I notice the old forums had a thread about this, although I haven’t seen it on the new ones so I’m starting a thread to continue the conversation. Snap Freeze seems like a straight upgrade to Shatter. And they have the same rarity, Common. I think Blizzard should nerf or buff one of these cards so that one isn’t a straight upgrade of the other.
Snap Freeze is basically the same card as Shatter, except it’s more useful, because you can Snap Freeze to freeze, whereas Shatter is useless unless something is frozen. I’m fairly sure that won’t happen, unfortunately, otherwise Wild’s Freeze Mage becomes better, with Frost Nova, and the ablility to clear 3 minions in a turn.
I mean nerfing Snap Freeze is also an option right?
Nerfing is an option, however, at this point in time, Witchwood cards are rotating out in a couple months. There’s also the fact that Shatter is from Whispers of the Old Gods, which was from a long while ago.
Yeah, I’ve heard that wild gets balance patches less frequently unfortunately.
It’s not a balance issue. Every expansion has its own power level. Comparing cards from one xpac to another is not a good way to go about it.
A card from when hearthstone came out that was considered strong To the point of broken dr.7 for example now days if the same card came out would be considered meh or only ok. Power levels change over time as such more or less powerfull versions or even the same card rereleased is not uncommon in card games.
You have to compare cards within a given xpac to each other and within the same class as well as even diff classes will have diff costs for doing something eg a pally might reduce the attack and health of a minion to 1 for 1 mana but a hunter might need to spend 2 mana to only drop health to 1. This is each class having there own strengths. To use mtg as a example it’s like blue being better at mill decks norm.
As such snap freeze and shatter being a strict upgrade from each other is not a issue there cards of different times. Wild gets the bonus of having both in there deck to “bypass” card limit to a point by having 4 copy’s of cards with a similar effect. While if only using 2 you use the better one. They should not buff one or nerf one just since there similar to make it so you have in effect a 4 card limit without a drawback of bringing a slightly weaker card. Unless you get lucky and x card is rereleased at the same power level which is unlikly norm cards are stronger with time. So even better for wild as they get an upgrade.
This is not a balance issue in fact it’s good balancing by adjusting cards to the relevant power level of the expansion they are in. Addressing weaker cards when there rereleased without screwing with old cards. Old cards should not be buffed just since there weaker than a new card if there going to buff a card it should be for a clear reason like they did that one time (to attempt to shake up the meta to keep it freash).
Wild dosent get patched much as that exactly what that mode is wild. It’s made to be a mode to play with cards from old expansions as they where to make new and protentally broken and unbalanced interactions for those that like that. The kind that could never happen in stand. Many of us play the mode exactly for that and as such do not want them patching wild other than as a direct result of them patching stand. If they want to fix a issue in wild it should be done via adding a card to stand that allows you to tech or break said issue in wild not a direct nerf. For the most part this is what they do. It’s rare to see wild patches for this reason and you should not. Card in wild should be kept how they where at there prime. To the point I would argue that cards nerfed in stand should go back to there org pre nerf way when entering wild. I would love to be able to still play with 0 mana hero power from raza or charge of patches.
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I think it is only half right.
It can be look upon in more depth, but in summary…
What Standard does is to limit the impact of balance within the released set. In wild, these cards are continually added, and we can get a clearer picture of it’s impact.
In addition, certain cards are omitted in the arena, another indication of the impact of individual cards.
note: the rng impact from discovery and random effects.
Yes wild keeps adding more cards and gives a picture of there power level.
That has little to do with if it’s a balance issue on if one card should or should not be a strict upgrade of another.
It’s completely fine and not a balance issue to have strict upgrades of another card. In fact it’s healthly for wild as said above as it makes you not able to slot 4 of the same card you have to take 2 of a worse type. Unless that card happens to be a rare one that was rereleased. Card balance is based on the set it’s from and should not be changed just since a future card is better.
Ommiting things in arena and wild also has little relevance. Wild is exactly that a mode to see the game with everything opened up. It dosent matter how broken it is. That is exactly what wild is and what many people like about the mode it gives you access to everything that ever was and lets you see what you can do with it. I firmly believe no matter how broken wild is no nerf should happen. At most new standered cards should be added to break or counter wild decks doing to well not direct nerds.
Rng and discover are vary diff things as they do not change the consentration of a given card in your deck and as such chance to draw as well as are not consistant least not at the same level of consistant as knowing you can draw x cards and as such x chance at x time due to x cards left in the deck.
I do get your message on the concept of “balance within a set”, but see slightly different from you.
