The issue with not having these players be able to drop below rank 15 is what do relatively newer players do when they do get to rank 15 or better and still don't have an amazing collection? Do you make it so that players don't drop below 10?
Side note to this part, yes that is exactly how it should work, why should it not? I don't want to play people all month who are just trolling the low ranks before they do their actual climb.
I thought that was the whole point in the rank floors thing coming in in the first place, is it only rank 20 that got this? I thought every 5 levels was a floor. so this exact thing could not happen. Grinding my way up the ladder to what I thought was the next floor and then dropping all the way back down the next month was not a pleasant experience.
You have to take into account that your friend is higher ranked than his collection would normally allow. Because he is more skilled than the average new player with same collection as his.
It's not just veterans lower than 15. It is also your friend higher than 20.
Because your friend is just as skilled as a player with golden portrait.
The difference is in the collection, but that can't be properly measured by Ranks or past Ranks.
It's just part of an incremental game with a collection: it takes time to farm, not just skill to win.
PS: golden portrait or legend cardback is not a good measure for collection owned. In particular in Standard, where everything grows obsolete pretty fast with Rotations.
They never decided what priest should be good at so they just made it moderate at pretty much everything.
If we get an overhaul for priest they should remove all the steal stuff (unfortunately including cabal shadow priest) as they already made that rouges thing and that does make more sense to be fair.
Priests are light or shadow based right? so why should we not represent that in hearthstone, the few shadow cards we have had have been bad to sub par at best (excluding Shadow Words) and they already told us we weren't allowed direct damage because "that isn't priests thing" so that kind of ruins shadow priest a lot but lets not write it off just yet.
Healing, Priests "main" thing, other classes have out shadowed priest at this at times in the past, Paladins and Warlocks come to mind here. This is dumb, priest should be the heal class period. No one ever complained about circle of healing before injured tolvir came out so why is it not that card that's the problem? we have always had blademaster, wild pyro and auchenai for circle and no one ever gave shit. put a 2 drop there and everybody looses their damn minds. The new card that restores 6 to everything friendly is overkill as well.
Resurrects, the second most boring thing about priest except the doomed combo. They went so hard on this that they created a forever problem with the class in wild (and still never made it good in standard) because this deck excuse the pun, will never die. It is thematic for the class sure enough but what they did with it was silly and now no one can escape it. Strip it back to basics and let people do the work rather than abusable cards OR just scrap everything except catrina and make n'zoth replace Velen as the classic legendary who is now the most useless class classic legendary in the whole game.
Buffs, never really been priests thing but we get a few that aren't bad but it certainly isn't our forte. Take IF and DS and give us back velens chosen, I would be so happy with that result.
Dragons, Priest does like dragons and at one point it was one of the most broken decks in the game. A less problematic version of this as a base would be a good "package" for priest to have at minimum but Op operative can stay gone.
So in conclusion we have a jack of lots of trades master of none class but we have a lot of things to choose from to make the class great and balanced. Healing will die down again once quests and tolvir and shit leaves but will remain a core of the class with a mana change to holy nova as well. If we get some dragons in the base set to trigger early/midgame effects, n'zoth to come in and murder velen and make any deathrattle deck solid at end game and a few thing like velens chosen, cabal shadow priest and the 3 drop that reduced drawn cards costs and things like that and it could be the most fun it's ever been
just my opinion of course but people will not like it because this would make priest too good
If this is true, then I feel like it should have been noted somewhere. Otherwise it looks like MrGnome is having a live conversation with Iksar and also has bipolar disorder. Maybe quote who tweeted the white text before or after the quote.
Yeah I thought for sure they would set it so you have to kill the plague lords in one run on heroic. Pretty surprising to me that they didn’t.
probably because it would ridiculously frustrating, since each of the boss phases requires a different type of strategy.
For example you can easily beat the Murloc's first two phases with a minion focussed deck, but the last phase ruins this strategy by just stealing your board and leaving you helpless
I'm more concerned about casual not being casual anymore. I mean, whenever you play, you find strong netdecks all over the place, both in casual and in ranked. Of course, ranked is tough until you have a decent collection, but it's a "competitive" format, so it's as tough as the meta is; but in casual you should be able to play just for fun without losing 80% of your games to tier-1 decks, and that's not possible currently.
