A new blog post has just released, detailing a dozen card changes coming to the game on Monday 18th.
Nerfed cards will be eligible for a refund until June 1st.
The patch also brings a bug fix for Ethereal Conjurer, which was causing the game to lock by not offering any Discover options.
Quote From Hearthstone On May 18, we’ll be releasing a 17.2.1 balance patch that includes updates for a dozen cards in Standard, as well as a bug fix for Ethereal Conjurer.
Balance Updates
Old: [Cost 2] 2 Attack, 3 Health → New: [Cost 1] 1 Attack, 3 Health.
Old: [Cost 5] → New: [Cost 4].
Old: 4 Attack, 6 Health → New: 5 Attack, 6 Health.
Old: 6 Attack, 3 Health → New: 6 Attack, 5 Health.
The 8 cards below will be eligible for a full dust refund until June 1.
Old: 6 Attack, 7 Health → New: 6 Attack, 5 Health.
Old: 2 Attack, 1 Health → New: 1 Attack, 1 Health.
Old: Draw a Beast. Give it +3/+3. → New: Draw a Beast. Give it +2/+2.
Old: 1 Attack, 5 Health → New: 1 Attack, 4 Health.
Old: Battlecry: If you control a Secret, return a minion to its owner’s hand. It costs (2) more. → New: Battlecry: If you control a Secret, return a minion to its owner’s hand. It costs (1) more.
Old: Dormant for 2 turns. When this awakens, give all minions in your hand +2/+2. → New: Dormant for 2 turns. When this awakens, give all minions in your hand +2/+1.
Old: 6 Attack, 8 Health → New: 5 Attack, 8 Health.
Old: 3 Attack, 3 Health → New: 2 Attack, 2 Health.
Game Improvements and Bug Fixes
- Ethereal Conjurer will now function correctly and will no longer lock the game state when played.
Comments
I agree to all of this, but not the part about Torrent. There'll only be a change of the base cost, not how much it is reduced, so you'll have a 'one mana deal 8 to a minion' spell which is great imo!
Time to craft Shadowjeweler Hanar so I can take him for a free test drive!
All 3 big decks take a nerf, seems fair, especially since these nerves are weakening the stats but not the role of the card, so it seems sensible.
I don't even want to dust the nerfed cards cause I know they still have some use.
In the end we can hope for more tier 1 decks.
Ineteresting.
Here's my two cents regarding the current policy on balance: it sucks. No sugarcoating it, the current design process on Hearthstone sucks.
Back when people would get angry over no changes and broken cards running rampant for months and months on end, there was a clear design policy: try and design cards that were balanced. T5 would sometimes fail on that policy (hello, Undertaker who lived without its nerf for 6 months, for example), but they tried to actually follow a path of balancing cards for the sake of having a balanced game.
Currently, however, the design seems more like "let's make a brutal amount of broken cards and slowly nerf them all so we don't need to try and balance the game and, as a bonus, get that sweet extra money". And the sad part is that people prefer this method, apparently. I mean, why focus money and time on balancing, for example, Priestess of Fury or Skull of Gul'dan and perhaps get criticized for doing it poorly, when you can release it as a clearly broken card, have the criticism anyway and, when you finally work around balancing, you get praised and people give you more money because you "listen to criticism and acted on it". That is not trying to make a competitive and balanced card game, that is us, Hearthstone's playerbase, spending money to do the balancing team's job.
And I know adding one new class means new class interactions that can shift the meta forever and in completely unpredictable ways, but what about the possibility of releasing Demon Hunter as a beta class instead? And you you're wondering how that could be done, it's simple: anyone can try on casual so T5 can still have the numbers on how the class plays out against other archetypes instead of releasing it fully to destroy ranked mode for two months. Hell, if T5 were to do it that way, they would have even more veried numbers, as playing on casual means people are more apt to experiment, giving some insight on how the class works against weaker archetypes like, for example, Heal Druid (yeah, that's something that was pushed by Blizzard for one expansion, remember?). And if they were afraid people wouldn't play in casual because they don't want to play for no rewards, just throw a couple of carrots on a stick like special card backs or unlocking new emotes (they have the "Sorry" emote on hold, at the very least), something that they can do with minimal effort and minimal downside in revenue and actually keep the game competitive without being completely broken.
I totally agree with you OP.
Sadly, people like to live in an eternal PTR, confusing it with dynamic content release.
People like to be overwhelmed and get bitter at broken stuff, and appreciate the subsequent relievement of nerfs even more.
