Wild getting new cards in no wise means it isn't fairly static. Both MtG and Yu-Gi-Oh had new cards added to their non-banned list formats as well but the developers didn't try micro managing popular decks in most cases for the sake of changing things that weren't broken in order make said involved formats a mirrored copy of the banned list formats.
You're moving the goalposts from "static" to "fairly static" and you're ignoring the substantive differences I've already pointed out between paper and digital card games: magic or Yu-gi-oh can't just nerf a card so their only options are banlists and multiple formats. Hearthstone has a different design philosophy, a key element of which is keeping things simple and fairly casual, something that pretty much excludes the possibility of 14 different formats with varying card pools and restrictions. Simply pointing out that other games do it that way is a poor argument for why it ought to be that way in HS, and I think that by and large that argument is refuted by the dev team's decisions over the years.
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I'm sorry but "a large number of players" hating something means absolutely nothing. Care to provide actual statistics or percentages to tell us what that is objectively supposed to mean? I'll wait while you pull those up. The thing is that I could just as easily do a survey of a random 1,000 HS players and find hundreds of players who hate control decks (even they're just tier 1 or 2) and say the exact same thing that you're saying (that a "large number of players" hate control decks). That doesn't mean it is anywhere near a majority of players.
Preposterous argument. I'm sorry, but do *you* have a list of names of all the players who think G&B are perfectly fine and shouldn't have been rotated out of standard early? Do you have a list of their hair colour and favourite pop songs?
Incomplete information is still information, and the G&B nerf gives us quite a bit of circumstantial evidence to work with. Just because I cannot present you with a quantity or proportion of players who hate G&B doesn't mean you can dismiss the argument. Try again. If you had a survey of 1000 random players you'd have more information and a better argument than you do now. Incomplete information is still better than no information.
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You also have to consider the actual regular wild audience more than the standard format audience. We don't go around balancing standard around the wild players, so in the end it is the wild players' feeling towards the cards in the wild format that matter much more than the standard players. Also note that the devs HoFed them because they were a problem in STANDARD, and not as big of an issue in wild. Hell, standard players b*tched and moaned about Odd Mage, of all things, for a period of time. Yet the deck was a vastly inferior version of Reno Mage in wild. Even the Even Lock deck saw considerably less play in wild than it did in standard. Please don't try to say that Genn & Baku were considered as big of a problem in wild as they were in standard considering fewer of the decks saw play in wild AND in wild it's much easier to stabalize against the aggression with some classes (one glaring example being Voidcaller into Void Lord). It's interesting you criticize my assumptions and then try to assert your own baseless assumptions instead, especially when they are picked apart as easily.
I'm well aware that wild has different standards for balancing and a distinct pool of players. I didn't argue that every card that is a problem in standard must be nerfed in wild as well, I said that if a card is so problematic that it has to be HoFed/nerfed in standard it's reasonable to assume that the same logic applies to that card in wild, if not necessarily to the same extent. If Genn and Baku make games extremely predictable and repetitive in standard then it stands to reason the same is true for wild, even if the cards might not be as strong there.
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Are you actually going to answer where the evidence is for T5 deciding to nerf Genn/Baku in wild or are you intentionally trying to throw the conversation in a different direction? You can't just say that cards are randomly nerfed at times as a strong indicator that Genn/Baku could be nerfed. It is still out of thin air guesswork with no concrete foundation to stand on.
Your demand for evidence is disingenuous and a non-argument. We haven't had prior warning for previous changes so you can't hold my lack of evidence now as evidence to the contrary. How are you so bad at this? I'm not arguing that we know these cards are going to be nerfed, you're the one insisting that they definitely aren't because "card game experience" and "no evidence" or whatever.
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Point out to me how I mocked any person here and I'll gladly apologize.
"Despite your call to ax every thing you find irritating to play with, even when said aggressive decks actually under perform with win rates from more consistent older aggro decks (ie Pre nerf Pirate Warrior), that doesn't mean your personal preference has any meaningful say in what gets removed from the game."
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However, I know I did not. I'm all for "mocking" (breaking apart) weak arguments or biased rationales to nerf something when the ideas are deserving of it. If you say a non-tier 0 deck should be nerfed, and all the reasons you provide for that argument is that you find the match-up boring then you should expect that I will provide counter arguments that point out your bias and why it shouldn't be nerfed for the reasons that person provided. I am well aware of the difference between mocking/flaming a person and opposing emotionless ideas and arguments.
Clearly you're not as aware of that difference as you believe. And if your "counter-argument" to a subjective opinion is that that opinion doesn't matter (but yours somehow does?) then you're being a hypocrite and I will call you on it. Tough titties.
The number of HS formats is not that confusing though. It's two primary formats. Yes, the developers want to keep things simple so that they aren't confusing, but constantly nerfing cards in counter intuitive of that goal. Take WoW for example, there were complaints from returning players who had taken a break and then found that their favorite class(es) were ability pruned or had talents/default abilities changed drastically to the point that they no longer recognized their class. Now of course an MMORPG is much different than a CCG, but the general idea still stands that if you change too much of want returning players enjoyed or were familiar with then they are more likely to be turned off. Having to have returning players return and find any one of the 18 odd/even decks working completely different than they used to before taking a break is likely to risk turning those players off. I think it is safe to say that most players like to be able to pop a game back in and not have to relearn everything again.
Neither of us having evidence means that neither point is proven or disproven. Your stance is no more valid than mine unless concrete evidence is provided so I fail to see why you're debating this point of the topic. Genn/Baku were HoFed because they would have had to have made substantial changes to the cards to provide any form of nerf in standard. Combine that with strong tools like Defile getting rotated out that previously combated Odd Pally and to a lesser extent Even Shaman the cards were HoFed. I've seen no blue posts that have stated that they currently plan to nerf or look at the decks in wild. Suggesting that they do plan to do this with less evidence than this is no more than wishful thinking for ex-standard players wanting to mold their wild experience for everyone else.
