Today's reddit AMA has been full of great replies from the Hearthstone team, and that includes talking about the usually forgotten Wild format.
Alec Dawson of the game design team says that we should expect changes to two problematic decks in the Wild format - Quest Mage and Darkest Hour Warlock. This will be done by making adjustments to Open the Waygate and Bloodbloom, the details of which are not yet known but will be announced soon.
How would you change the cards?
Quote From HS_Alec For Wild, we know there has been a lot of very strong reactions to Quest Mage and Darkest Hour Warlock. These decks play in a one-player fashion similar to other decks we've nerfed in the past. There's going to be crazy combos in Wild, but we don't think these two decks in particular are healthy. Expect to see changes to Open the Waygate and Bloodbloom.
Comments
I changed my response seeing how I had forgotten the Sn1p-sn4p tragedy, among other things. I was hoping you would at least read a post before quoting it. My bad.
Check out vicioussyndicate.com.
You now know what an actual meta report looks like. You're welcome.
Lets take a closer look if VS agrees with your claim "Secret mage has been the best deck for a long time now":
VS Report 21 Feb 2020: Secret Mage Nr 1 deck in Legend -> point for your
VS Report 20 Nov 2019: Secret Mage Nr 3 best deck in Legend -> hmm this doesn`t fit your claim
VS Report 19 Sept 2019: Secret Mage Nr 2 best deck in Legend -> close one, but the Nr. 2 is not the best deck
VS Report 18 July 2019: Secret Mage Nr 3 best deck in Legend -> damn again not the Nr 1
To sum it up: According to VS Secret mage is a T1 and one of the best decks for a long time, thats right. But the claim "Secret mage has been the best deck for a long time now" is still - according to your own source - nonsense.
So I still see no reason to think Secret Mage is so overpowered that it urgently needs to be nerfs. You're welcome.
To be fair in this argument, you're splitting hairs. Sure, he may have stated it was the most powerful deck a long time. But just because it occasionally got beat out by things like Big Priest, Snip Snap Warlock, or others, doesn't mean it hasn't been a very strong deck for a long time.
Let's think about this for a second though, trying to take a Team 5 perspective. They have shown a tendency in the past to nerf decks that are polarizing the meta. As you stated, a large part of the Wild meta is aggro or hyper aggro. Why is that? Is it because the players who don't want to play Secret/Quest Mage or Darkest Hour Warlock feel like they need to win super fast or lose? It's likely a combination of that and just wanting to get quick wins. Will weakening these decks eliminate or greatly decrease the amount of aggro in Wild? Probably not. Will doing so allow for more Control oriented decks to gain ground in the meta? Probably!
And I think that is the main reason for the nerfs. They are probably seeing a polarized meta in Wild, which is shaped by these two decks. You can't play anything control oriented that has a win condition requiring a longer game because you risk losing to DH Warlock on turn 5-6, or by the time you get your big game winning stuff going you're pretty much deck due to Flamewaker pinging you over and over again with Sorcerer's Apprentice, cheap spells, and Cyclone providing a quick quest completion and damage engine.
As for the secret tech, yes, there is plenty. But if you include several secret tech options for this one match up, you now are much weaker against other match ups. And one of the best tech options against DH Warlock is on the nerf list potentially, which is Bad Luck Albatross. So now, even if the effect stays the same, you may need to wait another turn to get it out if they raise it's cost. Which may not be soon enough to pack in the birds and make your opponent pull 1/1 minions with their Darkest Hour turn.
Bottom line: I think a nerf to both decks is fine. The team has done a pretty good job of making fair nerfs as opposed to giving problem cards the Warsong Commander treatment. And with recent nerf reverts of some cards in or going to Wild, I think it's safe to say if the change they make does go a bit too far, they could very well make another change to try and keep the cards playable. Remember, Dean Ayala's favorite deck is Secret Mage, so I don't think he'll let them nerf it too badly anyway, if he has a say.
FUCK YEAH!
Thank God they're finally nerfing this Quest-Mage BS! This Stuff is so unfun and non-interactable, you can practically concede t1 when you're a slower Deck and see your Opponent play this fucking Card.
I hope they change the Way the Reward interacts with Archmage Vargoth. That's imo the biggest Problem with this Deck. Increasing the required Number of Spells you have to play to complete the Quest wouldn't be enough, unless you at least double the Amount. Mages can shit out random Spells like it's nothing! (Mana Cyclone alone often enough completes the Quest).
The Change to Bloodbloom to address Darkest Hour Warlock is also great. But, what I read was „We're gonna nerf Mecha'thun".
As someone who quite enjoys the idea of Quest Mage, even I have to admit it's gotten way out of hand lately, to the point where a nerf or a good way to counteract them is needed. My guess is the requirement for quest completion will go up to 8, which will leave aggressive and midrange decks enough room to kill the mage off, thus dropping their winrate and, as a result, their attractiveness for spike players. At the same time, this slowdown will mean other combo decks will have more time to get their thing done, and control decks might be able to power up enough to a point where a board of Giants might not be enough for a secure lethal as often as it is now (though that will require some mana cheating on the control deck's part), or at least maybe squeeze in some disruption to mess up the mage's plan.
