Randomness allows even not-so-good players to win again opponent better than them, making the game accessible and fun to almost everyone (expecially the casuals). That's the primary reason for all the RNG effects that is in the game: keeping as many players as possible sticked to the game by giving them always a change to win thanks to some luck.
Personally I've decided long ago that taking in a competitive way HS is just not worth it, so I play the deck I want at my best and I don't care about the results. Too many matches are just decided by a random effect that are outside the control or the predictability of both players: getting salty is pointless.
Considering how balanced Frost Nova is, I don't think that it may need to be HoF'd since it's not even an evergreen card to goes in each Mage's archetype but only in the control ones. You don't need to print a new kind of freeze effect if you already have a well rounded one in your core set (think of Priest and his need to recieve a new board clear each rotation because it's missing from his Basic/Classic set, because Holy Nova is not a good one).
Lord Jaraxxus was a proto-DK since the early days, but that was a time where the powerlevel and speed of gameplay was totally different from now: fixing your max health to 15 was good enough if used as a sort of heal on top of getting infinite value from your HP and a nice weapon to go with. It's not Sacrificial Pact that limit its play, but the fact that Lord J is simply obsolete for today HS.
In order to fix it they should at last make him 8-mana, so you can HP the same turn you play it or rework it into a true DK by removing the HP limit and adding the 5 armor gain on cast (the weapon will be its battlecry, but it may require a side effect on attack or a buff in stats at this point). But then Warlock would be the only class to have a DK into the Classic Set and it's not something someone may want, to they'll probably be forced to move it into HoF.
If you win it's skill, if you loose than the game must be rigged. Seems a bit flawed to me. HS has a very heavy RNG factor and draw/matchup are just a portion of it. Sometimes you're lucky, sometimes you're not but that's is a totally different matter than making claim about the whole game being scripted to stop someone from winning.
Around rank 7 on Wild you can reach 5 with amost everything decent (at last Tier 1 or 2), so go for what you feel more comfortable with. Maybe Secret Mage as an extra edge at this time, so you may wanna try it out.
After 5 years HS has moved very little from its initial state: we got a fun mode (Brawl), just two format but both with just a difference in the avaible sets (Wild and Standard), one draft mode that is not even considered competitive (Arena). The economic system of the game has remained the same with just a little and meaningless rework of some quests, no cosmetics aside from cardbacks (that cannot even bee properly shown) and some alternate Heroes, a gameplay that too many times has felt boring or simply unfun (polarized matches, terrible unbalanced Classes for too long and the like).
While it remains the first, the most polished, well-looking and easy/fun to play of all OCG (expecially on mobile) the game as began to feel the competition of many other OCG that had/are/will coming out and that are making profit of the way already paved by HS: they already know how to appeal F2P players, what are the flaws of HS and how to avoid them, what kind of competitive environment players wanna see for tournaments and so on.
HS need to refresh its format under almost every aspect before it becomes too old to keep the pace of other competitors and while something it seems to be actualy moving, it's still too slow. The economy of the game is just the most important aspect (or at last the one that is more relevant to Blizzard) but it's not the only thing they should start to innovate and not even the one on which players are more engaged.
Some Season are smooth and fun, while others it seems like I can only face the worst matchup possibile or I had over and over terrible draws. I know it's just RNG but it's frustrating sometimes to loose 4 or more consecutive games without the chance to really even play.
While I've never paid attention to win counters of many Classes, I doubt that it decay over time. Maybe you remember wrong or it may also be a bug: try to post on the HS official forum in the technical support section, usually they answer in decent time.
More cosmetics are always welcome: anything Team5 will implement is indeed a good news. They also could have done this so long ago that I can just hope that the new potrait are a first step towards something bigger.
HS is so poor in terms of variety, rewards and cosmetics option that it almost hurt considering how successfull the game is.
That's interesting. Seems like they're experimenting different way to make something fresh by using time-limited events. That may (finally) lead to a new permanent format that could be in between Wild and Standard as avaible sets.
Of all the cards discussed only Injured Tol'vir is a new one: the others are all from the Classic and Basic sets.
Maybe if they could print a decent set for Priest instead of giving it crap, the Class won't be needing to use one of the oldest strategy in the whole game for being successfull.
