People seem to be expecting an awful lot out of the uncorrupted version. If the card were better than other 5-drops when uncorrupted, no one would ever bother corrupting it.
The whole point of the Corrupt keyword is that the card kinda sucks (but may still be worth playing) unless you trigger it, when it becomes extremely good.
As for "You can't play it corrupted until turn 7," well, yes, but then you get a 5 mana 8/8 with rush AND still have 2 mana left over for something else -- a hero power at the very least.
This card without Rod of Roasting is a very cool, albeit random card. This card with Rod of Roasting is the most degenerate crap ever designed. That effect on a PvE setting can be fun, on PvP is incredibly frustrating to play against.
And yes, it's only a 1/20 chance AFTER playing the card, but think of it this way: a game show where, out of 40 coin tosses, you need to just get heads once to win 10000€/$/whatever currency is in your country or you'll have to pay the same amount. You flip the 40 coins. You get 40 tails. That's how it feels to see the opponent get Rod of Roasting on a game you have won otherwise.
Now, imagine this is the finals of the HCT.
Imagine making it to the HCT finals without fully understanding and acknowledging that this card exists. Any competitor who doesn't accept Hearthstone as it is (and always has been) doesn't really deserve to win the HCT.
I wasn't really annoyed by this stuff before, but now I see something that pisses me off beyond all measure.
They have locked a legitimate LoR Guardian behind the K/DA premium paywall! I never intended to buy into the K/DA event because I genuinely don't need it in my life, and I had hoped that all the stuff it unlocked would have to do with K/DA. I still don't intend to buy in, but now there's no way for me to get the Stellacorn.
I mean, it's whatever, since it feels like Riot's design and balance decisions are gradually driving me out of the game anyway, but still ...
I agree that win rate should not be the only metric they use, but that doesn't mean they should ignore all data. They have access to all kinds of information, but they are choosing to ignore it. Instead, they give the players what they (seem to) want so Riot doesn't have to take the blame when the game doesn't improve as a result.
In particular, win rates between specific archetypes can highlight polarizing decks very quickly. If a certain deck's match-ups are all either very high or very low in terms of win rate, with no middle ground, that's a terrible, toxic deck. It will look fine if you go by overall win rate (around 50%), but the per-archetype data will show a completely different picture.
Why is such a deck toxic? Because the outcomes are decided by matchmaking, not player skill. There's a whole lot of that going on these days, and it makes people feel bad about the game.
"Balance" is a huge buzzword. Believe it or not, we have [internal] balance metrics in terms of if decks are winning too often or not. In general, if we "balanced" the game strictly [to those metrics], players would not be that happy with that (and haven't been when we've done it before).
I really wish he had elaborated on this, because I'm extremely skeptical. I would love to know which balance change was based on data and made players unhappy. Every change is going to make some people unhappy, so I'm not so sure you should worry about that if it's moving the game in a healthier direction.
In general I'm getting the impression that game balance at this point is almost 100% reactive, based on Riot's perception of what players want. The huge, gaping flaw there is that social media may not actually paint an accurate picture of what players want, especially when it's tainted by influencers with bad ideas who think they are a lot smarter than they actually are.
Quote From Steve Rubin
I think we should use our Odd patches in between [the larger Even-numbered patches] to do micro-adjustments to reworks. For instance, Braum and Lee Sin coming in over [after their original buffs]: the idea would be to do solid changes (not as absurd as Braum or Lee), and then use the 2 week period after that to preload "nerfs" in case they go haywire. That way, we get the type of metagame disruption (that lee did well), but we get a nerf in 2 weeks rather than 6.
I am utterly flabbergasted and horrified that this was not the protocol all along. With as little testing as they do, it seems hugely irresponsible to push such massive changes without having a plan in place to revert them quickly if things go south. I mean, I'm glad they finally figured this out, but holy crap, how do you even get a job in this field without grasping the importance of fail-safe measures?
Lee Sin would have been perfectly fine if they had left him alone in the first place. The main reason he's OP is all the Targon stuff they added after they buffed him. Without the buff, the Targon package would have brought him right up to par with most other Champions. This is not a card that ever needed to be ahead of the pack. The middle ground is not a compromise; it's a failure to admit they were wrong and a failure to fix the problem.
And yes, Make it Rain is worse now, but the real problem with Bilgewater has always been Ravenous Flock, so that's another bad miss.
I understand that a card game gets harder to balance the more cards you add, but it still blows my mind [Swain emote] that they were able to do such a good job in the earlier patches, and now we get garbage like this.
I haven't played HS in a while, but IIRC "cost" always refers to the current mana cost of a card.
I don't understand your second question, but I'll just say a thing and hope it helps. A card will not become corrupted unless it is in your hand at the time you play a higher-cost card. (How it got to your hand should not matter, as long as it is in your hand before the other card is played.)
I opened my Vault last Thursday and haven't touched the game since.
Lee Sin didn't have to happen in the first place. They could have reverted it weeks ago but did not. They didn't even mention it until the patch notes of the Monuments expansion.
