Mortal Shroud D1 Remake, Zero Empathy vs GR 74
Hearthstone Patch 9166 - Tavern Brawls, New Heroes - Animated, New Card Backs
Heroes of the Storm at Dreamhack, Heroes Academy Episode 5
Patch 6.2 Developer Q&A - Ion Hazzikostas
Ben Brode on Buffing Bad Cards
Last week, Kripparrian put out a video discussing bad cards in Hearthstone and came to the conclusion that they don't need to exist. Ben Brode, Hearthstone's Senior Game Designer, countered Kripparrian with a video of his own about discussing why he thinks bad cards are good.
You can find a summary of what Ben has to say on the matter, along with the video, below.
Quote from Ben BrodeBad Cards are Good
- It's impossible to not have bad cards. Cards are judged on their power level in relation to other cards.
- Making one better will make another one worse, now that card has become bad.
- Changing cards requires a significant amount of time to tune them properly - the same amount of time new cards take to balance.
- This then ends up setting back the release of new content.
- New card designs fit better into expansions.
- Changing old cards too much can lead to a negative response from players that have come back to the game after a break. They are no longer in a familiar environment with what they have.
- Buffing old cards between expansions could lead to drastic meta changes, like those seen at the start of sets.
- They don't want to get rid of the phase where the meta has settled between set releases - that removes the tinkering phase.
- Cards that may not be powerful are still good for Hearthstone.
- They can appeal to different types of players.
- You can be encouraged to think in different ways.
Specific Cards
- Nozdormu is a good card because it can blow your mind.
- "Anything can happen in this game. What kinds of cards will we see next?"
- River Crocolisk is a good example of a card was bad and then was (temporarily) good with the old Unleash the Hounds.
- Al'Akir the Windlord - Players called it the worst legendary in the game and that it needed buffs.
- The designers had agreed thanks to internal testing. It was going to become a 3/7.
- Internal data found that if it was drawn, people were more likely to win that game than any other card in the game (Alpha).
- Wisp is arguably one of the worst cards in the game but when Hobgoblin came out, people wanted to experiment with it.
- Eye for an Eye is an example of a card which may appear to be good but is bad.
- It's a card which can teach players who are new to card games about more complicated concepts (card advantage, value, board control).
- Magma Rager - Ben likes having "trash-tier" cards in the game because they can be a touchstone for the community.
- It leads to people talking about it, trying to win with it, and creating content around it.
Tavern Brawl
- Tavern Brawl is going to help keep things chaotic for players who really like the way the meta gets shaken up at the start of a new card set.
Popular Decks of the Week
Here are the popular decks for last week. Not as many Mage decks as the week before, and Priests are up at the top.
What decks were you playing last week? Share them below!
Deck | Author | Cost |
---|---|---|
Control Priest | tylerootd | 3840 |
Acolyte Priest | MatGagne | 6880 |
Dragon Mage | Uroshmeister | 5960 |
Tempo Mage | MPZaki | 5680 |
Malygos Lock | FreiKuk | 3520 |
MURLOCS!? | BoomX9 | 3540 |
Chromaggus Druid | fateos | 6200 |
Mech Shaman | iamdannywu | 3780 |
Grim Patron Warrior | Senfglas | 700 |
Patron | thornstaff | 3940 |
Tavern Brawl Patch - Datamined Info
If you missed our datamined information on the upcoming Tavern Brawl patch, head on over to our Patch 9166 datamining post!
Tavern Brawl releases mid-June! No official release date has been announced.
This kind of argument sort of works for why you don't really want to nerf cards but really doesn't work when you are buffing cards. for example if you came back to the game and your War Golem had been buffed to have a useful battlecry then you would be over the moon, not really confused...
I can counter agrument almost all of ben brode points I totally disagree with him.
making one card better will make another card worse than it was, the other card was probably also trash tier so if a trash tier cards becomes more trash tier it doesn't affect the game at all.
taking time to balance, can't argue much with that but making a trash tier card mediocre usable card doesn't take too much thinking.. like why you would ever use River Crocolisk over hunted creeper? there is a lot to gain from it.
there is an argument that they both didn't think about it and it is that some cards you tend to open in packs.. and yeah you get literary nothing from them you bought a pack hopping your collection to be better and you get .. "oh that POS again"(see Target Dummy)
I think people who leave HS feel that the game is too stale I mean the reason to be annoyed by HS is that .. there are 103241 face hunters and it's not gonna change till the next change like with undertaker.. it took too much time to nerf the card it was crazy OP and the game was about who gets to play him in the early phase and who doesn't.
