I’m not entirely opposed to a quick lethal, that isn’t exactly what I’m complaining about here, it is the way it is achieved. The lack of options to prevent it or answer it and the amount of options that could potentially prevent those if they’re not instant like Kharut’s defender for example can be silenced, returned to owner’s hand, silenced and killed, made to disappear, there’s a lot of options there to answer that.
When you have a bunch of 1/1 leper gnomes summoned by using a hero power that goes face, can be played on turn 1, no way to counter the quest itself, puts 3 bodies on board and carries an inherent ability to go face for 2 damage, possibility of a 2nd quest for additional 3 bodies, 2 regular bodies + 2 more 2/1’s that deal 3 dmg instead of 2, that’s a real issue. There’s not a lot of options to fix that and the only real thing that comes to mind is silence? On a 1/1 body that deals 2 dmg, 1/10+ bodies? That’s flawed design. The other option is heal which again is limited in most classes and as mentioned above either practically non existent in most, not just mage, and utterly useless and deck-destroying in most which rely on very finely tuned builds and/or maximizing cards that strive towards a win condition and not conditional cards /tech cards.
It isn’t that it achieved lethal by turn 6 it is the fact that I answered every body / token is spammed and still died without ever being attacked, just hero power button presses and token spamming that actually wants/needs them to die which leads to the last option/answer which would be freezing the board repeatedly which is useless considering the fact that they’ll die eventually anyways and the other options of healing, gaining armor, or preventing the damage outright are virtually non existent.
So the answers are don’t be a mage / be a warlock or priest with heavy healing options, maybe a PLD, and gear your deck specifically to this deck or lose?
As for the “nut draw” comment, this was hardly a “nut draw” situation. As I mentioned there was still PLENTY of face DMG options from spawning 1/1 beasts with charge equal to my board size, buffing those beasts in a number of ways relatively cheap for the DMG output. Kill command, bomb toss, explosive trap, dragonbane which is completely absurd, there’s a long list of spells and minions that buff other minions and even grant rush half the time.
So it isn’t a nut draw issue, literally the entire deck is able to go face and if you substantial healing or armor then there is no real answer or way to defend yourself other than pick a different class and/or build a deck specifically to combat this which isn’t ideal. Sure I could include Zillax for 3 health guaranteed for 5 mana, or build my deck around casting spells and gaining armor which literally throws 95% of my current deck in the trash. I could minimize the face damage by including some low cost silence instead of cards that kill the minions which would basically do nothing after 1 extra turn because now they’re going face for the same amount of damage or more if left alive. None of the answers are answers and all play into the style of automatic face damage on top of automatic face damage for literally every card in the deck.
There’s a reason there’s a limited number of Invoke cards, there’s a reason murlocs are inherently weak and low stat minions, pirates are low health and easily removed, dragons are relatively high cost and every other style in the game has limited amounts of cards that help and/or require balance to actually perform effectively.
So why give hunter which was already annoying as is going face and already has a ton of ways to buff low cost beasts and minions and tag on hero power damage and face damage spells, spawn buff-able charge beasts etc the option to just spawn automatic damage?
There’s a reason why Druid has to sacrifice 1+ mana for 4 individual turns to gain its quest effect which forces it to start relatively slow and sacrifice playable turns early.
Now it isn’t guaranteed damage but for 8/9 classes it basically is and honestly fishing a silence or two out of someone’s deck is powerful in and of itself for those that do have a way to cancel / negate the DR effects. Priest who has godly healing potential and ways to start slow, mass silence, etc. Maybe a few other aggro decks can run that race and win but again why include the possibility of instant victory for doing nothing which requires 0 strategy or decision making even more so than your typical aggro deck(s) that spam and go face.
It isn’t all or always about the biggest / worst exploit or #1 deck in the meta on paper. It is also about integrity of the game as a whole and direction it is going. Even if they changed it to “Use your Hero Power 4 times” it wouldn’t really make a difference to the decks that can’t answer or equal or exceed the imminent damage coming at them that isn’t preventable and has no bounce back from answers especially when it is a wrap by turn 6 or less.
You can’t play to defend against every style, that’s one of the first lessons I learned playing this game. I used to think, oh I got beat by aggro I need more AOE spells, oh I lost because I couldn’t remove a taunt I need some silence, I lost to big minions I need more removal, there’s not enough cards to answer everything and you just sacrifice actually viable win conditions trying to tech against everything.
In that line of thought, you can’t excuse broken design with there’s other broken designs that are worse, or this deck isn’t even the #1 deck in the meta. That’s like saying if a team cheats to win in basketball that it’s okay because they’re not even # 1 in playoff rankings. Or its not a big deal that a player is able to cheat because he’s not Lebron James so who cares.
