The Year of the Dragon Problem - An Opinion Piece

Hello everyone. I'm Raktoner.

For a while now I've been thinking of making a video expressing certain concerns I had with the way the Year of the Dragon has been handled by Blizzard. Unfortunately, I have no audience to start with, nor do I have the equipment (and frankly, knowledge) to make a video I'd be truly proud of. I've been commenting on this forum a bit lately and decided... Maybe this could be the place to start. It's important to note as I put in the title--this is an opinion piece. I am not speaking objectively. This is strictly subjective. 

I can't say I have terribly many qualifications, since I'm not exactly a Hearthstone personality, or a "pro player." However, I have some I can list that I hope will set my apart and show my opinion comes from the view of an above average Hearthstone player.

I am a 5x legend player--Two of those during the Year of the Raven, and the remaining 3 occurring in November, December, and January. I play for my University's TESPA team, where we were finished 3rd in the East and then went 2-2 in the playoff rounds. I have placed 1st in three local tournaments. Safe to say, I played a lot this year--it's why I feel I have a strong argument for my problems with this year.  

With that intro out of the way, I'd like to express my concern with the Year of the Dragon, going expansion by expansion. I'd then like to express my concern for what this means for the upcoming year rumored to be titled Year of the Phoenix.

Let's get started then.

Rise of Shadows

I think it's safe to say we were all excited for Year of the Dragon. Year of the Raven soured many people with the frustrating experience that came along with Genn and Baku's even and odd decks. Blizzard started off with a bold move: Moving all of the Even and Odd cards to the Hall of Fame, preventing them from controlling the meta for another year. This year promised us something we'd never seen before--a year long narrative. We were excited to see the return of Villains from Hearthstone history. Rafaam, Dr. Boom, Hagatha, Lazul, and Togwaggle all came back in an exciting way. But as their legendaries were revealed, the first two small problem started. First, Dr. Boom and Hagatha were and still are both represented in Standard already with their hero cards. Why were they getting legendaries again? This ended up not mattering much to people--a problem swiftly avoided as people realized: This doesn't matter, actually. I agree. But the next problem stuck the whole year: They were class legendaries. This struck fear in some people; I admit to being concerned as well. The 5 classes were branded the League of Evil, and were given the Scheme mechanic that saw little success outside of Hagatha's scheme. But the promise of the year long mechanic in the Lackey mechanic brought many people over to the evil classes.

In response, the "good" classes, who saw so little representation in the first expansion they didn't even get a team name, got... Twinspell. And Twinspell is a really good mechanic! For at least some point in the year, every Twinspell card saw play. It was a success! But the success of the mechanic stands much too short against the excitement brought by the Evil classes. We saw far more attempts by people to make Evil decks work, as Bomb Warrior and Tempo Rogue became the dominant decks of the meta, edging out Conjurer Mage. The "good" classes were flat out not as exciting as the Evil classes, and it showed. Blizzard attempted to balance this out in the next expansion, but made what I feel was a crucial error...

Saviors of Uldum

The good classes finally had their heroes. The League of Explorers returned, as Reno, Finley, Elise, and Brann brought with them the much loved Singleton mechanic. Concerns for Bomb Warrior ruining this mechanic were swept away quickly at launch, as Bomb Warrior was simply incapable of keeping up, especially after the August 26th patch nerfing the Dr. Boom hero card to 9 mana. Along with them, they brought an extremely powerful friend, the hardest to program card in Hearthstone's history: Zephrys the Great. A neutral legendary. Yes: a NEUTRAL legendary. 

Again, the Evil classes ended up being much more exciting. Four mechanics were re/introduced this set: Quests, which were for everyone, Reborn, which was for everyone, Plagues, which were for Evil only, and Singleton, which, thanks to Zephrys, was for everyone. Not to mention, the new Titanic Lackey really only saw play in the Evil classes that could properly support Lackeys. Hell, during this time, the best Quest was far and away the Shaman quest. This meant that again, the Evil classes were the favorite, more exciting classes. Thankfully the best Highlander decks during the Saviors of Uldum meta, and even during the Doom in the Tomb event, were the Good-Now-Explorer classes. This did not last.

Descent of Dragons & Galakrond's Awakening

The promised Dragons heavy expansion has finally arrived! This was the most excited I'd been for a Hearthstone expansion I'd been to date. I clearly had fun playing it; I've made legend twice during the event. But I won't lie to you all: the first time making legend was an absolute joke. The laughably overpowered Galakrond Shaman carried me to an 80% win rate as I reached legend on only the second day of the expansion. However, before I get in my own way, allow me to rewind a bit.