Again I can point out multiple cards that make a variety of match-ups/plays predictable. Going against any form of slow control or combo warlock? Prepare to have an answer for a massive board in the late game (including saving a transform effect for Mal'Ganis as mage or shaman so that you don't instantly lose to 30+ stats on the board when Mal'Ganis is used). Going against any form of aggressive paladin list? Try to dump your hand as best as you are able from the get go so you don't give your opponent insane refill value and renewed steam to smorc your face. Going against pretty much any kind of wild mage as an OTK player? Be prepared to pop their 1+ number of Ice Blocks before using your combo or attempt to find an alternate win condition. Obviously there's plenty of more examples, but the classes are extremely scripted with how games turn out nowadays. Genn/Baku having their effects active from turn 1 doesn't really make them that much more predictable than pretty much any other deck. The reason it seems like they are more predictable is because most of the complained about decks are aggressive decks that do not end the game in the late game while the few classes I mentioned above have their predictable plays happening in the late game (which isn't seen as often as the early game due to the existence of aggro). If aggro was incredibly weak and you saw games extend late most of the time you would see how predictable the many control decks are as well).
I'm arguing that in the current moment we have no evidence that they are going to be nerfed. It's pointless to argue that any card can technically be nerfed out of the blue because a couple cards have in the past. If I cared enough I could make the argument that any card could be nerfed then and we wouldn't be able to anticipate it.
The following are taken from Urban Dictionary and Dictionary.com
Flaming: " To engage in an online argument usually involving unfounded personal attacks by one or more parties."
Debate: "a discussion, as of a publicquestion in an assembly,involvingopposingviewpoints"
The one thing I will concede to is that the person I quoted earlier didn't directly say that they found Genn/Baku decks irritating, but it was certainly implied. So my calling out of their wish to kill a deck that they found irritating wasn't completely unfounded. I feel you are reaching to call me a flamer however, considering that in nowise have I called any person a name of personal insult, hate, etc nor have I cast aside the viewpoints of my argument to instead deride a person on topics completely personal and unrelated to Genn & Baku nerfs.
However, metas would still eventually stagnate. The difference would be that the mini-metas just wouldn't last more than that one month. It also wouldn't necessarily mean that random clown fiesta homebrews would hit legend as consistently as more refined decks.
It's actually quite relevant. I already mentioned before that more established card games, which HS very much follows the formula of, created formats both for a more static format and one that is quite fluid. If a player has little to no knowledge of the past giants/successes of CCGs, including how they generally have tried to design their various formats, then a newer player would be less likely to understand why HS making its own semi-static format & fluid format would make sense for this game. Hell, even throwing out terms like "eternal format" has the chance to fly completely over the head of some players who only have the knowledge of Hearthstone for a CCG. The relevance is in the breaking down of previous CCG static vs fluid formats if you just cave to every complaint and nerf every complained about card & deck in both standard and wild, because then you no longer have any format in Hearthstone that is static or semi-static, but merely two completely fluid formats with the only difference being the overall card pools.
It's one of the most commonly used fallacies. If you have an argument to make based on your extensive experience with other card games, make the hecking argument instead of boasting. Hearthstone doesn't have any static formats: wild is constantly expanding and standard is constantly changing, not to mention card nerfs and buffs affecting both of them. The analogy to other card games doesn't work either, for one because hearthstone is a digital card game, which means it isn't limited to the tools available to paper card games (we can actually nerf and buff cards), and two because it has it's own fairly unique design philosophy. But again, if you want to make some sort of argument here, you actually have to make it instead of just coyly referring to it.
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Is my argument any worse than somebody saying that Genn & Baku needs nerfs because they're stale & 'unbeatable'?
Yes, yes it's much worse, because you aren't really presenting arguments, just fallacies and assertions. It's painfully easy to argue that Genn and Baku being tossed out of standard a year early indicates that 1) a large number of players hate these cards 2) HS devs agree that they are a problem. If that is the case then it's not at all unreasonable to assume that the same holds true for wild.
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There has been zero evidence to suggest Blizzard is currently considering nerfing Genn/Baku at the moment so the opposition to my side of things is just as made up. At least on my end I brought up that other cards & entire decks technically create staleness in the format (and those are not nerfed). Genn & Baku are not even tier 0 (which is almost always when Blizzard steps in to make balance passes in wild). There is currently no objective grounds or hints from Blizzard HQ that either card will be nerfed.
Do you have some sort of personal connection with T5? How much of an advance notice did you get about Mind Blast getting HoFed or Aviana getting nerfed? Blizzard has pulled unexpected card changes on us all the time, if anything the way they're keeping players informed every time they choose not to do anything about Big Priest is unusual.
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You've established that a forum of public opinion is full of opinions. While I know my take on things is certainly not objective is still does nothing to prove any other opinion here so pointing out that I also have an opinion ultimately accomplishes nothing. I'm still waiting for the logical argument that impossibly proves that most wild players want Genn/Baku nerfed, or that they need to be nerfed.
I'm not the one who tried to ridicule someone's opinion because it was an opinion. You did that. Pointing out that you're standing knee-deep in subjectivity trying to mock others for expressing their views addresses another non-argument you made and (apparently) has caused you to recant this earlier position. So I wouldn't say nothing was accomplished.
If you're waiting for an impossibility then I sure hope you're the patient type. Sigh.
Wild getting new cards in no wise means it isn't fairly static. Both MtG and Yu-Gi-Oh had new cards added to their non-banned list formats as well but the developers didn't try micro managing popular decks in most cases for the sake of changing things that weren't broken in order make said involved formats a mirrored copy of the banned list formats.
I'm sorry but "a large number of players" hating something means absolutely nothing. Care to provide actual statistics or percentages to tell us what that is objectively supposed to mean? I'll wait while you pull those up. The thing is that I could just as easily do a survey of a random 1,000 HS players and find hundreds of players who hate control decks (even they're just tier 1 or 2) and say the exact same thing that you're saying (that a "large number of players" hate control decks). That doesn't mean it is anywhere near a majority of players.
