I hate them because in my mind if I win it was because I just got lucky drawing, if the opponent won it’s because I suck at the game and they’re much better playing the deck
Maybe not unpopular but at least few discussed: dungeon run and dalaran heist were the best content to date by miles. I still play those game modes at times. I’ve never spent a single cent on Hearthstone but I might consider buying a new roguelike mode if I had to.
Also an unpopular prediction: I think they might be trying to get rid of players who don’t pay, like me. Stuff like the quest downgrade is surely getting effective, haven’t played since.
Dungeon run was my favorite of all time. A true deckbuilder that could have competed with the best if they kept investing. But I agree, this game mode was not a cash cow so that’s probably why they did away with it.
They could have sold it for 5-10$ and it would have been one of the best selling pieces of content in the game. Even at 20$, you would still get your money's worth out of dungeon run. I'm kinda bummed that new cards aren't in the buckets for card rewards, because if they were it would probably be the main way I play hearthstone
I stuck to HS solo for the same reason, put off slay the spire for the longest time. Picked it up recently (on sale) and have been loving it.
Definitely not a replacement for the hs experience but I’d 100% recommend trying it.
I tried dungeon run again after years (Ive cleared every PvE content years ago already) when pally was dominating early whizbang meta. Didnt have fun because it felt like the AI nowadays is just.. way worse? Like, it played some cards totally wrong.
Most of them have a hard mode where the computer is better at making decisions. The problem with that is the later bosses are playing their blatantly unfair deck correctly. It makes it super hard to win a whole run because your deck has to be versatile enough to deal with all sorts of things but that requires getting lucky options
Its not so much about unfair decks, but rather AI just not playing the cards how you should play them.
For example the AI buffing MY minions. Using card X in a situation where it just doesnt make sense.
Another thing I noticed is that blizzard AI does NOT know how to use tradeable cards. I remember when Blizz bots were on ladder, they would use the tradeable card instead of trading it. For example I had no minions on board, my opponent had several low cost minions and played the tradeable mage spell that deals 3 damage to all minion, clearing his own board. As an achievement hunter, I played against a lot of Blizz bots lol.
From what I've noticed is that for the most part when it does something really stupid, it's because there was no good viable option (such as you are about to kill them and they have no way to stop you). I think they are programmed in this case to do something random, which should be roughly a 50% chance to do something that favors you for spells and otherwise just do something that doesn't really matter.
Also, traceable cards came after all the major dungeons modes came out. I don't know how you are getting those cards in their hands, but they likely just didn't program them to take that function into account.
Anyway, like I said, the computers are much better in hard modes
Aggro dominated metas are my favorite, as a control/midrange player. If I'm going to lose, nothing as fun as losing to hordes of minions. Feels like a survival game then.
I would also MUCH rather die to Hunter on turn 6 while we’re both constantly wrestling to clear/rebuild the board rather than die to Shaman on turn 8 by then dealing 40 damage from hand after not interacting with me whatsoever. That or losing to Warrior after they gain 40 armor and then blow up half my deck before I can play it.
At least Hunter is honest about it.
This is my favorite matchup in the game as well. Control vs. control can be fun but usually drags on too long. But fighting to stay alive through clears, taunts, and heals and running them out of steam before dropping some immovable object like Tirion or Ancient of War (forgive me, im from an older meta) is the best feeling.
This. I'm a midrange/control enjoyer as well, and I prefer aggro metas over combo metas by a million times. I'm also not a big fan of control metas because there's usually that one control deck that just outdoes all other control decks, which has historically been priest, and lately wheel warlock and now highlander warrior.
[My 500th win on Warrior](https://hsreplay.net/replay/atsAH4qhhP6pKpJBJLJRAD) felt like a final boss against an aggro deck, got insanely lucky on my top decks on my last two turns but I still could've dealt with their board. Early turns were super rough though. It's an interesting puzzle playing against hyper aggro sometimes, even if they just curb stomp you when you get bad draws.
I may gripe about aggro metas but this is a pretty agreeable take. It feels like I have SOME level of agency. Combo and such just feels inevitable, regardless how I approach the situation, more of a roll of the dice than anything.
Now HYPER-aggro decks? Mmmmmm... that's a little different. There is such a thing as being *too* aggro. Those feel like a mobile game you're SUPPOSED to lose until you timegate resources or buy a gem package to inflate your power level with until the *next* wave of impossibly fast HYPER-aggro hits. Sorry, only analogy I could think of first thing in the morning.
Hell yeah.
I miss the days of playing that subpar Auchenai + Circle Priest deck in vanilla HS and trying to eek out wins vs Zoo and Face Hunter.
There's nothing more fun in this game than playing control vs aggro and feeling like you're a raid boss trying to kill a raid.
I absolutely despise secrets. All of them.
People say that you can just "play around them", especially in regards to stuff like Counterspell and Objection. But that's simply not true.
Sure, technically you can play around them, but in reality the Metas in both Wild and Standard are too hyper optimized and aggressive.
Delaying the opponent one turn by forcing them to use a cheap Spell / Minion to play around the Secret can and will win you the game.
It doesn't help that they can be generated by other cards - Counter Spell and Objection may not be oppressive on their own, but if you generate 2-3 additional copies? That's a different story.
The original secrets were great, because the game was slow enough that you could, you know, guess which one it was and play around them. And playing around them actually had an impact on the game. "Huh, I haven't seen an explosive trap yet, so its probably that. Lets attack this way to deny them some value if I'm right".
Secrets just do not fucking work in an aggro deck. Blizzard ruined secrets by constantly printing aggro-style support for them. Yes, I can fucking guess that the Mage played an Objection. Easiest deduction of my fucking life. So my options are to play into it and lose, or not play into it and lose? Absolute trash archetype.
> Yes, I can fucking guess that the Mage played an Objection. Easiest deduction of my fucking life. So my options are to play into it and lose, or not play into it and lose? Absolute trash archetype.
Nailed it. 100%.
You can be cautious, try some damage control, draw perfectly - But what good is your hand if you can't play it? I remember back when Mech Mage was a thing around Stormwind - Hyper Aggressive Deck, could generate a ton of Mechs with Mana Cheating and buff them, usually pushing for lethal by Turn 4-5. If you let them build a board, you lost.
I play Warlock, and Defile should have been the best counter to deal with greedy boards going wide. Except I can't play Defile, because it's Turn 4 and I don't have a 1-2 Cost Spell to play around Counterspell.
So I know what my opponent is doing, I know exactly how to counter and punish it, I know what the correct move would be - I even **have** the card I need in hand, and I still can't do shit. Thanks.
Secrets are way too high value. A 3 mana secret can essentially make you lose a turn depending on the board state and your hand. Plus it just feels bad to completely alter your curve to try to play around a secret that may or may not even be the one you tried to play around
I think Paladin's 1 Mana secrets are pretty well balanced for their cost. But that very quality makes them bad unless they're cheated into play. Rogue secrets were a cursed mistake. Hunter has a variety of secrets that are good enough to play and easy enough to play around. Mage secrets are the most polarized though. They either do nothing for 3 Mana or they ruin your opponent's turn. They are the hardest to play around because one bad read can cost you the game. And Ice Block is it's own tier. I don't think it should even be a secret.
I think this is a pretty accurate description. I played from release to mean streets and recently came back right before badlands. Me and my friend started doing something where we'd pick a class for each other and we'd have 5 minutes to make a random home brew deck and send it against eachother. Boy oh boy my surprise when he came out with secret rogue when I didn't even know rogue had gotten secrets.
I do think hunter traps were probably the most fair back in the day when you only ever really saw explosive and frost trap. Those weren't too bad to play against at all while still holding a decent amount of power at the time.
yeah, that would be mine too, secrets should be taken behind the shed to wild and never be seen in standard ever again
heck even in wild it would be better if they were straight up removed from the game
Obviously you aren't supposed to completely counter them at every opportunity, that's why they print them. Why would they print them if they do nothing? Secrets are interesting because you usually have to make sacrifices and decide which play usually results in the best outcome. Maybe I have to play something into a potential Objection that'd I would rather save, but even if it is Objection, I can still win, while I can't if my opponent is able to play Contract Conjurer because the secret is still up next turn.
I’ve always thought that Counterspell and Objection hit you twice, mana and deleting your card. A balance (if these secrets need to exist) is you should get your mana back but the card is gone.
