Hearthstone 23: The Evil League of EVIL

[Requizen]

I came back from MTG to see what the Year of the Dragon has in store.

Is it just me or does the game feel balanced all of a sudden? Dare I say even interactive?

I havent had a 40 Turn Control Mirror, no inevitable combo waltzing my way. It is a combo of fun control decks, decent midrange and some aggro games.

From what I've seen, there are no guaranteed insta-win combos out there, until someone figures out a Mecha'thun deck that survives as well as the previous ones.

I've seen a lot of mixed decks online and I like it. Some crazy long game control decks (Warrior, Handlock[ish]), some hyper aggro gogogogo decks (Druid, Zoolock), some solid midrange decks (Tempo Mage, Rogue, Hunter). Bomb Warrior is the one I'm getting most tired of seeing but even that is not nearly as prevalent as Odd Mage/Odd Paladin/Even Rogue/etc from a week ago. Feels nice.

[Rynjin]

Also, more "science" I don't know if anyone has ever found out before, but Explosive Trap interacts REALLY WEIRDLY with Spell Damage. If you play Explosive Trap while Spell Damage is on board, it inherits the spell damage. So far so sensible.

HOWEVER, playing Explosive Trap and THEN a spell damage card will not buff the spell. This would imply that the damage of Explosive Trap is set when the Secret is cast, right? Nope. Playing a spell damage card, then playing Explosive Trap, and then losing Spell Damage WILL nerf the card back to its original 2 damage.

Consistency, thy name is Hearthstone.

[Anarion]

Hmm. I'm actually not enthused. The new stuff is kind of fun, but it's feeling like the decks are too linear to me and people are figuring out the format really fast. I'll be very curious if everyone is like "wow, the game feels so balanced and fun" in a week or two, or whether it grows stale quickly. I hope it doesn't, but I'm seeing some warning signs already.

[Rynjin]

Can you elaborate on what you mean by "too linear"?

[Anarion]

Can you elaborate on what you mean by "too linear"?

Too much similar mechanics. Treant druid plays a lot of treants and puts in every treant boosting card and token buffs. Togwaggle rogue puts in every lackey card and then some of the tried and true combo stuff that's in every rogue deck (like eviscerate and Van Cleef). Bomb druid puts in all the bomb and mech cards. Mech hunter practically builds itself if you just search all the mechs and deathrattles. I'm using the term the way that Mark Rosewater defines it.

[Lord Raziere]

Too much similar mechanics. Treant druid plays a lot of treants and puts in every treant boosting card and token buffs. Togwaggle rogue puts in every lackey card and then some of the tried and true combo stuff that's in every rogue deck (like eviscerate and Van Cleef). Bomb druid puts in all the bomb and mech cards. Mech hunter practically builds itself if you just search all the mechs and deathrattles. I'm using the term the way that Mark Rosewater defines it.

sounds like a good meta for board clears, ooze, and such. I've went up against token druid and they just kept making more tokens endlessly. not sure exactly how to counter bomb warrior other than ooze their wrenchcalibur and kill them before they can get too ridiculous though, some healing perhaps.

but yeah, I think board clears are going to be important. there are a lot of little minions coming out of nowhere.

so board clear and healing, which class is good at both? probably paladin and priest.

[Zevox]

The neutral Dragon and Mech packages feel really good right now, solid job on making Tribes feel worthwhile by Blizzard.

I know, right? It's almost like those Year of the Raven expansions had some pretty good cards that just got run out of the meta by crazy stuff from the Year of the Mammoth.

Eh... "5 mana 5/5 Battlecry: Silence a minion and do X" actually feels pretty worth it to me. Like yeah, it's great when you get a huge swingy Horror, but value is value. There are lots of ongoing effects you might want to shut down (deathrattles, auras, buffed minions, etc) as well.

The issue is that you're running Swamp Queen Hagatha, a 7 mana 5/5, to get that Horror. I expect more to justify that than Kabal Songstealer with an extra upside.

I came back from MTG to see what the Year of the Dragon has in store.

Is it just me or does the game feel balanced all of a sudden? Dare I say even interactive?