You also have to consider the actual regular wild audience more than the standard format audience. We don't go around balancing standard around the wild players, so in the end it is the wild players' feeling towards the cards in the wild format that matter much more than the standard players. Also note that the devs HoFed them because they were a problem in STANDARD, and not as big of an issue in wild. Hell, standard players b*tched and moaned about Odd Mage, of all things, for a period of time. Yet the deck was a vastly inferior version of Reno Mage in wild. Even the Even Lock deck saw considerably less play in wild than it did in standard. Please don't try to say that Genn & Baku were considered as big of a problem in wild as they were in standard considering fewer of the decks saw play in wild AND in wild it's much easier to stabalize against the aggression with some classes (one glaring example being Voidcaller into Void Lord). It's interesting you criticize my assumptions and then try to assert your own baseless assumptions instead, especially when they are picked apart as easily.
Are you actually going to answer where the evidence is for T5 deciding to nerf Genn/Baku in wild or are you intentionally trying to throw the conversation in a different direction? You can't just say that cards are randomly nerfed at times as a strong indicator that Genn/Baku could be nerfed. It is still out of thin air guesswork with no concrete foundation to stand on.
Point out to me how I mocked any person here and I'll gladly apologize. However, I know I did not. I'm all for "mocking" (breaking apart) weak arguments or biased rationales to nerf something when the ideas are deserving of it. If you say a non-tier 0 deck should be nerfed, and all the reasons you provide for that argument is that you find the match-up boring then you should expect that I will provide counter arguments that point out your bias and why it shouldn't be nerfed for the reasons that person provided. I am well aware of the difference between mocking/flaming a person and opposing emotionless ideas and arguments.
I started playing wild immediately as soon the as the split happened. A couple reasons kept me playing wild early on (and still playing) and that was 1) I like the idea of 'owning' my cards instead of constantly throwing them away not that long down the road and 2) I enjoy combos and OTKs (especially meme ones) instead of following the same scripted standard metas where control and aggro play out almost exactly the same way that they always do.
I first started thinking about this after noticing that Disguised Toast was doing a card reveal (and how he has been rather out of the HS spotlight for the time being, at least until new content releases). Then I thought back to Savjz (who I used to consume his Youtube content regularly before he quit HS. Now, I'm not saying that all streamers are burnt out on the game or that they even dislike the game. Nor, am I saying that specific streamers such as Toast are necessarily burnt out, as opposed to just taking a break (although at times I wonder if he really enjoys the game as much as his persona tries to sell his HS content, but that is complete conjecture).
However, it led me to the question in the title. If a streamer did start burning out and for whatever reason (mostly money probably) did not just quit the game and move on to something else, then would their half-hearted image and involvement in the game really be more of a good thing? I can't help but feel it would just create a little bit more potential for negativity in the community, or at least the false impression that the average player doesn't have fun with the game if some of the streamers in the public eye are burnt out.
What you call elitism I call experience with other games. It's up to you feel offended by what I said.
I call that an appeal to authority. If you have an argument to make it can stand on its own merits without you thumping your chest about your experience. You're not the only one who's played other card games and I don't see how that's terribly relevant to Hearthstone design philosophy.
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Extremely warped? T5 hasn't nerfed Genn or Baku, nor have they hinted that they are going to. Debate with me all you want, but it still isn't changing the fact that the cards are currently here to stay. :)
"Thing hasn't happened yet so it can't happen" is a terrible argument. By that logic heavier-than-air flight was impossible prior to the wright brothers. Before the Patches and Raza nerfs Blizzard had never touched a Wild card. There's a first time for everything.
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Despite your call to ax every thing you find irritating to play with, even when said aggressive decks actually under perform with win rates from more consistent older aggro decks (ie Pre nerf Pirate Warrior), that doesn't mean your personal preference has any meaningful say in what gets removed from the game. The goal of wild isn't to more or less make it the same thing as standard just with a bigger card pool.
Another non-argument. I can turn this same illogic back around on you and insist that just because *your personal preference* is for Wild to remain static and untouched doesn't mean T5 are going to act accordingly.
Obviously our opinions on card game design are subjective preferences, yours included.
It's actually quite relevant. I already mentioned before that more established card games, which HS very much follows the formula of, created formats both for a more static format and one that is quite fluid. If a player has little to no knowledge of the past giants/successes of CCGs, including how they generally have tried to design their various formats, then a newer player would be less likely to understand why HS making its own semi-static format & fluid format would make sense for this game. Hell, even throwing out terms like "eternal format" has the chance to fly completely over the head of some players who only have the knowledge of Hearthstone for a CCG. The relevance is in the breaking down of previous CCG static vs fluid formats if you just cave to every complaint and nerf every complained about card & deck in both standard and wild, because then you no longer have any format in Hearthstone that is static or semi-static, but merely two completely fluid formats with the only difference being the overall card pools.
Is my argument any worse than somebody saying that Genn & Baku needs nerfs because they're stale & 'unbeatable'? There has been zero evidence to suggest Blizzard is currently considering nerfing Genn/Baku at the moment so the opposition to my side of things is just as made up. At least on my end I brought up that other cards & entire decks technically create staleness in the format (and those are not nerfed). Genn & Baku are not even tier 0 (which is almost always when Blizzard steps in to make balance passes in wild). There is currently no objective grounds or hints from Blizzard HQ that either card will be nerfed.
You've established that a forum of public opinion is full of opinions. While I know my take on things is certainly not objective is still does nothing to prove any other opinion here so pointing out that I also have an opinion ultimately accomplishes nothing. I'm still waiting for the logical argument that impossibly proves that most wild players want Genn/Baku nerfed, or that they need to be nerfed.
When is paladin actually going to get more midrange or control synergies? It gets boring seeing a bunch of small minions pushed into paladin for so long.
I think it's a meme and as such until we see how viable that meme is (and given the power levels of aggro at the moment, might not be very viable at all) we shouldn't worry too much about it. It requires all cards in the combo to work.
In wild particularly this concept loses pretty ard to even shaman and odd paladin alone, let alone the many other hyper aggressive decks.
When I first saw this I thought "That shouldn't exist at all," and I still think that, but now I'm not concerned about it ruining the meta, just catching me off guard the 1-2 times it can even happen in the first month of SoU coming out.
