It's time for a different kind of counting this week, but don't worry - your cards will be keeping track for you this time!
You must create a card which uses a counter similar to those of the Objective spells or the Sigils
That's the little marker above your hero that counts down how long an Objective lasts for, or how long until a Sigil activates. So long as your card is counting something, you're good to go!
AeroJulwin is counting on us to do some counting this week - so make sure your cards are keeping track of it!
As always, I can be reached through Discord or here on the site via PM if you have any issues to report.
Competition Phases
Here are the phases of this card design competition
Submission Phase: Starts on Mon, Jan 10 17:00 EST (GMT -0500). Runs until Sat, Jan 15 17:00 EST (GMT -0500)
Voting Phase: Starts on Sat, Jan 15 17:00 EST (GMT -0500). Runs until Sun, Jan 16 16:00 EST (GMT -0500)
Finalist Phase: Starts on Sun, Jan 16 17:00 EST (GMT -0500). Runs until Mon, Jan 17 17:00 EST (GMT -0500)
Winner Selected: After finalist voting concludes and we validate votes.
Discussion Thread Rules
No thread rules were added to this season. Please populate and manually edit this thread with them.
I mean, I hope they are working on known issues and glitches as much as they do for trying to conferr cosmetics. I would not say no to a nice skin(depends on me, obviously) but I would be very upset about the patch if there will be no solution for the majority of those bugs. We'll see.
I used a example of decks people know about that featured Champs as primary win cons.
But like sure if we are dreaming let's go top tier Ash Thres, Thaliyah Malphite, top tier deep.
I just want champ focused win cons to actually win games.
Most decks that win seen to win despite any Champs they are running as opposed to because of them.
Ezreal Kenin used to win because kenin burned opponents down to 0.
Now Kenin delays the game until Ahiri can elusive swing you down to 0. Like if she just was a vanilla 2/3 elusive quick attack follower it would literally change nothing.
Good Champs, with unique play styles and wincons, over grindy value wars where you just swing over ans over again with hard to remove stuff for value.
Edit: Champs are supposed to be Runeterras plainswalkers (mtg) and unfortunately Legends doesn't work as a card game if 95% of those planeswalkers (aka the characters you care about) are just a joke. Like they hit the board and they are less threatening than 1 one mana fur ball...that's the game right now.
Champions are about fulfilling a particular fantasy regardless of their region. I guess it's a big part of why I got frustrated with the game, but for folks that have no issue with that, the game is probably totally reasonable.
I agree with you here, I think they care more about champion identity than region identity, which is a philosophy that, while not inherently bad, I disagree with. I made a video all about it, the research for that video being what led me to this thread. The Shurima and Bandle City sets prove your post from 2 years ago 100% correct.
That just like saying hey let's replace this trash with garbage.
Twisted Fate/Fizz didn't play that much different from elusive poro it was mostly about spamming a bunch of zero mana elusives and buffing them. TF was just their to make the deck more consistent and offer a secondary win con.
Fiora/Shen was never toxic, it didn't make control or aggro unplayable and even at it's most powerful the deck had a mostly a 50/50, 45/55 match up table but it was a top tier for a long time so people got tired or it same thing happened to Ezreal/Draven.
The frustrating part to me is that they are lot's of fun deck in this meta Senna/Veigar, Taliyah/Ziggs, Pantheon/Taric, Turbo Thralls but they are overshadowed yet another elusive deck.
I like Diablo being a "dual class" hero (and an outside IP character at that) in Duels. What I don't like is the insane fucking synergy that demon seed has with the claws hero power.
Demon seed needs to be nerfed heavily (or banned from Duels) because it's just too much of a warping factor, especially with Diablo around. It creates a situation where you can't even play big minions, because you actually help accelerate their quest completion.
I'm not trying to bitch for the sake of bitching, but the quest specifically with Diablo creates a polarizing situation where playing no-minions or going wide will cause you to lose. Playing big minions will....also cause you to lose, just faster.
I just really hate the Demon Seed as a mechanic as a whole, it circumvents a core mechanic, and should never have existed in the first place.
Also, since I'm ranting in this thread: Fuck Pirate Quest: I know it's low skill in both duels and standard, but I'm so sick and tired of seeing it. I'm sick of seeing cannoneer on turn 4, and I'm sick of highrolls with Smite/Gorehowl.
