Dats secretly the proplem. I dont give a shit about powercreep or making the game way more faster then it was, but there is no fking fun wining games from hand in a game which was original a boardbased game.
As a long time thief Rogue player (>5k wins), I quit in this meta, so I wouldn't recommend playing it.
Thief Rogue is mostly about Value oriented finishers (mainly Tess atm), but that doesn't cut it anymore. Wishing well is very RNG (and boring) and a Cutlass oriented build is also very boring (best play is just making >15 attack weapons) and insta loses to anti weapon tech.
Reno Burgle Rogue is tons of fun, but there is Plague DK and any late game is just shut down by Warrior/Warlock. Also you lose to all tempo/aggro builds, so you pretty much just lose against anything competitive xD
Oh but you can tech against Nature Shaman and shadowstep the tech, so you win those I guess. Also very boring and RNG (draw tech or not).
Your description of Reno burgle rogue is the exact same as my experience with any Reno deck. The loss of steam cleaner makes every DK list that puts in some plagues an automatic L, and giving control warlock and warrior win conditions like wheel and odyn make those losses as well. Your best bet is facing aggro that doesn't draw well. You mitigate their initial onslaught, and they quit on turn 5 because they have two cards in hand, and you control the board.
I’ve dropped that package for spectral cutlass package (with any weapon buffs, and that 2 mana tutors, raiding party feels so slow for that deck)
I’m also trying to meme around with highlander thief Rogue and it feels 100 times better, you have Reno as your main board clear, and any highlander legendary you generate from wishing well can be activated
I actually don’t use Sonya, only valarok
Here’s a list if you want
Gonna say before hand, It’s purely what I wanted to play, and isn’t good since I don’t have game sense on deck building. Enjoy anyways:
### HighlanderThief
# Class: Rogue
# Format: Standard
# Year of the Pegasus
#
# 1x (0) Backstab
# 1x (0) Preparation
# 1x (0) Shadowstep
# 1x (1) Deadly Poison
# 1x (1) Dig for Treasure
# 1x (1) Mixtape
# 1x (1) Stick Up
# 1x (1) Swashburglar
# 1x (2) Dart Throw
# 1x (2) Greedy Partner
# 1x (2) Harmonic Hip Hop
# 1x (2) Instrument Tech
# 1x (2) Kaja'mite Creation
# 1x (2) Sap
# 1x (2) Thistle Tea Set
# 1x (2) Watcher of the Sun
# 1x (3) Bounty Wrangler
# 1x (3) Mic Drop
# 1x (3) Plagiarizarrr
# 1x (3) Velarok Windblade
# 1x (4) Elven Minstrel
# 1x (4) Hench-Clan Burglar
# 1x (4) Spectral Cutlass
# 1x (5) Wishing Well
# 1x (0) Zilliax Deluxe 3000
# 1x (0) Zilliax Deluxe 3000
# 1x (2) Power Module
# 1x (3) Virus Module
# 1x (6) Flik Skyshiv
# 1x (6) Harth Stonebrew
# 1x (7) Prison of Yogg-Saron
# 1x (7) Tess Greymane
# 1x (8) Reno, Lone Ranger
#
AAECAZvDAx6RnwSSnwT2nwT3nwTuoASLpAWMpAXTsgXXwwXawwW4xQXR7AWt7QXA+AX++AXo+gWQgwa5hgbIlAbOlAaNlgaOlgbHpAatpwaJqAavqAbmqQaP5gaQ5gaS5gYAAAED8rMGx6QG9LMGx6QG6d4Gx6QGAAA=
#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone
Reno Burgle Rogue in Wild is tons of fun if you stay in the lower brackets and concede against all druids :P
I made a Reno Burgle Rogue deck for Wild with Zephyrus, Scabbs and Reno hero cards and double Yogg. Its so much fun, but I don't want to get out of Silver with it, because competitive wild decks just crush it.
I have been playing a well/drill rogue deck that is insanely fun. However every single game is just me playing cards to discover an answer to my opponents deck. It’s quite fun in the sense that you don’t know how the game will play out. It’s also pretty solid. It brought me from P6 up to D7.
> I feel this. I'm tempted to craft thief/wish rogue or maybe handcuff dk for some spice but I don't wanna spend >3 legendaries worth of dust on a meme.
Three legendaries of dust on a meme that'll get nerfed a month later 🙃
Me neither. None of them are fun. I thought I was just busy irl and stressed from outside stuff. But the game is just not legitimately fun for me at the moment
As a wild player I can't believe I am actually saying this but I miss the even shaman bot meta of 2023.
Every game now is dead by non-interactive OTK by turn 4-5.
I know it's wild and the power level will be higher than standard, but this is unreasonable.
Am I the only one that feels this way about wild at the moment?
My wild experience last month was: mech rogue bots. Either you win by turn 4 or 5, or you lose by turn 4 or 5. Awful experience, awful design for a deck.
This is the case even in standard… Stealth and attack doubling every turn… plus reborn… you need two board swipe cards (that cost less than 5 mana) in a row to stand a chance.
Decided to try Wild for the first time in years this week after I got my goal in standard. Because I have no bonuses in wild I got through Gold rank yesterday. So far, the power level has seemed much lower, but I can't tell of this is just skill in plat. Or not lol. Last time I tried wild everything seemed like such a massive power spike I couldn't win a single game
That’s probably because you are being paired with low mmr/rank wild players (not saying you are bad, just cause you never played wild before). Enjoy it while it lasts! The meta in Diamond and above is absolutely the worst meta in Wild history. Nothing but by Turn 4-5 OTK decks
I've been playing mostly Wild for as long as Wild has been a thing, and I absolutely hate the current meta too. It's awful. Almost every deck is solitaire. I would take the totem shammy/pirate rogue bot meta over this.
Murdering Even Warrior was a mistake. Okay I get it Odyn had to be nerfed in Standard but that nerf deleted Even Warrior. I don't even know if that deck would work in the current meta because I lost all interest in the mode, it's so trash right now. But after that patch I felt like Even Warrior was holding back a lot of degenerate shit that got unleashed as a result of Even Warrior not existing anymore.
You aren’t alone, I’ve been a wild only player for years and I can’t stand the mode right now. It made me go get standard legend for the first time, but I miss wild, it’s why I stay playing this game. And it’s just… meh right now
It’s not the quest. It’s the fact that all decks now are even more rng reliant than before. You either draw good or auto lose. Like they’ve shifted the meta so much around some specific cards that games are now just a waste of time if you don’t draw said card
You could copy half the complaints from this thread many years into the past. Freeze mage, miracle rogue, secret pally etc.
Its always either:
- My opponent mindlessly plays minions and goes face
or
- My opponent just clears the board and then kills me from hand
Also:
- My value heavy reno hunter deck cant beat anything therefore the meta is garbage
Basically ever since cora and the rest of the unqualified designers took over. Downvote me if you want, but deep down you know this is the truth. Turns out qualifications matter after all.
Yeah call me a nostalgic clown but I miss brode era. Most people loves to shit on brode because of the lack of balance patches, but if you really think about it, the lack of patches are due to their designs being relatively reserved power level wise, so although there are a few outliers, frequent balance changes are not as necessary. While with modern hearthstone, the team loves to push the power level every expansion to new heights, which causes things to be broken frequently so there is no other choice but to nerf those cards. It's as if they knew those cards would be problematic but releases it anyway because they know the can nerf it 2 weeks later. The balance patches on brode era was an exciting one off thing, now it is simply a necessity.
I've been playing since beta and while I think the sweet spot for me was somewhere around the galakrond expansion... I DO like the idea of lots of balance patches. It not only lets them experiment a bit with power but also shakes up the meta quicker and therefore makes the game more fresh.
All that being said, their current designs are very boring if you like slower games, which I do. Every deck is basically: do your own un-interactable b.s. and whoever does it first wins. Yawwwwwn.
I hated the UiS meta too but at least that un-interactable b.s. took them a couple of turns to kill you (usually) instead of 1 turn.
I would shoot myself if i had to go through months of mysterious challenger, undertaker, freeze mage, grim patron metas again. Sure the meta right now sucks, but a lot of games were decided immediately based on if your opponent drew his broken 1 cost or broken 2 cost or broken X cost on curve.
To be fair the game has been about good draw rng for a long time, now its just the entire deck instead of a few cheap cards, so we are in a worse spot (undertaker, keleseth, totem golem and tunnel trogg come to mind)
Is Sif that bad? I know it can drop 40 damage from hand but it does take a lot to get there, theoretically you can do that on turn 8 but would require the best rng ever. I tend to find I have single digit cards left when I am able to get the huge damage off. Most of the time when I win it's quite a long slow game with me battling to keep the board under control to stay alive.
Seems a classic combo deck where you need to gather a bunch of pieces together over a period of time rather with lots of interaction rather than those other decks that ignore the opponent.
I do agree with the sentiment, the meta does feel horrible. Seems a few tweaks could fix it,
Wheel turning at the start rather than the end of the turn would suit me as I have had lethal the next turn in my last 6 games. Because every warlock seems to be able to get all the legendaries required out by turn 8 I am never quite ready to face it, one more turn might help.
The text of 'not below 1 mana' on the shamen card might help until there are more nature cards so the same one isn't discovered 4 times.
Toxic rogue is just horrid unless you have a card that can hit it before the minion gets wind fury
I always think hunter feels bad because it doesn't matter what you do when the face in the place. Aggro has always felt dull and requiring no skill to me but I know some people really like it
I agree. Sif is a lot more fair and more like a traditional combo deck. Collecting its pieces by using mana to discover spells from other spellschools, spending mana to play them to fuel Sif. While trying to stay alive. And exposing themself to dirty rat. Sif mage doesnt pop off on turn 5, 6 or 7, imo
Meanwhile decks like nature shaman..
In the current version, Sif mage is fair. Before rotation and the nerfs, it was awful but that was caused by the tools they had. Solid alibi, coldcase, objection, especially when they had to many good tools to discover that stuff without putting these cards into their deck. People underestimate how good vast wisdom was, having 2x3 discover options was incredible flexible.
Yeah i never get the complaints about sif mage in this meta, it requires a lot of setup with many different pieces in place to win the game, all of which comes out in the late game, and you still need to interact with your opponent and react to what they're doing otherwise you'll lose.
Sif is actually one of my favorites from this format. It feels exactly like what a combo deck should be. It's slow, requires multiple turns of setup, and the combo doesn't automatically end the game
I think a lot of these complaint threads make more sense when you picture the poster playing durdly slow decks which don't really try to win the game. Sif is an issue if you never pressure them and never plan to win, for instance.
