Okay. So we know all about DoD release and how overpowered Gala Sham was and what that did to the Meta. Team 5 realizing the toxicity of Gala Sham quickly nerfed it to be in line with some of the other top decks (still insanely strong though).
This nerf caused the Meta to shift from a Sham and face hunter meta to a much healthier, more diverse Meta. This new meta consisted of Zoo Warlock, Gala Sham, many rogue variants, many warrior variants, and and Res priest.
The top of the Meta felt pretty diverse, but pally and mage were still left behind. Then everyone started complaining about Pack Spirit, Scion of Ruin, Apothecary, Ancharr, and Fiendish Rites (lol?).
The devs actually listened to the community and nerfed all these cards.
Now the Meta is garbage again except now with Rogue instead of Gala Sham. This is why the devs shouldn’t listen to the community as a whole (though some you actually do have good ideas and opinions).
The devs should of never listened to the community and thats on them, but some of you guys need to chill. Y’all just react emotionally to losing games and act like yall know whats best for the game when you don’t.
Honestly we deserve this garbage meta for complaining about a one that was actually decent.
I guess its more like the devs screwed it by avoiding any play testing in pre release state. So now they are trying to make nerf there, hotfix there and see how it would work.
I guess it shoudnt be “Devs should never listen to the community” but more likely “Devs should hire a competent test team that would test things profesionaly on some solid scale”
I agree, the devs need to do a better job on testing expansions before they release, but they also did fix gala sham pretty quickly so atleast give the some credit for that. Also we don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes, maybe activision isn’t allocating tons of resources to the HS team and giving them strict deadlines.
To be honest - gala shaman was considered OP even before the expansion was released. Its not something surprising or overlooked interaction they have missed. It was pure “I dont give a damn, just relase it” attitude.
So no - I do not think we should give them credit for that.
And yea, maybe there is not enough man power for proper play testing. Though if you charge 100 EUR for expansion, I guess you should provide proper services.
We can always hope. And the disappointments would give us a reson to drink. Win-win.
Maybe I’m getting all conspiracy theorist but why do you think Galakrond Shaman was the last card of the expansion iirc to be shown off before release? I think because with even their limited play testing they knew it was going to be game breaking. I didn’t know how broken it was going to be but seeing Dragon’s Pack, Invocation of Frost, and the tier 3 Galakrond Shaman, and corrupt elementalist at 5 mana. You could tell that it wasn’t going to be bad at least.
I first had my suscpicion that they weren’t willing to show off the Shaman Galakrond until the last day because it was going to be incredibly weak and they didn’t want to upset anyone. But then I saw that you could get two 8/8s with rush and the curve on the deck getting to upgraded Dragon’s pack and +3 +3… I thought “meh it has to be pretty good depending on the meta that forms.”
And then it was so powerful they felt the need to beat it to death again and again and now Rogue and Warrior reigns supreme.
The nerfs didnt happen exactly cause the community asked for them (although yes, the community was dumb enough to ask for them). The nerfs came cause we are living in a Hearthstone testing period and T5 s trying to find out what works better:
The community asked for buffed cards. Lets try it
The community asked for wild cards return. Lets try it
The community asked for more frequent nerfs. Lets try it
The community asked for adventures with cards. Lets try it.
Therefore T5 s trying new things, receiving feedback and whatever works in the best way is probably gonna be kept.
That said though, and while each and every change s core idea was actually smart to try, with only exception being the buffed cards, every but every other change they did was implemented realyyyyy poorly and with no extra thought.
Return of the wild cards? Lets throw evolve into it (probably untested or maybe even tested)
More frequent balance changes? Lets have a different meta/ week
Return of the adventures with cards system? Cool, lets create a mediocre solo mode, add 1-3 good cards just for the shake of buying the adventure and fill the rest 90% of cards that wont see play.
Therefore im not sure if the feedback they re getting is right or wrong, simply cause its one of these changes was implemented poorly.
I think the meta is wayyyy bettere right now than at the release. its way more balanced, and diverse. the deck that were op are still viable and strong , and other deck have managed to get decent WR enough to be competitive.
If the devs didn’t listen to the community, they wouldn’t have found out about Reckless Experimenter + Sn1P-Sn4P interaction.
An interaction that normal players spotted immediately within a few minutes of the release of the card that the devs themselves couldn’t spot half a year in the making.
The day DoD was released playing Priest’s galakrond was enough to disconnect your opponent. The animation itself literally overloaded the client and broke something in the connection. How much play testing could they possibly have done to miss something that blatently obvious? Galakrond is the flagship centerpiece of the expansion, and simply playing him caused a client crash. Mill over that one for a while before you go kissing up to the devs. They don’t read the forms anyway so it’s not like they’ll know.
I think it just got out off proportion so fast in terms of backslash that they decided to pretend they didn’t.
Like…
The day I believe devs did not even see something like that I going out of the game just because it would mean that a 10 year old child would do a better job at this game design.