On the next rotation Blizzard needs to tone down the mana cheating, tone down the card draw, and bring back resource management and actual decisions. When 90% of your playerbase currently is just speedrunning through their deck for their quest completion/OTK/aggro curve without any consideration to resources (because they never have to worry about running out of cards) then there is a fundamental problem with the game.
Every patch is going to bring in new bundles and skins, Hearthstone finally got into the proper rate of releasing cosmetics so everyone can find something they like. The bundles are also just super easy to do and good value over buying regular packs so I certainly can't fault them.
I hope they figure something out for wild. Keeping wild, wild, and then adding a new expanded card pool format that they are willing to apply some balance to would be the best way to go imo. Then they can make wild the place for cards with no changes and whatever the new mode the place for people to go that actually care about playing with thousands of cards, but with a tad less bs.
Of course, I have already met an APM mage. It seems that I have never lost to this deck with pirate warrior. it's just the balance of agro > combo > control > agro.
I started playing at the time of the release of the KoFT addon. I think I know quite a significant number of different decks. About the skill, I think I can handle any deck. I had different control and combo decks. I also played Shudderwock shaman when he was in standard (I just dust him then). I have several "unnecessary" legends. A couple of them are gold. So maybe I'll create freeze shaman deck.
Alright, time to some climb today.
Edit: Reached Diamond X.
Edit 2: It's next day and I reached Diamond 5. Today's climb was much easier then yesterday.
Edit 3: Past Diamond 5 climb is just unholy rage, rng fiesta and whatever it is... Stuck on the 3rd rank. I'm really unlicky with draws today. I'll try again tomorrow.
My big thing is I like when Champs are good. Like the kindred buff was nice. A while back the jarvan level up buff was great.
But when vanilla followed cards like whiteflame, iceborn tribal, generic value card piles are the optimal way to play the game things feel pretty boring.
So I'd rather see something toxic like fiora Shen, tf Fizz, Azir Irelia, because those decks actually do things and have unique play patterns etc.
Like hate them all you want but what's less stupid a fizz level up into a bunch of small free elusive, or a 1/1 elusive poro grinding out value into a big chonker. No animation, no card synergy, no champ, just blaaaaaah.
Like actual card vomit turned into a deck. So one solution is to again keep saying this buff Champs and keep buffing underplayed Champs till they aren't underplayed. That takes priority over nerfs for me.
I am nearly at Level 94. I've been doing dailies (in mercs and in the main game), and that's about it over the Holiday season. Mostly playing Standard - (I need to get to Diamond 5 still) and then I will flip over to Wild for my climb to D5.
If you are struggling with some decks completely hard countering your deck, I suggest playing Freeze Shaman. It is the multi-tool of wild and in my opinion the strongest deck wild, whose win rate is dragged down by the average player. I will give some pros and cons to it (and advice to op at the end so this comment stays relevant).
Pros:
Relatively cheap.
Every legendary is a staple of the class and has seen competitive play before, and will likely see play afterward. A lot of the cards are still in standard so they can go towards building a standard deck, too.
It hard counters every form of OTK in the meta.
Dirty Rat, Bolner, and Macaw hard counter every relevant mage deck (Ignite and Flamewaker Mage) while also stealing value. You can also stall using a combination of Cult Neophyte, Macaw, Boompistol, and Loatheb. All you have to know is how your opponent is planning on winning.
It can stall early game aggression.
Zentimo, Windchill, and Ice fishing are absurdly strong this meta.
It hard counters every questline deck.
Have you ever dirty ratted a quest reward out of your opponent's hand? The emotes afterward are the best part, IMO (I hope the player base never learns to wait to complete their quest until they can play their reward in the same turn).
It can freeze the enemy board a potentially infinite number of times.
It has infinite scaling and armor gain while also locking the opponent out of the game with Shudderwock.
Counters rez mechanics with Devolve.
Has a good WR against the most popular deck in the format, Pirate Warrior.
Cons:
Requires the player to be familiar with the meta.
Has a decently high skill floor.
A bad mulligan means you can lose at the start of the game.
This is true of nearly every deck, though.
Susceptible to Dirty Rat.
This deck is incredibly busted, and I think it needs to be taken a look at by Team 5. I was able to hit a 70% WR with a new variation of it and was able to get to 63% WR with the first popular version of it.
To OP:
When playing the most popular deck/version of a deck in a format, everyone knows your win condition and your cards, so you lose the element of surprise. Keep that in mind when you choose future decks.
Download HSreplay if you can. It helps you visualize what could have happened if you choose different plays.
