Be Excellent To Each Other

Yeah I think that's a good idea, I got a bit hung up on my ranking this season and it sucked the fun out of it somewhat.

Next month I'll just play the season as it comes and enjoy the game, muck around with the different classes, and take the arena entries as and when I have the 150 gold to pay for one.

And I'll try to resist the urge to buy another 40 packs of cards .....

Bloody hell Constructed's a bit of a chore at the moment isn't it? The number of Hunter UTH players is off the scale ridiculous, Blizzard properly have to nerf that cheapass play sooner rather than later. Even if you limit yourself to two minions on the board they can out-deal you and they've also got that tick-tock of the two damage hero power.

It's getting to the point where getting a game against something other than a bollocks aggro deck is something of a treat, as soon as I see hunter or warlock on the start game screen, I sigh and resign myself to another shit game.

Not enough gold for an Arena entry today though

I might see if I can put together a dedicated anti-aggro deck with what I have, but last time I checked I was missing some key cards and even with the dust and DE potential I have, I fear I won't be able to put any of the really good anti-aggro decks together.

Leeroy UTH combo particularly annoying even when you're being conservative. Changing it to a 2 cost from 4 was also a big fat wrong, letting you very easily play it twice along with staving buzzard/timber wolf combo bullshit bollocks.

It's not impossible win against, but you do sort of need a deck constructed specifically with that in mind. Priest probably fares better than others as you can do a lot without putting a minion on the board.

I totally agree it's incredibly satisfying to control a hunter UTH deck down and it is possible to do so (just won one myself and was rather pleased about it), but the Leeroy>UTH deck is IMO basically impossible to defend against in most circumstances because it's so cheap to do and they can conjure up those extra two minions on your side for the UTH with Leeroy, plus of course they can have two of everything except Leeroy himself. (And that awful tick-tock of the two damage against your hero puts a hard timer on the game too.)

At least with the giant decks for example, they're slow plays so you have some time and chance to work around them.

If you read around about the subject, even many hunters aren't happy about where they're at because UTH is so strong that you're insane to play without it, and most other players now play around it anyway - so hunters who DON'T want to do the cheapass UTH plays want something else to do as well.

It's just a basic balance issue and I'm sure Blizz will sort it, but frustrating for the time being.

Got myself back up to Rank 14 this evening so looks like where I'll finish this season at. Not going to get hung up on ranking next month though and play around with the other classes a bit.

I'm playing a priest at the moment and enjoying it, killed a warlock on round 7 with a 28 damage lightwell

Weirdly, I just seem to be being matched against Mage after Mage after Mage.

New season starts today!

I've been started at Rank 20 for finishing last season at 14.

Just need to do the daily quest then I can afford an Arena run, which as desperately sad as it sounds I've kind of been looking forward to all day.

What card backs did you earn? I have a sort of red 'Pandaria' theme back, but there must be variations as I've also played against someone whose backs are red, but slightly more golden adornments.

Meh, at least it's a change

ARENA RUN - I choose druid.

Arena Game 1 - Against another druid, he pulls out a fucking Ysera on Turn 9 in what is already a tight game. No prizes for guessing how that one ended..... 0:1

Arena Game 2 - Just a desperate game against a pally, horrible card draw when I knew I had decent cards in my deck and a reasonable mana curve, played a last stand Ironbark knowing exactly what was coming but literally had no choice. Equality > Game Over. In all fairness he did play well, but it was one of those dead loss games from pretty early on. 0:2

Arena Game 3 - Much better game against a shammy, got some decent card draw and kept on top of his overloads. At least it's not going to be a 0:3 now, as it's 1:3

Arena Game 4 - Pretty good game against a priest, got the feeling he was one of those 'I'll try and do the same cheap crap in Arena that I do in Constructed' but of course you can't build decks like that in Arena. Nice win, 2:2, if I can make it to even stevens on wins and losses I'll be happy, but need to win the next one.....

Arena Game 5 - Great game against a very control orientated warrior. Fortunately my slightly higher than the ideal mana curve worked in my favour and I got to play my giant (the one who costs less for damage taken) to be followed up by an Ironbark which pretty much sealed the game. 3:2 so worst case scenario now is evens on wins and losses!