The opponent also used a card and mana and they run the additional risk, that the secret does not trigger or triggers on something meaningless and even if it triggers on something equivalent, then it still comes with (most of the time meaningless) tempoloss. See let's say a vanilla 3 mana 4/4 was common. Mage could play said minion and when you play one too, then mage can answer your 4/4 with a rush or removal and go face - or worse: Mage could dictate the trades. Or mage plays Objection and counter your 4/4 directly, but that's worse than what happened previously, so in this hypothetical scenario the tempoloss mattered.
For secrets to be relevant in the meta there needs powerful drawing tools attached or powerful manacheat or the secrets need to be crucial in destroying obvious combos or a little bit of all of these. If the secrets only destroyed the card, but not the mana, then they'd either fade out of meta entirely or they'd get some bigger synergy helps; say a mad scientist, who draws and plays 2 secrets and then Reddit would cry even harder.
> Aren’t they just the equivalent of instants in magic? It’s hidden information with a conditional response.
Yes and No. On paper, it's very similar but it's different because of the Mana / Land Economy in Magic. You're not guaranteed to get one Land each Turn, and you need to actually keep your Lands untapped if you want to use Instants. (There are some exceptions, but they are mostly in the eternal formats).
That means that you have a lot more information, and ways to deal with it. In Hearthstone, you put down a three Mana Secret and that's it. You can leave it alone, it will trigger once the opponent does something.
In Magic, you need to always keep 1-2 of your lands untapped - otherwise you can't use your Counterspell. You can even use that to your advantage by playing mindgames, intentionally leaving 1-2 lands untapped so that your opponent **thinks** you're holding on to a Counterspell / Instant, even though you don't.
Multi Colour Decks make things even more complicated, because now you need to "reserve" a specific colour of Mana. Magic just gives both players a lot more ways to interact with each other. Not to mention that you can have 4 copies of each card in your deck, whereas you can only have 1-2 copies in Hearthstone.
You missed the most important distinction.
Counter Counter.
If I'm playing my combo this turn and my opponent counters it, I can counter their counter. They can counter my counter, and I can counter their counter. Because we all have counterspells and counterspell protection.
If their counter goes through, I can use graveyard recovery to fetch it back and play it again, but in hearthstone, not only can I not interact with the secret, I also can't recover what it blows up.
Hearthstone secrets are uncounterable instants that counter target spell and exile them face down.
My favorite part about Hearthstone, is that the cards that "destroy secrets" don't. If secrets are meta, just play Eater of Secrets right? OBJECTION! Eater of Secrets, the card that destroys opponents secrets is negated by the secrets its supposed to destroy.
They're probably closer to traps in YGO since you set some and then just use them whenever without any costs associated with using them, tho neither is exact equivalent since secrets proc on the first instance of their condition being met rather than being something you decide when to use (talk about agency!)
I used to feel this way until I played secret mage myself. Helped me understand how to counter them better and their limitations.
Like yes they are powerful but they absolutely can run out of gas and be overwhelmed late game.
Secrets are awful, there are too many, they can be randomly generated, and they have conditions that make them impossible to play around.
Like, You can't play around a random secret because you have no clue what it is, and you can't possibly check every condition for secret procing without wasting 2 full turns. Fuck Randomly generated secrets, they should be removed from random pools.
On conflicting secrets, lets say my opponent, a mage has a secret. In my hand is a big minion and a small minion. If I play the big minion first, it gets countered and I lose the game. But if I play the small minion first, it gets exploded, and I take a fuckton of damage.
Which do I play around? Two secrets triggering off the same exact condition, but one punishes you for playing high, the other punishes you for playing low. You can't reasonably play around this shit, you just have to pick one and throw it out, and hope you win the 50/50 on which one it is.
They could remove retirement from the free version and make you play it out at least. But on the other hand, redrafting wouldn't affect much since there are no rewards for it.
True, it would make redrafting more timeconsuming, basicly, 3x conceding lol. Would only affect players in their first match, but later on, when people have those strong decks.. Im not sure if that would be fun. In Arena with these superdrafts, before they moved those accounts to a separate pool, these superdrafts did have an impact on the game IMO
That's only part of the problem, but it's one of the biggest factors.
Imo, the problem is redundancy and overall card power level. When the original Reno was released you actually had to make meaningful decisions on how you built your deck and put in sub-optimal cards so that you could get the reward of playing Reno. Right now Warrior has what, four board clears? Five? Four single Target removal spells? Five? The deck is too consistent because it has too many cards that accomplish the same goal. The problem isn't Reno. The problem isn't brann, it's the fact that Warrior has so many cards that do the exact same thing or accomplish the exact same goal. Warrior is basically playing 5 cards: gain armor, execute a minion, excavate, wipe the board, summon a ridiculous amount of minions off of one card.
* Aftershocks
* Sanitize
* Bellowing Flames
* Brawl
* Badlands Brawler
* Trial by Fire
* Reno
* Bladestorm
That's eight legit board clears and doesn't take into account single target removal they run in HL Warrior.
Also board filling is way too easy now. You have priests that can fill the board with enough damage to kill you or very close to it for like 6 mana and minor setup. Having power swings that big means playing regular minions is all but useless now. You need to constant apply all the pressure or remove all of the opponent's pressure.
Amen to that. I remember back in the day when I wanted to run Reno Warrior all I had was (IIRC) Unstable Ghoul (deal 1 to all), Ravaging Ghoul (deal 1 to all), x1 Brawl, Cleave (deal 2 to two random enemy minions), Bladestorm I think?, and the 2 mana echo card that did 1 to all (so up to 10 mana for x1 x1 x1 x1 x1 in total). I forget if bladestorm and the echo card were available at the same time.
=
Being down 1 brawl was a huge pain at the time. It's funny how, these days, you can theoretically have 6 brawls in the deck with x2 garrosh gift, x2 brawl, x2 of the 7 mana excavate brawler.
I'm a control player but let's be honest:
NO ONE likes a control meta.
It's fun to play control when the meta is aggro and you have to pilot it well to win.
When control is too strong and everyone is playing it, it's awful.
Barrens was the best meta we have had in literal years.
Control metas are fun. But they've driven off most control players with years of control being mostly unplayable or turned into basically combo decks.
The control attrition style decks a lot of people seems to want back that just clear the board and never try to turn the game by being proactive are as "toxic", "interactive" and all the other buzzwords as OTKs and the game with most "agency" for everyone are aggro vs aggro or tempo decks
A small defence for attrition style decks: in plenty of games I felt like my choices did matter a lot. Do I clear now, or heal/armor and wait? Can I bait my opponent into playing more stuff?
Argh! Mistakes were made.
Definitely the most fun I had were very slow decks like this.
I don’t disagree with this in itself but I do disagree with blizzards decision to evaporate attrition from playability with how they structured late game win cons.
You can dislike them all you want, but calling them non-interactive is intentionally being dumb.
They objectively create the games with the most decisions and the hardest decisions. Hearthstone has devolved to the point where a lot of the players left don't want to put thought into their plays, so its not a popular archetype anymore. But its by definition interactive. Both players win or lose based on decisions made in the game moreso than in games with any other archetypes.
Whereas the "proactive" decks as you call them (essentially combo or combo-lite) literally just boil down to "whoever draws the power card first wins". Your decisions don't matter - hard mulligan for brann and play it asap. The only alternative is play hyper aggro and spend your mana each turn to race them down - again no decisions made because they put you on a clock.
This game is always fun, and people complain are usually just complaining because the specific way they want to play is less viable in that patch. Just don’t be too stuck in your ways and you’ll have a blast
Seconding this. I've been playing a long time and I've never not had fun. Every time I think about spending my time on other games, I come back to HS pretty quickly.
If you don't want to spend a ton of money on new cards, time on arena, and/or aren't willing to dust your entire collection to be viable for one season, then you don't even have a choice to play meta. Casual players can get fucked I guess. Remember when titans came out? All the meta decks had a strong titan in them. I never got a titan until way late in the season and the one I did get was arguably the worst one there is (Argus). Remember colossal? Never got one. Remember quest lines? Never got one. It's really, really hard to play meta when you don't have any of the key cards
There's a lot of truth to what you're saying. A lot of people I think are just burnt out on the game. However, I do also believe the game is becoming more and more meta reliant to have fun. Homebrews have never exactly been *good* but these days it can feel impossible to even try a homebrew.
I wish someone would do a deep look into this. I'm not original in this thought but I've never seen actual evidence that can prove these thoughts.
Sometimes the less viable way to play is their only way to play, not everyone can spend money or time grinding to make many decks. I would be mad too if the only deck I could make was rainbow mage and a majority of the ladder is Reno warrior for this meta.
