im gonna try to be charitable for this one but blizz hitting lightning bloom genuinely makes me so upset. to all the people praising the lightning bloom nerf: how are you justifying nerfing a card that is relevant in like 5+ different druid decks (NONE of which are overpowered) instead of any more specific cards to big shaman that would affect only that deck? what is the point of hurting a wide variety of druid decks that currently arent hurting the meta in any way? furthermore, big shaman has been a thing long before now using lightning bloom and hasnt been an issue until the printing of that 7/7 fish fuck i cant remember the name of and the colossal legendary. therefore, why nerf a card thats been non-problematic in that deck for ages and (more importantly) has an incredible degree of importance in a huge number of other decks instead of nerfing/banning one of the new cards that has caused this imbalance of power? malygos druid JUST managed to get back onto its feet after being mostly outmatched by other ramp druid variants, now maly druid along with a good number of those other variants are getting kneecapped for NOTHING. we have the statistics to see that they are not winning to an overpowered degree, there's a wide variety of different decks and variation between archetypes that stimulates such interesting deckbuilding between different versions, so why hit those decks? really depressing for me, i truly dont understand why druid had to be punished infinitely harder than the class that was actually causing problems.
This is something I noted/complained of years back. Shaman gets burdened with a disadvantageous "advantage" in Overload while Druid's native advantages (mana ramp, stall) negate Overload's disadvantages quite nicely, so Bloom becomse a much nastier Druid tool than a Shaman one. Instead of fixing it, Devs consider this a feature -- after all, this plays to Druids' strengths.
Caria didn't. Blizz, like many game companies, is effectively a cult of the new -- the newest product must be protected. Xhilag has the highest value because of novelty, Caria less so for the opposite reason, so Caria gets rendered basically worthless (she was borderline at 6 in the first place). Xhilag can't be made into a larger value proposition because DH doesn't have any tools to make a value deck work in Standard -- it's aggro/tempo or nothing -- and it can't be buffed any further without making it an instawin when you highroll and face an empty board with it.
They could have done something clever and given Caria something else to balance out her 7-mana hit, but it's simply easier to delete the older card entirely.
Okay, so the balance patch dropped and I got shocked, because I wasn't expecting such extensive changes. In fact, the change is so drastic its almost suggesting that the previous meta was wildly problematic, when in my opinion it wasn't.
Everyone was expecting warrior to get hit, but to get hit this hard? Ouch. I guess we're back to quest warrior until the next expansion. Because I cannot see control warrior ever getting back. The nerf to Shield Shatter basically shattered its AoE because its no longer guaranteed to clear 4 drops (or anything midrange for that matter), and then that massive nerf to From the Depths makes it even harder to play without dying, probably end up completely deleting that card from competitive.
Nerf to cariel...well that's been requested for ages. I personally disagree with it, but that card is basically in every paladin deck and now at 8 mana it'll likely no longer be so.
Changes to gnoll is near mandatory. Its insane that even the most greediest rogue deck around basically gets a free pass early game because of these things. The 3/5 will still be playable, but at least its no longer as offensive. The biggest change though is actually to Mr. Smite, which just completely demolish all of rogue's end game, making sure you can no longer do the combo with Shadowstep+edwin. I guess its all down to Pirate Admiral Hooktusk or bust.
Spitelash Siren change boggles the mind a bit. Not because the nerf wasn't expected, but why the additional health? Its hard enough to clear this shit as a 2/5 and now with 6 health its nearly impossible if you dont have board. I simply have to trust that team5 did the testing and the win rate drops from this change.
One change with a massive thumbs up. Lightning Bloom. Been asking for this since its very inception and for the life of me I cant understand why making this change took nearly 2 years, but here we are; a more balanced bloom. 2 years team5 have resisted and its not even druid's fault. Nice.
So where does this all leave us? My expectation would be warrior goes right back down to the bottom of the tier list, followed by rogue. On the top it might still be dhunters, followed by paladin. Priest, mage and shaman to fight off third spot. The wildcards here is hunter and warlock, because either its stuck on the bottom, or its literally the best class in the game.
Edit: I should have pointed out that nellie went from being the best colossal to instantly being the very worst of them. In fact its nigh unplayable now. They had one job, and that's simply removing mr smite from the pool. And instead we got this.
Shield Shatter was deserved and helps a lot. It's now a bit easier to actually have a board that can survive the 2-mana boardclear so it no longer feels like you're just stacking bricks waiting to be knocked down.
Tidal Revenant seems a bit overkill considering the two other changes we also got. I guess it might be future-proofing in case the next set boosts WArrior again, but I personally would have waited on the nerf.