I havent had a 40 Turn Control Mirror, no inevitable combo waltzing my way. It is a combo of fun control decks, decent midrange and some aggro games.

Indeed - though I have had long control mirrors, but that's totally fine by me since I love those. So far, I'm pretty darn happy with the effects of the rotation and new set. As long as nobody comes up with some crazy combo deck that starts running all the fun Control decks out of the meta as happened basically all of last year, I'm thinking we'll be in good shape.

so board clear and healing, which class is good at both? probably paladin and priest.

Warrior. Brawl and Warpath give it two strong board wipe spells, and armor gain is even better than healing since you can do it even while at full health.

Also Shaman to an extent. Lightning Storm and Hagatha's Scheme are good board wipe, and they picked up Witch's Brew and Walking Fountain for healing.

Paladin has the problem that the Equality nerf seriously hurt their board wipe potential (and really, Flash of Light is their only good healing, aside from neutrals like Zilliax), and Priest only has Mass Hysteria for good board wipe. Yes, they have Holy Nova too, but that's kind of mediocre and they only tend to run it if they absolutely have to.

Most of the others have one or the other. Mage and Warlock have great board wipe, not so much healing potential. Druid can still gain some good armor with Ferocious Howl and got Crystal Power for good healing, but their board wipe is weak. Rogue and Hunter basically have neither, aside from edge cases like Unleash + Hunter's Mark or Spectral Cutlass (or stolen cards from other classes in Rogue's case, of course).

[Gluteus_Maximus]

When Never Surrender causes your opponent to concede:

When you go infinite with Scargil and Underbelly Angler:

When Whizbang gives you the divine spirit priest deck and you win because your opponent killed your Shadequill when you had Auchenai up:

When you manage to win a game with the Whizbang big warrior deck:

Having super lots of fun with the Whizbang decks! Haven't spent any money on the expac so far but it looks super cool and looking forward to building a nice lackey rogue or token druid!

[Lord Raziere]

I tried a warrior deck I've titled "Fun Police" and got 4-0 on the ladder, up to rank 20, before being beaten by a hunter, so its 4-1 now

this is because the deck is designed to shut down anything I come across. fittingly enough, the second game was against someone named themselves "Memes" and playing some stupid rogue thing where they immediately play myra and I was having none of it. I didn't name it fun police for nothing and I have to confiscate their memes.

so I think I'm onto something here, because its all about outlasting so many decks that same to have great value but run out of steam quickly. hunter was just really good at dealing damage a lot to wear me down before I can outlast them.

[Rynjin]

I tried a warrior deck I've titled "Fun Police" and got 4-0 on the ladder, up to rank 20, before being beaten by a hunter, so its 4-1 now

this is because the deck is designed to shut down anything I come across. fittingly enough, the second game was against someone named themselves "Memes" and playing some stupid rogue thing where they immediately play myra and I was having none of it. I didn't name it fun police for nothing and I have to confiscate their memes.

so I think I'm onto something here, because its all about outlasting so many decks that same to have great value but run out of steam quickly. hunter was just really good at dealing damage a lot to wear me down before I can outlast them.

I'm curious how it would stack up against my Duel Paladin. It has a pretty good track record against slow decks.

[otakuryoga]

sigh..if not for bad luck i wouldnt have any

new arena run..priest..first card is 5/6 drakkonid..never saw a single dragon in next 29 picks

[Seerow]

sigh..if not for bad luck i wouldnt have any

new arena run..priest..first card is 5/6 drakkonid..never saw a single dragon in next 29 picks

That is disappointing, but a 5 mana 5/6 in Arena is still just pretty decent. The dragon synergy is nice, but it's still a good card if you don't have it. That's part of the card's power.

[zlefin]

about to get my final loss in the tavern brawl run; deck's going 0-3, as I expected, I knew it was a bad deck when I made it, just wanted to try it out. it was a life gain heavy mid-range paladin build. the biggest weakness was that the overall card quality just wasn't high enough; it also didn't have enough self-replacing cards to really hold up to a long term control matchup.

in other play, I've been enjoying a rogue deck, there's lots of high quality self-replacing cards in rogue; can maintain having strong plays basically forever. It's one of those decks which often ends up with more cards than it can afford to play, as it can refill so easily. Really liking the 4/3 discover a spell guy.

