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Author Topic: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?  (Read 613287 times)

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Titandrake

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #700 on: May 08, 2014, 04:06:32 am »
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I feel like my first 12 win took a lot longer than it took other people I know IRL to get. Something like ~400 arena games for it to happen, with two 11 win runs in between (and one 9 win when the cap was 9 wins.)

My play in arena has shifted between:
1. To the face! Trade only when my minion will live, given the exact current board state
2. Wait, buffers exist. Trade all the things!
3. Case by case basis, but a slight bias to assuming they don't have the buffer/answer and trying to fit in more damage.

Now, I'm noticing I'm losing a lot more because of not making the trade than because I've missed out on some damage, so I'm trying to trade more often + recognize when my board is strong enough I don't have to play more, in case of board clears.
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popsofctown

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #701 on: May 08, 2014, 04:22:54 am »
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^The counter to aggro Hunter is healing/taunt, and the counter to mid-range Hunter is combo decks, which rely on spells rather than minions. The devs have made it clear though that they want the game to focus on minion-based decks, which is why they nerfed freeze, and now they're nerfing UTH to 3 mana.

I'm not sure the UTH nerf has to do with whether the game focuses on minion-based decks or not.  UTH itself is a pretty minion based deck, and zoo did ok in the Hunter heavy environment.  Dire Wolph alpha next to a shieldbearer can absorb so many doggies that you could still win games where you allowed your opponent to Unleash3 or even Unleash4. 

I think they nerfed UTH for the reason that they stated, which was that the backend winrates and usage rates were too high for hunter.

I don't disagree that they want the game to be minion based though.  The freeze mage nerf is a sign of that, and so is the reluctant zoo nerfs when zoo has been prevalent since, forever.  Minion based stuff like Shattered Sun Cleric, DoA, Imps, Dark Iron Dwarf, have always been nerfed gently and reluctantly, non minion based stuff like Dalaran Mage, Battle Rage, Cone of Cold, and Conceal have been nerfed swiftly and heavily.
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Titandrake

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #702 on: May 08, 2014, 05:17:29 am »
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It reminds me of the "new wave" of Magic design.

(Disclaimer: I haven't played M:tG in a long time. Consider my last experience to be Innistrad, for people who do.)

There was an article by Mark Rosewater (lead designer), which roughly boiled down to, "reward the player for what they would have normally done." This means that you reward playing cards, using all your mana, amassing an army, etc. In previous MtG sets, there were mechanics where creatures got bigger if you kept your hand above 7 cards (which you have to be trying to do, and reduces board presence), or if you had all your lands tapped (which puts you at a deliberate disadvantage because you won't have mana on your opponent's turn to react.) Those sets were pretty bad. The newer sets generally have mechanics that don't force you to take a downside. Good players will recognize when taking the downside is worth it, but it feels much better when you can just yolo-play everything.

Blizzard's nerfing strategy reminds me of this. People like playing creatures, people like actually getting to use their creatures, and according to this philosophy cards that allow someone to almost entirely ignore creatures need to be balanced carefully and should be good, but not overpowering.

This isn't an attack on that philosophy; I actually agree with much of it, and for a Dominion analogy I'm a lot gladder that buying actions is good a lot of the time in Dominion. However, I don't like how Blizzard goes for more heavy-handed nerfs against strategies that are less fun against new players. I'd prefer more frequent small nerfs, it tends to be harder to justify buffing a card until long after it has dropped out of the metagame.
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Kirian

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #703 on: May 08, 2014, 10:26:49 am »
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Apparently people are still filtering their way up in ranked... I just played someone who dropped not one but three golden legendaries.  Followed by someone who played three non-golden legendaries.

Edit:  at Rank 19.

Im just got to rank 15 and I have 1 or 2 legendaries in all my decks.

o.O

I have a total of one legendary (class-specific) and like three epics so far.  I cannot imagine how anyone can have multiple golden legendaries without either spending a bunch of cash, or doing really, really well at arena... in which case they really shouldn't be near rank 20 should they?
Doing well in arena is so easy though.  Everyone in arena is bad

The arena is everyone, and you're also probably very good at drafting decks. So to you everyone is bad. To me it's 50/50. To Kirian maybe it's another ratio, but certainly getting 12 wins is not super easy because we would all have gotten it already.