The Nellie, the Great Thresher nerf seems downright vindictive though. I get she was OP, but you literally killed her completely, she's unplayable now. At least you could have made thee discount (2) or (3) but now with the added Smite nerf this is just a death sentence. There were many ways to tone her down without making her unplayable, but I guess the devs don't like her either. Oh well, free dust for me.
I fundamentally disagree with From the Depths. For one, I am still salty I didn't realize the potential earlier and dusted all my extra copies early, and secondly, FTD felt like Warrior's way to keep up with all the highrolling nonsense currently around. Granted, said nonsense mostly got nerfed as well, but I still never felt like losing just to FTD when playing against Warrior unless they highrolled Nellie (who is now obsolete) so this feels like overkill. Then again, maybe it's just necessary, Warrior was really broken for the last couple days.
Caria Felsoul is an unfortunate casualty, but a neecessary one. You could have reverted Xhilag of the Abyss but that would effectively render both cards useless and since Xhilag on 7 isn't that much of a problem I guess Caria was the best choice to hit.
Battleworn Vanguard is a card that should have been nerfed a month ago...when I still had like 15 extra copies..... This keeps happening to me, I think I'm just never going to DE anything ever again. Jokes aside, this is a good nerf that hits a large issue with DH right now, mainly their ability to snowball early while still having insane lategame burst.
Wildpaw Gnoll seems fair. Not as harsh as the last nerf and should keep it plenty strong, especially now that most of the Rogue counters have been nerfed anyways.
Lightforged Cariel is somewhat unnecessary but still welcome. The card is fine in concept but when she comes down at exactly 7 and cucks you out of lethal she's the least fun experience you can have so the nerf is warranted. Also I'm tired of Paladin being carried this hard by a single card.
Spitelash Siren nerf is also necessary for the future. The deck is fine, but if you just get highrolled out of existence on turn 5 it just feels like bullshit. Ironically, the health increase might be a buff in the long run in matchups where you don't just Siren as fast as you can but stack ressources for a better turn. Against aggro decks Naga Mage is now significantly weaker though. Against Rogue for instance a one-turn difference will lose you the game.
Earthen Scales nerf seems somewhat pointless now but I guess it's future-proofing. Can no longer be abused with Ivus with a cheeky Innervate.
Lightning Bloom nerf is just funny to me. After almost two years of Druid abuse it's Shaman that finally breaks it.
Mr. Smite nerf feels like fan-service at this point. The card is fine but people won't shut up about it so I guess it makes sense to nuke it.
School Teacher is uncalled for. The card will lose relevance once the next expansion hits and the spell pool gets bigger. It's currently one of the most enjoyable cards and effectively functions as a neutral class card that can fill different roles. NOw it's just awkward to play. Could have just made it a 4/4.
Can't say anything about Battlegrounds, but Pyramad is probably better now (although not by much) while Tamsin is probably still shit. Strange to see Nagas buffed again though. I guess it really was Siren breaking the entire archetype.
The Merc's changes are just comical at this point. FUCKING HELL, JUST REVERT TRIGORE YOU GOBLINS. I don't even care about refunds, just nerf the cancer that ruined PvP beyond repair. What am I going to do with 10-extra health on Rexxar? take him to PvE? What for? I have a Fire team, it kills everything anyways.
So the thing is they sorta overbuffed Xhilag so now it can actually just wins by itself when it hits an empty board. Caria turned that into a very highrolly win condition
In a perfect world Caria would be left untouched but Xhilag would be reverted (and maybe buffed to 6-mana as compensation) but we don't live in that world so instead they chose to let Xhilag be playable and shaft Caria, perhaps because there are more powerful big demons yet to come or maybe because they won't support the archetype any further in Standard and so it's better to not render the standalone Xhilag unpllayable yet again.
Does Caria really deserve a nerf? Did the pros abuse her too hard? In BIG DH she is perfectly mediocre unless you hit exactly Xhilag (1/6-7 chance) exactly on curve and even then it's far less backbreaking than the actual metadecks are capable of on turn 5-6 :( As a guy who unpacked Caria as my free Alterac leg and golden Xhilag i am very emotionally conflicted at the recent changes carousel.
Turned Witch Doctor into a spell based on feedback. I got a bit worried it was too similar to Eureka! (which I completely forgot existed), so I also made Ethereal Shadow Weaver which is more unique in its effect. Ill try to get feedback out at some point, but time constraints are rough, sorry y'all :(
Ethereal Shadow Weaver isn't allowed because it doesn't transform minions, and Mojo Mixing is too similar to Eureka!, as you said (I didn't remember that card, either.
