Hearthstone Game Designer, Alec Dawson, responded to a thread on Twitter on the weekend and commented about everyone's favourite Hearthstone class, Paladin.
According to Alec, Paladins are still a bit stronger than they'd like but the rest of the balance patch has been hitting their intentions. Consistency in how Blizzard has been balancing over the last "year or so" with lighter touches to cards instead of outright killing decks is the goal and they seem to be going a solid job at it - if you're asking me.
He goes on to mention that the buffs were there to fix some cards to proper costs for their power and that some of the buffs were to set up classes for the future. This could mean that some of the buffs we saw are going to see some synergies within the upcoming Forged in the Barrens miniset, or that Blizzard is looking even further at that which would be the next expansion that should be releasing around the end of July or beginning of August.
Further, on the subject of Blizzard's communication and how there was some disappointment when Alec stated the changes were going to be "spicy", he does believe they can do a better job at communicating. Alec continues by saying that although balance changes can help with shifts, we should be looking forward to the minisets and expansions for larger changeups.
Meta Changes via HSReplay
The whole discussion was brought on by HSReplay's Director of Business, Tiago Taparelli. Inside his chain of tweets, he stated he believes the patch was reasonably successful in addressing the meta with a nudge rather than significant changes, which was confirmed by Alec. Here's what Tiago had to say when looking at the data.
- Paladin and Mage’s popularity decreased substantially.
- Druid and Demon Hunter had a significant uplift in winrate & popularity.
- Matchup polarization improved overall.
Though, he goes on to mention that Hearthstone still needs to see some improvements.
- Shaman remains unplayable at most (if not all) ranks.
- Paladin is still way too strong and consistent across the board.
- Many of the new archetypes failed to gain a significant foothold in the meta..
Quote From Alec Dawson I’m seeing a lot of discussion about the impact of the recent nerfs and buffs (or lack thereof) in the meta. As usual a lot of it revolves around @HSReplayNet’s data, so I’d like to share some of my thoughts and additional data on the matter. 1/6 https://t.co/d0HaEvnBYY
I think @WickedGood hit the nail on the head as far as mismatched expectations being behind a lot of player’s frustration. I believe this patch was meant to nudge the meta in the right direction, not significantly change it. This is what the mini-set will be here for. 2/6 https://t.co/A7irZumLCy
If that was the intended goal, I’d say the patch was reasonably successful. Looking at Legend-only data: - Paladin and Mage’s popularity decreased substantially - Druid and Demon Hunter had a significant uplift in winrate & popularity - Matchup polarization improved overall 3/6 https://t.co/1pyF0I4BFd
That doesn’t mean there aren’t things that need to be improved: - Shaman remains unplayable at most (if not all) ranks - Paladin is still way too strong and consistent across the board - Many of the new archetypes failed to gain a significant foothold in the meta 4/6
With all that said I’d love to hear from the HS team if that was truly their goal with this patch, and whether they believe that goal was achieved. @Celestalon @IksarHS @GW_Alec 5/6
Paladin a little stronger than we’d like but everything else is hitting on the intentions. Most of the buffs were to set up classes for the future or do some cost correction. Player expectations surrounding patch can be hard to manage (people have different spice tolerance 😅). (Source)
But we can see that and adjust how some of the communication goes out. We’ve been fairly consistent in the way we balance over the last year or so (lighter touches, usually don’t kill decks) and can do a better job of getting that message out. (Source)
In the end though our expansions and mini sets will act as opportunities for bigger landscape shifts. Less likely to see that in our frequent balance changes unless something is very off. (Source)
To be fair your tweet indicating it would be "spicy" heightened expectations a lot and could partially be attributed to why people feel let down. Not trying to hate on you just putting that out there.
No hate detected ❤️ (Source)
Did the team not anticipate the resurgence of Secret Libram Paladin by the nerfs? Arguably First Day wasn't a nerf for that deck, and it seems the only thing depressing it was Aggro/Secret Paladin. It was already a deck with a high win rate, just waiting to be unleashed.
We did, reason we touched First Day of School instead of something like Conviction. Things are still early so we'll see how that particular change ends up over time. (Source)
How do you feel about the current meta in Hearthstone? Let us know in the comments below!
Comments
Tier S is an overexaggaretion. It's true that it has been one of the strongest decks since FitB launch, but it's not unbeatable and certainly nothing compared to Day 1 DH or Galakrond Shaman. The nerfs also never aimed removing the deck for the meta, but to slightly weaken it to bring it closer to the other decks.
Shaman Tier4ever KEK
I actually have been thinking about it for a while, and in my opinion the problem might be thus;
- Removal options have substantially decreased due to the core set introduction and we're still currently on the first of three expansions means this is the least amount of cards we have at our disposal. Paladin's ability to keep the board is therefore more secure than it's ever been.