I'm fairly happy with most buffs, but most nerfs happen on stupidly and obviously broken cards, over and over, as if we players were a bunch of chimps (with all due respect for chimps).
We'll both be downvoted for disagreeing with this policy.
No, you'll both be downvoted because the majority of people just straight up disagree with your opinion. "People like to be overwhelmed and get bitter at broken stuff"...have you even read your own sentence?
People like a living metagame, where things don't just get released and left alone for the rest of eternity. If you play an eternal format in card games, like Legacy in MtG, or Wild in Hearthstone, it is expected that things will change slowly, with like one or two strong things coming in per expansion, if you're lucky. Ever since the release of AoO, the Wild meta has barely had time to become stable, stale and boring. Why? Because the devs keep on meddling in it, changing things up, buffing things that disappointed, nerfing things that got a little too out of hand. I was at a point where I felt I got Buff Paladin kinda figured out, knew where its place was, no point testing it anymore and bam, Libram buff, time to give it another whirl.
It's good for competitive players to keep things fresh, and it's good for brewers like me who like to have things to discover and figure out constantly. It's just good for the health of the game to have an active development team rather than one that releases a 100 % guaranteed balanced and fine tuned set and the next time you hear of them is when the next one is coming up 4 months later. We've been there. We've seen it. We don't need to go back to it cause we know where it leads: the game gets boring and stale about a month into the new expansion.
If you check my opinion of Blackjack Stunner on the card's page, I said the card would be good at 3 mana with the current stats and effect, because the tempo swing of what could be described as a 1 mana 1/2 Sap would still be decent if the overall power level of the game would grow linearly rather than exponencially, which is what it feels right now.
That's why over tuning cards you know will end up scaled back should not be a goal of an expansion, even for the sake of keeping things fresh. Last year proved you can do that in many different ways, from releasing a handful of cards from wild to buffs for every class. Sure, said ideas would be more challenging when a new class is introduced, but that would be the point of a DH beta state (I mean, look at Battlegrounds, that mode is still in beta and was released before DH). In fact, when you consider there are 4 ranked seasons for each expansion, we could have something along the likes of, quick example, first two seasons with just the new cards, third season with extra cards thrown in and/or a couple cards banned and a final season with temporary buffs/changes before, like, a final week of that season to play with cards from the next expansion as a test run.
You don't need to show activity by constant nerfs. Or by giving Paladin their version of Northshire Cleric into 2 mana Extra Arms because their major expansion theme flopped yet again. These constant changes show that Blizzard have less than ideal control over their product under the disguise of activity.
One last thing: the whole deck brewer thing was possible in the older metas. In fact, I would argue it was, in my experience, much less punishing to go with cards and ideas that were on the weaker side because, again, the power level of the stronger cards was much more in line with them (example: I would try to put at least one copy of my favorite card Bomb Lobber in virtually every deck, even decks that got little to no benefit to having that card and I would have some degree of success with it. Last expansion, I slapped two Troll Batriders [basically a more powerful version of Bomb Lobber] in my Quest non-Galakrond Shaman as an early game tool/extra board control for Shudderwock and I quickly ended up scrapping it as it just couldn't compete with the overall powerlevel of the game).
Do you want a fresh and dynamic meta? Release new cards more often.
Simple as that.
No need to release broken cards just to have something to nerf.
The buffs is a different matter and I said it (maybe YOU should read better?): I'm fine with buffing cards that proved underwhelming (it's obviously better than powercreeping within the same expansion).
Nerfing obviously broken cards is like throwing crap on your car to have a good reason to wash it and fool yourself in thinking it looks like a new one.
Fine if you like it, fine if you disagree with me. Just be aware of it, instead of blaming me for pointing it out
"Release new cards more often" is so incredibly far from the simple task you make it out to be. Not only do all those new cards have to be designed, balanced and integrated into the game by the developers, we as players also have to have a way of collecting them, meaning more money required just to keep up.
I also think it's weird that you assume malice on the part of the developers in releasing 'broken' cards. It's not like there's some magical formula that they can perfectly balance cards with and they just choose not to use it so they can change up the meta with nerfs after a month; they just fuck up sometimes and correct their mistakes when the data rolls in.
Was Demon Hunter more pushed than new cards normally are? Yeah! I totally understand wanting people to play your new class and getting really excited by all the cool new cards you're making and just overshooting the balance. Thankfully, they've made frequent and quick adjustments, and Demon Hunter is now in a much better place.