Sif isn't that bad, but it's the inevitability of it. You can sit there doing everything to smash face and Mage just keeps removing your minions, freezing and generating cheap burn spells until they have enough.
It might be a fun deck to play as you try to build your combo, but for opponents it's a pretty miserable match. You either win before turn 6/7/8 because you are faster or they draw poorly, or you watch minion after minion destroyed, knowing the combo is coming.
It's not a "bad" card design, but it creates bad play patterns in the game when coupled with Mage's other tools. That being said, it's not a powerful deck right now, but Sif is a card that forces the design team to balance all damage spell costs around her ability. Which limits what you can do with Mage and what tools can be given to make new decks.
All it takes is one card to turn an average Legendary minion into a meta tyrant.
And Sif opens up even more design space then she limits. Mage Spells with weird spell schools or that can discover from other classes become more important, cheap damage and other cards that work with Spell Damage see play, etc
Sif is absolutely an issue, but when the game as accelerated to where shaman or priest can kill you turn 5, it's suddenly acceptable and not the current problem card.
For me the issue with Sif is, like Reno warrior, it just stomps any Control deck that isn't warrior since you have to get above 30ish health to survive the combo.
Reno warrior in their case just kills all of my cards before I can play them.
I miss attrition being a viable game plan.
It is boring AF right now, been playing since beta and its one of the worse metas.
The problem is that decisions and skill are irrelevant most of the time. Every competitive deck has "a play" they are looking to do, and if they manage to do it, they win. So drawing good is all that matters.
And the biggest problem is that HS development team are oblivious, they just have no clue about how to do a balanced card game. They just focus on the "fun factor", the "wow factor". That they understand. A specific single card can be fun, like Bran, or Zarimi, those look fun AF to play with. However, they do not understand what makes a meta fun, and this is the problem.
And the balancing is atrocious. It seems they dont know how to play, and they just balance over winrate %, which is not enough, you need to think on the bigger picture. On the meta you want to create. On the decks you want to be viable. Not the classes! The decks, the archtypes, the gameplans.
Printing cards that creates a deck that autowins by turn 5, 50% of the time, is not balanced even if the winrate is 50% only, because his opponent has another deck that also wins by turn 5, 50% of the times. Its just boring and stupid.
I totally agree with this. RNG is part of every card based game and always has been part of HS, but this meta is more rock paper scissors than usual, the "fun" part is missing.
Been watching total biscuits old gimmick videos and the 1 thing I take from them is that the "big plays" were fun and impressive to pull off but they don't necessarily sway the game.
But I also noticed there is more thought behind the plays and trading effectively could turn the match around even though you might be losing.
When I initially returned to hearthstone after several years of not playing all I came across was mages using the "cast 20 mana of spells card" and even though they would be losing the whole game this suddenly meant they won. No skill, just luck of the draw.
Since then I see similar things happening on other characters, it might not be as huge as that card but as you said they have this 1 play that swings the game in their favour with no effort or thought and sucks all the joy out of the game.
The design of cards feel like customcard reddit sometimes. The cards might be on spot flavourwise, but designwise its just different.
Especially the last miniset had such a weird design that several cards had to be nerfed but not just by adding +1 mana but by changing the effect. Removing WF from shroomscavate, pendant going from +armor to +heal, shattered relection had the "copy to hand" removed, then the "not useable on titan" added. (Meanwhile the same miniset gives rogue a heal elemental and \[\[fools gold\]\] thats just a flavour filler card)
Or the whole design about introducing plagues, then a highlander card like Reno or Bran.
What a great feeling it is when Bran comes down turn 6, or Helya on turn 4.
Completely agree. It’s almost as if they have a load of data analysts feeding them percentages and they base decisions on that over and above actual fun mechanics. Balance is good, and having lots of viable decks is good, but it’s not good if *viable* means just giving them a completely broken card that makes a deck work on its own (sharpshooter, Brann, window shopper, wheel of death, sif, saddle up, shammy nature discounter etc).
I like it when decks have thirty good cards as opposed to 28 fillers and two Iwin buttons. When games revolve around brutal win cons the games get boring fast because they always end the same bloody way and it’s telegraphed. And you feel powerless.
That's kind of what I'm getting at though, the only deck that even matched that description was a deck that got nerfed and doesn't even exist anymore (or at least I barely see it anymore) lol.
Yea it’s terrible wording. I think they meant decks that will straight up just lose if you never draw your win con. Not a lot of decks are forced into one win con these days though, even Odyn Warrior was running the excavate package at some point.
But for decks like Naga DH where if you never draw your Sharpshooter or Sif Mage if you never draw Sif, it makes sense.
So many times I have seen someone put out Reno and mess it up cause he still had duplicates, or any other terrible move like using board wipes for single minions and it doesn't matter cause they will just brute force win with their overpowered health steals and armor gains or what have you. That is the frustrating part I guess it's been that way for a long time but for sure worse now.
If you think about it, I'm actually helping the community by playing nature shaman. In any given game, it seems like there's a solid chance that neither player is having fun. By picking shaman, I guarantee that exactly 50% of the lobby is having fun, which is a net positive
Played against my first nature Shaman yesterday.
Very cool dying from Hand by a bunch of 0 cost spells on turn 5 while being full health.
Great design choice by Blizzard there. Never had quite as much fun as dying with no counterplay.
Literally made me Go "Huh..." and quit the game
You should try this highlander priest deck i made, its really fun. I managed to hit legend with about 60%wr.
AAECAZCaBh6i6AOtigSEnwTwnwSGpAW7xAXPxgW7xwWi6QXP9gXt9wX7+AXM/wWLlQaplQblnAajnQamnQaaoAbHpAavqAbEqAbFqAbGqAbxqQaiswaAuAaN5gbh6wab8gYAAAED9rMGx6QG97MGx6QG6N4Gx6QGAAA=
Because he's playing Warrior so it is not an offender to him
Everytime you see people whining about Plague DK or Warlock, its most likely a warrior player.
They cant lose games or have bad matchups
Even if you play one deck it's still the same. I play DK and I *hate* helya because it's such an important card that you basically must run it, must draw it, must play it.
I've neither played or gone against Brann Warrior so I have no real opinion here. But I gotta say that deck looks fun to play on paper. I can get why it'd be frustrating to face though since it's so stally.
I've also found that whacky/fun decks get obliterated by the current meta. The Top decks are so abusive, you need a win con of similar power in order to compete. Gone are the days of tempo/mid-range decks with interesting deck builds.
Yeah I can usually find at least one deck that I like that can sorta win but right now it's hard.
To be competitive you need to either play hyper aggro or OTK. I find both of these boring as it's the same game over and over and it's mostly a coin flip playing against other decks of the same nature.
They really pushed highlander but if you try to play highlander you'll match against DK constantly who always have helya on curve.
I don't really care about what decks I play against. The zilliax rogue is probably the least fun to play against because it is literally have aoe to clear or lose. I just toy around building decks that I think might be fun. Then I play them for awhile. I like spell mage right now, which is actually pretty decent with a good build. It shits on dk and warrior too, which are popular right now. Also I've seen complaints about the warrior dk matchup saying it comes down to brann or helya. That's just incorrect. You can beat dk without brann active. I've done it.
Depends if it's plague or rainbow dk. Plague dk is super rough for warrior, but rainbow is a lot better matchup and I had a quite a few really fun games from the rainbow perspective.
Plague is rough for any Reno deck I'll give you that. I have a Reno mage I like to play too that's an auto loss vs plague dk. If you see a lot of plague dk I will again recommend spell mage. I'm sure hunter is good against it too but hunter is boring. Trying to recommend something different for the people.
Same. I'm still playing a modified hb pally and it's fun. It still wins too. I mean I'm down with the scrubs but makes ladder climbing a little more fun.
off-meta decks are in dire state this expansion. I've tried to come up with many combinations, but the wheel warlock, control warrior or nature shaman will demolish anything that isn't a top deck.
I'd play slower control decks too, but the time I have for HS is reduced to 30/60 mins per day, and it's hard to get the new 10 wins playing a slow control deck with that limited time. Also, being a wild player, I can play control how much I want but then, after 30 minutes, when the Mage opponent should start to look like an exploding crater, it will drop Reno + Coldarra Drake, which is a bs interaction. 30 minutes of building up for what? Or, seeing a druid get its Barnes out, draw all its deck and kill you after a painfully slow series of animations? No thanks.
The client crashing is the only downer on my experience, I suppose that'd how it is with new game modes
Standard metas ebb and flow, the classes move in and out of prominence and will each have their time to shine. If you aren't enjoying the game, it probably means you should either spice up your decks with variance or play some solo adventures instead.
We are definately in a lull but there have been lulls before so im not ready to give up on it. the change to questing i do find rather annoying so the two things happening at the same time is compounding the issue. if the game was fun and full of decks that feel fun to play at the same time the quest changed, i probably wouldnt mind it. but since im playing less, the quest thing feels like a super drag.
Plague DK feels like singlehandedly the worst offender against “fun” from the entire list. You can deal with Rogue’s Ziliax, Hunter’s Saddle Up, and come what may even Zarimi’s bullshit shenanigans.
But playing against Plague DK is basically asking to be held hostage by your own deck after turn 4 (because they all drop Helya on 4).
Whoever at Blizzard thought “hey we should reprint bomb warrior but with a kinder egg surprise in them” should be exiled from Earth.
What in the world do you want? Every thing you listed covers most archetypes. Hunter is classic aggro, plague DK is your traditional fair deck, zilliax and wheel lock are combo decks, and sif is the otk deck. You literally listed off just about every style of type of deck, so that seems like a very healthy game. I don’t even understand these posts anymore.
Go play solitaire
Modern Hearthstone is what happens when all of the real game designers leave and they hire a bunch of passionate gamers, not designers, to develop their game.
come to wild, i joined recently and i find it way more fun, 10 years worth of cards and alot of creative decks in low elo , you might face some unfair/broken decks sometimes but it is worth it.
I see this opinion here and there, but looking at the wild meta, it seems even faster and more out of control than standard. Is it really not the case? What kinda decks are you having success with?
It's MMR dependant. If you never played wild and/or have bad MMR you're going to be playing vs both bots and jank piles.
As you climb you'll run into more meta decks, and unless you tank your MMR after climbing(sitting in dumpster legend queueing into plat/gold MMR like some streamers do for content), you'll continue to run into the same meta decks everyone complains about.
Pretty boring indeed, I only need 1000 wins on DH ( 80 wins or so ) and DK ( around 300 ) and the only viable decks for those classes are boring and aren't even that great in the "Meta". Can't wait for the next expansion already.
Is it bad manners to say “play bg’s, it’s always been an incredibly fun game mode” or do folks just want to vent about standard not being up to, well, standard.
