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Maurice | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Wild

Are there any viable counters against Reno-Priest?

1/3 of the hole ladder is Priest atm and I see no viable counter against it - but Priest has counters against everything. I am allready playing an ultra-aggressive deck in the hope to rush the Pries…

6

ShadowsOfSense | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Fan Creations

Trick And Treat - Card Design Competition Discussion Thread

Competition Theme: Trick And Treat For this competition, we've decided to give you a treat - you get to choose any of these three options for your card to qualify!Spooky Noi…

50

ChaosShadow | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

ramp druid 8 mana on turn 4

9

NebuchadnezzarHS | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Draconic Ragers achievement does not trigger

Visited all the card pages for Descent of Dragons' worst-rated cards by the community, but the Draconic Ragers achievement does not trigger unfortunately.

5

clawz161 | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

How it feels to play libram paladin

14

NebuchadnezzarHS | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Avatar Themes CSS styles not okay for long usernames

Hi, I just wanted to point out that the CSS style used for the Avatar Theme is not okay when the username is long. Currently, it is set to "left: -2px;" but it should be "left: 50%; margin-left: -92…

3

NebuchadnezzarHS | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Magic the Gathering Cards search filter not working

It seems like the 'add filter' option does not work?

2

Forgottenslayer | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Scorched Earth.

Can anyone see a reason to not run three of these in their deck? Landmark removal or a wounded  unit killer as a fast spell. It’s an absolutely fantastic card I guess Nox was hurting. I do…

2

AngryShuckie | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

RNG vs skill: a false competition

Hearthstone often called an RNG fiesta, and the prevailing wisdom is that it takes less skill to play than other TCGs/CCGs because of it. I’m not here to argue whether HS, MtG, LoR etc. is the …

Hearthstone often called an RNG fiesta, and the prevailing wisdom is that it takes less skill to play than other TCGs/CCGs because of it. I’m not here to argue whether HS, MtG, LoR etc. is the more skilful since as far as I know the concept of ‘skill’ cannot be quantified, so we’d be stuck using opinions and gut feelings which get us nowhere.

No, the purpose of this thread is to make the case that RNG, in HS as well as other (card) games, should not be regarded with the surface-level analysis that it usually receives. Namely: “you have less control of the outcome, therefore that outcome requires less skill”. To escape the ever-present debate of whether RNG in deck order counts, I'll focus more on randomness outside of card games, which helps shed a different light on things.

Chess and ‘the bamboozle play’

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I start with chess: a board game where 1 player goes up against another in a fair, zero-RNG battle of wits and planning. Well, no RNG except for who gets to go first anyway. In a sense we can view chess like a card game mirror match where both players’ decks start on the board. At every point in the game you know exactly what you are up against and you know exactly how every piece is going to behave.

In such a deterministic environment you can plan several turns ahead, working out what you want to do, how you want to do it, and devising counter-plays for your opponent’s inevitable counter-plays. It’s all very skilful… if you are a good player and that description applies to you. I am not a good chess player: I know the rules, but I’m not interested enough in the game to invest the time and effort to make chess a skill of mine. Because of this, I know that if I play against a good player, my odds of winning are very small (which frankly acts as a deterrent against me wanting to play the game, and is certainly a good argument for why HS has so much RNG: to let bad players still enjoy it. But I digress).

However, while I know I’m bad at playing chess conventionally, I also know I can help even the odds by reducing my opponent’s ability too. Which brings me to what I call ‘the bamboozle play’. The idea is simple: do something the opponent won’t expect yet doesn’t do you any harm either. Often this involves moving a piece that still leaves all your key pieces protected but has no influence on the current points of tension on the board. I basically pick a piece at random and as long as it can do something safe I’m happy to move it.

The upshot of the bamboozle play is that it leaves the opponent unsure what I’m going to do, thereby negating a lot of their advantage in being able to predict future turns. The bamboozle play itself is not especially skilful; yes, I must know the rules well enough to know what is safe to do, but it doesn’t go a whole lot deeper than that. However, the very idea of the bamboozle play is quite skilful since it is designed specifically to counter my main disadvantage.

Thus, by feeding a bit of randomness into how I play, I am a more skilful player than I would be without it. Of course I could choose to be even more skilful by actually learning to play chess properly, but I have better things to do than that.

