Hearthstone 19: Patches In All The Wrong Places

[Zevox]

Welcome to nineteenth GitP thread for Hearthstone. For anyone who doesn't know, Hearthstone is a video card game from Blizzard, based on the Warcraft series. The game is free to play and available here, so if you're interested, give it a shot. You've got nothing to lose but your free time.

For new players, something to be aware of is that there are a number of hidden "quests" you can complete which will give you free gold, dust, or even a pack. A complete list can be found here. Be aware that not quite all of those are ones you'll be able to complete quickly though.

And here is a list of Playgrounders currently in the game, for both NA and EU servers:

Spoiler

Show

GitP Username	Battle.net ID (US)
aethernox	ethernox#1948
AgentPaper	AgentPaper#1193
AmberVael	AmberVael#1225
Anarion	Anarion55#1254
Antonok	Antonok#1704
Anxe	GoCorral#1879
Baelot	Baelot#1149
Cogwheel	OmegaNixon#1123
banthesun	banthesun#1782
Dancing Owlbear	Owlbear#1586
Destro Yersul	DestroYersul#1239
D_Lord	Volrock#1367
Duck999	Duck999#1349
Duos	DoctorDapper#1491
Firedaemon33	Firedaemon#1486
flat_footed	Hiigara#1357
Fleeing Coward	Scorch#1432
GAAD	GAAD#1126
Gaelbert	SamHouston#1563
Gamerlord	Gamerlord#1612
Gandariel	Ciabatta#2958
Ganorenas	Ganorenas#1457
Gomipile	Glodd#1784
Gray Mage	GrayMage#1723
Grytorm	Grytorm#1777
Hamste	Theorules#1234
Haruspex_Pariah	HaruspexPari#1254
Hatevah	Hatevah#1405
heronbpv	Avan#1991
Hircine	IllusiveMan#1616
Jaxzan Proditor	Jaxzan#1878
jindra34	JinRia #1770
Johnjimco	JohnJimco#1482
Karoht	Karoht#1505
Kish	Grazzt#1417
Krade	Krade#1266
LegoShrimp	legoshrimp#1722
Landis963	Landis963#1789
Loreweaver15	Loreweaver#1199
Lunix Vandal	LunixVandal#1952
MacGiolla	MacGiolla#1982
MathMage	MathMage#1797
MCerberus	MCerberus#1734
mistformsquirrl	mistformsqrl#1430
moosabi	Moossabi#1325
Mystic Muse	NSFJunkblade#1400
Neon Knight	VultureCrook#1434
Neriractor	neriractor#1483
Nerocite	JoeKage#1852
nhbdy	Nohbdy#1927
Olinser	Olinser#1393
Onionbreath	GiantSquid#1845
OrcusMcP	Orcus#1805
otakuryoga	Scootaloo#1471
Pokonic	pokonic#1166
PsyBomb	PsyBomb#1878
Qwertystop	Qwertystop#1897
r2d2go	r2d2go#1262
Rodin	Rodin#1811
Rosstin	Rosstin#1609
SamBurke	SamBurke#1486
Shishnarfne	Gruschenka#1375
Sholos	Veebeebee#1383
Stabbity Rabbit	StabityRabit#1362
Techwarrior	Techwarri0r#1572
Temotei	Temotei#1507
Tesla_pasta	teslapasta#1973
Thanatos 51-50	Thanatos5150#1407
TheGlyphstone	Glyphstone#1419
The Hellbug	thehellbug#1216
The_Jackal	TheJackal#1499
Togarth	Asparag#1680
Trouble Brewing	HairyPoppins#1949
UserClone	UserClone #1545
Volatar	Volatar#1750
Yael	Urashima#1810
Yana	Raltis#1807
ZeroNumerous	ZeroNumerous#1913
Zevox	Zevox#1522
Zmek	JadeReaver #1783

GitP Username	Battle.net ID (EU)
Adumbration	Adumbration#2419
Aran Thule	AranThule#2780
Avaris	Avaris#2378
Avilan the Grey	Beardedgeek#2355
Beelzebub1111	SirArthurIV#1244
boomwolf	BoomWolf#1169
Dada	Scrattlebear#2863
D-naras	Dinos #2811
Epinephrine_Syn	SilverSeraph #2931
Fleeing Coward	Scorch#1432
Frog Dragon	Vasemmasti#2618
FyreByrd	FyreByrd#2962
Gandariel	Ciabatta#2958
GolemsVoice	CrazyCat#29897
Hewhosaysfish	HeWhoSezFish#2503
Hippie_Viking	HippieViking#2866
Infernally Clay	Winny#1904
Jormengand	Trianna#2529
Lionheart	Lionheart#2440
Mr.Silver	SilverSmiles#2462
Murmaider	Murmaider#2273
Posca	Mazura#2636
Raddish	Raddish#2730
ScionoftheVoid	JayPsi#2775
ShinyRocks	MoodyTuskarr#2790
Sian	Sian#2690
Silfir	Silfir#2863
SlyGuyMcFly	SlGuyMcFly#2562
Tokay	Tokay#2518
Tome	Taejix#2836
Volthawk	Volthawk#1214
Weimann	Weimann#2716
Wraith	Illusionist#2224
Xiander	Xiander#2814

