as some cards need changes now and then, I would hate for a good card to become like Warsong Commander.
They'd rather reprint cards then buff/change
I agree that too often balance changes would do more harm. One good balance change in between expansions is just perfect (like the last one, shoutout to blizz for making first-time-ever balance changes that covered basically all meta problems).
the first nerf should be quicker and maybe another one later on when needed or just for changing the meta a bit (warlock and priest for wild)
I hope they completely rotate the classic and basic set.