Legends of Runeterra
Hearthstone vs. LoR
Submitted 5 years, 2 months ago by
ayushi
Do you think LoR has a chance to overhelm hearthstone ? This game feels play (just like hearthstone and unlike Artifact), it has a nice design and has a potential to get a lot of players from LoL.
It also come to my mind that Riot exploited Blitzchung affair to introduce the game in the best time, since a lot of HS players promised to boycott Blizzard because of that.
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Do you think LoR has a chance to overhelm hearthstone ? This game feels play (just like hearthstone and unlike Artifact), it has a nice design and has a potential to get a lot of players from LoL.
It also come to my mind that Riot exploited Blitzchung affair to introduce the game in the best time, since a lot of HS players promised to boycott Blizzard because of that.
Most likely not. Hearthstone have too deep roots to be replaces by another card game
-=alfi=-
The game isn't even in beta yet, so there will be a lot of changes to it before release.. It will be a main competitor for sure, and I don't think hs will be a "dead game" though. But, Blizzard will have to fight harder to get players, and hopefully put more effort into the game and into it's economy.
There got to be a real good reason to move HS players to LoR. Many invested lots if money and time into the game and won’t switch just like this.
It could be a good F2P competitor but i doubt that .
Winner winner chicken dinner
Artifact was supposed to be the death of HS
GWENT was supposed to be the death of HS
Magic Arena was supposed to be the death of HS
I honestly hope LoR is successful just because it will force Blizzard to put more effort into some of the major issues with HS. They have improved greatly in 2019, but there is still plenty of issues that still need addressing. Competition is good, but I'm not going to keep my hopes up, because we've been down this road before.
This. Many card games can easylie coexist, so I hope LoR will be a great game with solid fan base. I also want try how LoR so for now it's ok, but easthetic still bother me so far (also I never played LoL). What I can is for sure it's a game that is not boring to watch, and it's also important for it's potencially success.
Missing lethal since February 2014.
LoR seems to have some of the core mechanics of HS (damage persist on creatures, mana that increase each turn) but also some of the best thing of MtG (chance to interact during your opponent's turn, no RNG effects). It's also pretty nice to watch and well polished. If it'll have a good economic system and many different modes (not at the beginning, but later at last) than it may actually be a real threat for HS. And LoR will also be on mobile, the platform on which HS is dominant and where it has the majority of its players.
HS' playerbase is shrinking little by little since a couple of years but Blizzard has taken very few step in the right direction to stop this loss or to bring more players. Some extra free packs is good, but the game is still untouched since forever and after 5 years of release it has introduced very few change and features. Even many of the top streamers have abandoned it for something else because bored by it.
Maybe LoR will not kill HS totally, but even if it'll fail I really hope that its threat may force Team 5 to release a sort of HS 2.0, with all those big changes the community is asking for a long time.
"For what profit is it to a man if he gains the world, and loses his own soul?"
First of all there is SOME RNG in the game, there are some cards that have random, not as many as in HS but I can already name a few: spell generators, teemo mushrooms, some random revive/evolve effects at least the discard and handbuff mechanics are not random which is great cause those 2 mechanics are very frustrating to use on HS.
I don't think HS will just die off specially cause it got his big strengths over any other digital card game currently, mostly that it's very easy to follow and appeals much to the casual audience.
I really hope that what you say comes true but, a 2.0 game is sort of admitting defeat HoTS did it and it's essentially a dead game right now I doubt they will go an overhaul the game (although it's much needed) after it didn't work with HoTS..
Riot didn't exploit the situation at all. It seems like they were always going to announce LoR during the LoL 10-year anniversary. The Blitzchung affair was just an happenstance.
The HS players who boycott and switch to LoR are hypocrites and or opportunists( justifying their out) because Tencent fully owns Riot. Why boycott 1 game because they bent the knee to the Chinese when the other is worse?
People like myself who still enjoys Hearthstone finds LoR to be another playable CCG.I had fun playing during this period that it was open. There were stuff that I wasn't used to ie the Magic like interactions and there was stuff that i liked ie the HS like mana & saved damage to units.
There are stuff that I hate like damage being blocked after a unit is destroyed by Active abilities & spells. Example is Anivia's active spell destroying 1/2 health units but since they were blocking my attackers suddenly their Force Ghosts can shit on me, that's bullshit!!!!!!!!!!
tl/dr: Don't play game as FU to Hearthstone, play the game as both are fun.