On the flip side, Druid has a lot of ways to gain a crazy amount of armor in Wild. This is both a 'win more' condition and also an 'always win in fatigue' condition. They've allowed two turn "win now or else you lose the game to your opponent's combo" things to exist in Wild and totally dodge nerfs, so probably this will too, even though it's really unfair and should be nerfed.
Believe it or not combos and otks are just as much of a valid fair strategy as anything else. If you dedicate your entire deck to a particular strategy then you need a win condition. Draw/cycling and stall is not a win condition, combos can be. I see absolutely no reason why playstyles such as control or midrange are owed any special justification for their existence merely because parts of the playerbase have a glaring bias towards that form of gameplay.
Learn this lesson HS community; just because you don't like something doesn't mean it is unfair.
I wouldn't exactly say Mana Cyclone, CC, and Dr. Boom are cards that are indicative of shying away from power creep. Mana Cyclone already sees play in wild Quest Mage ladder, CC is still extremely good midrange/early late game pressure, and a permanent rush aura (even when not potentially highrolling into desirable hero powers) is extremely potent in grindy attrition games. I've yet to be swayed that strong cards will not eventually compete against many viable odd/even decks. I feel that this debate is just focused on personal dislike of the playstyle as opposed to legitimate reasons why T5 should do a massive power check for multiple decks in an eternal ccg format.
I can't but help you're ignoring what the purpose of wild was intended for. It was for players to play whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted (again with tier 0 caveats). Saying that any card, deck, or playstyle is going to be wild's problem forever is pretty irrelevant when considering what an eternal format is. EVERY card game has a format where you are allowed to use all of your cards and if you didn't want to play against those than most of those card games also had another format to escape such strategies. Why are you so intent on making HS break this mold by essentially doing balance passes on decks in a mode where that isn't intended to happen, solely for the personal preference of just a portion of the format's players? I find this perspective especially annoying when it is spread by players who never were veteran players in any card game prior to Hearthstone. Changing cards in every format because you don't like them actually doesn't follow the CCG model that games like MtG and Yu-Gi-Oh ultimately followed. You want to play with any and all cards in the game? You can do that in one format. You don't want this? You can also do that in another format. Hitting everything with the nerf hammer, even in an eternal format, makes it so that players who have actually supported the product by putting money into it have less return on their contribution because in the end their decks can get broken by the vocal minority anyway.
In the end T5 does not agree with the logic that you are in support of anyway, so ultimately this conversation is null and void, but I thought I'd address this nonetheless because newer/ex-standard players keep advocating for breaking cards or decks that are not tier 0 just so that they don't have to play them/against them. You don't want to face older strategies then go to standard.
What, you're trying to pull some 'veteran card game' elitism act now? Pathetic.
None of those cards you mentioned come even close to Genn, Baku and others cards. Dr. Boom, Mad Genius is ridiculously strong in standard and ridiculously mediocre in wild. Conjurer's Calling sees no play whatsoever in wild and Mana Cyclone only allows for a deck that heavily struggles with consistency (hey, that term sounds familiar). Death knights, quests, LoE explorers are all weaker than their previous iterations. Sure, we might get one or two cards that are strong for wild's standards per expansion but none of these will compare to the power level of past expansions.
Your view on what you think Blizzard's idea of wild is is extremely warped and went out the window the second they nerfed Patches the Pirate and Raza the Chained right before they would be rotated.
I can't play old Undertaker hunter. I can't play old patron warrior. I can't play the old Force of Nature combo. This isn't an eternal format where I can play all the old cards and combos as they used to be. This is some crappy in-between mode where we sort of have all the cards but Blizzard comes in and butchers one or two every now and then as an act of half-assed balancing.
You can try and pretend like you know what wild is supposed to be all you want but when the developers themselves don't even know you just look like a fool.
What you call elitism I call experience with other games. It's up to you feel offended by what I said.
Extremely warped? T5 hasn't nerfed Genn or Baku, nor have they hinted that they are going to. Debate with me all you want, but it still isn't changing the fact that the cards are currently here to stay. :)
Despite your call to ax every thing you find irritating to play with, even when said aggressive decks actually under perform with win rates from more consistent older aggro decks (ie Pre nerf Pirate Warrior), that doesn't mean your personal preference has any meaningful say in what gets removed from the game. The goal of wild isn't to more or less make it the same thing as standard just with a bigger card pool.
You seem overly focused on the 'stale' part, yet this was only one of the few reasons why I'm not opposed to nerfing those cards. Nor did I ever say any of those decks were unbeatable. They're just too consistent at what they do and this won't change. Hence why these decks will forever stay on top in wild.
Your argument about stronger cards being added would've made sense a year ago, but not anymore. Blizzard are purposely shying away from stronger cards to prevent a power creep. Just compare the current highlander cards to their previous League of Explorers iterations. Hence why I believe that we will never see cards as strong as Genn Greymane and Baku the Mooneater ever again.
And if Blizzard actually knew what they were doing they would've a. made counters for Genn and Baku decks in the new expansion or b. altered both cards in a meaningful way. But they didn't do either. They chose for the easy, band-aid solution by making them wild's problem forever.
I wouldn't exactly say Mana Cyclone, CC, and Dr. Boom are cards that are indicative of shying away from power creep. Mana Cyclone already sees play in wild Quest Mage ladder, CC is still extremely good midrange/early late game pressure, and a permanent rush aura (even when not potentially highrolling into desirable hero powers) is extremely potent in grindy attrition games. I've yet to be swayed that strong cards will not eventually compete against many viable odd/even decks. I feel that this debate is just focused on personal dislike of the playstyle as opposed to legitimate reasons why T5 should do a massive power check for multiple decks in an eternal ccg format.
