I like your suggestions a lot! The Mystery tile is definitely an underutilized mechanic in this whole thing, and having more than one, with many different outcomes, would make the bounties so much more interesting.
I also like the guaranteed Mysterious Stranger at the end of each bounty, even when you were able to farm Air Ele and others, it still took a LOT of time, without it, it will take an insurmountable amount of time. Having a guaranteed merc task at the end of a bounty would be so good, and having it gated by the task number for lower level bounties would correspond with their "policy" of "not forcing players to play low lvl bounties". Im hoping ideas like these will get to them and they consider implementing them, because without it, the game mode asks of you too much of your time for it to be worthwhile for most (adult) players, which is shame.
That's definitely suspicious, the only way that I know for a P&Z/Bandle City deck to find a single combat is either with The University of Piltover or by cloning it from your hand with Curious Shellfolk.
Yeah, apparently you first roll a mercenary and only after that the algo checks, if you already have it or not, if not, you get merc, if yes, you get portrait or coins, if you have all portraits.
Very shitty design, but thats how it is.
Pre-order guys have it even worse, since you practically own a skin for merc, not the merc itself, so you can still unpack Diablo/LK/Sylvanas, even if you can already play them thanks to owning their skin. Shitty design times two.
That's definitely suspicious, the only way that I know for a P&Z/Bandle City deck to find a single combat is either with The University of Piltover or by cloning it from your hand with Curious Shellfolk.
"Once again, we would like to take the time and personally thank the Outofcards forums, for letting us post our tournament test run announcements on their site. We believe we got something beautiful going on and as such it deserves to be promoted and get to be known to all Hearthstone enthusiasts, so thank you!"
What happened?
"Unfortunately all Barracks are full of Warriors that in the next hours will compete with each other for the title of the best Warrior of Europe! The good news is that starting from next Sunday, we will have extra lobbies in order to host more participants to our tournament test runs. Just make sure you get there early so you can grab a spot that suits your time frame the best! (Athens Greece time)
BARRACK A (closed 4/4) 12:00
BARRACK B (closed 4/4) 16:00
BARRACK C (closed 4/4) 20:00
BARRACK D (closed 4/4) 23:00"
So who's the best Shaman amongst Shamans in Europe?
"The Final had to be postponed from Saturday to Monday, so we still have no Shaman Class Master! Finalists are Wels#21606 (Czech) and Zoltan#2312 (Ukraine). We will of course make sure to announce the winner!"
Do I have to pay in order to participate?
"Nope! It's still 100% free! We even pay you a symbolic amount of... euros due to the test runs we're conducting on our future Championship!"
Is it easy to register?
"It's really simple!
Create an account on 121gameon that hosts the test runs, or simply link your Facebook account with it! (one click)
Choose Hearthstone and link your battlenet account with your 121gameon account
Go to Hearthstone tournaments and join a Druids grove of your time frame choosing, since the Warrior Barracks are currently full!
You're ready!"
What if I do something wrong while in the tournament?
"It doesn't matter! All we would like from you is your feed back on your experience in the tournament. What was it you liked? What led you not to participate in it eventually? We are looking to build a relationship with you and we will make sure to remember your Hearthstone battle tag to honor you properly when we officially launch the Hearthstone Class Master Championship! Please feel free to leave a comment here on this thread and help us build a championship worth living"
So, when is the next class showdown taking place?
"The Hearthstone Class Master tournament test runs take place every Sunday, except Finals that are set to fit the day and time frame of the finalists. We now getting ready for the Druid Showdown next Sunday. There will be an official announcement in the days to follow so you can register then or for any of the other class tournaments that will follow!
I just have encountered a game that seemed a little suspicous.
My opponent who played a Bandle City P&Z deck surprised me with a Single Combat and I have no idea how that ended up in his hand.
He was playing a create card archetype but none of the cards he used allows him to fetch cards outside of his region, also he didn't have nab or anything.
I checked the event log and all the cards he played there is no explanation.
So do you have any idea how he got access to a 2 mana demacia spell in this region combination?
There's no dupe protection in mercs. Basically you have a chance to get screwed with a skin each time you open one, despite having missing a few mercs of that rarity. Happened to me too many times. Rolled a legendary - which then turns out to be a skin. A very sad day indeed.