The genius of Monte Carlo simulations

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Moving away from games, let’s talk about using RNG in a serious setting: to run scientific simulations and therefore better understand the world around us. The simulations in question, named after the casinos in the city of Monte Carlo (so it’s got some connection to card games through that at least), choose to ignore the known equations provided by mathematics and/or physics in favour of generating a heck of a lot of random numbers instead.

Perhaps the simplest example is calculating the value of the mathematical constant pi (i.e. the pi in the area of a circle = pi * r^2). The way to do this is to snugly put a circle inside a square so the circle’s diameter is equal to the square’s width, 2r = w, and then fire randomly generated vectors at it, each landing at a position (x,y) inside the square. Do this a lot of times, then at the end count what fraction of those vectors landed inside the circle. That will equal the ratio of circle area to square area (pi*(r/w)^2 = pi/4), so multiply it by 4 et voila! You have calculated pi!

You can do much more sophisticated things than this, and I personally have a lot of experience in running Monte Carlo simulations of polymers or swimming bacteria which need to interact in complex ways through the fluid they are in. Each random number does something that has no physical meaning, but real physics can be made to come out if you generate enough of them in the right way.

The point is that RNG can be extremely clever at a statistical level, but that only becomes apparent after a long time. If you focus on individual random numbers, then it looks uncontrolled and you might mistake the end result as an accident of chance when it is in fact just as likely to happen as if you used deterministic equations to get there.

Relating these to Hearthstone

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Now to bring things back to RNG in HS.

The bamboozle play can be most easily related to random card generation, letting you do something the opponent won’t expect and plan for. That could be entirely accidental, which is often the case with casting a random spell or summoning a random minion, in which case it is probably not skill or wisdom that led you to do it. Even here though there are examples where it does involve skill, e.g. recognising your only path to victory lies in summoning a taunt.

The discover keyword provides the cleanest demonstration of this ‘bamboozle skill’. There are at least 3 tiers of skill here: 1) you just pick randomly; 2) you pick the card that best suits your deck; 3) you pick the card that best suits your deck while also acting as a counter to the opponent. There’s a lot of knowledge and understanding that goes into making the right choice.

Ultimately, I think the middle ground random card generation (i.e. it goes into your hand, but you don’t have any choice in what card it is) hides the most skill of these three. Being able to work out a good use for a card that has no obvious use arguably shows more skill than following the same old game-plan with a low RNG deck. That comparison can be debated; I’m just pointing out there’s an argument for it.

Monte Carlo’s relation to RNG in Hearthstone is usually one of win rates rather than individual games. Put succinctly, you play the random effects that statistically improve your odds of winning, even if each individual effect looks uncontrolled. The entire reason RNG makes it into strong decks is statistical, and the people who worked out the RNG cards were good (I’m not looking at you netdeckers!) were the skilled players that saw past the variance… OK, and deck-trackers build the statistics for them so they only actually need to know that a larger number is good. But that diminishment of skill is down to the deck-trackers and HS websites, not the game design itself.

Ultimately, a player’s skill in any game is just a measure of how well they can navigate the environment they are given. You can be great at chess but hopeless in HS and vice versa, not so much because one game requires more skill than the other, but because the two games require a different set of skills. To comment on the amount of RNG in HS is to comment on the game environment, not the skill it takes to play it well.

To round things off I’m going to make a comment regarding Burgle Rogue (which has long been my favourite archetype and I am therefore very biased). Given my preference for the bamboozle play in chess, it is perhaps obvious that I would gravitate to a deck whose main win condition is to bamboozle the opponent into submission by doing it so much that statistics shine through within a single game. I guess all I really want is for people to recognise that there’s a lot more skill and planning going on than it looks like when you meet me on ladder and I beat you up with an Animated Avalanche in a deck with no elementals in it.

----------------------------------------------------

Tl;dr: seriously? If you really want 1500 words condensed into a single sentence I guess I’ll repeat this: To comment on the amount of RNG in HS is to comment on the game environment, not the skill it takes to play it well.

