While I really do not care about this mode and will probably never invest any time or ressources into it beyond trying it out on Launch I'm somewhat interested in getting Anacondra and all the Beast stuff together and see where that takes me. Whether that is even possible without dumping gold on packs I don't know, but I'll try it anyways
Azalina Soulthief saw play in some hyper aggro decks that wanted an option for late game reload, so I imagine the new Mindrender Illucia will still be viable for that narrow purpose in highly aggressive Shadow Priest decks. Given the low card draw Priest has that might be good, but it's still a shame that the card no longer offers any disruption potential for slower control decks. Combo disruption seems like a great expression of the Control Shadow Priest archetype, so I hope we'll see more (and more focused) attempts at that in the future.
Azalina did not see ANY play outside toggwaggle decks.
And aslo even if did illucia still isnt good and the meta nowdays is far crazier then when azalina was around
Those changes to treasures are really needed so I'm happy to see them. I haven't played much in Duels! (or HS in general) because balance seemed pretty terrible. Getting the treasures noted here was a huge advantage. Builds without them had a massive, uphill battle.
Love the changes to HP Mage. I still love playing Spell Damage builds and HP builds. I think these changes will definitely boost the HP build in the format. Reckless Apprentice is such a powerful card and the combo with Wyrm Bolt can be a great swing turn. I'm excited to try it, especially with several of the most egregious balance issues being addressed with this update.
Also, Sick article Avalon: keep up the good work! ;)
I can't imagine how somebody was able to make 12 wins in such an agressive meta with nine 5+ cost cards and no cards to take control over the board before turn 4. Maybe it was a million-to-one shot.
You can't compare Runeterra numbers to League, MOBA's are way more popular than card games and are always going to bring bigger numbers. It's like expecting a drama to have the same box office numbers of summer blockbuster just because they are produced by the same company.
Stat wise the event peaked at a 44k during the finals with an average of 23k viewers, so not only is the game growing in popularity but it's already surpassed both Magic and Gwent in term of views with only Hearthstone being more popular.
The tournament featured lot's of deck diversity and most matches were pretty close. Like Fenrir said they was lot's of underdog stories going on Yamato Darkness control deck went undefeated in the tournament even beating it's worst match up in Akshan/Sivir. Szychu managed to secure 3 rd place even thought he wasn't playing a single meta deck, the guy was playing a Heimerdinger control deck for God's sake, if that wasn't out of the left field I don't know what is.
I don't have any grand plans. I have barely even looked at the different abilities each character has as I'm keen to go into it 'dark' (or as dark as I can). I'll just do what I do when building a team the first time a I play a new Pokemon game, and use whichever ones look most cool at the time I find them.
In the long run I'd love to be able to run a Valeera + Varian + Broll Bearmantle team, but there's a lot of things in the way of that sadly. Broll doesn't exist yet, Valeera kind of doesn't exist yet *grrrr*, and Varian has a human tribe focus which isn't very useful for a mixed race lineup. Oh well.
Oh, I didn't notice this the first time, but the crafting cost for Legendaries is 500 coins, not 600. That was a typo in the FAQ and has since been fixed.
I bought the Diablo and Lich King bundles: I like them both, I think they could be strong together, and I wanted a solid head-start in Mercenaries for article write-ups and the like.
Based on what I saw in Trump's Mercenaries videos, I think the Starting Party has a solid game-plan: 2/2/2 Role coverage, with battle comps leaning 2/1 in favor of your Role advantage (leaving the two disadvantaged people on the bench). This means my dream starting comp - Lich King/Diablo/Xyrella - isn't really a good idea because the "balanced" approach leaves one of them vulnerable to double damage in basically all situations (which the PvE AI will target, from what I could tell).
With that in mind, here's my go-to Party (assuming I pull them):
TLK and Cairne are Speed-manipulators, which I think could be powerful. They also come with healing and Taunts.
Diablo is a Speed-manipulating Fighter, and can punish enemies who go slower (see a pattern?). Tirion is more defensive, but can neuter Attackers.
Xyrella can also counter Attackers, heal, and nuke enemies after she's healed a bunch. I'm not sold on Anduin, but there are two Humans in the comp already so I might as well consider it. Couldn't think of a second Caster that fits what I want to do. Maybe Uther?
