Interesting to see someone running the same deck as me. I know the concept isn't entirely new but I didn't expect to run into another person using the same concept this early in the expansion. I'd love to compare experiences with the decks.
How do you feel about the lackey package? In place of lackeys, I put a few more egg activators (Void Terror, Sanguine Reveler) and Baron Rivendare as well as some buffers (Abusive + Archerus). I'd probably go with Librarian like you instead of the Abusives though as I sometimes find myself trying to dig for the combo. That being said, my hand is rarely large enough for Plot Twist to be useful, yet the majority of my wins come from big egg plays which offsets that.
What's your justification for Plague of Flames? IMO with eggs it sucks to wipe your whole board and there seems to be more useful activators. Is it to counter Darkest Hour warlock swings and Big Priest rezzes? I'd love to know how useful you've found the card to be in your matchups. My preference is using Devilsaur Egg over Scarab for the more useful body since you have very few buffers to make use of the 1/1's, but I could see an argument for them if Plague of Flames ends up being key in most matchups.
I dunno man, while you cannot judge a series by the trailers, they simply do not have the feeling the games did. The feeling of mysterious medieval ghost story...This somehow feels soulless?Cheap? I dunno.
Maybe i've gotten so much into anime that 3d just turn's me off...
Right now is a VERY bad time to be crafting decks if you are really after meta ones and aren't a whale.
Deck prices have skyrocketed because everyone is slamming every legendary and epic they can into a deck and trying it out. They won't work in the long term and eventually most of the decks and their legendaries will get kicked out of the meta. Same in general for stuffing as many Uldun cards as possible. Even if the deck turns out powerful, it needs time to be fine tuned, so it'll shed and add a lot of cards before it's finalized.
As such crafting right now gives you a good chance of getting stuck with decks that get deemed bad later on.
It's also why your token druid deck is working better. It's spent over 6 months being refined (started since at least Rumble). A 6 month old high tier deck is going to wipe the floor with a batch of 2-day old decks probably made by people who don't know how to make a deck.
Lastly, 50-80 packs generally nets you most of the commons and rares, which is the best value as far as open packs is concerned. After that, though, you need the remaining epics and legendaries, and, bluntly, opening packs is NOT a good way to get them: far too rare, far too much of a chance to get the wrong ones.
Instead what you want to do is preserve your dust carefully. Wait until the dust settles.. about 2 weeks or so, and see which decks actually hold out. Then focus on the ones that you only need a few cards to make or uses cards that can be used in other decks you are interested in. THEn you'll have your meta decks.
Right now the people crafing and building are either folks who bought the entire set (about $200. Some people can toss $200 every 4 months without batting an eye) or don't care and are crafting whatever they like even if it messes them up later. The more cautious ones are either using Whizbang decks or spamming Arena while they let the first group sort out the bad from the good.
This is the first time I have experienced an expansion. The cost of decks (I am seeing in HSReplay) have really skyrocketed. I foolishly thought that if I bought the mega bundle I would have a good chance of creating a meta deck or two. I went from being able to create 4 decent decks to zero.
What happened? I need to craft way more than I can actually afford now.
Does this happen every expansion?
I am actually having way more success with my Token Druid than any other decks I create!!
Well. This Tavern Brawl Is great. Thanks Blizzard.
I make a Tempo Bomb/Taunt Warrior and what do I get? 4 Quest/Inner Fire Priests in a row. Fuck off Blizzard and take that fucking Class with you.
Infinite value to a Class that gets infinite value anyway? Sure. Why the fuck not.
That deck is fucking disgusting. Oh, did I mention that they had the exact same cards? The same cards. So. Which Fucknut Streamer do I have to thank for that? Whoever you are can just go do one. You fucking Asshat.
And the one game I did win? My opponent misplays the whole time and still nearly beats me, I had to rely on a top decked Execute to kill a 24/24 he'd casually thrown down with his last 4 cards.
Im looking forward to seeing Witcher, yes. Not sure what to expect, but i will watch it.
I can second recommendation of Westworld. Pretty unique take on a relatively common "robot" theme. I was pleasantly surprised. And there are some major WTF moments as well, great series :)
For more unique takes on sci-fi, make sure to watch Black Mirror if you haven't already. Westworld is more or less a really long episode of Black Mirror. It's an anthology series with WTF endings each episode. They both deal with the underlying theme of future or emerging technologies and their moral implications of their existence.
I've been playing my own version and I find that the Mechano-Egg was not the best. If you're going to do both options, you will need to magnetize more.
