Magic: The Combattening - Hearthstone

[Margalis]

Lovcraft in Hearthstone is an odd fit. Hearthstone is full of goofy bullshit.

[Rendakor]

They've had Lovecraftian stuff since WC3 at least.

[luckton]

They introduced a new alternative Paladin hero: Lady Liandra. She doesn't cost cash/gold to get though. All you have to do is level a WoW character to 20, which can be done for free using a trial account. Presumably most people here already have a lvl 60+ sitting on their account somewhere, but it's good to see Bliz trying to stoke the WoW fires by getting one of their player bases to play something they may yet to delve into.

[dusematic]

This game still rules.

[Sophismata]

This game still rules.

I was hoping the new formats would let them fix things; sadly though, the new cards revealed so far are pretty lacklustre. The game desperately needs real deck synergies and interesting effects to prevent it being a play-on-curve snorefest (now with RNG!). It's just so boring compared to existing CCG's.

[Paelos]

Trying again, how do I get back into this before the new xpac hits? I've got cards from Naxx, but not from anything after that. Is there an easy way to get quests done where I won't get my ass handed to me on my pitiful decks? Do older decks still work? Should I be doing ranked or casual? Etc.

[Azuredream]

Any deck from that time is not going to be nearly good enough to win consistently against the current meta decks. That said, at sufficiently high ranks you're not going to be facing those decks so I won't say you can't have success with an older deck. Make sure to check that it wasn't nerfed though. Undertaker was nerfed, as was Starving Buzzard, Gadgetzan Auctioneer, and Leeroy Jenkins. The new Standard format means you can completely ignore the Goblins vs Gnomes expansion. That still leaves League of Explorers and Blackrock Mountain, which cost a mountain of gold (or $) to unlock. There's also The Grand Tournament expansion, which has some useful cards as well. Depending on your classic card pool it might be best to just buy those packs. It's going to be hard to make a good deck you can play while leaving out GvG because there are a shit-ton of good cards from that expansion. It might just be better to wait until Standard hits.

Unless you're good at Arena you'll probably want to stay away from it because the pack reward is random, which means you could get a useless GvG pack. Not to mention the difficulty of getting to high wins without knowing most of the card pool. As for Casual vs Ranked, I am not 100% positive but I think there is some kind of hidden MMR in Casual that determines who you play against. So Casual is probably a better mode to play up until you start playing people with good decks that stomp you, then you should probably try Ranked. The rank 20-17 is generally not filled with high level players but once you start getting to 15+ you'll start seeing nothing but meta decks.

The most generic advice I can give without knowing what classic cards you have is to go to a site like hearthhead and find a cheap deck to play.

Oh, I forgot to mention Tavern Brawl, which is a new mode they added. In Tavern Brawl you either play with a premade deck (Your deck is nothing but Webspinners, e.g.) or make your own under special rules (whenever your minions die, you get a banana, e.g.) depending on the week. It changes every time although they recycle old Brawls sometimes. The first time you win in Tavern Brawl you get a free classic pack. So you should definitely do that if nothing else, if you plan on playing again.

[Paelos]

OK sounds like good advice, and that I'm mostly fucked until the new stuff comes out! 

[Druzil]

I have to disagree on casual mode, you should be playing ranked.  There's no rewards at the end of the month for casual mode but for ranked you get at least one pack plus usually some golden cards which you can keep or turn into a decent amount of dust.  Also casual doesn't net you anything, people play the same decks in both modes.   If anything there are more meta decks in casual from people that are just trying to get quests done without losing rank.  I agree on tavern Brawl, it's a free pack.

I would concentrate on the standard set and open a few TGT packs for getting as many commons/rares as you can.  It's possible that if the meta slows down in the new set that Inspire can be a good mechanic.  Other than that, just bank gold as your going to want to open Old Gods packs for commons/rares or eventually buy League of Explorers.   Unless you are really into Dragon Priest or Warrior, Blackrock Mountain should be your last focus as it has the worst overall cards of all the playable sets.

[Paelos]

My favorites are Mage, Pally, and Druid really. I like Warlock too to a degree. I hate Priest, Rogue, Warrior, and Hunter.

[Sophismata]

BRM and LoE have large numbers of relevant cards. At the moment the TGT expansion contains very few relevant cards, so if you're going to spend money or gold, prioritise those two adventures. The weekly Brawl is a great way to do quests on a mostly even footing, and will match you via MMR with players of similar skill (not that that means a huge amount in this game :P).

Paladin can create a fairly cheap and very effective aggro deck, they currently dominate the Ranked ladder with a secrets deck, as well.

Warlock can create a cheap and effective zoo deck.

The primary Druid decks are relatively expensive, but you can try "egg Druid" which is basically a zoo / aggro variant. It's pretty cheap, too.