----------------------------------------------

Big news!!

Year of the Mammoth announcement

(Will post link when I can, but you can find it on blizzard site)

Notable things:
1) Azure drake, Sylvanas, Rag, Power Overwhelming, Conceal and Ice Lance rotate into Wild
(we get a full dust refund AND keep the cards!)

2) 2017 will be only Expansions, no adventures.

3) new rogue hero, Maiev Shadowsong, free for everyone (just play some games)

Thoughts: happy to see rag and sylv go. They'll make space for new cool legendaries
Miracle rogue loses a lot of cards (conceal, drake, pillager)
Don't care about the hero skin, happy cause I'll have a ton of free dust (I never disenchant unless I need stuff, I have a few extras of the cards that are rotating )

Wait, what?! What the hell is with rotating out Classic cards? I thought that the whole point of those was that they would always be there as options for players, so even those who stop playing for a while and come back later have at least some pool of good, usable cards they can always draw from. That was the whole justification for the big nerfs to things like Ancient of Lore, BGH, Molten Giant, or Force of Nature - they were always going to be usable, so they had to be changed so that decks like Midrange Druid and Handlock wouldn't always be around largely the same as they'd been since pre-Naxx, or BGH wouldn't always be a one-of in every non-aggro deck whenever any minion he can hit is halfway common.

This is a big departure from their previous stance, and frankly, I think they had it right the first time. There should be an evergreen pool of cards for players who take breaks, and the classics are the perfect ones for the job - they should absolutely not be making any exceptions to that. If they wanted to do something about those cards being used consistently, they should've made some small nerfs to them. And frankly, the only one I can see particularly good reason to do that with is Azure Drake, which genuinely shows up in a ton of decks a lot of the time, and always has.

No adventures in 2017? Boo, I kind of like adventures. Not exactly upsetting news like the above, but not something I'm a fan of. The hero I'll just wait and see whether I like the look of him or her I suppose. So far I've liked Liadrin and Tyrande, not so much the rest. Well, I guess I might prefer Alleria if I played Hunter, but I don't; and I might use Magni if he didn't cost money, but he does.

[Kish]

Her. Maiev is a night elf, like Tyrande. For my part I find her completely uninteresting, so of course that's the one they made close to free.

[Haruspex_Pariah]

I am slightly miffed. I spent good dust to craft Doctor Boom, then Standard was announced. Now they're cycling out the two neutral classic legends (and Azure Drake!) that I invested in specifically because they could fit into multiple types of decks.

If we really are getting dust for the lost cards that's a little better. We'll have to see what the new landscape looks like.

[Temotei]

Is there anything stopping us from crafting golden copies of those cards and basically getting them for free because of the refund?

[moossabi]

Is there anything stopping us from crafting golden copies of those cards and basically getting them for free because of the refund?

Nope. This is what I'm planning to do with Ragnaros.

[Haruspex_Pariah]

Is there anything stopping us from crafting golden copies of those cards and basically getting them for free because of the refund?

All you need is 3200 dust on hand, otherwise that seems legit.

[Anarion]

Her. Maiev is a night elf, like Tyrande. For my part I find her completely uninteresting, so of course that's the one they made close to free.

Maiev had basically no character of her own. Her whole thing was just hating Illidan, iirc.

Is there anything stopping us from crafting golden copies of those cards and basically getting them for free because of the refund?

I'm not clear from their thing if you get a double refund or not. It says up to the maximum you can have in your deck, and they will refund the gold one, but I don't know if you get a second refund for the regular one.

[PsyBomb]

Need to see if I can rack up 1600 dust for Sylvanas before Mammoth hits, since it'll be effectively free.

On PO: it also combos hard with things like Shadowflame and Shambler, that don't need the original to survive the turn. If it were just Leeroy, then Cold Blood would have been nuked alongside Conceal.