Also, someone has to lose in the arena. Not everyone can win.

Some of you guys haven't done your first 12 win runs yet? 

LOL no.  Um... my record is 7.

Edit:  Note this is partially because I won't pay to get to the arena, so without a major gold infusion it's quests for me.  So I might do an Arena a week on average.
« Last Edit: May 08, 2014, 10:27:54 am by Kirian »
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Jorbles

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #704 on: May 08, 2014, 11:57:58 am »
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Apparently people are still filtering their way up in ranked... I just played someone who dropped not one but three golden legendaries.  Followed by someone who played three non-golden legendaries.

Edit:  at Rank 19.

Im just got to rank 15 and I have 1 or 2 legendaries in all my decks.

o.O

I have a total of one legendary (class-specific) and like three epics so far.  I cannot imagine how anyone can have multiple golden legendaries without either spending a bunch of cash, or doing really, really well at arena... in which case they really shouldn't be near rank 20 should they?
Doing well in arena is so easy though.  Everyone in arena is bad

The arena is everyone, and you're also probably very good at drafting decks. So to you everyone is bad. To me it's 50/50. To Kirian maybe it's another ratio, but certainly getting 12 wins is not super easy because we would all have gotten it already.

Also, someone has to lose in the arena. Not everyone can win.

Some of you guys haven't done your first 12 win runs yet? 

LOL no.  Um... my record is 7.

Edit:  Note this is partially because I won't pay to get to the arena, so without a major gold infusion it's quests for me.  So I might do an Arena a week on average.

I've done a 9 or 10 run, but not 12 yet. I think I just don't play Hearthstone as heavily as some other people do here.
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popsofctown

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #705 on: May 08, 2014, 02:08:03 pm »
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Focus group research for magic showed that creature based metas sell packs best, so it makes sense for Blizz to prefer new world order philosophy
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KingZog3

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #706 on: May 08, 2014, 02:23:43 pm »
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Apparently people are still filtering their way up in ranked... I just played someone who dropped not one but three golden legendaries.  Followed by someone who played three non-golden legendaries.

Edit:  at Rank 19.

Im just got to rank 15 and I have 1 or 2 legendaries in all my decks.

o.O

I have a total of one legendary (class-specific) and like three epics so far.  I cannot imagine how anyone can have multiple golden legendaries without either spending a bunch of cash, or doing really, really well at arena... in which case they really shouldn't be near rank 20 should they?
Doing well in arena is so easy though.  Everyone in arena is bad

The arena is everyone, and you're also probably very good at drafting decks. So to you everyone is bad. To me it's 50/50. To Kirian maybe it's another ratio, but certainly getting 12 wins is not super easy because we would all have gotten it already.

Also, someone has to lose in the arena. Not everyone can win.

Some of you guys haven't done your first 12 win runs yet? 

LOL no.  Um... my record is 7.

Edit:  Note this is partially because I won't pay to get to the arena, so without a major gold infusion it's quests for me.  So I might do an Arena a week on average.

I've done a 9 or 10 run, but not 12 yet. I think I just don't play Hearthstone as heavily as some other people do here.

Ive gotten 8 win. I also don't spend money for runs though, so uts usually one run every day or two.
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Jorbles

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #707 on: May 08, 2014, 02:26:21 pm »
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Focus group research for magic showed that creature based metas sell packs best, so it makes sense for Blizz to prefer new world order philosophy

Source? (if this was a joke that I misunderstood you can ignore)
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nkirbit

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #708 on: May 08, 2014, 02:56:24 pm »
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Focus group research for magic showed that creature based metas sell packs best, so it makes sense for Blizz to prefer new world order philosophy

Source? (if this was a joke that I misunderstood you can ignore)

It doesn't sound like a joke to me.. it's exactly what I would expect.  Probably one of Mark Rosewater's (He's magic's lead designer) articles.
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Watno

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #709 on: May 08, 2014, 03:23:21 pm »
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It took me roughly three weeks from creating my account to getting 12 wins. I didn't pay anything, but played quite a lot.
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KingZog3

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #710 on: May 08, 2014, 03:49:21 pm »
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It took me roughly three weeks from creating my account to getting 12 wins. I didn't pay anything, but played quite a lot.