- Via three new cards; Sword of the Fallen, Knight of Anointment, and Northwatch Commander, paladin's draw options are fairly robust. In fact in this expansion, due to the rotated generator options, I find that the number 1 problem when I'm trying to build decks is that without any draw engine that deck is fairly dead in the water unless a ton of generators are also present. Hence why building shaman decks feels like pulling teeth.
- The better discover pools is unusually making paladin better by buffing two cards that by all rights should be absolutely trash or just okay, and that's Underlight Angling Rod and First Day of School. In fact both rogue and priest, whose discover pools have often been dangerous in the past, has been substantially weakened in this area by having most of their reactive tools taken away. Even shaman have ironically suffered by having that one card that basically was the hallmark of an entire archetype: Totemic Might
We can only pray that the midset would introduce better cards and will be more substantial to this expansion than darkmoon race is to darkmoon itself. The buffs introduced earlier has been, in no uncertain terms, about as impactful as an ant is to a whale. I get that team5 probably wouldn't want to make radical changes, but if they want to see a different meta, it might do to actually make real buffs to cards that will otherwise never see play like say...caravans? Say what you like about the watchpost meta earlier, at least it made hearthstone feel and play differently. I really think team5 should have kept the Mor'shan Watch Post intact because we're not going to see any of them for the next 2 years unless a truly bonkers card on the lines of Totemic Reflection is printed.
Nice points.
The watch posts can still burn in hell.
I think the meta is decent right now, but it's telling that neither Blizzard nor OoC has had a good "off-meta decks to try" article in awhile. It's not that the class balance is that bad (except Paladin and Shaman on the extremes), but it doesn't feel like there's any room for experimentation. If you're not running THE most effective decklist it just falls apart in this meta because the good decks are so over-tuned.
Still, it's pretty hilarious that Paladin was the main target of the nerfs and it's win-rate actually went up. I got massively downvoted a month or so ago for saying that Aldor Attendant should be reverted to a 2-mana 2/3, but that's exactly what should happen.
Almost all of the buffs were fine, but none were really worth any hype. Is it weird though that I think the Lillypad Lurker buff went too far even though the mechanic, archetype, and class are still unplayable? It's these kinds of decisions that really confuse the community. Everyone knows card draw is the main problem in Shaman, followed by an inconsistent/unsynergistic hero-power, followed by Overload being poorly balanced (Blizzard has gotten much better on this final issue with the Core Set buffs). So they release two buffs to the elemental archetype that address none of these concerns. Honestly though, I'm fine with Shaman sucking until the next Core Set rotation (maybe an updated/new hero power??) because giving it ridiculous cards to counterbalance the problems with the entire class is a recipe for disaster.
Aldor attendant shouldnt be changed at all.
If wanan nerf pally its conviction , oh my yogg, the secret weapon
I hard agree with an Oh My Yogg! nerf. We have terrible data on how effective it is since the HSReplay data focuses on Mulligan win-rate and played win-rate, and it's always going to be a superior win-rate when it's cheated out by Sword of the Fallen. Another decent target would be bringing Northwatch Commander's health down to 3.
I saw a r/hearthstone post where someone shared a screenshot of hsreplay stats and the only difference pre-nerf and post was that mage had slightly lower wr.
I still think Bruh'kan is very oppressive for Shaman. If a shaman can tutor (nature) spells it can easily draw a insane combo with that Notetaker.
But in its current state, shaman is way too slow and too much relying on topdecks.
Will be a hardfix, but maybe a elemental that allows carddraw will be released in the mini-set.
I'd like to know how down to the wire are these nerfs/buffs decided? Seems like either these recent changes were finalized just hours beforehand, or they decided and just didn't want to share what was being done until just before. If it's the latter than why is that? If it's the former, have they ever considered a pole for what the community thinks should get the adjustment(s)?
New nerfs or mini expansion?
So what ? we're going to need to wait for the mini expansion set to see where the meta should be ?
So basically they will print even stronger cards in other classes to rival current Paladin and Mage dominance choosing powercreep instead of getting the current powrr level down?
That was not said. Dawson said that the meta was going to change through the mini set, not that power creep was going be used to change the meta. It could be done in the way jade druid was nerfed.
If is mostly the same power lvl and eahc has the nescary tools(draw/removal/burst/whatever) to handle/remove other clases stuff then that works.
That can work, Fighting fire with Fire.
But Hs hasnt really ever had that so its doubtfull they'd pull it that are all equally broken the classes
If they can do ti,its could be great but if not and 1 or more classes are less broken then theyre going to be like shaman now or even worse and could end up really badly.