Hearthstone Players!

Edwin is really nice in these new spell heavy builds. He like a third Arcane Giant and comes out on turn 4. The decks I am playing don't even need Edwin to do anything. He's just an oversized early threat. They spend resources to kill him that I can make sure don't kill important stuff like 4/4s that draw my deck or 8/8s I cast for free.

Krush is probably the "worst" of the class legendaries, and he's still pretty good. His biggest downside is that the rest of Hunter's cards are good enough to win you the game before you need him. In controllish builds he's a ton of fun.

I heard Reynad explain the problem with King Krush. At 9 mana he is slightly worse than Rags and also not something you would ever pick over Call of the Wild. If you making Hunter deck you are doing it wrong if you are going to put that many late threats in it. So it's not that it's a bad card at all, it's just that there are better options. You can grind it for lots of dust though.

I agree Reynad is toxic and has issues. At least is aware of it and is trying to be better. It's a struggle. What I like is he makes crazy decks and tinkers with them in stream. Seeing someone play a typical meta deck like Control Murloc Pallly is boring. I see that deck all day on the ladder. I also don't need to see arena streams. I want to see deck ideas I had not considered. Probably my current fave is HS Dog. He plays fast.... the fastest, talks about the reason for his plays, gets hilarious input from chat. Contrast that with Stifecro rubbing his chin until the rope every turn.... So boring. I also like JackieCh4n he makes original decks. Trump is ok, just a little dry for my taste. But yeah, I still find Reynad a compelling watch. He bitches a little too much about every time RNG bites him and misses lethal from time to time. But he plays exciting decks and has the most to say about non hearthstone world than other streamers. Firebat I would watch but I never see him streaming live. I have watched his YouTube edited videos. There are some good ones and some he just threw up there to pad his content where nothing remarkable happens.

One of the best streamers right now is Hotform. He is willing to try all kinds of goofy stuff once he makes certain marks, (like, let me get Legend, then we'll go crazy) and he's an excellent analyst and player (#2 at World Championships). There's not much that can phase him, because he's probably thought about it or played it before. For really top tier ladder play, you can watch Ant, Muzzy, or Navi. Navi was queueing at Rank #1 last night (losing) and Ant managed to get it. Meanwhile Muzzy and Fr0zen were gunning for it, but bouncing around in the teens or the most part. Once Ant made it (Aggro Shaman), he was trying to queue into Reynad with Purify Priest memes.

It's weird for me to have Shaman be so good. I played Shaman for so long when it was bad that now I feel dirty. It is so SO good. The speed of Aggro Shaman is best-in class (turn 5/6 kills). The recovery of Midrange Shaman is best-in-class--they wipe out your board? Here's two 5/5 Taunts, a 3/6, and a buffed totem. Some Spirit Claws next turn to clear the way. The threats they can spew rival Hunter, and they have Hex and Lightning Bolt to kill all your minions!

jeb wrote: Krush is probably the "worst" of the class legendaries, and he's still pretty good.

Hm. Herald Volazj, Acidmaw, Anomalus, Cho'Gall, and Flame Leviathan would all like a word about the loss of their potential #1 ranking. Krush isn't good, but he's far from the worst, IMO.

@ jeb. I will definitely check out some Hotform if I come across him streaming. I only check 7am 3pm and after 9pm pst. But streamers ranking means almost nothing to me. I just want to be entertained. There are tons of good players that stream with heavy euro accents.... I find I don't enjoy listening to that for long. And any recent tourney Championships mean the dude got lucky. All the top dudes are saying RNG has taken over the tournaments. That's why Firebat ran his own tourney and banned a bunch of cards. But if people are playing cool and unusual decks, are easy to listen to, and have a shred of charisma... I am in

jeb wrote: It's weird for me to have Shaman be so good. I played Shaman for so long when it was bad that now I feel dirty. It is so SO good. The speed of Aggro Shaman is best-in class (turn 5/6 kills).