Your friend did very well for somebody with a new collection, as you experienced, competition is fierce from rank 19 up, just keep playing and farming gold, try Arena from time to time, and use dust to craft some budget aggro deck; Zoo Warlock is always a good option, the last challenge of reaching Legend with a new account I saw used it. Basic Mage decks are good to start learning the game, but aggro is always the best bet to climb on a budget. You can always use HSreplay to find the best decks you can craft at the lowest cost, if you value results over creativity.
realistically speaking, Leeroy has been a staple for any deck that needs a finisher and dramatically imrpoves the winrate of any deck that uses it.
At best he will eventually be Hall of Famed, but I find that fairly unlikely considering how he has never been that much of an issue despite there being multiple ways to combo him for huge amounts of damage.
Either way it's dust well worth spending, especially if you like playing aggressive decks
It's a good investment, it fits in many decks (mostly aggro, of course), but as suggested, find a deck you'd like to play and craft the cards you need; if Leeroy is one of them, go ahead.
IIRC it was the first legendary I crafted, to use it in Miracle Rogue.
Leeroy is a staple, an evergreen card that will always see play
Not to mention if he ever gets nerfed you can get the refund, or if he gets sent to Hall of Fame you get the card plus the dust! I personally crafted him a long time ago, before you couldn't get duplicate legendaries. So of course that meant I opened him 3 days and a few packs later... To quote Arthas: "A misstep."
I mean....to be completely fair, it's not like the deck is obscenely strong right now. It's quite clearly one of the best around, but far from eclipsing anything else.
Also I'd rather they take a bit more time to actually think about what they're doing instead of just slamming the nerfhammer down for a quick and easy fix (look at the recent nerfs on Priest and Mage, one did pretty much nothing and the other one completely crippled the class...all because they wouldn't consider reworking some base mechanics)
also, what do you mean "refuse to address"? They literally made a post talking about their plans, they just don't want to go "yeah sure, f*ck Divine Spirit, we'll rotate it next week and replace it with Power Word: Fart which gives a minion +1 Health this turn only" when they might just go about it a different way (Hint: possible classic set rework for Priest)
quote from the OP:
"We have some plans to remove DS, but it comes with some other sweeping changes. If we end up doing that (a big maybe) it will probably be around set rotation timeline"
In other words, 'we know people have been complaining about DS/IF and Priest hitting you in the face with a 28/28 because you couldn't kill off a 7-health minion on turn 5.....we MIGHT do something about it (a big might).....in the next set rotation in April, 6 months from now. fuck you guys, give us money."
where did they ask for money? also remember how they always talk like that when talking about nerfs? They never say "we're definitely doing this", they just say "we might change something, but in case we don't, refer back to this"
Off the top of my head the only decks that use Leeroy right now are aggro warrior and aggro rogue.
The latter isn't in the best of spots because of unfavorable matchups against druids and warriors. If you can somehow dodge those you should be good, but if not, your experience will likely be similar to your quest paladin games.
Aggro warrior is in a great spot and one of the best ladder decks. However, it requires quite a few mandatory epic cards, in addition to Leeroy. If you only have 1600 dust I would first look at which deck you want to play. Leeroy can always temporarily be replaced with Reckless Rocketeer or other cards.
I mean....to be completely fair, it's not like the deck is obscenely strong right now. It's quite clearly one of the best around, but far from eclipsing anything else.
Also I'd rather they take a bit more time to actually think about what they're doing instead of just slamming the nerfhammer down for a quick and easy fix (look at the recent nerfs on Priest and Mage, one did pretty much nothing and the other one completely crippled the class...all because they wouldn't consider reworking some base mechanics)
also, what do you mean "refuse to address"? They literally made a post talking about their plans, they just don't want to go "yeah sure, f*ck Divine Spirit, we'll rotate it next week and replace it with Power Word: Fart which gives a minion +1 Health this turn only" when they might just go about it a different way (Hint: possible classic set rework for Priest)
quote from the OP:
"We have some plans to remove DS, but it comes with some other sweeping changes. If we end up doing that (a big maybe) it will probably be around set rotation timeline"
In other words, 'we know people have been complaining about DS/IF and Priest hitting you in the face with a 28/28 because you couldn't kill off a 7-health minion on turn 5.....we MIGHT do something about it (a big might).....in the next set rotation in April, 6 months from now. fuck you guys, give us money."