To be more clear, balance should not be based on assumption that if Card A shares a same rarity with Card B, then everything (stats or effect) must be equal.
What I refer to is the balance of card with reference to it’s environment. If Dev have a loose grasp of the impact of individual card, then powercreep can happen much faster than it is intended, creating a faster cycle for even more powercreep.
In the process, it does becomes a balance issue.
Yes but what you are speaking about is relative balance when releasing a new card. Which I do agree with the devs need to take old cards into account when releasing new and that is a back s factor. As I mentioned in the first post. Powercreep happens when the set is released not when it moves to wild. Power creep happening is not a issue the rate it happens at dose need to be kept in mind and never said anything adverse to that.
Nor dose power creep have anything to do with the subject at hand on if a card should be buffed or nerfed to match similar cards.
Even if there is powercreep from a card being released in a expansion yes it’s a balance issue in regard to how strong it was for that xpac but that’s completely fine (as in this case you are speaking about nerfing or buffing a card since it’s to good or weak for its time not since another card exists).
Exapantions over time go up in power. It is NOT a balance issue that the old card is weaker as said before. That is not a reason to buff the old cards. It is not a balance issue that the old card are weaker. The old card are weaker since that set is weaker. There is nothing wrong with that.
As I have explained in my previous replies,
The reason why I say it is half true is as above is these cards can post as a balance problem if above is ignored/neglected.
As cards are added to Wild, then the pool of consideration get bigger, and need more resources to manage it.
Annoy-o-tron is a 2/1/2 in GVG. While in that expansion, it is presumably ok within that set. The recent expansion, brought it back through giggling inventor.
The balance problem I refer to, is seen where a future card caused a balance problem from an unchanged (or maybe should be poorly accounted) card from a much earlier expansion. I do not say Annoy-o-tron needs to be buffed/nerf, I am saying it can cause a balance problem, even though it may not be intentional.
p.s. note: my replies are prior to your edited messages, thus may contribute to some misunderstanding.
Apology on poor example above. Technically, Giggling inventor summon 2x 1/2 mech with taunt and divine shield, and not Annoy-o-tron,
But to showcase the example, where balance could be a problem if poorly accounted for.
No, and there isn’t even a balance issue at play here.
Two cards can have a similar function with one of them being blatantly better in every situation, without there being a balance issue. Some cards are intentionally created to be obviously weak or strong compared to similar options so that new players can easily learn that not all cards are created equal.
Card balance issues occur when a card is so strong that there is little reason not to play it (see Sylvanas & Ragnaros) and/or it completely polarizes the game based on whether it’s drawn or not (see 5-mana Luna’s Pocket Galaxy).
I think Blizzard should design future expansions to have the same power, not more, than older expansions. Otherwise, people will always be encouraged to get newer expansions and their cards from older expansions will become irrelevant which defeats the main point of wild.
I disagree. You shouldn’t have a card that you always choose over another card. It should be made so one is better than the other in certain situations. Otherwise there is little point in having the weaker card in your collection.
I’m not sure why that’s healthier than having 4 cards that are similar, with 2 of them being better in certain situations and the other 2 better in others.
I like wild because my cards can always be used in it. But I still want wild to be balanced.
I’m not going to go into detail myself, but you should probably read the following article by Mark Rosewater who has the same basic point of view as myself on the subject (cards being blatantly different in power level help reward those paying attention):
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/when-cards-go-bad-2002-01-28
Just as a reference, Mark Rosewater has worked for WotC since 1996 and have been head designer for MtG since 2003 (and still is today).
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Stonehill and silverback
Ice rager and magma rager
Dr 7 and war golem
And alot alot more
Going to address one point and only one here as its ulti the only one that matters.
You thinking epac should not go up in power so you never have to replace old cards simply put will NEVER happen. xpacs go up in power for EXACTLY that reason. So that players replace old cards. This is a business. The goal is to sell cards.
The goal is NOT to have you sit in wild forever with the same deck never buying a new card again. That is not the point of wild which you claim. The point of wild is to allow players to play with all possible cards with the freedom to do what they want allowing for “broken” interactions that couldn’t happen otherwise. Wild players as much as any others are expected to buy new cards. If you never bought anything new blizzard really dosen’t make stuff for you. They have a “free to play” option NOT since they want you to play for free. But to get the free to play players to stay around giving players for others to play vs. If there is no one to play vs or a limited amount players are less likly to buy stuff. While fre to play players over time may spend money. That odds is reason to keep them. They are NOT kept around since they are free to play its the potential profit that is reason to keep them around. Right from blizzard when wild came out. They claimed wild should be mess of everything that could never happen in stand.
