I see people saying that this game is dead. It’s mostly because you don’t attract new players by matching them against decks that are obviously far superior to the basic cards. I get that they are trying to force people to buy the cards to have a chance at winning, but they have to enjoy the game first. RIP new players and a diverse community.
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Being a new player is undeniably difficult. However, you can very much build towards a budget deck and focus on your play to beat those meta decks. This seems to be the way to get into the game while you still have a small collection and missing many cards. Doing more with less and completing your daily quests.
Supplement the Classic cards you open with the powerful rares and commons from the latest expansions and you can get there.
Of course, everyone finds different things in the game fun, and it’s a narrow, disciplined path to try to “catch” up with everyone else.
Especially when you’d rather not feel like you have to spend money, but rather spend because you enjoy the game already.
This should be at least partly addressed by the introduction of the new player ranks (50-26), now a year ago. New players are only paired up with other new players, unless you choose to skip these ranks in which case it’s your own choice to leave the safe entry area.
Of course, there will still be a difference between new players who immediately drop their creditcard on the game, and new players who spend less or nothing at all. There’s little Blizzard can do to change that, other than entirely changing the business model of the game (i.e. making it pay to play and give all cards as included in the price, or make purchases impossible for new players which would probably cost them a lot of sales)
I think Hearthstone needs starter decks that aren’t just Basic cards. The ones that have never been updated aren’t even using the good Basic cards. Sure, maybe it’s left up to the player to figure out what’s a “good” or “bad” Basic card, but you rarely have just Basic cards only for starting out, you want to try and use some cards you opened from packs in Classic and expansions. I guess Whizbang gives you a taste of that, but you can’t edit the decks.
These starter decks could be earned by reaching level 20 with a class, for example.
And it’s just inefficient to just be crafting all the commons/rares you are missing while trying out stuff for different classes: better you opened it in a pack so you don’t waste dust otherwise. Having a starting deck that has a bunch of decent commons/rares across the sets lessens that initial collection curve you get on trying to build that collection, that way you can focus on using your dust for epics/legendaries to enhance your decks.
Eg: something like this budget Token Druid would allow players to get into Druid.
Summary
Druid Starter Deck
Class: Druid
Format: Standard
Year of the Dragon
2x (1) Acornbearer
2x (1) Mecharoo
2x (2) Dreamway Guardians
2x (2) EVIL Cable Rat
2x (2) Power of the Wild
2x (3) BEEEES!!!
2x (3) Blessing of the Ancients
2x (3) Harvest Golem
2x (3) Microtech Controller
2x (3) Savage Roar
2x (4) Explodinator
2x (4) Replicating Menace
2x (4) Soul of the Forest
2x (4) Swipe
2x (8) The Forest’s Aid
AAECAZICAA9A/QL3A+YFigaY+wL2/QKJgAOMgAO0kQPDlAPOlAPKnAPTnAOvogMA
To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone
I have played with a lot less when I was starting out (eg: put in classic cards like Argent Squire and Worgen Infiltrator), but having to spend months grinding for the first 40 packs from each set to fill in those rares/commons, all the while having to face all sorts of optimised decks that are more lenient on misplays: what % of players would really be able to get into and enjoy Hearthstone? I may have been able to, but I would consider myself part of a small minority.
It has been said before, but as a general rule, you can choose 2 of the 3:
- Have a broad collection
- Be highly competitive
- Play for free
Do you value being competitive? It is certainly possible to aggressively disenchant and manage your resources for free to get some powerful decks, but your overall collection will be quite narrow and vulnerable to meta changes.
Do you value having a nice collection? You can open packs that get you cards from all classes, but your decks will likely lack consistency and synergy that could make a deck more fun to play. This can be somewhat mitigated by “getting better” at the game and using budget substitutions but this won’t suit everyone.
Paying will allow you to stay relatively competitive while also having a broad collection and minimise the need to aggressively disenchant, but it doesn’t guarantee it. You can be “pay-to-win” and be unable to reach Rank 15.
These are just some thoughts: Hearthstone appeals to casual players, but the in-game economy does not reflect that very well at all.
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Misender, did you ever use others’ decks that were specifically constructed to be budget decks that were described as capable of reaching rank 5 or even legend?
I am asking because I avoided netdecks out of the desire to build my own decks. But when I tried budget decks, they were more successful than my decks, were therefore more fun, and the best part was they made completing “win X games” quests much less stressful.
And i’m wondering if new players know that budget decks can be fun/successful.
So I went on EU, the account is sitting back at Rank 20. Played 3 games.