Divine Spirit is not the problem. Inner Fire is. Hall of fame it, and problem is more or less solved. Topsy Turvy rotates soon, and while it's still here you can only use the minion if you go face (which retains the combo) but can;t keep it alive against other minions. Having a 16/16 on board as opposed to having a 16/4 on the board is miles away.
The problem lies also in the power creep and massive inflation of formerly good cards. The game is pretty old already an millions of players grinded so much value for their collection over the years. Even if they paused for a while many players still overwhelm newbies in the "higher" ranks.
It's very hard for budget players to compete with this. Blizz already made the start easier and more beginner friendly with more card packs at the beginning and the additional lower ranks. Maybe they should do it again so every beginner was able to craft at least one semi competitive deck once reaching the "higher" (<25) ranks.
I do think Quest Paladin is pretty fun it is just really weak, I guess that would be a control deck?
Quest paladin is hard to categorise. It plays like a tempo deck if you have a decent draw but then it transitions into insane lategame value. I suppose you could call it a very proactive control deck.
The issue with not having these players be able to drop below rank 15 is what do relatively newer players do when they do get to rank 15 or better and still don't have an amazing collection? Do you make it so that players don't drop below 10? Whenever you make it so that harder opponents don't drop below a certain rank is that it then makes those now peaceful ranks go by even faster when rank grinding for new players, which results in only a slightly longer time before new(er) players get matched against real opponents again.
The fix is fairly flawed and very much a band-aid solution imo.
If anything I feel a completely separate ranked system for new(er) and/or super casual players, with fewer rewards would be a better idea. A big obstacle to this idea though is how you filter experienced players out without accidentally filtering newer players with moderate collections in with actual opponents.
The biggest issue with the 25 extra ranks is that anyone with half a brain can fly through them. I started roughly a year ago and just playing occasionally, I made it through these ranks in less than two weeks. I hit the meta with little more than the basic collection and little better understanding of the game than when I'd started. One of the best things they can do is remove bonus stars and/or allow you to drop ranks during ranks 50-26. Unless you purposely lose every third game or so, you will climb those ranks right now and emerge little better than when you started.
Vol'jin
Love the art on this card, definitely one of my favorites
Tournament Grounds
The first Ranked Season cardback I ever got
Tombs of Terror - Fun/Strong runs
I'm just gonna leave this here:
Anomaly: summon a minion for the cost of a spell
double Sorcerer's Apprentice, Mana Addict, Cheap Shot
easy infinite damage
Should I craft Leeroy?
Leeroy was my first legendary, never failed me
Icecrown
This one is so cool, wish they would give us a chance to get this again
Ranking System is problemtic
You say that player with no collection and no dedication cannot get into top 25% of players?
Ranking System is problemtic
Side note to this part, yes that is exactly how it should work, why should it not? I don't want to play people all month who are just trolling the low ranks before they do their actual climb.
I thought that was the whole point in the rank floors thing coming in in the first place, is it only rank 20 that got this? I thought every 5 levels was a floor. so this exact thing could not happen. Grinding my way up the ladder to what I thought was the next floor and then dropping all the way back down the next month was not a pleasant experience.
Ranking System is problemtic
You have to take into account that your friend is higher ranked than his collection would normally allow. Because he is more skilled than the average new player with same collection as his.
It's not just veterans lower than 15. It is also your friend higher than 20.
Because your friend is just as skilled as a player with golden portrait.
The difference is in the collection, but that can't be properly measured by Ranks or past Ranks.
It's just part of an incremental game with a collection: it takes time to farm, not just skill to win.
PS: golden portrait or legend cardback is not a good measure for collection owned. In particular in Standard, where everything grows obsolete pretty fast with Rotations.
