Board 8 > Hearthstone Discussion Topic 493 - Rise of Shadows Is Upon Us

(+) Yeah! (+)

Right, so it might not be the universal best deck, but it's the best deck against you, so my point still stands.
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Knowing you can ban a deck is very important in constructing your own lineup and decks. Like I said, you can fine tune your decks and decklists to completely ignore your ban and strengthen matchups against another popular deck. Yeah, you are banning the deck that you think is going to give you the most problems, but that's because you made your decks that way because the ban exists.

The strategy of the ban has very little to do with actual play and more in the prep and prediction on what the decks in the field are going to be. This is why the fact that brackets are revealed so far ahead of time in a lot of big tournaments is a big deal as top players often have pretty long histories of what types of decks they like to play.
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But if they made the tournament "win 4 decks out of 4" instead of "win 3 decks out of 3, with a fourth one banned," would anything actually change? Other than people psyching themselves out into thinking they had to build their line-ups to survive the ban deck? I mean, if it's a bad match-up, it's a bad match-up. Win the other ones.
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Yes because you might not have your same decks banned each time and because not having a ban drastically changes how you construct your actual decks.

Like say for example Murloc Shaman was the number one deck on ladder. Obviously, you can put hungry crabs into every deck you have for that. But what if you could just ban murloc shaman? Now you can add in another tech card for another deck if you want to. Because in a tournament you expect to see a few very strong decks (much more limited compared to what you can expect on ladder) and such you are tuning your decks for those decks and to usually ignore your ban for the most part and target another popular deck. This is why some times tournament decks might have weird card choices that don't make sense outside of that arena.
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But in my scenario, you could just concede the murloc shaman match-up since even if you manage to take a 20% match-up to a 30% match-up, you're hurting your other games considerably. As I see it, a ban is effectively conceding the match to begin with.
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azuarc posted...

But in my scenario, you could just concede the murloc shaman match-up since even if you manage to take a 20% match-up to a 30% match-up, you're hurting your other games considerably. As I see it, a ban is effectively conceding the match to begin with.

Lets say there is no ban and everyone just plays 3 decks. This means you have one less deck to plan with when making your lineup. It's not uncommon for the 4th deck to be the difference in match win or loss. Each player only playing 3 decks means that it's much more likely every player only brings 3 of the most powerful decks.

If there are 4 decks with no bans, this means you have to play another game and a half or something a match on average. Tournaments are too long already, which again, is probably part of the reason why the format is changing.

A fourth deck and a ban simply brings more deck diversity. Again, the actual strategy behind it has nothing to do with playing the game and is about glaming information you can on scouting and knowing the meta.
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I mean, I am excited to see how specialist plays out. I think the current format has been used for a little too long already, and I always thought it was strange that players would bring four decks just so they could not play one of them.
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My only worry about specialist is if, or I should say when, one class is clearly more popular than the field. If you have a 16 player tournament and 11 of them bring Rogue...
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Maybe they've had more of these Choose Your Champion events than I remember, but I'm pretty sure that Bunnyhoppor has got me more packs in these last two events than everyone else I've ever picked combined.
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I changed my mind. Make the 1 game you watch game 5 of the finals for the face reactions alone.
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I'm watching the finals now.

HunterAce was my pick a champion, so I'm rooting for him! Let's see what happens!
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Oh. My. God.

Game 1.

I think Viper should've played Rafaam but it is what it is.
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the finals was insane.
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Oh, the finals just was? Darn timezones. But hey, my champion won!
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Those finals were interesting. Lots of decisions I wouldnt have made.

yay I picked Hunterace

also hit legend with Rogue. Granted it's Rogue but still
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Watching game 5 of the finals right now. Is this even real?
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It really is fantastic.
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I enjoy memes in the Hearthstone games I watch and nothing else
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davidponte posted...

It really is fantastic.

It was insane.

Ultimately, Hunterace had a bad draw but his matchup was good enough that he was able to beat the guy who kept getting RNG on his side

And HUNTERACE WAS MY CHAMP SO BRING ME THE CARDS
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Okay, I just watched the replay. Holy shitballs that was such an amazingly crazy series. I see some missing post numbers above me, so Ulti must be commenting, but that was such an intense combination of execution, luck, and planning. It really took all three phases from both players, and the amount of swings Viper through and kept coming was insane. When I saw the last game was over 40 minutes, I was just like, well, here we go again...it did not disappoint.
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Opened Jan'Alai

Is it still worth anything?
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I get a tone of use out of Jan'ali in my Rhadgar hand mage deck.
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Camden posted...