Only of it has a mobile version
HS is pretty well established now. MTG dropped the ball big time right in to Blizz lap. LoR? might take some marketshare from HS, but now the big issue is "new player experience"
Mostly it's a competition between new players IMO
"Soon we must all make the choice between what is right and what is easy"
HotS issues aren't tied to the 2.0 version, but are linked to some terrible choice made by Activision Blizzard in the try to take over on DotA2 and LoL. But you're right saying that an official "2.0" will be like admitting they're in some hard times.
What I mean is that, if LoR will be a success, Team 5 should really push on many different innovations for HS to keep up the pace. And that could only be a good thing to HS itself.
"For what profit is it to a man if he gains the world, and loses his own soul?"
I actually really like that mechanic. Sure if you're the attacker you'd prefer your attacks going to the nexus instead of doing nothing, but if this were the case, abilities and spells that can damage blockers before the attack phase would be really broken, because it would give way too much control to the attacking player who already gets to act first. Instead you can still choose to prevent your attackers from taking damage from their blockers with effects like this, which is still a very viable tactic but not immediately game-winning.
It might.
Let's be real here: Hearthstone hasn't changed much in the past years, mainly because it didn't need to. It's main appeal comes from the simple gameplay commbined with appealing visuals and ties to a well-known franchise.
LoR basically provides the same, but with some addeed depth. The gameplay is still fairly simple, but much more engaging than HS, the visual design isn't perfect, but it's definitely more appealing than most of the other card games, and finally it's set in the universe of a very popular MOBA that has many people hooked to it based on the characters and worldbuilding.
Add to that the Blizzard controversy (which they are determined to make even worse for some reason) and you have a perfect setup for many players to jump ship.
Personally, I'm gonna check the game out (once they actually let me in) and I'd have no problem completely dropping Hearthstone, if it ends up being better. Hearthstone just happens to occupy a niche that has yet to be sufficiently challenged and its claim to fame is flimsy at best.
Watching some of the LoR gameplay I realised just how basic and uninteractive Hearthstone has become, how many failed strategies keep being pushed and how the quality of a deck is determined by how fast it can turn a game into a one-sided curbstomp.
I tried having fun once.
It was awful.
LoR is from Riot Games. They came out immediately after the Blizzard controversy to warning their players not to say anything concerning "sensitive topics" (because supporting democracy is now sensitive).
They are 100% owned by the Chinese firm Tencent. They would be issuing the same punishments as Blizzard (if not more severe) had the situation happened in one of their tournaments.
I'm not saying this to absolve Blizzard, they should be held to account but you cannot exactly jump ship from Blizzard to Riot without understanding that Riot games is wholly in China's pocket, more so than Blizzard.
oh ofc, Riot is being cucked just as bad, if not worse, by China. The thing is....they have yet to get into controversy because of it (although I'm sure it will happen eventually).
What I'm trying to say is that a lot of self appointed moral crusaders feel the need to abandon Blizzard alltogether, but won't have enough of a shared braincell to to do the research and therefore will jump the Riot train for an alternative that lets them pretend they defended democracy.
I tried having fun once.
It was awful.
Full damage going to Nexus after units die can be abusive, but having Force ghosts full block is also bad. Maybe a solution would be attackers doing half damage or even a third damage and the justification can be the corpse of the dead unit being in the way thus making the attacker not get all of their hit in.
I think a lot of people are tired of the RNG in Hearthstone, which has increased significantly in the last years. LOR certainly appeals to me. Even in the 5 day BETA I had more fun than in the last 5 months of Hearthstone. Especially the dumb move of wild cards in standard with everyone playing even more shaman, was too much for me after 5 years of HS.
I don't necessarily think that LoR will overwhelm Hearthstone. But rather, that it will appeal to a specific subset of Hearthstone players. LoR feels a lot like classic Hearthstone, decision-making and interaction were king in it originally. Introducing too many powerful cards has pushed HS to ridiculous levels.Those playing the game for the competitive side and decision-making (like myself) have begun to feel like every game is won or lost on RNG. God curves, lucky draws, created by, etc. Add to that the fact that some matchups are completely unwinnable. It makes it hard to keep grinding HS.
Hearthstone's staying power for me has been the lack of another game which is relatively easy to begin playing and hard to master. LoR felt learnable to a competitive level in the brief period of me playing it, with tons more to do and learn in the future. It's barrier to entry is nonexistent, since there is no paywall. The game is easy to watch and follow on Twitch. It has all the makings of a potential replacement for me.
AAARARRRGWWWH
I think the idea is that the minion is already being blocked, so no matter what happens to the blocker, it has already been confirmed that the attacker has been blocked.