I can't but help you're ignoring what the purpose of wild was intended for. It was for players to play whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted (again with tier 0 caveats). Saying that any card, deck, or playstyle is going to be wild's problem forever is pretty irrelevant when considering what an eternal format is. EVERY card game has a format where you are allowed to use all of your cards and if you didn't want to play against those than most of those card games also had another format to escape such strategies. Why are you so intent on making HS break this mold by essentially doing balance passes on decks in a mode where that isn't intended to happen, solely for the personal preference of just a portion of the format's players? I find this perspective especially annoying when it is spread by players who never were veteran players in any card game prior to Hearthstone. Changing cards in every format because you don't like them actually doesn't follow the CCG model that games like MtG and Yu-Gi-Oh ultimately followed. You want to play with any and all cards in the game? You can do that in one format. You don't want this? You can also do that in another format. Hitting everything with the nerf hammer, even in an eternal format, makes it so that players who have actually supported the product by putting money into it have less return on their contribution because in the end their decks can get broken by the vocal minority anyway.
In the end T5 does not agree with the logic that you are in support of anyway, so ultimately this conversation is null and void, but I thought I'd address this nonetheless because newer/ex-standard players keep advocating for breaking cards or decks that are not tier 0 just so that they don't have to play them/against them. You don't want to face older strategies then go to standard.
If Blizzard could exponentially increase inventory space for item hoarders in WoW almost every single expansion then I really have to criticize the obstacle of increasing deck slot limits in HS. I may be no coder or game designer but that seems like a giant design oversight to have pigeonholed your future players into 9-18 slots almost as soon as your product has been created.
Hell, Blizzard even increased the default WoW backpack size, which they vehemently argued against for years.
If anything the opposition to more deck slots seems more like a money/server issue, not wanting to lose revenue by storing extra data for hundreds of thousands of customers. Blizzard is very much owned by Acti-Greed after all.
Strong doesn't equal broken. You have to have tier 1 decks. If it wasn't Odd Pally it would need to be something else. Tier 0 is what is concerning. Odd Pally, Even Shaman, Odd Rogue still are not warping the entire meta like Giant Lock, Giant Hunter, & SA Druid did, there are obvious counters. The point is that not everyone plays those counters, or the counters are countered by a different deck in the meta so again players don't use them.
For example, I get my first legend (really first time past rank 5 even) with Reno Dragon Priest the season just before the Even Shaman nerf. On the meta snapshot Reno Priest was marked as one of the tier 1 decks (although now it is nowhere to be seen on any tier for some odd reason). I was able to very quickly take myself from being stuck at rank 3 clear up to legend. Want to know my easiest match-up during the grind? Even Shaman (pre nerf). Having a bunch of midrange & late game board clears, along with midrange minions and late game burn easily carried me against one of the "strongest decks in the game". I will admit Odd Pally was still strong due to their persistent staying power and Odd Rogue was 50/50, but I'm bringing this up because there are counters for the decks. Don't allow a tier list to tell you what can or can't beat the meta.
One-dimensionality shouldn't play a role in balance design in most cases. I for one find decks like Reno Lock or Reno Mage just as one dimensional as decks like Even Shaman or Odd Rogue. The more you play a deck the more auto-pilot it becomes due to the skill and familiarity you get with said deck(s).
You seem to be under the impression that a deck needs to be tier 0 with no hard counters before it becomes a nerf candidate. Sure, this might be the cause of Blizzard since that is their mentality towards wild (and even then they take ages to actually do something) but it doesn't necessarily need to be. Just look at rogue in standard. Was it broken before the nerfs to EVIL Miscreant, Raiding Party and Preparation? No, it even had a hard counter which was immensely popular in the form of warrior. Hell, I believe it dropped to tier 2 on vS' meta report right before the nerfs. But it still got nerfed nonetheless.
Odd paladin, even shaman and odd rogue have been the top decks in the wild meta pretty much since Genn and Baku were released. This has not changed and most likely won't ever change unless Blizzard intervene. You ask why reno priest doesn't see play? Because it cannot beat the consistency that Baku provides for odd rogue and odd paladin. Cherry picking a niche deck's winrate against one of the three decks doesn't change that. Hell, odd warrior hard counters all three of those decks. But what's that in its name? Oh wait, it's "odd". Surprise.
One dimensionality shouldn't usually be a factor taken into account when balancing. But when every wild player can pretty much dream the matchup against odd and even decks, because they've been around forever, it becomes extremely stale.
Why do you think Blizzard removed Genn Greymane and Baku the Mooneater from standard and threw them in Hearthstone's dumpster, aka wild, in the first place? Because they're problem cards and Blizzard have no idea what to do with them.
I feel like too much of a standard format philosophy is being used at the basis for your argument. Staleness should NEVER be used as an argument to nerf something in wild (unless again it is due to a massive game warping Tier 0 level of 'staleness'. Eternal formats were never created with the intent to change the deck pool every few months or even every year. That is what CCGs banned list format has been for (Standard in HS' case). You may reference stale match-ups, stale cards, or stale strategies as a reason to change Genn or Baku, but I could just as easily counter argue that plenty of wild-only cards technically make wild classes stale (and always will). Do you honestly think any form of control or combo-oriented warlock deck would ever not use Bloodreaver Gul'Dan, for a perfect example? Many DKs technically would make many classes stale in wild because they are so powerful they are auto-includes for almost any playstyle used by that deck (and they don't even suffer from any glaring weakness like the original 'DK' did in the form of Jarraxus, such as tempo loss by playing a 9 mana card, a cap at low life total, etc).
I don't think you have very high confidence in the wild card pool, or ingenuity of better wild players. Genn & Baku weren't thrown into wild (they technically were already part of wild as soon as they were released) because T5 didn't know what to do with them, it was more because the entire standard format is inherently flawed by rotating out old effective answers and then releasing new cards that technically could be used to answer new problematic decks. In other words, Genn & Baku were HoFed because standard rotated out a bunch of old cards in the past that wild players could use at any time to answer the early/midrange aggressive of odd/even decks. Standard warlocks were utterly screwed against Odd Pally once the format naturally rotated out the ultimate token bane, Defile, but in wild we never lost that option.
I still stand by the stance that odd/even decks are not as terrible of an epidemic as some players want you to think. Even before Even Shaman was nerfed the only odd/even decks I faced were Even Shaman, Odd Rogue, some Odd Pallies, and a rare few Even Warlocks. Even with my "niche deck" I massively sped up my 3-legend wild grind against decks that people bemoaned were 'impossible' to beat during that meta. Odd/even decks have hardly changed since the nerfs, which means they are just as beatable with a variety of wild decks. The key is actually breaking away from 'Be all, end all' meta reports and mindless 'pro player' approved netdecks and dip into older archtypes sometimes or even older tech, instead of taking a standard net deck and plugging in a few wild cards and wondering why Genn/Baku seem to be allegedly invincible.