[Zevox]

Wow, today's special quest gives us 4 packs - one of each expansion currently in standard - for playing 100 cards. That is nice. Probably the capstone of the new set launch quests.

I drafted the free arena I got from buying the $10 launch bundle, went Priest because I had a Priest quest. Drafted a deck with four Hench-Clan Shadequills, two Power Word: Shields, and a Faceless Rager. Yeah, that's going pretty well, 4-1 so far, only loss was to another Priest who had drafted more late-game than me, and against whom I got a slow start. Hopefully that'll turn a tidy little profit for me.

[Rynjin]

So, if anyone wanted a hyper turbo aggro Hunter deck with a weird twist, I've got a spicy one for you.

Spoiler: ### Burn Baby Burn

Show

# Class: Hunter
# Format: Standard
# Year of the Dragon
#
# 2x (1) Arcane Shot
# 2x (1) Rapid Fire
# 2x (1) Saronite Taskmaster
# 2x (1) Springpaw
# 1x (2) Bloodmage Thalnos
# 2x (2) Bomb Toss
# 2x (2) Explosive Trap
# 2x (2) Spellzerker
# 2x (3) Arcane Watcher
# 2x (3) Kill Command
# 1x (4) Ancient Mage
# 2x (4) Marked Shot
# 2x (4) Spellbreaker
# 2x (5) Baited Arrow
# 2x (6) Unleash the Beast
# 1x (9) King Krush
# 1x (10) Zul'jin
#
AAECAR8E7QWTB/gIm4UDDagCyQTyBe0G4PUCoIUDo4cDoooD7IwD5pYD7JYD+ZYD rpsDAA==
#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone

I've played around 20 games of this over the last couple of days and lost 3 of them. One was to an INSANE high roll Lucentbark deck (he started with Lucentbark and TWO Faceless Manipulators in hand, and then top decked all his healing to keep bringing all three back), which made me salty enough to start running two Spellbreakers instead of just one. One was to a Midrange Hunter which I miscounted lethal on (I thought one of my Rapid Fires was a Twinspell but it was not; I could have won by clearing his board instead but thought I had 10 available damage when I only had 8). The third (well, first, these are out of order) was to Murloc Shaman who after I weathered his first Bloodlust fueled full board was within lethal range for me at the end of my turn...before an Ethereal lackey pulled him a SECOND Bloodlust.

All three losses were pretty close games in other words. I said Spell Damage Hunter has potential and I meant it; I think this deck is legit.

Deck strategy:

Only partly a joke. You can pull some big brain lethal plays with this deck and if hey're below 15 you can pretty consistently over the top them late game.

Dream draw: Saronite Taskmaster into Spellzerker into Arcane Watcher into Ancient Mage plus some Burn spells. You can pull 2 Mana deal 8 damage spells out of your ass like they're candy and contest board at the same time, it's disgusting.

[Gandariel]

Feel like there's way too few spell damage cards for a spell damage deck.. I mean arcane watchers? Do you ever activate them?

And also why Zuljin, with so much targeted stuff? Doesn't it backfire often?

[Rynjin]

Feel like there's way too few spell damage cards for a spell damage deck.. I mean arcane watchers? Do you ever activate them?

Almost every game, yeah. In a pinch Spellbreaker works on them too. They also effectively act as Taunt minions, since leaving them up is dangerous for most opponents. I thought about removing them for more generally useful cards but every time I do I drop Thalnos on board for surprise 5-10 extra damage or something.

Also you don't need a whole ton of spell damage cards for burn purposes in general. Spellzerker gives +2, Ancient Mage gives +2. I tried variants with other spell damage cards (even Malygos) but they're really just overkill and dilute your draws. Boosting your Rapid Fires to 3 and Arcane Shots to 4 is plenty enough burst. Kill Command is already fine at 5 damage, the extra 2 is just gravy most times.

It's not an OTK deck, it gets by with long term sustained aggro that can go face or clear however the situation dictates.

And also why Zuljin, with so much targeted stuff? Doesn't it backfire often?