My only worry about specialist is if, or I should say when, one class is clearly more popular than the field. If you have a 16 player tournament and 11 of them bring Rogue...

This is almost a guarantee to happen. I think the specialist format will be short-lived due to this.
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SaintAkira7 posted...

Camden posted...

My only worry about specialist is if, or I should say when, one class is clearly more popular than the field. If you have a 16 player tournament and 11 of them bring Rogue...

This is almost a guarantee to happen. I think the specialist format will be short-lived due to this.

Eh.

In that case people who brought the counter to Rogue (Warriors for example) would probably win or go far in the tournament.

We'll see how it goes though. I remember early in Hearthstone's life, Brian Kibler showed up to a tournament with an unexpected Undertaker Priest deck that nobody could figure out how to beat, but...it was a ban format, and his opponents just banned it. Basically, the old format punished innovation, especially the conquest format. It's possible we could see more innovation with the new format. If you can come up with one good deck that beats the popular netdecks and keep it secret, you might win a tournament out of nowhere. This happens a lot in magic the gathering, which has a similar tournament format.
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GANON1025 posted...

I get a tone of use out of Jan'ali in my Rhadgar hand mage deck.

Decklist?

I also have Pocket Galaxy if that helps anything.
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metroid composite posted...

SaintAkira7 posted...

Camden posted...

My only worry about specialist is if, or I should say when, one class is clearly more popular than the field. If you have a 16 player tournament and 11 of them bring Rogue...

This is almost a guarantee to happen. I think the specialist format will be short-lived due to this.

Eh.

In that case people who brought the counter to Rogue (Warriors for example) would probably win or go far in the tournament.

We'll see how it goes though. I remember early in Hearthstone's life, Brian Kibler showed up to a tournament with an unexpected Undertaker Priest deck that nobody could figure out how to beat, but...it was a ban format, and his opponents just banned it. Basically, the old format punished innovation, especially the conquest format. It's possible we could see more innovation with the new format. If you can come up with one good deck that beats the popular netdecks and keep it secret, you might win a tournament out of nowhere. This happens a lot in magic the gathering, which has a similar tournament format.

The problem of everyone playing the same deck in specialist has already happened. Warrior (and I suppose now rogue) are extremely popular in the format where complaints of rounds taking well over an hour at times have surfaced. IMO, even more so than ladder, is what blizzard is going to look at when determining what they are going to do with these two classes.

I come from yugioh and I think the biggest obstacle for hearthstone in specialist (which is basically a very traditional format) is that the actual card pool is very small when compared to other tcgs and the number of cards I'd deem playable is much much smaller. Yugioh doesn't have a rotation and works on a ban list. So all cards (except the ones on the list) can be used and even pretty bad cards can find their way into decks when other cards are printed. So certain strategies are almost always viable to an extent. Even a game like Shadowverse simply has more cards that are play viable within their rotation.
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Sometimes I miss playing Yugioh semi-competitively when I see new cards being released or reminisce about time spent at my hobby shop, and then I remember the boxes of cards I have in my closet that I spent likely $1000+ that are worth next to nothing now because of ban lists and constant reprints.

It makes it much easier to throw $60 at Hearthstone every 4 months.
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I know if you don't have the cards you don't have the cards, but I just played against a Control Warrior that wasn't running Boom. I thought he was just really unlucky and it was buried on the bottom of his deck like Hagatha was mine, I won with three cards left and never drew it, but he played every card in his deck and just wasn't running it. Strange decision to play that deck without that specific card.
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I played it last year specifically without it, because I found the 4 armor gain every turn more reliable, but I couldn't imagine trying it this expansion.
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NPH's specialist tier list update

https://noproshere.wordpress.com/2019/04/30/team-noproshere-specialist-meta-report-7/

Myra's rogue is alone in tier 1. I guess basically what happened is people figured out how to sideboard against warrior, so it seemingly doesn't have a weak matchup now. Basically Rogue is probably going to need a nerf.
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Prep has needed a nerf for years.
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I feel like theyre gonna hit raiding party instead but I can see Prep too, its too strong as a founding card
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Prep is part of rogue's identity. If not for that, I would say it's certainly the card to go. We learned very painfully last year that any cards that let you cheat mana cost tend to be broken.
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azuarc posted...