Priest - Nerf or Overhaul?
They never decided what priest should be good at so they just made it moderate at pretty much everything.
If we get an overhaul for priest they should remove all the steal stuff (unfortunately including cabal shadow priest) as they already made that rouges thing and that does make more sense to be fair.
Priests are light or shadow based right? so why should we not represent that in hearthstone, the few shadow cards we have had have been bad to sub par at best (excluding Shadow Words) and they already told us we weren't allowed direct damage because "that isn't priests thing" so that kind of ruins shadow priest a lot but lets not write it off just yet.
Healing, Priests "main" thing, other classes have out shadowed priest at this at times in the past, Paladins and Warlocks come to mind here. This is dumb, priest should be the heal class period. No one ever complained about circle of healing before injured tolvir came out so why is it not that card that's the problem? we have always had blademaster, wild pyro and auchenai for circle and no one ever gave shit. put a 2 drop there and everybody looses their damn minds. The new card that restores 6 to everything friendly is overkill as well.
Resurrects, the second most boring thing about priest except the doomed combo. They went so hard on this that they created a forever problem with the class in wild (and still never made it good in standard) because this deck excuse the pun, will never die. It is thematic for the class sure enough but what they did with it was silly and now no one can escape it. Strip it back to basics and let people do the work rather than abusable cards OR just scrap everything except catrina and make n'zoth replace Velen as the classic legendary who is now the most useless class classic legendary in the whole game.
Buffs, never really been priests thing but we get a few that aren't bad but it certainly isn't our forte. Take IF and DS and give us back velens chosen, I would be so happy with that result.
Dragons, Priest does like dragons and at one point it was one of the most broken decks in the game. A less problematic version of this as a base would be a good "package" for priest to have at minimum but Op operative can stay gone.
So in conclusion we have a jack of lots of trades master of none class but we have a lot of things to choose from to make the class great and balanced. Healing will die down again once quests and tolvir and shit leaves but will remain a core of the class with a mana change to holy nova as well. If we get some dragons in the base set to trigger early/midgame effects, n'zoth to come in and murder velen and make any deathrattle deck solid at end game and a few thing like velens chosen, cabal shadow priest and the 3 drop that reduced drawn cards costs and things like that and it could be the most fun it's ever been
just my opinion of course but people will not like it because this would make priest too good
Should I craft Leeroy?
Yes, craft him
Iksar: "We have some plans to remove Divine Spirit"
If this is true, then I feel like it should have been noted somewhere. Otherwise it looks like MrGnome is having a live conversation with Iksar and also has bipolar disorder. Maybe quote who tweeted the white text before or after the quote.
Elise Needs more Faith in herself
probably because it would ridiculously frustrating, since each of the boss phases requires a different type of strategy.
For example you can easily beat the Murloc's first two phases with a minion focussed deck, but the last phase ruins this strategy by just stealing your board and leaving you helpless
Ranking System is problemtic
I'm more concerned about casual not being casual anymore. I mean, whenever you play, you find strong netdecks all over the place, both in casual and in ranked. Of course, ranked is tough until you have a decent collection, but it's a "competitive" format, so it's as tough as the meta is; but in casual you should be able to play just for fun without losing 80% of your games to tier-1 decks, and that's not possible currently.
Your friend did very well for somebody with a new collection, as you experienced, competition is fierce from rank 19 up, just keep playing and farming gold, try Arena from time to time, and use dust to craft some budget aggro deck; Zoo Warlock is always a good option, the last challenge of reaching Legend with a new account I saw used it. Basic Mage decks are good to start learning the game, but aggro is always the best bet to climb on a budget. You can always use HSreplay to find the best decks you can craft at the lowest cost, if you value results over creativity.
Should I craft Leeroy?
realistically speaking, Leeroy has been a staple for any deck that needs a finisher and dramatically imrpoves the winrate of any deck that uses it.
At best he will eventually be Hall of Famed, but I find that fairly unlikely considering how he has never been that much of an issue despite there being multiple ways to combo him for huge amounts of damage.
Either way it's dust well worth spending, especially if you like playing aggressive decks
Should I craft Leeroy?