I dont think Im terrbile at arena, but my runs usually end up like my last one, where I lost my first 2 games, thought I drafted terribly, then won 5 in a row. Sometimes I play 4 hunters and Warriors in a row, then sometimes its all mages and wins are much harder.
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Grujah

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #711 on: May 08, 2014, 06:30:00 pm »
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It's very hard to determine what the best crafting strategy is, as it really depends on what you want. You know a legenedary is 2 epics or 4 rares, but without having played with the decks you plan on making, it's hard to say how much impact each of the cards will have. One of the worst feelings is saving up 1600 dust for some legendary, putting it in a deck, and immediately realizing you don't actually like the deck. If there's cards you might want 2 of, those are nice to craft, since you're not likely to open 2 of them that soon, and you can kind of see how the singleton copy works out.


The fact that there is no sandbox mode (friends only) or any way to test cards without spending lots of dust is quite annoying. In MTG you can always proxy up.

That and 9 decks only, which really slows you down when you want to test slight variations of certain decks.
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Jorbles

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #712 on: May 08, 2014, 06:34:02 pm »
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Arena is kindof a place you can test cards as you can eventually try out all cards given enough time. It's not necessarily the best place for it, but it's how I've played with most Legendaries that I've used. (I only have Gelbin and Cenarius). So you can get a feel for cards that way.

Arena is how I learned that I had no idea how to use Lorewalker Cho properly, why oh why, didn't I pick Nat Pagle?
« Last Edit: May 08, 2014, 06:35:19 pm by Jorbles »
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KingZog3

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #713 on: May 08, 2014, 09:03:41 pm »
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Arena is kindof a place you can test cards as you can eventually try out all cards given enough time. It's not necessarily the best place for it, but it's how I've played with most Legendaries that I've used. (I only have Gelbin and Cenarius). So you can get a feel for cards that way.

Arena is how I learned that I had no idea how to use Lorewalker Cho properly, why oh why, didn't I pick Nat Pagle?

Lo Walker Cho is just not that good. In arena basically anything else is better than him. But even in constructed you never see him. Nat Pagle is ok, but still can whiff.
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blueblimp

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #714 on: May 09, 2014, 02:56:40 am »
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I'm not sure the UTH nerf has to do with whether the game focuses on minion-based decks or not.
It was one of their stated reasons for the nerf:
http://us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/forum/topic/12673778812#1
Quote
We do like the idea of decks that have a really big turn and pull off a sweet combo, but when playing against Hunter decks, you may feel punished too much for playing minions. Playing minions is one of the key, fun pieces of the overall Hearthstone puzzle, and feeling like your options are limited by the opponent creates a play experience that may not be particularly enjoyable.
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Grujah

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #715 on: May 09, 2014, 04:06:05 am »
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Arena is kindof a place you can test cards as you can eventually try out all cards given enough time. It's not necessarily the best place for it, but it's how I've played with most Legendaries that I've used. (I only have Gelbin and Cenarius). So you can get a feel for cards that way.

Arena is how I learned that I had no idea how to use Lorewalker Cho properly, why oh why, didn't I pick Nat Pagle?

That only helps with evaluating cards in a vacuum, and it means very little in constructed.

For example, I have the Zoolock list. Now, I don't have Young Priestesses, so I use Blood Imps instead. I cannot evaluate how much more powerful YP is and whether she is worth it without buying her. It dies to anything unlike the imp, but it also trades up and hits for two. And so.