Look up those three decks and you'll find example deck lists. They are all strong enough to take you past rank 10. You didn't mention Shaman, but there is an extremely effective Shaman aggro deck available, too. It uses mostly cheap LoE, BRM, Classic and TGT cards. You will need LoE and 2 copies of Doomhammer to field it, though.


Edit: The reason I didn't mention mage is that its cheap tempo deck uses a lot of GvG cards, which you don't have and won't be able to use in two weeks.

[Paelos]

For the time being I'm crafting decks based on Arena rankings and doing fine winning at the ranked levels. I'm at 18 atm. The brawls are easy for classes I hate.

[Kail]

Stupid question, but do you have to do anything to start getting unlocks in this game?  I think I'm entitled to a few things (card backs etc.) from playing other games, and the launcher says I SHOULD be getting free packs for this Lovecraft epansion, but so far nada.  I haven't played the game hardly at all, I think I have one character to level 10 and that's it, so if there's some threshold or action I need to take to get this stuff I'm not seeing it or how to access it or anything.

[Paelos]

Not sure on the unlocks, but have you unlocked all the classes? You might need to do that before you can get the other rewards.

[Paelos]

I will say this though, the new expansion completely changed the game. If you have good Old God Cards you can dominate right now. If you don't, you likely get bent over and lose. There's almost nothing out there in standard that I've found which competes with the new xpac.

[Azuredream]

That's only to be expected. They released a lot of really good cards, but helpfully a lot of them are commons, like the warlock Councilman and the shaman 4 mana 7/7 faceless. Zoo is still a cheap deck barring the Sea Giants and so is Shaman barring the Doomhammers. A C'Thun deck without the legendary 7 mana double taunt is pretty gimp though. I'm also seeing some aggro paladin with the new 3/3 divine shield giver and aggro warrior with all the pirates and weapons and I don't think those are too expensive. The heaviest decks are the ones with N'Zoth like N'Zoth paladin which needs Tirion, N'Zoth, Cairne, etc. I've been running a gadgetzan rogue list with the new rogue legendary Xaril and cold blood/conceal. I think I am something like 15-0 against priest which just can't do anything to stop you from comboing them.

[Paelos]

7/7 faceless is broken as fuck. That's begging for a nerf.

[Sophismata]

7/7 faceless is broken as fuck. That's begging for a nerf.

Blizzard do not believe in nerfs or bans for their digital card game :P.

It's actually not that bad, once you learn to expect it. Removal is a lot more common in this expansion due to the loss of deathrattle minions and strong midrange plays.

That's only to be expected. They released a lot of really good cards, but helpfully a lot of them are commons, like the warlock Councilman and the shaman 4 mana 7/7 faceless. Zoo is still a cheap deck barring the Sea Giants and so is Shaman barring the Doomhammers. A C'Thun deck without the legendary 7 mana double taunt is pretty gimp though. I'm also seeing some aggro paladin with the new 3/3 divine shield giver and aggro warrior with all the pirates and weapons and I don't think those are too expensive. The heaviest decks are the ones with N'Zoth like N'Zoth paladin which needs Tirion, N'Zoth, Cairne, etc. I've been running a gadgetzan rogue list with the new rogue legendary Xaril and cold blood/conceal. I think I am something like 15-0 against priest which just can't do anything to stop you from comboing them.

It's not so much that they released good cards, IMO, more that all the great cards from GvG and Naxx have left Standard. The options now are mostly mediocre in comparison.

However, with the removal of the old staples, there's a lot more space for deck and card variance. Unfortunately, the gameplay has been homogenised into the style of game Blizzard initially wanted — long curve games with few surprise endings. Combo decks are mostly gone except for Miracle Rogue and Freeze Mage, but Freeze mage has been hit pretty hard by the loss of Naxx.

As far as cheap decks go, Aggro Shaman and Divine Shield Paladin are great and both can go to legend, although the loss of Crackle leaves a void in Aggro Shaman that the 7/7 minion doesn't properly fill. N'Zoth Paladin is strong but expensive, N'Zoth rogue is also strong and expensive, Druid can build a solid C'Thun deck but you really want that emperor card.

Stupid question, but do you have to do anything to start getting unlocks in this game?  I think I'm entitled to a few things (card backs etc.) from playing other games, and the launcher says I SHOULD be getting free packs for this Lovecraft epansion, but so far nada.  I haven't played the game hardly at all, I think I have one character to level 10 and that's it, so if there's some threshold or action I need to take to get this stuff I'm not seeing it or how to access it or anything.

It's a good question. When you first play the game you should get some free Classic cards to start with, and then more Classic cards (or maybe gold) once you complete some hidden achievements the game has. You should automatically get the Old Gods achievement with 3 free packs just for logging in, but it may require you to complete some others first - namely the unlock all classes one. Getting all classes to level 10 will also unlock all the basic cards for you, so there are a few initial milestones you want to achieve:

Crushed Them All!
Defeat every Expert AI Hero.

Got the Basics!
Collect every card in the Basic Set.

Ready to Go!
Unlock every Class.