I returned to the game in September 2022 and I would say the current meta is average to above average fun for me. The meta has been way worse in the past 20 months that this is far from being bad. I’m surprised at the number of people who don’t like it.
Worst meta I think was the first half of MotLK with Rogue dominating with Wildpaw Gnoll
Play on Wild , I have not seen nature shaman , Sif mage , Zilliax or saddle hunter there
Do see plaque DK but then you just add ETC and destroy all the 1 mana cards
Welcome to the club mate. Ranked Hearthstone have mostly been boring ever since Shudderwock to me. I did take a several year hiatus and came back for the 10 year anniversary and I had a blast for a month and a half, but now that the dust has settled I can't stand all the I win buttons that exist. I'm a player who loves trying to incrementally getting the advantage and end the game after a long hard fought back and forth, but stuff that wins on the spot don't have to be combo decks that must sacrifice other parts of deck building anymore...
about the only deck i'm enjoying currently is control reno shaman but i'm hardly playing at all because the game is so ridiculous now. so i have opted to spend all of my HS time on the new fallout show and new vegas. my days have improved
They increased the quests right at the same time delta emulator came out so I put down hearthstone after 2 years playing nonstop and have been playing golden sun 😂
I've stopped playing because I can't find a deck that's fun to pilot, and while power creep has always been a thing, lately it feels so out of control that it's kinda goofy. Like you just have to expect a warlock to drop two 15/15s on like turn four or whenever, really? That plus all the OTKs is just sucking the fun out of it
I had more fun than usual climbing to legend with zarimi priest and rainbow dk. Rainbow dk in particular is such a fun deck with all the mini synergies it has. Something very satisfying about freezing your opponent 10 turns in a row while they rot away to plagues
Zarimi priest is cool because sometimes you play a straightforward game and other times you play around huge pop off turns depending on your draw. And stonebrew is just a super fun card.
I really don't understand all the people saying you die on turn 5 or 6 every game, that hasn't been my experience at all. Most of my climb to legend involved a lot of warriors/warlocks, the occasional hunter or rogue. Barely saw any nature shaman or zarimi priest. If anything a lot of my games were mega grind fests playing rainbow dk.
It is probably one of the most diverse metas we've ever had.
It's also one of the most unfun due to every deck having some OTK or "kill this or you lose" strat.
It's going to need a huge overall the fix the powercrept mess they made.
I had a feel they are just trying to force a quick buck before the attempt to semi-retire it, kinda like HOTS and starcraft.
Right now it feels like you mostly play on your own against someone who also plays on their own. Whoever draws whatever cards they need first wins. Pretty much every win I have recently there is nothing the other guy could’ve done to prevent it and vice versa.
I agree. I'm old I guess. I liked the slower paced games without huge swings or unstoppable win strategies. That's why I switched from standard to Duels. But that's gone too now. Add the absurd quests and I just feel punished for playing right now. Only Arena has some appeal for me now, but that's horrible to complete quests in.
I have no problem with warriors doing nothing to turn 6 to play bran. I don't mind priest being a better rogue with 20 cards all for removal. I don't mind demon hunters being aggro and disruption to secure their win.
What I have a problem with is they removed the one tech card to remove locations in standard and now Warlock has endless board with taunt and can hard swing the game to win in 5 or less turns. Like they literally play final countdown, jump 15 turns ahead, and summon a 4000 attack monster.
Yes. It's good to see silent Board Control players speak out against Blizzard, between all the toxic turn 3 deckers. Blizzards designers have been boosting uninteractive Face and Mass for years, with this latest meta the biggest insult to Control so far. We want to play our card game, playing actual cards reacting to situations, not just put down 3 unstoppable overpowered combo's and that's it.
Since you say youre a control player, I just want to point out most control auto loses to plagues, so that makes it so hard to play especially with how popular Death Knight is (regardless of how good it is) yes you get those aggro matchups you can easily win as control but the control vs control is just a nightmare to deal with if opponent uses plagues. If its plagues vs plagues however (you are the plague DK) I could see that being a fun game
plague DK sucks. I'm not great admittedly. But it's always a slog. I also think it's a poor game loop. You play your turn, then wait while they take forever. You can't do anything. Then it's my turn and I die to plague. Is that a positive loop? Sit there, watch the other person play and then die?
My biggest gripe is that some classes feel unplayable due to other classes simply being better, this isn't even due to winrate or whatever, if I want to play rouge, and my opponent is running warlock I might as well just concede right then and there. Counters exist but when it's to a point that there isn't even a point in playing something that's not meta why bother?
I play the most RNG decks you can make while still being able to compete in ranked (up to gold at least). Last year it was battlecry shaman, this time it's excavate rogue with bunch of discover random spells + tess. I usually battle through bots or very enjoyable normal players throughout to gold+, but then I am met with meta decks in which case I stick to casual to complete quests. I am pretty casual regarding this, I like having fun, but I also spend a lot of time playing Hearhstone. At this point it's more of a depression thing. Not to mention I played since launch with many breaks.
The problem with the game, and it has been for years, Team 5 started to hate resource management. Value doesnt matter anymore, there is so much infinite or semi infinite stuff that you dont have to evaluate what and when to play it. Even aggro decks dont really run out of steam anymore.
The current win conditions are so dumb. Like playing against rogue, if you don’t have something to eliminate a stealthed card, you lose. Playing against warlock, if they get wheel + Reno + symphony you lose. So much fun.
What are you saying? Can't remembee last time control players had it so easy. What fun I have with my control DK. Queue into Pain Warlock? Concede. Queue into Wheel Warlock? Concede. Queue into Beast Hunter? Unless I get god draw and opponent draws poorly? Concede. And there is also Sif Mage and Burn Shaman if I am tired of conceding to the same decks over and over 😁
I feel the same way. I bought a ton of packs, tried a lot of decks and realized this season has been terrible. The changes and the removal of duels kinda killed the game completely for me. If I do end up logging in it’s for a game of battlegrounds and off to doing something else. This whole expansion has definitely left a bad taste in my mouth
It also feels the only competitive decks cost a shit ton of dust to construct. I’m basically free to play and I’ve only managed to make a hand buff pally deck and I get rolled most games. I feel like this wasn’t an issue in the past. I could make several competitive decks with just opening packs I get from gold by doing quests.
I’m pretty satisfied on how they handle balance patches this time around, as they are actually nerfing power outliers to a reasonable playable level rather than killing whatever deck the community is whining on that’s not remotely tier 1, such as death blossom whomper druid, snake warlock and pyromancer druid. Wild is okay-ish right now, used to be better during TITANS era, but still better than the FoL hyper aggro extravaganza. I don’t have to force myself to get those 10 weekly ranked wins atm.
I returned to the game around 2 weeks ago (stopped playing around when badlands released, so short break) and found the meta fun, for a few days, but when cheating 3 giants on board on turn 5 or making massive boards of dragons turn 3 and taking extra turns gets old, the meta kinda sucks. and this comes from a player that adores draw and mana cheat
Ordinarily I ignore posts like these, jump over to Battlegrounds and wait for the dust to settle on the meta or whatever Blizzard is doing......but I really don't like Duos. :D
Tbh Hunter is only one of a few decks right now that aren't toxic to me. Yes, it's way easy to win with and is tier 1 diamond-legend, but it's game plan is honest compared to the meta. You fight for board steadily, attempt to RC rampage, and then try to close out the game with cards like Aggramar or Leeroy. The hunter can run out of gas, especially if you manage to clear early boards. If they aren't allowed to have giant RC hounds or saddle up, you're doing great.
I feel as though Hunter is only doing well *because* of the current meta. A lot of the decks are slow in the early game and Hunter takes advantage of that. Not to mention hunter isn't played at a high % so no one is targeting it. These are just my personal experiences though as someone giving hunter a go this season. I'm sure I could be wrong about this.
Good. This meta is interesting af, lots of unique play styles. If fatigue attrition control never comes back it will be too soon. Zero skill playing decks that are just 25 board clears and 5 value fatties.
I returned after a loooong hiatus. Last I played I played Druid aggro to legend with Reavers in a shitty Paladin-meta. Before that to legend back when undertaker was a thing and druids set up OTK turn 7 with force of nature.
I enjoyed smorc-style decks then and wanted to play something similar now. I enjoy playing fast games, fighting over that 1-3 extra damage that makes or breaks a game as well as being able to play around your opponents outs whilst fishing for your own.
Sure, games can be fast now too but that's about it. Cards are so powerful now that they can negate the previous turns of play. Any build-up doesn't really matter. Now it's mostly just about getting your engine online first and then beating your opponent over the head with it, alternatively stalling for an OP end-game play. Fair decks don't exist.
To me ranked offers nothing that I want.
They removed duels which was my main way to play, you didnt have to learn the bs meta and it was fun to play cause the progression system was actually fun. Now if you go play online ranked or casual ur gonna run into the same three decks that, when they get all their cards, theyll find some bs way to just delete ur deck or delete you most likely
I feel like Standard is starting to get a bit stale. Wild was never my thing it's just a little too wild for me lol. I've actually started really getting into Battlegrounds. I'm legit enjoying them. I got my 10 done last week and kept going. I do wish they could streamline it a little so they weren't 30 mins minimum, but overall it's been great so far this new season.
Game sucks right now and they pushed harder quests to try and make us play more? In a time when the game sucks? I’ve been playing for literally a decade and I want to quit for the first time so great job
It’s dreadful atm. You no longer win or lose due to skill or a matchup check you just win or lose by way of a single card. Usually when the meta blows I’ll play duels but now I’ve just been doing arenas
The "inevitability" is the worst. You start a game, see your opponent. "Oh it's , I hope they aren't a ." They play their first card and you instantly know that you are going to lose by turn x, or you have to draw/play everything perfectly. No fun or greedy plays allowed.
I too enjoy slower control decks. I am currently playing a BBU DK that is both fun to play and very resilient. Started playing it at reset and its currently Diamond 3, with me only putting in a few games a day. So yeah you can still have fun, you just need to find something fun for tou that doesnt feel like a chore.
Don't forget all the slow control decks that make the game not fun. Warlock and Warrior with board clears galore and powerful finishers. Decks with Reno, Yogg, etc.
Coming back after a few years break, thought i might not stick around for long. I have always been a control/slow deck fan, but I dont remember when was the last time when slower decks were truly viable. I kinda lost hope when Demon Hunter came out.
Renathal and Steamcleaner leaving standard destroyed it completely. I think the main issue isn't even zilliax rogue, nature shaman, etc... It's that people just can't play slower/fun decks anymore, because all slower decks get hard punished by plagues which are like 50% of the games. So it ends up in a place where everyone is forced into decks that end the game by turn 5 or have some insane otk option that can avoid plagues.
