Asked and answered. Please see previous responses.
Please provide further details. Which levels of play am I aware of, which levels of play are you aware of, what are your grounds for these observations and why is each level of play relevant to the argument that I presume you will build around these observations?
That wasnât a question, it was an observation. Your previous âresponseâ also wasnât a response at all, just more snobby behavior.
Your elitist behavior suggests you play at a high level. If I am incorrect, you have hilariously disqualified yourself by your own qualifications to talk about balance. You are also no different from any other Iâve met, thinking that the highest levels of play reflect balance at all levels of play.
I donât play at very high ranks. I can understand net decks and high tier decks, but I hate playing them. I also donât have a lot of time to grind.
As you surmised, this all leads the the main point. Things have different power at different ranks. Just because something isnât a problem at high ranks, doesnât mean it is fine at all ranks. This also has to do with aggro, which is generally ok at high ranks and overwhelming at low ranks.
Well all lost the plot somewhere. Point is, aggro decks are great for mindlessly grinding ladder. Which is to say I donât know why anyone would enjoy them outside of sheer ease and winrate. They are also really frustrating to go against
It has been thoroughly answered by both myself and ilikeeggs. If you have an issue with one or more of the responses, please rebut them.
Believe it or not, you are a mid-tier player. As you say, you have some understanding of the top decks and some grasp of the core mechanics of the game. This likely puts you at least in the top half of Hearthstone players.
The thing is, the game canât be balanced at all levels of play in a asymmetric game, so you need to decide what level of play to balance to.
Balancing to some arbitrary mid point is historically doomed - I donât have time to get into this right now, so take it as true or do a little background research yourself. This leaves your options to balancing to the lowest common denominator or to the top end of play.
Games that balance to the top end of play, like starcraft, age of empires, the most popular legacy formats of magic the gathering and yugioh tends to lead to a format that will stand the test of time and remain interesting going forward, possibly with minor tweaks. I canât think of any similar examples for games that have balanced around the lowest common denominator.
People enjoy agro because it holds intricate decision making with real consequences, while still allowing you to play enough games to consistently walk away with satisfying wins and satisfying losses. The typical control player is more frustrated than the typical agro player because the typical control player does not always get to walk away with satisfying wins and losses, making their highs much higher and their low nights much lower.
Other levels on which to enjoy agro could include themes - I personally find the beast themes to be very appealing and could understand why people might feel similar about pirates, mechs or murlocs - thrill of discovery - âI was defeated, but then I ripped a Leeroy off the topâ can provide a rush to some players - and the texture of wins and losses - one thing that is often renowned in fictional strategists like Ender from Enderâs Game tends to be their ability to find the shortest path to victory; I could see how this might give some that fantasy.
There are more factors, of course, including many offered in this thread. The fact is that you donât want to understand them because you are a scrub - err, I guess snob or elitist is a preferable way of saying this? - who has laid out an arbitrary set of rules for their opponent and expects their opponent to play by those rules.
If you actually wanted to understand agro, you would have done so by now. Instead, you choose to continue to demand that players continue to justify its existence because it does not fit within your set of rules.
Obviously balancing the top will give you the best balance overally, that fact is outdated though. You can balance for the top as a starting point, but then you can rework things that are problematic in other stratum of play and keep them in mind at the top. The game Iâve researched in this is Dota. You can take a character like Riki that stomps low tiers and is garbage at high tiers and make changes that will at least make him less stompy at low tiers and maybe even more viable at high tiers. Itâs hard, but not impossible. As far as I know, Dota pioneered the idea that you can balance for the top without neglecting the other tiers.
Blarg. Intricate decisions like hitting face or which minion to give a small stat buff to in order to hit face more. It doesnât help that the reasons you like aggro are the reasons I hate aggro. Iâm also pretty sure no one actually cared.
To be clear. When you call someone a scrub, you are calling them garbage. You are saying that they are trash at the game. You are referring to them as obnoxious sum. Ironically, you are also implying that they do not follow your arbitrary set of rules for the âcorrectâ way to play the game.
Also, the only reason I have been calling you elitist is because you have been calling me scrub, which implies that you think Iâm trash at the game and you are so much better.
And likewise you refuse to realize the perspective of anti-aggro players. Both outcomes are unsurprising. Did you ever stop to consider that some people wanted to vent frustration rather than literally understand what aggro players enjoy about aggro.
Wardrum, I see you skulking again. The favoritism doesnât suit you
Favoritism and supporting facts are not synonymous. He is entitled to his opinion, and Beaky is right imo as well. Poor form buddy, poor form! You not liking the other side of the debate doesnt mean its not relevant!
Youâve got me at a loss, here. What?
Wasnât the last thing I said in this thread a goofball comment about Aggroâs mockable focus on smorcing? What favoritism?
you gave Beaky ![:heart:](https://dacy5cilkxabf.cloudfront.net/en/hearthstone/images/emoji/twitter/heart.png?v=6" ":heart:")
, therefore youre playing âfavouritesâ.
Oh.
Well, I agree with Beakyâs assessment on the matter. Iâm allowed to like peopleâs posts, good grief.
Regarding the whole Dota comment, balancing a MoBa (and many other games, really) can be done in far smaller increments than in a CCH like Hearthstone, where a single point in atk/health or mana costs can take a card straight from hot garbage to excellent or knock a good card off itâs pedestal into the trash can. Apples and oranges, in this case.
