Board 8 > Hearthstone Discussion Topic: Voyage To The Sunken City - Year of the Hydra

(+) Yeah! (+)

Honestly, when your MMR is low, (which mine is cause I haven't played BGs in a while) you can just greed the shit out of nearly every lobby.

Like...last time I played BGs, I remember selling down to some stupidly low number of minions to level up to tier 5 hilariously early, looking for direction on tier 5, spending a couple turns stabilizing and finding direction then steamrolling the lobby by getting tier 5 scaling online stupidly early.

But it is a bit dependent on what you have, of course. Pretty sure I had something like sellemental that wanted to be sold, and didn't get good options in the shop on a turn when I should have bought two minions by the "standard curve", so that made the choice to level more tempting.

If your MMR actually does get high you can't reliably get away with powerlevelling like that though. You will just lose too much health early on when you get matchmade against people who don't suck.

Obviously due to labour day we won't know the patch notes for a bit. But...there was an interview done last week with some of the cards they were discussing:

https://twitter.com/bennidgez/status/1565776601232551937?s=46&t=OVcMPhgWMhPiLnnVwQHJ0Q%3A

Re: Theotar "... Due to both his play rate and the frustration that weve been hearing about him, well be considering changes to Theotar in the next patch, but probably nothing too crazy."

I read this as if they do nerf him it'll be really mild, like...maybe he becomes a 2/2 or a 5 mana 4/4.

Re: Guff & Scales "... The win rate data for Druid before the last patch was not indicative of a balance outlier... With that said, our next patch in early September has different goals and we will be considering changes to both of these cards in that patch."

Druid might get gutted for a sentiment nerf. But the deck has kind of been a problem since the patch. Just...here's hoping they don't go overboard.

Re: Renathal "... Both the data and the player sentiment seems to indicate that hes in a mostly healthy spot right now, but well be keeping an eye on him as time goes on and will make an adjustment if he starts to feel too dominant."

People like Renathal and don't seem to get salty about him. Which...is interesting cause I think he's the cause of a lot of problems in this meta, and last I checked the most played legendary from the set. Guess team 5 is going with the (positive) sentiment on this one, though.

Other things on the radar: "... which are definitely on our watch list - ramp druid, control mage, and miracle rogue in particular. In addition to balance-focused changes, well also be taking a look at some cards and interactions that are frustrating to play against."

Yeah, no surprises there.

I can see Theotar going up to 5 mana. Hed still be an amazing card, and I wouldnt want to see his effect get changed.

I'll be happy if I can play three games for a daily quest and have them not all be Denathrius.

UltimaterializerX posted...

Guff is not a problem and never was.The problem is and always has been Scales of Onyxia. There is a reason Druid doesnt get board clears.

I mean, Guff is certainly a problem in wild (because Twig of the World Tree sets you pretty close to 20 mana when you break it by equipping Sphere of Sapience).

I'm a lot less confident in standard, admittedly.

Although it can't be that out of line to suggest a Guff nerf for standard cause ZachO did say Guff is an obvious nerf target in the latest VS podcast.

ZachO talks about his balance change suggestions he tweeted out earlier in the week. Guff is the primary target to nerf for Druid without question. ZachO says nerfing the card to 6 mana wouldn't do much, but in order to make it more restrictive, he recommends changing it to give you empty mana crystals instead of full. It would be a huge nerf to the card since you no longer have an effective 1 mana Wild Growth to use each turn, and becomes a much harder decision if you want to use 2 mana each turn to ramp.

(Transcription from here):

https://old.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/comments/x8kbav/summary_of_the_932022_vicious_syndicate_podcast

Speaking of the patch it seems like it's coming tomorrow (patch notes 9am, patch 10am).

https://twitter.com/hsdecktech/status/1568032640313458689?s=46&t=YoENtPb8IrHI2HzJhjAoyg

UltimaterializerX posted...

Hey how do you get first in BGs? I can get 2-4 no problem but I can't ever win.

Be really greedy. Level up way more than is safe, and just hope that you don't die. (If you've raised your MMR, you will die early a few times trying this before you pull it off).

It's a bit like free for alls in starcraft. The person who does something dumb like triple expand with no army at the start of the game, if nobody punishes them for it? Well, I guess they win.

UltimaterializerX posted...

I really would love if any mode in this game wasn't crippled by moronic RNG elements.

I mean...I would guess mercenaries PvP has very little RNG?

(I've honestly never played it. Mercenaries PvE has some RNG in the form of the random upgrades you get between fights).

Unless you're implying that Mercenaries doesn't count as a "mode" of hearthstone, in which case....honestly? That's fair.

https://playhearthstone.com/en-us/blog/23852686/

Basically reverting Edwin, touching Mage and Druid a little and whacking Kael and Starfish

Guff: empty mana crystals (on both battlecry and hero power).

Edwin: revert

Arcanist dawngrasp: honourable kill only gives +1 damage.

Mage location: -1 durability

Hunter quest: +1 spell required to complete.

Kael'thas: 6 mana -> 8 mana

Smothering Starfish: 3 mana -> 4 mana

BUFFS:

School Teacher: 4/3 -> 4/4

Alliance Bannerman: 2/1 -> 2/2

---

First thoughts: I'm really cashing in from this round of nerfs. I opened every single legendary on this list from card packs.

Followup thoughts: I'm interested in running Smothering Starfish in wild Even warlock. Unfreezes the board against board freeze effects.