Dang, I wish you'd been on the initial design team for Mercenaries. I like your additions to the random events, and your approach to the "grinding overleveled bounties" problem.
I agree with you that Boons and Spirit Healer should be included in Random Events, and that those spots on the map should become Random Events. The only thing that I was thinking of to be different was that when you land on a mystery tile, it could give you a choice between multiple outcomes, and you get more choices the deeper you get in a map, and one option will always be a Boon (with the class chosen at random). So, if you land on a mystery tile within four steps from the start it gives you two choices: a random boon, then one of Stranger, Healer, Potato, or Sabotage. Then later tiles give you a choice from a Boon, then two of Stranger, Healer, Potato, Sabotage, or Portal.
That way, you technically aren't forced into anything (you always have a choice), and early mystery squares (like those on lower bounties like Air Elemental) are less likely to give Mysterious Stranger than later mystery squares. Obviously, it isn't likely my version can be implemented because it would require too much of an overhaul of the entire system, but in my opinion it just makes more sense to have mystery squares give players a choice.
So, Mysterious Stranger on Air Elemental was gutted. While it is sad, and while you can argue about the priorities Blizzard have (let's face it, we all know what they are, Bobby "Goblinlord" Kotick needs a new 150M$ bonus check), it doesn't change the fact the Random Event Tile (RET for short) is still very shallow in terms of gameplay. Getting one of 4 options (Potato, Portal, Sabotage and Stranger) is boring and feels cheap. So what can we do about it? Here's my suggestions:
Remove Stranger altogether (I have a different approach for task collecting);
Add a lot of events (both good and bad), allowing for more variety of gameplay throughout the map and, more importantly, allowing for more than one RET on the map.
So, what are the events I'm suggesting?
Keep the Hot Potato. It's a genuinely interesting gimmick, it only falls into sore eyes because we want the Stranger;
Keep the Portal, but add the option to walk into it or not;
Keep the Sabotage, even if it's boring and has almost no gameplay impact [it remains mostly as a placeholder for more interesting detrimental effects, with a smaller chance than other events];
Boons become RETs. You won't know where they are on the map anymore;
Spirit Healer can be found on RETs;
AMBUSH!!! -> You face a team of 6 Mercs all at once who were payed to stop you on your tracks. But it turns out, those mercs were payed partly in advance, and they were payed with up to 25 coins for a random epic/legendary merc (rarity and number of coins depending on the bounty you're in);
Bananas! -> King Mukla passed by here and forgot some bananas. Your team picks them up and eats them, granting a +X/+X buff (again, depending on the bounty);
Sidequest! -> Send one of your mercs alone on a sidequest, removing him temporarily from your team. He promises he'll come back to you before the final boss and he returns with a special treasure (like the ones you gain when you face elite battles), or he finds a new task for him (if you didn't finish all his tasks. If you did, he returns with a couple of merc coins, with a higher chance of those coins being for him) [both the task and the amount of coins he finds also depend on the bounty and you find less coins than the AMBUSH!!! event];
Mud Pit! -> Oh great, now you're all muddy. And look at the dirt on our treasures! We have to clean them up. You won't be able to use your treasures next battle;
Bob! -> "Hey there, friend, glad to see you. Here's a treasure to make sure your travels are safe". You gain a random treasure for a random merc (you don't even choose 1 of 3);
Wrong turn! -> You can only find this in the middle of the map. It changes your pathing, nothing too special [it's also mostly a placeholder, low chance to get it on the event pool].
These are just some ideas, there could easily be more of them, both beneficial and detrimental. These ideas also represent pathings with more than just 1 RET (for example, I could easily see bounties from Heroic Blackrock Mountain with 5 RETs, especially when you consider that Boons would stop showing up as Boons themselves [some tiles would still be Spirit Healers, you just also have a chance of finding them in a RET]).
Now, regarding the Mysterious Stranger, my answer is actually simple. You ALWAYS find one after completing a bounty. However, to avoid abusing early level bounties, the level of your task depends on your bounty.