One of the nice things about this game being so consumer-friendly is that I don't feel the need to play when they make the game suck for over a month. I feel so sorry for the content creators who don't have that luxury.
First, yes, when I say launch, I mean launch, not beta.
And I was referring to TF/Swain, not Gangplank. TF/Swain is a midrange burn deck (some might even say control burn), and it is the poster child for the kind of problems that arise when any card game prints too many burn cards. You reach a critical mass, and boom, there's your archetype, with almost no way for the meta to recover until some of those burn cards are either removed or nerfed into oblivion.
Except that in LoR, you have Champions that require burn for their very existence (and here I do include not just Swain, but also GP and Sejuani, and even Ezreal), so making burn too unappealing also guts those Champions. Riot doesn't want to cause a revolt by killing some very popular Champions all at once, so here we are, downtown Burnsville, with no cellphone or even a roadmap to find our way out.
The problem right now is not that aggro is too good. It's that LEE SIN is too good. If you play decks that counter aggro (control and midrange), you lose to Lee Sin. THAT is the problem. Aggro has been nerfed so hard so many times, it is not actually a problem in itself. (The sole exception here is Pirate Aggro, and only that because of Make It Rain and Jagged Butcher, which are way too good compared to other cards.) Aggro is only having success right now because Lee Sin is preying on everything that's good against aggro and pushing them out of the meta.
You don't get to say, "Aggro and burn are perfectly fine except for this one archetype that has been at the top of the charts since the game launched." Just take it as given that when people are talking about overpowered aggro/burn, they are talking about that archetype. Obviously there are less powerful aggro decks out there, but there's no reason to discuss the ones that are reasonable.
And yes, Lee Sin is a problem, but we're not doing ourselves any favors if we pretend he's the only problem. Pirate aggro was too good long before Lee Sin even existed. Nerfing Lee Sin will not fix everything else that's wrong with the way this game is being balanced.
Here's what's really happening: Card games start to go bad when developers see players' positive reactions to big, flashy effects. So they decide to lean into that, creating more and more extreme content, and it's not long before the whole thing becomes literally impossible to balance. But the truth is that cool, interesting effects do not have to be so extreme. With a little finesse, it is possible to keep the game interesting without making every top deck into a polarizing monstrosity.
Yet in Runeterra, players always seem happy with nerfs, which have generally been very even-handed. Too often when Riot buffs a card, the meta becomes a cesspool of misery. (Except for poor Jae Medarda ... don't know what happened there ...)
Shen emote would have a higher win rate, but some people like to open with him.
My takeway from this is that they have no idea how to fix underpowered archetypes, and no idea how to bring the most overpowered ones (aggro and burn) into check. So they faff about in the middle ground, hoping people will find that interesting in spite of everything else.
There are like three very different versions of Noxus aggro with significantly higher win rates than any TK deck.
Swain-Twisted Fate has had a higher win rate than TK almost since the day LoR launched.
I'm not saying Tahm Kench isn't problematic, but it's because he's polarizing, not overpowered. There's a difference. He's literally impossible to beat if you're not playing the right deck, and very easy to beat if you are. There's almost no middle ground, which means games are decided more by the matchmaking system than by player skill.
If I could delete this garbage from my collection, I definitely would.
The only regret I have from skipping most of that year.
No interest in pins, but if they put the actual Lemonade card back up for sale, they can have my money.
(I was on a break.)
People seem to be expecting an awful lot out of the uncorrupted version. If the card were better than other 5-drops when uncorrupted, no one would ever bother corrupting it.
The whole point of the Corrupt keyword is that the card kinda sucks (but may still be worth playing) unless you trigger it, when it becomes extremely good.
As for "You can't play it corrupted until turn 7," well, yes, but then you get a 5 mana 8/8 with rush AND still have 2 mana left over for something else -- a hero power at the very least.
Imagine making it to the HCT finals without fully understanding and acknowledging that this card exists. Any competitor who doesn't accept Hearthstone as it is (and always has been) doesn't really deserve to win the HCT.
Most of the effects are solidly weighted in your favor. The Rod of Roasting is almost necessary to balance out how strong the other outcomes are.
I wasn't really annoyed by this stuff before, but now I see something that pisses me off beyond all measure.
They have locked a legitimate LoR Guardian behind the K/DA premium paywall! I never intended to buy into the K/DA event because I genuinely don't need it in my life, and I had hoped that all the stuff it unlocked would have to do with K/DA. I still don't intend to buy in, but now there's no way for me to get the Stellacorn.
I mean, it's whatever, since it feels like Riot's design and balance decisions are gradually driving me out of the game anyway, but still ...
I agree that win rate should not be the only metric they use, but that doesn't mean they should ignore all data. They have access to all kinds of information, but they are choosing to ignore it. Instead, they give the players what they (seem to) want so Riot doesn't have to take the blame when the game doesn't improve as a result.
In particular, win rates between specific archetypes can highlight polarizing decks very quickly. If a certain deck's match-ups are all either very high or very low in terms of win rate, with no middle ground, that's a terrible, toxic deck. It will look fine if you go by overall win rate (around 50%), but the per-archetype data will show a completely different picture.