Arena Game 6 - Quite the most awesome game against a warlock, finished him off on Turn 9.... I think he had a few ideas up his sleeve but I had nice draw and did some good plays, including passing on a 'nearly lethal' to control the board down and get lethal next turn. One thing I've learned off Trump is never go 'nearly lethal', if you're going to go for a finish, then you'd better damn well finish it. 4:2!

Arena Game 7 - Awful game against a warrior, take the last game and flip it on its head. All done by Turn 9. The last chance saloon I had was getting a Scarlet Crusader down with an Ironbark coming on the next turn, which he pulled out a black knight for to eat the shield. Got the Ironbark down but at that point he had too much damage potential on the board. CONCEDE!

4:3 then, I'll settle for that, got 85 gold and a pack of cards so another arena run tomorrow. Shit pack though, just the one rare and all five cards were duplicates.

Arena runs are very exciting and involving experiences.

I got this back, and the one I've seen people playing is in the other screeny.

With the card backs you can have 3 so far on top of the standard -



Earned through special Hearthstone events like, currently from Fireside gatherings. Fireside gathering card can be gained from playing Hearthstone against another player on the same LAN as long at least 3 seperate accounts are logged in to the LAN at that time.



Earned from getting to Legend Rank in Ranked Play Mode



Ranked play participation reward as long as you reach rank 20 in the previous season. Not sure if they will be adding a new back for each season.

They have released the images for 2 more but have not said how to unlock them yet -

Those card backs - I have the Fireside Friends (not bad to look at, maybe a little 'meh') and Pandaria (the red and gold one, looks nice). I don't have Legend (hah! some hope!).

The vomit-worthy green card back is 'Black Temple' which will be awarded on the 1st June to those who have reached rank 20 or above this month (not exactly difficult for most - these card backs need to be more of a challenge to earn).

The last one, which is also pretty dire, hasn't yet been given a name or how it will be earned.

Ahh thanks for the info

Good to know that I'm just imagining my opponents have shinier backs than me.

I've seen quite a few of the Fireside backs on opponents. No fucking chance of me getting it, given I don't know anyone on my LAN who plays hearthstone (and by LAN, I presume they also mean subnet of your ISP?), but you'd also need them to be your friends? I'm not quite sure how the 'players near me' feature works. I have it turned on but never see any options.

There are still a ton of cards I need to get (this is why buying 40 packs removes the fun from it!) so pretty much every open adds something I need. I have around 900 gold at the moment so I really should do more Arena runs. They're very time-consuming though - I sort of want it over faster, but if I'm doing well I have to plough through so many games! The trouble is I'm so busy with other stuff that I'm struggling to justify the time.

The Fireside Friends card back isn't hard to get hold of, even on a SINGLE PC.

These links will show you the way(s):

http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/com ... _easy_way/

http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/com ... e_friends/

http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/com ... acks_with/

http://www.reddit.com/r/hearthstone/com ... card_back/

Don't forget you don't need to do the whole Arena run at once, it'll remember wherever you're up to, even if you have to quit out half way through putting your deck together. (The only thing you can't do is disappear mid-game.)

I've split an Arena run over two or three sessions on more than one occasion, as they can tend to go on for quite a while.

Aye I know that AE I just don't like leaving it half done!

Cheers for the links, I'll see if the one using Evolve works

BUWAHAHAHAHAHA!

Gurubashi Berserker.

Divine Spirit x 2

Inner Fire.

How'd you like them 28/28 apples, Mister Hunter?

My bravado didn't last long.

Got my Warlock opponent down to 1 health. He replaced his hero with that bitching legendary that can attack for 3 every turn and summon a 6/6 for 2 mana.

Oh, and he played 5 legendary cards in the match.

Still nearly won, despite having two cards (shadow word: pain) that were ineffective for the entire game.

The more I play against hunters the more I think the class has a big balance problem, the sheer number of them out in Constructed says it all really.

Off the top of my head.

1) Their hero power which is flat 2 damage directly against your hero every turn from turn 2 onwards (or even turn 1 if they coin it). OK a priest can heal for 2 every turn, a druid can lob 1 armour onto themselves, a warrior 2 armour and what have you, but these are all reactive and defensive. The hunter gets a straight 2 damage every single turn which puts you against a hard turn cap without anything else at all going on.