Another important thing to point out before I end this post is that wild metas have always changed more slowly than standard metas, and this is intended. Please reflect on this for a moment. Metas do change, but if you place the requirement that they change as quickly, or close to as quickly, as standard metas then you already are skewing the basis for your argument for why Genn/Baku 'should' be nerfed. Do you see Christmas Tree Pally around in wild anymore, despite never having received many direct nerfs? Nope, stronger cards replaced it. Do you see as many Even Locks, Murloc Shamans, Tempo Rogues (non-Kingsbane), Miracle Rogues (having never received many direct nerfs), Traditional Freeze Mage (non-quest), legit Spell Hunters, and many more? Nope, most of those have dipped in frequency when compared to when they first became popular due to better cards/decks coming out. Some of those decks have almost 100% dropped out of competitive ladder play altogether (having only received HoF changes as opposed to nerfs). Let's not be so hasty to doubt the powercreep of both control and aggro decks to say that odd/even will never dip in popularity shall we.
Every time midrange/totem shaman was successful in the past their midrange/totem cards were nerfed into high mana cost oblivion. This is just to address the elephant in the room before you even invite it over for dinner.
Just what wild secret mage needed, more burst. It wasn't enough having over 30 damage in spells, not counting any minion attacks, hero power pings, or either Explosive Runes splash damage.
The number of HS formats is not that confusing though. It's two primary formats. Yes, the developers want to keep things simple so that they aren't confusing, but constantly nerfing cards in counter intuitive of that goal. Take WoW for example, there were complaints from returning players who had taken a break and then found that their favorite class(es) were ability pruned or had talents/default abilities changed drastically to the point that they no longer recognized their class. Now of course an MMORPG is much different than a CCG, but the general idea still stands that if you change too much of want returning players enjoyed or were familiar with then they are more likely to be turned off. Having to have returning players return and find any one of the 18 odd/even decks working completely different than they used to before taking a break is likely to risk turning those players off. I think it is safe to say that most players like to be able to pop a game back in and not have to relearn everything again.
Neither of us having evidence means that neither point is proven or disproven. Your stance is no more valid than mine unless concrete evidence is provided so I fail to see why you're debating this point of the topic. Genn/Baku were HoFed because they would have had to have made substantial changes to the cards to provide any form of nerf in standard. Combine that with strong tools like Defile getting rotated out that previously combated Odd Pally and to a lesser extent Even Shaman the cards were HoFed. I've seen no blue posts that have stated that they currently plan to nerf or look at the decks in wild. Suggesting that they do plan to do this with less evidence than this is no more than wishful thinking for ex-standard players wanting to mold their wild experience for everyone else.
Again I can point out multiple cards that make a variety of match-ups/plays predictable. Going against any form of slow control or combo warlock? Prepare to have an answer for a massive board in the late game (including saving a transform effect for Mal'Ganis as mage or shaman so that you don't instantly lose to 30+ stats on the board when Mal'Ganis is used). Going against any form of aggressive paladin list? Try to dump your hand as best as you are able from the get go so you don't give your opponent insane refill value and renewed steam to smorc your face. Going against pretty much any kind of wild mage as an OTK player? Be prepared to pop their 1+ number of Ice Blocks before using your combo or attempt to find an alternate win condition. Obviously there's plenty of more examples, but the classes are extremely scripted with how games turn out nowadays. Genn/Baku having their effects active from turn 1 doesn't really make them that much more predictable than pretty much any other deck. The reason it seems like they are more predictable is because most of the complained about decks are aggressive decks that do not end the game in the late game while the few classes I mentioned above have their predictable plays happening in the late game (which isn't seen as often as the early game due to the existence of aggro). If aggro was incredibly weak and you saw games extend late most of the time you would see how predictable the many control decks are as well).
I'm arguing that in the current moment we have no evidence that they are going to be nerfed. It's pointless to argue that any card can technically be nerfed out of the blue because a couple cards have in the past. If I cared enough I could make the argument that any card could be nerfed then and we wouldn't be able to anticipate it.
The following are taken from Urban Dictionary and Dictionary.com
Flaming: " To engage in an online argument usually involving unfounded personal attacks by one or more parties."
Debate: "a discussion, as of a public question in an assembly, involving opposing viewpoints"
The one thing I will concede to is that the person I quoted earlier didn't directly say that they found Genn/Baku decks irritating, but it was certainly implied. So my calling out of their wish to kill a deck that they found irritating wasn't completely unfounded. I feel you are reaching to call me a flamer however, considering that in nowise have I called any person a name of personal insult, hate, etc nor have I cast aside the viewpoints of my argument to instead deride a person on topics completely personal and unrelated to Genn & Baku nerfs.
It sounds like an interesting idea for standard.
However, metas would still eventually stagnate. The difference would be that the mini-metas just wouldn't last more than that one month. It also wouldn't necessarily mean that random clown fiesta homebrews would hit legend as consistently as more refined decks.
Wild getting new cards in no wise means it isn't fairly static. Both MtG and Yu-Gi-Oh had new cards added to their non-banned list formats as well but the developers didn't try micro managing popular decks in most cases for the sake of changing things that weren't broken in order make said involved formats a mirrored copy of the banned list formats.
I'm sorry but "a large number of players" hating something means absolutely nothing. Care to provide actual statistics or percentages to tell us what that is objectively supposed to mean? I'll wait while you pull those up. The thing is that I could just as easily do a survey of a random 1,000 HS players and find hundreds of players who hate control decks (even they're just tier 1 or 2) and say the exact same thing that you're saying (that a "large number of players" hate control decks). That doesn't mean it is anywhere near a majority of players.
