Probably stupid question since I didn't watch the reveal but here goes: Is there no economy overlap to traditional HS at all? Like buying Merc coins with HS gold or using HS dust to craft Mercs? That would help a lot with the accessability imho.
It's also worrisome that they said so little about the enemies you'll be facing. Surely the challenges faced are just as important as the heroes used - but we only see bounty contracts, the fighting pit, and a few bosses? Hrm.
The press kit has a 25 minute video that features a whole run, you might be interested in that one.
It sounds like a conspiracy theory, but I had the same thought about Mercenaries when I saw the nerfs. Killing all the Reno decks might alienate a big part of the Wild player base and maybe Blizzard hopes those people will flock to the new game mode instead.
Gameplay is very pokemon-esque. You have 3 mercs, your opponent has the same amount of mercs, you choose attacks and then all the attacks comes out turn after turn, determined by a single stat, which in this case is the number on the tech chosen. And like pokemon, you collect mercs to be utilized as you see fit, which with its own set of stats.
First impression is fine I guess. It isn't flashy; the graphics is predictably (since its likely built on the hearthstone engine) very close to hearthstone's. The game board or field looks very empty, not helped by the fact that the merc icons are very small, which unfortunately makes it look like six ants fighting on a blank piece of paper. I don't understand why they didn't just fill the field with knick-knacks that react with each attack, to both increase the impact of each attacks and having every end game look like a nuclear holocaust. That would look cool, if nothing else.
Im still confused slightly about how the gameplay progresses outside of battle. Looks to me like there's some sort of 'develop your village' kind of gameplay which will require coins, which is earned through gameplay (presumably). You will likely get a basic set of stuff to start with, and if you grind your arse off on this game, you'll receive the familiar end of month chest which will give you more stuff. Outside of that, its all via gameplay...or off your credit card.
Speaking of monetization, which the video skillfully avoids talking about at length. There's three bundles up on offer currently, each costing a great deal of real life cash. Im assuming that this is a pack of mercs to be used immediately on purchase so anyone who swipes his or her credit card gets an early advantage in battle on top of a likely exclusive merc. So all in all, the money will roll out from exclusive mercs, and likely coin purchases. (just a side note: I like how the diablo on offer showcases the classic d2 character, and then the website showcases the d3 character instead.)
Until the game comes out, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. The monetization is annoying but not unexpected, and since its a largely single player game I'm willing to overlook the very, very expensive (50 bucks, and thats one of three pre-orders) offering and say that if the gameplay is good and there's no overt pay-to-win bs with the exclusive mercs then blizz can market those stuff for all I care. Im not spending a cent until Im 100% sure the game is legit fun because if the showcase is anything to go by, it doesn't look all that impressive.
They are certainly taking a big risk in aggressively monetizing the mode right away. Battlegrounds had the negative reactions but what propelled it towards success wasn't just the fact that it was fun to play: it was completely free. That allowed people to jump in immediately and experiment with the heroes, minions and mechanics of the game mode.
Duels definitely left a bad taste in people's mouth initially because of the requirement of having a certain number of legendaries to unlock treasures. I don't know if people still care about that. The monetization was already there but it was a bit more subtle, i'd say.
This new mode, however, is monetized very aggressively and has its own set of cards that must be bought with real money or in game currency. This limits experimentation a lot and that could have a significant impact on its chances of success. I'm not particularly interested in grinding (or paying) another game mode so i'll probably just ignore this one. I already have Slay the Spire, anyway.
The stupid thing is that the HS team WANTS the game to go in this direction, they WANT the game to end by turns 6-7. In fact, the most insulting part of all of this is that they probably consider Quest Warlock to be a CONTRO deck and want to uphold this new standard of “having a win condition”. Remember when a win condition used to just be dropping 2 Rattlegores and hitting your opponent with them? Well good luck getting to turn 9.
Really intent on not making wild playable it seems, the entire format is two slightly different variations on seedlock and the handful of decks that don't immediately fold to it, probably just going to leave the game until they do something about Wild, because Seedlock is getting to be almost as bad as day 1 DH, and it's been like this for almost a full month
Maybe its specifically designed by team5 to wean players off wild so they go back to standard. Curious to know if that's what preventing them from nerfing wild more often.
Handlock is one of the few counters to quest shaman so weakening it too drastically will almost certainly result in shamanstone yet again, not that it isn't everywhere in diamond 5 and above anyway.
Speaking of shamanstone, its actually strange to me how no one is talking about quest shaman and how powerful the deck actually is, both in early game highrolls and late game value. In fact, you can reliably get it done by turn 7. Aggro cant beat it, and control sure as hell cant neither. Even decks that counter it takes it all the way to the end. And yet there's not even a hint of discussion or outrage anywhere.
