Hearthstone 23: The Evil League of EVIL

[Zevox]

I feel like the Shaman quest doesn't necessarily clash with Hagatha, it's similar to playing Zul'jin into Rexxar. Kind of like a new boss battle stage, and you're almost always going to finish the quest before you have a chance to play Hagatha.

At that point, it's a matter of which battlecries are worth 2 mana to you. Hagatha giving a second horror, the Horror getting double spells, a 6 damage board wipe with the hero Hagatha, okay so with the current card pool I can't think of much more that Shaman runs, although those three are incredible value for 2 mana. Maybe double Fire Elemental for an 8 mana 6/5 deal 6, sort of a spendier Crowd Roaster. And there's a problem with that.

Right now, the best use is to get a few swing turns with double battlecries and then play Hagatha to wipe the board, so you're getting a narrow benefit.

Yeah, that's kind of the thing. As good as doubling the two Hagathas' battlecries are, that's really it as far as strong options go. You can use it to double things that generate you random cards, as Geno suggests below, but I don't think that's such a great option. Shaman isn't struggling with having cards these days, they're struggling with those cards being strong enough to win them the game. They've got some standouts like the Hagathas, Walking Fountain, or of course classic removal like hex, but the total package doesn't quite add up to being as good as Warrior for that Control play style. (On the flip side you've got Murloc Aggro, and I'll be honest, I'm not sure what's keeping them down exactly since I don't play them and don't see them often enough to tell, but obviously something is, and I don't think this helps them at all.)

I for one am scared of Shaman Quest, because it's ridiculously easy to complete, and it affects ALL of your battlecries for the rest of your turn. I'm not putting in Hagatha (okay, maybe Swampqueen because 2 Dustvar Horrors sounds really good), I'm not putting in Flame Elementals: I'm putting in Sludge Slurper, I'm putting in EVIL Cable Rat, Menacing Nimbus, Lifedrinkers. I'm not thinking about playing one thing with double battlecries, I'm playing like I'm capped at 8 mana with a hand full of Lackeys that have an permanent Spirit of the Shark in play.

Feel free to try it, but honestly, that doesn't sound very scary to me. I guess enough Lackeys with doubled battlecries could help you win out against a deck that completely depends on having the board, like Mech Hunter, since it can be hard to keep the board against 1 mana 1/1 deal 4 into 1 mana 1/1 give +2 attack and rush and the like, but from the perspective of a Control Warrior player, that kind of thing doesn't worry me. The only thing that worries me with Spirit of the Shark is how dangerous it can make Edwin if I don't have an immediate answer handy for him, and Shaman doesn't have anything like that.

[Rynjin]

"From the perspective of a Control Warrior" is kind of the key bit there. Yeah, of course Control Warrior doesn't fear value, for the most part. It's a currently overtuned decklist that has both the hardest control tools in the game while still maintaining a threatening board presence.

Everything else though? That kind of fast value (the key there is fast; Pogo Rogue probably has more value in the late game but it's too slow and has no health gain) with the sustain Shaman has is a spooky combo for most decks. It can remove Murloc Shaman and Mech Hunter's boards easy, can potentially grind out Treant Druid (especially if we get a good board clear Battlecry besides Dragonmaw Scorcher and Mossy Horror, which with this hero power deals with Soul of the Forest quite handily), can grind out Tempo Rogue and out-tempo Pogo Rogue.

I don't see it being meta-defining but it's no stretch to say it will probably be a solid Tier 2 deck, especially if a deck comes out that eats Control Warrior alive besides Conjure Mage and forces it into a smaller proportion of the meta.

[Zevox]

"From the perspective of a Control Warrior" is kind of the key bit there. Yeah, of course Control Warrior doesn't fear value, for the most part. It's a currently overtuned decklist that has both the hardest control tools in the game while still maintaining a threatening board presence.