If wild never had to buy another card the mode would be pointless to blizzard and a waste of server power. The fact wild players still buy cards thou as they need less cards are more likly to just craft them so norm are more free to play than stand players is reason enough to keep the mode around.
Your suggestion of all xpac being the same power level and never needing to buy new cards is nothing more than a way to KILL the game. As if blizzard doesn’t make money there is no reason to keep making the game. This is true for ALL modes. If blizzard doesn’t make money from wild there is no reason for wild to exist and likely wont or at least will NEVER see anything added or changed or wild mode as they wouldn’t want players there.
In short as said expansions go up in power over time this is HEALTHY for the game. So long as the power jumps are not unreasonable. As such two cards like snap freeze and shatter being similar but a strict upgrade is not a issue is any way shape or fourm. One comes from a earlier time and as such has a weaker stat line as its from a weaker xpac. It should NOT be brought up to the level of new cards.
As a side (you can stop reading here if you want) do read the post winged linked its a read I seen long ago from magic the gatherings dev. He explains the reason fodder cards and weak cards are made quite well. Even cards that are never likely to see play are quite healthy for the game and he explains why.
Also as a wild players I DON’T want to see wild balanced via nerfs and buffs. I want to see issues in wild addressed via tech cards or other cards ADDED to the game that stop broken decks. By allowing me to change my deck to counter them. These cards I would CRAFT. Blizzard “balancing” never goes right and norm just screws stuff up for no reason. Prime example barns nerf from 4-5 mana. Did nothing to stop big priest but hurt many other decks. Better fix would of been adding good cards that summon trash for the other guy killing his rez pool (eg lerroy a card you want to play that summons welps but not a pure finsher card something you would play early. Marsh Drake think its name is is a good example. OR a new keyword that interacted with the rez pool in some way. Such as “soulburn” remove a random minions from opponites rez pool to raise your attack/health by that cards. (or x cards removed to gain x attack/health equally to removed cards). There has been many other ideas tossed around that could also be used as a xpac keyword. OR nerfing raza to 1 mana hero vs 2 only 2 months before going wild in stand was a issue in wild was not and honestly would be better at 0 mana hero to allow playing with the card as it was all stand basically. Wild should be about playing with cards as they where at least for the majority of stand. So if they where nerfed early leave them nerfed otherwise if nerfed at the end unnerf as they enter wild. Molten giant another card that should of been unnerfed as it entered wild.
Most of the arguments aren’t applicable when you are talking about straight card upgrades instead of bad/good cards but I’ll try to address the ones that still are.
First, even bad cards must exist you don’t have to make them straight downgrades from other cards. They can be practically bad most of the time, but they shouldn’t be worse than their alternative in virtually all situations.
Lastly, they said Volcanic Hammer sees play in Standard while Lightning Bolt sees play in older formats. Except Snap Freeze is both the newer and the more powerful card. In both Standard and Wild there is no reason to play Shatter.
@Razzysnazzy
So I do believe that expansions should have approximately equal power level. But my main idea for this thread is discussing straight upgrades of cards, so my responses will be to address that and not the power level of expansions.
You can forbid future expansions from having straight upgrades of cards and still have their power level be higher. An extreme example to show my point: if a 2 mana 2/3 exists instead of making a 2 mana 3/3 you can make a 2 mana 2/2 with battlecry restore your hero to full health. Obviously higher power level but still not a straight upgrade.
Sure in the short and medium term making future expansions have a higher power level will increase profits. But in the long term since people don’t like games that just keep making new expansions better it’ll cause loss of players. And even if they are F2P players as you said F2P players are useful for indirect and potential profit.
Do you have a link? Precise wording on what exactly they meant by “mess of everything” would help me understand their intentions.
It is debatable whether making older sets have a higher power level would even make Blizzard lose money. You have to spend real money or dust (harder to get than gold) to get wild packs/cards. So it might even increase Blizzard profits.
There is one more thing that Mark’s article doesn’t touch upon: If a card is so bad it never sees play (like Shatter) making a new card doing the same thing but better (ie. Snap Freeze) does not create a balance issue. Unless the new card is so good it sees play in any deck that could include it.
Having cards that are so bad that no player with just a slight understanding of the game would use them is still useful to the game as a whole. It shows newer players (to the game or CCGs in general) that cards are not created equal, regardless of rarity or set. With both cards being Common, these two are a prime example of that and thus a great learning tool.
The basic set already does that. No need to use expansions for it.