Board 8 > Hearthstone Topic #5: The Generated By Meta

(+) Yeah! (+)

Ok, now that I've played over 80 hours (plus some on an EU smurf) and grinded to around 9K, I feel I have enough information to review BGs. It's like a slot machine, except you can pay an extra $20 to have more luck than other people and every once in a while it asks you to add 2 single digit numbers together to make sure you aren't a total idiot. It's a good introduction to the genre, but in the same way that finger painting is a good introduction to art. If they updated the game with any kind of regularity it could have an interesting dynamic, but apparently that isn't going to happen, so you'll know everything you need to know about the game in about 20 hours. 80% luck, 10% not being a total moron, 10% skill.

It's fun, but I agree with bebe, once you hit 6.5K or so you know everything there is to know about the game. The only difference in rank after that is how much time people spend playing the game. I hope Blizzard actually gets aggressive with updates soon to switch it up. Rotate tribals, balance heroes, change turn 1 tokens, etc. The potential is there to make the game better.

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ESY16 posted...

once you hit 6.5K or so you know everything there is to know about the game. The only difference in rank after that is how much time people spend playing the game.

*looks at rating, which has been sitting at around 6.5k for months*

Golly, I sure wonder why I'm not steadily climbing then.

ESY16 posted...

it asks you to add 2 single digit numbers together to make sure you aren't a total idiot.

Oh, and here I thought there was more to my choice of units than just total stats. But if you can get to 9k in just 80 hours, I guess I don't know what I'm talking about.

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azuarc posted...

*looks at rating, which has been sitting at around 6.5k for months*

Golly, I sure wonder why I'm not steadily climbing then.

Again, those aren't my words, but the words of probably the best auto-chess player on the planet. I'm just agreeing with him. At 6.5K you could beat a 12K player or lose to a 4.5K player just based on luck. There's a reason a game like TFT has tournaments and BGs doesn't. I'm not saying every 6.5K player or 9K player always makes the right decision. What I'm saying is that once you start climbing the role that luck plays in winning increases and the role that decision making plays decreases. Bebe says that you can be doing the right thing but on an unlucky patch, and that can reasonably last for maybe 100 games before things even out.

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Well the way it works is theres like 2 or 3 good units every tier, and if you miss on each its awkward. If you get too attached and dont develop a strategy its also awkward.

Like the early game is basically built around tokens and spawn, the mid game is almost all about divine shield and buffs for your units, and the late game is just committing to a strategy that makes sense either given your board state or pivoting to a good late game strategy (divine shields/Murlocs/Dragons/Menagerie are the big ones)

The comps

Pogos: a meme comp, but you can hypothetically do it with Shudderwock. I wouldnt force it. But Ive lost to it before and laughed.

Lizards: a semi popular one, you can force lizards with the right heroes and do ok. Selfless Hero is great, Ghoul is surprisingly excellent with it. You can run it with Weaver since a decent chunk of low level demons have deathrattles.

Demons: Weaver/Watcher you kinda have to get into early or you fall behind. Jugglers is interesting, with golden you can do very well in the late game but it has counters since theres only so much stats you can do, even with Voidlords/Imp mama

Mechs: Theres two ways to build this. One is Double Deflecto and a bunch of resets, this kinda ties into the Divine Shield build but it works pretty well. The other is a straight Deathrattle build with Baron, Kangors, and good deathrattles (Egg and Golden Bomb and Sneeds), these are solid builds but winning can be tricky depending on the matchup.

Beasts: I feel like a lot of people try to put the mid game beasts into the late game and it usually feels like a mistake. Theres two ways to build it, around Goldrinn/Baron and around Mama. Goldrinn usually uses cleaves and stats for a quick burst that can do a ton of damage, Mama usually uses tokens and finding triples to make your beasts even bigger. In the minority but both are clunky.

Divine Shields: a safe build when doing poorly in the early/mid game. The key units are divine shield guys, Drakonid Enforcer, and maybe Bolvar. You usually dont level to 5 until you can triple as there really isnt much there for you, you mainly just want Mackeral to close out games.

Menagerie: If you luck into Brann or Lightfang this is a good comp. The key units are Beast, Murloc, Dragon (Magician) but dont feel like you are forced into running all of them, you basically want a cleave, a divine shielded taunt, and then some good beefy units. If you are low on health, Brann Battlemaster can carry you into top 4.