I'd probably go back to Witty Witch Doctor, but I'd give it Tradeable (and a Stormwind watermark, of course). His appearance doesn't fit Stormwind, so I suggest an alternate potion merchant flavor.
In any case, I've decided to post my other cards just because of the low activity this weak. I'll probably go with some variation of Ovella, though.
Polymorph: Penguin shows what cross school synergy could look like, but the transform effect itself is as boring as it gets.
Polymorph: Bomb is big + wide removal all in one. I think it's my favorite of my cards, but I've already used it in another comp and it didn't do too well.
There are a lot of new and interesting gamemechanics in the game with the mercs they added. In fact, coming up with creative comps to use these mechanics is my favorite thing in mercs now. Even though most of them aren't better than meta decks, just trying to make them work consistently is super fun for me.
Generally you are right, but occasionally those effects work well, notably Lynessa Sunsorrow because it's still limited to creating 1 big minion and Tess Greymane because her effect is entirely improvised and different every game. I guess the big difference between these two and the rest is that playing them usually gives the opponent an opportunity to respond (Tess usually only 'guarantees' wins when she is multiplied like crazy).
Hit Level 175 yesterday with the Tavern Pass. I've been playing a mix of modes, but mostly constructed. Still really enjoying the flavor of this expansion, if not all of the archetypes. I am working on grinding the less RNG-driven achievements from the mini-set.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
im gonna try to be charitable for this one but blizz hitting lightning bloom genuinely makes me so upset. to all the people praising the lightning bloom nerf: how are you justifying nerfing a card that is relevant in like 5+ different druid decks (NONE of which are overpowered) instead of any more specific cards to big shaman that would affect only that deck? what is the point of hurting a wide variety of druid decks that currently arent hurting the meta in any way? furthermore, big shaman has been a thing long before now using lightning bloom and hasnt been an issue until the printing of that 7/7 fish fuck i cant remember the name of and the colossal legendary. therefore, why nerf a card thats been non-problematic in that deck for ages and (more importantly) has an incredible degree of importance in a huge number of other decks instead of nerfing/banning one of the new cards that has caused this imbalance of power? malygos druid JUST managed to get back onto its feet after being mostly outmatched by other ramp druid variants, now maly druid along with a good number of those other variants are getting kneecapped for NOTHING. we have the statistics to see that they are not winning to an overpowered degree, there's a wide variety of different decks and variation between archetypes that stimulates such interesting deckbuilding between different versions, so why hit those decks? really depressing for me, i truly dont understand why druid had to be punished infinitely harder than the class that was actually causing problems.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
This is something I noted/complained of years back. Shaman gets burdened with a disadvantageous "advantage" in Overload while Druid's native advantages (mana ramp, stall) negate Overload's disadvantages quite nicely, so Bloom becomse a much nastier Druid tool than a Shaman one. Instead of fixing it, Devs consider this a feature -- after all, this plays to Druids' strengths.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Caria didn't. Blizz, like many game companies, is effectively a cult of the new -- the newest product must be protected. Xhilag has the highest value because of novelty, Caria less so for the opposite reason, so Caria gets rendered basically worthless (she was borderline at 6 in the first place). Xhilag can't be made into a larger value proposition because DH doesn't have any tools to make a value deck work in Standard -- it's aggro/tempo or nothing -- and it can't be buffed any further without making it an instawin when you highroll and face an empty board with it.
They could have done something clever and given Caria something else to balance out her 7-mana hit, but it's simply easier to delete the older card entirely.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Okay, so the balance patch dropped and I got shocked, because I wasn't expecting such extensive changes. In fact, the change is so drastic its almost suggesting that the previous meta was wildly problematic, when in my opinion it wasn't.
Everyone was expecting warrior to get hit, but to get hit this hard? Ouch. I guess we're back to quest warrior until the next expansion. Because I cannot see control warrior ever getting back. The nerf to Shield Shatter basically shattered its AoE because its no longer guaranteed to clear 4 drops (or anything midrange for that matter), and then that massive nerf to From the Depths makes it even harder to play without dying, probably end up completely deleting that card from competitive.
Nerf to cariel...well that's been requested for ages. I personally disagree with it, but that card is basically in every paladin deck and now at 8 mana it'll likely no longer be so.
Changes to gnoll is near mandatory. Its insane that even the most greediest rogue deck around basically gets a free pass early game because of these things. The 3/5 will still be playable, but at least its no longer as offensive. The biggest change though is actually to Mr. Smite, which just completely demolish all of rogue's end game, making sure you can no longer do the combo with Shadowstep+edwin. I guess its all down to Pirate Admiral Hooktusk or bust.