Imagine if I am in the process of swinging my sword at a guy, and then he suddenly disappears, I won't stop mid-swing then move over and hit the other guy, my sword will just fly through the air and hit nothing. It is not that the unit is disappearing then blocking your unit, it is that he is blocking your unit then disappearing.
Carrion, my wayward grub.
Well, I agree I think hs lately has been a lot about those broken cards in general giant + CC, desert hare + evolve, having the right board clear at the right time the god curve of warrior in the early game..
Well in LoR I had a few really good curves as well, curving draven into jinx in a discard deck is also kind of unstoppable..
but you know what is probably the best mechanic to counter the bad curve in LoR? the spell mana, I think that it just makes decks that skip turn 1 and maybe 2 have a chance in the game they would otherwise lose hard that mechanic is amazing, at first I wasn't sure why they did that but the more I played I realized that's the "perfect curve vs high cost hand opponent scenario" answer or LoR which is quite great, it's also a skill experecion that will stay forever in the game of "do I save my mana now for later?".
Now we say that other DCCGs didn't succeed as well as HS but I am sure there are also plenty of people who play ShadowVerse, Gwent, Eternal.. (not artifact though XD https://steamcharts.com/app/583950 - RIP artifact).
LoR just have a lot of stuff HS players were asking for years that are just not game mechanics such as "react on enemy turns". "fix early curves", "lower rng", "monthly balance patches", so people who dislike HS for those reason will go there.
but casual players/heavely invested players will probably stay.. or people will play both..I hope I will be of those who will quit hs.. since let's be honest the game is not gonna Evolve in any way
That's a good comparison. I was thinking more of "I'm preparing my attack on you guy 1... my ally takes out guy 1... fine I'll move to attacking the boss."
I guess I'm still not used to the board being divided into a battlefield plus a combat zone at the same time.
Spell mana is the ultimate skill test. It allows you to plan many turns in advance for specific combos and provides a comeback mechanic at any point of the game. The discard god curve is pretty nutty, but if you focus on removing key threats and use cards like Deny to stop key skills any game is winnable. My biggest takeaway was that every game felt like it could go either way, regardless of the decks. All the decision-making to get there and play around your opponent felt meaningful and interactive. LoR is a competitive HS player's dream, I doubt its gonna be as big of a hit as the casual crowd. You can't pay for a deck and expect to win.
AAARARRRGWWWH
Is this true? I never got the impression that LoL fans were there for the characters or the world...
"We will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
its already confirmed that it will have a mobile version in 2020 upon the final release
You're right that many games can easily coexist, and that it's silly to proclaim every new digital CCG "the Hearthstone killer," but I think you may be a bit too rosy in your outlook on coexistence today. The facts remain that Hearthstone is the 500lb gorilla in the room when it comes to marketshare:
The same SuperData report that this comes from says that the overall audience size for digital CCGs is leveling out, and that a large majority of players want access on their smartphones. HS's biggest competition - MTGA - will probably never make it to mobile because the game is too complex and the board size has no limits to make rendering straight-forward. Other games like Gwent are getting into mobile, but they're just not popular enough to make a dent.
These factors, combined with the inertia of players' sunk cost in Hearthstone, makes it a juggernaut, and for someone to get into the digital CCG space, they need to take shots at Hearthstone's marketshare. That would be great, and that's why people are looking for the "Hearthstone killer." If Blizzard takes a big hit in their profits, perhaps they'll make a serious investment in Hearthstone improvements. How long have they talked about tournament modes? How long have people been calling for rotating standard sets or greater investment into the Wild format to make old cards less worthless?
Runeterra may not be a "Hearthstone killer," but from my first impressions, I think it's well-poised to deal the major hit to Hearthstone that Blizzard needs if they're ever gong to take major steps to improve the game. In particular:
Nothing is going to kill Hearthstone (which is a good thing), but it doesn't have enough real competition, and Runeterra looks poised to be a major competitor in this space.
I actually didn't know that Riot Games was entirely owned by a Chinese company, so thank you for posting this.
I think you're absolutely right that they'd do the same thing as Blizzard is they were faced with this controversy, but I'm not sure being owned by a Chinese company has a ton to do with how "in China's pocket" they are. The type of censorship Blizzard exercised has been happening all across American entertainment. Recent examples in other entertainment industries include the NBA's ongoing issues around Daryl Morey's tweets and the "costume ret-con" to Tom Cruise's iconic Top Gun jacket.
Entertain companies of all stripes and colors see China as the way to grow revenues, and while you're right that jumping to Riot Games from Blizzard won't benefit a company that has real independence from Chinese influence, it might make Blizzard think twice about restricting free speech because that could hurt their bottom line.
