Be Excellent To Each Other

It would definitely do one or the other

Watched a couple of The Walking Dead episodes (Season 4 charge underway) and back to Hearthstone, but I must confess I'm playing Casual. Just not finding Ranked much fun at all at the moment, I appreciate we're supposed to have a GRAND BEEX CHALLENGE on and all that, but the meta out in Ranked really is pretty fucking dreary so far this season.

In Casual I'm getting good games against good opponents with good decks, but far more variety and far more fun than Ranked is delivering. Ranked seems to be rush and control, and that's it. PRIEST and WARRIOR stand against HUNTER AND ZOO, and that's about most of your games accounted for. Dull.

I'm actually quite happy with the MMR system that's in place for Casual games (cheers for the links on that Trooper), I was concerned I might be getting easier games by choosing Casual (even though it never seemed to feel like that was the case, as I've stated previously), but knowing that it's trying to find a suitable opponent skill level wise is fine for me in Casual. (It's just Ranked that I wouldn't accept them doing anything beyond looking for a player at around your rank.)

I will keep chipping away at Ranked as the month goes on, but not to the point where it's not fun, or where I wouldn't just prefer to seek out a more interesting game in Casual with a suitably MMR-matched opponent.

This just happened to me in ranked. I'd had an admittedly poor card draw initially but felt I was in a decent position. I felt less confident after this happened...

Did you win?

I asked him that when he emailed me the pic.

He only needs to do 18 damage and if you dont have the cards in hand then its just

and hit him in the face next turn

Sadly I did not win. A Deathwing would have been lovely to throw at him but alas it was only turn 9 and didn't have one in my deck. Still not entirely sure how he ended up with 4 x Thaddius. Rivendare makes it 2 but why 4?

It depends on what the board was beforehand - If both Feugen and Stalagg die at the same time then there are 2 Thaddius's summoned - I guess he used the void terror to do that ? if so that would give you 4

Oh my EBG's crazy-ass psycho Warrior deck just went off in awesome form, admittedly I have modified it a bit - (taken the two Reapers out for alternatives and a couple of other changes) - but the essence of the deck remains the same.

The Alex turned up in my hand fairly early on so I just focused on controlling the board (you know what it's like against Priests, can't leave anything on the board for the motherfuckers to lay their insane buffs onto).

Did a final board clear the turn before the Alex (had to whack a Temple Enforcer with my face, decided I could afford to leave the Priestess up, and had been using every last little bit of extra damage from the Ghouls and Death Bite deathrattles, plus I've added a Whirlwind in which is very useful), Alex took him from 30 health to 15, he couldn't clear the Alex but did a Holy Fire thing to take her to 3, and his health back to 20.

On my turn Grommash > Taskmaster gives him 12 attack (4 base + 6 for the enrage, then +2 from the Taskmaster), Alex has 8, BANG, 20 damage finisher dead on Turn 10

It's an awesome deck when it goes off, but I stand by my 'meanness' ( ) in the video, it's too erratic for the ladder IMO.

Oh I've tweaked the deck myself btw. No whirlwinds (although that isn't a bad pick), but at one point I had a second brawl (controversial) but I eventually swapped that out for a second Senjin to help combat this prevalence of rushy Rogue I'm seeing.

Awesome about those Thaddius CrazyFace. There's a post from me about 20 pages ago where I had that happen to me as a Paladin, except I had an equality/consecrate in hand

What's the deck's current form?

It's the six weapons that really feel like overkill to me, the Fiery War Axes and Death Bites have stayed for me, but the Reapers have gone. (The Death Bites also have more synergy with the rest of the deck.)

I also took the Rampage out and a couple of other cards that I wasn't getting any value out of, but fundamentally I'd say it runs on the same principle as your original.

I wondered why you kept saying 6 weapons, as I'm sure the original only had 5 too.

Blimey what a game this was, Warrior vs Warrior and we had similar-ish decks so it was a massively tactical affair. (I played, if I do say so myself, pretty damn well, and so did he. We exchanged a few 'well played's at various stages of the game.)

As we both got down to our last few cards it was looking likely it'd go to fatigue on both sides, and indeed that's what happened. He actually had a big lead on armour, but I just about managed to cobble together the defences you can see here and with nothing left on his side except one charge of a Reaper, he did the sums and conceded at the start of my turn. (If he'd have used the whack to take a minion out the Armorsmith would have given me more armour, but without doing that I had enough firepower to whittle him down before fatigue killed me.) TBH it would have been nice to see the game play out as he did have a big lead on armour and I still think it would have been close. IIRC he had about 30 armour.