If each deck should have been 60 cards instead of 30, then you also should allow 4x of each cards (with the exception of legendaries) in order to have enough consistency. Just like MTG.
That will drastically chance all the gameplay and the overall balance of most cards because the game strategy itself will be different.
The main issue with quests, aside from the rewards being terrible even after they reworked them, is that people don't really care too much about them in terms of deckbuilding: they want their gold fast and then they wanna mainly go on Ladder or Arena, since those are the "serious" modes of HS and the most played. That's also why Casual is often infested with top tier decks: people wanna win fast and move on.
While the idea of themed quests for each new expansion set could be interesting (maybe if limited for the first week of release), I would suggest to make all the quests the more generic as possible, so that people could just complete them while playing their normal game instead of feel forced to build something specific to get some gold. In this way I also hope that Casual can go back to being really casual.
Zilliax is a very powerfull card for every kind of deck, since it provides so many good thing for a decent cost. It's a nice balanced card that will remain for a very long time with us. On the other side SN1P-SN4P is far more situational and I don't think it'll stick around for long.
I agree that expecially Zilliax is going to surpass any other card in terms of longevity and presence, but I hope they'll not nerf it since it doesn't really need any change actually (or at last since some crazy interaction may pop up in the future).
It will adds unecessary complexity to the game. New HPs, as already discussed on several other topics, will be a nightmare to balance while cards that may have different effect based on something else are pretty point less per se.
The flavor of each class is pretty well rapresented by most of the Basic set.
The only way to make a decent use of alternate HP is a mechanic like Justicar Trueheart: high mana cost, bad stats and the only condition to use it is that you actualy have to draw that single card in your deck, so you're also tied to get a decent luck or you may not even see it.
Everything that can come into play in the early game will be broken or at last really hard to balance, because the initial turns are a crucial phase of a match and often the final outcome is determinated by how it's started.
Randomness allows even not-so-good players to win again opponent better than them, making the game accessible and fun to almost everyone (expecially the casuals). That's the primary reason for all the RNG effects that is in the game: keeping as many players as possible sticked to the game by giving them always a change to win thanks to some luck.
Personally I've decided long ago that taking in a competitive way HS is just not worth it, so I play the deck I want at my best and I don't care about the results. Too many matches are just decided by a random effect that are outside the control or the predictability of both players: getting salty is pointless.
Considering how balanced Frost Nova is, I don't think that it may need to be HoF'd since it's not even an evergreen card to goes in each Mage's archetype but only in the control ones. You don't need to print a new kind of freeze effect if you already have a well rounded one in your core set (think of Priest and his need to recieve a new board clear each rotation because it's missing from his Basic/Classic set, because Holy Nova is not a good one).
Lord Jaraxxus was a proto-DK since the early days, but that was a time where the powerlevel and speed of gameplay was totally different from now: fixing your max health to 15 was good enough if used as a sort of heal on top of getting infinite value from your HP and a nice weapon to go with. It's not Sacrificial Pact that limit its play, but the fact that Lord J is simply obsolete for today HS.
In order to fix it they should at last make him 8-mana, so you can HP the same turn you play it or rework it into a true DK by removing the HP limit and adding the 5 armor gain on cast (the weapon will be its battlecry, but it may require a side effect on attack or a buff in stats at this point). But then Warlock would be the only class to have a DK into the Classic Set and it's not something someone may want, to they'll probably be forced to move it into HoF.
If you win it's skill, if you loose than the game must be rigged. Seems a bit flawed to me. HS has a very heavy RNG factor and draw/matchup are just a portion of it. Sometimes you're lucky, sometimes you're not but that's is a totally different matter than making claim about the whole game being scripted to stop someone from winning.
Around rank 7 on Wild you can reach 5 with amost everything decent (at last Tier 1 or 2), so go for what you feel more comfortable with. Maybe Secret Mage as an extra edge at this time, so you may wanna try it out.
After 5 years HS has moved very little from its initial state: we got a fun mode (Brawl), just two format but both with just a difference in the avaible sets (Wild and Standard), one draft mode that is not even considered competitive (Arena). The economic system of the game has remained the same with just a little and meaningless rework of some quests, no cosmetics aside from cardbacks (that cannot even bee properly shown) and some alternate Heroes, a gameplay that too many times has felt boring or simply unfun (polarized matches, terrible unbalanced Classes for too long and the like).