[Nerocite]

In the Sylvanas change they talk about new deathrattle build-arounds, which makes me excited for N'Zoth decks.

[flat_footed]

Is there anything stopping us from crafting golden copies of those cards and basically getting them for free because of the refund?

Man, I am so glad you all said something about this. I've been sitting on a Golden Nat Pagle for a while and a free Sylvanas is a great reason to finally dust him.

[Joran]

I'm not clear from their thing if you get a double refund or not. It says up to the maximum you can have in your deck, and they will refund the gold one, but I don't know if you get a second refund for the regular one.

No, you don't get a double refund. You get it up to the maximum you can have in your deck.

If you have 2 copies of Ragnaros, you only get the dust for one of them (1600). If you have 2 copies of golden Azure Drake and 2 copies of regular Azure Drake, you only get the dust value of the two golden copies. Likewise, if you have Ragnaros and create a Golden Ragnaros and dust your regular Ragnaros, you get the equivalent of 400 dust rather than the 1600 dust you would have had with just regular Ragnaros.

Edit: Just got the dream in the Tavern Brawl: Pyroblast, Greater Arcane Missiles, Fireball, Firelands Portal. Turn 1, 30 damage to opponent face, 28 to mine.

[Epinephrine_Syn]

For this brawl, I'm going Hunter. Put in two copies of Tracking, ideally getting a t1 or t2 Call Of The Wild. It basically demands a response-play or it's an IMMEDIATE loss. Flares and Quick Shots for more digging and getting around the mages that are prolific here. Lotsa cheesy stuff, and hunter power is best power if the game somehow drags out to t4+.

[PsyBomb]

Yeah, this Brawl degenerated fast, and I won't be going back to it this week. Got rocked by a Mage, a Shaman, and a Druid all in a row on turns 1 or 2, just going for a face burn blitz. Glad I got my one win early

[Haruspex_Pariah]

Looking over the "Hall of Fame" list, the only one I'm on the fence about is Ice Lance. I can only guess that they're planning to add new cards which would combo too strongly with it.

[Mando Knight]

Looking over the "Hall of Fame" list, the only one I'm on the fence about is Ice Lance. I can only guess that they're planning to add new cards which would combo too strongly with it.

The original announcement for the list explained several types of cards that they had in mind when removing each of the Hall of Fame cards: besides its potential in Freeze Mage or other OTK Mage decks, "Ice Lance also prevented us from making powerful Spell Damage cards and designs that allowed you to duplicate your cards."

[Gandariel]

So basically the "strat" for the Hall of Fame cards is:

If you have them already, don't do anything.

If you don't, craft them GOLDEN. You get the dust back AND you get the card, so spend as much as you can.

Also, a comment on a post from the last thread:

Mando Knight:
With Sylvanas and Entomb gone, Priest will probably start looking at Mind Control again if Paladin returns in Year of the Mammoth. That's both of the Tirion "hard-counters" gone

Hah. Paladin.
Let me guess, the loss of Entomb also hurts the Hunter matchup because it used to counter Highmane?

But yeah, let's hope Paladin and Hunter get back in the meta.
I actually think Hunter doesn't need anything new.
Everyone else is just gonna lose a lot of good cards with the rotation, and they'll just get back up. Their power plays (Call of the wild, cloaked huntress, Pat Rack, Highmane) are still here.

Paladin just needs a 2-drop, everyone has been saying that for years.
I just realised that Paladin decks crutch extremely hard on Tirion.
I mean think of every successful paladin deck : Midrange (play a normal value game, drop Tirion, gg), Secret (play Challenger to deplete their answers, follow up with the one-two killer punch Boom Tirion). Even Anyfin is super reliant on Tirion, because he's the only STRONG play they have until turn 20 or so.

Maybe they should just nerf him and give Paladin some other cards.

Like, maybe make the sword 5/2? Everyone would still play him, but they'd be free to give paladin more good cards

[Epinephrine_Syn]

Yeah, this Brawl degenerated fast, and I won't be going back to it this week. Got rocked by a Mage, a Shaman, and a Druid all in a row on turns 1 or 2, just going for a face burn blitz. Glad I got my one win early

To be fair, this brawl actually does have SOME tactics and counter play, despite games literally going 4 turns long maximum 90% of the time.

Specifically, I know I'm running Snipe, because everyone plays mage, and they play Violet Teacher+Armor (reduce damage to you to 1) critter, then cast a buttload of spells. Sniperino cuts that off dead, and playing it exactly the turn they want to means they can't drop a critter before (they'd need to have literally wisp or 0/2 taunt in their deck to eat the snipe).