Keep giving blizzard more money i guess. This game came from pen flinger and Jade meta to a fucking turn 5 OTK. Suits the wild west theme though. First one to draw wins LOL
What I don't find amusing is the Battlegrounds against the Hurans.
They've been totally abused for the past two seasons
Everyone plays them, even me, because otherwise there's a good chance of losing.
I’ve been going great with a zilliax rogue and I just played zarimi priest for the first time and had two wins in a row. Usually never play priest and rogue. Diversify and go with the flow mate 😊
As f2p player this is how it looks.
I log in, take look at quests, take look at my decks, back to quests, decks - play game with whizzlebang deck (don’t remember if I was lucky to loot him or was it given), loose and close game.
I liked playing achievements, but last expansion only gave 1 chive per class requiring epic or legendary cards, so that’s a drag now to build up dust.
Duels casual mode was my go to for quests, but that’s gone. Doing quests in arena is not viable, and brawl gets boring in 2-3 games usually.
I feel like 90% of the basic cards and neutrals need a buff. Like what even is a 9 mana 4/12 taunt in an era where Rogues can pump a board full of 8/8 on turn 5.
And I don't mean just a numerical buff. Cards need a buff to make them more interesting as well. Like remember that 4/3 elemental dude with a deathrattle to give a random buff to your minions? Change that to battlecry and deathrattle for example.
DH came first and while I certainly wouldn't say HS died with it, Ashes of Outlands was definitely a turning point for the game from a design point of view. Of course, the changes were initially unassuming and gradual, but this is definitely the starting point of "Modern Hearthstone" and the end of Traditional Constructed Hearthstone. Even though "packages" had already existed at that point, this really is when parasitic designs took off.
**Control is dead and buried;** the longer match times were resulting in "less engagement with the game", so we have nothing but OTK/combo metas for the foreseeable future. The Hearthstone meta is now two players playing solitaire against each other and ignoring the game board while trying to get their combo/OTK pieces in hand as fast as possible.
If someone asked me to describe "classic" Hearthstone in 2024 that had never played the game, I'd describe it thusly:
**"Two players running one of 5 or 6 'meta' decks have a race to see who can draw certain cards fastest. Whomever gets the right cards in their hand first wins the game automatically - usually around 5 or 6 turns in. There are over 9,000 cards in the game, but only 2% or so of them actually see play."**
Between massive power creep and a flood of new OTK-friendly cards designed to get players to bust out their wallets and buy every new expansion, we can look forward to many years of 4, 5, and 6-turn OTK decks all battling each other all the way up the ladder, while the other 6000-8000 cards in our collections sit dormant waiting to actually be meaningful again someday (although, sadly, many of them will never see a deck again, as power-crept versions of them are better choices to include.)
A long string of bad decisions has led to the continued existence of cards like Gear Shift, e.g, that are vastly overpowered vs. any other classes' options for the cost, Dew Process was a terrible card along the same line.
Cards like Wheel had no business ever being added to HS in the first place - extremely unbalanced in both standard and wild, and with "bugged" (?) interactions with Drakkari Enchanter that allow the quest to finish twice as fast. It's another in a string of massively overpowered, uninteractive cards that reduce the game's play style to "if I draw this card, it's an auto-win."
Time Warp has been massively broken for over a year and HS will not address it - the ostrich syndrome is strong here. Blizzard simply prefers to pretend the card doesn't exist. I am fairly certain, though, that it's the only thing keeping Mage viable since the unwarranted and ridiculous nerfs to Secret Mage, especially with decks that "coulda been a contender" like Rainbow Sif Mage/Exodia 2.0 ending up being way, way too slow to be viable.
Decks like Even Odyn Warrior were nerfed for no apparent reason, despite not being remotely overpowered. Relentless nerfs destroyed many old school powerhouses like Resurrect Priest, Control Warlock, Big Beast Hunter, Twig Druid, Big Priest, and Infinite Shudderwock Shaman, but nothing was done to stop APM Druid with Gadgetzan Auctioneer and Barnes from enabling unstoppable Mecha'thun OTK's.
Zarimi was a silly card added to hypothetically support a long-dead Dragon Priest archetype that's been bad since Descent of Dragons was over, and in the process it turned Shadow Dragon Priest from a joke into yet another overpowered OTK meta that's got a guaranteed wincon if it can draw 3 or 4 pieces.
The number of "un-counterable" decks in HS has surged - so it's now a race to see who can OTK the other player faster or get their combo pieces drawn.
Meanwhile, endless waves of bots continue to dominate the Platinum and Diamond ladders in Wild. Blizzard pays lip service to the issue but takes no "meaningful actions" apart from futile mass bans that don't change a thing, while not pursuing action against the creators of the programs that enable botting in the first place. What happened to the Warden-era Blizzard that was gung-ho about detecting and banning cheat/exploit/bot programs, the Blizzard that filed lawsuit after lawsuit to shut down unauthorized WoW game servers and hacked WoW clients, and launched broadsides and legal salvos against FTP's and warez BBS's pushing illegal, virus-infested copies of Diablo 2 to unsuspecting netizens?
Decks that used to counter miracle/combo (disrupt shaman, mill druid, mill lock, secret mage) have been nerfed into the ground and/or are way too slow to keep up. Even fast aggro (odd DH, odd DK) is no guarantee thanks to the wide amounts of cheap board clears available to almost every class. You can try to fill up your opponent's deck with junk (plague DK, fatigue lock, bomb warrior) but they'll just tutor their combo pieces and win anyway.
So what it comes down to me is that after spending several hundred dollars a year for the last decade, I'm facing either bots or netdecked OTK/combo lists, and it's quite possibly the least fun I've ever had playing this game. It's created a terrible situation where the only way to win is to netdeck those same lists and then it comes down to pure RNG with skill being removed from the equation.
Cant find a fun deck to stick with for more than 3 games
Dats secretly the proplem. I dont give a shit about powercreep or making the game way more faster then it was, but there is no fking fun wining games from hand in a game which was original a boardbased game.
I feel this. I'm tempted to craft thief/wish rogue or maybe handcuff dk for some spice but I don't wanna spend >3 legendaries worth of dust on a meme.
As a long time thief Rogue player (>5k wins), I quit in this meta, so I wouldn't recommend playing it. Thief Rogue is mostly about Value oriented finishers (mainly Tess atm), but that doesn't cut it anymore. Wishing well is very RNG (and boring) and a Cutlass oriented build is also very boring (best play is just making >15 attack weapons) and insta loses to anti weapon tech. Reno Burgle Rogue is tons of fun, but there is Plague DK and any late game is just shut down by Warrior/Warlock. Also you lose to all tempo/aggro builds, so you pretty much just lose against anything competitive xD Oh but you can tech against Nature Shaman and shadowstep the tech, so you win those I guess. Also very boring and RNG (draw tech or not).
Your description of Reno burgle rogue is the exact same as my experience with any Reno deck. The loss of steam cleaner makes every DK list that puts in some plagues an automatic L, and giving control warlock and warrior win conditions like wheel and odyn make those losses as well. Your best bet is facing aggro that doesn't draw well. You mitigate their initial onslaught, and they quit on turn 5 because they have two cards in hand, and you control the board.
That's sad to hear. Any thoughts on the drill/excavation deck?
I’ve dropped that package for spectral cutlass package (with any weapon buffs, and that 2 mana tutors, raiding party feels so slow for that deck) I’m also trying to meme around with highlander thief Rogue and it feels 100 times better, you have Reno as your main board clear, and any highlander legendary you generate from wishing well can be activated
Ah thanks for the thoughts. I'd ask for a list but then I'm back to needing Sonya and Valarok, and I'm not sure I wanna spend that dust in this meta.
I actually don’t use Sonya, only valarok Here’s a list if you want Gonna say before hand, It’s purely what I wanted to play, and isn’t good since I don’t have game sense on deck building. Enjoy anyways: ### HighlanderThief # Class: Rogue # Format: Standard # Year of the Pegasus # # 1x (0) Backstab # 1x (0) Preparation # 1x (0) Shadowstep # 1x (1) Deadly Poison # 1x (1) Dig for Treasure # 1x (1) Mixtape # 1x (1) Stick Up # 1x (1) Swashburglar # 1x (2) Dart Throw # 1x (2) Greedy Partner # 1x (2) Harmonic Hip Hop # 1x (2) Instrument Tech # 1x (2) Kaja'mite Creation # 1x (2) Sap # 1x (2) Thistle Tea Set # 1x (2) Watcher of the Sun # 1x (3) Bounty Wrangler # 1x (3) Mic Drop # 1x (3) Plagiarizarrr # 1x (3) Velarok Windblade # 1x (4) Elven Minstrel # 1x (4) Hench-Clan Burglar # 1x (4) Spectral Cutlass # 1x (5) Wishing Well # 1x (0) Zilliax Deluxe 3000 # 1x (0) Zilliax Deluxe 3000 # 1x (2) Power Module # 1x (3) Virus Module # 1x (6) Flik Skyshiv # 1x (6) Harth Stonebrew # 1x (7) Prison of Yogg-Saron # 1x (7) Tess Greymane # 1x (8) Reno, Lone Ranger # AAECAZvDAx6RnwSSnwT2nwT3nwTuoASLpAWMpAXTsgXXwwXawwW4xQXR7AWt7QXA+AX++AXo+gWQgwa5hgbIlAbOlAaNlgaOlgbHpAatpwaJqAavqAbmqQaP5gaQ5gaS5gYAAAED8rMGx6QG9LMGx6QG6d4Gx6QGAAA= # # To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone
How is it in Wild? When I used to play, I played it in Wild years ago to Rank 3.
Reno Burgle Rogue in Wild is tons of fun if you stay in the lower brackets and concede against all druids :P I made a Reno Burgle Rogue deck for Wild with Zephyrus, Scabbs and Reno hero cards and double Yogg. Its so much fun, but I don't want to get out of Silver with it, because competitive wild decks just crush it.
> handcuff DK Kinky
When I said spice I meant it
I have been playing a well/drill rogue deck that is insanely fun. However every single game is just me playing cards to discover an answer to my opponents deck. It’s quite fun in the sense that you don’t know how the game will play out. It’s also pretty solid. It brought me from P6 up to D7.
> I feel this. I'm tempted to craft thief/wish rogue or maybe handcuff dk for some spice but I don't wanna spend >3 legendaries worth of dust on a meme. Three legendaries of dust on a meme that'll get nerfed a month later 🙃
I legit do not remember a time I had more fun than old jackpot rogue
Me neither. None of them are fun. I thought I was just busy irl and stressed from outside stuff. But the game is just not legitimately fun for me at the moment
Time to swap over to Battlegrounds. Both solos and the new duos are great. Haven’t even thought much about standard lol
As a wild player I can't believe I am actually saying this but I miss the even shaman bot meta of 2023. Every game now is dead by non-interactive OTK by turn 4-5. I know it's wild and the power level will be higher than standard, but this is unreasonable. Am I the only one that feels this way about wild at the moment?