Dragons: good but from my experience you have to have a few dragons to really be able to take off with Kalecgos and Razorgore. Luckily most of the better units at each tier are dragons, though those dragons tend to fall off quickly unless you get either one. Nadina is usually a finishing touch, ghoul Nadina can beat murlocs if your dragons are big enough.

Murlocs: Stupidly OP in the late game, many ways to get there, can either go with them early and try to triple into Brann or Bagurgle and keep going, or transition into them late with no direction (Brann can single handedly help with the 3/2 discover) or if you are feeling really adventurous, Brann/Khadgar combo can get you a ton of triples off tokens so you can consistently get megasaur. If you get Mackeral with the divine shield/poison, or two its usually just game winning, and you can just taunt them and win.

man Im bored


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This is a true example of high ELO gameplay: https://clips.twitch.tv/AmazonianAnnoyingCrowFreakinStinkin

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I won a game where I was 7 cards deeper in fatigue.

Priest lyfe.

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UltimaterializerX posted...

Archivist Elysiana in highlander. Always.

nah this was an abnormality

a control warrior who, yes, was running Elysiana

but I didn't need it then, so when will I ever need it?

The only change I made this month is putting in Kaarhj for Scorpid and I've been mulling the idea of an ooze or even Stickyfingers since I'm facing a lot of weapons lately

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Sticky fingers is much more fitting with your theme.

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yeah that's what I thought too

especially since all the weapons I want to take are played on 4 or 5 anyway (wrench, truesilver, warglaives)

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oh hey

that was me alright

https://hsreplay.net/replay/wy9RLWjMPaqCAwgZZ9agsk

I don't ever really pay attention to the names. Fun times!

Watching the replay, you topdecked like a champ, even with the Siamat/Krush combo I think I still pull it off without you topdecking the 1 mana to corrupter then the stunner.

I had Nozari, Deathwing, and DQA all in hand. I just needed one more turn!

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https://playhearthstone.com/en-gb/news/23440114?

yay pirates

also thank god holy Mackeral is gone

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Going to see a lot of Starseeker Saurolisk builds I think

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Well the rotating pool (one tribe will be not in your Tavern) will help make that not happen as much I think

The 3/3 that sells for 3 is pretty nuts in a ton of ways imo. I have a few questions as to how Hooktusk and Eudora work, like if you can discover 1s off of Hooktusk from 1s shes really strong otherwise it might just be around Maly. Eudora if you guarantee a triple roll is silly, especially with 4 of them.

Kragg if you can fit in two levels is also strong, but maybe situational.

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Some of those new pirate minions seem awfully strong. Definitely glad to see a major meta shakeup, and rotating minions has been badly needed for months. Holy Mackerel being gone is excellent. New heroes are a lot to digest. Waiting for Eudora into Golden Zerus into Golden Kaly memes if that's possible.

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I think Eudora needs to use his hero power 4 times to get a golden minion so it's basically 1 gold do nothing until then. Considering golden minions aren't much stronger than regular minions most of the time it's basically 4 gold for 2 minions, not crazy overpowered unless you high roll on the golden minion.

I doubt they add 0 mana cards just for Hooktusk so I'm sure she'll be able to get lots of triples early game. Didn't see that her hero power was discover instead of just replacing, that seems a little too strong for 0 mana honestly.

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Yeah after looking at the dev statement about Eudora shes basically a worse Reno because the number of times you want to float a gold are usually low, especially in the early game.

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If you get the golden minion after 4 hero powers and go to play it, does that not give you a high-tier discover like a triple would? I kinda assumed that would happen, which means you have a mini-power spike turn that Reno doesn't get at the cost of choosing what minion you get in gold.

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I dunno, I think pirates look pretty freaking weak. Like, you might buy some of these minions to supplement your plan. Swabbie and Gambler certainly have their place. But the new minions I'm most intrigued by don't even have pirate tags -- Arcane Cannon and Monstrous Macaw.