1. First, this deck is called an aggro deck but loses tempo with Sense Demons and Lakkari Sacrifice. I am not saying that you drop the quest but I would suggest dropping Sense Demons because it is too slow.
2. Drop Lord Jaraxxus because the card is extremely risky to play. Lord J. is currently a dead card. I love him and he was absolutely my favorite Hearthstone card but Blizzard has murdered the card beyond any redemption. Why? Well, if you are playing against any Highlander/Renolock deck of ANY class type then they will most likely have Zephrys the Great and once you play Lord Jaraxxus they can kill you instantly because Zephrys the Great will produce a Sacrificial Pact.
3. Millhouse Manastorm is a liability card and should not be played in any deck.
While I love the idea of Lakkari Sacrifice the card can be a bit slow however I haven't written it off as a lost cause. I might consider replacing Howlfiend with Reckless Diretroll because this deck doesn't contain a Treachery and Diretroll allows you to control what you discard or another option is to include Faceless Manipulator because of it works really well with your Doomguard and another replacement card suggestion listed below.
I just crafted Plague of Flames and Dinomancers since this deck seemed pretty fun and interesting. Wasn't expecting much, but I decided to give it a shot. Hot damn. This deck is insane! Its on the power level of Naga Giants and Pre-nerf Ungoro Quest Rogue. There is no counterplay aside from Psychic Scream, and the dinomancers ensure that you threaten lethal no matter what. Power overwhelming indeed. Definitely give this a shot as its very cheap in terms of dust and VERY powerful.
edit: I forgot about Devolve, Murloc Plague and Poison Seeds, but regardless its still very powerful.
What's your opinion on [Hearthstone Card (Elemental Invocation) Not Found]? It's always one of the first cards I put in a deck with Mana Cyclone, it's a common so it's in budget, it cycles itself easily with the cyclone and with Dune Sculptor, not to mention it can also be a pseudo, pre-nerf Innervate for Water Elemental in addition to working with the cyclone.
Not a problem currently at least. There are enough quests in circulation right now that there aren’t many decks that can dedicate themselves to an aggro push in the early turns, and once you have the Blades in hand, those higher health Murlocs or Mechs aren’t quite so scary. (That’s the other reason I hold onto the Saps — to prevent mech stacking.)
What I’ve actually found is that because the quest is relatively easy to complete, and because I’ve dropped Blink Fox or the spawn of Pharaoh Cat (Kittens?) on the board to finish, by turn 4-5 *I’m* often the aggressor. It’s kind of what I like about the archetype; you’re control when facing control, but with enough pressure to keep the other guy on his heels.
By the way, it turns out Dragon Shaman with the quest is a bad idea. The first problem is that because the quest is in your opening hand, there is less likely to be a dragon in your early hands, which makes Firetree Witchdoctor and Scaleworm poor plays until you draw a dragon. The second problem is that most of the dragon battlecries don't improve all that much after quest completion.
Yeah MTG goldfish is always a great site for pretty much any format. The issues with having a full vicious syndicate-style application for not only MTGA but also just MTGO and paper MTG are that each has tons of small differences in the meta. The clearest examples are how Nexus of Fate is banned on MTGA despite it being one it is one of the largest payoffs for Simic Ramp, resulting in an imbalance in the meta. Another issue is just that certain cards are more accessible than others just due to how you obtain cards on MTGO and MTGA. A huge example of this is in how in the MTGA beta, they basically gave you all the cards you needed for Mardu Vehicles and as such, that deck saw an incredibly large play rate compared to how much it saw in the other ways of playing the game.
That being said, one of the best ways to learn the meta is through either just playing the game more and trying out things yourself or there are several websites that host their own content that is all very helpful to learn the game. The channel I mostly watch to learn more about the meta of different formats is Channel Fireball, most specifically LSV, Mengucci, and Reid Duke, albeit none of those really cover standard so you might be a bit SoL for learning about standard matchups. Both Channel Fireball and another site, Starcity Games both also upload articles to their respective websites, so maybe that's more what you would be interested in.
All that being said, I also remember the same people behind HS replay trying to create a MTGA replay thing. Not sure how well that has been working since I'm not a fan of using that type of program. There's also this program I found from a quick google search but once again, I don't personally use it so I do not know whether it costs money or anything of the sort.
You really don't need all these legendaries, this is just the highlander list where we have to choose the 30 best hunter cards. You can play normal secret hunter and cut Siamat, Brann, and Zephrys.