Barrens -> Up to Task 2 (the first 3 bounties), Task 3 (the next 3 bounties), Task 4 (the last 3 bounties);
Barrens Heroic -> Up to Task 3 (the first 3 bounties), Task 4 (the next 3 bounties), Task 5 (the last 3 bounties);
Felwood -> Up to Task 8 (the first 3 bounties), Task 9 (the last 3 bounties);
Felwood Heroic -> Up to Task 9 (the first 3 bounties), Task 10 (the last 3 bounties);
Winterspring -> Up to Task 14 (the first 3 bounties), Task 15 (the last 3 bounties);
Winterspring Heroic -> Up to Task 15 (the first 3 bounties), Task 16 (the last 3 bounties);
Blackrock Mountain -> Up to Task 17 (the first 3 bounties), Task 18 (the last 3 bounties);
Blackrock Mountain Heroic -> Up to Task 18 (all bounties).
These are my suggestions for events to spice up bounty runs. What do you guys think of them? Guaranteeing Mysterious Stranger as an extra reward severely diminishes frustration with grinding and the increased amount of events makes each bounty more unique and engaging. EDIT: Also, throw in more ideas if you have them, maybe we could actually see some of them in-game.
PS: Turns out it's hard to think of detrimental effects without simply gutting your team. I feel only Mud Pit! really worked as a one and done detrimental effect (Sabotage and Wrong Turn! feel very meh), with the more extreme ones (AMBUSH!!! putting you in a 6vs3 fight and Sidequest! temporarily disabling a merc [maybe you can choose which one, maybe not]) compensating the detrimental effect with a reward. I feel that is a way detrimental effects can be more engaging.
Mercenaries (only talking about pve) was fun for like 5 hrs. Until than it gets dull and repetetiv grind. Its like a hearthstone-esque minigame for pre-school teens without any skill required. The roguelite-modes in the earlier expansions were much better in every aspect. I hope that dev ressources will used better soon...
Today I broke and purchased the Mercenaries Welcome Bundle. One pack contained an alternate portrait for Brightwing (who I already had) instead of one of the many epic Mercs I do not have. WTF? Aren't you only supposed to get alternate portraits if you already own all the Mercs of that specific rarity? I'm feeling pretty cheesed off here.
Well mistake sounds like an overstatement as it was about time they gave us the sauce ^^
Puns aside, I'm glad to see we are provided with such insight. One could always assumed that there is more happening behind the curtain than was revealed and on display, but assumptions can be mislead, uninformed and slightly conspirationist at times. Getting a full overview of not only the content, but also the many people involved, timeline and process it went through allows the community to get a fair opinion, for which I am very grateful.
I'll spare us all the obvious - if it is publicly accessible, right there under our nose, it is public - and simply emote : "Mistakes were made". Datamining is a public service to the community that can also serve the developer. If Blizz doesn't like it, when not communicating or engaging with the offer presented to them, they failed at providing a viable alternative.
As to if Flux's an idiot, I'll let everyone be their own judge of the situation. I think this kind-hearted games enthusiast is maybe too loyal for his own good, hence the conflicting aspect of this saga. Holding off on the info just goes to show how he gave the game's dev team a fair chance to orchestrate the reveal - I would have also assumed that they had a plan ... - and this meta-feedback/goodies showcase article on the whole fiasco is proof of this dedication and commitment to the community.
This honest, transparent and insightful communication is, in a nutshell, the reason(s) why OoC is my go-to for any HS related content. Hat's off to Flux and the whole OoC team
"Intention of the change was to stop players from feeling like they have to farm the same low-level content over and over again to play optimally."
I find this quote interesting because, in my experience, a lot of the conversation around farming air elemental from those who were grinding it was, "I've got to get this grind in before Blizzard nerfs Mysterious Stranger." Thus it becomes a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy: Blizzard nerfs the thing people felt that they "had" to grind because they wanted to get their grind in before Blizzard nerfed it. If there was no threat of Blizzard nerfing Mysterious Stranger, I think there would have been fewer people feeling like they "had" to grind air elemental to "play optimally." Most people probably would have just "grinded" the specific mercs they wanted, then moved on to the fun parts that they are grinding those mercs for.