"Anyone who purchases (or has purchased since Thursday, July 1,2021) a 6-month subscription before October 19, 2021 or have a 6-month subscription with a future renewal date of Monday, August 31, 2021 is eligible for the 6-Month Subscription rewards."
...
"Your Mercenaries packs will not be visible until the Mercenaries game mode goes live on October 12, 2021."
...
"In addition, if you still have game time on December 1, 2021, you will also get an additional:
15 New Expansion Packs
15 Mercenaries Packs
Next Expansion Tavern and Battleground Perks"
Stole the description from Wowhead. This has to be the reason.
If its going to offer up epic cards for all five cards per pack, I'd expect it to be quite expensive or very limited in offering. With the guaranteed in rares and commons, its usually only the epic cards that most people will even care to buy a pack for because unlike legendaries they are substantially easier to get per pack. There's also the fact that most decks can't function well without its epic cards but legendaries are more easily substituted (most times anyway).
If I were to guess, its going to be the same price as a golden pack. And probably still too expensive for all but whales and the occasional porpoise.
I must confess I only understood how it worked after I saw a solution, but for those people who are stuck on the mechanics and don't want a full solution, read on below:
Show Spoiler
You're walking on a map, of which you see a slice along one axis (let's call it east-west). The minions are grid locations you can walk to, immune minions represent locations that cannot be reached from your current position.
The hero power makes you change direction (north/south). You'll continue walking in the new direction until you flip it again using the hero power.
Every time you visit a location, its counter decreases by one. The goal is to make all the counters on the map reach one.
Its nice to know that this particular issue may be resolved. Because its kinda dumb to restrict people from playing whatever classes they like in duels, since its a largely constructed format, at least in the first few games anyway.
I wouldn't be too worried about the variety we will be seeing if everyone can choose what class they want from duels. The fact is that the top end is and will always be composed of the best classes anyway and in casuals most people will just concede turn one to reroll the class dice. Either way, duels is generally less impactful than ranked, so I remain optimistic that people will occasionally play bad classes for fun if nothing else.
I super messed this post up, my apologies! Things have been going a bit too fast and I'm a bit disappointed no one on staff figured out I screwed up and then alerted me to that fact. More care will be taken in the future!
Its so rare to make a mistake this big. I can't even recall the last time it happened.
The article has been updated with accurate information. You are all right,
The mount in WoW is actually a part of a Mercenaries cross-game promotion.
The Hearthstone rewards are a part of a 6-month WoW subscription.
My previous comment still holds true though, this is a great deal for players of WoW and players of Hearthstone. If you only play Hearthstone and want to experience all that content, buying the 6-month subscription makes a ton of sense since you'll be getting a discount.
I highly recommend giving World of Warcraft a shot though - you could even try out Classic instead if you don't want to give Shadowlands (up to level 50) a go (bonus points since Classic is 100% part of your subscription, Shadowlands end-game is not). You might meet some familiar characters in Hearthstone and learn a thing or two about their stories!
One other detail I caught, although I don't know if it was deliberate: the chopsticks stuck vertically in the bowl. Asians will never do that in real life, because it's reminiscent of the incense sticks you plant in a bowl of rice to honour the deceased during a funeral. It's therefore quite fitting to have them in this position on this tribute image.
Are Epic Card Packs Coming to Hearthstone? Datamining Reveals Blizzard's Potential Plans
I'd drop a few bucks down on a pile of those purple packs.
Mercenaries: My First Impressions
Probably stupid question since I didn't watch the reveal but here goes: Is there no economy overlap to traditional HS at all? Like buying Merc coins with HS gold or using HS dust to craft Mercs? That would help a lot with the accessability imho.
Hearthstone's Mercenaries Debut Stream - Everything New We've Learned About the Mode Releasing in October
The press kit has a 25 minute video that features a whole run, you might be interested in that one.
Our Thoughts on Today's Warlock Balance Changes Targeting Stealer of Souls and Flesh Giant
It sounds like a conspiracy theory, but I had the same thought about Mercenaries when I saw the nerfs. Killing all the Reno decks might alienate a big part of the Wild player base and maybe Blizzard hopes those people will flock to the new game mode instead.
Hearthstone's Sarge Enters World of Warcraft as a Rideable Mount - Cross Game Mercenaries Promotion + WoW Subscription Perks Coming
Yeah, I'm happy I read that wrong first time! Got the packs :)
Mercenaries: My First Impressions
Gameplay is very pokemon-esque. You have 3 mercs, your opponent has the same amount of mercs, you choose attacks and then all the attacks comes out turn after turn, determined by a single stat, which in this case is the number on the tech chosen. And like pokemon, you collect mercs to be utilized as you see fit, which with its own set of stats.