You also have to consider the actual regular wild audience more than the standard format audience. We don't go around balancing standard around the wild players, so in the end it is the wild players' feeling towards the cards in the wild format that matter much more than the standard players. Also note that the devs HoFed them because they were a problem in STANDARD, and not as big of an issue in wild. Hell, standard players b*tched and moaned about Odd Mage, of all things, for a period of time. Yet the deck was a vastly inferior version of Reno Mage in wild. Even the Even Lock deck saw considerably less play in wild than it did in standard. Please don't try to say that Genn & Baku were considered as big of a problem in wild as they were in standard considering fewer of the decks saw play in wild AND in wild it's much easier to stabalize against the aggression with some classes (one glaring example being Voidcaller into Void Lord). It's interesting you criticize my assumptions and then try to assert your own baseless assumptions instead, especially when they are picked apart as easily.
Are you actually going to answer where the evidence is for T5 deciding to nerf Genn/Baku in wild or are you intentionally trying to throw the conversation in a different direction? You can't just say that cards are randomly nerfed at times as a strong indicator that Genn/Baku could be nerfed. It is still out of thin air guesswork with no concrete foundation to stand on.
Point out to me how I mocked any person here and I'll gladly apologize. However, I know I did not. I'm all for "mocking" (breaking apart) weak arguments or biased rationales to nerf something when the ideas are deserving of it. If you say a non-tier 0 deck should be nerfed, and all the reasons you provide for that argument is that you find the match-up boring then you should expect that I will provide counter arguments that point out your bias and why it shouldn't be nerfed for the reasons that person provided. I am well aware of the difference between mocking/flaming a person and opposing emotionless ideas and arguments.
I started playing wild immediately as soon the as the split happened. A couple reasons kept me playing wild early on (and still playing) and that was 1) I like the idea of 'owning' my cards instead of constantly throwing them away not that long down the road and 2) I enjoy combos and OTKs (especially meme ones) instead of following the same scripted standard metas where control and aggro play out almost exactly the same way that they always do.
I first started thinking about this after noticing that Disguised Toast was doing a card reveal (and how he has been rather out of the HS spotlight for the time being, at least until new content releases). Then I thought back to Savjz (who I used to consume his Youtube content regularly before he quit HS. Now, I'm not saying that all streamers are burnt out on the game or that they even dislike the game. Nor, am I saying that specific streamers such as Toast are necessarily burnt out, as opposed to just taking a break (although at times I wonder if he really enjoys the game as much as his persona tries to sell his HS content, but that is complete conjecture).
However, it led me to the question in the title. If a streamer did start burning out and for whatever reason (mostly money probably) did not just quit the game and move on to something else, then would their half-hearted image and involvement in the game really be more of a good thing? I can't help but feel it would just create a little bit more potential for negativity in the community, or at least the false impression that the average player doesn't have fun with the game if some of the streamers in the public eye are burnt out.
Thoughts?
It's actually quite relevant. I already mentioned before that more established card games, which HS very much follows the formula of, created formats both for a more static format and one that is quite fluid. If a player has little to no knowledge of the past giants/successes of CCGs, including how they generally have tried to design their various formats, then a newer player would be less likely to understand why HS making its own semi-static format & fluid format would make sense for this game. Hell, even throwing out terms like "eternal format" has the chance to fly completely over the head of some players who only have the knowledge of Hearthstone for a CCG. The relevance is in the breaking down of previous CCG static vs fluid formats if you just cave to every complaint and nerf every complained about card & deck in both standard and wild, because then you no longer have any format in Hearthstone that is static or semi-static, but merely two completely fluid formats with the only difference being the overall card pools.
Is my argument any worse than somebody saying that Genn & Baku needs nerfs because they're stale & 'unbeatable'? There has been zero evidence to suggest Blizzard is currently considering nerfing Genn/Baku at the moment so the opposition to my side of things is just as made up. At least on my end I brought up that other cards & entire decks technically create staleness in the format (and those are not nerfed). Genn & Baku are not even tier 0 (which is almost always when Blizzard steps in to make balance passes in wild). There is currently no objective grounds or hints from Blizzard HQ that either card will be nerfed.
You've established that a forum of public opinion is full of opinions. While I know my take on things is certainly not objective is still does nothing to prove any other opinion here so pointing out that I also have an opinion ultimately accomplishes nothing. I'm still waiting for the logical argument that impossibly proves that most wild players want Genn/Baku nerfed, or that they need to be nerfed.
When is paladin actually going to get more midrange or control synergies? It gets boring seeing a bunch of small minions pushed into paladin for so long.
Believe it or not combos and otks are just as much of a valid fair strategy as anything else. If you dedicate your entire deck to a particular strategy then you need a win condition. Draw/cycling and stall is not a win condition, combos can be. I see absolutely no reason why playstyles such as control or midrange are owed any special justification for their existence merely because parts of the playerbase have a glaring bias towards that form of gameplay.
Learn this lesson HS community; just because you don't like something doesn't mean it is unfair.
What you call elitism I call experience with other games. It's up to you feel offended by what I said.
Extremely warped? T5 hasn't nerfed Genn or Baku, nor have they hinted that they are going to. Debate with me all you want, but it still isn't changing the fact that the cards are currently here to stay. :)
Despite your call to ax every thing you find irritating to play with, even when said aggressive decks actually under perform with win rates from more consistent older aggro decks (ie Pre nerf Pirate Warrior), that doesn't mean your personal preference has any meaningful say in what gets removed from the game. The goal of wild isn't to more or less make it the same thing as standard just with a bigger card pool.
I'm sure warriors will want to play this instead of Boom.
Who wouldn't want a weaker value generator/questionable midrange pressure card in place of a permanent rush aura/occasional value generator?
RIP King Mosh
The power creep is real.
T5 already hinted at either HoFing, or nerfing Divine Spirit with one of their last interviews. That should be kept in mind in regards to this card.
I wouldn't exactly say Mana Cyclone, CC, and Dr. Boom are cards that are indicative of shying away from power creep. Mana Cyclone already sees play in wild Quest Mage ladder, CC is still extremely good midrange/early late game pressure, and a permanent rush aura (even when not potentially highrolling into desirable hero powers) is extremely potent in grindy attrition games. I've yet to be swayed that strong cards will not eventually compete against many viable odd/even decks. I feel that this debate is just focused on personal dislike of the playstyle as opposed to legitimate reasons why T5 should do a massive power check for multiple decks in an eternal ccg format.
