New Freljord Landmark - The Howling Abyss

Now this is quite a casual card. Nobody can afford to run a card like this that put you behind 7 mana for an effect that can be completely useless. It is cool,  but pointless from a competetive perspective 

This is exactly what people are talking about when they say "bad RNG." It's the kind of card that makes people prejudiced against all RNG, when the problem is actually just bad design of this particular card.

Then again, there are so many Champions that are mediocre or bad if your deck doesn't support them, I don't think you'll be winning because of the specific Champion generated very often. More likely, you'll win because of the infinite value, which sucks just as much.

I REALLY HATE INFINITE VALUE, AND THIS CARD MAKES ME VERY ANGRY.

Again, i doubt that this card is competetive. Sure it is in theory infinite value but in practice it is just too slow and unreliable to be any competetive 

too slow to be useful

Is this perhaps the reason to play Freljord Purrsuit of Perfection?

@FortyDust

Sure this is kind of infinite value, but it is infinite value of random champions. Because of that, if the opponent has any way to finish the game the Infinite value won't matter. I also calculated it and the average cost of a champion is 4.33 mana (58% of champions cost 4 or less and 79% of champions cost 5 or less), so the champions you get from Howling Abyss likely won't be able to compete with something like an Infinite Mindsplitter, Warmother's Call, or Celestials for late-game power. Having only 5 unit slots also limits the power of the ability by a lot (because in the late game you might have a full board and your 4/4 Fiora in hand becomes really useless). Not all infinite value is necessarily bad (for example, a card that filled your hand with 1 cost Poros every round would be a fine card). Howling Abyss isn't even a win condition, it's a meme condition.

P.S. I'm not trying to call you out or anything, I just wanted to show you my thought process from "I hate this" to "this is probably fine"  

Quote From TheTriferianGeneral

Again, i doubt that this card is competetive. Sure it is in theory infinite value but in practice it is just too slow and unreliable to be any competetive 

If that's true -- if it's really not worth playing -- that's just another reason to hate it.

@Cursed Parrot: The problem is that you can have this on the board in addition to Mindsplitter, Warmother's Call, and Celestials. I totally agree that this card isn't a win condition on its own, but if you can play it and stabilize, you can just sit back and wait for a winning card to appear -- either from the Abyss or from the good cards you have in your deck. You don't stop drawing after you've played this card, so your chances of finding something useful increase dramatically. If your hand fills up with cheap Champs, you can always play them and immediately play over them as needed.

Quote From FortyDust

Quote From TheTriferianGeneral

Again, i doubt that this card is competetive. Sure it is in theory infinite value but in practice it is just too slow and unreliable to be any competetive 

If that's true -- if it's really not worth playing -- that's just another reason to hate it.

You don't have a sense for fun and casual card designs do you?

The Abyss is not meant to be part of top tier, it is meant for fun times in friendly pvp matches what is great!

You won't lose any mmr, won't have to deal with it in competetive play and timmis got spectacular moments to make youtube material of...

I call that a huge win without great risk to backfire 

I don't think this will be an extremely successful card (i.e., in terms of winrate), but I do anticipate it being a very fun card. Random L2 champions are probably good enough to consistently win Expeditions but not Constructed, so you'll need a bit of luck on your side too.

If anything, I'm sad that they made this an Epic as it seems like it would be a fun memey deck that casuals would enjoy.  

I dunno guys, my verdict is yet to be determined on this. It definitely could be terrible, like everyone is saying.

But I did a quick skim of the leveled up champions that would be good without any support, and it looks like more than half of them fit that description. The ones that are obviously bad include Fizz, Teemo, Elise, Maokai, Fiora, Diana, Braum, and probably Nautilus (though Naut could be quite a hit if you're Deep). Karma, Heimer, and Lux could be bad, depending how many spells are in your deck. Tryndamere is pretty meh as well. Everything else is actually pretty good for its cost.

This card might be quite a bit more menacing than it looks at first. Even Katarina could be pretty amazing when you get her for free into a board that's already developed.

Edit: I counted out (according to my own opinion) four categories of level 2 champions: Bad, Iffy/Situational, Good, Very good. Here's my counts-

Bad - 7 (16.2%) - (see above)

Iffy - 5 (11.6%) - (Karma, Heimer, Lux, Tryndamere, Katarina)

Good - 22 (51.2%) - (Everything not specifically listed)

Very good - 9 (21%) - (Sejuani, Asol, Swain, Twisted Fate, Thresh, Kalista, Vi, Lee Sin, Nautilus)

Meaning you have a 72% chance to get a champ that is either good or very good. And of course, we all know that a free flipped Asol into Invoked Living Legends is a thing that WILL happen.