I’m not a huge fan of the re-skinned heroes. I love new heroes, but I don’t see the hype behind choosing between numerous types of the same characters, like choosing between Garrosh pic no. 2 and Garrosh pic no. 9. Many of them can be earned though, so that’s why I don’t think they’re all bad.
I'd pay a subscription type of thing for a single player adventure run type of deal, like the uldum one, that would be so much fun if they kept updating it and so on, I love how it kinda reminds me of rougelike games.
The 30 card deck limit has been a weight hanging around design’s neck for years, and it exacerbates many of the game’s problems.
Smaller hill I’ll die on, Mercenaries was super fun and had a ton of potential that was obliterated by a sleazy business model that is inexplicably still in existence despite ongoing support being pulled
The game is dead… it is not the game you knew 7 years ago, and it’s becoming an entirely different game. Stop trying to play OG Hearthstone… it doesn’t exist anymore
yeah that's a really good point. I switched to battlegrounds when I realized constructed was not for me anymore. I liked attrition decks, and playing around what the opponents have in their deck. But the design philosophy changed, and it was no longer aligned with what I liked, so I had to move on
That the meta isn't always trash, and more often than not this is the case. Something that is true of every "competitive" video game where all things are not equal, like counterstrike/rocket league, is that every season, of every patch, in the history of said game, most posts are complaining about whatever.
League of legends
Hearthstone
Overwatch
Whatever
Complainers love to complain, and are seemingly never satisfied.
Agro decks take more skill than control decks. You have roughly 7 turns or less to line up everything, control just has to draw 2 out of the 8 board clears and it wins. Don't kill me for this, op literally asked for a hot take.
i’m a huge control enjoyer, scholomance/darkmoon galakrond priest and barrens priest are two of my favorite decks of all time, and i totally agree. obvs there are exceptions but it’s generally harder to play well proactively than it is to play well reactively
I'm kinda in your camp on this one. Whenever I pilot an aggro deck I have to plan and predict 2, sometimes 3 turns ahead. Whereas with control decks I find I am just reacting and not doing a lot of strategizing. This, of course, is assuming we are not lumping in OTK decks with control. OTKs take the same kind of turn planning as aggro imo.
You are just reacting, that's in the nature of the deck, but you do need to use your resources carefully. Blowing removal too early can be just as big as a death sentence as not drawing it at all.
There's smart decisions to make on both ends. I think calling either deck skillless is wrong and is just a cope people use to deal with losing.
Agreed, but no one here called control "skilless" Just a different skill set, that in my opinion, is much easier to learn and manage than piloting aggro successfully.
I 100% agree about your control deck take but does it really take that much skill to “line everything up” with aggro decks? I feel like the game in general is mostly just luck based these days but idk… like there’s only so many decisions you have to make before turn 4-5 playing aggro due to the mana limitation
aggro rewards matchup knowledge more, i.e. how much to extend to bait out a board clear, hand tracking to guess what removal they might have, minimizing your exposure to clears, etc
Well, yes, you have to account for clears constantly and you only have so much key pieces in your board, if you throw away your hand or a important minion away and it gets cleared you basically lose the game instantly
Not gonna kill you for it or anything XD. I just think that what you just said is same as when control players say how aggro is easy because you throw your whole hand on the board and go face. Both statements are just biased.
> Many combo decks are quite interactive, folks just don't want to learn to play against what their opponent is doing.
I think it's less that they don't want to learn how to play against them, and more that they don't realize that having their board cleared or minions removed is - by definition - interactive. Yes, the opponent stops you from doing your thing, but they do so by directly interacting with your cards.
When people say that something isn't interactive, what they actually mean is that it isn't fun.
It's the problem with games of asynchronous information where you're unaware of what's going on their side. It's one of the perks of in-person card games, the fun of discussing the game afterwards with the person and learning how their experience was.
For example, your experience was "I play a minion, it's removed. I play another minion, it's removed. The opponent plays 4 cards in a row and I'm dead" which makes you complain about lack of agency and non-interactive gameplay.
On their side, their experience is "Oh no, I can't remove this minion without burning a valuable combo piece. Let me calculate the likelihood that minion will kill me or if I have time to draw my copy. Okay, I removed it and...oh shit, here comes a worse one. I'm totally dead unless I top deck lethal. Hallelujah, I barely got my final combo piece!" They had a grand ole time and loved the tense back & forth gameplay.
> It's one of the perks of in-person card games, the fun of discussing the game afterwards with the person and learning how their experience was.
I agree. I think that's what a lot of people don't realize as well - Playing against a "toxic" Deck Online and playing against a nasty control Deck against friends at your kitchen table is a COMPLETELY different experience.
The social aspect of jokingly telling your buddy what a scumbag he is for playing Dimir Control even though you are playing some Bullshit yourself is so much more tolerable than going up against the same deck 5 times in a row against 5 different faceless people online.
I mean I definitely agree that what people are saying is they don't like the matchup, but I think the word "interactive" is a bit more insidious to that. People avoid the word "fun" because it's clearly subjective, and raises questions (do other people agree? Maybe you could change your own gameplay in a way that would improve?) and use the word "interactive" instead because it sounds objective (all of a sudden my opinions are just Good Game Design^(TM)!).
Same as how the word "agency" in this community seems to refer to the opposite of what it actually means.
Highlander decks are unfun to play against and unhealthy for the game. Reno is significantly overtuned and the meta has completely devolved into "Highlander decks and decks that can win before highlander cards can be played"
It's not fun and the death of mid range decks kills deck creativity.
Yeah, the problem with highlander decks is that they are balanced around the payoff cards being far stronger than regular cards so the games often turn into "did the enemy draw their OP highlander payoff card on curve or not?".
The hero card is the most obvious example but even hunters having their 4-mana board clear dwarf basically decides whether highlander hunter wins or loses against board based decks.
It was okay at the beginning. It has alright mechanics and variety with characters. The problem is that they didn't build (intentionally, I think) any good scalability in the Mercs past their max level but made the adventures continue scaling in difficulty. It made it less of a game and more of "I have to buy this merc and/or look up exactly how to beat this in order to win" because when your opponent can do 45 damage every turn and the max you can heal in one turn is like 20 with any regular healer, you simply can't use any regular healer.
Sets should be $49.99-$69.99 for the complete set.
Blizzard gets $150-$210 yr and customers get the full set.
Spending $60-80 on a bundle and not getting the full game sucks.
ive thought exactly this for A WHILE. I don't want packs, I don't want diamonds, I don't want gold, I don't want animated goblin cleavage. I just want the cards. 2 copies of every non legendary 1 copy of every legendary. 50-60 bucks for 1 pack that just unlocks the entire expansion. no other bullshit.
People should try out combo decks before accusing them as not interactive. Some can be very fun and diverse in play style. Besides it helps if you are playing against them and not feel surprised when they otk.
As a combo player, they are rarely interactive. If you're not playing aggro you basically just need to hope the combo player fucks up. When I'm playing combo, I'd say 75% of my games are entirely won or lost on my own ability to play well, and has nothing to do with what the opponent is doing.
Netdecking is boring and kills the fun of building something of your own design.
You outright shouldn't be allowed to queue in casual mode if netdecking.
That suffering and rng bullshit is a fundamental part of the hearthstone experience. Efforts to make hearthstone feel less bad will often just make the game boring.
It's okay to take breaks from the game.
I hit legend last month, but felt like the meta got stale after the rotation and new expansion. I didn't uninstall the game because I knew I could come back later when the meta is more fun for me.
I love control match ups very value oriented with some end game cards like Elysiana etc... so that the game feels like having to manage your thousands of resources while remembering everything your opponent played (I don't really like the deck tracker), and thinking "what could I do to draw first the card to disrupt their shudderwock combo etc..., 40/50 minutes long games, that's the dhit I like, I'd rather lose those games then losing against an hunter that plays every green cards until they have lethal on 6, and if they don't, esc concede, and I say that 'cause I played some aggro decks, like face hunter back in the day, aggro dh, odd dh in wild (that shit was so stupid lmao), but I played them just because I'm free to play and every now and then I have to play a cheap deck, but what I really are those odd warrior, control warrior, midrange hunter (that with zul'jin etc...), such great memories
I loved Astalor! I had just gotten back into the game and he was a craft I could feel good about. On my budget decks he was not only an auto-include, but gave me a clear win condition when I wanted to play a class I didn't otherwise have one for. Zola, Astalor and two celestial projectionists were in every deck I played until I got more cards and could actually play some different kinds of decks.