With Darkest Hour, I'm pretty surprised it's Bloodbloom they're looking at, and not Darkest Hour itself. Obviously, Bloodbloom is the card that allows them to do that dirty thing they do much faster than many decks can answer it (especially if all board-clear suddenly costs 2-4 mana more), but at the same time the card is an integral part of one of the few other Warlock decks that are good right now. The nerf I imagine they might do is restrict Bloodbloom only to spells that cost 4/5 or less mana, to essentially prevent Darkest Hour from existing completely. That I'd be fine with, as that deck simply feels utterly miserable to play against if you lose and completely toothless if you win. My issue is that if they were to nerf the card in this way, it essentially tanks Bloodbloom's conceptual usefulness to almost nothing. You get a two mana discount on a spell this turn at the cost of an extra card and some life. That looks like a terrible deal. Previously, the spell could be included in some niche control warlock builds for surprise emergency Twisting Nethers or to accelerate the Rin rituals (when those were still relevant) etc. Simply put, the card had potential. I don't feel it deserves to be the scapegoat for what is first and foremost a design blunder in the Darkest Hour card itself.
Cubelock and Renolock and maybe now Discardlock again are enough other viable to strong decks Warlock has left in Wild, even if Darkest Hour and Mechathunlock will be unplayable after the nerf. As long as Warlock can cheat out a 6/18 taunt on turn 4 this class will be viable.
To be honest, the choice to go after bloodbloom did surprise me a little as well, mostly because there's collateral damage in the form of mecha'thun decks that also used the card. But ultimately I think it makes sense for the long term health of the game, since bloodbloom's very existence requires all high-cost spells in the class to be designed knowing that they might come down for two mana, either on turn two (one with the coin) or in tandem with another play as DH warlock does.
Without bloodbloom, darkest hour isn't a particularly scary card, and it would feel absurd to nerf it in standard where it's a meme. Plus it isn't easy to nerf, seeing as increasing the mana cost doesn't really do anything to DH warlock.
Blizzard: What cards are everyone loving but no one really wants to play the counters for them?
Panel: Oooh! Right now Mage is a pain with their quest deck. Oh OH OH! Warlock is seeing a lot of spotlight too because someone figured out how to get big minions out in one turn.
Blizzard: Great! Let's make everyone playing those types of deck hate the game and play something else that they really won't like. Anything else?
Loner on the Panel: Well, players have been complaining about Big Priest for the past few years and.....
Blizzard: You're Fired!!!!
tbh, big priest isn't that strong in wild ever since the barnes nerf. raza priest is much more powerful that big priest as of now.
Raza is doing VERY well and is very powerful. unsure if Barnes nerf actually makes big priest much worse. Some cut him from the deck even before the nerf and did very well with the deck. I think the deck might still be just fine but people ran away from it after the nerf.
I'd disagree with the part that Big Priest isn't that strong in wild.
Yes Barnes was nerfed, but the moment Vargoth was released he pushed he was into the slot as the most powerful minion in the deck.
Barnes was an early highroll card, that's it. The usefulness of the minion in the deck actually made the deck worse as the turns rolled on since a top deck Barnes at turns 8+ was not impactful at that point. Plus, he naturally diluted the rez pool.
Vargoth on the other hand, is a good draw at almost any point in the game versus the priest. Get him on turn 4 versus a deck with no transforms? Insta play and enjoy the problem the opponent is placed as they determine whether they want to kill him and get him rezzed back with two copies, or don't kill him and let Shadow Essence and other spells snowball you to death. Then in the late game Vargoth completely carries the deck when the spellstone highrolls into instantaneous 7 minion boards.
Big priest is terrible. Its win rate isn't even tier 4 at this point. Only reason it still sees play is because certain players are incapable of playing anything else.
YES! Let Open the Waygate DIEEEEE!
No changes to secret mage? are you kidding me?
While secret mage can be tilting, I’d argue that secret mage is probably the power level they are looking to reach in wild for the format in general. The deck is synergistic, lean, but not impossible to beat or completely noninteractive. We will see if they manage to print cards that let secret mage reach that level or not, but I thank at a game design level secret mage is in an ideal spot balance wise. Now it’s up to them to fill in other wild synergies
These changes are long overdue and very appreciated, but the more I play quest mage, the more I realize that sorcerer’s apprentice is the problem card. The quest is too easy to complete, but the fact that I can borderline kill someone with sorcerer’s apprentice and flame waker turn 4 has nothing to do with the quest. Out of the 10 matches I won today, 3 of them I won without even casting quest, thanks to sorcerer’s apprentice.
also, open the waygate is a wonderful change, since the requirement was far too easy to earn, and bloodbloom is quite possibly the strongest card they hadn’t nerfed yet. It’s effect is disgustingly powerful
about fucking time. It needed someone to rage on Iksar in order to save wild. And to think he got bullied for it...
Kinda sad, that someone had to complain about the power level of this deck on Iksaar's wedding picture and to flame the devs there, in order to accelerate the nerf patch. If only this was avoided.
It's not as though some idiot's tweet affected the patch schedule. I'm sure they've been looking at these changes for quite some time now.
I might be naive for saying this, but you never know. Wild rarely receives balance updates. I remember, that when I created the hpwn thread 1 year ago, there was a discussion among the devs about the oppressors in the wild format and bb was listed as one of them. So that card was on their radar even back then, but I guess the low win-rate of Big Warlock prevented it from getting a change. So the devs settled down with changing Barnes' cost to 5 and I don't know about you, but I'm one of the ppl who thought the nerf came in too late for it to matter. LyraSilvertongue explained the Barnes case a couple of posts above mine, so you can read all about it there.
My point is that external factors can affect the implementation of some balance changes. From what I heard, this was the case with Naga Sea Witch.