I guess the question is, what does a pirate build do to win, exactly? They're like bad murlocs. Salty Looter grows like a Murloc Tidecaller -- except with health, which is vital since there's no other health buffs to be had, unless you count Southsea Strongarm's bad rendition of Van Cleef's hero power. Ripsnarl Captain is a bad Bagurgle. Goliath isn't reliable at all. Even their "defining" 6-drop is awful. Let's say you have a board full of pirates. One attacks, you get +1. A second one gets attacked and dies because none of these pirates have any health. A third attacks and you get +2 for your remaining pirates. The fourth one gets attacked and dies. Sans deathrattles, you're down to 3 minions now for what you could have had from a golden spawn that doesn't lock you into shitty pirates. If they had other scaling options, okay, maybe, but they're just bad. You might play pirates in the early or even mid-game just to fill your board until you pivot, but there's absolutely zero chance you win with them.

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azuarc posted...

You might play pirates in the early or even mid-game just to fill your board until you pivot, but there's absolutely zero chance you win with them.

Yeah this is exactly what Kripp said on twitter I believe.

MrSmartGuy posted...

I kinda assumed that would happen, which means you have a mini-power spike turn that Reno doesn't get at the cost of choosing what minion you get in gold.

The real cost is losing 1 gold for 4 turns. He's basically playing 1 gold down from everyone else for no benefit until he gets his power spike. It'll be interesting to see if he's just handed a minion or if he gets to discover one.

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Does Eudora get a gold minion of the current tier? A random tier? Discover? I don't think it's great either way but there's definitely differing levels there.

And yeah I don't see how Pirates can win against any remotely competent set-up.

VeryInsane posted...

Yeah after looking at the dev statement about Eudora shes basically a worse Reno because the number of times you want to float a gold are usually low, especially in the early game.

Eudora's hero power is repeatable, though.

From the topic:

Sure! So, you press the hero power 4 times and you get a golden minion (your current Tier or below). Once you play this minion, you still get to discover.

It is a random Golden Minion.
Anytime you play a Golden Minion from hand, you get to Discover. So, you play it > get to Discover a minion.
Correct, you can do this multiple times.

Seems like it's somewhat comparable to Elise. 3 mana for discover a minion from a higher tavern tier (assuming you just sell the golden), whereas Elise is 3 mana to discover a minion from the current tavern tier (but the 3 mana is spread over four turns). Also, some potential the golden minion isn't garbage and doesn't get sold immediately.

If 4 turns wasn't such a long time to plan ahead, I'd call this really good and clear power creep on Elise. As is I still think it's solid, you probably play this like Rafaam and don't tavern up on 2 so that you can use her hero power every turn for the first several turns.

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ShatteredElysium posted...

And yeah I don't see how Pirates can win against any remotely competent set-up.

Pirates seem designed kind-of like how they are in vanilla hearthstone, which is to say they don't necessarily have synergy with each other the way murlocs do.

But there is a lot of mana cheating going on with pirates. The one that sells for 3 gold. The one that reduces the cost of your next tavern tier. Hogarr, which gives you gold when you buy a pirate (this probably stacks, so 2 Hogarrs or a golden Hogarr is going to give you 2 gold for buying a pirate). And then a bunch of stuff that synergizes with buying and selling pirates like pirates with battlecries and salty looter.

IDK if that's strong enough to form an endgame comp, but I'm expecting some shenanigans kind-of like what people do with Khadgar.

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Hm so Rafaam like curve means you would get your golden at 7 gold, and you can level to 3 that turn to try your best to not get a golden 1 star unit.

and then the second time you are on 10. Thats... ok.

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Pirates also seem like a try to close out the game quickly type of comp. Like you try to do a ton of damage before other comps find their pieces through buffers and that 6 star that refills your board with pirates to do a ton of damage

Edwin might be pretty nuts with Pirates, theres that one lady that buffs them for each one you buy, you get a ton of gold with pirates, and his own hero power buffs them further. Potential there

The macaw might be good in Deathrattle beast builds, its basically another goldrinn, or spawn. Or Ghastcoiler/Kangor. Interesting card.


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VeryInsane posted...

Edwin might be pretty nuts with Pirates

Oh, snap, I hadn't even thought of that.

Yeah, any hero that's heavily based on doing lots of of buying and selling might like pirates. Deryl also jumps to mind, as does Millhouse Manastorm.

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There are certainly better heroes to do pirates with than others. I still don't think they'll be good. That's kind of like saying pogos are okay because Shudderwock can sometimes meme with them.