2) UTH and even more so the Leeroy > UTH combo means you can never have more than a couple of minions on the board, the risks involved with going above this are too great. This means you need to play slowly and conservatively. Generally speaking a 'blitz' turn needs a turn to set up, you set that turn up and you get UTH-ed - game over. (Add Leeroy into the mix and it starts to get ridiculous IMO.)

3) Too many cheap cards that buff UTH. Starving buzzard and timber wolf specifically. You have to assume that every hunter is running with two buzzards, wolves, and UTHs, and play around the chance of there being a Leeroy in there. This limits your play massively, and every turn you've got the tick-tock of the hero power.

4) A decent selection of hard removal cards, such as deadly shot. On paper 'destroy a random minion' doesn't look as good as say a poly or a hex, but when you can only ever have two minions out on the board, it becomes a very powerful card. Multi-shot is also a good early game spoiler for them, and explosive shot is powerful too.

5) They can slow you down with secrets. These are fairly predictable and can be played around, but they slow the game and you've still got the tick-tock of the hero power.

6) Insane card draw ability, even a 'non-lethal' UTH can draw them a large number of cards, fuck up your board, and you know they've probably got another one to play as soon as they fancy. And let's not forget tracking either... I can't think of any other class that can achieve the cards they want to be in their hand as quickly and easily as a hunter.

7) A decent selection of other quality cards that give them good options for most situations. Arcane shot is cheap and effective, hunter's mark is pseudo-poly/hex effective and costs zero mana! Kill command works well, houndmaster can slow you down in a game that you're already playing slowly, and so on.

I'm sure they're due a nerf sooner rather than later, what I think is really telling is that in a game where a hunter doesn't play UTH, I pretty much always beat them. Having a whole class revolve around one card combo isn't right.

By all means give them other stuff to compensate, but make the class interesting to play, and interesting to play against.

I got the hunter class legendary in my 40-pack card splurge the other week, and I haven't even bothered to try and play with it, because I know I still need the cheapass UTH shit in the deck, and I refuse to play like that.

Well, that was easy. Took about 10 mins after setting up the client. Everyone else was at it too, and mostly just conceded immediately. So woo, three card backs!

Also: 1105 gold saved up. Quite unwilling to spend it until Naxxramas pricing is indicated.

EBG - Well done on getting the card back. :-)

AE - another thing in Hunter's favour is the fact that when they use the Tracking card it does NOT show the opponent which cards have been discarded (unlike the various cards in the Warlock deck which also discard cards yet which DO show the opponent what has been discarded).

Hunters are seriously OP. Blizzard's attitude seems to be that they want the players to reach some kind of equilibrium instead of them nerfing Hunter cards (or buffing cards for other heroes) but this is just drawing out the agony. Some of the Naxxramas look to also be useful against Hunter, but again these aren't going to be out for a while yet and many will need to be earned.

Not sure what the fuckity-fuck Blizzard are playing at to be honest - why they are seemingly 'happy' to let one hero type give so many lousy players the illusion of 'skill' is beyond me. I'd like to bet that the vast majority of these players would be bloody awful playing a control deck of any kind.

I've started up an asian server deck, in which i'm going to just play warlock and hunter and disenchant everything else, just to see what it is like and what my comparable rank is playing only those decks.

So I now have:

EU - my main account and the one I play the most and collect cards with
US - Warrior deck only
Asia - Warlock and Hunter decks only

Does this mean that we can now call you a Huntard?

Or perhaps a Warcock?

Embarrassingly annihilated by AE in that friendly game, exemplifying how if you get a shitty Priest draw, there's no recovery.

Priest is now L55. Will actually be quite glad when he gets to 60 and I can switch out to something else. I'm thinking Rogue.

You were all over me like a cheap suit in the rematch though

I cannot even begin to explain the anguish of seeing my own Golden Epic Force Of Nature being played against me before I've even had the bloody thing in hand myself

I once played a fellow Priest and we'd gotten each other down to card fatigue. We both had one card left - Mind Vision We played them over and over a few times for the lols, then I think he conceded.