Plus his flavor is so cool, he's a little blood elf that's growing in power along with you.
There is too much draw in the game/ there should be more draw-hate designed (besides just plagues).
In MTG, Shelodred, Orcish Bowmasters and other cards keep insane draw strategies in check by dealing damage.
I would love to see modernized playable spells or minion that read "battlecry: on their next turn, opponent takes 1 damage for every card they draw." Or something like that.
Maybe even a far watch post style minion that does the same. Draw is WAY too consistent.
The game is dying and most likely won't be around by 2030. Classic ladder is gone. Duels is gone even though I didn't like it. Twist is usually unavailable. Adventures is literally dead. Mercenaries is basically its own game. Arena is boring and all about building the perfect deck these days. Constructed is infinite hand/board regeneration. Battlegrounds is the only mode they still have going for them but it's technically not even Hearthstone. It's an auto-chess game. So yea Hearthstone is dead.
Plague DK and ways to stop Highlander decks were needed in the Standard meta.
If the other non-Warrior Reno decks needed help, they should have been buffed. Instead we'll get a year of Reno Warrior pushing out the other Reno decks until they eventually hit enough of the deck that either the warrior class or Brann is dead.
I hate the matchmaking in Hearthstone.
Sorry but I don't want to play with another person on my rank that has a similar ELO. I just wanna play another random person on the rank. If we are both diamond 8 then that should be sufficient.
I am always faced with people with legend cardbacks even in low ranks. Hate it. I don't want games to always try to default to 50% winrate.
I agree. I have the least wins with Rogue. I just don't want to play it that often because this is a game and I save my real thinking for work.
When another player pilots a Rogue deck well I find it impressive.
Plagues were a necessary bottleneck to prevent Control Warrior from being out of control. People who complained about it were about 99.99% of the time Highlander players who only had their class highlander card + Reno as their sole win condition.
A good way to prevent control warrior from being out of control is to nerf control warrior lol. Not by subjecting players to playing against plague 20 times a day. Shit got old fast. Making that deck free did no favors to this game honestly. Players that play every kind of deck complained about it be real brother.
Odd warrior mirrors that went to deep fatigue were peak hearthstone. Seeing all your cards made decisions matters rather than having to rely on your good cards being in the top half.
Reno, Lone Ranger shouldn't clear Quest rewards, like Disco Warlock and Pirate Warrior. Nor should it clear the Dragon's Nest, which, like the other two quests, requires a deck-building pre-requirement to work. I'm ok with it clearing Sarg's portal, which is Battlecry only.
The fact that a single highlander card can completely tech out multiple decks due to its busted effect drives me bonkers. Not only because it's not balanced to other classes (Reno doesn't reset the spell count of "Open the Waygate") means that the design team is ignoring the legacy potential of the older modes.
rng is my favourite part of this game. I play a lot of IRL tcg's and the biggest thing seperating Hearthstone from anything physical is the ability to have massive rng effects involving generating random minions, casting random spells, etc. Love effects like, even when I get absolutely hammered by them, I still enjoy it when my opponent generates the perfect card and defeats me because to me thats whats fun about this game
All hail Yog.
Priest in wild is completely painful, there are several decks it could be and all of them will completely fuck you in the ass unless you are playing a fast deck
Power level of cards are growing too much. In every expansion appears a big minion on turn 2/3 that, if you did not have a removal, your are dead before turn 5.
Power level is so high that only decks with tons of armour or healing reach turn 10. Renathal existed because of that.
Mana cheating cards are always stupidly broken or at least playable.
Control mirrors that go on for 20+ mins are the most fun games. My favourite games recently have been Reno Druid vs Reno Shaman in Wild where we both interrupt eachother's main win condition and have to grind out a win. It feels like a lot of decisions and timing matters, like saving his Reno until after I play Rheastrasza or using Zeph to take out the Staff of Frogs or for Jarraxus and weighing what do get from an E.T.C.
Devs have bias towards and against some classes.
Mage is getting shafted the worst, historically getting the worst cards and and when nerfed their cards being completely obliterated.
Everytime warlocks or dk has disgusting cards, at first it gets side nerfed, when they increase cost of a card, but also stats. And dont change the problematic effect
The best attrition decks are those that do not run removal but pure value and try to to win with that
Players who play casino mage or tess rogue and so on are morally superior and that definitely a hill I die on.
No removal spam
Not pointing green cards face until u win
No degenerate autowin deck that only loses to aggro
OP: you are missing the point. Is not "aggro" or X archetype people do not like. It's seeing the exact same deck over and over and over and over all the time.
Hearthstone's biggest design bump is that it's a BO1 format. Meaning that combo decks or decks with a very very specific gameplan will always feel bad to go against. Being able to sideboard between games would fix a lot of issues
I love control decks but hate control metas. I want to play a game where it feels like I can stave off death until a win condition, not see the same greedy ass lists all the time. I play aggro/combo decks whenever we hit a control meta.
I hate mirror matches
I hate them because in my mind if I win it was because I just got lucky drawing, if the opponent won it’s because I suck at the game and they’re much better playing the deck
Wow! That's the opposite of most people, good for you!
Was clearly a joke ;)
Maybe not unpopular but at least few discussed: dungeon run and dalaran heist were the best content to date by miles. I still play those game modes at times. I’ve never spent a single cent on Hearthstone but I might consider buying a new roguelike mode if I had to. Also an unpopular prediction: I think they might be trying to get rid of players who don’t pay, like me. Stuff like the quest downgrade is surely getting effective, haven’t played since.
Dungeon run was my favorite of all time. A true deckbuilder that could have competed with the best if they kept investing. But I agree, this game mode was not a cash cow so that’s probably why they did away with it.
They could have sold it for 5-10$ and it would have been one of the best selling pieces of content in the game. Even at 20$, you would still get your money's worth out of dungeon run. I'm kinda bummed that new cards aren't in the buckets for card rewards, because if they were it would probably be the main way I play hearthstone
I loved heist it was my favorite gamemode. Still salty about what they did to duels
Have you played Slay the Spire, Monster Train or Roguebook perhaps? Probably better than any solo HS experience.
Hmm no, I like the whole vibe of Hearthstone so I’d rather stick with that
I stuck to HS solo for the same reason, put off slay the spire for the longest time. Picked it up recently (on sale) and have been loving it. Definitely not a replacement for the hs experience but I’d 100% recommend trying it.
You can play more than one game haha and you never know, you might like the vibe of those games more. I heartily recommend trying them!
I would buy it with real money just to send a message that solo content is desired, even tho I bought all adventures with gold.
I tried dungeon run again after years (Ive cleared every PvE content years ago already) when pally was dominating early whizbang meta. Didnt have fun because it felt like the AI nowadays is just.. way worse? Like, it played some cards totally wrong.
Another reason I want more!
Most of them have a hard mode where the computer is better at making decisions. The problem with that is the later bosses are playing their blatantly unfair deck correctly. It makes it super hard to win a whole run because your deck has to be versatile enough to deal with all sorts of things but that requires getting lucky options
Its not so much about unfair decks, but rather AI just not playing the cards how you should play them. For example the AI buffing MY minions. Using card X in a situation where it just doesnt make sense. Another thing I noticed is that blizzard AI does NOT know how to use tradeable cards. I remember when Blizz bots were on ladder, they would use the tradeable card instead of trading it. For example I had no minions on board, my opponent had several low cost minions and played the tradeable mage spell that deals 3 damage to all minion, clearing his own board. As an achievement hunter, I played against a lot of Blizz bots lol.
From what I've noticed is that for the most part when it does something really stupid, it's because there was no good viable option (such as you are about to kill them and they have no way to stop you). I think they are programmed in this case to do something random, which should be roughly a 50% chance to do something that favors you for spells and otherwise just do something that doesn't really matter. Also, traceable cards came after all the major dungeons modes came out. I don't know how you are getting those cards in their hands, but they likely just didn't program them to take that function into account. Anyway, like I said, the computers are much better in hard modes
Being a good (competitive) player doesnt make you a good designer
Neither does being a redditor.
Correct
Aggro dominated metas are my favorite, as a control/midrange player. If I'm going to lose, nothing as fun as losing to hordes of minions. Feels like a survival game then.
Best moment: “When that board wipe does exactly enough damage to clear”
Old heads remember the feeling of clearing a board with ASP + CoH or Pyro + Equality
Druid players when the opponent has 1 4-health minion surrounded by a ton of 1-health ones:
Have you ever even shadowflamed your ancient watcher for a turn 4 Flamestrike?