Prep is part of rogue's identity. If not for that, I would say it's certainly the card to go. We learned very painfully last year that any cards that let you cheat mana cost tend to be broken.

I mean, so were Wild Growth and War Axe
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Prep is so inherently tied to how they design Rogue spells that if they nerfed it out of nowhere without planning it, it'll affect every Rogue spell for sets yet to release in addition to some in Classic/Basic. That said it should have been HoF'd in advance by now. It's a textbook design space + power level issue and they've adjusted cards for less.

I kinda liked when Rogue could generate extra coins or just put Counterfeit Coin in the deck. That seemed a lot safer than the things Prep does when it's a problem.
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We got the 'concede until you get Rag' brawl. Always a good one.
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I mean it kinda depends on how its nerfed

Like if its 0 mana reduce spells by 2 then it probably isnt changing much other than swingy cards like Raiding Party, Caverns Below, Myra, Togwaggle treasure or Sprint.

1 mana reduce spells by 3 is pretty big though since it heavily affects Rogues Tempo (rip turn 2 10/10 Van Cleefs)

I do think Raiding Party is more likely though

Other suspects: Boom, Omega Devastator, Conjurers Calling, Whispering Woods, maybe even Ethereal Lackey

I think Mech Hunter is a little annoying to play against but I cant really think of something OP from it, maybe a Zilliax nerf?
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LiquidOshawott posted...

I feel like theyre gonna hit raiding party instead but I can see Prep too, its too strong as a founding card

This. They'll hit raiding party. Everything they've ever printed for Rogue has been balanced around the existence of Prep in its current form (whether they've been balanced incorrectly or not is an entire other topic).

I just think nerfing an expansion rare instead of a Classic epic that the class is "balanced" around is the better course to take.
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No, I think Prep needs to be changed. It has been a problem card since like forever and fixing other cards are just bandaids. I also think that Edwin needs to be nerfed or hall of famed.

As for cards in current standard rotation. Let's say prep gets hit, I think Waggle Pick could actually use a nerf in that case, if it doesn't then Raiding Party should get nerfed.

I'd also like them to do something even more unprecedented and just rotate golloka crawler back into the game.

And I think Dr. Boom Mad Genius, Archivist, Mountain Giant, and Soul of the Forest are cards they might look at.

In terms of Dr Boom, I think the only real change that actually has a real impact is modifying the hero power pool. Archivist would have a once per game condition. Not really sure what they can do with Mountain Giant besides just removing it from the game, but from what I hear, it's a card that is like teetering on the chopping block each time HoF comes around. I would be fine with them just unnerfing BGH. Soul of the forest would probably just get a mana nerf. I think that the long term issue of soul of the forest is a bigger problem than the one year Whispering Woods has left.
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The fact that the entire Rogue class has been balanced around a single card for five years is exactly why it needs to be dealt with.
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I mean, Druid was balanced around Innervate and Wild Growth and both have been nerfed so the balanced around the card argument fails pretty spectacularly
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VeryInsane posted...

I mean, Druid was balanced around Innervate and Wild Growth and both have been nerfed so the balanced around the card argument fails pretty spectacularly

Yes, and Druid has bounced back from that Wild Growth nerfing spectacularly with exactly one deck in the meta. From multiple-win-conditions to a token deck :/.
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This brawl is awful. I just want my pack and RNG refuses to give it to me.
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davidponte posted...

We got the 'concede until you get Rag' brawl. Always a good one.

I mean, when this brawl first came out I played it a ton, got something like 100 wins, and once I had practice was able to pretty consistently win with both characters. (This was when Nef was very OP and had an overal 67% winrate; I was still able to win about 60% of the time with Rag once I got used to the mulligans and strategies). Like...it helps a lot knowing what to mulligan for and correct lines of play. I can totally understand not wanting to learn mulligan strategies and play lines for tavern brawl decks, though.

Anyway, comfortably won tavern brawl first try, and then got back to rank 5 in Wild and Standard. Using Goblin Bomb hunter in standard (5-2 or 7-3 something like that?) and Corpsetaker Walking Fountain Even Shaman in Wild (3-0).
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