It's a good investment, it fits in many decks (mostly aggro, of course), but as suggested, find a deck you'd like to play and craft the cards you need; if Leeroy is one of them, go ahead.
IIRC it was the first legendary I crafted, to use it in Miracle Rogue.
Should I craft Leeroy?
Not to mention if he ever gets nerfed you can get the refund, or if he gets sent to Hall of Fame you get the card plus the dust! I personally crafted him a long time ago, before you couldn't get duplicate legendaries. So of course that meant I opened him 3 days and a few packs later... To quote Arthas: "A misstep."
Iksar: "We have some plans to remove Divine Spirit"
where did they ask for money? also remember how they always talk like that when talking about nerfs? They never say "we're definitely doing this", they just say "we might change something, but in case we don't, refer back to this"
Should I craft Leeroy?
Craft decks not cards.
Off the top of my head the only decks that use Leeroy right now are aggro warrior and aggro rogue.
The latter isn't in the best of spots because of unfavorable matchups against druids and warriors. If you can somehow dodge those you should be good, but if not, your experience will likely be similar to your quest paladin games.
Aggro warrior is in a great spot and one of the best ladder decks. However, it requires quite a few mandatory epic cards, in addition to Leeroy. If you only have 1600 dust I would first look at which deck you want to play. Leeroy can always temporarily be replaced with Reckless Rocketeer or other cards.
Iksar: "We have some plans to remove Divine Spirit"
quote from the OP:
"We have some plans to remove DS, but it comes with some other sweeping changes. If we end up doing that (a big maybe) it will probably be around set rotation timeline"
In other words, 'we know people have been complaining about DS/IF and Priest hitting you in the face with a 28/28 because you couldn't kill off a 7-health minion on turn 5.....we MIGHT do something about it (a big might).....in the next set rotation in April, 6 months from now. fuck you guys, give us money."
Priest - Nerf or Overhaul?
Divine Spirit is not the problem. Inner Fire is. Hall of fame it, and problem is more or less solved. Topsy Turvy rotates soon, and while it's still here you can only use the minion if you go face (which retains the combo) but can;t keep it alive against other minions. Having a 16/16 on board as opposed to having a 16/4 on the board is miles away.
Ranking System is problemtic
The problem lies also in the power creep and massive inflation of formerly good cards. The game is pretty old already an millions of players grinded so much value for their collection over the years. Even if they paused for a while many players still overwhelm newbies in the "higher" ranks.
It's very hard for budget players to compete with this. Blizz already made the start easier and more beginner friendly with more card packs at the beginning and the additional lower ranks. Maybe they should do it again so every beginner was able to craft at least one semi competitive deck once reaching the "higher" (<25) ranks.
Should I craft Leeroy?
Quest paladin is hard to categorise. It plays like a tempo deck if you have a decent draw but then it transitions into insane lategame value. I suppose you could call it a very proactive control deck.
Ranking System is problemtic
The issue with not having these players be able to drop below rank 15 is what do relatively newer players do when they do get to rank 15 or better and still don't have an amazing collection? Do you make it so that players don't drop below 10? Whenever you make it so that harder opponents don't drop below a certain rank is that it then makes those now peaceful ranks go by even faster when rank grinding for new players, which results in only a slightly longer time before new(er) players get matched against real opponents again.
The fix is fairly flawed and very much a band-aid solution imo.
If anything I feel a completely separate ranked system for new(er) and/or super casual players, with fewer rewards would be a better idea. A big obstacle to this idea though is how you filter experienced players out without accidentally filtering newer players with moderate collections in with actual opponents.
Should I craft Leeroy?
Leeroy is a staple, an evergreen card that will always see play
Ranking System is problemtic
The biggest issue with the 25 extra ranks is that anyone with half a brain can fly through them. I started roughly a year ago and just playing occasionally, I made it through these ranks in less than two weeks. I hit the meta with little more than the basic collection and little better understanding of the game than when I'd started. One of the best things they can do is remove bonus stars and/or allow you to drop ranks during ranks 50-26. Unless you purposely lose every third game or so, you will climb those ranks right now and emerge little better than when you started.