Try your best to remember the different archetypes you come across, and what kind of cards they use. It will help you when you mulligan against your opponent thinking they were one archetype when they were another.
If you do download HSreplay, do not take the mulligan feature as gospel. Trust me. I do think it is better on minion-based decks like Pirate Warrior, however.
Sorry for derailing the thread, just wanted to share a deck that I think is great for reaching Legend.
Edit: Also, I think APM is very balanced ATM but I understand not finding them fun.
3rd Equipment no longer comes from Task 7, instead, clear the appropriate Heroic Bounty with them on your team.
this is just for the new mercs that will be introduced tho, right? the old ones wont be affected by this change? I hope it is like that. I would really prefer the old way of unlocking that.
Mini update: I reached level 150 and Legend in Wild along the way. Now waiting for the new patch with bugfixes and the upcoming mini-set, hopefully arriving soon™
I've reached level 67 on the track. I finally bought the pass, but I wasn't able to play much last week because I got sick, so I spent the past two days finishing my quests from last week, then cleaning up the new quests this week. I managed to climb 8 levels in two days, not bad.
With Thief Rogues dominating the meta, I've been strictly playing Quest Shaman and Quest Handlock. I know, I know, try something new, but these decks are my best bet to counter those Rogues because of their removal tools. And I've been farming wins for that golden Shaman portrait anyway, so might as well. I'm only 13 wins away!
I'm also excited to have unlocked the Venerable Bru'kan portrait, definitely one of the best Shaman skins in the game. I just love skins with flashy animations, and the lightning emanating from Bru'kan's fingertips is just sweet (he's also my favorite mercenary; love me some old geezers who can still dish it out!). I'll be using this skin exclusively in my grind for the golden portrait.
I got a Drek'Thar from packs. It isnt in any of my decks, so I dusted it for full value. I really dont need the dust as I am around 25k dust. If I need it in the future I will just create it, if not I have more dust.
With todays Weeklies I´ve jumped to lvl 90 and got that sweet coin. My XP achievement count is 70% done. Funny thing is that I´ve accidentaly completed warriors "What Happens When...?" even I don´t own Rokara, the Valorous - more in spoiler.
Show Spoiler
I was playing Casual Duels against Diablo. Turn 6 I´ve played Southsea Scoundrel I got in loot bucket, and managed to discover Rokara, the Valorous. Next turn I played her, attacked my opponent with all my minions on board, leaving him at exactly 1 health. And guess what, my opponent had only one minion left - a mere 1/1. Never been so lucky before :D
I'm glad those were disenchantable for full refund, i've not opened my alterac packs ('cause golden runetotem hunter is on the rewards track...) so for preventing from finding them on packs i've crafted them and then disenchanted them back.
I'll get my golden vanndar before next set
FOR THE HORDE!
(Hope other guys are getting the lead, i simply can't)
Keep On Ticking - Card Design Competition Discussion Thread
Competition Theme: Keep On Ticking
It's time for a different kind of counting this week, but don't worry - your cards will be keeping track for you this time!
AeroJulwin is counting on us to do some counting this week - so make sure your cards are keeping track of it!
As always, I can be reached through Discord or here on the site via PM if you have any issues to report.
Competition Phases
Here are the phases of this card design competition
Discussion Thread Rules
No thread rules were added to this season. Please populate and manually edit this thread with them.
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
I mean, I hope they are working on known issues and glitches as much as they do for trying to conferr cosmetics. I would not say no to a nice skin(depends on me, obviously) but I would be very upset about the patch if there will be no solution for the majority of those bugs. We'll see.
Up To Date Winrates Post Patch
I used a example of decks people know about that featured Champs as primary win cons.
But like sure if we are dreaming let's go top tier Ash Thres, Thaliyah Malphite, top tier deep.
I just want champ focused win cons to actually win games.
Most decks that win seen to win despite any Champs they are running as opposed to because of them.
Ezreal Kenin used to win because kenin burned opponents down to 0.
Now Kenin delays the game until Ahiri can elusive swing you down to 0. Like if she just was a vanilla 2/3 elusive quick attack follower it would literally change nothing.
Good Champs, with unique play styles and wincons, over grindy value wars where you just swing over ans over again with hard to remove stuff for value.
Edit: Champs are supposed to be Runeterras plainswalkers (mtg) and unfortunately Legends doesn't work as a card game if 95% of those planeswalkers (aka the characters you care about) are just a joke. Like they hit the board and they are less threatening than 1 one mana fur ball...that's the game right now.