Everything else though? That kind of fast value (the key there is fast; Pogo Rogue probably has more value in the late game but it's too slow and has no health gain) with the sustain Shaman has is a spooky combo for most decks. It can remove Murloc Shaman and Mech Hunter's boards easy, can potentially grind out Treant Druid (especially if we get a good board clear Battlecry besides Dragonmaw Scorcher and Mossy Horror, which with this hero power deals with Soul of the Forest quite handily), can grind out Tempo Rogue and out-tempo Pogo Rogue.

I don't see it being meta-defining but it's no stretch to say it will probably be a solid Tier 2 deck, especially if a deck comes out that eats Control Warrior alive besides Conjure Mage and forces it into a smaller proportion of the meta.

I think you misunderstand there. It's not that Control Warrior doesn't fear value, because that's not really what the advantage is there. It's tempo. Lackeys are fantastic tempo plays because while their effects individually aren't that strong, they're powerful for the amount of mana that they cost. So Spirit of the Shark into a bunch of doubled Lackey battlecries can generate powerful turns in the mid-game that makes up for the poor tempo of playing the Spirit in the first place. That's very strong in matchups against decks that need to have the board in order to be winning, but against one that can play just fine from behind like Control Warrior, it's only impressive if the board it sets up threatens to kill them pretty quickly, and a bunch of 1/1s or random 2-mana minions just doesn't, unless the Warrior was already in a bad spot anyway. That's why Edwin is the one thing Control Warrior needs to fear with Spirit of the Shark, he can actually end the game very quickly if unanswered.

Now, it's true that Control Warrior wouldn't fear something like doubled Menacing Nimbus battlecries because it's just insufficient value, but Menacing Nimbus doesn't see play at all at the moment anyway. The more important comparison Geno made was made was to Spirit of the Shark with a bunch of Lackeys, and value is ultimately not what that's about.

[Rynjin]

I actually misread the Hero Power as "2 mana, your next Battlecry triggers twice", so my thinking was a bit skewed there.

[The Glyphstone]

I actually misread the Hero Power as "2 mana, your next Battlecry triggers twice", so my thinking was a bit skewed there.

That would get insane if it worked like the Dalaran Heist Hunter boss, where the 'Battlecry triggers an extra time' effect stacked between turns until it got used up.

[Zevox]

Well, just for fun I went and played the Brawl until I got a win with every class.* And the end of the day, I'd say I still think that Rogue is the clear winner. The mode can easily turn on tempo, since value usually isn't a concern with the way your hand reloads every turn, and they have so many good tools for that (SI:7 Agent and Backstab are standouts, and effects like Sap and Kidnapper get better in this Brawl than they usually are), plus a few just ridiculous high-rolls, like Edwin and Pogo-Hopper. And in general the batch of 1-drops and coins that you get make combos very easy to activate. Plus they have the best hero power for the Brawl, no question.

I had the most trouble getting wins with Mage and Warrior. Mage was partly just bad luck - multiple matches in a row where I had no coins in my starting hand, leading to weak starts - but it also just feels like they're bad at getting tempo back. Even when I drafted Flamestrike and Blizzard, their high cost made them less useful than I would've expected, and my opponent just rebuilt their board and I was right back to square 1. And Warrior, geez. Useless hero power plus a whole lot of bad class cards. If you don't draft pretty much exactly the cards that see play in actual Control Warrior (or some pretty strong neutrals), you're in trouble with that one, or at least so it felt to me. I only managed to win a very rough match after getting a sweet Warpath board wipe with a Security Rover my opponent had ignored to try and set me low on the board to spawn a bunch of 2/X taunts while I was at it.

Despite managing to get a win on the first try with them, I suspect Warlock's also bad. My opponent was just either offered bad cards or played poorly (I suspect the latter, given a couple of plays...). Similar issue to Warrior: useless hero power and weak class cards.