You don't play it every game. You play it either when you're way ahead and you can take some Baited Arrows to the face for the free 5/5s and maybe lethal or you're way behind and feel like Yogging your opponent for potential RNG Fiesta wins.

[Joran]

I haven't figured out what I want to play nor which cards to craft, so I did the best next thing...

Craft Golden Whizbang!

He's been fun and I went 7-3 in the Brawl with him and everything is so shiny...

[Anarion]

I haven't figured out what I want to play nor which cards to craft, so I did the best next thing...

Craft Golden Whizbang!

He's been fun and I went 7-3 in the Brawl with him and everything is so shiny...

Blizz default decks are shockingly good thus far. I had the hunter quest and no new decks and just made the beast one because it showed me having all 30 cards for it. Immediately went 2-0.

[Requizen]

Can I say how happy I am Handlock is back at least for now? It was the deck that first wowed me in the first year of Hearthstone, and while the new version is obviously different, the idea of a control deck that leans on that Hero Power and big bodies is so interesting to me. Having a deck with Jaraxxus again is amazing, and Rafaam is such a solid addition.

[Zevox]

Can I say how happy I am Handlock is back at least for now? It was the deck that first wowed me in the first year of Hearthstone, and while the new version is obviously different, the idea of a control deck that leans on that Hero Power and big bodies is so interesting to me. Having a deck with Jaraxxus again is amazing, and Rafaam is such a solid addition.

It is? *spots Trump's video from today, which is actually about exactly this*

Well, hot damn. I will have to make that. Already have everything but Rafaam, and honestly I'm skeptical as hell about him anyway, so replacing him works for me. And being able to actually play Jaraxxus again sounds fantastic, I've always loved him, but I've thought that the 15 health thing was just going to be too big of an issue for him to ever see standard play again.

[Anarion]

Why are you all so happy about games taking a half hour each? *Woe and despair*

Edit: not to be totally negative, I was completely wrong in my Khadgar prediction and I really love the Mage summoning deck. The 10 mana combo is really great.

[Zevox]

Why are you all so happy about games taking a half hour each? *Woe and despair*

Eh, even the heavy control mirrors don't tend to go beyond 20 minutes. And I like those - I'd rather play three matches like that, where the game goes back and forth for a long time and it feels like a lot of little decisions over time add up the eventual result, than basically any other kind of match in any quantity for that same amount of time. Certainly they're exponentially more fun than any match where someone just gets a crazy opening and the opponent can barely do anything about it before they die on turn 5-6, or a match where one side just draws into an instant-win combo that the opponent can't interact with except by killing them before that happens.

[heronbpv]

@Anarion:
The only solid complain I saw was in a Firebat video, and it bears mention: The problem right now is not so much the ladder, but the current competitive format, in which everybody will play Control Warrior with Elysianna, and then the match will take up to 40 minutes, particularly when you include Baleful Banker to counter the mirror match, and be decided purely by the Elysianna effect. In summary, a clown fiesta instead of an actual display of pure skill.

[Anarion]

Eh, even the heavy control mirrors don't tend to go beyond 20 minutes. And I like those - I'd rather play three matches like that, where the game goes back and forth for a long time and it feels like a lot of little decisions over time add up the eventual result, than basically any other kind of match in any quantity for that same amount of time. Certainly they're exponentially more fun than any match where someone just gets a crazy opening and the opponent can barely do anything about it before they die on turn 5-6, or a match where one side just draws into an instant-win combo that the opponent can't interact with except by killing them before that happens.

Have you run into the Archivist Elysiana mirrors? Where, like, the entire game is decided by who gets a better set of 10 pulls at the end because the two decks are so closely mirrored that it's impossible to win before that? I don't mean to say that every game is bad, but warrior v. warrior can sometimes go super long. Some people are even running baleful banker and the game can run all the way to the 45 turn automatic draw.

edit: Heron posted the thing I wanted to say while I had the post window open. Well done.

[Zevox]

Have you run into the Archivist Elysiana mirrors? Where, like, the entire game is decided by who gets a better set of 10 pulls at the end because the two decks are so closely mirrored that it's impossible to win before that? I don't mean to say that every game is bad, but warrior v. warrior can sometimes go super long. Some people are even running baleful banker and the game can run all the way to the 45 turn automatic draw.

edit: Heron posted the thing I wanted to say while I had the post window open. Well done.