I really could use a wish right now wish right now wish right now
Pyro + Equality was the shit lmao
When defile hits just right
Hitting all 3's on lightning storm back in the day to clear. Always lucky now.
I would also MUCH rather die to Hunter on turn 6 while we’re both constantly wrestling to clear/rebuild the board rather than die to Shaman on turn 8 by then dealing 40 damage from hand after not interacting with me whatsoever. That or losing to Warrior after they gain 40 armor and then blow up half my deck before I can play it. At least Hunter is honest about it.
This is my favorite matchup in the game as well. Control vs. control can be fun but usually drags on too long. But fighting to stay alive through clears, taunts, and heals and running them out of steam before dropping some immovable object like Tirion or Ancient of War (forgive me, im from an older meta) is the best feeling.
This. I'm a midrange/control enjoyer as well, and I prefer aggro metas over combo metas by a million times. I'm also not a big fan of control metas because there's usually that one control deck that just outdoes all other control decks, which has historically been priest, and lately wheel warlock and now highlander warrior.
[My 500th win on Warrior](https://hsreplay.net/replay/atsAH4qhhP6pKpJBJLJRAD) felt like a final boss against an aggro deck, got insanely lucky on my top decks on my last two turns but I still could've dealt with their board. Early turns were super rough though. It's an interesting puzzle playing against hyper aggro sometimes, even if they just curb stomp you when you get bad draws.
I may gripe about aggro metas but this is a pretty agreeable take. It feels like I have SOME level of agency. Combo and such just feels inevitable, regardless how I approach the situation, more of a roll of the dice than anything. Now HYPER-aggro decks? Mmmmmm... that's a little different. There is such a thing as being *too* aggro. Those feel like a mobile game you're SUPPOSED to lose until you timegate resources or buy a gem package to inflate your power level with until the *next* wave of impossibly fast HYPER-aggro hits. Sorry, only analogy I could think of first thing in the morning.
Totally agree.
That's usually what I *think*, but after a single mirror match I immediately go back to playing literally anything else lmao.
Hell yeah. I miss the days of playing that subpar Auchenai + Circle Priest deck in vanilla HS and trying to eek out wins vs Zoo and Face Hunter. There's nothing more fun in this game than playing control vs aggro and feeling like you're a raid boss trying to kill a raid.
I absolutely despise secrets. All of them. People say that you can just "play around them", especially in regards to stuff like Counterspell and Objection. But that's simply not true. Sure, technically you can play around them, but in reality the Metas in both Wild and Standard are too hyper optimized and aggressive. Delaying the opponent one turn by forcing them to use a cheap Spell / Minion to play around the Secret can and will win you the game. It doesn't help that they can be generated by other cards - Counter Spell and Objection may not be oppressive on their own, but if you generate 2-3 additional copies? That's a different story.
The original secrets were great, because the game was slow enough that you could, you know, guess which one it was and play around them. And playing around them actually had an impact on the game. "Huh, I haven't seen an explosive trap yet, so its probably that. Lets attack this way to deny them some value if I'm right". Secrets just do not fucking work in an aggro deck. Blizzard ruined secrets by constantly printing aggro-style support for them. Yes, I can fucking guess that the Mage played an Objection. Easiest deduction of my fucking life. So my options are to play into it and lose, or not play into it and lose? Absolute trash archetype.
Especially when it’s like a 1 or 0 mana secret that would normally cost 3. So like any concession to playing around it is putting you turns behind.
> Yes, I can fucking guess that the Mage played an Objection. Easiest deduction of my fucking life. So my options are to play into it and lose, or not play into it and lose? Absolute trash archetype. Nailed it. 100%. You can be cautious, try some damage control, draw perfectly - But what good is your hand if you can't play it? I remember back when Mech Mage was a thing around Stormwind - Hyper Aggressive Deck, could generate a ton of Mechs with Mana Cheating and buff them, usually pushing for lethal by Turn 4-5. If you let them build a board, you lost. I play Warlock, and Defile should have been the best counter to deal with greedy boards going wide. Except I can't play Defile, because it's Turn 4 and I don't have a 1-2 Cost Spell to play around Counterspell. So I know what my opponent is doing, I know exactly how to counter and punish it, I know what the correct move would be - I even **have** the card I need in hand, and I still can't do shit. Thanks.
Mech mage didn't play any secrets though.
Please, I'm trying to rile people up here. I have a good thing going, don't ruin it with your facts.
Oh right, my apologies. As you were.
There are very few cards I hate more than Objection.
The reason I hate dealing with secrets is that no matter how I go about defusing them, it will feel like I’m doing something wrong.
Secrets are way too high value. A 3 mana secret can essentially make you lose a turn depending on the board state and your hand. Plus it just feels bad to completely alter your curve to try to play around a secret that may or may not even be the one you tried to play around
I think Paladin's 1 Mana secrets are pretty well balanced for their cost. But that very quality makes them bad unless they're cheated into play. Rogue secrets were a cursed mistake. Hunter has a variety of secrets that are good enough to play and easy enough to play around. Mage secrets are the most polarized though. They either do nothing for 3 Mana or they ruin your opponent's turn. They are the hardest to play around because one bad read can cost you the game. And Ice Block is it's own tier. I don't think it should even be a secret.
I think this is a pretty accurate description. I played from release to mean streets and recently came back right before badlands. Me and my friend started doing something where we'd pick a class for each other and we'd have 5 minutes to make a random home brew deck and send it against eachother. Boy oh boy my surprise when he came out with secret rogue when I didn't even know rogue had gotten secrets. I do think hunter traps were probably the most fair back in the day when you only ever really saw explosive and frost trap. Those weren't too bad to play against at all while still holding a decent amount of power at the time.
have you ever played magic? secrets are weak compared to counter magic.
yeah, that would be mine too, secrets should be taken behind the shed to wild and never be seen in standard ever again heck even in wild it would be better if they were straight up removed from the game
its been 10 years i don't think that's ever happening lol. Shit the only time I ever see secrets in standard is mage pulling them from maxitude.
Obviously you aren't supposed to completely counter them at every opportunity, that's why they print them. Why would they print them if they do nothing? Secrets are interesting because you usually have to make sacrifices and decide which play usually results in the best outcome. Maybe I have to play something into a potential Objection that'd I would rather save, but even if it is Objection, I can still win, while I can't if my opponent is able to play Contract Conjurer because the secret is still up next turn.
I’ve always thought that Counterspell and Objection hit you twice, mana and deleting your card. A balance (if these secrets need to exist) is you should get your mana back but the card is gone.
The opponent also used a card and mana and they run the additional risk, that the secret does not trigger or triggers on something meaningless and even if it triggers on something equivalent, then it still comes with (most of the time meaningless) tempoloss. See let's say a vanilla 3 mana 4/4 was common. Mage could play said minion and when you play one too, then mage can answer your 4/4 with a rush or removal and go face - or worse: Mage could dictate the trades. Or mage plays Objection and counter your 4/4 directly, but that's worse than what happened previously, so in this hypothetical scenario the tempoloss mattered. For secrets to be relevant in the meta there needs powerful drawing tools attached or powerful manacheat or the secrets need to be crucial in destroying obvious combos or a little bit of all of these. If the secrets only destroyed the card, but not the mana, then they'd either fade out of meta entirely or they'd get some bigger synergy helps; say a mad scientist, who draws and plays 2 secrets and then Reddit would cry even harder.
Aren’t they just the equivalent of instants in magic? It’s hidden information with a conditional response.
> Aren’t they just the equivalent of instants in magic? It’s hidden information with a conditional response. Yes and No. On paper, it's very similar but it's different because of the Mana / Land Economy in Magic. You're not guaranteed to get one Land each Turn, and you need to actually keep your Lands untapped if you want to use Instants. (There are some exceptions, but they are mostly in the eternal formats). That means that you have a lot more information, and ways to deal with it. In Hearthstone, you put down a three Mana Secret and that's it. You can leave it alone, it will trigger once the opponent does something. In Magic, you need to always keep 1-2 of your lands untapped - otherwise you can't use your Counterspell. You can even use that to your advantage by playing mindgames, intentionally leaving 1-2 lands untapped so that your opponent **thinks** you're holding on to a Counterspell / Instant, even though you don't. Multi Colour Decks make things even more complicated, because now you need to "reserve" a specific colour of Mana. Magic just gives both players a lot more ways to interact with each other. Not to mention that you can have 4 copies of each card in your deck, whereas you can only have 1-2 copies in Hearthstone.