(Not to mention that the people who abused the grind are actually being "rewarded" by the nerf: they've already got the grind in, so their teams are stronger than people who didn't abuse air elemental and who can no longer grind as efficiently as they did--which I believe a lot of people [I've seen at least Regis on Twitter] are pointing out)
In my opinion ads in this site work in a non disturbing way. Some banners and a video that aren't that annoying, not like other sites that have pop ups that you end up clicking by mistake or full width page images.
As far as the game, I've been here since Beta and so I've seen it all. I have to agree with you that BG and Mercs give the opportunity to avoid ranked, now with mercs I feel they went a little too far and I feel compelled to complete all daily bounties, and it's a bit too much. I'll eventually drop it to avoid the daily pressure of completing them.
As I see it, not being mistreated and not being treated good are not the same thing and both are bad. I'd say the site deserves a special place with some top streamers and sites, you've been working since the begging and so earned a place that at least deserves respect for all the hard work!
So the article posted on reddit too (and that can be a negative place) and most comments were showing appreciation for you and your team. That does not happen very often and speaks of a respected site!
Again, thanks for all this years of news, opinions, decks and community!
At least Snowclaw is a level 30 bounty, so there is a modicum of actual gameplay there. Against Air Elemental you can switch off your brain to the point where it isn't even a game anymore; it's just a chore.
The way the 'pick the optimal bounty and grind that for everything' method works is clearly running counter to the designers' intent. They did a sensible thing by telling us bounty X will give coins for mercs A, B and C, giving us a focus on where to grind when we want specific things while building in variety over time as we hunt coins for different mercs. That this isn't being used is an obvious 'conceptual bug' in my eyes. As you suggest, that could be resolved by making the coins given when you lose being for the same pool of mercs as in the final chest.
That influences the time scale a bit too. With completely random coins you're spreading resources thin, which slows things down compared to being able to focus on a sub-set of mercs. Not all of which are needed to be a high-level PvP player, of course.
In a much broader picture though, I see a split by 'healthy' gameplay and 'unhealthy' gameplay. Mercs is weird because it is actually really well designed to incentivise both. There is so much in there that lets super-casual players like me relax and enjoy it without feeling any need to maximise everything immediately, all while setting plausible mid-to-long term targets. But at the same time, I have to acknowledge how many people there are who are slaving away, grinding out coins as quickly as they can for... that's where I get stuck. I don't really see what they are doing it for. To me the game is very clear on not needing to max out mercs, let alone all of them, even for PvP. From what I've read I don't think the devs expected people to take the PvP quite as seriously as they do, although they would certainly have been aware of how obsessed people can get with this sort of game.
All of that is why I have largely kept out of discussions. I am really enjoying it as a casual game where the 'grinding' is really just me playing bounties because I want to, and openly admit I don't fully understand the mentality behind the more aggressive grinding performed by others.
Don't get me wrong, I love to see a stranger, but don't take away my potato :P
Random Event Tiles: Suggestions
I like your suggestions a lot! The Mystery tile is definitely an underutilized mechanic in this whole thing, and having more than one, with many different outcomes, would make the bounties so much more interesting.
I also like the guaranteed Mysterious Stranger at the end of each bounty, even when you were able to farm Air Ele and others, it still took a LOT of time, without it, it will take an insurmountable amount of time. Having a guaranteed merc task at the end of a bounty would be so good, and having it gated by the task number for lower level bounties would correspond with their "policy" of "not forcing players to play low lvl bounties". Im hoping ideas like these will get to them and they consider implementing them, because without it, the game mode asks of you too much of your time for it to be worthwhile for most (adult) players, which is shame.
How common is it to find hackers?
Okay now I see that it was Curious Shellfolk that was creating the Single Combat.
I didn't know that Curious Shellfolk also works for pranks.
Getting extra portraits when I'm missing Mercs?
Yeah, apparently you first roll a mercenary and only after that the algo checks, if you already have it or not, if not, you get merc, if yes, you get portrait or coins, if you have all portraits.
Very shitty design, but thats how it is.
Pre-order guys have it even worse, since you practically own a skin for merc, not the merc itself, so you can still unpack Diablo/LK/Sylvanas, even if you can already play them thanks to owning their skin. Shitty design times two.
How common is it to find hackers?
That's definitely suspicious, the only way that I know for a P&Z/Bandle City deck to find a single combat is either with The University of Piltover or by cloning it from your hand with Curious Shellfolk.