I can't but help you're ignoring what the purpose of wild was intended for. It was for players to play whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted (again with tier 0 caveats). Saying that any card, deck, or playstyle is going to be wild's problem forever is pretty irrelevant when considering what an eternal format is. EVERY card game has a format where you are allowed to use all of your cards and if you didn't want to play against those than most of those card games also had another format to escape such strategies. Why are you so intent on making HS break this mold by essentially doing balance passes on decks in a mode where that isn't intended to happen, solely for the personal preference of just a portion of the format's players? I find this perspective especially annoying when it is spread by players who never were veteran players in any card game prior to Hearthstone. Changing cards in every format because you don't like them actually doesn't follow the CCG model that games like MtG and Yu-Gi-Oh ultimately followed. You want to play with any and all cards in the game? You can do that in one format. You don't want this? You can also do that in another format. Hitting everything with the nerf hammer, even in an eternal format, makes it so that players who have actually supported the product by putting money into it have less return on their contribution because in the end their decks can get broken by the vocal minority anyway.
In the end T5 does not agree with the logic that you are in support of anyway, so ultimately this conversation is null and void, but I thought I'd address this nonetheless because newer/ex-standard players keep advocating for breaking cards or decks that are not tier 0 just so that they don't have to play them/against them. You don't want to face older strategies then go to standard.
Behold, the HS version of the Yu-Gi-Oh Victory Dragon meme!
If Blizzard could exponentially increase inventory space for item hoarders in WoW almost every single expansion then I really have to criticize the obstacle of increasing deck slot limits in HS. I may be no coder or game designer but that seems like a giant design oversight to have pigeonholed your future players into 9-18 slots almost as soon as your product has been created.
Hell, Blizzard even increased the default WoW backpack size, which they vehemently argued against for years.
If anything the opposition to more deck slots seems more like a money/server issue, not wanting to lose revenue by storing extra data for hundreds of thousands of customers. Blizzard is very much owned by Acti-Greed after all.
FOMO.
I played WoW for over 10 years and hated missing out of cool mounts, titles, gear, achs, etc if I didn't pump the content hard.
You never know which old heroes will or will not actually be brought back on the BMAH, er on the Blizzard store.
I feel like too much of a standard format philosophy is being used at the basis for your argument. Staleness should NEVER be used as an argument to nerf something in wild (unless again it is due to a massive game warping Tier 0 level of 'staleness'. Eternal formats were never created with the intent to change the deck pool every few months or even every year. That is what CCGs banned list format has been for (Standard in HS' case). You may reference stale match-ups, stale cards, or stale strategies as a reason to change Genn or Baku, but I could just as easily counter argue that plenty of wild-only cards technically make wild classes stale (and always will). Do you honestly think any form of control or combo-oriented warlock deck would ever not use Bloodreaver Gul'Dan, for a perfect example? Many DKs technically would make many classes stale in wild because they are so powerful they are auto-includes for almost any playstyle used by that deck (and they don't even suffer from any glaring weakness like the original 'DK' did in the form of Jarraxus, such as tempo loss by playing a 9 mana card, a cap at low life total, etc).
I don't think you have very high confidence in the wild card pool, or ingenuity of better wild players. Genn & Baku weren't thrown into wild (they technically were already part of wild as soon as they were released) because T5 didn't know what to do with them, it was more because the entire standard format is inherently flawed by rotating out old effective answers and then releasing new cards that technically could be used to answer new problematic decks. In other words, Genn & Baku were HoFed because standard rotated out a bunch of old cards in the past that wild players could use at any time to answer the early/midrange aggressive of odd/even decks. Standard warlocks were utterly screwed against Odd Pally once the format naturally rotated out the ultimate token bane, Defile, but in wild we never lost that option.
I still stand by the stance that odd/even decks are not as terrible of an epidemic as some players want you to think. Even before Even Shaman was nerfed the only odd/even decks I faced were Even Shaman, Odd Rogue, some Odd Pallies, and a rare few Even Warlocks. Even with my "niche deck" I massively sped up my 3-legend wild grind against decks that people bemoaned were 'impossible' to beat during that meta. Odd/even decks have hardly changed since the nerfs, which means they are just as beatable with a variety of wild decks. The key is actually breaking away from 'Be all, end all' meta reports and mindless 'pro player' approved netdecks and dip into older archtypes sometimes or even older tech, instead of taking a standard net deck and plugging in a few wild cards and wondering why Genn/Baku seem to be allegedly invincible.
Another important thing to point out before I end this post is that wild metas have always changed more slowly than standard metas, and this is intended. Please reflect on this for a moment. Metas do change, but if you place the requirement that they change as quickly, or close to as quickly, as standard metas then you already are skewing the basis for your argument for why Genn/Baku 'should' be nerfed. Do you see Christmas Tree Pally around in wild anymore, despite never having received many direct nerfs? Nope, stronger cards replaced it. Do you see as many Even Locks, Murloc Shamans, Tempo Rogues (non-Kingsbane), Miracle Rogues (having never received many direct nerfs), Traditional Freeze Mage (non-quest), legit Spell Hunters, and many more? Nope, most of those have dipped in frequency when compared to when they first became popular due to better cards/decks coming out. Some of those decks have almost 100% dropped out of competitive ladder play altogether (having only received HoF changes as opposed to nerfs). Let's not be so hasty to doubt the powercreep of both control and aggro decks to say that odd/even will never dip in popularity shall we.
"Discover a copy of a random Arcane Missiles type effect and cast it on a random enemy opponent's face."
Seems legit.
Premptive nerfing :P
Every time midrange/totem shaman was successful in the past their midrange/totem cards were nerfed into high mana cost oblivion. This is just to address the elephant in the room before you even invite it over for dinner.
Just what wild secret mage needed, more burst. It wasn't enough having over 30 damage in spells, not counting any minion attacks, hero power pings, or either Explosive Runes splash damage.