Does each region have enough of an identity?
I agree with you here, I think they care more about champion identity than region identity, which is a philosophy that, while not inherently bad, I disagree with. I made a video all about it, the research for that video being what led me to this thread. The Shurima and Bandle City sets prove your post from 2 years ago 100% correct.
Up To Date Winrates Post Patch
That just like saying hey let's replace this trash with garbage.
Twisted Fate/Fizz didn't play that much different from elusive poro it was mostly about spamming a bunch of zero mana elusives and buffing them. TF was just their to make the deck more consistent and offer a secondary win con.
Fiora/Shen was never toxic, it didn't make control or aggro unplayable and even at it's most powerful the deck had a mostly a 50/50, 45/55 match up table but it was a top tier for a long time so people got tired or it same thing happened to Ezreal/Draven.
The frustrating part to me is that they are lot's of fun deck in this meta Senna/Veigar, Taliyah/Ziggs, Pantheon/Taric, Turbo Thralls but they are overshadowed yet another elusive deck.
Group Therapy! Need to blow off some steam? Mega salty? Here's the place!
I like Diablo being a "dual class" hero (and an outside IP character at that) in Duels. What I don't like is the insane fucking synergy that demon seed has with the claws hero power.
Demon seed needs to be nerfed heavily (or banned from Duels) because it's just too much of a warping factor, especially with Diablo around. It creates a situation where you can't even play big minions, because you actually help accelerate their quest completion.
I'm not trying to bitch for the sake of bitching, but the quest specifically with Diablo creates a polarizing situation where playing no-minions or going wide will cause you to lose. Playing big minions will....also cause you to lose, just faster.
I just really hate the Demon Seed as a mechanic as a whole, it circumvents a core mechanic, and should never have existed in the first place.
Also, since I'm ranting in this thread: Fuck Pirate Quest: I know it's low skill in both duels and standard, but I'm so sick and tired of seeing it. I'm sick of seeing cannoneer on turn 4, and I'm sick of highrolls with Smite/Gorehowl.
On the next rotation Blizzard needs to tone down the mana cheating, tone down the card draw, and bring back resource management and actual decisions. When 90% of your playerbase currently is just speedrunning through their deck for their quest completion/OTK/aggro curve without any consideration to resources (because they never have to worry about running out of cards) then there is a fundamental problem with the game.
/endrant
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
Let's hope part of the big plans is to actually release a big patch without introducing yet more bugs into the system.
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
Don`t get me wrong, I think it is a good thing that we get more bundles and skins.
Still I wish there would be "more love" for Wild from the defs :/ ...
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
Oh boy, I can't wait for the Darkmoon Mini-set.
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
Every patch is going to bring in new bundles and skins, Hearthstone finally got into the proper rate of releasing cosmetics so everyone can find something they like. The bundles are also just super easy to do and good value over buying regular packs so I certainly can't fault them.
I hope they figure something out for wild. Keeping wild, wild, and then adding a new expanded card pool format that they are willing to apply some balance to would be the best way to go imo. Then they can make wild the place for cards with no changes and whatever the new mode the place for people to go that actually care about playing with thousands of cards, but with a tad less bs.
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
So we have to suffer through another week of Rogue dominating the meta? Wow....I can't even right now....
No Hearthstone Patch Planned This Week, Blizzard Has Bigger Plans for the Lead-up
What I hope: A better balancing for Wild.
What I expect: A ton of bundles and pricy skins.
Reach Legend Rank
Of course, I have already met an APM mage. It seems that I have never lost to this deck with pirate warrior. it's just the balance of agro > combo > control > agro.
I started playing at the time of the release of the KoFT addon. I think I know quite a significant number of different decks. About the skill, I think I can handle any deck. I had different control and combo decks. I also played Shudderwock shaman when he was in standard (I just dust him then). I have several "unnecessary" legends. A couple of them are gold. So maybe I'll create freeze shaman deck.
Alright, time to some climb today.
Edit: Reached Diamond X.
Edit 2: It's next day and I reached Diamond 5. Today's climb was much easier then yesterday.
Edit 3: Past Diamond 5 climb is just unholy rage, rng fiesta and whatever it is... Stuck on the 3rd rank. I'm really unlicky with draws today. I'll try again tomorrow.