What creature is this?
Yes, this is ordinary cancer
Something to enjoy this weekend (Maybe..)
Cool idea, but I don't know how you can describe yourself even with a card)
Anyone here having have played Artifact?
I played, but I like cards better
What do you do on Out of Cards?
in my free time from cards, I lie on the couch, smoke weed and watch various TV series or films
Books
I like Isaac Asimov and his novel Academy, also Stanislav Lem and Charles Bukovsky
Oozefest 2
Why isn't this one called Twoozefest btw? :D
The Hearthstone Class Master Championship (tournament test runs)
TOURNAMENT DAY TODAY 24/10/21! CLOSED!
"Once again, we would like to take the time and personally thank the Outofcards forums, for letting us post our tournament test run announcements on their site. We believe we got something beautiful going on and as such it deserves to be promoted and get to be known to all Hearthstone enthusiasts, so thank you!"
What happened?
"Unfortunately all Barracks are full of Warriors that in the next hours will compete with each other for the title of the best Warrior of Europe! The good news is that starting from next Sunday, we will have extra lobbies in order to host more participants to our tournament test runs. Just make sure you get there early so you can grab a spot that suits your time frame the best! (Athens Greece time)
So who's the best Shaman amongst Shamans in Europe?
"The Final had to be postponed from Saturday to Monday, so we still have no Shaman Class Master! Finalists are Wels#21606 (Czech) and Zoltan#2312 (Ukraine). We will of course make sure to announce the winner!"
Do I have to pay in order to participate?
"Nope! It's still 100% free! We even pay you a symbolic amount of... euros due to the test runs we're conducting on our future Championship!"
Is it easy to register?
"It's really simple!
What if I do something wrong while in the tournament?
"It doesn't matter! All we would like from you is your feed back on your experience in the tournament. What was it you liked? What led you not to participate in it eventually? We are looking to build a relationship with you and we will make sure to remember your Hearthstone battle tag to honor you properly when we officially launch the Hearthstone Class Master Championship! Please feel free to leave a comment here on this thread and help us build a championship worth living"
So, when is the next class showdown taking place?
"The Hearthstone Class Master tournament test runs take place every Sunday, except Finals that are set to fit the day and time frame of the finalists. We now getting ready for the Druid Showdown next Sunday. There will be an official announcement in the days to follow so you can register then or for any of the other class tournaments that will follow!
Thank you for taking the time to read this!"
Oozefest 2
Wow, someone tricked us and now all text is in Comic Sans! oh nooooo 😱🤣
How common is it to find hackers?
I just have encountered a game that seemed a little suspicous.
My opponent who played a Bandle City P&Z deck surprised me with a Single Combat and I have no idea how that ended up in his hand.
He was playing a create card archetype but none of the cards he used allows him to fetch cards outside of his region, also he didn't have nab or anything.
I checked the event log and all the cards he played there is no explanation.
So do you have any idea how he got access to a 2 mana demacia spell in this region combination?
Getting extra portraits when I'm missing Mercs?
Actually I bought the preorder Diablo pack and the first legendary I opened was Diablo. Feels awful.
Getting extra portraits when I'm missing Mercs?
There's no dupe protection in mercs. Basically you have a chance to get screwed with a skin each time you open one, despite having missing a few mercs of that rarity. Happened to me too many times. Rolled a legendary - which then turns out to be a skin. A very sad day indeed.
Random Event Tiles: Suggestions
Dang, I wish you'd been on the initial design team for Mercenaries. I like your additions to the random events, and your approach to the "grinding overleveled bounties" problem.
I agree with you that Boons and Spirit Healer should be included in Random Events, and that those spots on the map should become Random Events. The only thing that I was thinking of to be different was that when you land on a mystery tile, it could give you a choice between multiple outcomes, and you get more choices the deeper you get in a map, and one option will always be a Boon (with the class chosen at random). So, if you land on a mystery tile within four steps from the start it gives you two choices: a random boon, then one of Stranger, Healer, Potato, or Sabotage. Then later tiles give you a choice from a Boon, then two of Stranger, Healer, Potato, Sabotage, or Portal.