I have not, but sounds fun. Having an mini-arena draft worth of extra cards at the end of the match to delay fatigue is not something that I mind at all. I am in fact running Elysiana in my Warrior decks right now (and using her in place of Rafaam in the Handlock I just put together), I just haven't actually had the occasion to play her.

A short way to summarize my feelings on Control mirrors, no matter how long they run: they actually are legitimately fun and interactive. I can play one of those and be more satisfied than I would be by any number of other matches, even if I lose.

[Lord Raziere]

and control decks going way too long is probably why people design combo decks to counter them in the first place.

personally the three most troublesome decks for me have been Priest, Bomb warrior and Hunter so far. it just feels like Hunter aggro game is too strong while Priest and bomb Warrior are better at the control thing. hopefully as I play more I can get a better handle on things...

[Rynjin]

I have not, but sounds fun. Having an mini-arena draft worth of extra cards at the end of the match to delay fatigue is not something that I mind at all. I am in fact running Elysiana in my Warrior decks right now (and using her in place of Rafaam in the Handlock I just put together), I just haven't actually had the occasion to play her.

A short way to summarize my feelings on Control mirrors, no matter how long they run: they actually are legitimately fun and interactive. I can play one of those and be more satisfied than I would be by any number of other matches, even if I lose.

No match of any non-4X game should run longer than 30 minutes.

[Resileaf]

No match of any non-4X game should run longer than 30 minutes.

Eeeh, it depends. It depends on how fun it is to spend in those games, no matter how long you spend in it.
For example, DotA 2. Matches can last fourty-five minutes to an hour. But it's not fun to lose, because you'll be losing for half an hour before the game ends, you can't understand your teammates because half of them are russians, and there's just one guy on the enemy team who is just ripping through everything and you're just waiting for it to finally be over (I haven't had many good experiences in DotA 2).

Hearthstone is not necessarily that bad. When it's back and forth, when you're trying to outsmart your opponent, guessing what he'll do each time while trying to keep your counters for the moment you will really need it, knowing that he has certain counters ready for you... That's pretty thrilling.
Not that every Hearthstone game is going to be thrilling, of course. "So this priest resurrected an entire board of huge minions for the fifth time, he can do it three more" is not particularly fun, for example.

Wild is terrible right now, you guys.

[Rynjin]

Eeeh, it depends. It depends on how fun it is to spend in those games, no matter how long you spend in it.
For example, DotA 2. Matches can last fourty-five minutes to an hour. But it's not fun to lose, because you'll be losing for half an hour before the game ends, you can't understand your teammates because half of them are russians, and there's just one guy on the enemy team who is just ripping through everything and you're just waiting for it to finally be over (I haven't had many good experiences in DotA 2).

I can't stand playing DotA or LoL for exactly those reasons. It's way worse than a hypothetical 45 minute Hearthstone game because at least I can get up to take a piss or grab a sip of water while playing that or damn near any other game in existence, but MOBAs require your complete and undivided attention for the entire game's run time unless you die (in which case you now have to deal with your whiny manchild teammates berating you for "feeding") and have time to maybe literally sprint across the house to the bathroom.

I play HotS with friends, partly because it's the only MOBA I've played that consistently has 15-20 minute matches, and longer ones are a rarity.

Hearthstone is not necessarily that bad. When it's back and forth, when you're trying to outsmart your opponent, guessing what he'll do each time while trying to keep your counters for the moment you will really need it, knowing that he has certain counters ready for you... That's pretty thrilling.
Not that every Hearthstone game is going to be thrilling, of course. "So this priest resurrected an entire board of huge minions for the fifth time, he can do it three more" is not particularly fun, for example.

Wild is terrible right now, you guys.

Eh. I've always been bored by the Control mirror. Chances are your opponent is running, card for card, the same deck as you so there's no "Aha, well played" moments, you're literally just playing cards to bait out the exact answers you know for a certainty they have so eventually whoever drew the most efficient answers in the right order inevitably wins in fatigue.