The first one, vs a Warrior, was actually the most difficult because the Paladin deck I built isn’t that strong at all. It was a Murloc/Mech Hybrid which I didn’t really put much thought into, but just with an eye towards completing a daily quest. Turns out they had Brawl and I was pretty much running out of steam until I topdecked… SN1P-SN4P. In the context of both decks, the card felt like cheating. The Warrior was already at low health but they couldn’t clear all the SN1P-SN4P minions of course.
While of course, SN1P-SN4P in more refined decks is nothing super spectacular but just a good card.
I then switched to my Pleb Token Druid I’ve had since RoS and haven’t modified. I noticed a case of players who didn’t really know what they were doing, playing out minions at the wrong times for whatever reason (Turn 2 Pyro, and not saving it?). For me, playing out cheap minions and making the odd trade is more than enough.
Just in case anyone might want an idea to complete some quests with Druid and not much of a collection.
Summary
Pleb Token
Class: Druid
Format: Standard
Year of the Dragon
2x (1) Acornbearer (RoS, common)
2x (1) Argent Squire (Classic, common)
2x (1) Elven Archer (Basic)
1x (1) Mecharoo (Boomsday, common)
2x (2) Acidic Swamp Ooze (Basic)
2x (2) Dire Wolf Alpha (Classic, common)
1x (2) EVIL Cable Rat (RoS, common)
1x (2) Hench-Clan Hogsteed (RoS, common)
1x (2) Knife Juggler (Classic, rare)
1x (2) Loot Hoarder (Classic, common)
1x (2) Power of the Wild (Classic, common)
1x (3) Blessing of the Ancients (RoS, common)
1x (3) Landscaping (Boomsday, common)
2x (3) Microtech Controller (Boomsday, common)
2x (3) Savage Roar (Basic)
1x (4) Cult Master (Classic, common)
1x (4) Soul of the Forest (Classic, common)
2x (4) Swipe (Basic)
1x (5) Force of Nature (Classic, epic)
1x (6) Tending Tauren (Boomsday, rare)
2x (8) The Forest’s Aid (RoS, rare)
AAECAZICDPsB/QLtA/cDqwaxCN/7AuH7Avb9ArSRA8OUA8edAwlAhQPmBfUFigfZB4yAA86UA9OcAwA=
To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone
Just 1 epic in that deck, which honestly is replaceable with something else in your collection and the rest is common rare. The deck can be refined to be more consistent as you acquire more cards, but has got me to Rank 14 at least in the past. This might mean nothing to the competitive player, but for the casual, it’s a path to learning the game.
Early in the season or expansion might be difficult, but later in the season, it’s very much possible.
You was stupid enough to rush into competetive modes instead of practicing with a bot. You deserved your suffering.
It’ll be dead when the servers go offline permanently. Otherwise, I’m getting matches every minute. It’s far from dead. Don’t listen to those people, as they say that stuff usually when they’re on tilt or jaded from one aspect of the game.
To be honest, I made a fairly basic deck (Mixture Basic and Classic) and while this was only casual mode, I had a few quite surprising wins. Don’t underestimate the beginner set of cards.
Last tip: Save up 1600 dust from packs you buy with gold and craft Whizbang the Wonderful or Zayle, Cloak of Shadows (need to be Rank 25 though) and they give you a random deck each time you play but fairly good competitive ones.
The hardcore players that espouse netdecks don’t seem to see the basic flaw in their perfect argument - in that it will alienate anyone who doesn’t want to play a game paint by numbers.
Which I guess is the majority.
I am sure that most new players would come to the game with an open mind to build a deck of their own and compete, being the fun of creating and using it to beat your opponent with flexible skill.
And which that will quickly become apparent that it doesn’t work.
Which means that there is huge churn of ‘innovative’ players and the tiny minority left are going to be rote players.
Not really sure how anyone can promote strategies in a game where mind numbing, copy and paste mechanics are considered how new players should survive and stay around long enough to evolve.
I didn’t intend to my comments to be read as discouraging players, even new players , to not craft their own decks.
I was addressing the part where OP wanted to have “a chance at winning” while building their card collection. Budget netdecks can fill that need without draining their resources for their main decks.
For classes that I didn’t use in ranked, I saw budget netdecks as an opportunity to have the basics of a deck without having a deck solved for me. I would challenge myself to maintain the performance of a budget netdeck, while bringing in the cards that I wanted to experiment with.
And I was genuinely wondering whether OP used budget netdecks and found them useful to relieve boredom of playing limited classes or frustration with losing, because I did.
Even if you’re not a new player, but a returning player who hadn’t played the last 5 expansions is difficult. I’ve looked at guides and tried budgeting, but I still lose. Reminds me why I quit, in the first place. Only thing that’s enjoyable is the Innkeeper, yet the XP is really slow.