Concerned about Power Creep and Game Balance

An Open Letter to the Hearthstone Developers
Dear Hearthstone Developers,
I’m a long-time Warcraft fan since 2007 and a true Hearthstone veteran since its release in 2014. Over the years, I’ve experienced many ups and downs with the game, witnessing its various stages of development.
Lately, despite the success of the latest expansion and mini-set, I’m deeply concerned about the direction the game is heading. It feels like Hearthstone is drifting away from what made it unique and engaging.
Here are some issues that, in my opinion, require immediate attention:

  • Power Creep: New cards are often significantly stronger than older ones, which devalues previous expansions and forces players to constantly update their decks. This leads to many interesting and original decks becoming uncompetitive.
  • OTK (One Turn Kill) Decks: Decks capable of killing the hero in a single turn, dealing 30+ damage, make the game non-interactive and frustrating. The player simply has no chance to respond to such an attack.
  • Mana Cheat: Cards that allow for mana advantage, such as Shadowstep, enable the abuse of certain cards and combinations, disrupting the game’s balance.
  • Unlimited Resources: Some decks have the ability to replenish their resources infinitely or in large quantities, leading to drawn-out games and diminishing the importance of decision-making. A prime example is the current combo with Photographer, which would be fixed if the Photograph could only be used once per game.
  • Cards with Unique Impact: Certain cards, like the current Kil’jaeden and Wheel of Death, have a unique impact on the game that the player cannot react to.
    Proposed Solutions
  • Reduce Mana Cheat: Introduce limitations on the use of cards that grant mana advantage, or modify their effects.
  • Balance OTK Decks: Change the cards used in OTK decks so they cannot deal more than 20-23 damage in a single turn.
  • Address Unlimited Resources: Modify resource replenishment cards to prevent infinite accumulation.
  • Avoid Cards with Unique Impact: Future game design should avoid creating cards with such a unique impact that the player cannot react to them.
    I believe these changes will help make Hearthstone a more balanced, engaging, and interactive game.
    Thank you for your time and consideration!
5 Likes

I agree with pretty much everything you said. Team 5 has already statet (in a patch note) that they want to decrease the powerlevel. I believe the game will get better after rotation.

So, you’re sick of Zilliax, Druid Ramp, Terran (specifically shaman), Shadowstep, hand disruption (dirty rat/viper), infinite photo decks, being forced to play 1-3 decks to climb in legend, not being able to play your favorite classes some patches because they are unplayable if you want to get out of diamond, dungar, no way to counter infinite armor gain because they removed armor breaker…too? Nice, thought I was the only one who wanted dump in a bag and set it outside Team 5’s offices.

2 Likes

I don’t like this sentiment. Impact is a major issue in gaming today where we reach the most people by making it less intellectual. Cards should have responses, things you can tech for, but it should feel cool when you play something, and unique impact is important, otherwise there is no reason to play a game that is just homogenized and monotonous, something I think we all agree is better, specifically given the current game state.

An issue that I see is that people copy decks from sites hosting them but don’t realize they are for the most part, without tech cards. Running Silences, Mind Control Techs and other such removal cards that are available.

Thats not to say I am saying the current game state is by any means good. The current state of game is checking to see if you are about to play against infinite Shaman or Warrior, and then maybe you’ll play Druids, Death Knights or Hunters. Rogues and Paladins are in the next tier, and you’ll be lucky if you see a Priest, Mage, Demon Hunter or Warlock.

The main issue is because of Photographer, like you said. The game has become for lack of a better term a slog to see if you are playing against an opponent or if they’re simply playing Solitaire if you aren’t shaman or warrior. The issue is more mana cheat and unlimited resources in certain classes that are above and beyond powerful, such as Heights being a 3 cost card to give you one extra mana and 3 more mana gems.

That being said, a literal load of cards are about to rotate out of standard when the next set comes out which is going to slow the gamestate down a lot. I would suggest just waiting and seeing what the next set will do.

Back to the original branigan at hand: Unique Impact isn’t a problem, its a matter of finding out how to interact with that unique impact. There is some unique impact that isn’t really possible to interact with with some classes or that there are too few ways to interact. It would be like saying, “Ghost shouldn’t be allowed to be in the game because it interacts uniquely by reducing my cards in my hand.” But that is a case of needing to play a Dirty Rat. I’ve seen a lot of “Nerf Infestor” but thats just a matter of using silences, which there is a 4 cost silence that is neutral that is a body to remove them.