I generally agree with your assessment, Clawz, although I think you give Rogue too much credit and Warlock too little.
My big problem with the Rogue quest is the anti-synergy with Spectral Cutlass, but I think that's by design. I too suspect we will start to see aggro decks that channel the spirits of Odd Rogue and pre-nerf Raiding Party to create fast burn decks, but I don't think there every going to breakout like the latter did due to how much the quest slows them down. Getting an extra +2 face damage a turn as soon as T4 is nice, but its not game-breaking--especially in a meta where (admittedly experimental) healing decks are so popular.
Warlock, on the other hand, has a lot of potential. With the current base of cards you're really relying on hitting Arch-Villain Rafaam--but let's face it, control warrior relies on hitting Dr. Boom, and that hasn't slowed it down. It's a big investment, but once you do, you're usually utilizing your new hero power to play 2 mid-sized Legendaries a turn--pretty good! Not to mention: you specifically said you want to analyze these quests with respect to future expansions. This archetype has a lot of potential upside through new cards, and the only significant card up for rotation next year is Dollmaster Dorian, which isn't really core.
EGGO-Mancer (Budget Friendly!)
Interesting to see someone running the same deck as me. I know the concept isn't entirely new but I didn't expect to run into another person using the same concept this early in the expansion. I'd love to compare experiences with the decks.
How do you feel about the lackey package? In place of lackeys, I put a few more egg activators (Void Terror, Sanguine Reveler) and Baron Rivendare as well as some buffers (Abusive + Archerus). I'd probably go with Librarian like you instead of the Abusives though as I sometimes find myself trying to dig for the combo. That being said, my hand is rarely large enough for Plot Twist to be useful, yet the majority of my wins come from big egg plays which offsets that.
What's your justification for Plague of Flames? IMO with eggs it sucks to wipe your whole board and there seems to be more useful activators. Is it to counter Darkest Hour warlock swings and Big Priest rezzes? I'd love to know how useful you've found the card to be in your matchups. My preference is using Devilsaur Egg over Scarab for the more useful body since you have very few buffers to make use of the 1/1's, but I could see an argument for them if Plague of Flames ends up being key in most matchups.
Cost of decks
Hey Dakarian
Thank you sooo much for this reply, that really makes me feel a hell of a lot better. I thought I had just flushed my money down the drain.
What you say makes perfect sense.
Have a glorious weekend.
The Witcher (Netflix)
I dunno man, while you cannot judge a series by the trailers, they simply do not have the feeling the games did. The feeling of mysterious medieval ghost story...This somehow feels soulless?Cheap? I dunno.
Maybe i've gotten so much into anime that 3d just turn's me off...
Cost of decks
Right now is a VERY bad time to be crafting decks if you are really after meta ones and aren't a whale.
Deck prices have skyrocketed because everyone is slamming every legendary and epic they can into a deck and trying it out. They won't work in the long term and eventually most of the decks and their legendaries will get kicked out of the meta. Same in general for stuffing as many Uldun cards as possible. Even if the deck turns out powerful, it needs time to be fine tuned, so it'll shed and add a lot of cards before it's finalized.
As such crafting right now gives you a good chance of getting stuck with decks that get deemed bad later on.
It's also why your token druid deck is working better. It's spent over 6 months being refined (started since at least Rumble). A 6 month old high tier deck is going to wipe the floor with a batch of 2-day old decks probably made by people who don't know how to make a deck.
Lastly, 50-80 packs generally nets you most of the commons and rares, which is the best value as far as open packs is concerned. After that, though, you need the remaining epics and legendaries, and, bluntly, opening packs is NOT a good way to get them: far too rare, far too much of a chance to get the wrong ones.
Instead what you want to do is preserve your dust carefully. Wait until the dust settles.. about 2 weeks or so, and see which decks actually hold out. Then focus on the ones that you only need a few cards to make or uses cards that can be used in other decks you are interested in. THEn you'll have your meta decks.
Right now the people crafing and building are either folks who bought the entire set (about $200. Some people can toss $200 every 4 months without batting an eye) or don't care and are crafting whatever they like even if it messes them up later. The more cautious ones are either using Whizbang decks or spamming Arena while they let the first group sort out the bad from the good.
Cost of decks
Why hello there...
This is the first time I have experienced an expansion. The cost of decks (I am seeing in HSReplay) have really skyrocketed. I foolishly thought that if I bought the mega bundle I would have a good chance of creating a meta deck or two. I went from being able to create 4 decent decks to zero.
What happened? I need to craft way more than I can actually afford now.