The problem I have with Shaman right now isn't the speed, it's the defensive options. It's entirely possible to deal with things like Flametongue Totem, Flamewreathed Faceless and Tunnel Trogg as individual threats. But it's so easy for Shaman's to throw up a defensive wall which you have to deal with first, while these huge threats pound you into the ground. Spirit Wolves, Thing from Below and the default Taunt totem are cheap and difficult to get rid of: playing against them is far more frustrating than fun.

Jackwraith wrote:

jeb wrote: Krush is probably the "worst" of the class legendaries, and he's still pretty good.

Hm. Herald Volazj, Acidmaw, Anomalus, Cho'Gall, and Flame Leviathan would all like a word about the loss of their potential #1 ranking. Krush isn't good, but he's far from the worst, IMO.

I was talking about the ones in the Welcome Pack, the class Legendaries from Classic. I got my Welcome Pack yesterday--Edwin Van Cleef was my Legendary (have him, boo) and Millhouse Manastorm popped up and reset my counter (booo booooooooo). Oh well. I did get 2x Forbidden Healing with the dust and have lots left over.

I hear you, Matt. Shaman's just strong all over the game. 3-mana 6/6 (Tuskarr Totemic rolling the 3/4) into 4-mana 7/7 (Flamewreathed Faceless) that you can roll into 10/10 Taunt (cheap Things From Below) not long after--probably to recover with if they manage to survive Round 1 there. It's crazy. Hunter has had access to good creatures like this all along, but not this cheap, and not with spells that can deal with board very well. There isn't a better removal spell in the game than Hex. Shaman is riding high, the elements are destroying us.

Thing from Below is undercosted; it should cost more or at least have Overload. Not only does Shaman have good defensive options but in their current state they can repopulate the board very efficiently. In Firebat's tournament I saw Thijs lose a match (I can't remember against who) to a Shaman where Thijs used Equality to clear the board three times and he still couldn't deal with all of the minions his opponent was playing.

And I couldn't tell you how many times I've barely dealt with a Shaman's threats and have a tenuous board presence, and then here comes the Fire Elemental...

In a never-ending quest to tweak my deck to peak inefficiency, I added The Curator to my Deathrattle Hunter deck. It's actually not that bad; beast synergy, taunt, card draw, blah blah blah, you know the drill...

SebastianBludd wrote: Thing from Below is undercosted; it should cost more or at least have Overload.

Personally I think Shaman could be given an effective light nerf by reverting all its totem cards to basic totem. So Tuskarr Totemic only summons one of the four basic Totems. Thing From Below only gets a mana reduction for one of the four basic totems. Thunder Bluff Shaman only affects basic totems etc etc.

But this kind of grandstanding is irrelevant. Blizzard will do what they want and we know they dislike heavy-handed card changes. All we'll likely see is the above change to Tuskarr Totemic, which is the real focus of annoyance at the moment, and possibly a nerf to Doomhammer. It was widely labelled for a nerf in the last round of downgrades.

SebastianBludd wrote: Not only does Shaman have good defensive options but in their current state they can repopulate the board very efficiently. In Firebat's tournament I saw Thijs lose a match (I can't remember against who) to a Shaman where Thijs used Equality to clear the board three times and he still couldn't deal with all of the minions his opponent was playing.

And I couldn't tell you how many times I've barely dealt with a Shaman's threats and have a tenuous board presence, and then here comes the Fire Elemental.

Haha, yes. That's always a horrible moment.

That said, the one thing about the current aggro Shaman builds that separates them from previous meta-ruining decks like Face Hunter and Secrets Paladin is that it requires a fair amount of skill to play properly. Just throwing everything at the face over and over isn't particularly effective. You need to be able to time and co-ordinate your plays properly to keep the enemy side clear, then get your threats down and keep them protected with taunts.

MattDP wrote: That said, the one thing about the current aggro Shaman builds that separates them from previous meta-ruining decks like Face Hunter and Secrets Paladin is that it requires a fair amount of skill to play properly. Just throwing everything at the face over and over isn't particularly effective. You need to be able to time and co-ordinate your plays properly to keep the enemy side clear, then get your threats down and keep them protected with taunts.