Spitelash Siren change boggles the mind a bit. Not because the nerf wasn't expected, but why the additional health? Its hard enough to clear this shit as a 2/5 and now with 6 health its nearly impossible if you dont have board. I simply have to trust that team5 did the testing and the win rate drops from this change.
One change with a massive thumbs up. Lightning Bloom. Been asking for this since its very inception and for the life of me I cant understand why making this change took nearly 2 years, but here we are; a more balanced bloom. 2 years team5 have resisted and its not even druid's fault. Nice.
So where does this all leave us? My expectation would be warrior goes right back down to the bottom of the tier list, followed by rogue. On the top it might still be dhunters, followed by paladin. Priest, mage and shaman to fight off third spot. The wildcards here is hunter and warlock, because either its stuck on the bottom, or its literally the best class in the game.
Edit: I should have pointed out that nellie went from being the best colossal to instantly being the very worst of them. In fact its nigh unplayable now. They had one job, and that's simply removing mr smite from the pool. And instead we got this.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Argh, I was really hoping Pirate Rogue's weapon would get touched. I am glad to see Lightning Bloom bite the dust, though.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Conflicted on some of these.
Shield Shatter was deserved and helps a lot. It's now a bit easier to actually have a board that can survive the 2-mana boardclear so it no longer feels like you're just stacking bricks waiting to be knocked down.
Tidal Revenant seems a bit overkill considering the two other changes we also got. I guess it might be future-proofing in case the next set boosts WArrior again, but I personally would have waited on the nerf.
The Nellie, the Great Thresher nerf seems downright vindictive though. I get she was OP, but you literally killed her completely, she's unplayable now. At least you could have made thee discount (2) or (3) but now with the added Smite nerf this is just a death sentence. There were many ways to tone her down without making her unplayable, but I guess the devs don't like her either. Oh well, free dust for me.
I fundamentally disagree with From the Depths. For one, I am still salty I didn't realize the potential earlier and dusted all my extra copies early, and secondly, FTD felt like Warrior's way to keep up with all the highrolling nonsense currently around. Granted, said nonsense mostly got nerfed as well, but I still never felt like losing just to FTD when playing against Warrior unless they highrolled Nellie (who is now obsolete) so this feels like overkill. Then again, maybe it's just necessary, Warrior was really broken for the last couple days.
Caria Felsoul is an unfortunate casualty, but a neecessary one. You could have reverted Xhilag of the Abyss but that would effectively render both cards useless and since Xhilag on 7 isn't that much of a problem I guess Caria was the best choice to hit.
Battleworn Vanguard is a card that should have been nerfed a month ago...when I still had like 15 extra copies..... This keeps happening to me, I think I'm just never going to DE anything ever again. Jokes aside, this is a good nerf that hits a large issue with DH right now, mainly their ability to snowball early while still having insane lategame burst.
Wildpaw Gnoll seems fair. Not as harsh as the last nerf and should keep it plenty strong, especially now that most of the Rogue counters have been nerfed anyways.
Lightforged Cariel is somewhat unnecessary but still welcome. The card is fine in concept but when she comes down at exactly 7 and cucks you out of lethal she's the least fun experience you can have so the nerf is warranted. Also I'm tired of Paladin being carried this hard by a single card.
Spitelash Siren nerf is also necessary for the future. The deck is fine, but if you just get highrolled out of existence on turn 5 it just feels like bullshit. Ironically, the health increase might be a buff in the long run in matchups where you don't just Siren as fast as you can but stack ressources for a better turn. Against aggro decks Naga Mage is now significantly weaker though. Against Rogue for instance a one-turn difference will lose you the game.
Earthen Scales nerf seems somewhat pointless now but I guess it's future-proofing. Can no longer be abused with Ivus with a cheeky Innervate.
Lightning Bloom nerf is just funny to me. After almost two years of Druid abuse it's Shaman that finally breaks it.
Mr. Smite nerf feels like fan-service at this point. The card is fine but people won't shut up about it so I guess it makes sense to nuke it.
School Teacher is uncalled for. The card will lose relevance once the next expansion hits and the spell pool gets bigger. It's currently one of the most enjoyable cards and effectively functions as a neutral class card that can fill different roles. NOw it's just awkward to play. Could have just made it a 4/4.
Can't say anything about Battlegrounds, but Pyramad is probably better now (although not by much) while Tamsin is probably still shit. Strange to see Nagas buffed again though. I guess it really was Siren breaking the entire archetype.