Or, I have ~4 swappable spots in my hunter deck that I need to find the best cards to fit. There is no way for me to test, for example, how good Snake Trap actually is (without buying it, and it's I believe an epic). How often does it trigger in a meaningful way etc.
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Titandrake

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #716 on: May 09, 2014, 04:31:58 am »
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I can save you time, and say that Snake Trap starts out good when people don't know about it. Then it gets worse as people play around it. Then it gets slightly better because who plays Snake Trap? The dream of Buzzard -> Snake Trap fails against any 1 damage ping, which is really easy (Mage, a good Knife Juggler, Whirlwind, any board clear.)

I don't think it's worth the dust, Explosive/Freezing/Misdirection should be good enough and you can use other cards instead, but it's cute.
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ycz6

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #717 on: May 09, 2014, 04:54:24 am »
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A friend of mine somehow managed to amass 9 Unleashes the Hound from Arena rewards, and popped them for 280 dust after the nerf. #value
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Grujah

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #718 on: May 09, 2014, 04:58:35 am »
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I can save you time, and say that Snake Trap starts out good when people don't know about it. Then it gets worse as people play around it. Then it gets slightly better because who plays Snake Trap? The dream of Buzzard -> Snake Trap fails against any 1 damage ping, which is really easy (Mage, a good Knife Juggler, Whirlwind, any board clear.)

I don't think it's worth the dust, Explosive/Freezing/Misdirection should be good enough and you can use other cards instead, but it's cute.

I was just taking an example, but yeah, nobody slams into Buzzard if you have a secret out.

Misdirection proved to be quite bad, IMHO, I took it out. It usually done just a part of explosive trap's job (kill minions or damage opponent), rarely worked better than it. Luckily I did have it already and didn't have to waste dust to test it.
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Kirian

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #719 on: May 09, 2014, 08:23:54 am »
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Quick question:  Should I be disenchanting more cards, or should I keep my Pokemon-esque mentality?

I'm thinking in particular some of the terribad cards I've collected (like Secretkeeper).
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Drab Emordnilap

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #720 on: May 09, 2014, 08:36:45 am »
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Quick question:  Should I be disenchanting more cards, or should I keep my Pokemon-esque mentality?

I'm thinking in particular some of the terribad cards I've collected (like Secretkeeper).

Personally I only disenchant cards I have more than 2 of, even "awful" ones. I like trying lots of kinds of decks, and who knows what tomorrow holds? Maybe the next batch of cards has something that makes Secretkeeper a valuable role player -- I'd hate to not be able to try the deck because I wanted that 40 dust.
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Kirian

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #721 on: May 09, 2014, 09:54:38 am »
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Good:  Drafting two Twilight Drakes

Bad:  Topdecking both with no cards in hand.

http://arenamastery.com/VZMo

Edit:  Game 3, I have two taunts and 15 damage on the table.  Rogue topdecks fucking Deathwing.  Please, guys, tell me how fucking bad I am at arena.
« Last Edit: May 09, 2014, 10:17:41 am by Kirian »
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theory

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #722 on: May 09, 2014, 09:56:58 am »
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Those links don't work -- you have to use the Share Arena link.
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Jorbles

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #723 on: May 09, 2014, 10:40:27 am »
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Good:  Drafting two Twilight Drakes

Bad:  Topdecking both with no cards in hand.

http://arenamastery.com/VZMo

Edit:  Game 3, I have two taunts and 15 damage on the table.  Rogue topdecks fucking Deathwing.  Please, guys, tell me how fucking bad I am at arena.

Deathwing wins games, especially Arena games. It's kinda like UtH in that it punishes you for playing creatures. It's vulnerable to single target creature killers, but the Deathwing player can usually force their opponent to play those out of their hand if you're playing aggressively enough. It's also not realistic to play as if your opponent has a Deathwing since it's a Legendary. I think the card is kinda borked personally, in Arena anyways, in constructed it would probably lose to a beatdown.
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Grujah

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Re: Has anyone learned Hearthstone yet?
« Reply #724 on: May 09, 2014, 11:05:40 am »
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Finally came out of way too many 4-3 with a 8-3, which was a very drunk draft too.  ;D
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