17

Grumpy000 | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

reward details

A part the general principle, is there any detail about how much you get from a win and how do you get rewards from progress ? I would like to know figures not "philosophy" - tks

19

Arthas | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Card Reveal

New Targon Spell - Out Of The Way

A new Epic Targon Spell, Out Of The Way, has been revealed! [runecardimg rating]804[/runecardimg] Discuss this card below or head on over to the card page to give it a rating! Learn more about Cal…

2

Arthas | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Card Reveal

New Shadow Isles Spell - Go Hard

A new Epic Shadow Isles Spell, Go Hard, has been revealed! [runecardimg rating]802[/runecardimg] Discuss this card below or head on over to the card page to give it a rating! Learn more about Call…

3

Arthas | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Card Reveal

New Ionia Spell - Go Get It

A new Epic Ionia Spell, Go Get It, has been revealed! [runecardimg rating]805[/runecardimg] Discuss this card below or head on over to the card page to give it a rating! Learn more about Call of t…

1

Arthas | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Card Reveal

New Piltover & Zaun Spell - Give It All

A new Epic Piltover & Zaun Spell, Give It All, has been revealed! [runecardimg rating]801[/runecardimg] Discuss this card below or head on over to the card page to give it a rating! Learn more…

1

Xerow | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Stack limit

Is there seriously such a thing as maximum how many abilities and spells can be on the stack? Today as I was playing ranked, I played Rex with plunder on a Ledros that had 1hp left, with me still hol…

5

Neoguli | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Fan Creations

[New Class] Archivist

Greetings here! I'm here to present you my version of how I would change Priest's Core Set... new class. I've taken a break from my core set plans and created something a bit different.&nbs…

Greetings here! I'm here to present you my version of how I would change Priest's Core Set... new class. I've taken a break from my core set plans and created something a bit different.

This time, it's an entirely new class. In my interview about Hunter and Demon Hunter Core Set Changes, I did say making one for Demon Hunter was close to creating a new class, but Archivist was one true new class, because I had to make everything from sratch instead of having ready pieces like I had with DH. It's been at least a year since I attempted to make a new class - my latest one beforehand was Monk, and before Monk - Witch Doctor, which was actually one of the first ever classes released to Hearthcards Class Creator. But without further adieu, let's move on to Archivist!

For your information, you can also check the class in Hearthcards Class Creator.

Strengths and Weaknesses

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Strengths
- Card Draw and Generation - Archivists must quickly move through pages to find exact information.
- Discard - Informations may sometimes be lost, but that can also clean up the text if an error occurs.
- Buffs - Poets can take inspiration from books they read.
- Removal - In a library, you must remain silent. Obey this rule or else get expeled!
- Cost Reduction - Digging in books faster at a cheap price? Count them in!
Limitations
- Agression - To read and find inromation fast, you need to BE fast.
- Survivability - Some medicine can't hurt if it means to find information more precisely.
- Mill - Your opponent is also encouraged to read on a regular basis.
Weaknesses
- Spell Damage - While interrupting silence will get you kicked, you won't get vanquished. Yes, they don't have any form of damage to heroes and even minions (!).
- RNG - Archivists must be precise. They musn't allow mistakes to happen. They happen, but they should be quickly eliminated.

Heroes and Cards

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Hero and Hero Power

Basic Set

Initiate Set

Tokens

4

ShadowsOfSense | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Fan Creations

Intense Magic - Card Design Competition Discussion Thread

Competition Theme: Intense Magic It's time we started casting some real spells around here!You must create a 10-mana spellYour spell must simply cost 10 mana - there's only …

61

Neoguli | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Fan Creations

Neoguli's Custom Priest Core Set Changes

Greetings there! I'm here to present you my version of how I would change Priest's Core Sets. I'm jumping the bandwagon a bit with the changes after seeing some other people trying their reworks and …

Greetings there! I'm here to present you my version of how I would change Priest's Core Sets. I'm jumping the bandwagon a bit with the changes after seeing some other people trying their reworks and generally accepting classes may need some updates.

This time, I've put crossfire onto Priest. While it's very hard to actually do them, please don't think I'm going to make changes for literally every class, although if I get bored, I might do in near future. Also chose Priest this time, because some of their new cards they got aren't seeing any value, and they could use some nice tools. I also chose them as the last one for me to revise, as there were plenty of Priest Core Set changes beforehand.