Some other classes do have some nice high-rolls though. Extra Arms in Priest is a notably strong one, along with Grave Horror as we brought up before, though I never actually saw that one. Mage can indeed get great results out of Magic Dart Frog too, that's how I wound up getting a win with that class. Shaman also felt surprisingly easy, with Totemic Smash being a surprisingly good card - Totems are nice when you can often give them buffs, especially Healing Totem.

*Besides Hunter, of course.

[Rynjin]

That would get insane if it worked like the Dalaran Heist Hunter boss, where the 'Battlecry triggers an extra time' effect stacked between turns until it got used up.

"Triggers twice" would not allow that potential, similar to how playing two Murmuring Elementals would not trigger three battlecries.

Re: the Brawl, I'm really not seeing why so many people want it to be a regular game mode. It's an RNG clown fiesta only slightly better than the usual RNG clown fiesta Brawls everybody claims to hate. There's a bit more strategy to it, but the game lives and dies on what cards you get offered, and you're often stuck between picking something that's good for tempo but screws you long term (cards like Ravencaller), cards that might be useful later if you draw them, and cards that screw you forever (like Arcane Dynamo, and other cards that Discover high cost cards when played and/or have a bad base statline).

It's like playing Arena except you can't mitigate being forced to choose bad cards by trying to even out your curve later and just play them and be done with them. If you have to choose a bad card, you're stuck with it forever.

Add to that how sloooooooooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwww the game is when everybody has to Discover every turn and you're left with a game mode I found mostly mildly irritating and boring to play.

[Tvtyrant]

I liked Warrior most, I got Frothing Berzerker and Warpath together multiple times. Lots of board wipes and pushed chsrge creatures energize well IMO.

[Zevox]

Re: the Brawl, I'm really not seeing why so many people want it to be a regular game mode. It's an RNG clown fiesta only slightly better than the usual RNG clown fiesta Brawls everybody claims to hate.

It's nothing like those at all. The discover mechanic is a hell of a lot better than just getting random cards, and the format very much changes the value of different cards in an interesting way. Cards that you want to use often become a lot better, particularly cheap ones if you draft them early (i.e. Pogo Hopper), while cards that generate other cards become a lot worse since they just dilute your deck. There's less need to worry about value, since you always have five cards per turn, so card draw becomes mostly pointless - but effects that put cards in your opponent's hand or deck (like King Mukla) become beneficial, diluting their deck and denying them cards that they want when they get them off their redraw. Echo cards wind up putting a bunch of copies of themselves into your deck, which can be either very good (ones like Snip-Snap or Warpath which you're happy to get often) or very bad (ones like Witch's Brew, which you definitely don't want to get often). The mode just makes you think and play in a different way, and rewards skill at that quite nicely.

[Anarion]

I would love this mode if discover didn’t take so long. Most games I’ve played in the mode take half an hour, and two thirds of that time is my opponent staring at their discover options.

[The Glyphstone]

One semi unique thing Warlock does have in its favor this Brawl is the prevalence of Discard effects. Get one of the 'discard lowest' spells and you can purge out all the chickens and spare parts.

[Zevox]

One semi unique thing Warlock does have in its favor this Brawl is the prevalence of Discard effects. Get one of the 'discard lowest' spells and you can purge out all the chickens and spare parts.

I don't think you actually want to do that until/unless you hit the late game, though. I mean, discarding the spare parts is probably usually good, sure, but for much of the game the chickens are valuable curve filler that help you use your mana efficiently each turn. And if you get ahead enough on board and the opponent doesn't pick up some AoE, games don't go long enough to get to the point where you'd want to consider ditching them.

[Hamste]

Was doing the spells cast twice anomly. Lost turn 2 to Toomba playing the card that fires 3 8 damage bolts. 48 damage turn 2.

[The Glyphstone]

I don't think you actually want to do that until/unless you hit the late game, though. I mean, discarding the spare parts is probably usually good, sure, but for much of the game the chickens are valuable curve filler that help you use your mana efficiently each turn. And if you get ahead enough on board and the opponent doesn't pick up some AoE, games don't go long enough to get to the point where you'd want to consider ditching them.