Every time I play Arena and get Shieldbearer, the value sites say "Worst card ever!".

Every time I actually come up against it, that card wins them the match. Unless you have an insta-kill card in your hand then chances are you won't ever get rid of the little shit.

I agree there. I've never run it, but it's quite the shit if you have an undeveloped board. Most low-cost minions are three damage, so they won't blast past it like a Goldshire footman. With Priest you have other possibilities - a cheap 4/4 or a 0/8.

Like anything it can be removed, but I think it's annoying enough not to be considered as terrible as it is.

Just got totally Huntered in the Arena.

Had three minions out. Figured that he could UTH me, but he threw in a Knife Juggler and then UTH to kill all three minions. Next turn one to give all beasts charge, and three more minions. Next turn another four beasts. Dead before I even got to 7 mana, despite pretty much pulling all the cards I wanted!

And another loss to an amazing Warrior deck. He had loads of awesome cards:

Cairne Bloodhoof
Argent Commander x2
Arathi Weaponsmith x2
Arcanite Reaper
Argent Squire
Execute x2
etc

Given that I only got a choice between awful legendaries, one rare and the rest were mostly average or below commons, I am surprised I even won a battle at all!

Yeah it can be a difficult card if they can get another cheap card to hide behind it (those priestess things that give more health to a random minion at the end of a turn, or a knife juggler, and suchlike), as four damage can be a surprisingly tough ask early game, especially if they can heal it.

The argument against it goes that it doesn't 'do' anything but even then they can be buffed to have an attack by all sorts of means. (Get a flametongue totem to sit next to a Shieldbearer and all of a sudden it's a serious problem.)

I wouldn't put one in my own Arena deck as there's no guarantee you'll be able to buff it by any means at all, and they don't overly worry me when I see one played, but I do attempt to get rid of them pretty sharpish.

http://www.liquidhearth.com/forum/arena ... al-commons

Trump puts it in his 'terrible' section of commons.

It is annoying when you get an Arena run like that, but what do you use to put your Arena decks together? I'm doing MASSIVELY better in Arena since I started using the Trump Arena Rankings. (I've even printed off the spreadsheets )

http://www.liquidhearth.com/forum/arena ... al-commons - Links to other sections down at the bottom.

There are only custom lists for five classes which is a bit limiting, but he's got all the neutral cards covered.

But yeah, some Arena games can be very brutal, a single good legendary in your opponent's hand can fuck the whole thing up. If I can get 3:3 I'm happy, anything above and beyond that is gravy.

I use Trump's ranking, but again I think he's wrong on some cards, especially Shieldbearer. First turn you can play that AND a buff if you have the coin, then get other annoying minions out. Shieldbearer will almost always last a few turns if he is played so early, and if you're running any buffs will usually return a minimum of 1 for 1.

I suppose the issue is that if you don't get it in your starting hand, or in the first couple of turns, it really is a pretty dead card, and that in a random Arena deck there are stronger options, especially given that Arena games tend to be more drawn out than constructed and you can't tend to build 'special' decks.

I can see the appeal of it, but it'd never get a slot in my Arena deck.

Depends what your other options are, surely? Pretty much any Murloc is worse if you're not building a Murloc deck.

Even then I'd say borderline, at least all the murlocs have an attack.

I think it might be one of those cards that becomes better regarded over time. Ok, by default it doesn't trade, but cards have more value than simply trading out. Assume it takes two 3 damage minions to overkill it, that's 6 damage to your face that you've avoided. That's sort of like a 1-cost 6-health heal, as well as potentially giving you an extra turn to pull out additional options.

I dunno. I might run two of them in a custom Priest buff-deck for fun to see what happens. We can test it out

Here lookie:



Silly buff-tastic Priest deck. I actually had to craft two Shieldbearers as I had none. Angry chickens thrown in for potential lols, and aside from that, as much healing as is possible to see how much these pups can last.

Here's an annoying first turn in Arena from a mage, with me playing as a warrior.

I pass as I have no 1 mana cards.

He goes - Mana Wyrm > Coin (buffs mana worm) > Mirror Image (buffs mana worm).