Further followup thoughts: I have standard packs saved from tavern brawls and stuff that I haven't opened, potentially saving for the next expansion, and I think I will continue to hold onto them. They can really only give me the mage location or smothering starfish out of the nerfed cards. Duplicate protection will block everything else. I guess maybe opening them gives me a small chance at re-opening Alliance Bannerman out of the buffed cards, and I would like to try out 2/2 alliance bannerman, but...whatever. Still only like 3 card hits.

Thoughts on the patch...

1: Yay no Theotar
2: Boo no Denathrius (Though hopefully Kael helps second hand)
3: I see nothing in the bug fix section about making a certain exclamation point go away.

LMAO, I didn't even realize it till I went to dust them, but two of the nerfed legendaries I opened in packs? They were golden. (Golden Kael, golden Dawngrasp).

10,000 dust from one nerf; I think that might be a record for me?

Dane played a ranked game where his opponent got to have 7 turns, and he got 83.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HE2P4SzZJ14

UltimaterializerX posted...

Are you less likely to get triples if other people have the same tribe? My inability to even get tier one minions gold is why I keep losing.

Yeah theres a finite amount of units that exist for each unit

also havent even touched the game yet

UltimaterializerX posted...

He single handedly got rogue nerfed in wild

Eh, I wouldn't go that far.

Like...yeah, "Dane Rogue" was a deck for years, I built a version myself like...four years ago.

But several things happened that made it a serious meta deck.

1. lots of deathrattle support. Sketchy Information tutoring a deathrattle that costs 4 or less and triggeringing it guaranteed tutoring for and triggering kobold illusionist. You can double that with snowfall graveyard too.
2. Neptulon is literally the best thing to cheat out of all time. They were actually considering banning Neptulon in wild because it caused problems in THREE different classes (big shaman, where they nerfed lightning bloom, big rogue where they nerfed illusionist, and big priest, which is still obnoxious and at large, but not as consistent).
3. An obscure Castle Nathria card, Masked Reveler, added a ton of consistency--it's another mana cheat deathrattle card that fits right in with the deathrattle synergy and mana cheat synergy.
4. Serrated bone spike also gave the deck some over the top mana cheating highrolls.

In the week or two before they nerfed it, it was legit being played by a ton of people in high legend. Just a deck that can cheat out Neptulon on turn 1 and it's not even that much of a highroll to do so.

I love how a Thief Priest with Harvester of Envy is perfectly viable and fun, even at high legend

UltimaterializerX posted...

It's always funny playing Classic and seeing how things were trash right from the start. Silencing Druid of the Claw still gives a 4/6. Silencing Ancient of War leaves a 5/5 instead of a 5/10.

it's always been the case that 'transform' effects can't be silenced. they've always been consistent on that

My ability to draft well in arena is completely gone at this point. Last two decks...

Great deck, not a single outright bad card, could almost believably be a ranked deck? lol nope, wasn't actually good like I thought, and the one game where everything goes right the opponents deck is even more bonkers aka Mage. Two wins.

Garbage deck, a quarter of the deck being terrible cards I hope to never draw and absolutely no late game combined with no way to pressure or win before the late game? I don't even want to play the deck and would like to just retire the run but my daily quests keep lining up with it so might as well keep playing. Ten wins. Absolutely no idea how it happened.

I just drafted a Reno deck with two copies of Reno. I should be happy but I've already convinced myself it's going sub-3.

I guess everyone is kinda whatever about this miniset so far

Nothing so far looks like it's going to have any effect on the trash rank meta I play at, so nothing much to get excited over for me personally.

I like the Thief Priest cards, Jailer looks fun

the puns are fantastic

habeas corpses is an all-time winner

[Achievements] Fixed a bug causing the Journal notification to persist even if there were no notifications to clear.

Oh happy day!

https://i.imgur.com/mCQoko8.png

Just you wait until I have 10 mana!

10 mana: https://i.imgur.com/on5kUYW.png

At least the game really wasn't winnable at that point, otherwise that salt would've hurt a lot more.

I just tilted an arena opponent off a fucking cliff. His 6-mana turn was a Masked Reveler that deathrattled into a Stoneborn General to go with his 5/3 on the board. My 6-mana turn was a Creepy Painting into Immolation Aura + hero power to kill his entire board and have an 8/8 remaining. He immediately alt+F4'd.

Even though I'd never bothered trying this before, I googled "(his username) twitch" and one came up. I clicked on it and he was actually live, and I got so excited that it might've been caught on stream, but nah, it was just some random guy playing Overwatch 2.

Are there actual arena streamers still

feel like most of them moved on to one of the other modes or something ese

I've never watched him, but Twitch loves to recommend Redbeard to me and when it does the description always mentions arena.

https://twitter.com/playhearthstone/status/1579880748005220353?s=46&t=25sSwLfygNqB2SywGzQFLA

Im glad Theotar is only getting a minor nerf

Patch notes:

https://hearthstone.blizzard.com/en-us/news/23852692/24-4-3-patch-notes

Theotar 4 mana -> 5 mana

Stag wild spirit 5/4 -> 4/3

Bear wild spirit 2/5 -> 2/4

Harpoon Gun discounts by (3) -> discounts by (2)

Theotar: We dont want him to be one of the most popular cards in the next expansion

Denathrius: ...

Camden posted...

Theotar: We dont want him to be one of the most popular cards in the next expansion

Denathrius: ...

I'm assuming they expect next expansion to be faster, so a 10 mana card might just naturally become too slow with the meta shift. Or maybe they're printing more high cost wincons that they expect to naturally push out Denathrius because people will run the new wincons instead.