Without checking the breakpoints, I think Eudora is decent. Not ungodly, but decent. And with the potential for some extreme highrolls. Imagine getting a golden juggler for your first cycle. Almost doesn't matter what 4-star you get off the discover then. The real question is how hard do you bank on the hero power. A standard curve can only float mana for rerolls twice before 10 gold (at 5 gold and at 8, and not even at 5 if tokens are available.) So it's a matter of if the Rafaam plan works for a not-Rafaam hero, and there are other heroes that will use that same plan, like Pyramad. So I'm inclined to think it'll work out.

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Can't wait for the Arcane Cannon ties.

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Nah, Pirates are good. Like the idea is you just cycle pirates with the +1/+1 and Hogger, and then just get decentish supporting pirates in between (The buffers, the ogre taunt, and maybe a boat come to mind)

Got destroyed MMR wise as I went from like 9.4 to 8.8. It just seemed like I fought the highroll opponent. Every game. Felt bad.

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UltimaterializerX posted...

I do not understand how or why Blizzard refuses to acknowledge extreme slow play and roping as a problem.

Oh hey, a complaint I actually agree with.

Roping is the one thing that really bugs me about Hearthstone. Like...obviously I'm into the RNG or I wouldn't enjoy card games (and wouldn't also enjoy ROM randomizers, and fast paced match 3 puzzle games). I've never been bothered by emotes; can't remember the last time I squelched someone.

But I hate ropers with a passion and want them banned.

It's weird too, I almost feel like Blizzard promotes roping. HGC is filled with players who think till rope (often to the point that they don't have enough time in the turn to play all their cards). And it's understandable--if thousands of dollars are on the line, ok, don't give your opponent extra information by ending the turn early and letting them know you have no 2 mana cards in hand. But it makes for a way worse viewing experience. I know people who were seriously turned off of watching HGC because of how slow everyone was playing.

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I can get on board with the hating of ropers.

If you reduced the amount of time people had to think then some peoples play would suffer a performance drop. However, with time that performance would pick back up because they would learn to think and play faster out of necessity.

What is the turn timer? 75 seconds? At most it should be 60 seconds but I honestly feel 40 would be better. Actually I'd go lower but I recognize 40 is already significantly lower than what most people would say.

If you constantly rope every turn in Runeterra then they put you in a different matchmaking queue against other people who also rope every turn.

Easy solution considering how play people play Hearthstone it's not going to mess up queue times by taking those people out of the normal queue.

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After playing 6 or 7 battlegrounds yesterday, I have to say that I was wrong about pirates. It's basically essential now that you have a very large taunt minion to snuff out their windfury overkill dude or everything gets +4/+4, and beyond from the other buffs on board.

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skullbone posted...

If you constantly rope every turn in Runeterra then they put you in a different matchmaking queue against other people who also rope every turn.

Yeah, I like that solution a lot actually.

Cause there are people like Lifecoach who really enjoy speinding the maximum amount of time thinking about their turns. And I can respect that, I don't just want to delete their experience from the game, but Hearthstone is a game I use for 15 minute exercise breaks at work, it's always incredibly disruptive when I get roped, often makes the games take too long etc.

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I'd be curious if the meta is the same in both queues, because istinctively I'd expect the ropers queue to have more control decks, which means the optimal play is to rope to get into that queue and play the equivalent of Face Hunter.

But it's possible the metas are very similar.

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Just watched dog get 5 Hoggarrs (one triple, two non-triples).

His salty looter got up to 244/244, and the edwin-style combo buffers targeted his windfury guy who got up to 150/151 or so.

So...that sure is a way you can play pirates.

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Also, turns out Hooktusk is busted because you can sell 1 drops and discover a 1 drop, which just gives you free money. She appears to have taken the top winrate spot.

Eudora seems to be fine. About the same winrate as Finley on HSReplay; ahead of Elise.

(The other two, Patches and Kragg, are around Elise level on HSReplay, so still solid enough).

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Yeah I feel like Hooktusk would be somewhat more fair if you couldnt hero power 1 drops or tokens. As is now easily the op hero.

Trying to figure out ideal strategies for each tribe that gets removed. Murlocs is probably the most game changing since poison is basically gone except for Maexxna. No Beasts is also tricky since theyre the most versatile of the bunch. Demons feels about the same.

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Does no beasts mean no Megasaur? Or does Megasaur get counted under murlocs?

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Megasaur is considered part of murlocs

its kinda weird how they did it, since you have to figure out on your own which tribe is missing from the list thats there (if you forget, hover over bobs deck)

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So are all the new cards considered part of pirates? Even the cannon and the bird?

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