Hearthstone Players!

jeb wrote: They have SO MUCH DATA. They have folks that can parse that data. They use it to diagnose issues in the game and --fix-- them, where the --fix-- can end up way more broken than the game in the first place.

Sure but, again, there may be areas that they think don't qualify as mistakes. Mysterious Challenger wasn't introduced solely because no one played Paladin secrets. It was introduced to create a new archetype in Paladin, one which did, in fact, use secrets as a key element of the deck. It succeeded, spectacularly. Similarly, Grim Patron was introduced to create an interesting combo deck. In both cases, what they failed to realize was that those cards were so strong that they would become the dominant decks of the meta. You can't fault them for trying new things. You also can't fault them for not seeing past their limited testing pool. They have designers that reach a high-level of legendary every season. The fact that they might be able to turn Grim Patron into an amazing deck isn't an indication that everyone will. But now they've learned that, in fact, everyone will. Those are the development mistakes that you live with. As you say, the data is there for them to make changes between expansions but they're likely more concerned about the mass audience that doesn't pay attention to the scene the way you and I do. If you're a casual player and you turn on your phone to find that your favorite deck has just been eliminated, you're going to be pretty disappointed and, perhaps, stop playing the game. Many other games don't have those kinds of "obvious" answers because there are more factors in play.

The other thing is something that I think is kind of a dodge, but I've rarely seen Blizzard employ it. Designer reactions to the problems of Priest were decidedly muted. In more than one interview, they said that their data indicated that people were succeeding with Priest and that meant, ispo facto, that it wasn't so bad. But the reaction of the competitive community (Reddit, et al) and the pro community (the complete absence of Priest decks in any major competition) means that the class is not good, despite Kibler's ability to take it to legend. Yes, it's possible. It's just not likely. But, again, I think that problem is rooted in the same depths that Overload was: they think it's a good mechanic/class concept and they're determined to make it work, even if only gradually, rather than a radical overhaul (the former of which is probably the sounder design approach, regardless of what we may think of it.)

I actually don't agree that Sir Finley has anything whatsoever to do with Shaman's rise. As I said earlier, I think it's a case of them piling more and more on top of Overload and totems until they both reached kind of a breaking point. Now would be the time to draw back a little, but then they printed Spirit Claws. But that, too, may be another example of the Purify effect in action: they didn't think that Shaman would explode like it has and so Spirit Claws was already developed and set for ONiK and it was too late to back out.

I'm betting that what Team 5 is really afraid of is becoming a mass example of the SC2 Bunker effect. The devs for SC2 had real problems sorting out Terran balance for a long time and much of it was centered around the Bunker rush, where Terran players could roll up to your naturals and pen you in and choke you to death. So they increased the cost and build time of the Bunker. Suddenly, Terran players had no defense against a Zerg rush. So they lowered the build time. And back. And forth. And back. It became a running joke within the game that the Bunker was kind of a programming cornerstone of the game structure and you couldn't make changes anywhere else without including a change to the Bunker to activate all the others. Kael'Thas has that reputation in Heroes, as well, since he's been changed in almost every balance patch since he was introduced a year-and-a-half ago. Team 5 doesn't want to make the massive changes that you and I may think are necessary because of all the unknown ripples that they'll cause. I respect that... to a point. I think they do have room to make more changes than they are but they have the typical Blizzard "just let it play out" frame of mind (and possibly some element of the notorious disdain that some of the devs have for the audience; WoW is replete with stories about this phenomenon) that keeps them thinking that it's better to move slowly.

The Heroes team (Side note: I'm not sure what to call the Heroes team. They're not team 1, anymore. Are they Team 6? Is Overwatch now Team 4 since Titan is dead?) tried to take that same approach until last winter, when it was evident that not only was a pro scene not growing because of persistent imbalance in the game, but that pros were actively leaving the scene for the more stable (at the time...) environments of LoL, DotA2, and Smite. There was a big meeting and then suddenly balance patches were hitting the servers almost every week as problems arose. They recognized that their game required swifter action. Of course, said swifter action has also meant balance changes that only last for a couple weeks before being reverted (Greymane is a prominent example.) But the Heroes audience is smaller than HS and far more conscious of competitive balance issues, so it's easier to assume that mindset. My guess is that Team 5 just isn't there yet, but with the widespread revolt among pros right now and many of them being quite vocal about leaving the game or only playing in tournaments with a controlled card pool, like Firebat's, then change should be coming soon (and not ™.)