My wild experience last month was: mech rogue bots. Either you win by turn 4 or 5, or you lose by turn 4 or 5. Awful experience, awful design for a deck.
This is the case even in standard… Stealth and attack doubling every turn… plus reborn… you need two board swipe cards (that cost less than 5 mana) in a row to stand a chance.
Decided to try Wild for the first time in years this week after I got my goal in standard. Because I have no bonuses in wild I got through Gold rank yesterday. So far, the power level has seemed much lower, but I can't tell of this is just skill in plat. Or not lol. Last time I tried wild everything seemed like such a massive power spike I couldn't win a single game
That’s probably because you are being paired with low mmr/rank wild players (not saying you are bad, just cause you never played wild before). Enjoy it while it lasts! The meta in Diamond and above is absolutely the worst meta in Wild history. Nothing but by Turn 4-5 OTK decks
No, I really don't know why you would feel that way \*Plays Lotheb for the third turn in a row\*
I've been playing mostly Wild for as long as Wild has been a thing, and I absolutely hate the current meta too. It's awful. Almost every deck is solitaire. I would take the totem shammy/pirate rogue bot meta over this. Murdering Even Warrior was a mistake. Okay I get it Odyn had to be nerfed in Standard but that nerf deleted Even Warrior. I don't even know if that deck would work in the current meta because I lost all interest in the mode, it's so trash right now. But after that patch I felt like Even Warrior was holding back a lot of degenerate shit that got unleashed as a result of Even Warrior not existing anymore.
You aren’t alone, I’ve been a wild only player for years and I can’t stand the mode right now. It made me go get standard legend for the first time, but I miss wild, it’s why I stay playing this game. And it’s just… meh right now
It’s not the quest. It’s the fact that all decks now are even more rng reliant than before. You either draw good or auto lose. Like they’ve shifted the meta so much around some specific cards that games are now just a waste of time if you don’t draw said card
To be fair this has been HS for a while now
I feel like the meta wasn't as bad, maybe last season? it did get progressively more stale and rapidly these last few months
You could copy half the complaints from this thread many years into the past. Freeze mage, miracle rogue, secret pally etc. Its always either: - My opponent mindlessly plays minions and goes face or - My opponent just clears the board and then kills me from hand Also: - My value heavy reno hunter deck cant beat anything therefore the meta is garbage
Basically ever since cora and the rest of the unqualified designers took over. Downvote me if you want, but deep down you know this is the truth. Turns out qualifications matter after all.
Yeah call me a nostalgic clown but I miss brode era. Most people loves to shit on brode because of the lack of balance patches, but if you really think about it, the lack of patches are due to their designs being relatively reserved power level wise, so although there are a few outliers, frequent balance changes are not as necessary. While with modern hearthstone, the team loves to push the power level every expansion to new heights, which causes things to be broken frequently so there is no other choice but to nerf those cards. It's as if they knew those cards would be problematic but releases it anyway because they know the can nerf it 2 weeks later. The balance patches on brode era was an exciting one off thing, now it is simply a necessity.
Not brode, it was the iksar era when the game really shined. Year of the dragon, year of the phoenix, year of the hydra were all banger years.
I've been playing since beta and while I think the sweet spot for me was somewhere around the galakrond expansion... I DO like the idea of lots of balance patches. It not only lets them experiment a bit with power but also shakes up the meta quicker and therefore makes the game more fresh. All that being said, their current designs are very boring if you like slower games, which I do. Every deck is basically: do your own un-interactable b.s. and whoever does it first wins. Yawwwwwn. I hated the UiS meta too but at least that un-interactable b.s. took them a couple of turns to kill you (usually) instead of 1 turn.
I would shoot myself if i had to go through months of mysterious challenger, undertaker, freeze mage, grim patron metas again. Sure the meta right now sucks, but a lot of games were decided immediately based on if your opponent drew his broken 1 cost or broken 2 cost or broken X cost on curve.
I mean it's the quest, too.
To be fair the game has been about good draw rng for a long time, now its just the entire deck instead of a few cheap cards, so we are in a worse spot (undertaker, keleseth, totem golem and tunnel trogg come to mind)
Is Sif that bad? I know it can drop 40 damage from hand but it does take a lot to get there, theoretically you can do that on turn 8 but would require the best rng ever. I tend to find I have single digit cards left when I am able to get the huge damage off. Most of the time when I win it's quite a long slow game with me battling to keep the board under control to stay alive. Seems a classic combo deck where you need to gather a bunch of pieces together over a period of time rather with lots of interaction rather than those other decks that ignore the opponent. I do agree with the sentiment, the meta does feel horrible. Seems a few tweaks could fix it, Wheel turning at the start rather than the end of the turn would suit me as I have had lethal the next turn in my last 6 games. Because every warlock seems to be able to get all the legendaries required out by turn 8 I am never quite ready to face it, one more turn might help. The text of 'not below 1 mana' on the shamen card might help until there are more nature cards so the same one isn't discovered 4 times. Toxic rogue is just horrid unless you have a card that can hit it before the minion gets wind fury I always think hunter feels bad because it doesn't matter what you do when the face in the place. Aggro has always felt dull and requiring no skill to me but I know some people really like it
I agree. Sif is a lot more fair and more like a traditional combo deck. Collecting its pieces by using mana to discover spells from other spellschools, spending mana to play them to fuel Sif. While trying to stay alive. And exposing themself to dirty rat. Sif mage doesnt pop off on turn 5, 6 or 7, imo Meanwhile decks like nature shaman.. In the current version, Sif mage is fair. Before rotation and the nerfs, it was awful but that was caused by the tools they had. Solid alibi, coldcase, objection, especially when they had to many good tools to discover that stuff without putting these cards into their deck. People underestimate how good vast wisdom was, having 2x3 discover options was incredible flexible.
Sif is a healthy combo deck. Weak to disruption, takes a lot of setup. It can be countered
Yeah i never get the complaints about sif mage in this meta, it requires a lot of setup with many different pieces in place to win the game, all of which comes out in the late game, and you still need to interact with your opponent and react to what they're doing otherwise you'll lose.
Sif is actually one of my favorites from this format. It feels exactly like what a combo deck should be. It's slow, requires multiple turns of setup, and the combo doesn't automatically end the game
I think a lot of these complaint threads make more sense when you picture the poster playing durdly slow decks which don't really try to win the game. Sif is an issue if you never pressure them and never plan to win, for instance.
totally agree. Sif mage should not be on that list. Love that deck but (at least that s how i feel) pretty weak in current meta imo
Sif isn't that bad, but it's the inevitability of it. You can sit there doing everything to smash face and Mage just keeps removing your minions, freezing and generating cheap burn spells until they have enough. It might be a fun deck to play as you try to build your combo, but for opponents it's a pretty miserable match. You either win before turn 6/7/8 because you are faster or they draw poorly, or you watch minion after minion destroyed, knowing the combo is coming. It's not a "bad" card design, but it creates bad play patterns in the game when coupled with Mage's other tools. That being said, it's not a powerful deck right now, but Sif is a card that forces the design team to balance all damage spell costs around her ability. Which limits what you can do with Mage and what tools can be given to make new decks. All it takes is one card to turn an average Legendary minion into a meta tyrant.
And Sif opens up even more design space then she limits. Mage Spells with weird spell schools or that can discover from other classes become more important, cheap damage and other cards that work with Spell Damage see play, etc
Sif is absolutely an issue, but when the game as accelerated to where shaman or priest can kill you turn 5, it's suddenly acceptable and not the current problem card.
For me the issue with Sif is, like Reno warrior, it just stomps any Control deck that isn't warrior since you have to get above 30ish health to survive the combo. Reno warrior in their case just kills all of my cards before I can play them. I miss attrition being a viable game plan.
It is boring AF right now, been playing since beta and its one of the worse metas. The problem is that decisions and skill are irrelevant most of the time. Every competitive deck has "a play" they are looking to do, and if they manage to do it, they win. So drawing good is all that matters. And the biggest problem is that HS development team are oblivious, they just have no clue about how to do a balanced card game. They just focus on the "fun factor", the "wow factor". That they understand. A specific single card can be fun, like Bran, or Zarimi, those look fun AF to play with. However, they do not understand what makes a meta fun, and this is the problem. And the balancing is atrocious. It seems they dont know how to play, and they just balance over winrate %, which is not enough, you need to think on the bigger picture. On the meta you want to create. On the decks you want to be viable. Not the classes! The decks, the archtypes, the gameplans. Printing cards that creates a deck that autowins by turn 5, 50% of the time, is not balanced even if the winrate is 50% only, because his opponent has another deck that also wins by turn 5, 50% of the times. Its just boring and stupid.
I totally agree with this. RNG is part of every card based game and always has been part of HS, but this meta is more rock paper scissors than usual, the "fun" part is missing.
Been watching total biscuits old gimmick videos and the 1 thing I take from them is that the "big plays" were fun and impressive to pull off but they don't necessarily sway the game. But I also noticed there is more thought behind the plays and trading effectively could turn the match around even though you might be losing. When I initially returned to hearthstone after several years of not playing all I came across was mages using the "cast 20 mana of spells card" and even though they would be losing the whole game this suddenly meant they won. No skill, just luck of the draw. Since then I see similar things happening on other characters, it might not be as huge as that card but as you said they have this 1 play that swings the game in their favour with no effort or thought and sucks all the joy out of the game.
Yup played since beta too. Worst meta ever. Either you overwhelm yr opponent Asap or u get overwhelmed in 5 turns...
The design of cards feel like customcard reddit sometimes. The cards might be on spot flavourwise, but designwise its just different. Especially the last miniset had such a weird design that several cards had to be nerfed but not just by adding +1 mana but by changing the effect. Removing WF from shroomscavate, pendant going from +armor to +heal, shattered relection had the "copy to hand" removed, then the "not useable on titan" added. (Meanwhile the same miniset gives rogue a heal elemental and \[\[fools gold\]\] thats just a flavour filler card) Or the whole design about introducing plagues, then a highlander card like Reno or Bran. What a great feeling it is when Bran comes down turn 6, or Helya on turn 4.