That way, you technically aren't forced into anything (you always have a choice), and early mystery squares (like those on lower bounties like Air Elemental) are less likely to give Mysterious Stranger than later mystery squares. Obviously, it isn't likely my version can be implemented because it would require too much of an overhaul of the entire system, but in my opinion it just makes more sense to have mystery squares give players a choice.
Random Event Tiles: Suggestions
So, Mysterious Stranger on Air Elemental was gutted. While it is sad, and while you can argue about the priorities Blizzard have (let's face it, we all know what they are, Bobby "Goblinlord" Kotick needs a new 150M$ bonus check), it doesn't change the fact the Random Event Tile (RET for short) is still very shallow in terms of gameplay. Getting one of 4 options (Potato, Portal, Sabotage and Stranger) is boring and feels cheap. So what can we do about it? Here's my suggestions:
So, what are the events I'm suggesting?
These are just some ideas, there could easily be more of them, both beneficial and detrimental. These ideas also represent pathings with more than just 1 RET (for example, I could easily see bounties from Heroic Blackrock Mountain with 5 RETs, especially when you consider that Boons would stop showing up as Boons themselves [some tiles would still be Spirit Healers, you just also have a chance of finding them in a RET]).
Now, regarding the Mysterious Stranger, my answer is actually simple. You ALWAYS find one after completing a bounty. However, to avoid abusing early level bounties, the level of your task depends on your bounty.
These are my suggestions for events to spice up bounty runs. What do you guys think of them? Guaranteeing Mysterious Stranger as an extra reward severely diminishes frustration with grinding and the increased amount of events makes each bounty more unique and engaging. EDIT: Also, throw in more ideas if you have them, maybe we could actually see some of them in-game.
PS: Turns out it's hard to think of detrimental effects without simply gutting your team. I feel only Mud Pit! really worked as a one and done detrimental effect (Sabotage and Wrong Turn! feel very meh), with the more extreme ones (AMBUSH!!! putting you in a 6vs3 fight and Sidequest! temporarily disabling a merc [maybe you can choose which one, maybe not]) compensating the detrimental effect with a reward. I feel that is a way detrimental effects can be more engaging.
Blizzard is Rebalancing the Mysterious Stranger in Mercenaries, Fixes to Tasks Coming
Mercenaries (only talking about pve) was fun for like 5 hrs. Until than it gets dull and repetetiv grind. Its like a hearthstone-esque minigame for pre-school teens without any skill required. The roguelite-modes in the earlier expansions were much better in every aspect. I hope that dev ressources will used better soon...
Getting extra portraits when I'm missing Mercs?
Unfortunately not. You first roll the mercenary and then something for it.
Getting extra portraits when I'm missing Mercs?
Today I broke and purchased the Mercenaries Welcome Bundle. One pack contained an alternate portrait for Brightwing (who I already had) instead of one of the many epic Mercs I do not have. WTF? Aren't you only supposed to get alternate portraits if you already own all the Mercs of that specific rarity? I'm feeling pretty cheesed off here.
Blizzard Sent Me a Hearthstone Mercenaries Care Package, Let's Talk Public Datamining!
Well mistake sounds like an overstatement as it was about time they gave us the sauce ^^
Puns aside, I'm glad to see we are provided with such insight. One could always assumed that there is more happening behind the curtain than was revealed and on display, but assumptions can be mislead, uninformed and slightly conspirationist at times. Getting a full overview of not only the content, but also the many people involved, timeline and process it went through allows the community to get a fair opinion, for which I am very grateful.
I'll spare us all the obvious - if it is publicly accessible, right there under our nose, it is public - and simply emote : "Mistakes were made". Datamining is a public service to the community that can also serve the developer. If Blizz doesn't like it, when not communicating or engaging with the offer presented to them, they failed at providing a viable alternative.
As to if Flux's an idiot, I'll let everyone be their own judge of the situation. I think this kind-hearted games enthusiast is maybe too loyal for his own good, hence the conflicting aspect of this saga. Holding off on the info just goes to show how he gave the game's dev team a fair chance to orchestrate the reveal - I would have also assumed that they had a plan ... - and this meta-feedback/goodies showcase article on the whole fiasco is proof of this dedication and commitment to the community.
This honest, transparent and insightful communication is, in a nutshell, the reason(s) why OoC is my go-to for any HS related content.