I figure if you only draft 1 discard, you'll bleed your chickens slowly enough that by the time you run out they're irrelevant. I'm not saying it makes warlock good, just that it could be useful to 'thin' your deck of the chaff and draw your actually useful cards slightly more often.

[heronbpv]

New fire festival announced for this month! Details on the video:

Spoiler

Show

Twist: it's the Fire FestE.V.I.L. all along!

[ranagrande]

The new tavern brawl is a mini Dungeon Run of Blackrock Mountain! It's neat, the time trial aspect is interesting, and it's nice to be able to complete quests in single-player mode. Unfortunately it probably won't have as much replayability potential as most brawls, especially compared to the last one.

[Zevox]

Two new cards were apparently revealed today.

Earthquake: Shaman spell, 7 mana. Deal 5 damage to all minions, then deal 2 damage to all minions.
- That is some big AoE, with the minor upside of being better against deathrattles and divine shields than most. Pretty solid against Snip-Snap in particular, if you can get it down to 5 or less health first. I could see one or two of these supplementing Hagatha's Schemes in Control Shaman, for sure.

Impbalming: Warlock spell, 4 mana. Destroy a minion. Shuffle 3 Worthless Imps into your deck. [Worthless Imps = 1 mana 1/1 demons, same as the ones you get from playing Sense Demons with no demons in your deck.]
- Interesting, sort of a new take on Blastcrystal Potion as hard removal that's cheaper than most but with what is usually a drawback (can be a benefit in fatigue situations). I'm honestly not sure whether that drawback is bad enough that you don't want to play this or not. Drawing a 1/1 for 1 is usually bad, but how bad depends on how good your hand currently is. Notably though I'd say this doesn't go so great with Plot Twist, which is otherwise the direction they've seemed to want to move Control Warlock lately, so that may limit its likelihood of seeing play. Really need to see how the rest of Warlock pans out to judge this one I think.

The new tavern brawl is a mini Dungeon Run of Blackrock Mountain! It's neat, the time trial aspect is interesting, and it's nice to be able to complete quests in single-player mode. Unfortunately it probably won't have as much replayability potential as most brawls, especially compared to the last one.

Bleh. Maybe it's just me, but I've been pretty done with Dungeon Run style modes for a while now, so that does not sound appealing to me. Probably going to be a "get the pack and then don't touch it again" one for me.

[Spore]

The brawl has a time limit. Go under 40 minutes to get all rewards.

But the unfair advantages from Team E.V.I.L. honestly make this far more bearable than Dungeon Runs. Though the AI is not particularly well made.

[Resileaf]

If you want an easy victory, play Dr. Boom with double deathrattle. The moment you put out the boom box, you win.

[Nerocite]

My best run was with Hagatha, I managed to make my deck all Taggawags with the duplicator treasure.

[Mando Knight]

If you want an easy victory, play Dr. Boom with double deathrattle. The moment you put out the boom box, you win.

Boom also has an easy victory condition against Vaelastrasz: put Bombs in his deck, watch as he digs through the deck to find your bombs 3x as fast as anyone else.

[Zevox]

Boom also has an easy victory condition against Vaelastrasz: put Bombs in his deck, watch as he digs through the deck to find your bombs 3x as fast as anyone else.

Vaelastrasz burns so much of his deck that it's less guaranteed than it looks, but yeah, in theory that should usually go pretty easy. Which is good, since it really feels like the only bosses you're likely to risk losing to are him and Garr.

[Seerow]

If you want an easy victory, play Dr. Boom with double deathrattle. The moment you put out the boom box, you win.

Yeah that wound up being pretty smooth all things considered. I made it 25 minutes first try, collected my golden cards, would play again if any of my quests line up with the classes in the brawl.

[Tvtyrant]

If you want an easy victory, play Dr. Boom with double deathrattle. The moment you put out the boom box, you win.