Edit #2 - Topandito makes a great point, which my brain somehow missed. Nautilus is a 13/13 tough fearsome, every time. That puts him solidly in the Very Good bin instead of the bad one.

Small note, deep or not Nautilus will be a 13/13 since this specifies they are leveled up automatically by the effect of the landmark.

Maokai probably wins you the game on the spot, instant mill. Opponent has 4 turns left before dying to fatigue

Maokai mills your deck as he levels up but since he doesn't level when you get him from the HA he is only a 2/5 token generator for 4

I dont't like these card of cards because they are part of the reason why I don't play Hearthstone anymore. With that said I think it is balanced quite nicely and won't be a competitive card. 

• It's a value generator that can low- or highrole. And as previously discussed in this thread "when I level up" conditions do not trigger. 
• It's essentially 7 mana do nothing, so you have to be in a good position to play this card otherwise you are prone to open attacks. 
• They have printed counters to these kind of cards. 
• Champions tend to require some build-around to be good; teemo, Fiora, Maokai, Yasuo to name a few. 
• It's a meme card. 
• It is a horrible card to draw in your opening hand. 

However, there can be some feel bad moments if it gives the opponent a level 2 Asol and he/she starts snowballing. 

On the plus side it will probably generate a few good Youtube highlights. But Riot... careful with the RNG. 

@Thazud

I agree with you completely about this card being the kind of design that made me dislike Hearthstone. This is probably a very balanced card (I don’t anticipate something like the Yogg meta because of this) but very few cards like this should be printed. Hopefully this card will create some good highlight reels and moments (like when Kripparian Unstable Portal’ed into a Nefarian into a Sacrificial Pact against Jarraxus) but sees no serious play.

I really do not enjoy these random effects. I wish they did not go into this direction.

@Thuzad

Just a quick note - Level 2 Yasuo is a 5/5 Quick Attack for 4 cost. I'm pretty sure that's good, even with zero synergy in the deck. Similar for Jinx as well - 5/4 Quick Attack (though a deck with this Landmark in it probably never empties its hand - so that part probably never comes into play). We do have to always keep in mind, however, the raw stats and keywords of level 2 champions (like 10/6 overwhelm for 6 cost - Darius; or 13/13 tough, fearsome for 7 cost - Nautilus). Even Braum, whom I rated as bad, still has challenger and 6 health with regeneration.

I'd hate the card if it was strong, but it's a 7 effective mana do nothing, so i'm ok with it; it's just a meme card to have some fun. 

i'll probably even try it 

Quote From sto650

@Thuzad

Just a quick note - Level 2 Yasuo is a 5/5 Quick Attack for 4 cost. I'm pretty sure that's good, even with zero synergy in the deck. Similar for Jinx as well - 5/4 Quick Attack (though a deck with this Landmark in it probably never empties its hand - so that part probably never comes into play). We do have to always keep in mind, however, the raw stats and keywords of level 2 champions (like 10/6 overwhelm for 6 cost - Darius; or 13/13 tough, fearsome for 7 cost - Nautilus). Even Braum, whom I rated as bad, still has challenger and 6 health with regeneration.

Valid points for sure. Depending on your matchup 5/5 quick attack, at that stage of the game, isn’t that big of a deal. If your opponent is playing 8 drops and you are playing well-statted 4 drops you are probably still on the losing side from the tempo loss of playing Howling Abyss. Jinx is probably a bit better because of the extra draw she provides - depending on how many cards you have left in your deck and what you are playing against. 

My point was not to rank them (you did a better job at that in your previous post). I just wanted to give examples of champions that require certain synergies to shine, and perhaps Yasou wasn't the best example.

I am the only one who enjoys the fact its effect is mostly a flavor to the ARAM that happens on The Howling Abyss rather then a proper mechanic?

Think Elise isn't that bad it still is a 2 mana 4-3 challenger with fearsome.

Fizz is okay alot of decks have around 10 spells, if you can hit the nexus once with a lvled up fizz he can activate his ability himself every turn.

Plus he is a 3-2 for 1 mana potential to block elusive if you really need it.

Maokai is okay for the fact that he can create a chump blocker every turn that one extra body can make a difference sometimes.

Low costs with decent bodies/effects.

Now we have Divergent Paths which counters that well.

Still, 7 mana infinite value might see play.