Yes many aggro decks pull of lethal most are based on actually getting minions to stick and going face which requires your opponent to not remove the minions you play on turns 1, 2, 3 etc. Not have taunts in the way, and dozens of other if/when conditions that have to be met based on your opponents lack of answers even though the answers are readily available and they simply chose not to use them and/or couldn’t draw them and honestly yes aggro is always going to have the “nut draw” effect and there isn’t directly enough answers for most aggro but indirectly there is at least for most. There is more viable decks that beat aggro decks more often than not even if aggro can slip a 2 victories in to every lost based on the meta and force people to change it up at least there’s options to change it up as in add/remove cards from their deck to have answers, lower their mana curve a little, increase their draw curve a little, have some more removal, etc. That isn’t the case here. To answer this I’d have to design a deck with this deck in mind which will ultimately make me lose to all other decks a majority of the time = gamebreaking / metabreaking.
Aggro is a problem in general I’ve always had a problem with aggro. Not because it is the most dominant or most consistent but because it races for a 5 turn victory while other decks have to actually play and make decisions that include considering what others are doing and not just spamming and going face. but this is next level version of that adding;
8 Leper Gnomes (16 damage of DR, 8(x) if left alive without taunt in the way which could be silenced/destroyed etc)
Hero Power every turn 2(x) starting turn 2 (or 1 with crystal)
Dragonbane 5(x) potentially starting turn 6 (or 5 w/ crystal)
Kill Command (5x2)
Rapid Fire 1x2
Arcane Shot 2x2
Explosive Trap 2x2
Kobold Sandtrooper 2x3 (plus 2(x) if left alive)
Baited Arrow 3x2
Bomb Toss 2x
That’s not including spell damage potential, unleash the hounds, dire frenzy, animal companion, fresh scent, goblin prank, rat trap, snake trap, revenge of the wild, boommaster flark, dinotamer brann, king krush, Vareesa Windrunner and all weapons, etc.
Without all of those and a few more buffs and mechs which are essentially charges if bomb toss mechs are left alive a turn, etc.
You already have 19 cards that deal face damage, (18 + dragonbane which is a chance at face dmg) so even without counting it; without adding baited arrow;
for 24 total mana at 1-3 each you have all but guaranteed face damage of 56+ potential for a lot more not even counting Hero Power damage yet.
By turn 7 you have 28 total not counting the crystal, by turn 8 thats 36 total. that’s 7-8 Hero powers for 14-16 mana. Another 20-22 / 24 with 11-13 cards drawn of 30.
Add Eaglehorn Bow and Headhunters Hatchet, the others I didn’t count, and any/all of the rest I mentioned and the entire deck can go face for upwards of 100+ DMG.
So the answer isn’t healing or armor unless its godly. It isn’t board clears because it doesn’t stop all the auto/face dmg. There isn’t enough silence in the game or freeze without triggering.
You have to beat them before they beat you. That requires few very specific builds to either aggro first or out value their insane auto-face dmg by turn 5 which is nearly impossible.
I’m sure there’s a few decks and win conditions that give them trouble but again this is the problem with aggro in general and even worse with this one. They can lose to that 1 deck that gives them trouble and concede by turn 8 if things somehow didn’t go their way and run it back 3 times before you are able to compete in 1 more match up and they’ll win most of their match ups purely on the fact that no one has answers for them other than maybe Warlock and Priest with specific answers / problems like healing/taunts/mass silence, a few variants of aggro and maybe a WAR or Druid with lots of heal/armor potential to turn that corner here or there. These are still match ups, they still win these a lot of the time and these are specific builds against their style that are also including their own win conditions and rely on drawing the right cards and combinations of cards.
Anything that doesn’t have the right mix of control/heal/taunt/silence, and a win condition and draws it correctly or simply out aggros them somehow loses automatically and lots of them simply cannot include answers to these problems.
That’s where I have an issue. Because it breaks most decks and makes them unviable and so long as it is viable that hinders the process for other builds.
I built my own random mage deck around a few fun ideas and the new Reno Hero and made it to rank 10 with a homebrew deck and I know my deck isn’t perfect, as most home brew decks it is a little top heavy with too much value and a steep mana curve but most games I fair well and give just about any deck a run for its money and have answers and it becomes a chess match and thats what I love about this game and these types of game and that’s really why we play these types of games isn’t it?
You take a rock paper scissors type base and expand on it and add details and strengths and weakness but most importantly is balance. Games like these always end up releasing OP cards and eventually players find game breaking builds that find ways to cheat the system beyond what should be expected by having unstoppable combos and ways to get to them relatively consistently enough to be successful and then nerfs come to balance it out because if 1 specific deck or a few specific decks and/or cards are dominating the current meta it breaks every other card that isn’t included in that tried and tested proven formula to consistent victory and takes the fun back out of it and reduces it down to rock paper scissors where the viable mage beats the viable shaman who beats the viable hunter or beats the viable mage.
It starts to feel like your choices don’t matter and it is an auto-win auto-lose structure based purely on deck choice and not in game decisions which defies then entire premise of the game; game-breaking.