Hat's off to Flux and the whole OoC team
Kaleidosaurs are Going Extinct - A Full Guide to Cloning Galvadon on the Wildest of Wednesdays
I can post the list I’ve been trying out if you like. Would here or your Reddit post be better?
Blizzard is Rebalancing the Mysterious Stranger in Mercenaries, Fixes to Tasks Coming
"Intention of the change was to stop players from feeling like they have to farm the same low-level content over and over again to play optimally."
I find this quote interesting because, in my experience, a lot of the conversation around farming air elemental from those who were grinding it was, "I've got to get this grind in before Blizzard nerfs Mysterious Stranger." Thus it becomes a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy: Blizzard nerfs the thing people felt that they "had" to grind because they wanted to get their grind in before Blizzard nerfed it. If there was no threat of Blizzard nerfing Mysterious Stranger, I think there would have been fewer people feeling like they "had" to grind air elemental to "play optimally." Most people probably would have just "grinded" the specific mercs they wanted, then moved on to the fun parts that they are grinding those mercs for.
(Not to mention that the people who abused the grind are actually being "rewarded" by the nerf: they've already got the grind in, so their teams are stronger than people who didn't abuse air elemental and who can no longer grind as efficiently as they did--which I believe a lot of people [I've seen at least Regis on Twitter] are pointing out)
Blizzard Sent Me a Hearthstone Mercenaries Care Package, Let's Talk Public Datamining!
In my opinion ads in this site work in a non disturbing way. Some banners and a video that aren't that annoying, not like other sites that have pop ups that you end up clicking by mistake or full width page images.
As far as the game, I've been here since Beta and so I've seen it all. I have to agree with you that BG and Mercs give the opportunity to avoid ranked, now with mercs I feel they went a little too far and I feel compelled to complete all daily bounties, and it's a bit too much. I'll eventually drop it to avoid the daily pressure of completing them.
As I see it, not being mistreated and not being treated good are not the same thing and both are bad. I'd say the site deserves a special place with some top streamers and sites, you've been working since the begging and so earned a place that at least deserves respect for all the hard work!
So the article posted on reddit too (and that can be a negative place) and most comments were showing appreciation for you and your team. That does not happen very often and speaks of a respected site!
Again, thanks for all this years of news, opinions, decks and community!
Dean Ayala's Hearthstone Q&A #34 - Balance, Pandaren Ninjas, Mercenaries, Datamining, & More
At least Snowclaw is a level 30 bounty, so there is a modicum of actual gameplay there. Against Air Elemental you can switch off your brain to the point where it isn't even a game anymore; it's just a chore.
The way the 'pick the optimal bounty and grind that for everything' method works is clearly running counter to the designers' intent. They did a sensible thing by telling us bounty X will give coins for mercs A, B and C, giving us a focus on where to grind when we want specific things while building in variety over time as we hunt coins for different mercs. That this isn't being used is an obvious 'conceptual bug' in my eyes. As you suggest, that could be resolved by making the coins given when you lose being for the same pool of mercs as in the final chest.
That influences the time scale a bit too. With completely random coins you're spreading resources thin, which slows things down compared to being able to focus on a sub-set of mercs. Not all of which are needed to be a high-level PvP player, of course.
In a much broader picture though, I see a split by 'healthy' gameplay and 'unhealthy' gameplay. Mercs is weird because it is actually really well designed to incentivise both. There is so much in there that lets super-casual players like me relax and enjoy it without feeling any need to maximise everything immediately, all while setting plausible mid-to-long term targets. But at the same time, I have to acknowledge how many people there are who are slaving away, grinding out coins as quickly as they can for... that's where I get stuck. I don't really see what they are doing it for. To me the game is very clear on not needing to max out mercs, let alone all of them, even for PvP. From what I've read I don't think the devs expected people to take the PvP quite as seriously as they do, although they would certainly have been aware of how obsessed people can get with this sort of game.
All of that is why I have largely kept out of discussions. I am really enjoying it as a casual game where the 'grinding' is really just me playing bounties because I want to, and openly admit I don't fully understand the mentality behind the more aggressive grinding performed by others.
Don't get me wrong, I love to see a stranger, but don't take away my potato :P