For your interactions, Kil’Jaeden is currently not seeing much play and when it is its being hidden away in an ETC to be used after they draw out their whole deck. It was a monster when it was first released, but it dwindled after the starcraft set. A lot of what made KJ powerful is ETC hiding it away so that you couldn’t interact with via Dirty Rat. Alternatively you could also just play KJ.

Wheel of Death is staying around since it is in a newer set, what makes it powerful right now is that you can play Sargeras and stall out the opponent and also play KJ to nullify its no deck. However, you’ll notice almost half of the cards of Hand Warlock are going away with the new release, such as Fracking, Harp, Endgame, Fanottem and even the dreaded Sargeras (oooOOooOooOoooOooOooo, so spooky).

Just give it a small wait and see how the new set shapes up.

i don’t understand why someone can have 15-20+ mana and a ton of armor as well. not how it’s done, but why it’s okay. :wink:

I wish dirty rat would work more often. IF you have it in your hand and IF it picks Ghost, okay.

I played a rat tonight that pulled out Ceaseless Expanse lol. RIP me.

These posts are completely pointless.

  1. No one at Blizzard reads these posts.
  2. They don’t care about feedback.
  3. Even if they did, they only want your money.
  4. They have zero interest in making it a better game outside of doing enough to make you spend your money.
1 Like

Posts like these are not completely pointless. Blizzard has already confirmed, they want to reduce the powerlevel.

“Our long-term ambition is for the overall power level of the game to be closer to The Great Dark Beyond than the power level of the sets before it”
-patchnotes 31.0.3

The Devs are not dumb. They power creep the game on purpose because most players are lazy and don’t want to learn new cards. Hence the players want the new cards OP because they don’t want to take the time to learn them and optimize new decks (it can take more than 2 weeks) hence the Devs indulge them and make them OP.

Even supposed “pillars of the community” like Vicious Syndicate are dumb at that. They keep whining they want OP cards on release and they did exactly that on TGDB release.

Just to be absolutely clear - these posts are completely and utterly pointless.

Blizzard don’t read them.
They don’t care what you want.
They will only do what makes them most money.

Questions?

in fact that’s exactly how it is, blizzard has no interest in what we do or say, it only cares about money and manipulating the game to maximize the profit, the imbalance is wanted and everything is manipulated, so today the strongest deck is one and tomorrow it’s another and you are forced to spend to get it. Even all the discovers are driven according to a logic that has never been revealed to us but exists and changes periodically…

1 Like

I’m so sick of not being able to compete with decks that I create myself. What drew me to this game is the creative process in making a unique deck and tweaking it gradually.

These days everyone is using the same deck ripped off the internet with the most OP cards available from the last release and to be honest its getting very very stale and boring.

This release its DK zerg and that Mage Protos card that clears the board twice and gives you about 18-22 damage to the face. These decks are so BROKEN ASF its not even funny. How anyone at Blizzard though this was a good balanced idea is beyond me.

Last release it was meteor Shaman and Elemental mage that I saw half of all games both of which were more manageable than the two decks above.

Its just so boring to see the same 3-4 decks 75% of my games and knowing that with my old deck I have probably a 10-20% chance of getting lucky and winning against them. For these people running these decks ripped off the internet, I really don’t see how it’s fun to use a pre-constructed deck that you stole from YouTube just so that you could seal club with zero creativity or skill.

Honestly, Whenever I see a zerg drop on the field or a mage use a Protos card, I simply just concede the game and prefer not wasting my time with a desperate uphill battle.

I am about a couple weeks away of frustration from uninstalling this game for good.

We have rotation in a couple of weeks. Zerg-DK will be dead.

Or, they’re better deck builders than you. Good deck builders often arrive to the same netdeck independently because the good combinations of cards are finite.

1 Like

That’s possible, but it’s much more likely that they look up a deck online. They literally all have the same cards (even the 1 cost cards)

I honestly, dont see how you could be defending the current meta of the same 2-4 decks that we see 75% of the time and will continue to see because these cards/combos are so broken that to be competitive YOU MUST use them to have a chance to win any games.

I don’t like the meta so that’s a different subject. I was saying the combos of cards that are good are finite.

This is more true this time because almost all Starcraft decks use ALL the cards of their faction.