Descent of Dragons brought us two new mechanics: Invoke, one of the strongest mechanics to ever become part of the game, and Sidequests, a mechanic that like Twinspell has been really strong, but just doesn't bring the excitement of the Evil classes. We of course can't forget new Lackey synergy cards and the new Draconic lackey, or most importantly: Galakrond. Five brand new hero cards that were only for the Evil classes, again showing these 5 favor over the Explorer classes. Invoke and Galakrond was such a powerful mechanic, that the Shaman version of it was nerfed a mere two weeks in, and some cards with the mechanic got nerfed AGAIN a few weeks later. It was the most botched expansion launch in a while; not since The Witchwood has a new expansion come in and been nerfed so quickly. It left a terrible tastes in our mouths; how did Blizzard not see how freakishly overpowered this set was?

I did not forget about Zephrys. What should have been the most exciting card for the explorers robbed them of what made them most unique: The Singleton mechanic. Since Descent of Dragons, we've seen Highlander Rogue, Warrior, and Shaman all arrive in some form. Highlander Hunter remains the strongest, to be sure; but it's not what I've been hammering on this whole post. It is not exciting. Mage, Hunter, Druid, and Paladin were all powerful at some point during this year--but none of them have the excitement the EVIL classes brought. Their identities were pushed aside for Blizzard to focus on only five of it's nine classes.

Looking Forward

I hope people noticed something as they read this. I did talk about balance, sure, but that wasn't the main point I was talking about. It feels like Blizzard gave up on 4 of the 9 classes, and it showed throughout the year. When only five (or four, sorry Priest) classes are fun, the Meta isn't fun. The most fun I've had this year has been playing Battlegrounds--a game mode that provides us with no helpful rewards to help our collections, save for the occasional "play Battlegrounds" quests. This makes me concerned for the rumored Year of the Phoenix. What will Blizzard do?

Are we going to have a Witchwood situation? Is Descent of Dragons and Galakrond's awakening going to be so god damn powerful and fun that the first expansion of 2020 will be pushed to the wayside? 

Is Blizzard going to try to balance itself out, and then leave the 5 Evil classes in the dust by over focusing on the Explorer classes? 

Blizzard has already announced they will not be continuing the year long story. Why? The story and connected mechanics have at least been well received, if not without their problems.

As we face Hearthstone 2020, what does the future hold in store? 

I don't think there's any simple solutions, especially in the case that my opinions here don't reflect strongly on others opinions. I just hope that 2020 brings cool, fun stuff for all the classes, not just half of them.

I appreciate you taking the time to read all of my thoughts. I love Hearthstone. I love playing Hearthstone. I just played so much of it this year, I couldn't ignore these problems, and I wanted to share my thoughts somewhere. Thank you. <3

I agree that overall the EVIL classes got more of the 'headlines' in the Year of the Dragon, and it perhaps wasn't helped that Zephrys (and later Alex) were enough for EVIL classes to steal a bit of the Explorer's singleton limelight.

But I think you are overstating the imbalance a bit. Here are my thoughts. 

Regarding class mechanics and flavour

While hunter, druid and paladin flavour was a bit lacking in RoS (mage had Dalaran's mages to fall back on), the same could be said of the EVIL classes in SoU who were really doing their own separate things aside from the odd lackey card. The plagues are connected only in name and it's not really a mechanic, as is best evidenced by Plague of Madness which didn't even affect the whole board because unlike the other EVIL classes rogue doesn't do AoEs.

That just leaves DoD, where Galakrond is a true imbalance, but not quite as much as it first seems. Excluding Galakrond himself because he was an extra card, the EVIL classes had to use up 3 of their 10 cards towards Galakrond. In their place the Explorer classes got both their explorer dragon and sidequests. That might not compensate totally (especially on power, see below), but they are more flexible so if you don't want to play a Galakrond deck that is 3 less options than the good classes got.

As far as flavour goes, Galakrond was more interesting than getting one of the main dragon aspects (sorry hunter). On the bright side, at least The Amazing Reno nudged that back a little bit so mage didn't feel left out. So the losers here were hunter, druid and pally I guess, just as they were in RoS.

Regarding power

First let's get Galakrond out of the way: the shaman, warrior, warlock and probably rogue Galakrond packages were over-tuned compared to everything else. Nerfs have helped bring them back in line, but I am never going to defend Blizz for the state of Galakrond shaman on release. I am also happy to complain about how the Doom in the Tomb event brought shaman-stone upon us, which only compounded the annoyance of the smooth transition to Galakrond shaman when DoD arrived.

As for everything else, I don't remember it being too biased towards EVIL. Pally has been a bit narrow, focusing so much on mech decks, but druid, hunter and mage have all been significant and varied presences in the meta across the year. 

Edit: pally also had that dumb high-roll murloc deck. So even pally has had it's place in the meta.

Regarding fun to play

Now this truly is subjective, and I am certainly biased towards rogue, but not because the Year of the Dragon cards were more interesting; I just enjoy the rogue class the most generally. Rogue aside, I have found the EVIL classes less enjoyable than the good ones this year. Probably not enough to make a huge point about it, but certainly enough to disagree with you.

I'm sure everyone disagrees with everyone on the fine details here so I'll leave it at that.

Looking forwards

I would be surprised if there was a plan to leave the "EVIL classes in the dust", especially as the EVIL vs Explorers story has now ended and I doubt they would group classes in exactly that way again for a long time. 

