Hearthstone 19: Patches In All The Wrong Places

[BRC]

So, this week's Brawl is 'Who Gets First Turn and Crafted Patches'.

...I got my win with Renounce.

I never even considered Patches...

[Mando Knight]

So, this week's Brawl is 'Who Gets First Turn and Crafted Patches'.

Ice Block can counter if the opponent doesn't luck into Flare, but it's an extremely slow grind.

Maelstrom Portal works a little faster, but relies on the 1-drops and other cards you get to actually win before turn 7 (where the Hunter kills you with Steady Shot attrition).

[Hamste]

The tavern brawl is pretty good for finishing quests though not that great in general. Thankfully I only saw a single patches deck the time I have played of it.

[The Glyphstone]

I've seen Patches Warrior,Timber Wolf Hunter, Jade (Blossom/Idol) Druid, Soulfire Warlock, and Mind Blast Priest.

[Rodin]

Feels pretty poor overall. While I'm sure there's a meta for it, it doesn't seem anywhere near as interesting as the "Pick 2" Brawl. One card doesn't leave a lot of room for strategies.

One win and done for me. First couple matches were against Patches decks, then I ran into a Druid who only played one Savage Roar the whole game. I'm not sure if that's what he picked (for some reason) or if he picked a high mana cost card that he died before getting to.

[Joran]

They're nerfing the Rogue Quest:

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/hear...ic/20757246514

Instead of 4 bounces, you'll need 5. As someone who owns both a regular and golden Rogue quest, I'm pleased.

[Rodin]

Thank God.

Quest Rogue utterly crushing all forms of Priest (outside of maybe Silence Priest) is what has kept me out of ranked this expansion. It's so frustrating to run into a deck where you have an almost 100% loss rate. An extra bounce required could make all the difference in the world, as well as just reducing the number of Quest Rogues in general.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

RIP Quest Rogue. The Blizz tradition of deck-killing nerfs seems to continue. I don't see any way that the deck survives, but at least I'll be able to get free Legendary dust.

I say this mostly because the difference between four plays and five plays is huge. With four plays, you can play a minion twice (achievable by having enough pairs of duplicate minions and Mimic Pod) and then bounce twice. Now, you need to draw into three of your bounces, so the deck becomes even more RNG-dependent.

You also lose Igneous Elemental + two Fireflies, or Igneous + Firefly + Bounce.

I guess maybe it isn't the end of the world, but wow that's a severe nerf, and to a deck that already had a lot of bad matchups.

[Lord Raziere]

beat one person using Soulfire. Heheheheheh. and another using nothing but Murloc Tidecaller. in todays brawl. this is fun. lets try nothing but Ravaging Ghoul!

[CarpeGuitarrem]

beat one person using Soulfire. Heheheheheh. and another using nothing but Murloc Tidecaller. in todays brawl. this is fun. lets try nothing but Ravaging Ghoul!

That...might actually work. With Priest/Warrior, that lets you heal past the damage that 21 Patcheses are able to do to your face (they drop first Patches T1, 7 face damage, you drop Ghoul T2, T2 they kill the Patcheses off and hit you with 7 more, you drop Ghoul T3, T3 they kill the Patcheses off and hit you with 7 more, you drop Ghoul T4 and heal/armor, T4 they have no Patcheses left and soon start to fatigue).

EDIT wait I was thinking of the wrong card, the 1/3 taunterino.

[Lord Raziere]

well I did win the SECOND match I had using ravaging ghoul against a hunter, but not against patches yet....the hunter WAS using 1/1 charge boars though.

[PsyBomb]

3-1 right now. Wins were with Brave Archer and Jade Idol. Loss was to Patches.

[Joran]

Thank God.

Quest Rogue utterly crushing all forms of Priest (outside of maybe Silence Priest) is what has kept me out of ranked this expansion. It's so frustrating to run into a deck where you have an almost 100% loss rate. An extra bounce required could make all the difference in the world, as well as just reducing the number of Quest Rogues in general.

I remember a streamer saying that Silence Priest should be favored against Quest Rogue, but VS Reaper is showing it as a unfavored matchup.

The extra bounce makes a huge difference and may make the deck unviable. Another change that could have been made is make the quest reward into a minion; this means it couldn't get cheated out with prep and the opponent has a turn to get ready.

[Zevox]

New Thread is up.

[Rodin]

I remember a streamer saying that Silence Priest should be favored against Quest Rogue, but VS Reaper is showing it as a unfavored matchup.

The extra bounce makes a huge difference and may make the deck unviable. Another change that could have been made is make the quest reward into a minion; this means it couldn't get cheated out with prep and the opponent has a turn to get ready.

That may have been better for balance, but realistically I can't see Blizzard going through the design necessary to create a minion, voice it, stat it, give it new art...etc.

There's only three ways the card was likely to get balanced.

1) Increase number of bounces.

2) Increase mana cost of Crystal Caverns.

3) Decrease the stats on the quest.

Of the 3, I think 1 was the best. Increasing the mana cost makes the Rogue win if they have Preparation and lose if they don't have it. Decreasing the stats is very hard to balance - if you don't do it by enough it's pointless, and if you nerf the stats too hard the entire deck becomes non-viable even if the quest is completed.

Increasing the bounces by one is the best compromise. It slows the quest down a bit, doesn't allow cheating like Preparation, and keeps the explosive lategame power. It just makes it less likely for the Rogue to be completing the quest on turn 4, which I don't think was ever intended.

Of course, I may be a bit biased here since I hate Quest Rogue with a passion. Regardless of balance it is the least fun deck to play against I have ever seen, even including OTK Warrior. The Rogue just sits there playing solitaire without even trying to interact with your board, and then suddenly explodes and you have no chance of winning.