I agree that Zeddy deserves the lion's share of the blame, but Regis and Dexxster both based their videos entirely on his analysis without doing any calculations themselves or considering what information might be missing. To me, that's pretty irresponsible and feels like pandering to the hater-base.
So, basically, you blame the content creators that they done their assumptions just based on the information available and on the communication of Blizzard?
i liked every single one of this stuff(buffs and nerfs and stuff) but im not still sure about Shudderwock hero power half buff cuase a murlock has a lot of battlecry so it will be so much overpowerd
i faced a hero power mage(with my elemental shaman)and in some parts it was really risky i guess it takes some time to people can get the perfect strategy,and these nerfes and buffs are great(idk about pirate buffs).
I’m really excited with Mercenaries and I would like to know peoples opinion.
Which bundle will you buy? Personally I’m will chose Lich King because i feel good protectors are few ( Lich and Cairne). even if I love Diablo.
for the leveling up, I will concentrate on Lich king, Cairne, Xyrella, Millhouse, blinkfox, breathwing, Tirion, Tyrande, Samuro et Diablo/Sylvanas/Illidan if I have the chance to open them.
i m still thinking on which team to build for PVP:
i might start with : Cairne/Tyrion/Xyrella with blinkfox/Millhouse/Lich king on the bench due to there long cool down.
the haters getting shut down bit by bit as new information trickles out.
You vs the internet. Let's see whos gonna win.
Besides, Everyone has their own opinion. Me too. I'm gonna say Blizzard has failed in terms of communications (silence for weeks), and bad promotional showcase (shoving expensive bundles to everyone). You could choose to be offended by what I said, or ignore it completely. I stand with what I said. If anyone agrees, then my opinion has spark a little joy. Maybe spark a bit of convo too.
I came in thinking that the skins would be 20 bucks only to get whipped round the ear to see it as 25 bucks. Kinda sad, because out of the 5, I only wanted maybe 2. Would have spent some cash to get it if it was sold separately, but as it stands I shall be spending none at all.
Because why would I when I can just as easily spend the same amount of cash for 20 packs + likely 2 legendaries.
Hello, all. Never posted before but have found your analysis quite insightful :) . I personally think it's rather interesting that Elune's Grace is itself an Arcane ability. Maybe this could lead to some interesting combos? For example, If you're willing to suffer an intermediary skip you could use it again and I think it would trigger itself twice. This means the next would trigger perhaps four times? If somehow you managed to keep it alive you'd also have a much faster ability to give Milhouse a major boost. Sort of reminds me of battleground in that many mercs are somewhat weaker in the earlier part of the game so could be a gambit worth exploring.
Great breakdown! I'm excited for the mode, but not excited about spending any real money on it if it can be helped. So this breakdown really helps to determine that maybe I'll hold off on any pre-purchase and just go F2P in this mode due to it having what seems to be a fairly generous rewards system (unless I'm misinterpreting something). The part about being able to farm specific coins is something I hadn't heard yet so that especially makes the rewards seem more fair and generous, even if you have to invest the time to get enough.
Maybe I'll buy an occasional bundle down the road if they offer a sweet deal or have some really nice cosmetic item. But due to spending on the main game mode already being a bit higher than I'd prefer, keeping that cash in my pocket for now.
Mercs’ launch: who are you going to level up first?
While I really do not care about this mode and will probably never invest any time or ressources into it beyond trying it out on Launch I'm somewhat interested in getting Anacondra and all the Beast stuff together and see where that takes me. Whether that is even possible without dumping gold on packs I don't know, but I'll try it anyways
Standard and Wild Balance Updates Arrive on Tuesday - Mindrender Illucia No Longer Swaps Decks or Cards, The Demon Seed Banned in Wild
Azalina did not see ANY play outside toggwaggle decks.
And aslo even if did illucia still isnt good and the meta nowdays is far crazier then when azalina was around
The Battlecry Meta is Over! How Will Patch 21.3 Affect Hearthstone Duels?
Those changes to treasures are really needed so I'm happy to see them. I haven't played much in Duels! (or HS in general) because balance seemed pretty terrible. Getting the treasures noted here was a huge advantage. Builds without them had a massive, uphill battle.