Reminder: Full Dust Refunds for Alterac Valley's Drek'Thar and Vanndar Stormpike Cards End on January 10
Opened drek'thar today so glad i was informed. Perfect timing
Up To Date Winrates Post Patch
My big thing is I like when Champs are good. Like the kindred buff was nice. A while back the jarvan level up buff was great.
But when vanilla followed cards like whiteflame, iceborn tribal, generic value card piles are the optimal way to play the game things feel pretty boring.
So I'd rather see something toxic like fiora Shen, tf Fizz, Azir Irelia, because those decks actually do things and have unique play patterns etc.
Like hate them all you want but what's less stupid a fizz level up into a bunch of small free elusive, or a 1/1 elusive poro grinding out value into a big chonker. No animation, no card synergy, no champ, just blaaaaaah.
Like actual card vomit turned into a deck. So one solution is to again keep saying this buff Champs and keep buffing underplayed Champs till they aren't underplayed. That takes priority over nerfs for me.
Rewards Track Progress: 4.0
I am nearly at Level 94. I've been doing dailies (in mercs and in the main game), and that's about it over the Holiday season. Mostly playing Standard - (I need to get to Diamond 5 still) and then I will flip over to Wild for my climb to D5.
Reach Legend Rank
If you are struggling with some decks completely hard countering your deck, I suggest playing Freeze Shaman. It is the multi-tool of wild and in my opinion the strongest deck wild, whose win rate is dragged down by the average player. I will give some pros and cons to it (and advice to op at the end so this comment stays relevant).
Pros:
Cons:
This deck is incredibly busted, and I think it needs to be taken a look at by Team 5. I was able to hit a 70% WR with a new variation of it and was able to get to 63% WR with the first popular version of it.
To OP:
Sorry for derailing the thread, just wanted to share a deck that I think is great for reaching Legend.
Edit: Also, I think APM is very balanced ATM but I understand not finding them fun.
Big Mercenaries Updates Coming Soon - New Zone, Bounties, Equipment Change, and Training Grounds
this is just for the new mercs that will be introduced tho, right? the old ones wont be affected by this change? I hope it is like that. I would really prefer the old way of unlocking that.
Rewards Track Progress: 4.0
Mini update: I reached level 150 and Legend in Wild along the way. Now waiting for the new patch with bugfixes and the upcoming mini-set, hopefully arriving soon™
[Game] Card Treasure Hunt (Hearthstone Riddles)
My name tells you my format
I prefer to rest in your hand a bit before I go into combat
You rarely see me without my vanguard
Turtles, Bees and Penguins prepare my path
Rewards Track Progress: 4.0
I've reached level 67 on the track. I finally bought the pass, but I wasn't able to play much last week because I got sick, so I spent the past two days finishing my quests from last week, then cleaning up the new quests this week. I managed to climb 8 levels in two days, not bad.
With Thief Rogues dominating the meta, I've been strictly playing Quest Shaman and Quest Handlock. I know, I know, try something new, but these decks are my best bet to counter those Rogues because of their removal tools. And I've been farming wins for that golden Shaman portrait anyway, so might as well. I'm only 13 wins away!
I'm also excited to have unlocked the Venerable Bru'kan portrait, definitely one of the best Shaman skins in the game. I just love skins with flashy animations, and the lightning emanating from Bru'kan's fingertips is just sweet (he's also my favorite mercenary; love me some old geezers who can still dish it out!). I'll be using this skin exclusively in my grind for the golden portrait.
Reminder: Full Dust Refunds for Alterac Valley's Drek'Thar and Vanndar Stormpike Cards End on January 10
I got a Drek'Thar from packs. It isnt in any of my decks, so I dusted it for full value. I really dont need the dust as I am around 25k dust. If I need it in the future I will just create it, if not I have more dust.
Rewards Track Progress: 4.0
With todays Weeklies I´ve jumped to lvl 90 and got that sweet coin. My XP achievement count is 70% done. Funny thing is that I´ve accidentaly completed warriors "What Happens When...?" even I don´t own Rokara, the Valorous - more in spoiler.
Reminder: Full Dust Refunds for Alterac Valley's Drek'Thar and Vanndar Stormpike Cards End on January 10
I'm glad those were disenchantable for full refund, i've not opened my alterac packs ('cause golden runetotem hunter is on the rewards track...) so for preventing from finding them on packs i've crafted them and then disenchanted them back.
I'll get my golden vanndar before next set
FOR THE HORDE!
(Hope other guys are getting the lead, i simply can't)
Arcane Nature
Edit:
Also consider the equipments to be leveled up