Strengths and Weaknesses

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Strengths

Removal - Priests control every move you make.
Survivability - Priests have access to tons of healing, be it to themselves or their allies.
Card Generation - The Light shall bring you unexpected tools to help you win.
Minions - Priests are aided by their companions they ought to protect and resurrect in the time of need. Especially Dragons.
Healing - Priests are ready to heal your wounds.

Limitations

Disruption - Priests can enter your mind.
Buffs - Allies deserve some more power.
Combos - Priests usually cast slow, but powerful spells, but they also have some smaller ones to spare.

Weaknesses

Burst - Priests prefer to remain neutral or positive, they don't want to cause harm.
Card Draw - Priests need time to save you, you randomly engaging fool.

New Sets

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Basic Set

Classic Set

Explanations

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Northshire Cleric - returning with a different effect. You no longer can go full Northshire, but you can still get a draw, and it now triggers off of healing on your hero.

Power Word: Feast - a nice buff for Priest to let your minions stay alive.

Sanctuary Angel - a minion for your Rez Priests. Helps you defend your face, albeit it deals mediocre damage.

Priest of the Feast - provides you with a payoff for playing multiple spells in a turn.

Divine Hymn - not the strongest card, but heals your board and your hero.

Apotheosis - another buff for the class that also heals you.

Shadowmelder - serves as a removal tool that also supports Deathrattle synergies.

Breath of the Infinite - allows for evergreen Dragon synergies and serves as removal.

Reviving Infusion - the core Rez card.

Shadowy Figure - the primary Deathrattle synergy card, giving you more of those effects.

Hall of Fame

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Some cards that were considered, but didn't make the cut

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Silhouettes - my custom card that was meant to replace Mindgames. It was supposed to generate value, but in the end, maybe it could generate too much of it.

Shadowboxer - If I remember, I wanted to add this card, but I guess it deals damage to the enemy hero when it can, so no.

Mana Geode - Same story, except this one looks so cool that had I not gone for more Deathrattle synergies, this would probably make the cut.

Lyra the Sunshard - was meant to replace Natalie Seline, but maybe the value potential could go out of control.

Initiation - dunno, but I think I wanted to add this card, but I guess it could be weird to have.

Power Word: Replicate - maybe too gimmicky and also conflicted with Silhouettes back when I wanted to add them.

Among many, many, MANY other cards…

3

Neoguli | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Can't add Impish Aid to the deckbuilder

It's invisible for me, and I can't add it. Is it a bug or am I just impatient enough?

2

Thonson | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Challenge a Friend in New System

I'm sure it's too early to tell, but I was wondering if anyone has heard whether or not all existing quests will be ported to the new system with appropriately adjusted XP rewards?Specifically thinki…

6

Live4vrRdieTryn | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Battlegrounds

Worst. Meta. Ever.

Can someone tell me what the hell they were thinking or why they won’t hotfix this?? Every game is 6 ppl going elementals and the other two brave souls losing. Whoever is lucky enough to gobble…

6

CarnageTime | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Quest progress

Hey guys,   I just played a few games against 3 friends today (they all had the Challenge a friend quest) and after none of these games my quest log has been updated. I had 2 50 gold quests "…

4

Fluxflashor | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Halloween Site Event Delay

Making a post here for visibility. We were supposed to have our Halloween event go live earlier today, as teased via "Out of Cards Surprise" on the October card back post for Hearthstone. We're behi…

1

MenacingBagel | 5 years, 6 months ago

Event idea

First, off I'm not sure which prefix to put it under so sorry if I picked the wrong one. But anyways on with my point, I had an idea for a sort of mini-event to have on Out Of Cards. Essentiality you…

4

anchorm4n | 5 years, 6 months ago |

Discussion

Will Corrupt trigger with discounts?

Basically the title. I wonder if Corrupt can be triggered using discount effects like giants. Another example: You have [card]Kalecgos[/card] in play, draw a Corrupt card and proceed to cast [card]Py…

8

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Competition Theme: Trick And Treat

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Chess and ‘the bamboozle play’

The genius of Monte Carlo simulations

Relating these to Hearthstone

Learn more about Call of the Mountain

Learn more about Call of the Mountain

Learn more about Call of the Mountain

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Competition Theme: Intense Magic

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