Absolutely fantastic game, (took a fair while too!), the likes of which you just don't get out in Ranked at the moment.

Hmm that was an interesting end against a Warlock

Round 10 - he was on about 12 health and nothing in play and i had 18 with characters on the board - not many but with the cards i had i could get him close to dead - and he plays Leroy / power overwhelming / power overwhelming to the face for 14 and then a 4 point soulfire to finish

I really getting to grips with this Warrior deck, I've been playing it wrong in a lot of ways.

So what I'm doing now is:

1) Board control board control board control. Keep it as clear as possible. Can afford to over-extend and be very aggressive, because we don't actually need to kill the enemy in the usual way.

2) Card draw. Lots of card draw, maximise the Acolytes, think of it like Miracle Rogue, it's all about getting the finishing cards in hand.

3) Enemy's health is irrelevant. That's what Alex is for.

4) BOOM ALEX. She doesn't need to survive (and usually doesn't, as the opponent is like ZOMG gotta kill that Alex.)

5) BOOM GROMMASH, preferably enraged, a weapon in hand or a minion or two on the board finishes it off. (Grommash > Death's Bite to face > deathrattle enrages Grommash is nice.)

On a great winning streak in casual with it, and TBH it's putting me up against good opponents, but that finisher is just so strong.

Dare I take it out into Ranked, I'm 12 ** so it wouldn't be an easy game......

Hi, welcome to Warrior.

I just had a delicious Warrior mirror match, both Alex's drop, I do the Death Bite/Grom combo to shred his armor and put him at 15.

Then he drops Rag and armours at which point I shout HIT MY FACE at the screen, and it does. I bop him down to 7 and hit him with another charge of a fresh Death Bite to put him at 3.

He YOLO-brawls and loses, and concedes. Woot! Rank 13.4.

Bah! Here's a pisser.

New quest comes in at 11pm, I ignored it as I know that the mulligan opportunity doesn't appear until 12am for some reason.

Having paid no attention to what the quest actually was, I went and duffed up a Druid with the EBGPsychoWarrior deck, and then noticed with some concern that I'd completed 1 of 2 wins for a 'Win two games with Warrior or Paladin' quest.

So now I can't play another game with either Warrior or Paladin, because if I win I'll complete the quest and then I won't get an opportunity to mulligan for a 60 gold quest.

Why the hell do they put the quests at hour apart? I've got to avoid Warrior or Paladin until midnight now so I get my mulligan opportunity. Grrrr.

Here's my current iteration of the deck BTW.

I'm running with two Fiery War Axes because they're excellent for early removal, or just putting 3 damage onto a minion you want to get rid of.

Whirlwind is great, so versatile. Massive value out of Armorsmiths and Acolytes, can do a surprising amount of damage to rush boards (lots of one health minions), can enrage Grommash etc. Superb value at 1 mana IMO.

The Berserker I'm not sure on, he's quite handy as he almost acts as a 'passive taunt' because his potential is so great, but in reality since the deck is all about the Alex > Grom finish I'm not convinced if he really belongs as he's a damage card.

Rampage has gone, it just wasn't working for me at all, an extra Axe makes more sense to my mind. (And you get two goes with it.)

Two Armorsmiths, they're great early plays and can give a good amount of value later on too.

Also running with two Ghouls, they're great nuisance cards and synergise nicely with the Armorsmiths and Acolytes.

The Reapers seemed like overkill to me so they went, not sure why the Sen'jin is in your deck EBG when you've got two Sludgies in there as well? In fact the Sen'jin looks very bad value compared to the Sludgies IMO.

Other than that a lot of the cards are non-negotiable and clearly just very strong. Cleaves, Slams, Executes - two of each is mandatory IMO. One Shield Slam seems to be about right, one Brawl too, limited utility couldn't justify a second, but can be critically important too for when the board just gets out of control.

Have done a lot of games with the deck today and I'm massively more comfortable with it, earned 80 gold just off wins! <<< EDIT, it's 80 not 60, that's quite a lot of games.

Can't play with it again until midnight though, and that's just about bedtime though. Grrr!

Fair play if you're climbing with it though!

There are a couple of floating cards in my deck that are negotiable and will change depending on what I encounter.

The critical aspect of Warrior is as you've already said, the big cards for the decisive finisher. For that to work you need to get to turn 8/9/10 to set it all up. With many rush decks around, you need to stall out and protect your face, especially when you're also controlling down with weapons. You can ill afford a charger to the face and then have to bop it again with a weapon. Many taunts seem essential to me and the Senjin was added latterly after a few rushy Rogues beat me to death.