[dusematic]

If you're a newb at hearthstone and/or terrible but want to ease into the game, just concentrate on completing your daily quests.

Remember, you can cancel one quest per day and receive a new one, so use that fact to  your advantage.  If you only have a viable mage and hunter deck, and a shaman/pally quest drops, cancel it.  You can only carry a max of 3 quests at once.

Also, every 4 days or so a new Tavern Brawl will pop.  Do this for a free pack.  That in combination with doing your daily every day will net you at least 4 packs a week for a modicum of effort.  If you aren't very good or don't have a ton of time, I would recommend just buying the packs outright for 100 gold versus spending 150 for a potentially disastrous arena run, but do whatever appeals to you.

Always buy the newest expansion packs.  Try to netdeck/brainstorm 2 viable decks to assist in quest completion.  

After about 3 months of this you'll have most of the cards you need.  Save your dust to craft the more irreplaceable cards of a meta deck.

[Paelos]

Remember, you can cancel one quest per day and receive a new one, so use that fact to  your advantage.

Holy shit, I didn't know this. HUGE help.

[Nebu]

I used to do my dailies religiously... to the point that I had 3k gold saved up to buy packs of the new expansion.  Sadly, this expansion really took the fun out of the game for me.  The power creep seems real.  I often have to spend an hour+ just to complete some simple quest dailies. I don't have enough new cards to make my decks competitive.  Lately I've been using brawl and arena to complete them.   

[dusematic]

I used to do my dailies religiously... to the point that I had 3k gold saved up to buy packs of the new expansion.  Sadly, this expansion really took the fun out of the game for me.  The power creep seems real.  I often have to spend an hour+ just to complete some simple quest dailies. I don't have enough new cards to make my decks competitive.  Lately I've been using brawl and arena to complete them.   

You can complete the quests in brawl and arena like you said, but also you can still play the wild format. 

I agree the C'Thun decks aren't fun, but I don't think they're unbeatable.  As far as power creep GvG was probably the worst imo.

[Nebu]

I agree the C'Thun decks aren't fun, but I don't think they're unbeatable.  As far as power creep GvG was probably the worst imo.

I agree with both of these statements.  C'Thun isn't unbeatable, but it does take me more games to get my wins than it used to... and I'm annoyed.

*goes outside to yell at clouds*

[dusematic]

I guess the bigger issue is how how the C'Thun decks aren't fun.  The game has changed to such a degree that I might be out.  I was trying to think of why that is.  I suppose because when every class has a C'Thun deck, it homogenizes the game.  If only one class ran a C'Thun deck, it would be cool.

[Azuredream]

I think you'll see less and less C'Thun decks as time goes by. Warrior/Druid are the two I think will stick around, and maaaybe priest but all the other classes (Rogue, Warlock) aren't nearly as consistent.

[Druzil]

I've had good luck with a Warlock C'tun / Zoo deck.  Maybe it was just because it was the first week.  This week I played a bit of C'thun druid which is ok but just gets wrecked by Patron.   Also did some divine shield aggro paladin which is a ton of fun.   I think I'm going to try out Rogue and Shaman next.   Maybe Craft N'Zoth since he seems like he might be playable.   

I opened up 2 Y'Shaarj in back to back packs.  The first one was exciting the second one felt real bad    I still think they need to bump the legend disenchant value to 800 dust.

[Nebu]

There's only one thing I like about this new expansion.  It seems to have helped shamen.  They needed some love.

[Paelos]

I'm very annoyed by this expansion. It has also made my normal daily quest moves take freaking forever mostly because everyone's running the same crap and those that spent the money have all the cards right now.

[Nebu]

I'm very annoyed by this expansion. It has also made my normal daily quest moves take freaking forever mostly because everyone's running the same crap and those that spent the money have all the cards right now.

This is how I feel.  I figure that I have 3 options: buy cards, lose enough games to tank my MMR and make winning easier, or quit.

I'm done... for now.   

[Paelos]

The game did a good job before this of not being pay to win. And after a few months as things even out maybe it will get better, but man in the interim it's no fun getting matched up with completely full decks on somebody else.

[Morat20]

So, if I got bored halfway through Naxx and stopped playing ---- anything I need to know going back in?

[Nebu]

So, if I got bored halfway through Naxx and stopped playing ---- anything I need to know going back in?

Yes.  Power creep is real.

[Morat20]

So, if I got bored halfway through Naxx and stopped playing ---- anything I need to know going back in?

Yes.  Power creep is real.

So...toodle along losing a lot, slowly acquiring cards?

Maybe I can go back to Magic: The Gathering. I'm sure I can use my cards from 1995, right? :)

[Malakili]

You can probably sell your cards from 1995, if nothing else.

[Nebu]

So...toodle along losing a lot, slowly acquiring cards?

That's what I was doing for a while.  Then I got tired of it taking forever to win 2 games and took a break.  Your mileage may vary.