So on Turn 2 I have a 3-3 hidden behind two taunts with two health.

He then got a Sunfury Protector down and it all went to shit from there.

Otherwise known as the perfect mage opening. I had that happen to me just a couple of games ago. The bloody worm got to 6/3 before I took it out. I won the game though, thanks to the sunfury protector and the arrival of my double-healing Velen legendary. Just about managed to keep my health up as he threw direct damage spells at my face, and was on 11 health when he pulled the pyroblast. He died next turn. I earned that victory

I wish you could make more than 9 decks...

Hahahaha. That worked!

Seriously, that Hunter stood no chance there. It was comedy gold!

Just went 0:3 in Arena with a pally

I thought my deck was middling. Not great but usable I thought. First game was against a rogue and not too bad, but he nailed me down around Turn 8 and it was all downhill from there.

Second game was against a druid and just ridiculous, he innervated into that Ancient Brewmaster thing on Turn 2 or 3, ridiculously early anyway to put a 5-4 down, game was over by Turn 5 or 6, he seemed to have perfect draw and despite my deck being pretty nicely on the mana curve it was a total no-hoper. (I had no 1 cards at all as I wasn't offered anything worth having, but had loads at 2-3-4, but when you're 10 health down and trading on the board by Turn 4 it's pretty nasty)

Third game against another pally and after an insanely aggressive early game from him looked like I'd got myself into a position where I could have a crack back him and he top-drew a charge card which with the 1-1 he had on the board finished me off. That was a depressingly quick game.

Worst Arena run ever I'd say, I've gone down 0:3 before but that was back when I didn't really understand the mechanics of Arena vs Constructed.

Utter shite. I'd been looking forward to that all afternoon as well.

I'm encountering some really strange games at around rank 15 - some people are playing well, but some are playing so incredibly badly that I'm left thinking: "how the hell did you get to rank 15?!?".

One Mage, while low on health, no minions on his side of the board (but some on mine) and me on high health: he decides to throw two fireballs at my face instead of wiping out my minions.

Suffice to say that I won next turn.

Overall though I'm having one of those days - win one, lose one, win one, lose one ........... etc.

I'm back at level 20 again (after getting to 18) with just a never ending procession of Hunters - some know what they are doing with the deck and others dont but seem to fluke or have a deck stacked in the right way for them to win - is it possible your playing people who are used to using one deck and player using another because its what the daily challenge gave them ?

BTW i only just realised that you can change your daily quest (once only) by clicking the X on the top corner of the challenge if it throws one you dont fancy taking on

I'd imagine people who care about their rank will play casual mode the daily quests, rather than risk their ranking playing a class and/or deck that they're unfamiliar with.

Just to keep the hunter hatred going, had one who played both starving buzzards on one turn yesterday, which as you can imagine generated a truly insane card draw for him, and this was on the back of a couple of trackings too. Just absurd the way they can rifle through most of their deck so quickly, to get exactly the cards they need out of their deck, into their hand.



Doesn't that just mean you've got more than the maximum of three stacked up and you're simply abandoning one and replacing it with the day's new quest?

I always make a point of doing every daily quest, Arena runs don't pay for themselves!

I just got 300 coins for winning 100 battles.

Arena ahoy!

You can do one quest swap a day, even if you only have one active quest.

Ooohh I didn't know that, although I guess you could end up with a more awkward quest than the one you binned off.

Snap !



Correct - its a gamble , but if you get one you dont fancy the look of you can swap it for something else (i'm getting good at clearing out the active quests so i typically only have 1 at a time and even that will let me swap)

What I was trying to say with the hunter comments last night is that i can totally get people who are at the high levels exploiting the hunter however last month i got quite a good variety of players at the lower levels but i think most players there now seem to be either taking a hunter deck off a website and just using that without knowing what they are doing (like playing UTH without anything down to suck up the cards or playing a hyena / buzzard without any cards to 'feed' them) - just about all i'm facing are hunters and i'm hovering between level 20 and 19 which is nowhere.

I did also unlock all the cards (for more gold) and the last one i did was the warlock so i'm playing with him just now and quite like the balance between wounding yourself and wounding everyone :-)