I don't seem to lose against a Mage, Hunter is 50/50, Miracle rogue is hard if they draw well or if I can't decisively deal with the first auctioneer. Priest is also a bit of a fucker if I haven't got the answers to hand, and Druid also seems unfavourable - lots of early charge to put you in Combo range. My last loss was to a fucker that had double combo in hand and played them on successful turns.

The only switchout I'm considering is putting Loatheb in there. Much utility against many things. I'm also wondering about BGH but I don't think there's enough call for it. I *actually* quite like the idea of putting a Youthful Brewmaster in there. I see many uses for it. Dropping a Loatheb twice, recalling a Korkron Elite, picking a silenced Acolyte back up.... yes, I really think I will have to fiddle with it.

I acheived triple Rag last night.

He initially killed him and my secret gave me two copies. I played one, then the next one and drew faceless manipulator for 24 damage to the face.

Made even sweeter by my remaining 5 health.

Happy times that would have been even happier If I had hit print screen before the win screen appeared.

FFS, Hearthly, you're letting yourself not play a game you're enjoying for the possibility of getting 20 more gold!

Just complete the quest!

I'll laugh if it replaces it with a 40 gold Warlock quest

I think this month is the last month of getting to Legend before the meta becomes completely fucking incomprehensible with the sheer volume of new cards being dumped into play. I've just watched Trump's overview of the ones that are known and already I can see things will just be utterly randomised up. It will take so long for things to settle down that we'll either have to be awesome deckbuilders, or rely on netdecking in order to get anywhere.

I need to maximise my chances of having 1000 gold for my grand bi-weekly 10 pack opening extravaganza!

I just decamped to Miracle Rogue for a few games as I love that deck, even though it's probably 50/50 at best on winrate, even in Casual.

Quite looking forward to getting home for more Warrior shenanigans, I have to say.

I'm really liking my druid deck that i've built. I think I posted it earlier in the thread.

There are a few basic tactics and good synergies.
Innervate to a large card in the early game. Coin Innervate to Loatheb on turn 2 really fucks people up
Violet teacher and spell cards, the apprentice comes out before the spell fires so Power of the wild will give you a 2/2 apprentice as well as giving everyone else +1/1.
Savage Roar and treants, if you have a couple of other minions out on the board at turn 9, this will finish off pretty much anyone, it's a serious damage burst, and split over multiple minions so you can clear taunts and still have damage left over.
Swipe and spell damage minions give you a serious board clear ability.

If you like a more tactical, slower deck that still works in the current meta, i'd give it a go

Loatheb - This is the change I'd most likely make to my variant. Probably lose the Beserker for a Loatheb, he's a nice solid body anyway for the cost, and kind of buys you a turn against spell-heavy decks. I do like the Berserker when he goes off on one though, very entertaining

BGH - Not enough for him to do IMO, plus two Executes and the Shield Slam are already there for his role.

Youthful Brewmaster - Can see some fun and games potential with him, but does he really deserve a slot in the deck? Not sure....

Trump would probably call it slow, but I disagree. Some of the nicer cards in the deck are often silence magnets. Armour Smith, Sludge, and Acolyte get silenced often and are then ignored. There's very little value in having a dud 1/3 or a 3/5 on the board, so if I can attack and replace it with a 3/2 while getting the original back, I'll consider that a bonus.

I am using cards to fight baddies!

It doesn't work with my Rift though, so points off for that.

I won a horse thing that I can use in World of Warcraft.

Um - thanks.

You mean a Hearthsteed, you filthy casual.

"Horse".

IN YOUR FACE!

And it'll only take me 10+ games as Miracle Rogue in Casual to bag that sweet extra gold.....

TBH I'd rather be playing Warrior.... OH WELL.

Well that saves me from having to craft the card myself

Nice!

I don't have Alex or Grommash, or many Warrior cards at all, but I had a go with a deck last night for a 2 win challenge.

Went 2-2 in ranked, which is okay enough since I don't know what I'm doing!

I improvised a Windfury Harpy with Charge as a 12 damage finisher.

Free to play thieves stealing all our legendaries!

Congrats Alex is a really nice card but she's a very specific sort of play IMO, not like a Raggy that you can pretty much drop into most decks and he'll work.

The 1600 dust I spent on mine I don't regret at all, but she belongs in a control deck like the EBG one or variants thereof.