First impression is fine I guess. It isn't flashy; the graphics is predictably (since its likely built on the hearthstone engine) very close to hearthstone's. The game board or field looks very empty, not helped by the fact that the merc icons are very small, which unfortunately makes it look like six ants fighting on a blank piece of paper. I don't understand why they didn't just fill the field with knick-knacks that react with each attack, to both increase the impact of each attacks and having every end game look like a nuclear holocaust. That would look cool, if nothing else.
Im still confused slightly about how the gameplay progresses outside of battle. Looks to me like there's some sort of 'develop your village' kind of gameplay which will require coins, which is earned through gameplay (presumably). You will likely get a basic set of stuff to start with, and if you grind your arse off on this game, you'll receive the familiar end of month chest which will give you more stuff. Outside of that, its all via gameplay...or off your credit card.
Speaking of monetization, which the video skillfully avoids talking about at length. There's three bundles up on offer currently, each costing a great deal of real life cash. Im assuming that this is a pack of mercs to be used immediately on purchase so anyone who swipes his or her credit card gets an early advantage in battle on top of a likely exclusive merc. So all in all, the money will roll out from exclusive mercs, and likely coin purchases. (just a side note: I like how the diablo on offer showcases the classic d2 character, and then the website showcases the d3 character instead.)
Until the game comes out, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. The monetization is annoying but not unexpected, and since its a largely single player game I'm willing to overlook the very, very expensive (50 bucks, and thats one of three pre-orders) offering and say that if the gameplay is good and there's no overt pay-to-win bs with the exclusive mercs then blizz can market those stuff for all I care. Im not spending a cent until Im 100% sure the game is legit fun because if the showcase is anything to go by, it doesn't look all that impressive.
Mercenaries: My First Impressions
They are certainly taking a big risk in aggressively monetizing the mode right away. Battlegrounds had the negative reactions but what propelled it towards success wasn't just the fact that it was fun to play: it was completely free. That allowed people to jump in immediately and experiment with the heroes, minions and mechanics of the game mode.
Duels definitely left a bad taste in people's mouth initially because of the requirement of having a certain number of legendaries to unlock treasures. I don't know if people still care about that. The monetization was already there but it was a bit more subtle, i'd say.
This new mode, however, is monetized very aggressively and has its own set of cards that must be bought with real money or in game currency. This limits experimentation a lot and that could have a significant impact on its chances of success. I'm not particularly interested in grinding (or paying) another game mode so i'll probably just ignore this one. I already have Slay the Spire, anyway.
Our Thoughts on Today's Warlock Balance Changes Targeting Stealer of Souls and Flesh Giant
The stupid thing is that the HS team WANTS the game to go in this direction, they WANT the game to end by turns 6-7. In fact, the most insulting part of all of this is that they probably consider Quest Warlock to be a CONTRO deck and want to uphold this new standard of “having a win condition”. Remember when a win condition used to just be dropping 2 Rattlegores and hitting your opponent with them? Well good luck getting to turn 9.
Our Thoughts on Today's Warlock Balance Changes Targeting Stealer of Souls and Flesh Giant
Really intent on not making wild playable it seems, the entire format is two slightly different variations on seedlock and the handful of decks that don't immediately fold to it, probably just going to leave the game until they do something about Wild, because Seedlock is getting to be almost as bad as day 1 DH, and it's been like this for almost a full month
Hearthstone's Sarge Enters World of Warcraft as a Rideable Mount - Cross Game Mercenaries Promotion + WoW Subscription Perks Coming
If you have it set to auto-renew you definitely will. I don't think you will with auto-renew off, but I could be wrong.
Our Thoughts on Today's Warlock Balance Changes Targeting Stealer of Souls and Flesh Giant
Maybe its specifically designed by team5 to wean players off wild so they go back to standard. Curious to know if that's what preventing them from nerfing wild more often.
Are Epic Card Packs Coming to Hearthstone? Datamining Reveals Blizzard's Potential Plans
My guess is that an Epic pack will be like a normal pack but guarantee at least one card being an Epic rarity.
Our Thoughts on Today's Warlock Balance Changes Targeting Stealer of Souls and Flesh Giant
Handlock is one of the few counters to quest shaman so weakening it too drastically will almost certainly result in shamanstone yet again, not that it isn't everywhere in diamond 5 and above anyway.
Speaking of shamanstone, its actually strange to me how no one is talking about quest shaman and how powerful the deck actually is, both in early game highrolls and late game value. In fact, you can reliably get it done by turn 7. Aggro cant beat it, and control sure as hell cant neither. Even decks that counter it takes it all the way to the end. And yet there's not even a hint of discussion or outrage anywhere.