Also, got a fair couple wins off of somebody burning themselves to 9-12 range, forgetting that I am playing a Hunter.

[Temotei]

A paladin I faced put himself at 1 health on turn 1. I had Patches in hand.

[thirsting]

Got my pack with minions only warrior, stuffed with everything that gives free armor (well, had two Ironforge Portals because in effect those cost only one health).

Three expansions is exactly what I wanted. Yuletide all year long!

[Gandariel]

I just made a random Mage deck, went t1 Babbling book, T2 coin Violet illusionist + Arcane Intellect Pyroblast Firelands portal Cabalist's tome and, well you get the gist.

Didn't manage to win right there, but the opponent just conceded.

[PsyBomb]

Just drafted an odd Warlock Arena, about to get started. Ridiculously aggressive 1-2, mediocre 3-4, tons of bombs on 6-7-9, and almost literally nothing outside of those.

Spoiler: Decklist

Show

Flame Imp x2
Soul Fire

Boneguard Lieutenant
Dark Peddler x2
Friendly Bartender
Haunted Creeper x2
Nerubian Egg
Darkbomb

Dancing Swords
Darkshire Councilman
Hired Gun
Illuminator
Spider Tank

Daring Reporter
Kabal Chemist
Lost Tallstrider
Ogre Magi

Floating Watcher

Boulderfist Ogre
Drakonid Crusher
Kabal Trafficker
Piloted Sky Golem

Abyssal Enforcer x2

North Sea Kraken
Ysera

I'm optimistic about my chances as long as I can keep the opponent on the defensive long enough to get into my 6+ (or, to be honest, possibly rip them to shreds with the early game blitz). Any thoughts before I get started?

[Spore]

Is there anything stopping us from crafting golden copies of those cards and basically getting them for free because of the refund?

Nope, only one instance of the card.

Maiev had basically no character of her own. Her whole thing was just hating Illidan, iirc.

I still LOVE her voice actress so I am insanely happy for her to be the new rogue. Actually I feel Valeera to more of a bland stereotype than Maiev. Sure, Valeera has the bigger backstory but she is still a b*tch in a bikini, ready to turn against any and all friends and foes.

I prefer the design of the Wardens but having a glaive - or call ot moon sword - as a weapon with a heavy armor doesn't make much sense. They should have glaives - like the pole weapon - not some oversized bottle openers. I am curious what the Rogue hero power will procure for her.

[Gandariel]

Just drafted an odd Warlock Arena, about to get started. Ridiculously aggressive 1-2, mediocre 3-4, tons of bombs on 6-7-9, and almost literally nothing outside of those.

Spoiler: Decklist

Show

Flame Imp x2
Soul Fire

Boneguard Lieutenant
Dark Peddler x2
Friendly Bartender
Haunted Creeper x2
Nerubian Egg
Darkbomb

Dancing Swords
Darkshire Councilman
Hired Gun
Illuminator
Spider Tank

Daring Reporter
Kabal Chemist
Lost Tallstrider
Ogre Magi

Floating Watcher

Boulderfist Ogre
Drakonid Crusher
Kabal Trafficker
Piloted Sky Golem

Abyssal Enforcer x2

North Sea Kraken
Ysera

I'm optimistic about my chances as long as I can keep the opponent on the defensive long enough to get into my 6+ (or, to be honest, possibly rip them to shreds with the early game blitz). Any thoughts before I get started?

Don't Blitz and don't tap.

Your early game is good, but not as good as you'd think.
Don't expect to win off of it, just play defensive and fight for board.

If you go all-in early you are at very high risk: no taunt or heal, no catchup cards (aside from Enforcer).
You have an insane lategame, but they're all slow win conditions.

Your best bet is to only fight for board, preserve your life total, and force your opponent to play the value game (which you'll win, because dayum)

[Haruspex_Pariah]

Played Dragon Priest against a Rogue. She played Reno once, which surprised me. Then she shadow stepped him and I sighed; it was going to be one of those games. She played Reno a second time, and Shadowcaster'd it. Then she played the 1/1 Reno for her third full heal. Then she played the 18/26 C'Thun which got so big because her C'Thun assassin fellow ate the Ysera I Discovered from a historian.

Then I Shadow Word:Death her C'Thun and she conceded. Phew.