While it remains the first, the most polished, well-looking and easy/fun to play of all OCG (expecially on mobile) the game as began to feel the competition of many other OCG that had/are/will coming out and that are making profit of the way already paved by HS: they already know how to appeal F2P players, what are the flaws of HS and how to avoid them, what kind of competitive environment players wanna see for tournaments and so on.
HS need to refresh its format under almost every aspect before it becomes too old to keep the pace of other competitors and while something it seems to be actualy moving, it's still too slow. The economy of the game is just the most important aspect (or at last the one that is more relevant to Blizzard) but it's not the only thing they should start to innovate and not even the one on which players are more engaged.
Some Season are smooth and fun, while others it seems like I can only face the worst matchup possibile or I had over and over terrible draws. I know it's just RNG but it's frustrating sometimes to loose 4 or more consecutive games without the chance to really even play.
While I've never paid attention to win counters of many Classes, I doubt that it decay over time. Maybe you remember wrong or it may also be a bug: try to post on the HS official forum in the technical support section, usually they answer in decent time.
More cosmetics are always welcome: anything Team5 will implement is indeed a good news. They also could have done this so long ago that I can just hope that the new potrait are a first step towards something bigger.
HS is so poor in terms of variety, rewards and cosmetics option that it almost hurt considering how successfull the game is.
That's interesting. Seems like they're experimenting different way to make something fresh by using time-limited events. That may (finally) lead to a new permanent format that could be in between Wild and Standard as avaible sets.
Such a well written (and interesting) article! Excellent work, keep it coming.
From those previews, Anduin still disappointing as always :(
Jaina is pretty amazing, while Gul'dan seems at last ok.
Of all the cards discussed only Injured Tol'vir is a new one: the others are all from the Classic and Basic sets.
Maybe if they could print a decent set for Priest instead of giving it crap, the Class won't be needing to use one of the oldest strategy in the whole game for being successfull.
Dragon Tempo Warrior was so fun back in the days. I really wish it could be competitive viable also today.
If each deck should have been 60 cards instead of 30, then you also should allow 4x of each cards (with the exception of legendaries) in order to have enough consistency. Just like MTG.
That will drastically chance all the gameplay and the overall balance of most cards because the game strategy itself will be different.
The main issue with quests, aside from the rewards being terrible even after they reworked them, is that people don't really care too much about them in terms of deckbuilding: they want their gold fast and then they wanna mainly go on Ladder or Arena, since those are the "serious" modes of HS and the most played. That's also why Casual is often infested with top tier decks: people wanna win fast and move on.
While the idea of themed quests for each new expansion set could be interesting (maybe if limited for the first week of release), I would suggest to make all the quests the more generic as possible, so that people could just complete them while playing their normal game instead of feel forced to build something specific to get some gold. In this way I also hope that Casual can go back to being really casual.
Zilliax is a very powerfull card for every kind of deck, since it provides so many good thing for a decent cost. It's a nice balanced card that will remain for a very long time with us. On the other side SN1P-SN4P is far more situational and I don't think it'll stick around for long.
I agree that expecially Zilliax is going to surpass any other card in terms of longevity and presence, but I hope they'll not nerf it since it doesn't really need any change actually (or at last since some crazy interaction may pop up in the future).
I love the Boom's Lab and its puzzle solving. The others are pretty much on the same level for me, since I don't really like solo content on HS.
Absolutly nuts in this Brawl.
It will adds unecessary complexity to the game. New HPs, as already discussed on several other topics, will be a nightmare to balance while cards that may have different effect based on something else are pretty point less per se.
The flavor of each class is pretty well rapresented by most of the Basic set.
The only way to make a decent use of alternate HP is a mechanic like Justicar Trueheart: high mana cost, bad stats and the only condition to use it is that you actualy have to draw that single card in your deck, so you're also tied to get a decent luck or you may not even see it.
Everything that can come into play in the early game will be broken or at last really hard to balance, because the initial turns are a crucial phase of a match and often the final outcome is determinated by how it's started.