Does this happen every expansion?
I am actually having way more success with my Token Druid than any other decks I create!!
Group Therapy! Need to blow off some steam? Mega salty? Here's the place!
Well. This Tavern Brawl Is great. Thanks Blizzard.
I make a Tempo Bomb/Taunt Warrior and what do I get? 4 Quest/Inner Fire Priests in a row. Fuck off Blizzard and take that fucking Class with you.
Infinite value to a Class that gets infinite value anyway? Sure. Why the fuck not.
That deck is fucking disgusting. Oh, did I mention that they had the exact same cards? The same cards. So. Which Fucknut Streamer do I have to thank for that? Whoever you are can just go do one. You fucking Asshat.
And the one game I did win? My opponent misplays the whole time and still nearly beats me, I had to rely on a top decked Execute to kill a 24/24 he'd casually thrown down with his last 4 cards.
4 cards to make a 24/24 Taunt? FUCK OFF!
[GA] At a Bazaar with Tess Greymane
This deck absolutely should've been called "RoRo's Bazaar Adventure."
SoU Wall Priest
I think King Phaoris is one of the weaker cards in the deck. You can put in one of those cards and sub him out.
The Witcher (Netflix)
For more unique takes on sci-fi, make sure to watch Black Mirror if you haven't already. Westworld is more or less a really long episode of Black Mirror. It's an anthology series with WTF endings each episode. They both deal with the underlying theme of future or emerging technologies and their moral implications of their existence.
Mech-Egg Quest
I've been playing my own version and I find that the Mechano-Egg was not the best. If you're going to do both options, you will need to magnetize more.
Aggro: Lakkari Warlock
"I always appreciate suggestions to improve my decks."
Hello SirHerpDerp,
I have a few suggestions for this deck.
1. First, this deck is called an aggro deck but loses tempo with Sense Demons and Lakkari Sacrifice. I am not saying that you drop the quest but I would suggest dropping Sense Demons because it is too slow.
2. Drop Lord Jaraxxus because the card is extremely risky to play. Lord J. is currently a dead card. I love him and he was absolutely my favorite Hearthstone card but Blizzard has murdered the card beyond any redemption. Why? Well, if you are playing against any Highlander/Renolock deck of ANY class type then they will most likely have Zephrys the Great and once you play Lord Jaraxxus they can kill you instantly because Zephrys the Great will produce a Sacrificial Pact.
3. Millhouse Manastorm is a liability card and should not be played in any deck.
If you remove both Sense Demons, Lord Jaraxxus andMillhouse Manastorm you have 4 card slots that need to be filled.
While I love the idea of Lakkari Sacrifice the card can be a bit slow however I haven't written it off as a lost cause. I might consider replacing Howlfiend with Reckless Diretroll because this deck doesn't contain a Treachery and Diretroll allows you to control what you discard or another option is to include Faceless Manipulator because of it works really well with your Doomguard and another replacement card suggestion listed below.
I would recommend cards like x2 Soulwarden, High Priestess Jeklik, and to replace Lord Jaraxxus you could go Bloodreaver Gul'dan because of the Doomguard and perhaps the Faceless Manipulator that may have been included.
I will stop there and I will conclude by saying, Discard Warlock is a fun archetype in the right meta and right now isn't a bad time.
Thank you for producing the great numbers of decks that you make and I don't want to discourage you from the content that you are creating.
Keep making those decks at god speed! ;)
Slight Dropdown issue on Safari
Can confirm this is happening to me on Mac Mojave’s Safari as well.
SoU Wall Priest
King Phaoris seems like it doesn't fit well. It could really dillute your rez pool with some bad RNG. Any experience with it in play?
The Greatest Dinomancers (aka. 5/5 Dreadsteed Warlock)
Poison Seeds actually doesn't counter it since deathrattles trigger before the treants are summoned.
The Greatest Dinomancers (aka. 5/5 Dreadsteed Warlock)
I just crafted Plague of Flames and Dinomancers since this deck seemed pretty fun and interesting. Wasn't expecting much, but I decided to give it a shot. Hot damn. This deck is insane! Its on the power level of Naga Giants and Pre-nerf Ungoro Quest Rogue. There is no counterplay aside from Psychic Scream, and the dinomancers ensure that you threaten lethal no matter what. Power overwhelming indeed. Definitely give this a shot as its very cheap in terms of dust and VERY powerful.
edit: I forgot about Devolve, Murloc Plague and Poison Seeds, but regardless its still very powerful.