EDIT: She also used the Gadgetzan ferry to bounce him again, so she actually got to Reno four times.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Wait, what?! What the hell is with rotating out Classic cards? I thought that the whole point of those was that they would always be there as options for players, so even those who stop playing for a while and come back later have at least some pool of good, usable cards they can always draw from. That was the whole justification for the big nerfs to things like Ancient of Lore, BGH, Molten Giant, or Force of Nature - they were always going to be usable, so they had to be changed so that decks like Midrange Druid and Handlock wouldn't always be around largely the same as they'd been since pre-Naxx, or BGH wouldn't always be a one-of in every non-aggro deck whenever any minion he can hit is halfway common.

This is a big departure from their previous stance, and frankly, I think they had it right the first time. There should be an evergreen pool of cards for players who take breaks, and the classics are the perfect ones for the job - they should absolutely not be making any exceptions to that. If they wanted to do something about those cards being used consistently, they should've made some small nerfs to them. And frankly, the only one I can see particularly good reason to do that with is Azure Drake, which genuinely shows up in a ton of decks a lot of the time, and always has.

No adventures in 2017? Boo, I kind of like adventures. Not exactly upsetting news like the above, but not something I'm a fan of. The hero I'll just wait and see whether I like the look of him or her I suppose. So far I've liked Liadrin and Tyrande, not so much the rest. Well, I guess I might prefer Alleria if I played Hunter, but I don't; and I might use Magni if he didn't cost money, but he does.

What irks me about these two things (the rotation and the no-adventure policy) is that having a core set of viable cards that would always be in play and having expansions with guaranteed cards and PvE content were two big things that differentiated Hearthstone from Magic's model, in my eyes. Really, Hearthstone is just becoming more and more like a Magic clone with worse card design and more questionable balance. I hardly play it as-is, and this news hardly incentivizes me to.

Still, as long as I get confirmation of how the free dust works, I'll be claiming my free legendary, methinks.

[Joran]

To be fair, this brawl actually does have SOME tactics and counter play, despite games literally going 4 turns long maximum 90% of the time.

Specifically, I know I'm running Snipe, because everyone plays mage, and they play Violet Teacher+Armor (reduce damage to you to 1) critter, then cast a buttload of spells. Sniperino cuts that off dead, and playing it exactly the turn they want to means they can't drop a critter before (they'd need to have literally wisp or 0/2 taunt in their deck to eat the snipe).

Also, got a fair couple wins off of somebody burning themselves to 9-12 range, forgetting that I am playing a Hunter.

I've also been burned down to a point that I couldn't cast a spell; the spells don't check if you have an ability like Violet Illusionist or Animated Armor to reduce the damage. So I've had Pyroblasts in hand to finish off the opponent but not the 10 health to play it.

It's a silly mode, but I like silly stuff so I've been playing it a fair bit.

[Anarion]

What irks me about these two things (the rotation and the no-adventure policy) is that having a core set of viable cards that would always be in play and having expansions with guaranteed cards and PvE content were two big things that differentiated Hearthstone from Magic's model, in my eyes. Really, Hearthstone is just becoming more and more like a Magic clone with worse card design and more questionable balance. I hardly play it as-is, and this news hardly incentivizes me to.

Still, as long as I get confirmation of how the free dust works, I'll be claiming my free legendary, methinks.

You'll still be getting single player content though. Possibly more of it, even, since they seemed to suggest that the part of adventures they like is the story showing off the characters and setting, so they might do that for every expansion. Hopefully, they might even make it so the single player stuff offers a few guaranteed iconic cards in the set, though if they're uninventive, they'll probably just do packs instead.

The other thing, though, at least for me as someone who tries to play up to rank 5 each month, is that the meta can get really stale, especially with stuff like the current shaman>all problem that's leading to the nerfs at the end of the month. More big expansions with more cards makes me really happy because it means more experimentation and variety.

[Seerow]

I hope that the new single player stuff comes with decent rewards. Like I don't mind it so much if every expansion has 130 cards if I can drop 20 bucks and get about half of the iconic legendaries and a handful of epics, I'd be pretty happy. But if it's all pack based and we're only getting like 5 or so bonus packs at the start of the expansion it is basically a money grab, and leaves f2p players further behind than ever.

[Spore]

Agreed. I liked the adventure designs very much because it somewhat levelled the playing field for everyone. I have invested far too much into Hearthstone and if I need to get 100 packs every 4 months to stay competitive I will probably not continue that hobby.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

I'm glad to see that Blizzard is willing to rotate classic cards out in this fashion. However, I'm a bit sad we don't see them doing similar things to rotate healthy cards that have good long-term gameplay INTO classic.

There are a number of very solid, interesting, and non-meta-defining cards, and I don't see the harm in making some of them into "classic" cards. Especially given how useless some of the basic / classic cards are, which really just makes the number smaller. There are some cards there I've NEVER seen in play.