I think that's ultimately what a lot of these backlashes are about - reminding these companies that there are certain things that American audiences (and Western audiences more generally) consider sacrosanct, and that their efforts to grow revenues in China can have negative consequences on their (currently) stable fan bases here at home.
There are another reasons why Runeterra might probably succeed more than other dccg's. It is language support.
For example, Here in Turkey, Some people don't know English. Especially younger people who studies in colleges. They want to play Hearthstone for example but most of them don't decide to play because of the language part. They don't know English so they can't play it effectively.
Riot brought League of Legends in Turkish to Turkey, They opened Turkish Server. With Legends of Runeterra's reveal, They announced that LoR will also be playable in Turkish, They posted a video about voiceovers with anouncement. That excited people, especially the people who couldn't play Hearthstone or other card games because of language skills.
There is not a little gaming community here. If you go check out, There is always a Turkish streamer in LoL channel at top 5. There is a potential and Riot saw that.
There was even a petition about translating Hearthstone to Turkish here. Blizzard refused it.
%70 of our people are young and at best, %90 of them are playing computer games and I know that Riot is doing same thing for another countries which can't get language support for best games around.
For being another example how a gaming company should act, When Witcher 3 published, There was no Turkish translation and They had no Turkish translator in their team. After the launch, some people here voluntarily translated the game and contacted with CD Projekt Red. Cd Projekt Red agreed the translation and added it to original copy. Now, one of the most loved game is Witcher 3 and company is CD Projekt Red here. And for being answer, Most of people here bought original copy of Witcher 3 even it is a single game. (people here rarely buy original games, especially single games, They started to buy tho.) Now, some people don't even like sci-fi games, They all are waiting for Cyberpunk because they are expecting same support.
Like the example here, The people who rarely buy games can spend their money to cosmetics in LoL and they are really spending much. not even for themselves, They are also gifting each other so much. That seems so weird at first look, but if you go deeper you can understand that. They feel important when a company listens them and give support to them.
Playing a game in your main language might be normal for French, German, English, Russian , Chinese or Japanese people but not for people here and I believe there are other nations like us. They become excited when they hear about a game is publishing in Turkish. I remember how all people here loved Crysis for being fully Turkish. Even people here loved Age of Empires II because of there are some Turkish words although they are not even close to Turkish. They were just words which an unnative person's wrong pronounciation of Turkish words. They are still meme here tho. :D (Well, it is not valid for me and people like me because I had an uncle who is an English teacher and I grown up with his computer and games. Even the games are in my main language, I always prefer English because I've been used to it like that and I can't really understand some gaming terms when they translated to my main language.)
So, Runeterra will probably succeed. Not just because of being a good game but because of this kind of policy and support. Well, I've tried it and game also seems great.
Unpopular Opinion Incarnate
The concept of a "HS Killer" really reminds me of the supposed need for a "Halo Killer" during Halo's heyday... it really is a result of the human psyche's desire to have a "one vs. one" scenario and a prevalence to champion underdogs. Of course things are never that simple and there usually isn't a _____ killer; games die due to a ton of different factors. Halo's popularity (which was crazy at its peak) dropped due to some poor decisions in game design, marketing, company focus and competition, not to mention all the studio decisions regarding resources and contract negotiations. If LoR offers a legitimate alternative to HearthStone, that can only be good for fans of DCCG (note it may not be good for HS, but that's free market for you). As mentioned, if Blizzard sees a portion of the market swinging away from them and no longer feel dominant, maybe they will take some positive actions to make HS more appealing to both their veterans and newcomers to secure their position. If not, other games (including LoR) may take more and more of the market share. The introduction of a solid new product will always shake up the economy a bit, but don't expect LoR to drop and HS to die the next week... those things rarely happen.
"We will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
I have been playing hearthstone since launch, with a two year break because I lost interest. I will be dropping it the second LOR will come out and here is why:
-RNG: This did not use to be such a big issue, but lately it is too much. A lot of games feel like, opponents draws card `x`, you lose. Random generated spells from Lackey’s, drawing into key cards like Zephyr, Dr. Boom, flesshaper+mutate on an early game etc. You can analyze and think through your turns all you want, just to get 3@$#!@#@# by a lucky draw or lucky generated card. Of course this has always been the case, but not as much as lately.