Cards are only 'obviously broken' to us because we all collectively play millions of games and quickly sort out the good from the bad, and then just play the good. The Devs need to balance every card, and have far less people available for the testing. Now, there have been two big recent misses - super early Gala Shaman and super early Demon Hunter - but both were course corrected very quickly, and received further balancing after more data came in.
I just don't see this 'trend' of not testing cards or deliberately releasing broken cards or whatever. Whenever something has been broken, they've just decided they're now actually going to balance it quickly, instead of waiting around because they don't want to admit the mistake like they used to do.
I don't really suppose malice from the devs, just an incredibly obvious maximum outcome with least effort, that the playerbase perceives as a positive revolution made for them.
But it's far from optimal from the customer point of view. They probably changed very little on their side: they just refine less before releasing, and they let us test it.
As I said in another comment, it's just a huge PTR.
And no, the obviously broken cards were truly obvious. No need for testing. Some are still out there btw. Let's be honest.
People like it, and I accept it.
I'm pointing out the appeasement of the perception (because this does not push for improvement), not malice.
You've somehow built up this assumption of what goes on backstage and you're painting everything you see in the game with that brush to suit your argument, IMO. You're talking as if the way things were designed previously was better and more refined than it is now and they've just started slacking. Was TGT a more refined product? Was Karazan? Shamans of Shamanstone ring a bell? The difference is, in the past they would release these broken or lackluster expansions and they'd just leave them like that for months. Maybe out of fear of breaking something, they might have held back on power level because their reponse times were so slow. Maybe that's how TGT happened, and how Grimy Goons happened. We can speculate all we want. But we can, I'd say, agree on the fact it sucked. The things that sucked (Grimy Goons, Inspire, Joust) continued sucking forever and the broken things would get nerfed into the ground after a few months at best. If an expansion released weak, boring and underpowered, well, better hope the next one's good in 3-4 months, cause things aren't getting better until then. What's buffing cards anyway?
Are they now swinging for the fences and trying to make things as busted as possible? I'd say evidence speaks to the contrary, seeing the state many classes and mechanics are in this expansion and in expansions prior. I mean, the buffs to Boomsday cards didn't happen for no reason, a lot of Boomsday underperformed. So did a lot of Rastakhan's Rumble. Is the current metagame more busted and imbalanced than Knights of the Frozen Throne? I'd say no. The amount of "I drew it first so I win" and single-card win condition has dropped drastically I'd say. Compare the Death Knight cycle to the Prime cycle. Does that seem juiced to the moon to you?
But even IF they were going for the new MtG approach (as in, make everything broken then completely ban the worst of it), they're also taking the appropriate approach to it by being quick to react if things are busted. And more than that, they're going out of their way to also bring up some of the things that didn't pan out. Where most games would just nerf everything to the weakest class's level, instead classes are getting brought up from the bottom (where was that attitude in Mean Streets of Gadgetzan?). And was DH overtuned? Absolutely. But unless they were releasing it just for standard, it kinda had to be to make any mark on Wild. As much as I hate much of what DH did in Wild, at least it was a presence rather than a complete non-factor that we'd have two wait 2 more years for before it becomes competitive in any way.
This assumption that they're just shoveling these cards out there willy nilly with the attitude "we'll fix it later" is just that. An assumption. One that cannot be proven or disproven either way by hard facts. Which is why it's best to not let your assumptions colour your arguments. Facts are facts. Things were broken, now they're less so. Things were weak, not they're stronger. Past status quo? Things are weak? Eh, whatever. Things are too strong? We'll fix it. In 2 1/2 months. Maybe. Marked improvement for the better that's hard to argue with and a more dynamic meta that keeps things fresh when they'd be getting stale. For my money, that's a win. I'd rather have another DH release with three quick rounds of nerfs than another Naga Sea Witch situation.
I didn't say before was better.
I am saying that now is not as better as people perceive it to be.
At the end of the day, anything is an assumption, including yours. I am also talking of facts, it's just that you refuse to see them.
But if we look at the bare effects here, is that with people being happy with the current policy, there will hardly be room for further improvement (eg. release more interesting and varied cards, and less OP BS). Why improvimg if people are content?
Also, the surface of things IS a PTR mode, whether it is in the backoffice or not. I am discussing what we get (obviously OP stuff that requires multiple nerfs, it happened twice in a row now after Galakrond Shaman), what we perceive (we are happy with the nerfs, instead of being frustrated with such releases), and how the devs adjust the game (keep going with this policy, instead of more internal testing, and more variety in card design and card release).