Its been played quite a bit against me recently which can be frustrating when your knocking their health down into single digits and I dont draw King Krush then they play Alex and then a 'combo' to do the 15 damage required

Warrior / Mage / Druid / Shamen all have a few combo cards that they can play directly off an Alex on turn 9 to end the game on turn 10 - when my hunter deck fires off then i win on round 6 or 7 but if i dont then my fallback is King Krush - and if i dont draw that then it gets very random

I have been close to crafting it a few times to try it (i have 1700 dust) so I'm glad I didnt :-)

FYI : I paid for Nax on day 1 (and will probably do the same for the new expansion)

new expansion is just cards, not like naxx. So you can buy card packs as you can now, but there is no play against computer component to it, so no total price tag.

Pfft, I won a horse.

But look how pretty it is

Fo sho. Let me rephrase:

"You think that's special? I won a horse."

They started the permanent banning of bot users yesterday. So a few thousand have now been permanently banned.

http://us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/blo ... DIbl82Wg.0

It was very much tongue in cheek

More sideways-directed at EBG in all honesty

And yes as has already been noted, it's purely card packs to get the next expansion, as I understand it Arena rewards are changing to the new card packs, and you can continue to buy them with gold and cash like now.

I guess they'll have to split the shop out into the original packs, and the new Goblins vs Gnomes packs, and you choose which ones you want to buy.

It's a bit of a ballache, at least with Naxx you could get all the cards by completing the challenges. This is just new, added grind! F2P surely does take a while, although I take comfort in knowing that Hearthly has spunked ~£60 and only has a couple more legendaries than me

The snake trap hunter is a great deck. My win rate with it is now better than Zoo.

Just those pesky control warriors that rain on my parade. The quaintly named Ebola Druid is very good for those and against hunters.

Mainly I am seeing Zoo, Hunter (about 4 variations) and Ebola Druid on the ladder.

At 13 but been mainly developing my Mage which is now very reliable and fun in casual.

Snake trap triggering when an enemy attacks the knife thrower is great to watch :-)



I got down to 16 again last night which was the first time I've really been able to chain a few wins together - at this level I'm also seeing quite a few priest decks with death-rattle stuff in there.

My total spend so far is £87.

2 x 40 packs (£35 each)
1 x Naxx (£14)
1 x Beta packs, gave Mekkatorque (sic?) legendary guaranteed (£3 IIRC)

I don't begrudge the game the money at all, I've had hundreds of hours of enjoyment out of it and it's saved me far more than that in cash that I usually spunk on PC upgrades that I don't need or even particularly want, or rash console purchases, or other techy shit that I can't resist but in no way require.

The benefit for me is that it's given me the freedom to play around with decks and legendaries almost as I've fancied, rather than having to wait for cards and/or dust through gold/arena. For example when I decided to give Miracle Rogue a try, I could just drop the 1600 dust on Leeroy without worrying about it. (And craft a couple of other key cards, like a second Preparation which is an epic.)

More recently with Warrior, I was able to craft a Grommash and then an Alex, which allowed me to have a crack with your Psycho Warrior Deck (albeit with some tweaks), and that's become one of my all time favourite decks to play.

(And I made myself an Al'Akir to have a crack with a Trump Shaman deck I liked the look of.)

I don't see it as pay to win (because the game clearly isn't that, one of my mates at work who's 100% F2P hit Rank 5 last season with a Hunter deck, four ranks higher than I've ever managed), but it is perhaps 'pay to play as I want to', and I've got no problem with that at all.

As such I'll lob £35 at Goblins vs Gnomes packs, to give me a head start with my card collection, and then do the rest with gold, same as I have with the main game. (Apart from Naxx I haven't spent any cash since May.)

Each to their own I guess, (for me F2P would diminish the fun of the game, but I can understand those who appreciate the challenge and the long-term goals it provides), however my focus with the game is to enjoy as many different decks and cards as possible, and paying a bit of cash helps with that

Yeah and I'll repeat my sentiment that the game is worth the money. I spent over £60 on Skyrim + DLC and felt that was well worth it for >250 hours of play. Considering I can easily fritter £60 on minor non-essential purchases, it's not hard to justify anything that provides even medium term enjoyment.

I've mostly been larking about this season. Used the cheapo Warlock and Hunter to get to 15 and then tried out all sorts of others (Druid, Warrior, etc) and dropped back down to 16. Just used my Shaman deck for today's quest and won 5 in a row, with none of them even close! Too tired to play more now, but might have a go at that next week.

Nothing is more satisfying than a Handlock dropping a 4/10 Twilight Drake, only for you to Earth Shock it to death for 1 mana

Heh, I always mulligan for Earthshock against Warlock as it's very good against Handlock and pretty good against Zoo.

If I have one in hand I'm like, please, please, play a Twilight Drake, the bigger the better

Yes, I am a big fan of the knife thrower as well. Useful in lots of situations.

I must be lucky as I am not encountering many priests. They can be incredibly irritating!