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An Open Letter to Team 5 from a Wild Player [x-post from /r/wildhearthstone]

First you made a change affecting Naga Sea Witch that was not communicated, and it's tearing up the Wild meta. I personally think the Wild format is much better off without a 10-card neutral package that shits out free 8/8s on turn 5, but at least the format can adapt with a slew of answers from past sets.

But then you nerfed FWA/Innervate/Hex/Warleader instead of moving them to Wild, where those cards are not nearly as oppressive and in fact are quite important in balancing the wild meta game. In particular, these nerfs severely affect the two only top tier aggro decks in the format right now (Pirate Warrior and Aggro Druid). And the long term trend of nerfing much needed answers like BGH, Owl, and now Hex (without making good replacements) is arguably OK for Standard, but will imbalance Wild in the long-run by reducing interactivity/counterplay and making reactive strategies worse.

All I'm saying is that it would be nice if you cared about the Wild format.

There are a handful of reasons why you focus your attention on Standard. I get it. Standard rotates more so it brings in more money. Standard has a lower barrier to entry so it attracts more (and more importantly, newer) players.

But Wild is important too. It's important for the game in the long run, both financially and for maintaining the game's rapport. In my experience playing MtG, most players over time become eternal format players, for a few reasons: They want to spend less money on cards with high depreciation rates. They want to use all their outmoded standard cards. They want to play higher-power games and are comfortable enough with how the game works to handle the crazy shit that happens in eternal formats.

In MtG, eternal players tend to spend less money on sealed product than new and/or standard players, but more money overall (i.e. buying singles). MtG wouldn't survive financially without standard format sealed products, but the game would collapse reputationally without eternal formats because a large swath of players would stop playing, which would mean less referrals from old players to prospective players.

Healthy eternal formats are also important for the retention of players because while Standard has its highs and lows, eternal formats rarely experience major game-breaking changes. This means a large share of the game's playerbase can weather through a bad Standard environment so long as the eternal formats are good.

Wild's still a great format pending the upcoming nerfs, but the changes in the past month indicate more than ever (if it wasn't already clear) that you consider it a dumping ground for outmoded cards. The player base for Hearthstone simply will not survive in the long-run if Wild is a bad format. Old players will simply uninstall the game if they get tired of standard and perceive Wild to be a bad format not worth their time.

We wild players all have differing opinions on what the best solution is. (I'm personally a fan of unnerfing many of the previouslt nerfed cards such as Owl, BGH, Molten Giant, and moving them to the Hall of Fame.) But there's one thing Wild players agree on, and it's that the format isn't being taken seriously right now. But it should be taken seriously, and the long term health of Hearthstone depends on Wild being a good format.

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