I hope I made my point clear here: all I am concerned about is exactly the dynamic future of the game.
PS: this 3rd round of nerfs didn't really come soon enough.
My reaction was mostly over the game's overall powercreep and how DH should have had a beta stage rather than released as it was. Hearthstone feels frustrating right now because of those factors, at least to me.
I believe a more sensible design process could be made, mostly because it was made throughout HS's early history. I welcomed DH as something new and exciting for example, and I will welcome more bold ideas like these as long as they do it in a manner that allows for the game to react to those changes.
If DH was released as a beta like I said, all the changes announced would have been fine by me. The class needs games and time to be balanced.
PS: Do you mind me asking what do you mean by "eternal PTR"?
"PTR" stands for Public Test Realm, a location where the developers can introduce beta elements and make changes after player feedback and testing. It's a bridge between alpha still-in-development projects and actual live gameplay. Games like League of Legends and Overwatch do this; the implication is that Hearthstone's live state *is* the Public Test Realm, and we're all beta testers on a permanent basis. I don't necessarily agree with that assertion, but I believe that's what RavenSunHS is getting at.
That.
Either I am right with the PTR assertion, or we should believe the devs genuinely thought the original Galakrond Shaman and DH could be fine as they were.
Once can be a mistake, twice is not anymore: it's a policy.
Balancing a game is extremely hard and time consuming but when you can collect the data from thousands of games that can lead to better data. One reason I really like this kind of balancing personally is it gives leeway for more powerful and interesting things that they would likely never have even tried in the first place out of fear of being unable to balance it. There are Pros and Cons to both ways of doing it but to say this isn't balancing and is just a cash grab is a bit more cynical than the truth of how these things work.
Wasn't trying to make it sound like balancing was just a cash grab but upon rereading my comment I can see what you mean, maybe my reaction was a bit hotheaded.
I'm just not a fan of having around 19 nerfs in half an expansion cycle for standard alone (I could have miscounted) nor am I a fan of insane powercreeping (I recognize powercreep is a part of virtually every card game, but it appears a bit over the top these last 4 to 6 expansions). Even the buffs seem more like T5 is forcing archetypes right now rather than bringing more stuff or more interactions over more expansions. Just look at Libram Paladin: the archetype is relatively well balanced, but's not that great right now because of the overall powerlevel of the game. 3 years ago, however, it would have been borderline broken.
EDIT: I also gave an idea on how to get some data for balancing purposes without disrupting ranked or tournament gameplay. Losing a game that decided you're getting 100$ or 10000$ on a tournament because you just got steamrolled by broken cards over and over again seems very unfair.
The thing is all the Pros all have access to the same cards so if they lose out on that kind of money usually it is decision based not because something is broken(they can play the broken thing too). And yeah sometimes they lose out on money because of RNG but that is card games and they are or at least should be well aware of that. But to the point of the way you suggested they do balance, that is one way to tackle it but from experience with smaller physical card games it does not even come close to finding the kind of data you get from live play. As it turns out unpaid play testers are still going to be a small group and not all that motivated because they are just testing with no real reward other than satisfaction that you are making the game slightly better which only goes so far. So stuff will still either slip through or just get scrapped because it is too much work. Like I said in the first comment there are Pros and Cons to both ways personally I believe the way they are doing it now is the better way to do it, there is no harm in disagreeing.
Not in the mood to go deep on all of these but from a Wild perspective, the DH nerfs are huge and absolutely warranted (especially the Priestess, that card was nowhere near reasonable). The Aldor Attendant buff turns the Buff Paladin deck from an archetype that has potential to I'd say an actual competitor in the meta. I've already had some very surprising success with the deck as is and this just kicks its competitiveness up a notch. The Lurker Below buff is just...wow. The card is already surprisingly good in Quest Shaman and Evolve Shaman (not that those are the top of the meta by any means) and now it's essentially a strictly better Fire Elemental. That's kinda crazy. You'd have to have serious reasons NOT to run the card which...I mean that's kinda overdoing it IMO. If Even Shamans were annoying with their "oops Wrath of Air + Maelstrom Portal", they'll now be packing this. We really don't need autoincludes in the game, and we just got one. Hopefully this won't lead to Shamans of Shamanstone. The rest is not a big deal for Wild but I am kinda bummed by the nerf to Scavenger's Ingenuity. Not sure why that was needed. I've had some decent fun with Dire Frenzy + Master's Call Spell Hunter and now it's weaker.
Well, the Lurker is NOT strictlt better than the Fire Elemental - it cannot hit face