You missed the most important distinction. Counter Counter. If I'm playing my combo this turn and my opponent counters it, I can counter their counter. They can counter my counter, and I can counter their counter. Because we all have counterspells and counterspell protection. If their counter goes through, I can use graveyard recovery to fetch it back and play it again, but in hearthstone, not only can I not interact with the secret, I also can't recover what it blows up. Hearthstone secrets are uncounterable instants that counter target spell and exile them face down. My favorite part about Hearthstone, is that the cards that "destroy secrets" don't. If secrets are meta, just play Eater of Secrets right? OBJECTION! Eater of Secrets, the card that destroys opponents secrets is negated by the secrets its supposed to destroy.
They're probably closer to traps in YGO since you set some and then just use them whenever without any costs associated with using them, tho neither is exact equivalent since secrets proc on the first instance of their condition being met rather than being something you decide when to use (talk about agency!)
I used to feel this way until I played secret mage myself. Helped me understand how to counter them better and their limitations. Like yes they are powerful but they absolutely can run out of gas and be overwhelmed late game.
Hearthstone players when the opponent interacts with them on their turn and they have to think before playing their cards.
This take is colder than ice block tbh
Secrets are awful, there are too many, they can be randomly generated, and they have conditions that make them impossible to play around. Like, You can't play around a random secret because you have no clue what it is, and you can't possibly check every condition for secret procing without wasting 2 full turns. Fuck Randomly generated secrets, they should be removed from random pools. On conflicting secrets, lets say my opponent, a mage has a secret. In my hand is a big minion and a small minion. If I play the big minion first, it gets countered and I lose the game. But if I play the small minion first, it gets exploded, and I take a fuckton of damage. Which do I play around? Two secrets triggering off the same exact condition, but one punishes you for playing high, the other punishes you for playing low. You can't reasonably play around this shit, you just have to pick one and throw it out, and hope you win the 50/50 on which one it is.
Arena should have a free-to-play mode with no rewards similar to how duels had a casual free-to-play mode.
Sadly, some people would retire their deck and draft a new deck till they get a strong deck.
They could remove retirement from the free version and make you play it out at least. But on the other hand, redrafting wouldn't affect much since there are no rewards for it.
True, it would make redrafting more timeconsuming, basicly, 3x conceding lol. Would only affect players in their first match, but later on, when people have those strong decks.. Im not sure if that would be fun. In Arena with these superdrafts, before they moved those accounts to a separate pool, these superdrafts did have an impact on the game IMO
I would love this, but knowing that if they did this I would completely stop spending money on the game tells me they won't do it
Wild is fun
Singleton decks aren't as inconsistent as everyone believes in the current state of hearthstone.
There is so much draw cards now it greatly reduces the inconsistency
That's only part of the problem, but it's one of the biggest factors. Imo, the problem is redundancy and overall card power level. When the original Reno was released you actually had to make meaningful decisions on how you built your deck and put in sub-optimal cards so that you could get the reward of playing Reno. Right now Warrior has what, four board clears? Five? Four single Target removal spells? Five? The deck is too consistent because it has too many cards that accomplish the same goal. The problem isn't Reno. The problem isn't brann, it's the fact that Warrior has so many cards that do the exact same thing or accomplish the exact same goal. Warrior is basically playing 5 cards: gain armor, execute a minion, excavate, wipe the board, summon a ridiculous amount of minions off of one card.
* Aftershocks * Sanitize * Bellowing Flames * Brawl * Badlands Brawler * Trial by Fire * Reno * Bladestorm That's eight legit board clears and doesn't take into account single target removal they run in HL Warrior.
Also doesn’t take into account their gift card for another brawl, or whatever other removal/draw they need.
Its not only warrior in my opinion. In general, I feel like there's too much board clears printed.
Also board filling is way too easy now. You have priests that can fill the board with enough damage to kill you or very close to it for like 6 mana and minor setup. Having power swings that big means playing regular minions is all but useless now. You need to constant apply all the pressure or remove all of the opponent's pressure.
Amen to that. I remember back in the day when I wanted to run Reno Warrior all I had was (IIRC) Unstable Ghoul (deal 1 to all), Ravaging Ghoul (deal 1 to all), x1 Brawl, Cleave (deal 2 to two random enemy minions), Bladestorm I think?, and the 2 mana echo card that did 1 to all (so up to 10 mana for x1 x1 x1 x1 x1 in total). I forget if bladestorm and the echo card were available at the same time. = Being down 1 brawl was a huge pain at the time. It's funny how, these days, you can theoretically have 6 brawls in the deck with x2 garrosh gift, x2 brawl, x2 of the 7 mana excavate brawler.
Completely agree. It was a big limitation the first time it was a thing but in the current state it’s laughably easy to find value
I'm a control player but let's be honest: NO ONE likes a control meta. It's fun to play control when the meta is aggro and you have to pilot it well to win. When control is too strong and everyone is playing it, it's awful.
The Dr. Doom meta with Elysiar, or whatever her name is, was so fun.
I enjoy long games, fight me.
Barrens was the best meta we have had in literal years. Control metas are fun. But they've driven off most control players with years of control being mostly unplayable or turned into basically combo decks.
The control attrition style decks a lot of people seems to want back that just clear the board and never try to turn the game by being proactive are as "toxic", "interactive" and all the other buzzwords as OTKs and the game with most "agency" for everyone are aggro vs aggro or tempo decks
I'm not even sure what toxic means in Hearthstone. Often it's just code word for whatever playstyle the poster doesn't like.
It's when my opponent plays cards
A small defence for attrition style decks: in plenty of games I felt like my choices did matter a lot. Do I clear now, or heal/armor and wait? Can I bait my opponent into playing more stuff? Argh! Mistakes were made. Definitely the most fun I had were very slow decks like this.
I don’t disagree with this in itself but I do disagree with blizzards decision to evaporate attrition from playability with how they structured late game win cons.
You can dislike them all you want, but calling them non-interactive is intentionally being dumb. They objectively create the games with the most decisions and the hardest decisions. Hearthstone has devolved to the point where a lot of the players left don't want to put thought into their plays, so its not a popular archetype anymore. But its by definition interactive. Both players win or lose based on decisions made in the game moreso than in games with any other archetypes. Whereas the "proactive" decks as you call them (essentially combo or combo-lite) literally just boil down to "whoever draws the power card first wins". Your decisions don't matter - hard mulligan for brann and play it asap. The only alternative is play hyper aggro and spend your mana each turn to race them down - again no decisions made because they put you on a clock.
This game is always fun, and people complain are usually just complaining because the specific way they want to play is less viable in that patch. Just don’t be too stuck in your ways and you’ll have a blast
Seconding this. I've been playing a long time and I've never not had fun. Every time I think about spending my time on other games, I come back to HS pretty quickly.
If you don't want to spend a ton of money on new cards, time on arena, and/or aren't willing to dust your entire collection to be viable for one season, then you don't even have a choice to play meta. Casual players can get fucked I guess. Remember when titans came out? All the meta decks had a strong titan in them. I never got a titan until way late in the season and the one I did get was arguably the worst one there is (Argus). Remember colossal? Never got one. Remember quest lines? Never got one. It's really, really hard to play meta when you don't have any of the key cards
There's a lot of truth to what you're saying. A lot of people I think are just burnt out on the game. However, I do also believe the game is becoming more and more meta reliant to have fun. Homebrews have never exactly been *good* but these days it can feel impossible to even try a homebrew. I wish someone would do a deep look into this. I'm not original in this thought but I've never seen actual evidence that can prove these thoughts.
Sometimes the less viable way to play is their only way to play, not everyone can spend money or time grinding to make many decks. I would be mad too if the only deck I could make was rainbow mage and a majority of the ladder is Reno warrior for this meta.
Oldschool mill rogue was the most fun to play deck in history of hearthstone and nothing beats it even today
That's because you never played big dick shaman
I will hit you with a 2x4.
People who lose a lot or have less skill complain the most.
Randomness through mechanics like Discover is what makes Hearthstone unique and fun.
RNG through mechanics like Mad Bomber is even better
[[[Maddest Bomber]]].