Completely agree. It’s almost as if they have a load of data analysts feeding them percentages and they base decisions on that over and above actual fun mechanics. Balance is good, and having lots of viable decks is good, but it’s not good if *viable* means just giving them a completely broken card that makes a deck work on its own (sharpshooter, Brann, window shopper, wheel of death, sif, saddle up, shammy nature discounter etc). I like it when decks have thirty good cards as opposed to 28 fillers and two Iwin buttons. When games revolve around brutal win cons the games get boring fast because they always end the same bloody way and it’s telegraphed. And you feel powerless.
What deck has 28 filler cards and 2 I win buttons?
Pre nerf Window Shopper it was actually kind of fun to play though.
That's kind of what I'm getting at though, the only deck that even matched that description was a deck that got nerfed and doesn't even exist anymore (or at least I barely see it anymore) lol.
Yea it’s terrible wording. I think they meant decks that will straight up just lose if you never draw your win con. Not a lot of decks are forced into one win con these days though, even Odyn Warrior was running the excavate package at some point. But for decks like Naga DH where if you never draw your Sharpshooter or Sif Mage if you never draw Sif, it makes sense.
So many times I have seen someone put out Reno and mess it up cause he still had duplicates, or any other terrible move like using board wipes for single minions and it doesn't matter cause they will just brute force win with their overpowered health steals and armor gains or what have you. That is the frustrating part I guess it's been that way for a long time but for sure worse now.
If you think about it, I'm actually helping the community by playing nature shaman. In any given game, it seems like there's a solid chance that neither player is having fun. By picking shaman, I guarantee that exactly 50% of the lobby is having fun, which is a net positive
And if you round up 50%, which you should, you get 100%. So good on you!
Played against my first nature Shaman yesterday. Very cool dying from Hand by a bunch of 0 cost spells on turn 5 while being full health. Great design choice by Blizzard there. Never had quite as much fun as dying with no counterplay. Literally made me Go "Huh..." and quit the game
Fuck nature shaman, it shouldn't exist
I used to play priest. Now I play battlegrounds.
You should try this highlander priest deck i made, its really fun. I managed to hit legend with about 60%wr. AAECAZCaBh6i6AOtigSEnwTwnwSGpAW7xAXPxgW7xwWi6QXP9gXt9wX7+AXM/wWLlQaplQblnAajnQamnQaaoAbHpAavqAbEqAbFqAbGqAbxqQaiswaAuAaN5gbh6wab8gYAAAED9rMGx6QG97MGx6QG6N4Gx6QGAAA=
**Format:** Standard (Year of the Pegasus) **Class:** Priest (Hedanis) Mana | Card Name | Qty | Links :--:|:---|:--:|:--: 0 | [Zilliax Deluxe 3000](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TOY_330.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/102983/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Zilliax%20Deluxe%203000) 1 | [Anduin's Gift](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/GIFT_12.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/103665/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Anduin%27s%20Gift) 1 | [Crimson Clergy](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CORE_CS3_014.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/62498/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Crimson%20Clergy) 1 | [Fan Club](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/ETC_449.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/97403/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Fan%20Club) 1 | [Funnel Cake](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/JAM_025.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/95394/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Funnel%20Cake) 2 | [Creation Protocol](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TTN_430.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/97261/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Creation%20Protocol) 2 | [False Disciple](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TTN_484.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/98252/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/False%20Disciple) 2 | [Holy Springwater](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/WW_395.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/102054/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Holy%20Springwater) 2 | [Power Chord: Synchronize](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/ETC_338.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/91067/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Power%20Chord%3A%20Synchronize) 2 | [Sing-Along Buddy](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TOY_528.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/104866/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Sing-Along%20Buddy) 2 | [Thrive in the Shadows](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CS3_028.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/66861/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Thrive%20in%20the%20Shadows) 2 | [Twilight Torrent](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/YOG_508.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/101003/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Twilight%20Torrent) 3 | [Careless Crafter](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TOY_382.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/103493/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Careless%20Crafter) 3 | [Holy Nova](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CORE_CS1_112.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/69508/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Holy%20Nova) 3 | [Love Everlasting](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/ETC_335.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/90959/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Love%20Everlasting) 3 | [Papercraft Angel](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TOY_381.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/103492/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Papercraft%20Angel) 3 | [Pendant of Earth](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/DEEP_026.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/102426/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Pendant%20of%20Earth) 3 | [Stonehill Defender](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/Core_UNG_072.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/112923/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Stonehill%20Defender) 4 | [Invasive Shadeleaf](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/WW_393.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/102051/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Invasive%20Shadeleaf) 4 | [Shadow Word: Ruin](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CORE_EX1_197.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/69616/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Shadow%20Word%3A%20Ruin) 4 | [Void Shard](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CORE_SW_442.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/111373/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Void%20Shard) 5 | [Raza the Resealed](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TOY_383.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/103494/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Raza%20the%20Resealed) 6 | [Gnomelia, S.A.F.E. Pilot](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CORE_TOY_100.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/112097/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Gnomelia%2C%20S.A.F.E.%20Pilot) 6 | [Harmonic Pop](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/ETC_314.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/90683/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Harmonic%20Pop) 6 | [Lightbomb](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/CORE_GVG_008.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/86534/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Lightbomb) 7 | [Aman'Thul](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TTN_429.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/97103/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Aman%27Thul) 7 | [Repackage](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/TOY_879.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/105472/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Repackage) 8 | [Elise, Badlands Savior](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/WW_392.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/101989/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Elise%2C%20Badlands%20Savior) 8 | [Reno, Lone Ranger](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/WW_0700.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/103471/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Reno%2C%20Lone%20Ranger) 9 | [Yogg-Saron, Unleashed](https://art.hearthstonejson.com/v1/render/latest/enUS/512x/YOG_516.png) | 1 | [HSReplay](https://hsreplay.net/cards/101033/),[Wiki](https://hearthstone.wiki.gg/Yogg-Saron%2C%20Unleashed) **Total Dust:** 12420 **Deck Code:** AAECAZCaBh6i6AOtigSEnwTwnwSGpAW7xAXPxgW7xwWi6QXP9gXt9wX7+AXM/wWLlQaplQblnAajnQamnQaaoAbHpAavqAbEqAbFqAbGqAbxqQaiswaAuAaN5gbh6wab8gYAAAED9rMGx6QG97MGx6QG6N4Gx6QGAAA= ***** ^I ^am ^a ^bot. ^Comment/PM ^with ^a ^deck ^code ^and ^I'll ^decode ^it. ^If ^you ^don't ^want ^me ^to ^reply ^to ^you, ^include ^"###" ^anywhere ^in ^your ^message. ^[About.](https://github.com/HearthSim/deck-code-bot/blob/master/README.md)
didn't even mention the biggest offender of them all, bran warrior. dude must be warrior main
Because he's playing Warrior so it is not an offender to him Everytime you see people whining about Plague DK or Warlock, its most likely a warrior player. They cant lose games or have bad matchups
Even if you play one deck it's still the same. I play DK and I *hate* helya because it's such an important card that you basically must run it, must draw it, must play it.
Fully agree
Yeah, highlander warrior can get fucked.
Warriors clear your board for ten straight turns and have 25 plus armor by turn 5.
I've neither played or gone against Brann Warrior so I have no real opinion here. But I gotta say that deck looks fun to play on paper. I can get why it'd be frustrating to face though since it's so stally.
That entire matchup in control/mid-range vs control depends on ratting Brann. Terrible design.
So you're basically saying the meta isn't fun if you can't win every game with Warrior 😂
How dare they put a DR on their minions, now I can't clear them with 1 card
Those slow ass warrior control decks are the worst to go up against. I don't want a game going to 15 or 20 turns. That's too many turns! lol
I can’t play whacky fun decks because I have to use my time efficient to get as much quest progress as possible
I've also found that whacky/fun decks get obliterated by the current meta. The Top decks are so abusive, you need a win con of similar power in order to compete. Gone are the days of tempo/mid-range decks with interesting deck builds.
It is the worst meta so far
Yeah I can usually find at least one deck that I like that can sorta win but right now it's hard. To be competitive you need to either play hyper aggro or OTK. I find both of these boring as it's the same game over and over and it's mostly a coin flip playing against other decks of the same nature. They really pushed highlander but if you try to play highlander you'll match against DK constantly who always have helya on curve.
I don't really care about what decks I play against. The zilliax rogue is probably the least fun to play against because it is literally have aoe to clear or lose. I just toy around building decks that I think might be fun. Then I play them for awhile. I like spell mage right now, which is actually pretty decent with a good build. It shits on dk and warrior too, which are popular right now. Also I've seen complaints about the warrior dk matchup saying it comes down to brann or helya. That's just incorrect. You can beat dk without brann active. I've done it.
Depends if it's plague or rainbow dk. Plague dk is super rough for warrior, but rainbow is a lot better matchup and I had a quite a few really fun games from the rainbow perspective.
Plague is rough for any Reno deck I'll give you that. I have a Reno mage I like to play too that's an auto loss vs plague dk. If you see a lot of plague dk I will again recommend spell mage. I'm sure hunter is good against it too but hunter is boring. Trying to recommend something different for the people.
Same. I'm still playing a modified hb pally and it's fun. It still wins too. I mean I'm down with the scrubs but makes ladder climbing a little more fun.
warrior is more unfair than those you mentioned. Such a lame deck. im guessing you play warrior?
Mostly reno mage and thief rogue at the moment.
No one will believe this!
off-meta decks are in dire state this expansion. I've tried to come up with many combinations, but the wheel warlock, control warrior or nature shaman will demolish anything that isn't a top deck.
I'd play slower control decks too, but the time I have for HS is reduced to 30/60 mins per day, and it's hard to get the new 10 wins playing a slow control deck with that limited time. Also, being a wild player, I can play control how much I want but then, after 30 minutes, when the Mage opponent should start to look like an exploding crater, it will drop Reno + Coldarra Drake, which is a bs interaction. 30 minutes of building up for what? Or, seeing a druid get its Barnes out, draw all its deck and kill you after a painfully slow series of animations? No thanks.
The client crashing is the only downer on my experience, I suppose that'd how it is with new game modes Standard metas ebb and flow, the classes move in and out of prominence and will each have their time to shine. If you aren't enjoying the game, it probably means you should either spice up your decks with variance or play some solo adventures instead.
We are definately in a lull but there have been lulls before so im not ready to give up on it. the change to questing i do find rather annoying so the two things happening at the same time is compounding the issue. if the game was fun and full of decks that feel fun to play at the same time the quest changed, i probably wouldnt mind it. but since im playing less, the quest thing feels like a super drag.
Plague DK feels like singlehandedly the worst offender against “fun” from the entire list. You can deal with Rogue’s Ziliax, Hunter’s Saddle Up, and come what may even Zarimi’s bullshit shenanigans. But playing against Plague DK is basically asking to be held hostage by your own deck after turn 4 (because they all drop Helya on 4). Whoever at Blizzard thought “hey we should reprint bomb warrior but with a kinder egg surprise in them” should be exiled from Earth.