I think that's fair. Positioning is very important too, for the Aggro Shaman player, given how Totems and Taunt Wolves deploy to the right and so forth. It's more like Zoo in this aspect than it is like Deathrattle Hunter. That Doomhammer, Druid Hero Power, Rockbiter Weapon synergy, though--that's 12 damage, and you can wait around a few turns for the cards to show up. That's better than an extra charge on Eaglehorn Bow, that's for sure.

MattDP wrote: But this kind of grandstanding is irrelevant. Blizzard will do what they want and we know they dislike heavy-handed card changes. All we'll likely see is the above change to Tuskarr Totemic, which is the real focus of annoyance at the moment,

So, now comes the question: Is it Tuskarr that's the problem or all of the totem changes around it? When TT was first released, people tried it and constantly failed because of the randomness inherent to the Shaman hero power and the fact that totems had no other cards to work with them. One of the many reasons that Shaman was so weak for so long was that you couldn't properly strategize with your hero power in the same way every other class could because you could rarely predict what your hero power would produce. Similarly, you didn't have any cards that really took advantage of that hero power in the way that Priest cards are enhanced by healing (Cleric) or Warrior cards are enhanced by armor (Shield Slam) and so on.

That's all changed in the last couple expansions, not because Totemic became better, but because there are now cards that produce a benefit simply from having totems at any point like Thing or aren't reliant upon huge mana costs (Valiant) to produce a relatively minor effect, such as Primal Fusion. The advantage that TT does have, now that it has other cards to play off of, is that it produces the extra stats in its higher mana cost. You're paying 3 for a 3/2, which is bad, but you're actually paying 3 for, at minimum, a 3/4 which is fine, but also a 3/4 with an ability attached, which is great. A comparable card, Deadly Fork, isn't widely used because you're not getting that. You're overpaying for a 3/2 and then you're overpaying for Fiery War Axe.

I think it's interesting that they've hit on an approach that seems to be a revised version of Inspire. No one played Inspire decks because most of the effects were subpar and Brode later confessed that they'd been nerfed based on internal testing, where they were out of control. So now comes Thing from Below, which gives a benefit no matter when you've used your power, not just when he's in your hand, and Arcane Giant, which works no matter when you've cast spells. There's a pretty clear design path there. The weird thing is that Shaman was so awful for so long, despite having one of the best base card sets in the game, because of two things that are highest among complaints about the game right now: The necessity of tempo (Overload inhibits it) and RNG (the Shaman hero power.) Once you bring an inherent benefit to those "should be good but are actually drawbacks" mechanics (Trogg and Thing, respectively), you make subpar cards like Totemic into cards that your opponents dread.

This is a great analysis of what's going on in competitive HS right now. This idea that "you don't have to pay for stuff" can be really poisonous in this kind of quick-paced card game, where every early turn really matters. Let's look at where we see this effect right now:

• Shaman: Thing From Below often ends up a 5/5 Taunt for 0. Tuskarr Totemic gets you between 0 and 3 mana worth of stuff.
• Paladin: Mysterious Challenger ruined the game for a bit there. Thank goodness Avenge rotated away in Standard. Secret Paladin still Tier 1 in Wild.
• Druid: Innervate gets you discounts on whatever you want.
• Mage: Sorcerer's Apprentice discounts. Fireballs from Antonidas,
• Rogue: Preparation discount.
• Hunter: Free secrets from Cloaked Huntress
• Priest:
• Warlock: Free Silverware Golems
• Warrior:
• All Heroes: Thaurissan discounts, Arcane Giants, the incredible value of NZoth and Yogg-Saron

Some of this is talked about as "tempo" but it's not "tempo" in the traditional card game sense when the opponent gets 12-stats worth of stuff for 3 (normally tops out at 7). You can get this effect "right," i.e., not make it The Most Important Thing, by keeping it narrow. I think the discount for Farseek is fair, or from Call Pet (too narrow!). The others make the game more about Did I Draw More Discounts Than You than actual interactive play.