Random 15 packs?
You're already ahead of the competition with Mercenaries, and you didn't spend anything additional ;D
Random 15 packs?
"Anyone who purchases (or has purchased since Thursday, July 1,2021) a 6-month subscription before October 19, 2021 or have a 6-month subscription with a future renewal date of Monday, August 31, 2021 is eligible for the 6-Month Subscription rewards."
...
"Your Mercenaries packs will not be visible until the Mercenaries game mode goes live on October 12, 2021."
...
"In addition, if you still have game time on December 1, 2021, you will also get an additional:
Stole the description from Wowhead. This has to be the reason.
Are Epic Card Packs Coming to Hearthstone? Datamining Reveals Blizzard's Potential Plans
If its going to offer up epic cards for all five cards per pack, I'd expect it to be quite expensive or very limited in offering. With the guaranteed in rares and commons, its usually only the epic cards that most people will even care to buy a pack for because unlike legendaries they are substantially easier to get per pack. There's also the fact that most decks can't function well without its epic cards but legendaries are more easily substituted (most times anyway).
If I were to guess, its going to be the same price as a golden pack. And probably still too expensive for all but whales and the occasional porpoise.
A New Hearthstone Puzzle Card Back "Gift of Elune" Has Been Added - Solve the Mysteries of Stormwind
I must confess I only understood how it worked after I saw a solution, but for those people who are stuck on the mechanics and don't want a full solution, read on below:
The hero power makes you change direction (north/south). You'll continue walking in the new direction until you flip it again using the hero power.
Every time you visit a location, its counter decreases by one. The goal is to make all the counters on the map reach one.
Datamining in Hearthstone Duels Showcases a New Season of Wizard Duels With 10 Heroes Drafted Instead of 4
Its nice to know that this particular issue may be resolved. Because its kinda dumb to restrict people from playing whatever classes they like in duels, since its a largely constructed format, at least in the first few games anyway.
I wouldn't be too worried about the variety we will be seeing if everyone can choose what class they want from duels. The fact is that the top end is and will always be composed of the best classes anyway and in casuals most people will just concede turn one to reroll the class dice. Either way, duels is generally less impactful than ranked, so I remain optimistic that people will occasionally play bad classes for fun if nothing else.
Hearthstone's Main Menu Gets an Overhaul - Play is Now Hearthstone, Battlegrounds Out of Beta, Mercenaries Joins the Fun
holy crap, you can actually play the hearthstone mode in hearthstone
wowzers
Our Thoughts on Today's Warlock Balance Changes Targeting Stealer of Souls and Flesh Giant
another one of the category "this wont change anything"
kudos to the balance team for not doing their job
Hearthstone's Sarge Enters World of Warcraft as a Rideable Mount - Cross Game Mercenaries Promotion + WoW Subscription Perks Coming
I get the 6 month 3 weeks ago, i'll get the packs?
Hearthstone's Sarge Enters World of Warcraft as a Rideable Mount - Cross Game Mercenaries Promotion + WoW Subscription Perks Coming
Tons to do in World of Warcraft if you don't want to raid!
WoW will always be a gear game though at the end of the day. Nothing else really "matters", much like all MMOs.
Hearthstone's Sarge Enters World of Warcraft as a Rideable Mount - Cross Game Mercenaries Promotion + WoW Subscription Perks Coming
I super messed this post up, my apologies! Things have been going a bit too fast and I'm a bit disappointed no one on staff figured out I screwed up and then alerted me to that fact. More care will be taken in the future!
Its so rare to make a mistake this big. I can't even recall the last time it happened.
The article has been updated with accurate information. You are all right,
My previous comment still holds true though, this is a great deal for players of WoW and players of Hearthstone. If you only play Hearthstone and want to experience all that content, buying the 6-month subscription makes a ton of sense since you'll be getting a discount.
I highly recommend giving World of Warcraft a shot though - you could even try out Classic instead if you don't want to give Shadowlands (up to level 50) a go (bonus points since Classic is 100% part of your subscription, Shadowlands end-game is not). You might meet some familiar characters in Hearthstone and learn a thing or two about their stories!
Hearthstone's Newest Battlegrounds Hero, Master Nguyen, is a Tribute to the Late Dan Nguyen of the Hearthstone Team
One other detail I caught, although I don't know if it was deliberate: the chopsticks stuck vertically in the bowl. Asians will never do that in real life, because it's reminiscent of the incense sticks you plant in a bowl of rice to honour the deceased during a funeral. It's therefore quite fitting to have them in this position on this tribute image.
Datamining in Hearthstone Duels Showcases a New Season of Wizard Duels With 10 Heroes Drafted Instead of 4
Here's a thought: the eye action GIFs are great.