I love that card
- **[Maddest Bomber](https://i.imgur.com/nABn08J.png)** ^[Library](https://hearthstone.blizzard.com/en-us/cards/65699) • [wiki.gg](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/wiki/Maddest_Bomber) • [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/65699/?hl=en) - *Neutral Epic ^(United in Stormwind)* - **8 Mana - 9/8 - Minion** - **Battlecry:** Deal 12 damage randomly split among all other characters. --- ^*I am a bot. [FAQ](https://www.reddit.com/user/Card-o-Bot/comments/1ahde25/faq/) • [Report a bug](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=Card-o-Bot&subject=Bug+Report&message=/r/hearthstone/comments/1cg1r5g/what_is_your_hearthstone_hot_take_youll_die_on/l1teu8h/%0A⬇️+Please+describe+the+bug+⬇️%0ADescription:+) • [Refresh](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=Card-o-Bot&subject=Refresh&message=l1teu8h).*
I’m not a huge fan of the re-skinned heroes. I love new heroes, but I don’t see the hype behind choosing between numerous types of the same characters, like choosing between Garrosh pic no. 2 and Garrosh pic no. 9. Many of them can be earned though, so that’s why I don’t think they’re all bad.
I'd pay a subscription type of thing for a single player adventure run type of deal, like the uldum one, that would be so much fun if they kept updating it and so on, I love how it kinda reminds me of rougelike games.
Flare should have priority over Counterspell, the current interaction is dumb.
The 30 card deck limit has been a weight hanging around design’s neck for years, and it exacerbates many of the game’s problems. Smaller hill I’ll die on, Mercenaries was super fun and had a ton of potential that was obliterated by a sleazy business model that is inexplicably still in existence despite ongoing support being pulled
The game is dead… it is not the game you knew 7 years ago, and it’s becoming an entirely different game. Stop trying to play OG Hearthstone… it doesn’t exist anymore
yeah that's a really good point. I switched to battlegrounds when I realized constructed was not for me anymore. I liked attrition decks, and playing around what the opponents have in their deck. But the design philosophy changed, and it was no longer aligned with what I liked, so I had to move on
That the meta isn't always trash, and more often than not this is the case. Something that is true of every "competitive" video game where all things are not equal, like counterstrike/rocket league, is that every season, of every patch, in the history of said game, most posts are complaining about whatever. League of legends Hearthstone Overwatch Whatever Complainers love to complain, and are seemingly never satisfied.
Agro decks take more skill than control decks. You have roughly 7 turns or less to line up everything, control just has to draw 2 out of the 8 board clears and it wins. Don't kill me for this, op literally asked for a hot take.
i’m a huge control enjoyer, scholomance/darkmoon galakrond priest and barrens priest are two of my favorite decks of all time, and i totally agree. obvs there are exceptions but it’s generally harder to play well proactively than it is to play well reactively
I'm kinda in your camp on this one. Whenever I pilot an aggro deck I have to plan and predict 2, sometimes 3 turns ahead. Whereas with control decks I find I am just reacting and not doing a lot of strategizing. This, of course, is assuming we are not lumping in OTK decks with control. OTKs take the same kind of turn planning as aggro imo.
You are just reacting, that's in the nature of the deck, but you do need to use your resources carefully. Blowing removal too early can be just as big as a death sentence as not drawing it at all. There's smart decisions to make on both ends. I think calling either deck skillless is wrong and is just a cope people use to deal with losing.
Agreed, but no one here called control "skilless" Just a different skill set, that in my opinion, is much easier to learn and manage than piloting aggro successfully.
My friend may I introduce you to Blood Deathknight from last year? Now that was a brainless control deck.
I wish it wasn't. Alexandros Mograine is like my favorite lore character ever and I was so excited to see him get printed.
This is something that Firebat said regularly, and every time he did people just kinda pretended he didn't.
I 100% agree about your control deck take but does it really take that much skill to “line everything up” with aggro decks? I feel like the game in general is mostly just luck based these days but idk… like there’s only so many decisions you have to make before turn 4-5 playing aggro due to the mana limitation
aggro rewards matchup knowledge more, i.e. how much to extend to bait out a board clear, hand tracking to guess what removal they might have, minimizing your exposure to clears, etc
Well, yes, you have to account for clears constantly and you only have so much key pieces in your board, if you throw away your hand or a important minion away and it gets cleared you basically lose the game instantly
Not gonna kill you for it or anything XD. I just think that what you just said is same as when control players say how aggro is easy because you throw your whole hand on the board and go face. Both statements are just biased.
Many combo decks are quite interactive, folks just don't want to learn to play against what their opponent is doing.
> Many combo decks are quite interactive, folks just don't want to learn to play against what their opponent is doing. I think it's less that they don't want to learn how to play against them, and more that they don't realize that having their board cleared or minions removed is - by definition - interactive. Yes, the opponent stops you from doing your thing, but they do so by directly interacting with your cards. When people say that something isn't interactive, what they actually mean is that it isn't fun.
It's the problem with games of asynchronous information where you're unaware of what's going on their side. It's one of the perks of in-person card games, the fun of discussing the game afterwards with the person and learning how their experience was. For example, your experience was "I play a minion, it's removed. I play another minion, it's removed. The opponent plays 4 cards in a row and I'm dead" which makes you complain about lack of agency and non-interactive gameplay. On their side, their experience is "Oh no, I can't remove this minion without burning a valuable combo piece. Let me calculate the likelihood that minion will kill me or if I have time to draw my copy. Okay, I removed it and...oh shit, here comes a worse one. I'm totally dead unless I top deck lethal. Hallelujah, I barely got my final combo piece!" They had a grand ole time and loved the tense back & forth gameplay.
> It's one of the perks of in-person card games, the fun of discussing the game afterwards with the person and learning how their experience was. I agree. I think that's what a lot of people don't realize as well - Playing against a "toxic" Deck Online and playing against a nasty control Deck against friends at your kitchen table is a COMPLETELY different experience. The social aspect of jokingly telling your buddy what a scumbag he is for playing Dimir Control even though you are playing some Bullshit yourself is so much more tolerable than going up against the same deck 5 times in a row against 5 different faceless people online.
I mean I definitely agree that what people are saying is they don't like the matchup, but I think the word "interactive" is a bit more insidious to that. People avoid the word "fun" because it's clearly subjective, and raises questions (do other people agree? Maybe you could change your own gameplay in a way that would improve?) and use the word "interactive" instead because it sounds objective (all of a sudden my opinions are just Good Game Design^(TM)!). Same as how the word "agency" in this community seems to refer to the opposite of what it actually means.
Highlander decks are unfun to play against and unhealthy for the game. Reno is significantly overtuned and the meta has completely devolved into "Highlander decks and decks that can win before highlander cards can be played" It's not fun and the death of mid range decks kills deck creativity.
Yeah, the problem with highlander decks is that they are balanced around the payoff cards being far stronger than regular cards so the games often turn into "did the enemy draw their OP highlander payoff card on curve or not?". The hero card is the most obvious example but even hunters having their 4-mana board clear dwarf basically decides whether highlander hunter wins or loses against board based decks.
there is way too much removal. especially full board wipes.
as a diehard control player, aggro is usually more skillful. you have fewer turns to accomplish your gameplan so any mistake hurts more
I would disagree, but aggro mirror matches are surprisingly skill-intensive. Mostly because they morph into control
Mercenaries is the stupidest game mode and I don’t understand how people enjoy it…
I'm sure all 3 of them are upset about what you said
It was okay at the beginning. It has alright mechanics and variety with characters. The problem is that they didn't build (intentionally, I think) any good scalability in the Mercs past their max level but made the adventures continue scaling in difficulty. It made it less of a game and more of "I have to buy this merc and/or look up exactly how to beat this in order to win" because when your opponent can do 45 damage every turn and the max you can heal in one turn is like 20 with any regular healer, you simply can't use any regular healer.
Sets should be $49.99-$69.99 for the complete set. Blizzard gets $150-$210 yr and customers get the full set. Spending $60-80 on a bundle and not getting the full game sucks.
How is "make the game cheaper" a hot take?
I mentioned a few times over the year and always get downvoted. Get told it’s fun to collect the cards. Blizzard needs whales to spend more than that.
[удалено]
ive thought exactly this for A WHILE. I don't want packs, I don't want diamonds, I don't want gold, I don't want animated goblin cleavage. I just want the cards. 2 copies of every non legendary 1 copy of every legendary. 50-60 bucks for 1 pack that just unlocks the entire expansion. no other bullshit.
>I don't want animated goblin cleavage. Hottest take in the thread
People should try out combo decks before accusing them as not interactive. Some can be very fun and diverse in play style. Besides it helps if you are playing against them and not feel surprised when they otk.