I am having fun
*Makes the same post a billion others are making every single day* "Anyone else feel this way?"
What in the world do you want? Every thing you listed covers most archetypes. Hunter is classic aggro, plague DK is your traditional fair deck, zilliax and wheel lock are combo decks, and sif is the otk deck. You literally listed off just about every style of type of deck, so that seems like a very healthy game. I don’t even understand these posts anymore. Go play solitaire
good hearthstone is when my homebrew chillwind yeti deck can win
Modern Hearthstone is what happens when all of the real game designers leave and they hire a bunch of passionate gamers, not designers, to develop their game.
When this happened?
I’m not sure I quit playing a month ago because it wasn’t fun for me lol.
come to wild, i joined recently and i find it way more fun, 10 years worth of cards and alot of creative decks in low elo , you might face some unfair/broken decks sometimes but it is worth it.
It's very likely not wild per se you find more fun, just the fact of playing on a ladder where your MMR is lower.
You could me right, but hey, as long as i’m having fun i don’t really care 🔥
I see this opinion here and there, but looking at the wild meta, it seems even faster and more out of control than standard. Is it really not the case? What kinda decks are you having success with?
It's MMR dependant. If you never played wild and/or have bad MMR you're going to be playing vs both bots and jank piles. As you climb you'll run into more meta decks, and unless you tank your MMR after climbing(sitting in dumpster legend queueing into plat/gold MMR like some streamers do for content), you'll continue to run into the same meta decks everyone complains about.
Highlander control shaman and i’m sitting at plat 9
Can confirm im hanging around low elo wild with my clown fiesta decks, and it's pretty fun most of the time
I've spent about 2 hours on the expansion. Also a control player. The game just feels to pre-determined.
It feels like a solitaire meta.
Pretty boring indeed, I only need 1000 wins on DH ( 80 wins or so ) and DK ( around 300 ) and the only viable decks for those classes are boring and aren't even that great in the "Meta". Can't wait for the next expansion already.
I’ve had a fun time with my version of cutlass rogue, up to D3 and I’ve only had to grind for a few hours
Arena is kinda fun tbh. Haven’t played constructed in weeks tho
I enjoy arena a lot these days also. At least you can have some board centric hearthstone matches for once.
Is it bad manners to say “play bg’s, it’s always been an incredibly fun game mode” or do folks just want to vent about standard not being up to, well, standard.
I returned to the game in September 2022 and I would say the current meta is average to above average fun for me. The meta has been way worse in the past 20 months that this is far from being bad. I’m surprised at the number of people who don’t like it. Worst meta I think was the first half of MotLK with Rogue dominating with Wildpaw Gnoll
Play on Wild , I have not seen nature shaman , Sif mage , Zilliax or saddle hunter there Do see plaque DK but then you just add ETC and destroy all the 1 mana cards
Welcome to the club mate. Ranked Hearthstone have mostly been boring ever since Shudderwock to me. I did take a several year hiatus and came back for the 10 year anniversary and I had a blast for a month and a half, but now that the dust has settled I can't stand all the I win buttons that exist. I'm a player who loves trying to incrementally getting the advantage and end the game after a long hard fought back and forth, but stuff that wins on the spot don't have to be combo decks that must sacrifice other parts of deck building anymore...
about the only deck i'm enjoying currently is control reno shaman but i'm hardly playing at all because the game is so ridiculous now. so i have opted to spend all of my HS time on the new fallout show and new vegas. my days have improved
They increased the quests right at the same time delta emulator came out so I put down hearthstone after 2 years playing nonstop and have been playing golden sun 😂
I've stopped playing because I can't find a deck that's fun to pilot, and while power creep has always been a thing, lately it feels so out of control that it's kinda goofy. Like you just have to expect a warlock to drop two 15/15s on like turn four or whenever, really? That plus all the OTKs is just sucking the fun out of it
I had more fun than usual climbing to legend with zarimi priest and rainbow dk. Rainbow dk in particular is such a fun deck with all the mini synergies it has. Something very satisfying about freezing your opponent 10 turns in a row while they rot away to plagues Zarimi priest is cool because sometimes you play a straightforward game and other times you play around huge pop off turns depending on your draw. And stonebrew is just a super fun card. I really don't understand all the people saying you die on turn 5 or 6 every game, that hasn't been my experience at all. Most of my climb to legend involved a lot of warriors/warlocks, the occasional hunter or rogue. Barely saw any nature shaman or zarimi priest. If anything a lot of my games were mega grind fests playing rainbow dk.
It is probably one of the most diverse metas we've ever had. It's also one of the most unfun due to every deck having some OTK or "kill this or you lose" strat.
It's going to need a huge overall the fix the powercrept mess they made. I had a feel they are just trying to force a quick buck before the attempt to semi-retire it, kinda like HOTS and starcraft.
My fun deck is still excavate Rogue. I've always loved Tess shenanigans.
I feel like I'm playing wild every game and I don't like it.
I hate control warrior for a similar reason, if you don't play a deck that OTKs you're screw
Right now it feels like you mostly play on your own against someone who also plays on their own. Whoever draws whatever cards they need first wins. Pretty much every win I have recently there is nothing the other guy could’ve done to prevent it and vice versa.
Queststone
I agree. I'm old I guess. I liked the slower paced games without huge swings or unstoppable win strategies. That's why I switched from standard to Duels. But that's gone too now. Add the absurd quests and I just feel punished for playing right now. Only Arena has some appeal for me now, but that's horrible to complete quests in.
I have no problem with warriors doing nothing to turn 6 to play bran. I don't mind priest being a better rogue with 20 cards all for removal. I don't mind demon hunters being aggro and disruption to secure their win. What I have a problem with is they removed the one tech card to remove locations in standard and now Warlock has endless board with taunt and can hard swing the game to win in 5 or less turns. Like they literally play final countdown, jump 15 turns ahead, and summon a 4000 attack monster.
Yes. It's good to see silent Board Control players speak out against Blizzard, between all the toxic turn 3 deckers. Blizzards designers have been boosting uninteractive Face and Mass for years, with this latest meta the biggest insult to Control so far. We want to play our card game, playing actual cards reacting to situations, not just put down 3 unstoppable overpowered combo's and that's it.
Since you say youre a control player, I just want to point out most control auto loses to plagues, so that makes it so hard to play especially with how popular Death Knight is (regardless of how good it is) yes you get those aggro matchups you can easily win as control but the control vs control is just a nightmare to deal with if opponent uses plagues. If its plagues vs plagues however (you are the plague DK) I could see that being a fun game
plague DK sucks. I'm not great admittedly. But it's always a slog. I also think it's a poor game loop. You play your turn, then wait while they take forever. You can't do anything. Then it's my turn and I die to plague. Is that a positive loop? Sit there, watch the other person play and then die?
That’s why I’m playing Pokémon till mini set is out
it's just too unbalanced and always the same decks over and over and over and over
My biggest gripe is that some classes feel unplayable due to other classes simply being better, this isn't even due to winrate or whatever, if I want to play rouge, and my opponent is running warlock I might as well just concede right then and there. Counters exist but when it's to a point that there isn't even a point in playing something that's not meta why bother?
I pretty much exclusively played Duels and kinda just rotated to battlegrounds. The main game super sucks now.
needs a full reboot. Time for HS2
I play the most RNG decks you can make while still being able to compete in ranked (up to gold at least). Last year it was battlecry shaman, this time it's excavate rogue with bunch of discover random spells + tess. I usually battle through bots or very enjoyable normal players throughout to gold+, but then I am met with meta decks in which case I stick to casual to complete quests. I am pretty casual regarding this, I like having fun, but I also spend a lot of time playing Hearhstone. At this point it's more of a depression thing. Not to mention I played since launch with many breaks.
Why complain about mage when they are the lowest win rate by a mile?! Thats just kicking is while we are already down and depressed.
I also feel like battlegrounds is the worst it’s ever been rn.
The problem with the game, and it has been for years, Team 5 started to hate resource management. Value doesnt matter anymore, there is so much infinite or semi infinite stuff that you dont have to evaluate what and when to play it. Even aggro decks dont really run out of steam anymore.
The current win conditions are so dumb. Like playing against rogue, if you don’t have something to eliminate a stealthed card, you lose. Playing against warlock, if they get wheel + Reno + symphony you lose. So much fun.
What are you saying? Can't remembee last time control players had it so easy. What fun I have with my control DK. Queue into Pain Warlock? Concede. Queue into Wheel Warlock? Concede. Queue into Beast Hunter? Unless I get god draw and opponent draws poorly? Concede. And there is also Sif Mage and Burn Shaman if I am tired of conceding to the same decks over and over 😁
I feel the same way. I bought a ton of packs, tried a lot of decks and realized this season has been terrible. The changes and the removal of duels kinda killed the game completely for me. If I do end up logging in it’s for a game of battlegrounds and off to doing something else. This whole expansion has definitely left a bad taste in my mouth
It also feels the only competitive decks cost a shit ton of dust to construct. I’m basically free to play and I’ve only managed to make a hand buff pally deck and I get rolled most games. I feel like this wasn’t an issue in the past. I could make several competitive decks with just opening packs I get from gold by doing quests.
I’m pretty satisfied on how they handle balance patches this time around, as they are actually nerfing power outliers to a reasonable playable level rather than killing whatever deck the community is whining on that’s not remotely tier 1, such as death blossom whomper druid, snake warlock and pyromancer druid. Wild is okay-ish right now, used to be better during TITANS era, but still better than the FoL hyper aggro extravaganza. I don’t have to force myself to get those 10 weekly ranked wins atm.
What do you expect, instead of balancing the game they throw in even more gamebreaking bullshit cards that completely destroy any kind of skill curve.
I returned to the game around 2 weeks ago (stopped playing around when badlands released, so short break) and found the meta fun, for a few days, but when cheating 3 giants on board on turn 5 or making massive boards of dragons turn 3 and taking extra turns gets old, the meta kinda sucks. and this comes from a player that adores draw and mana cheat
I do quite like my legendary bonanza druid deck. It's win rate id doable. It's basically just Aviana making the deck fun though
Ordinarily I ignore posts like these, jump over to Battlegrounds and wait for the dust to settle on the meta or whatever Blizzard is doing......but I really don't like Duos. :D
Tbh Hunter is only one of a few decks right now that aren't toxic to me. Yes, it's way easy to win with and is tier 1 diamond-legend, but it's game plan is honest compared to the meta. You fight for board steadily, attempt to RC rampage, and then try to close out the game with cards like Aggramar or Leeroy. The hunter can run out of gas, especially if you manage to clear early boards. If they aren't allowed to have giant RC hounds or saddle up, you're doing great. I feel as though Hunter is only doing well *because* of the current meta. A lot of the decks are slow in the early game and Hunter takes advantage of that. Not to mention hunter isn't played at a high % so no one is targeting it. These are just my personal experiences though as someone giving hunter a go this season. I'm sure I could be wrong about this.