Love the changes to HP Mage. I still love playing Spell Damage builds and HP builds. I think these changes will definitely boost the HP build in the format. Reckless Apprentice is such a powerful card and the combo with Wyrm Bolt can be a great swing turn. I'm excited to try it, especially with several of the most egregious balance issues being addressed with this update.
Also, Sick article Avalon: keep up the good work! ;)
Rhino OTK Hunter!
Sorry, I just saw this comment! But glad you're having such great success with the deck! And thanks for checking out the streams and YouTube!
BTW, this deck got even better with the Selective Breeder buff now :)
12-Win Duels Decks to Play Before Next Weeks Balance Patch
0-3 Clown Druid as expected.
I can't imagine how somebody was able to make 12 wins in such an agressive meta with nine 5+ cost cards and no cards to take control over the board before turn 4. Maybe it was a million-to-one shot.
Hearthstone Patch 21.3.0 is Now Live! Card Buffs & Nerfs, Shadowlands Hero Skin Bundle, New Standard & Wild Bundles Coming
Sometimes it doesn't work on public/work wifi for me, also full reinstall might help
How To Make Worlds More Sucessful
You can't compare Runeterra numbers to League, MOBA's are way more popular than card games and are always going to bring bigger numbers. It's like expecting a drama to have the same box office numbers of summer blockbuster just because they are produced by the same company.
Stat wise the event peaked at a 44k during the finals with an average of 23k viewers, so not only is the game growing in popularity but it's already surpassed both Magic and Gwent in term of views with only Hearthstone being more popular.
https://escharts.com/tournaments/lor/legends-runeterra-world-championship-2021
The tournament featured lot's of deck diversity and most matches were pretty close. Like Fenrir said they was lot's of underdog stories going on Yamato Darkness control deck went undefeated in the tournament even beating it's worst match up in Akshan/Sivir. Szychu managed to secure 3 rd place even thought he wasn't playing a single meta deck, the guy was playing a Heimerdinger control deck for God's sake, if that wasn't out of the left field I don't know what is.
Mercs’ launch: who are you going to level up first?
I don't have any grand plans. I have barely even looked at the different abilities each character has as I'm keen to go into it 'dark' (or as dark as I can). I'll just do what I do when building a team the first time a I play a new Pokemon game, and use whichever ones look most cool at the time I find them.
In the long run I'd love to be able to run a Valeera + Varian + Broll Bearmantle team, but there's a lot of things in the way of that sadly. Broll doesn't exist yet, Valeera kind of doesn't exist yet *grrrr*, and Varian has a human tribe focus which isn't very useful for a mixed race lineup. Oh well.
Gotta catch 'em all
Oh, I didn't notice this the first time, but the crafting cost for Legendaries is 500 coins, not 600. That was a typo in the FAQ and has since been fixed.
Mercs’ launch: who are you going to level up first?
I bought the Diablo and Lich King bundles: I like them both, I think they could be strong together, and I wanted a solid head-start in Mercenaries for article write-ups and the like.
Based on what I saw in Trump's Mercenaries videos, I think the Starting Party has a solid game-plan: 2/2/2 Role coverage, with battle comps leaning 2/1 in favor of your Role advantage (leaving the two disadvantaged people on the bench). This means my dream starting comp - Lich King/Diablo/Xyrella - isn't really a good idea because the "balanced" approach leaves one of them vulnerable to double damage in basically all situations (which the PvE AI will target, from what I could tell).
With that in mind, here's my go-to Party (assuming I pull them):
Lich King, Cairne / Diablo, Tirion / Xyrella, Anduin(?)
Trump's f2p early access shreds haters' concerns
So, basically, you blame the content creators that they done their assumptions just based on the information available and on the communication of Blizzard?
Hearthstone Patch 21.3.0 is Now Live! Card Buffs & Nerfs, Shadowlands Hero Skin Bundle, New Standard & Wild Bundles Coming
Hearthstone stuck on downloading files phase, after updating to latest patch on iOS 15, on both iPhone and iPad.
Master Duelist 1.2: From Zero To Hero - Submission Thread
The starting screenshot is most important for proof that the rules in deck building were followed.
Also seems like my result hasn't been added to the leaderboard yet and it's been about 4 days since I posted it now.
The Battlecry Meta is Over! How Will Patch 21.3 Affect Hearthstone Duels?