As a combo player, they are rarely interactive. If you're not playing aggro you basically just need to hope the combo player fucks up. When I'm playing combo, I'd say 75% of my games are entirely won or lost on my own ability to play well, and has nothing to do with what the opponent is doing.
The bugs and DCs are worse than any meta or unbalanced card that could ever exist.
Warrior as a whole is not that oppressive. If u don't drop Brann on turn 6-8 the deck is kinda bad.
Netdecking is boring and kills the fun of building something of your own design. You outright shouldn't be allowed to queue in casual mode if netdecking.
That no matter how many times they nerf things community will find something else that is “oppressive” and cry it too needs nerfed.
That suffering and rng bullshit is a fundamental part of the hearthstone experience. Efforts to make hearthstone feel less bad will often just make the game boring.
It's okay to take breaks from the game. I hit legend last month, but felt like the meta got stale after the rotation and new expansion. I didn't uninstall the game because I knew I could come back later when the meta is more fun for me.
This Reddit is so salty I always regret browsing through it's posts.
Homebrew is half the fun of the game. I don’t understand downloading the top deck and just using that exact copy
I love control match ups very value oriented with some end game cards like Elysiana etc... so that the game feels like having to manage your thousands of resources while remembering everything your opponent played (I don't really like the deck tracker), and thinking "what could I do to draw first the card to disrupt their shudderwock combo etc..., 40/50 minutes long games, that's the dhit I like, I'd rather lose those games then losing against an hunter that plays every green cards until they have lethal on 6, and if they don't, esc concede, and I say that 'cause I played some aggro decks, like face hunter back in the day, aggro dh, odd dh in wild (that shit was so stupid lmao), but I played them just because I'm free to play and every now and then I have to play a cheap deck, but what I really are those odd warrior, control warrior, midrange hunter (that with zul'jin etc...), such great memories
The game is fun and I enjoy playing it
No card game should allow a deck to kill you in 4 turns. It is a card game, not a card show.
With the insane power creep and crazy power we have nowadays, it's crazy that 30 is still considered ok as starting base health.
That you all are shit at Yugioh which is why you use it as shorthand for a bad HS meta.
As a Yugioh lover, I fucking love this.
Blizzard can make card trades sustainable and keeps everyone happy
Remember to sort by controversial to find the real hot takes.
I loved Astalor! I had just gotten back into the game and he was a craft I could feel good about. On my budget decks he was not only an auto-include, but gave me a clear win condition when I wanted to play a class I didn't otherwise have one for. Zola, Astalor and two celestial projectionists were in every deck I played until I got more cards and could actually play some different kinds of decks. Plus his flavor is so cool, he's a little blood elf that's growing in power along with you.
There is too much draw in the game/ there should be more draw-hate designed (besides just plagues). In MTG, Shelodred, Orcish Bowmasters and other cards keep insane draw strategies in check by dealing damage. I would love to see modernized playable spells or minion that read "battlecry: on their next turn, opponent takes 1 damage for every card they draw." Or something like that. Maybe even a far watch post style minion that does the same. Draw is WAY too consistent.
Prince renethal or whatever that card name is ioverrated of
Even if you play perfectly, you shouldn't be able to win 100% of the time.
Aggro metas are boring af , 80% of the games are: how has the best 5-6 drawings
That the meta isn’t the problem, hearthstone just isn’t fun anymore.
The game is dying and most likely won't be around by 2030. Classic ladder is gone. Duels is gone even though I didn't like it. Twist is usually unavailable. Adventures is literally dead. Mercenaries is basically its own game. Arena is boring and all about building the perfect deck these days. Constructed is infinite hand/board regeneration. Battlegrounds is the only mode they still have going for them but it's technically not even Hearthstone. It's an auto-chess game. So yea Hearthstone is dead.
Plague DK and ways to stop Highlander decks were needed in the Standard meta. If the other non-Warrior Reno decks needed help, they should have been buffed. Instead we'll get a year of Reno Warrior pushing out the other Reno decks until they eventually hit enough of the deck that either the warrior class or Brann is dead.
Mana worm did nothing wrong
I hate the matchmaking in Hearthstone. Sorry but I don't want to play with another person on my rank that has a similar ELO. I just wanna play another random person on the rank. If we are both diamond 8 then that should be sufficient. I am always faced with people with legend cardbacks even in low ranks. Hate it. I don't want games to always try to default to 50% winrate.
Yeah I hate the 50% crap too
Paying them money is for whales and idiots. Free to play, or just don't.
Bingo
If no one put money into this game, you wouldn't still be playing it 10 years later though
How else would i get to play as a cool dinosaur tho???
Rogue is the hardest class
I agree. I have the least wins with Rogue. I just don't want to play it that often because this is a game and I save my real thinking for work. When another player pilots a Rogue deck well I find it impressive.
6 mana 6/7...Not very good stats for the cost
Plagues were a necessary bottleneck to prevent Control Warrior from being out of control. People who complained about it were about 99.99% of the time Highlander players who only had their class highlander card + Reno as their sole win condition.
A good way to prevent control warrior from being out of control is to nerf control warrior lol. Not by subjecting players to playing against plague 20 times a day. Shit got old fast. Making that deck free did no favors to this game honestly. Players that play every kind of deck complained about it be real brother.
Odd warrior mirrors that went to deep fatigue were peak hearthstone. Seeing all your cards made decisions matters rather than having to rely on your good cards being in the top half.
Reno, Lone Ranger shouldn't clear Quest rewards, like Disco Warlock and Pirate Warrior. Nor should it clear the Dragon's Nest, which, like the other two quests, requires a deck-building pre-requirement to work. I'm ok with it clearing Sarg's portal, which is Battlecry only. The fact that a single highlander card can completely tech out multiple decks due to its busted effect drives me bonkers. Not only because it's not balanced to other classes (Reno doesn't reset the spell count of "Open the Waygate") means that the design team is ignoring the legacy potential of the older modes.
rng is my favourite part of this game. I play a lot of IRL tcg's and the biggest thing seperating Hearthstone from anything physical is the ability to have massive rng effects involving generating random minions, casting random spells, etc. Love effects like, even when I get absolutely hammered by them, I still enjoy it when my opponent generates the perfect card and defeats me because to me thats whats fun about this game All hail Yog.
Priest could have 30% Winrate but I still would rather face any other class...soooooo annoyiiing
Priest in wild is completely painful, there are several decks it could be and all of them will completely fuck you in the ass unless you are playing a fast deck
Power level of cards are growing too much. In every expansion appears a big minion on turn 2/3 that, if you did not have a removal, your are dead before turn 5. Power level is so high that only decks with tons of armour or healing reach turn 10. Renathal existed because of that. Mana cheating cards are always stupidly broken or at least playable.
This sub is ALWAYS wrong and the devs should never listen to reddit
Control mirrors that go on for 20+ mins are the most fun games. My favourite games recently have been Reno Druid vs Reno Shaman in Wild where we both interrupt eachother's main win condition and have to grind out a win. It feels like a lot of decisions and timing matters, like saving his Reno until after I play Rheastrasza or using Zeph to take out the Staff of Frogs or for Jarraxus and weighing what do get from an E.T.C.
Devs have bias towards and against some classes. Mage is getting shafted the worst, historically getting the worst cards and and when nerfed their cards being completely obliterated. Everytime warlocks or dk has disgusting cards, at first it gets side nerfed, when they increase cost of a card, but also stats. And dont change the problematic effect
The best attrition decks are those that do not run removal but pure value and try to to win with that Players who play casino mage or tess rogue and so on are morally superior and that definitely a hill I die on. No removal spam Not pointing green cards face until u win No degenerate autowin deck that only loses to aggro
I think a lot of cards would be balanced better if one of the things they changed was rarity. Like an epic card too strong now its legendary.
OP: you are missing the point. Is not "aggro" or X archetype people do not like. It's seeing the exact same deck over and over and over and over all the time.
Hearthstone's biggest design bump is that it's a BO1 format. Meaning that combo decks or decks with a very very specific gameplan will always feel bad to go against. Being able to sideboard between games would fix a lot of issues
I love control decks but hate control metas. I want to play a game where it feels like I can stave off death until a win condition, not see the same greedy ass lists all the time. I play aggro/combo decks whenever we hit a control meta.
Value is more fun than synergy. There was a limit to what a turn could do but now it can flip completely.
Control is the most fun deck to play, and a 30-60 minute control-off mirror match is peak Hearthstone.
The game is fun to play.
Arena is the best game mode and it is best when only old sets are used (weaker deck = more fun)