And maybe it doesn’t need a nerf. Maybe we need more cards like PLD “Time Out” in a neutral form and in a playable form that would enable any/all decks to counter a board of Leper Gnomes / bombs by making themselves immune next turn and then wiping the board. Or some type of card that recovers all damage you’ve taken on your turn this turn for relatively cheap seems fair enough to counter these types of boards while currently there is none. Warlocks already have crazy heals at the moment so I doubt allowing them 2 turns to recover self inflicted damage would be any more game breaking for them than it would be for heroes that use weapons and take face dmg or any deck that simply wants to clear a board of Leper Gnomes / bombs and not take absurd amounts of damage that can’t be stopped or countered effectively at the moment.
Last I have suggested this before and I still think and honestly even more than ever that a few things need to happen.
Increase Deck Size to 40; This makes it harder to mill yourself into win conditions, to pull specific cards from discover / cast from deck plays which are consistently game breaking from summoning copies and resurrecting to pull OP 8-10 cost spells and casting virtually for free and copies without using the original, to milling your deck into OTK and auto-win conditions etc.
It makes all decks across the board less reliable and consistent, it allows for more options and bigger combos but at the price of reliability and consistency in a way that promotes unique builds because regardless of if you’re running low cost aggro or well rounded your draw isn’t going to be consistently the same. You’re odds of each individual card go down.
You can counter balance this by increasing starting hand size and/or starting mana so that the first few turns are either dead or a head start for aggro and auto-win for aggro against players that don’t have or draw their answers right away. Aggro can still be aggro, they can still spam the board with tokens and threaten players by buffing their entire board and using disposable tokens and low cost minions as opposed to trying to pull off big combos and create huge / OP minions and plays overall.
The difference is it reduces the auto-win rates and requires more strategy and consideration that if they over extend or over commit they’ll lose steam and so they can no longer simply commit their entire deck to low cost face damage and rely auto-wins for easy victories and positive win rates.
It would force them to develop actual strategies instead of just looking to exploit a broken system.
Next;
Increase starting Health OR Start all players with armor. Get rid of the “destroy your opponents armor” card and make more reasonable “reduce” your opponents armor options for early game damage. Some might opt to optimize their resources by taking the easy hits off armor while others might choose to focus on their strengths and take it down the old fashioned way but by increasing the starting health/armor beyond 30 it extends the game just enough to make things interesting and further prevent these face race decks that just look to exploit the broken mechanics of the game and win as quickly as possible with as little thought/strategy as possible and forces them to develop actual strategies.
See when I have a Shaman bloodlust deck I don’t want it to be spam tokens repeatedly until they stick and I can bloodlust and auto-win. I want it to be that they’re forced to clear my board and if they choose not to they might suffer the consequences when I evolve the board or bloodlust and hit them hard. And in a lot of ways I’ve seen some parts of the game lean this direction with ability to gain 100 armor and extend the game until turn 42 but in some aspects its still looking for turn 4 victory based on broken mechanics and it has to be one or the other and the better, more fun, intelligent, strategic approach is extending games.
Again you can balance this by reducing the number of games needed and/or increasing the rewards of games played to balance the longer duration and increase the value of wins/losses.
You can adjust the way(s) to rank up, for example dropping the win streak to 2 wins if 2 games are taking considerably longer or as long as 3 games prior it makes sense right?
This is how to add depth, balance, etc. This is how the game must evolve.
I understand the counter argument for fast paced action and not wanting games to take too long. Then speed up the animations considerably.
I get the argument for not wanting too but at the end of the day we’re all going to have seen these animations dozens and hundreds of times so its pointless. Time is more important than animations and if you really wanted to change the game with animations you’d have to go all out CGI with a complex design after each turn to really impress anyone and at the end of the day that seems like a gimmicky approach that ultimately boils down to the same thing, we’ve seen these animations dozens and hundreds of times we’re not playing the game for animations we’re playing for strategic competition.
The only way that TRULY becomes a valid style of game is becoming the first hybrid of an actual real time game with some type of foundation in the card game. There’s some examples of this type but ultimately that turns into an entirely different game so just speed up the animations of this game so we can get through these matches as quickly as possible and have the maximum amount of time to think and ACTUALLY ACT because being caught in a string of animations doesn’t count and just robs people in some situations of a fair and reasonable amount of time to act in later rounds.
This can also be fixed with a timer that gives players extra time and even better you can reduce the time of each round from say 45 seconds to 30 or 30 to 20 while adding a timer for more time when needed that increases by ending rounds early to build up the clock and has a fixed/set max cap, so it can’t be abused by ropers and ultimately minimizes their ability to rope while still giving players enough time to act and even more time when it is needed most.
So instead of a player roping 45 seconds every round and acting at the last possible second to get the full 45 seconds next turn, you give them 20 seconds with a clock for an additional 20-30 seconds that once used has to refill by ending rounds early or simply add 5 seconds each round maybe 10 in later rounds etc. Ultimately reducing the average time of rounds but allowing players in later rounds to have a little more time and ropers can rope once for 45-60 seconds but then they’re down to 20-25 seconds per round instead of 45 every round.