I think that buffing cards that are useless like war golem have more to gain than to lose it was never good to begin with.
nozerdomo being a 8 mana or 6/10 like kripp suggested won't brake the game it will just make him being played here or thare it's still too slow and it's still only a psycological effect.
The main agrument I have on buffing base and common cards is that it might make new players not play face hunter to somehow stay relevant to the game that's a big thing the starter set everyone get is just "here play aggro" if you make some base cards good.. maybe you can change the base game play to mid range or a bit more control... currently there is no way for a new player to play warrior (except face warrior).
I don't get what's so wrong having a "totally new game" for people it's that way anyway it's not like you gonna quit HS return after a year and expect an existing archtype to actually exist, if someone comes back to HS and see that everything has changed it would be quite interesting for such person actually that's my opinion though..
I totally agree with you Double Summon. Ben makes a few good points but his card examples were terrible In My Opinion like Harvest Golem and Al'Akir the Windlord. Ali is crap because you have to use Rockbiter Weapon with him for him to be useful and you don't always get in his double hit. Ben also needs to stop putting Magma Rager in the spotlight. The fact that people can make funny videos or w.e around it is a sack of crap it IS a shitty card that needs to be buffed and in no way useful unless you can somehow give it charge with another card or even divine shielding it is crap. Devs really could improve the cards like kripp says. Ben is being way more opportunistic and expecting that the community will take a small buff/change and take it out of control like in his hunter example. Coming to the players coming back to a familiar environment concern, there is small chance that someone will be upset after they take a break and come back to have previously crappy cards in their decks or not in their decks get a little better.
In the end Ben is just trying to say Blizzard too lazy to make new upgrades for old cards because even though this could bring in more money their time could be "better spent". But the vanilla cards like kripp says are becoming more ass. New players don't need to be spoon-fed why the card is bad just play the dang game enough and you will see and learn. Blizzard just being a large gaming company and giving 0 fucks about the community is a thing all too commonplace nowadays. Bring me back to the 90's where everything wasn't pay-to-win and buy-this-expansion-or-your-game-experience-will-be-ass.
Someone explain Brody that if they will buff ie. 10 unplayable legendaries, there will be a lot of people who will buy packs just to get them immediately and try them out, and a whole bunch of people who craft only useful golden cards, who will have to buy about 50 or more packs to craft it.
Its pure value, and changing card text, like making ie. river croc have effect similar to earthenring farseer, but restoring 2 health, is like 3 min of work, ctrl-c ctrl-v.
I just can't stand talking about community mentioning only what is good for casuals. I'm not casual, nor pro, if they make Nozdormu 7 mana 5/8 i will craft it to have fun, and maybe counter grim patron op crap. Because Grim is broken. Blizz is waiting for people to optimize Grim Warrior to death, and then they will nerf it. Like facehunter with UTH + Starving Buzz. Like Miracle Rogue (which was unnecessary, and I was left sad with my crafted Maly :( ). It's just stupid way of managing the game in my opinion, and thinking how wonderful game heathstone could be just makes me sad :(
I just want the patch to go live.
JUST DO IT!( pls)
I actually agree with Ben on this one. Most of his points were clearly thought out and I'm of the same mentality about 'trash-tier' cards.
Of course, Kripp had some good points too, but we always skipperino kripperino, so nobody will ever know.
Ben: "Cards are judged on their power level in relation to other cards. Making one better will make another one worse, now that card has become bad."
So he is saying that there are only polar relations? That you cannot attain a balance between card levels?
Kripp:"there's no reason for bad cards,here is why."
Ben:"we know what every person want, people get angry if we change things, fun things are fun, we use shaman as an example of what is fine on this game , Nozdormu is so funny XD!!!"