Sick article Avalon: keep up the good work!
Hearthstone Battlegrounds Gets a Massive Patch Tomorrow - Datamined Leapfrogger Nerfed Confirmed
i liked every single one of this stuff(buffs and nerfs and stuff) but im not still sure about Shudderwock hero power half buff cuase a murlock has a lot of battlecry so it will be so much overpowerd
Our Thoughts on Hearthstone's Stormwind Nerfs, Buffs, Bans, and Redesign Patch Arriving Tuesday
i faced a hero power mage(with my elemental shaman)and in some parts it was really risky i guess it takes some time to people can get the perfect strategy,and these nerfes and buffs are great(idk about pirate buffs).
Tarecgosa Has Been Temporarily Disabled in Hearthstone Battlegrounds Due to Crashes
without this no one will play dragons in bg's
Hearthstone Patch 21.3.0 is Now Live! Card Buffs & Nerfs, Shadowlands Hero Skin Bundle, New Standard & Wild Bundles Coming
This is just really cool
Blademaster Samuro
I was thinking Xyrella to negate retaliation damag
Mercs’ launch: who are you going to level up first?
I’m really excited with Mercenaries and I would like to know peoples opinion.
Which bundle will you buy? Personally I’m will chose Lich King because i feel good protectors are few ( Lich and Cairne). even if I love Diablo.
for the leveling up, I will concentrate on Lich king, Cairne, Xyrella, Millhouse, blinkfox, breathwing, Tirion, Tyrande, Samuro et Diablo/Sylvanas/Illidan if I have the chance to open them.
i m still thinking on which team to build for PVP:
i might start with : Cairne/Tyrion/Xyrella with blinkfox/Millhouse/Lich king on the bench due to there long cool down.
Impatient to know your opinion guys!!!
Our Thoughts on Hearthstone's Stormwind Nerfs, Buffs, Bans, and Redesign Patch Arriving Tuesday
Rather unexpected warrior buffs... will give a try to quest warrior
Got 3640 dust from nerfs, so rather happy with this :)
Trump's f2p early access shreds haters' concerns
You vs the internet. Let's see whos gonna win.
Besides, Everyone has their own opinion. Me too. I'm gonna say Blizzard has failed in terms of communications (silence for weeks), and bad promotional showcase (shoving expensive bundles to everyone). You could choose to be offended by what I said, or ignore it completely. I stand with what I said. If anyone agrees, then my opinion has spark a little joy. Maybe spark a bit of convo too.
If you disagree, well that's up to you too.
Hearthstone Patch 21.3.0 is Now Live! Card Buffs & Nerfs, Shadowlands Hero Skin Bundle, New Standard & Wild Bundles Coming
I came in thinking that the skins would be 20 bucks only to get whipped round the ear to see it as 25 bucks. Kinda sad, because out of the 5, I only wanted maybe 2. Would have spent some cash to get it if it was sold separately, but as it stands I shall be spending none at all.
Because why would I when I can just as easily spend the same amount of cash for 20 packs + likely 2 legendaries.
Tyrande
Hello, all. Never posted before but have found your analysis quite insightful :) . I personally think it's rather interesting that Elune's Grace is itself an Arcane ability. Maybe this could lead to some interesting combos? For example, If you're willing to suffer an intermediary skip you could use it again and I think it would trigger itself twice. This means the next would trigger perhaps four times? If somehow you managed to keep it alive you'd also have a much faster ability to give Milhouse a major boost. Sort of reminds me of battleground in that many mercs are somewhat weaker in the earlier part of the game so could be a gambit worth exploring.
Gotta catch 'em all
Great breakdown! I'm excited for the mode, but not excited about spending any real money on it if it can be helped. So this breakdown really helps to determine that maybe I'll hold off on any pre-purchase and just go F2P in this mode due to it having what seems to be a fairly generous rewards system (unless I'm misinterpreting something). The part about being able to farm specific coins is something I hadn't heard yet so that especially makes the rewards seem more fair and generous, even if you have to invest the time to get enough.
Maybe I'll buy an occasional bundle down the road if they offer a sweet deal or have some really nice cosmetic item. But due to spending on the main game mode already being a bit higher than I'd prefer, keeping that cash in my pocket for now.