I got an Al'Akir from my welcome pack. I'm not sure what I wanted most... maybe Antonidas or Edwin Van Cleef.

I ripped a gold Mukla, Tyrant of the Vale. Haven't dusted it yet, but I'm still trying to think of which legendary I want to get to replace it. I'm thinking I should stick to a neutral classic legendary. I've already got Sylvanas, Thalnos, and Onyxia. Malygos, Ysera, and Alexstrasza all seem like they're either good now or have been staples in the past. The Black Knight would be pretty good in the Pirate deck I keep messing around with, as a way to deal with Thing from Below and whatever big taunters some of the control decks are running these days. I haven't been playing much ladder lately, still sticking mostly to Arena. I don't think I've done better than 8 or 9 wins recently.

I'm thinking I should stick to a neutral classic legendary. I've already got Sylvanas, Thalnos, and Onyxia. Malygos, Ysera, and Alexstrasza all seem like they're either good now or have been staples in the past.

Ragnamotherfuckinros The Motherfucking Firemotherfuckinglord. He's so good I want to cry. And with Barnes—I weep. I weep. Turn 4 concedes. I can't complain if you take the dragons, though, they are all amazing and open new deck building opportunities.I just crafted Alexstrazsa over here actually, playing Dragon Mage. I suck with it, but it's a good deck Hotform was driving the other day.

2x Mana Wyrm (or Babbling Book)
2x Frostbolt
2x Arcane Intellect
1x Ice Block
2x Fireball
2x Polymorph
2x Flamestrike

2x Faerie Dragon
2x Netherspite Historian
2x Blackwing Technician
Lx Brann Bronzebeard
2x Twilight Guardian
2x Azure Drake
2x Blackwing Corrupter
2x Book Wyrm
Lx Chillmaw
Lx Alexstrasza

Huh, I actually have all that shit. Maybe I'll give it a go.

I crafted a Ragnaros the other day when my dust total got stupid (10k) and I wanted to try a deck with him in it.

That goddamn card has been the bane of my existence for years, and I was happy when he'd quieted down in the meta. Then he came raging back in Standard, and with Barnes in the game he's just critical. I need to build a Paladin deck with with both versions, to see if I can get them on the board at the same time.

DIE, INSECT! LIVE, INSECT!

Thanks for letting my complain here, folks. I just need to vent a little from time to time. I had a lot of success with Control Priest in the past, and it's frustrating for me to just hang up that Hero for months while HS evolves. I had a good Season in Standard. I think I showed I can get the wins. I don't have the time to make Legend, but I believe it's something I am capable of. My win % this Season is > 60% through Rank 8 (and was like > 80% through 15), so I could get there for sure. It would just take a hell of a lot of games, even with a drop in win%. I can netdeck with the best of them: Dragon Warrior, Aggro Shaman, Secret Hunter were the sauce this Season.

Next Season, I will focus on Wild. Definitely a more "spread" metagame. You'll see as many Mill Rogues as Warlock Zoo builds. Secret Paladin is a big deal, and Control Priest may be the best deck in the format. Turn 7 Dr. Booms, Turn 6 Lightbomb, Turn 4 Piloted Shredder and all the rest. Looking forward to it--I think my creative juices need a little kick and Wild is simultaneously more rewarding and interesting to play in as a deckbuilder.

No worries. That's what boards are for, in at least one respect. I'm out of Wild, since I scrapped all my non-Standard cards. Just have my head in other games, like Heroes.

Jackwraith wrote: No worries. That's what boards are for, in at least one respect. I'm out of Wild, since I scrapped all my non-Standard cards. Just have my head in other games, like Heroes.

I am too much of a completionist to do this. I don't even like disenchanting golden garbage because I might might, uh, perhaps...

I eventually do, but it's tough. #stillrockingMaexxna #mightneeditsomeday

That's where I draw the line. If I have two of something, the gold ones go away. (Oddly enough, the one exception to that is the Eaglehorn Bow, I used to have one of each, then got a second golden one. They get used so much I haven't cashed them, and I'd still have to buy the second regular).