I made it to Rank 9+ this Season on the back of Secret Hunter . It is LOADED with Secrets (2x Freezing, Explosive, Snipe, Cat; 1x Snake, Bear), but you ideally don't actually pay for those. That's what Cloaked Huntress is for. You generate these asymmetric turns where you get, say, 8 mana worth of stuff to their 4. And if you get Freezing Trap in there--you might negate their 4 mana entirely. Having so many Traps makes the game very difficult for the opponent. Snipe can be brutal at the wrong time. Cat Trap is very tough in the early game against Druid while they ramp. (My turn 2 Cat Trap fired off their turn 2 Innervate into Savage Combatant--I won that game. Should have played slower, I am thinking.) Freezing can stall them out, either by snoozing a creature, or by preventing attacks to avoid triggering it. That gets you to Call of the Wild and the win if that goes on too long.

I had a game earlier against a hunter where my Yogg's effects did a bunch of neat stuff, but Vanished the board so he got his Alex back. He was at 2 health. I played my zero mana (from Emperor reductions) Servant of Yogg-Saron and he finished what his master started with a Holy Nova. It's a good thing I only play to get card backs, because I think at higher ranks that would have likely been a friends list add by him.

rocketkiwi wrote: I had a game earlier against a hunter where my Yogg's effects did a bunch of neat stuff, but Vanished the board so he got his Alex back. He was at 2 health. I played my zero mana (from Emperor reductions) Servant of Yogg-Saron and he finished what his master started with a Holy Nova. It's a good thing I only play to get card backs, because I think at higher ranks that would have likely been a friends list add by him.

I have been exploiting Yogg since WotOG came out, so I have gotten my share of ridiculous Yoggs. But I got salty yesterday at an opponent who got Avenging Wrath (6), Explosive Shot (5) (cleared my board), Lay On Hands (8), Call of the Wild (8), a couple of Traps (~5), Journey Into Darkness (1), Mark of the Wild (2), and some other stuff. I'd conceded before it was done. He went from ~6 life, two cards, empty board, looking at lethal to 9/7 Yogg, 12/10 in Hunter Beasts, opponent's empty board, some Traps up, 14 life, and 5 cards in hand. Paid 10 mana for about 40 mana worth of effects. That was something.

I just lost to an Nzoth Paladin (pretty sure, he never cast the big guy though), who gained, not shitting you: FORTY-ONE life points over the course of the game, and I was still a card away from winning. I killed him three times and it wasn't enough. Hunter has threats, though, dang!

jeb wrote:

Paladin: Mysterious Challenger ruined the game for a bit there. Thank goodness Avenge rotated away in Standard. Secret Paladin still Tier 1 in Wild.

Divine Favor should be included for Paladin, as should Solemn Vigil, if we're talking about OP cards that can get you insanely discounted value.

I don't think it's coincidence that the two most currently played Inspire cards - Savage Combatant and Thunderbluff Valiant - are the two that synergize best with their class' hero power. Inspire cards have a built-in two mana Battlecry that you usually don't get to use twice unless you're way ahead, anyway. I don't know why they even tied the Inspire mechanic to hero powers when they could have let you click on the minions themselves and have a Discover-style card pop up to give you the option of spending 1 mana (or whatever) to activate an ability.

If something like that's too complicated/buggy, there is a lot of design space in Battlecries, Deathrattles, Silence and positional play that I'm surprised haven't been explored. For instance, why haven't we seen more cards in the style of Loatheb (other than Saboteur, that is)? Sure, Loatheb was over-statted, but the idea is sound. So instead of giving Nerub'ar Weblord and Mana Wraith auras that hit both players, make them tech minions that hinder your opponent for a turn. They would reward skilled play and it would force me to finally start memorizing common meta decks. For instance, a 5 mana 3/4 with "Battlecry: Your opponent's minions cost 5 more next turn" would be a nice counter to a Doomsayer board clear.

You'll inevitably have to figure out how to design them so they're not must-includes by aggro decks to shut down opponents for setting up lethal the next turn, but it's worth looking into.