I got boom with the hands that injure them and the three boom bots starting on the field. Took me 30:55 to win the set based on simply all in aggro. I killed most without taking damage.

[The Glyphstone]

I got all the way with Toggwaggle on my first try until Ragnaros, then stalled because I couldn't build any tempo before he started flinging fireballs at me. I'll try again with a better sense of how to play, or just better treasures - going the Trickery pack route and bloating my deck with random cards was a terrible idea for basically every boss except Vael.

[Psyren]

Impbalming: Warlock spell, 4 mana. Destroy a minion. Shuffle 3 Worthless Imps into your deck. [Worthless Imps = 1 mana 1/1 demons, same as the ones you get from playing Sense Demons with no demons in your deck.]
- Interesting, sort of a new take on Blastcrystal Potion as hard removal that's cheaper than most but with what is usually a drawback (can be a benefit in fatigue situations). I'm honestly not sure whether that drawback is bad enough that you don't want to play this or not. Drawing a 1/1 for 1 is usually bad, but how bad depends on how good your hand currently is. Notably though I'd say this doesn't go so great with Plot Twist, which is otherwise the direction they've seemed to want to move Control Warlock lately, so that may limit its likelihood of seeing play. Really need to see how the rest of Warlock pans out to judge this one I think.

It's less bad in Warlock than it would be in other classes since you have built-in card draw. There are also several "sacrifice a minion to do X" effects in warlock that work decently well with any 1-drop, and the demon synergy could occasionally be handy also.

[Geno9999]

It's less bad in Warlock than it would be in other classes since you have built-in card draw. There are also several "sacrifice a minion to do X" effects in warlock that work decently well with any 1-drop, and the demon synergy could occasionally be handy also.

The tokens also works well with Shriek and Reckless Diretroll, though I'd imagine that really the best use/reason why it sees play at all is Arch-Villain Rafaam turning them into more Legendaries.

Earthquake looks pretty potent, especially when this meta is filled with Deathrattles that summon 1/1 tokens. Heck, the only decks I think would counter this is Resurrect Priest, since they run high health minions such as Witchwood Grizzly and Damaged Stegotron for the Divine Spirit + Inner Fire combo.

[Joran]

I read on Reddit about how the Curse of Rafaam cards were really good for winning quickly; I never drafted them in the regular Dungeon Runs since the other treasures always look better and the boss' health totals are really high and they start with more mana later on.

I then got offered the Curse cards twice and the bosses top out at 40 hp, so it made the run trivial, I finished in 22 minutes.

[Tvtyrant]

I read on Reddit about how the Curse of Rafaam cards were really good for winning quickly; I never drafted them in the regular Dungeon Runs since the other treasures always look better and the boss' health totals are really high and they start with more mana later on.

I then got offered the Curse cards twice and the bosses top out at 40 hp, so it made the run trivial, I finished in 22 minutes.

Curses used to be glitched and only one would activate each turn, so they have improved dramatically. Even then they actually were okay because the AI would frequently just skip their first turns to play them.

[Rodin]

Curses used to be glitched and only one would activate each turn, so they have improved dramatically. Even then they actually were okay because the AI would frequently just skip their first turns to play them.

What makes them so powerful here is that these are bosses from before that spell existed, and from what I saw they rarely actually play out the spells unless they have nothing else to do. I wound up killing Nefarian almost entirely with Curses as he dodged over a dozen bombs I shuffled into his deck.

Ragnaros also dodged the bombs entirely, but fortunately I got the Boom Box out on 4 like I was supposed to and he ate about 20 damage from the double deathrattle. 27 minutes for my final time, not too shabby.

The big lesson I've learned from both this Brawl and the Heist proper is that a hero power that shuffles bombs in SUCKS. Like, hardcore, worst hero power ever level. It's only in ranked play where the opponent has a puny 30 HP and you're actively doing damage throughout the game that it actually works. Even then you need something extra instead of just "spend mana, shuffle bomb". In my run the Curses always did far more damage than anything I shuffled in.