Starter Cyclone Mage
What's your opinion on [Hearthstone Card (Elemental Invocation) Not Found]? It's always one of the first cards I put in a deck with Mana Cyclone, it's a common so it's in budget, it cycles itself easily with the cyclone and with Dune Sculptor, not to mention it can also be a pseudo, pre-nerf Innervate for Water Elemental in addition to working with the cyclone.
[GA] At a Bazaar with Tess Greymane
Not a problem currently at least. There are enough quests in circulation right now that there aren’t many decks that can dedicate themselves to an aggro push in the early turns, and once you have the Blades in hand, those higher health Murlocs or Mechs aren’t quite so scary. (That’s the other reason I hold onto the Saps — to prevent mech stacking.)
What I’ve actually found is that because the quest is relatively easy to complete, and because I’ve dropped Blink Fox or the spawn of Pharaoh Cat (Kittens?) on the board to finish, by turn 4-5 *I’m* often the aggressor. It’s kind of what I like about the archetype; you’re control when facing control, but with enough pressure to keep the other guy on his heels.
7 Highkeeper Ra in 1 Turn! 140 Damage!
You evil genius
Cora Leaves Casting Hearthstone, Joins the Final Design Team
Good for her!
Let's talk about the quests.
By the way, it turns out Dragon Shaman with the quest is a bad idea. The first problem is that because the quest is in your opening hand, there is less likely to be a dragon in your early hands, which makes Firetree Witchdoctor and Scaleworm poor plays until you draw a dragon. The second problem is that most of the dragon battlecries don't improve all that much after quest completion.
Uldum Standard Big Spell Mage
Why no Sunreaver Warmage?
SoU Wall Priest
Fun but expensive and not really efficient long-term.
What's the best, well-rounded MTGA fansite?
Yeah MTG goldfish is always a great site for pretty much any format. The issues with having a full vicious syndicate-style application for not only MTGA but also just MTGO and paper MTG are that each has tons of small differences in the meta. The clearest examples are how Nexus of Fate is banned on MTGA despite it being one it is one of the largest payoffs for Simic Ramp, resulting in an imbalance in the meta. Another issue is just that certain cards are more accessible than others just due to how you obtain cards on MTGO and MTGA. A huge example of this is in how in the MTGA beta, they basically gave you all the cards you needed for Mardu Vehicles and as such, that deck saw an incredibly large play rate compared to how much it saw in the other ways of playing the game.
That being said, one of the best ways to learn the meta is through either just playing the game more and trying out things yourself or there are several websites that host their own content that is all very helpful to learn the game. The channel I mostly watch to learn more about the meta of different formats is Channel Fireball, most specifically LSV, Mengucci, and Reid Duke, albeit none of those really cover standard so you might be a bit SoL for learning about standard matchups. Both Channel Fireball and another site, Starcity Games both also upload articles to their respective websites, so maybe that's more what you would be interested in.
All that being said, I also remember the same people behind HS replay trying to create a MTGA replay thing. Not sure how well that has been working since I'm not a fan of using that type of program. There's also this program I found from a quick google search but once again, I don't personally use it so I do not know whether it costs money or anything of the sort.
Hope this helps!
11-Win Secret Highlander Hunter
You really don't need all these legendaries, this is just the highlander list where we have to choose the 30 best hunter cards. You can play normal secret hunter and cut Siamat, Brann, and Zephrys.
Let's talk about the quests.
I generally agree with your assessment, Clawz, although I think you give Rogue too much credit and Warlock too little.
My big problem with the Rogue quest is the anti-synergy with Spectral Cutlass, but I think that's by design. I too suspect we will start to see aggro decks that channel the spirits of Odd Rogue and pre-nerf Raiding Party to create fast burn decks, but I don't think there every going to breakout like the latter did due to how much the quest slows them down. Getting an extra +2 face damage a turn as soon as T4 is nice, but its not game-breaking--especially in a meta where (admittedly experimental) healing decks are so popular.
Warlock, on the other hand, has a lot of potential. With the current base of cards you're really relying on hitting Arch-Villain Rafaam--but let's face it, control warrior relies on hitting Dr. Boom, and that hasn't slowed it down. It's a big investment, but once you do, you're usually utilizing your new hero power to play 2 mid-sized Legendaries a turn--pretty good! Not to mention: you specifically said you want to analyze these quests with respect to future expansions. This archetype has a lot of potential upside through new cards, and the only significant card up for rotation next year is Dollmaster Dorian, which isn't really core.