-Balance: It does not seem like Blizzard really cares. Shaman was already overplayed before evolve was brought back temporarily, now it’s just nuts. If you bring back some cards, why not bring back the best cards for classes that are struggling like warlock or mage? At the start of HS I did watch a lot of the big tournaments, now I only log in for the free packs. I really am not interested in another Shaman vs druid vs priest vs warrior. The promise of monthly balance changes in LOR is great.
-reward system: outside of the quest, the reward system is really, really poor. 30 wins equal one pack, which usually gives you random stuff you don’t need. In LOR this felt so much better.
-emotes: Yeah, I don’t like emote spamming people, why is there still no auto squelch button in HS? I think it is only possible when using a deck tracker. In LOR I was triggered by their system.
So basically we still say the same thing. My look is not too rosy, cos this games coexisting and will be coexist (until Blizz or other company don't do something stupid). I think you also have right telling that LoR will be main copetitor for HS and it's a good thing. Blizz need strong opponent to feel that they must wokr hard to keep up. I hope it will be the case.
By the way, I had no idea that Pokemon TCG doing that good on the market.
Missing lethal since February 2014.
You're right that there are a lot of factors which contribute, but at the end of the day, a game with no competition in its genre won't fall out of favor despite a lot of other failures in design, marketing, etc. Moreover, while your Halo example demonstrates how Halo's position weakened, and competition was able to come in and dethrone it, Hearthstone is not like Halo in one key aspect - the collection invests players with time and money in a way that doesn't happen in FPS games. The perceived cost of switching FPS games is much lower because the skills translate and you can start playing competitively immediately.
I think people are looking for an HS killer not because they want a one vs. one battle of games, but because there's a sense that HS's position in the market has weakened, but that the sunk cost hold HS has on players, and the mobile-friendly nature of it, makes competing much harder. It's not enough to make a better game - it needs to be better, still be mobile-friendly, and provide a reasonable new-player experience that can incentivize someone to leave a game to go somewhere else where they'll need to invest money and time to build a collection large enough to play competitively
I don't think LoR will surpass HS, since, IMO, one of the most brilliant feature of it is the simple gameplay. On your turn, you play minions, cast some spells and try to destroy your opponent. Then you wait your opponent's turn. Straightforward.
And also, it has another advantage over MtG, that it's mobile friendly.
What I think that will happen is that many MtG newcomers will switch to LoR (since they won't have to catch up the old stuff) and they might grab some HS players that, like me, miss more in-game micromanagement, like in MtG, and at the same time, can do it in a cell phone...
LoR might not surpass HS, but it doesn't really need to. It just needs to take enough of the marketshare to push Blizzard to compete more in this space. I agree that the simple gameplay that Hearthstone offers is a bit part of its advantage, but I think that simplicity is a double-edged sword. The focus on tempo and the offense advantage in combat makes Hearthstone inherently anti-control, and when a control-heavy meta does come about, it's often quite degenerate. (This was well-demonstrated by recent Control Warrior mirrors that went on for as long as an hour per game and were often won by random discovered cards from Archivist Elysiana or the 40 turn limit.)
Hearthstone's biggest competitor today is MTGA, and the reason I think LoR will meaningfully impact HS is because LoR addresses a lot of what's wrong with MTGA:
Different Games,
Different Audiences.
I don't think the average HS player will enjoy LoR as much as HS. LoR gameplay is more similar to MTG, so MTGA players will fit better into it.
Personally, I hate to be interrupted every time I play a card and it makes me feel really nervous. The HS flow is fast and straight, and casual players (especially from mobile) will still prefer HS because of his simplicity.
Anyway LoR still a 10/10 AAA game, gratz to Rito.
I agree to a degree (wow, that rhymed...); I think there is a much greater sunk cost fallacy occurring with HS, but it still exists within FPS (more so now with microtransactions, but even back in Halo's prime the FPS has the time investment and the most basic sunk cost... the price tag. Still, you are right in that it is much stronger with HS.
I would also agree that the example does not fully hold up, but I think it actually works against the HS killer need, because you can easily play multiple mobile-friendly games... it's part of their attraction. The fact the game must be mobile-friendly and provide a new take on a genre is just the nature of the type of game you are attempting to make, and it doesn't necessarily need to incentivize someone to leave HS... the company just needs to get enough attention for someone to try it (we'll see if LoR tries to increase their gross impressions across the market to accomplish this). If the game is more appealing, HS players who have tried it will start to migrate over (or at least support it as much as they do HS). I agree that HS's market share is ripe for a hit, but I think the human psyche is the main reason we are seeing a hope for a dethroned Blizzard (plus, as I mentioned, everyone loves to champion the underdog, especially when the giant has done some bad stuff recently).
"We will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.