The Merc's changes are just comical at this point. FUCKING HELL, JUST REVERT TRIGORE YOU GOBLINS. I don't even care about refunds, just nerf the cancer that ruined PvP beyond repair. What am I going to do with 10-extra health on Rexxar? take him to PvE? What for? I have a Fire team, it kills everything anyways.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Wow, I guess I'm lucky I haven't dusted both free epics from Sunken City track until now. I mean, it's sucks to have gotten them in the packs.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
The funniest part is that it wasn't even Druid who ended up breaking the game with it.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
So the thing is they sorta overbuffed Xhilag so now it can actually just wins by itself when it hits an empty board. Caria turned that into a very highrolly win condition
In a perfect world Caria would be left untouched but Xhilag would be reverted (and maybe buffed to 6-mana as compensation) but we don't live in that world so instead they chose to let Xhilag be playable and shaft Caria, perhaps because there are more powerful big demons yet to come or maybe because they won't support the archetype any further in Standard and so it's better to not render the standalone Xhilag unpllayable yet again.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Does Caria really deserve a nerf? Did the pros abuse her too hard? In BIG DH she is perfectly mediocre unless you hit exactly Xhilag (1/6-7 chance) exactly on curve and even then it's far less backbreaking than the actual metadecks are capable of on turn 5-6 :( As a guy who unpacked Caria as my free Alterac leg and golden Xhilag i am very emotionally conflicted at the recent changes carousel.
0 MANA KING KRUSH! My Big Beasts Hunter Is CRAZY Strong! Throne of the Tides Mini-Set | Hearthstone
So... How does this deck get a 0 mana King Crush?
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
lot of dust :)
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Lightning Bloom - where has that nerf been for the last 2 years
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
No, no, Jackman. Got lost on his way to SNAP.
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
will dust a lot of cards today lol :D
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
that's a good one :D
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Laurie? What is he doing in this Hearthstone patch?
Hearthstone Patch 23.4.3 Arrives With Sweeping Balance Changes for Standard, Wild, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries
Wow, these changes are hugh!
I guessed we will see 2-3 cards nerfs - but this is "insane"! This will shake up the meta for sure! O.O
New You - Card Design Competition Discussion Thread
Ethereal Shadow Weaver isn't allowed because it doesn't transform minions, and Mojo Mixing is too similar to Eureka!, as you said (I didn't remember that card, either.
I'd probably go back to Witty Witch Doctor, but I'd give it Tradeable (and a Stormwind watermark, of course). His appearance doesn't fit Stormwind, so I suggest an alternate potion merchant flavor.
In any case, I've decided to post my other cards just because of the low activity this weak. I'll probably go with some variation of Ovella, though.
Polymorph: Penguin shows what cross school synergy could look like, but the transform effect itself is as boring as it gets.
Polymorph: Bomb is big + wide removal all in one. I think it's my favorite of my cards, but I've already used it in another comp and it didn't do too well.
Both use existing minions as tokens, in Snowflipper Penguin and Explosive Sheep.
Hearthstone is Getting a Balance Patch Tomorrow, June 16
The patch notes are out, lighting bloom is dead
Summer Tides Have Claimed Our Nozdormu Day for June 2022 - No Special Hearthstone Quest This Month
Damn, received a 900 exp quest and didn't know why until now, and the answer is just Blizzard being Blizzard as always
How to Complete Y'Shaarj Mercenaries Event Task 10 "Visions of Conquest" - Tips & Parties Inside
There are a lot of new and interesting gamemechanics in the game with the mercs they added. In fact, coming up with creative comps to use these mechanics is my favorite thing in mercs now. Even though most of them aren't better than meta decks, just trying to make them work consistently is super fun for me.
Hearthstone is Getting a Balance Patch Tomorrow, June 16
Generally you are right, but occasionally those effects work well, notably Lynessa Sunsorrow because it's still limited to creating 1 big minion and Tess Greymane because her effect is entirely improvised and different every game. I guess the big difference between these two and the rest is that playing them usually gives the opponent an opportunity to respond (Tess usually only 'guarantees' wins when she is multiplied like crazy).
Rewards Track: Current progress 5.0
Hit Level 175 yesterday with the Tavern Pass. I've been playing a mix of modes, but mostly constructed. Still really enjoying the flavor of this expansion, if not all of the archetypes. I am working on grinding the less RNG-driven achievements from the mini-set.
Marvel Snap's Featured Location This Week is Muir Island - The Early Bird Gets the Power!
I wanna play also :(