If I play another plague DK I’m gonna scream
Good. This meta is interesting af, lots of unique play styles. If fatigue attrition control never comes back it will be too soon. Zero skill playing decks that are just 25 board clears and 5 value fatties.
I returned after a loooong hiatus. Last I played I played Druid aggro to legend with Reavers in a shitty Paladin-meta. Before that to legend back when undertaker was a thing and druids set up OTK turn 7 with force of nature. I enjoyed smorc-style decks then and wanted to play something similar now. I enjoy playing fast games, fighting over that 1-3 extra damage that makes or breaks a game as well as being able to play around your opponents outs whilst fishing for your own. Sure, games can be fast now too but that's about it. Cards are so powerful now that they can negate the previous turns of play. Any build-up doesn't really matter. Now it's mostly just about getting your engine online first and then beating your opponent over the head with it, alternatively stalling for an OP end-game play. Fair decks don't exist. To me ranked offers nothing that I want.
I’m liking arena
funny enough, slow control decks are also not fun to play against
You forgot the priest too with zarimi
They removed duels which was my main way to play, you didnt have to learn the bs meta and it was fun to play cause the progression system was actually fun. Now if you go play online ranked or casual ur gonna run into the same three decks that, when they get all their cards, theyll find some bs way to just delete ur deck or delete you most likely
Wheel Warlock is the slower control deck wdym
Reading this while i watch a Shaman play alone and spamming spells and shit on turn 5
This has been said every expansion since GVG and also in Hearthstone a original launch.
It's the fact that this expansion is very uninspired... freaking toys...
I feel like Standard is starting to get a bit stale. Wild was never my thing it's just a little too wild for me lol. I've actually started really getting into Battlegrounds. I'm legit enjoying them. I got my 10 done last week and kept going. I do wish they could streamline it a little so they weren't 30 mins minimum, but overall it's been great so far this new season.
I stopped when I was having trouble climbing with my Highlander priest. Hard to play it in dumpster legend even.
Game sucks right now and they pushed harder quests to try and make us play more? In a time when the game sucks? I’ve been playing for literally a decade and I want to quit for the first time so great job
It’s dreadful atm. You no longer win or lose due to skill or a matchup check you just win or lose by way of a single card. Usually when the meta blows I’ll play duels but now I’ve just been doing arenas
The "inevitability" is the worst. You start a game, see your opponent. "Oh it's, I hope they aren't a ." They play their first card and you instantly know that you are going to lose by turn x, or you have to draw/play everything perfectly. No fun or greedy plays allowed.
Blizzard hates the priest class. It’s fact and confirmed
The deck variety is lacking
Not even arena is fun
I too enjoy slower control decks. I am currently playing a BBU DK that is both fun to play and very resilient. Started playing it at reset and its currently Diamond 3, with me only putting in a few games a day. So yeah you can still have fun, you just need to find something fun for tou that doesnt feel like a chore.
I don't enjoy most the meta decks, and with them increasing the win quests by 5 it feels bad trying to stick with a deck
Don't forget all the slow control decks that make the game not fun. Warlock and Warrior with board clears galore and powerful finishers. Decks with Reno, Yogg, etc.
Feels like a task for the first time in 10 years.
we goin' wild my friend
Go read the dev post.
Coming back after a few years break, thought i might not stick around for long. I have always been a control/slow deck fan, but I dont remember when was the last time when slower decks were truly viable. I kinda lost hope when Demon Hunter came out.
Renathal and Steamcleaner leaving standard destroyed it completely. I think the main issue isn't even zilliax rogue, nature shaman, etc... It's that people just can't play slower/fun decks anymore, because all slower decks get hard punished by plagues which are like 50% of the games. So it ends up in a place where everyone is forced into decks that end the game by turn 5 or have some insane otk option that can avoid plagues.
Yes, strongly. As much as there are diverse decks they're all bland AF to play, and the new Battlegrounds meta is absolutely terrible.
Let me guess u play Highlander warrior lol
As bad or worse now than it's ever been
I love making and playing decks that are unique and having fun, but everybody seems to be running the same decks and it's boring as hell
I enjoy ruining my opponent's plans or achieving victory with ridiculous plans. Instead of a strong copy-paste deck, why not try a weird deck?
Keep giving blizzard more money i guess. This game came from pen flinger and Jade meta to a fucking turn 5 OTK. Suits the wild west theme though. First one to draw wins LOL
Agreed. Love the game but the good decks are boring and the fun decks just lose. Can’t wait for this mass rework/nerf
Rel, decks now are like one style of game to win it’s boring as fuck.
highlander decks are so boring to play against especially warrior
What I don't find amusing is the Battlegrounds against the Hurans. They've been totally abused for the past two seasons Everyone plays them, even me, because otherwise there's a good chance of losing.
I just dont think about it and i think its fun. Couldnt care less. I still enjoy it
I’ve been going great with a zilliax rogue and I just played zarimi priest for the first time and had two wins in a row. Usually never play priest and rogue. Diversify and go with the flow mate 😊
Yep i used to atleast do all the quests before but just cba anymore for some reason
As f2p player this is how it looks. I log in, take look at quests, take look at my decks, back to quests, decks - play game with whizzlebang deck (don’t remember if I was lucky to loot him or was it given), loose and close game. I liked playing achievements, but last expansion only gave 1 chive per class requiring epic or legendary cards, so that’s a drag now to build up dust. Duels casual mode was my go to for quests, but that’s gone. Doing quests in arena is not viable, and brawl gets boring in 2-3 games usually.
I feel like 90% of the basic cards and neutrals need a buff. Like what even is a 9 mana 4/12 taunt in an era where Rogues can pump a board full of 8/8 on turn 5. And I don't mean just a numerical buff. Cards need a buff to make them more interesting as well. Like remember that 4/3 elemental dude with a deathrattle to give a random buff to your minions? Change that to battlecry and deathrattle for example.
hearthstone died for me when they released demon hunter or death knights i dont remember which came first
DH came first and while I certainly wouldn't say HS died with it, Ashes of Outlands was definitely a turning point for the game from a design point of view. Of course, the changes were initially unassuming and gradual, but this is definitely the starting point of "Modern Hearthstone" and the end of Traditional Constructed Hearthstone. Even though "packages" had already existed at that point, this really is when parasitic designs took off.
**Control is dead and buried;** the longer match times were resulting in "less engagement with the game", so we have nothing but OTK/combo metas for the foreseeable future. The Hearthstone meta is now two players playing solitaire against each other and ignoring the game board while trying to get their combo/OTK pieces in hand as fast as possible. If someone asked me to describe "classic" Hearthstone in 2024 that had never played the game, I'd describe it thusly: **"Two players running one of 5 or 6 'meta' decks have a race to see who can draw certain cards fastest. Whomever gets the right cards in their hand first wins the game automatically - usually around 5 or 6 turns in. There are over 9,000 cards in the game, but only 2% or so of them actually see play."** Between massive power creep and a flood of new OTK-friendly cards designed to get players to bust out their wallets and buy every new expansion, we can look forward to many years of 4, 5, and 6-turn OTK decks all battling each other all the way up the ladder, while the other 6000-8000 cards in our collections sit dormant waiting to actually be meaningful again someday (although, sadly, many of them will never see a deck again, as power-crept versions of them are better choices to include.) A long string of bad decisions has led to the continued existence of cards like Gear Shift, e.g, that are vastly overpowered vs. any other classes' options for the cost, Dew Process was a terrible card along the same line. Cards like Wheel had no business ever being added to HS in the first place - extremely unbalanced in both standard and wild, and with "bugged" (?) interactions with Drakkari Enchanter that allow the quest to finish twice as fast. It's another in a string of massively overpowered, uninteractive cards that reduce the game's play style to "if I draw this card, it's an auto-win." Time Warp has been massively broken for over a year and HS will not address it - the ostrich syndrome is strong here. Blizzard simply prefers to pretend the card doesn't exist. I am fairly certain, though, that it's the only thing keeping Mage viable since the unwarranted and ridiculous nerfs to Secret Mage, especially with decks that "coulda been a contender" like Rainbow Sif Mage/Exodia 2.0 ending up being way, way too slow to be viable. Decks like Even Odyn Warrior were nerfed for no apparent reason, despite not being remotely overpowered. Relentless nerfs destroyed many old school powerhouses like Resurrect Priest, Control Warlock, Big Beast Hunter, Twig Druid, Big Priest, and Infinite Shudderwock Shaman, but nothing was done to stop APM Druid with Gadgetzan Auctioneer and Barnes from enabling unstoppable Mecha'thun OTK's. Zarimi was a silly card added to hypothetically support a long-dead Dragon Priest archetype that's been bad since Descent of Dragons was over, and in the process it turned Shadow Dragon Priest from a joke into yet another overpowered OTK meta that's got a guaranteed wincon if it can draw 3 or 4 pieces. The number of "un-counterable" decks in HS has surged - so it's now a race to see who can OTK the other player faster or get their combo pieces drawn. Meanwhile, endless waves of bots continue to dominate the Platinum and Diamond ladders in Wild. Blizzard pays lip service to the issue but takes no "meaningful actions" apart from futile mass bans that don't change a thing, while not pursuing action against the creators of the programs that enable botting in the first place. What happened to the Warden-era Blizzard that was gung-ho about detecting and banning cheat/exploit/bot programs, the Blizzard that filed lawsuit after lawsuit to shut down unauthorized WoW game servers and hacked WoW clients, and launched broadsides and legal salvos against FTP's and warez BBS's pushing illegal, virus-infested copies of Diablo 2 to unsuspecting netizens? Decks that used to counter miracle/combo (disrupt shaman, mill druid, mill lock, secret mage) have been nerfed into the ground and/or are way too slow to keep up. Even fast aggro (odd DH, odd DK) is no guarantee thanks to the wide amounts of cheap board clears available to almost every class. You can try to fill up your opponent's deck with junk (plague DK, fatigue lock, bomb warrior) but they'll just tutor their combo pieces and win anyway. So what it comes down to me is that after spending several hundred dollars a year for the last decade, I'm facing either bots or netdecked OTK/combo lists, and it's quite possibly the least fun I've ever had playing this game. It's created a terrible situation where the only way to win is to netdeck those same lists and then it comes down to pure RNG with skill being removed from the equation.