BlizzCon 2015 Announced - Nov 6th and 7th, Golden Hearthstone Card Back
Eric Dodds on Blackrock Mountain
The guys at MetaBomb had a chance to discuss Blackrock Mountain with Hearthstone's Lead Designer, Eric Dodds. Check out our recap of the interview below, or if you'd like to read it in full, head on over to their article.
Quote from Eric Dodds
- Initially when deciding on Blackrock Mountain, the team threw up a bunch of ideas on a whiteboard.
- Blackrock Mountain is very different thematically when compared to Naxxramas and Goblins vs Gnomes.
- It fit in really well with the 10th World of Warcraft anniversary being themed around Molten Core (which is in BRM!).
- Dr. Boom is not on the nerf list.
- They only want to nerf cards when it's "really negatively impacting the game".
- The team has discussed Karazhan as an adventure, and he'd "be surprised if they didn't do it at all".
- Not all cards in new sets are going to be designed to fix issues in the current meta, but some will be related.
- Cards have two stages of creation:
- Design: Make a cool concept for a card, and make it awesome.
- Development: Balance the numbers. Playtest. Balance the numbers.
- No plans to redesign the Hunter Hero Power, nor are they talking about it.
- They are not working on a console version of Hearthstone, but they won't rule it out for the future.
- The phone version of Hearthstone has an updated tutorial to make sure new players understand the game.
- No current plans to change anything about how new players can get brought up to speed with their collections, but it's something they're talking about.
I want to say something about Dr. Boom, there aren't really strong neutral cards in that spot(the 7th) so if in their eyes Dr. Boom is balanced, we will see some other strong neutral cards in the 7th spot. So maybe the "way" they will use to nerf is to adding strong cards(not stronger) in that spot, that will make Dr.Boom an option.
Just wait, they said the same thing about Undertaker.
What will likely happen is that they will release a card in BRM that is sort of 'Counter-Boom' and if that card doesn't tone The Balanced One down, they will bring out the nerf bat, mark my words.
Feels like the correct response to it. Personally, I wish they'd never nerfed Undertaker, and they just tried more ways to make it not as good. They could have easily dropped in some more neutral, metagame specific card choices into the Mix for Blackrock Mountain to combat Undertaker. Maybe at that point though it was a bit too long of a wait.
Clearly we just need monthly card releases!
well, the problem with ut was in cards that benefit him. So any newgood deathrattle minion will buff UT indirectly (dr. Boom was one of them). But doctor boom can only be nerfed indirectly by introducing new cards (he is already have counters like bgh and mctech). That is the difference. For example card that steal deathrattle effects from all minions on the board. It won't affect UT but it will affect dr. Boom
I'm glad they're at least discussing a way to get new people up to speed. I know the basic and expert set is OK as far as cards go, but GvG and Naxx introduced so many cards that are so much better. Maybe they'll have "adventure packs" where you get all the current adventures at a discount.
Hey! just look at the name of the site in which he gave the interview, Its called "MetaBomb"
Meta= The Hearthstone Meta.
Bomb=The Boom Bots from Dr. Boom.
So they want to keep the meta just like now.
IS A CONSPIRACY!
Illuminati confirmed.
What about Half-Life 3? Boom Bot + Dr. Boom + Boom Bot = 3 Minions..
and max dmg 7+4+4=15 that is your half-life in the game.
they won't nerf dr. boom until they've met their booster pack quota for GvG. 'tis a business, kids.
Blizzard are dumb how a "must have in every deck,even aggro decks use him" doesn't negatively impact the game?? it's in
EVERY DECK I don't own him I am in a big disadvantage cause neither naxx nor the basic set offer ANY KIND OF DECENT LATE GAME CARD!
There are plenty of good late game cards, the problem is blizz keeps giving aggro tools to make super efficient decks, but hasn't given a control meta sufficient tools to reliably counter it. Healing cards don't heal enough, no taunters that are efficient enough, No clearing spells that can clear everything these days. I'm of the mind of some other players at this point that the only way to make a control meta possible is to make the life total 10 to 15 health more and increase the deck limit by 2-4. Then control and midrange have more time to recover from face rush cancer.
It's balanced because the random deathrattle bomb effect. 8 damage to the face Kappa
Great news! Kappa
This surely means that War Golem will be buffed and design flaws will be carefully addressed with revisions rather than simply nerfing cards.
Because two adventures and an expansion makes up a collection that new players can easily acquire in a feasible amount of time...
Has anyone thought of occasional discounts? Steam (Season) sales anyone? It not only increases sales and profits but it is also beneficial to the playerbase.
So, there is a nerf list.
:)
Just add some more 7 mana legendaries or even non-legs, so there will be a choice in that mana spot. Now its like Dr. Kappa is the best 7 drop, fitting to EVERY deck.
(bombs still need some minor nerf like 1-3 damage from 1-4 or hit either face or minions only, or THE BEST option to deal dmg in Mad Bomber's way to any random character on board, yours or foes)
the way dr. boom is wored makes me wish they had the effect of hitting 1-4 random minions (both good or bad) for something like 2 damage. Because It reads as a warning. which to me should mean that when they explode it's not a controlled explosion. As is the warning is more: "Warning boombots may devastate your opponent"
The last suggestion you made sounds best, since it already gives a warning on Dr. Boom's card, like, it warns you of the possibility of backfiring.
If they had to let everyone know about where one card stands on the nerf list, then maybe they need to rethink that list.
For every one person that thinks Dr. Boom is overpowered, there's another nine people that think he's okay. The minority, as always, is more vocal.