Why is such a deck toxic? Because the outcomes are decided by matchmaking, not player skill. There's a whole lot of that going on these days, and it makes people feel bad about the game.
Zephyr Sage can no longer copy another Zephyr Sage. This happened many patches ago.
I know, right? And the fact that he comes out and says he thinks an infinite combo is balanced ... wow.
I really wish he had elaborated on this, because I'm extremely skeptical. I would love to know which balance change was based on data and made players unhappy. Every change is going to make some people unhappy, so I'm not so sure you should worry about that if it's moving the game in a healthier direction.
In general I'm getting the impression that game balance at this point is almost 100% reactive, based on Riot's perception of what players want. The huge, gaping flaw there is that social media may not actually paint an accurate picture of what players want, especially when it's tainted by influencers with bad ideas who think they are a lot smarter than they actually are.
I am utterly flabbergasted and horrified that this was not the protocol all along. With as little testing as they do, it seems hugely irresponsible to push such massive changes without having a plan in place to revert them quickly if things go south. I mean, I'm glad they finally figured this out, but holy crap, how do you even get a job in this field without grasping the importance of fail-safe measures?
Too little, too late.
Lee Sin would have been perfectly fine if they had left him alone in the first place. The main reason he's OP is all the Targon stuff they added after they buffed him. Without the buff, the Targon package would have brought him right up to par with most other Champions. This is not a card that ever needed to be ahead of the pack. The middle ground is not a compromise; it's a failure to admit they were wrong and a failure to fix the problem.
And yes, Make it Rain is worse now, but the real problem with Bilgewater has always been Ravenous Flock, so that's another bad miss.
I understand that a card game gets harder to balance the more cards you add, but it still blows my mind [Swain emote] that they were able to do such a good job in the earlier patches, and now we get garbage like this.
I haven't played HS in a while, but IIRC "cost" always refers to the current mana cost of a card.
I don't understand your second question, but I'll just say a thing and hope it helps. A card will not become corrupted unless it is in your hand at the time you play a higher-cost card. (How it got to your hand should not matter, as long as it is in your hand before the other card is played.)
If that's the thing that "fixes" the game, I will be extending my break indefinitely.
I opened my Vault last Thursday and haven't touched the game since.
Lee Sin didn't have to happen in the first place. They could have reverted it weeks ago but did not. They didn't even mention it until the patch notes of the Monuments expansion.
One of the nice things about this game being so consumer-friendly is that I don't feel the need to play when they make the game suck for over a month. I feel so sorry for the content creators who don't have that luxury.
First, yes, when I say launch, I mean launch, not beta.
And I was referring to TF/Swain, not Gangplank. TF/Swain is a midrange burn deck (some might even say control burn), and it is the poster child for the kind of problems that arise when any card game prints too many burn cards. You reach a critical mass, and boom, there's your archetype, with almost no way for the meta to recover until some of those burn cards are either removed or nerfed into oblivion.
Except that in LoR, you have Champions that require burn for their very existence (and here I do include not just Swain, but also GP and Sejuani, and even Ezreal), so making burn too unappealing also guts those Champions. Riot doesn't want to cause a revolt by killing some very popular Champions all at once, so here we are, downtown Burnsville, with no cellphone or even a roadmap to find our way out.
You don't get to say, "Aggro and burn are perfectly fine except for this one archetype that has been at the top of the charts since the game launched." Just take it as given that when people are talking about overpowered aggro/burn, they are talking about that archetype. Obviously there are less powerful aggro decks out there, but there's no reason to discuss the ones that are reasonable.
And yes, Lee Sin is a problem, but we're not doing ourselves any favors if we pretend he's the only problem. Pirate aggro was too good long before Lee Sin even existed. Nerfing Lee Sin will not fix everything else that's wrong with the way this game is being balanced.
Here's what's really happening: Card games start to go bad when developers see players' positive reactions to big, flashy effects. So they decide to lean into that, creating more and more extreme content, and it's not long before the whole thing becomes literally impossible to balance. But the truth is that cool, interesting effects do not have to be so extreme. With a little finesse, it is possible to keep the game interesting without making every top deck into a polarizing monstrosity.
Yet in Runeterra, players always seem happy with nerfs, which have generally been very even-handed. Too often when Riot buffs a card, the meta becomes a cesspool of misery. (Except for poor Jae Medarda ... don't know what happened there ...)
Shen emote would have a higher win rate, but some people like to open with him.
My takeway from this is that they have no idea how to fix underpowered archetypes, and no idea how to bring the most overpowered ones (aggro and burn) into check. So they faff about in the middle ground, hoping people will find that interesting in spite of everything else.
There are like three very different versions of Noxus aggro with significantly higher win rates than any TK deck.
Swain-Twisted Fate has had a higher win rate than TK almost since the day LoR launched.
I'm not saying Tahm Kench isn't problematic, but it's because he's polarizing, not overpowered. There's a difference. He's literally impossible to beat if you're not playing the right deck, and very easy to beat if you are. There's almost no middle ground, which means games are decided more by the matchmaking system than by player skill.