What we might see is the usual cycle of class power landing in favour of one of the good classes (I'd suspect paladin, which is very believable if the guesses for a blood elf expansion are correct), though that would likely be disconnected from the good/EVIL bias.

The biggest letdown was not giving all the Explorer classes playable hero cards in Galakrond's Awakening. They gave away 5 hero cards to the E.V.I.L. classes, and left the Explorers hanging. They even made you think that was what they were going to do be showing The Amazing Reno as one of the first reveals.

The first free wing of the adventure should have given hero cards for all the explorers. Giving each class a hero card to play with going into the new year. 

Instead, I'm left concerned about the effect Galakrond, and the lackey package is going to have on the meta come rotation. 

This is a very interesting take. I've never seen somebody consider the intended representation of the classes in terms of 'flavour' before, but I suppose it makes sense to look at that when you consider that the year as a whole was a story this time.

I suppose that objectively I can agree that over the year the EVIL classes had the more obvious, splashy cards to get people excited about - with the Galakronds tipping the scales at the end. Generally though, we saw every class get a Quest, and every class have a main member represented across the two first expansions.

In terms of actual excitement to play classes, I can't really agree with the premise though.

Lucentbark Druid, Oblivitron and Nine Lives Mech Hunter, Cyclone Mage, Big Spell Mage with Power of Creation and Kalecgos, Conjurer's Calling Giants Mage, Quest Druid (with so many other cards), Combo Druid, Highlander Hunter, Quest Hunter, Big Spell Mage with Tortollan Pilgrim and Puzzle Box of Yogg-Saron, Embiggen Druid, Dragon Druid (along with so many other cards), Dragon Hunter (again, so many other cards), Mech Paladin.

Those are all decks that I've been super excited for over the course of the year for the various Explorer classes. Those aren't even all the decks that came out of this year for those classes; equally, there were plenty of EVIL class decks I was interested in.

I don't see any imbalance in how the classes played out in terms of exciting cards. Flavourfully important cards, a little, but not excitement or powerlevel (overall - Shaman obviously had a bit of an outlier for a couple weeks or so).

I hope the Good classes also get a Galakrond or something else to compensate. Sure you can do reno decks all the time but that gets a bit boring after a while. The new reno hero card for mage is nice but not a major game changer (only 1 card and 10 mana cost) and not of the same level as say Zul'jin. What I do like is with so many cards in the pool you can try out all kinds of different decks and they can all work.

What I always find disappointing is that most of the time you queue up against some well-known net-deck and my tolerance for some of them is approaching zero, probably because it is so predictable and not because of expected winrate, I think the balance is pretty ok at the moment.

Just a few points on your article;

That EVIL classes got more hype for their cards should be a given, considering that the explorers weren't even featured in RoS. Also it doesnt help that the most hyped of all the cards is Galakrond, a hero card, which is only provided to EVIL classes, with only The Amazing Reno being available only to mage. So I think we are in agreement that EVIL got the more exciting cards throughout the year. But this does not necessarily translate to having more fun:-

- Galakrond decks are amazingly predictable, and because of the necessity of including invoke cards and invoke-support cards, this reduces creativity in deck building. Its also not really all that fun to face against. Against rogue, always play around Seal Fate turn 3, against warrior always be vary of Ritual Chopper, etc. Its standard, and boring, in many ways, both to play and played against.

- Lackeys are not really class restricted. There's always EVIL Cable Rat and Grand Lackey Erkh if you're really keen on the card. Also, lets be honest, only shaman and rogue uses lackeys. Its nearly missing in both warrior and priest, and despite being pushed, lackey warlock never was a thing.

- Of all the EVIL classes, I think only quest shaman as a high claim for being genuinely interesting and good at the same time. The quests for warlock, warrior and rogue is generally meh. And quest priest is good on paper but brought down to earth by the priest class being a joke this year. By contrast, quest druid and quest hunter is astonishingly fun, and because of how its structured, is not a rail road of familiar cards from turn to turn neither.

- On the singleton issue. Zephrys the Great is the kind of card that should not under any circumstances be class restricted. Its the sole reason for any class to try highlander to begin with and promotes deck building

Just to conclude, I've had plenty of fun with the EVIL classes this year (aggro bomb warrior, quest tempo priest, quest shaman, galakrond rogue, quest warlock, plot twist warlock etc.) but I think I've have had more fun with the explorer classes, if only because its more challenging to build and win with those decks (beast hunter, quest paladin, quest hunter, quest druid, quest mage, secret quest mage, giants mage, mech highlander hunter, secret hunter, Lucentbark druid, etc.). I wouldn't call Year of the dragon an astoundingly fun year, but its been healthier and more diverse than any other year I can think of in hearthstone.

Its not easy to design cards to be fun and good at the same time. But I dont really feel that blizzard has let 4 out of 9 classes down. The only class to be put on that pedestal is priest, but priest and shaman are special classes where they are either too OP or too down in the dog turdlings to consider.