But aside from burning gold for dust, I can barely even bring myself to burn shit Legendaries. I still have the stupid Millhouse they gifted me with a few weeks ago, and some other junky ones. I can't stand restricting my options.

I did burn the Flame Leviathan I got, because fuck that noise. What a shit card.

I dusted a gold Troggzor when Old Gods came out, as well as the fucking Boogeymonster, but otherwise I've kept all my legendaries, no matter how underwhelming. I should have dusted Anomalus but I'm giving it until the expansion before Old Gods rotates to be useful in a deck (spoiler: probably not going to happen), and my most recent legendary is a Tinkmaster Overspark I'm keeping around in case it's useful in a Tavern Brawl or if I can shoehorn it into a janky Reno deck to grief opponents. As for Naxx cards, I just can't bring myself to dust any of them. I feel bad dusting classic epics (thankfully I pulled a replacement Twisting Nether), let alone discontinued adventure cards.

I'm in gold hoarding mode right now for the next expansion/adventure even though it's surely months away. It's also an excuse to wait and see what, if anything, Team 5 is going to do with their game to arrest its implosion. After reading a recent interview with a couple of guys from Team 5 I don't have high hopes.

As for ladder, I'm at rank 15 on the strength of Bubble Paladin but I don't feel like trying to get much higher. However, it's nice to realize that Tempo Mage is still as annoying as it's ever been and it's easily my most detested deck to play against.

jeb wrote: Next Season, I will focus on Wild.

I'd kind of forgotten about Wild. But after a 5-game losing streak in standard, four of which were instant losses to Call of the Wild, I thought I'd give it a try. Vastly amused by the shit people playing shit FaceHunter decks at Wild rank 25

I feast on their entrails, those Rank 25 Face Hunters. First there's the Deathlords to get through. Then there are the Wild Pyro clears. Then you see a Holy Nova, but it's OK: Hero Power and spells will get me, right? Oh no, my friend. For I Flash Heal away your Kill Commands, Lightbomb your board, and warm myself with the embrace of Justicar Trueheart. By now, you are gasping, trying to draw something, snapping away at your two second turns. Here's where I pass your life total and wait for N'Zoth to bring all those Deathlords and Sludge Belchers back and finish you off. You should have clicked Concede on turn 4, or maybe when you saw the matchup. No matter, maybe you'll get the next one. Or maybe you'll pause a bit, to make sure I have moved on, to avoid the rematch.

The nerfbat arrives: us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/blog/203030...update-613-9-28-2016

Most of them seem fairly wise. For example, Call of the Hunt is now the equivalent of casting 3 Animal Companions and getting three different results, if you could do such a thing (I'm not talking about having 3 copies in a deck; everyone knows you always get Huffer.) I'm not sure the change to Yogg is going to have the impact that they're hoping for, as I've seen him go off many times and survive and, fairly frequently, end up even more powerful than the 7/5 that he already is. But at least it's a sign of progress.

Ooh, I am big fan of these changes. I'll summarize them here. Read the link in Jackwraith's post, it has the context for the changes.

• Rockbiter Weapon --> Now costs 2. This is the only one I grumble about a little, if only because I remember how shitty Shaman "normally" is, given their Basic set cards. It makes sense though, the Basic set also has Doomhammer, and taking 10 on turn 6, or 16 on 7 was not super fun.
• Tuskarr Totemic --> Can only summon Basic totems. HUGE change here, holy crap. Folks really hated seeing 6/6 for 3 (rolling Totem Golem). This is a buttkicking. This card moves out of everything and into Totem/Evolve decks at best.
• Call of the Wild --> Now costs 9. Huh! Costs as much as three really good 3-mana spells. Weird. This will still see play, this card is a sumbitch.
• Execute --> Now costs 2. Good. This card pissed me off. It'll still piss me off, not to worry, but maybe slightly less so now. Makes playing big minions bad. Unhealthy for Timmy/Johnny when trying to duke it out with Control Warriors.
• Charge --> Doesn't do fuck all.I'm kidding! They lowered the cost to 1 and made it unplayable. I'm kidding again! Ha ha, it is to laugh. They lowered the cost to 1 and now the affected creature can't attack Heroes this turn. RIP Raging Worgen OTK.
• Abusive Sergeant --> It's now a 1/1. I'm fine with this. Same nerf as Knife Juggler and Leper Gnome, and it totally works. The cards still see a little play, but not like before. The new "rule" seems to be four damage for 1 is too much. Leper Gnome represented four damage, Abusive was four damage. Too strong in Neutral.
• Yogg-Saron, Hope's End --> turns "off" if Yogg turns off (Silenced, killed, bounced, transformed) and will give you Overload. Again, I am OK with this. I like Yogg, and was abusing His Infinite Mouths for a long time, but it is pretty unfair for that thing to keep going after you get the clear. This aligns it with the interaction with Sylvanas, where if Sylvanas dies and "steals" Yogg, the Yogg starts swinging for the other side. If Yogg is the source, and the source is gone--the effect should go with it.