In a moba or rpg or shooter, you can increase/decrease a certain skill by 3% or 8% or 14% damage and it will make a noticeable, but if done correctly, fair, difference. In Hearthstone, a single point of anything easoly becomes a 20-100% change on that value in many cases, far and away overshooting anything that could be considered a âtweakâ.
To follow this up, if you reply Iâm not ignorung you, my alarm for work goes off in 6 hours and I need to get some sleep. Everyone stay rad.
Baited one, got two. This is hilarious.
You have a tendency to follow long debates between two people and only upvote one side without every saying anything on the matter. Upvote whatever you want to upvote, just know that kind of behavior is usually referred to as âskulkingâ though it is usually applied to social media more than forums
And there you go for real with the favoritism! Sure I called you out, but you arenât going to mention Beaky bringing up Starcraft and Age of Empires? Pretty sure those are apples to oranges as well
As far as balance, I already said it would be very difficult, I donât know why you try to make that point when I already acknowledge it. The idea is that you take away things that are very effective at low levels and replace them with things that are only effective at higher levels. And yes, this even works with things that are binary
Again, itâs difficult but not impossible. There are more subtle ways to change cards than you give credit for. Not everything is plus or minus health, damage, or mana.
Trolling then? Thanks for admitting it, now I can flag you knowing your intent.
Note to fellow humans, turn your phone volume off so random work emails donât cause you to check your phone and then decide to check the forums one more time before going to bed
NowâŚ
Classy. Look at you go.
Iâve read maybe 15% of this whole thread. Seeing how far back the feuding on here has gone, Iâve seen enough âAgGrO iS dUmBâ threads that honestly, it holds little interest for me.
I wouldnât know, I donât spend all my time on Twitter or Tumblr or wherever else they do that.
My point was showing the differences in those balancing philosophies and why one is practically applicable to a CCG than the other. If other games of whatever genre choose to adopt a similar philosophy to what works with Hearthstone then itâs whatever. Surely you understand the difference, here.
You say this about whatever you want done but isnât feasible or reasonable. To that I say:
There are, but the past 2+ years of balancing shows that they generally arenât interested in any of them, be it due to the thought input required or what. Mana cost especially seems to be their #1 tuning knob by far.
Now, Iâm going to go to bed. Have a delightful evening/morning (I donât know where you are).
Not trolling. I was baiting someone out of skulking. Turned out there were two skulkers on this thread.
Baiting is trolling. Read the CoC.
Nice cover, and yet here you are liking a post over 100 posts in
look at you trying to be too cool for social media. Itâs common knowledge, not something you have to be deeply into it to know about.
Obviously your point is valid. The problem is that you call me out on it while conveniently ignoring the fact that Beaky did the exact same thing.
You are so burdened by limitation. Like an elephant tied to a chair, you have no idea how easily you could break free simply for lack of trying.
Yeah, because they set themselves up for it. They decided to make heavy handed nerfs so they donât have to touch those cards again for a long time. There have also been plenty of more subtle nerfs mixed in that hardly affected a cardâs playability aside of making it less widespread. Of course changes like those are very forgettable
Werenât you an enormous troll a year or so ago?
Nope, I just spoke my mind, and continue to do so. You, on the other hand, have just admitted youâre trolling. Not the smartest move imo.
Am I not allowed to comment at all? Have I liked every single post by one side going all the way back to the beginning? Why are you so obsessed with my involvement in this thread?
I could care less what other games are doing for their balance philosophies, though Iâm happy if itâs working for them. I pointed out your instance of comparison because you were attempting to imoart a different, less-appropriate philosophy to the game. Beaky was not, their point was drawn from Hearthstone and showing how other games do it too. I donât care if AoE uses a similar philosophy.
More idealistic fluff with no actual substance behind it.
There have been only a couple like SCG, but others like the lifesteal weapon enchant completely dropped that card from the meta entirely and again, they were aimed at cards that were actively oppressive towards the meta, not this balancing towards the middle idea.
I play mostly control or combo ish warrior, but aggro decks like zoolock, pirate warr, enrage warr are my favs. Zoolock is fun just because you can puke out cheap minions and get cards at the same time. Pirate warr is fun because i like pirates and going all in and relying on topdecks are pretty exciting. Enrage is fun because the mechanic is really unique.
I miss playing Enrage Warrior.
âOh, whatâs he gonna do with those littl-OH MY GOD!!â
Sure, but Hearthstone doesnât. It either keeps a card, or it guts a card. They have become a little better about this over time, but only a little.
Actually, which 3 minions to give a small stat buff to, how to position your minions for best value and which âmust removeâ threats you actually need to remove instead of hitting face. It is the least interesting of agroâs match-ups, but at least itâs not as bad as controlâs end of the match-up - finding the 10% time that you actually hold removal, instead of playing it now and thatâs about it.
Also, admitting that you actually donât care why people like agro probably isnât smart, given that itâs your whole excuse for making an asp of yourself trying to bash on agro in this thread.
I am pretty sure I made it clear what I was calling you. Garbage was not one of those things. Obnoxious isnât too far removed, though.
Unless the OP is your alt, that was the first time I called you a scrub.
âI believe you shouldnât exist.â
âI believe I should.â
âYeah, but like⌠havenât you ever tried thinking of it from the perspective of someone who thinks you shouldnât?â
Kay.