All in all, these are reasonable, and I think they show the direction Blizzard wants the game to go. Compared to Magic and other CCGs, the game is very "aggressive" by allowing the attacker to control combat. Making "aggro" cards like Abusive Sergeant and Leper Gnome is gilding the lily and can spoil the fun. Games will go a couple turns longer with these changes, and I'm all for it.

jeb wrote: All in all, these are reasonable, and I think they show the direction Blizzard wants the game to go. Compared to Magic and other CCGs, the game is very "aggressive" by allowing the attacker to control combat. Making "aggro" cards like Abusive Sergeant and Leper Gnome is gilding the lily and can spoil the fun. Games will go a couple turns longer with these changes, and I'm all for it.

Generally good changes. Oddly, I suspect the biggest impact might be from the Abusive Sergeant nerf since it's such an aggro staple. But it's a good change: still a very useful early game card but is no longer worth playing on its own, nor having it left on the board after its bonus has traded up another minion.

I'm surprised they went for Rockbiter Weapon over Doomhammer and I don't think that's an effective change. Doomhammer lasts for eight attacks, so making the Shaman wait one extra turn to unleash ten damage really isn't a big deal.

Also think Call of the Wild should be 10 mana. The unpredictability of Call of the Wild is the reason it costs 3 mana: the minions it summons are all worth 4. Plus the three of them syngerise extremely well, making them harder to deal with.

Blizzard sound like they're not sure on the Yogg changes themselves. I had a sudden brainwave on a better way to deal with it. Make its first effect non-random, and ensure it's always an Ice Block spell cast on the opponent.

Some nerd did the math on Yogg not being killed/silenced/polymorphed/whathaveyou: www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/comments/55..._that_yogg_finishes/

T(oo fucking confusing)L; DR: It seems that he's going to average about 5 or 6 spells before offing/silencing/frogging/sheeping himself. However, as with most card games involving intermeshed variables of skill and luck, most will always remember the bad beats (Yogg casts 14 spells and survives as a 10/5 charger with divine shield) than the inevitable, boring wins (Yogg casts Assassinate on himself with the first spell.) That's why I was saying that I don't think the adjustment is sufficient to solve the pro scene problem. In most decks, Yogg is not THE win condition. He's a fallback. If you find yourself in the late game with Token Druid and both your Teachers and your Swipes are gone and they've cleared your board a time or two, you can cast Yogg and he can still win the game for you in, quite literally, completely random fashion.

In that way, he's still injecting too much RNG into tournaments that are nominally won by the person who plays best with the uncertainty already created by draws and deck matchups and he's also still leaving the social stigma of that "bad beats stand out" phenomenon. In the above example, if the person across from you outplays your Token Druid and you still win because you dropped Mr. Chaos, that person is justified in engaging that sensation, even though the same thing might have happened because you topdecked the perfect answer or they drew the top quarter of their deck for the first six turns. Draws are the fundamental RNG of card games. Most players learn to live with that, even if they still remember the bad beats based on human nature. But no one wants to dread approaching turn 10 and beyond because someone might drop a card that can still completely revert a game. That randomness is not a measure of replayability. It's a measure of chaos, which Blizzard usually refers to as "fun" (strangely, a label also applied to decks like Purify Priest...) Games Workshop used to call Chaos effects that crippled your powerful characters on a single die roll "fun", as well, until people avoided them at all costs in both 40K and Fantasy. The same thing will continue to happen here, which means the HS competitive scene will continue to shrink as esports orgs decide that it's not a viable investment to support good players that can be beaten regularly by the random dude off the street who has a thing for ending hope.