Let's look at class play rates before VS drops tomorrow

Multiplayer Discussion
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Since 5 days ago
All decks in Tier 1 and Tier 2 Diamond and Legend ranks combined:
Imp Warlock - 53,000 games
DR Rogue - 218,200 games
Evolve Shaman - 25,900 games
Pure Paladin - 42,000 games
Curse Imp Warlock - 30,400 games
Big Spell Mage - 26,600 games
Beast Hunter - 22,500 games
Spell DH - 83,800 games
Bless Priest - 22,000 games
Silver Hand Paladin - 15,700 games
Aggro Druid - 56,300 games
Control Priest - 53,300 games
Spooky Mage - 12,900 games
Quest DH - 91,100 games
Miracle Rogue - 118,400 games
Quest Priest - 21,200 games
Enrage Warrior - 9,400 games
Control Paladin - 15,000 games

That’s 917,700 games
Rogue is 336,600 of that…about 37% of that meta.
DH is 174,900 of that…about 19% of that meta.

Remember that classes before were nerfed when they were around 20% play rate. The play rate of Rogue is absolutely insane. I said about 4-5 days ago we’d be playing Roguestone and we are absolutely there. About 50% of your games will be facing Rogue or DH.

There’s no way Rogue does not get substantially nerfed coming out of this championship.

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As a said earlier, it’s the unfortunate truth that popularity is a massive metric for nerfs.

I agree to a degree because no one wants to play vs the same thing over and over again.

But it’s just sad that things people find enjoyable are more prone to nerfs than things people find boring. (and I mean people as “in average”, obviously different people like different things).

I just hope they don’t gut and make them completely unplayable as a lot of the suggestions here want to make them.

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It’s not just that it’s enjoyable though. It’s the 2nd best deck and it’s play rate JUST for that deck is sitting around 22% overall.

We’re not at 22% play rate for 1 class…with a new class introduced mind you. We’re at 22% for single deck…with 11 classes.

The combination of those 2 absolutely warrant nerfs.

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Thank god people did stop playing mage that much.

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Wild how a brand new class came out, with entirely unique mechanics and no one is playing it.

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Which is exactly why I think we’re going to be seeing nerfs and buffs. They can’t allow DK to be bad.

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I’m not saying it doesn’t.

I’m just making an observation that the way things are done the more enjoyable something is, the more nerfs it will receive.

Two equally good decks, one being played by 7% and one by 27% will be balanced differently.

And that fact is just sad, but facing the same thing all the time is also bad.

So not sure how it could be different.

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Class bans.

They have their own set of issues but solve that

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I agree. This is often an issue because the player base just swarms around a new deck because everything else feels “old”. This is especially so if the new deck is some archetype they haven’t seen before or in a very long time - much like DR Rogue.

The same thing happened with Casino Mage. People just would not stop playing it no matter how good or bad it was.

And you can’t have 30% of your player base just playing 1 deck because it makes the game really unbalanced and makes the classes/decks that 1 deck counters unbearable to play and no fun. So while 30% of the people might be having fun, what about the other 70%?

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People just play the most efficient deck to climb the ranks, instead of the deck they enjoy most.

Ranked system is just BS and ranked is why meta fails all the time, it should change.
They should introduce tournament mode.

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well to some degree, albeit i´d argue it´s mostly simplicity+strength that plays into current rogue popularity.
with the stuff people truly enjoy you can see them sporting 10%playrates even with tier 3 decks.
While with the difficultish decks like blesspriest you can see them getting results and still don´t become popular because people don´t want to invest the time not learning the deck or just have negative experience when they take it up and leave it be.

So i´d say the #1 reason for nerfs is fair, as it´s the combination of lowish skill floor and power.

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I know this is a hugely unpopular opinion right now; but I am not sure DR rogue needs a nerf as badly as people say. These playrates we are seeing are basically because it’s an archetype that feels fresh, it’s easy to play, it’s really good in terms of WR and it’s pretty fun. People like to play things that are fun and win games.

But it’s really not as broken as people say. Pretty much any priest destroys this deck and it can be outaggroed fast if it doesn’t get a good hand. It’s a T2 in legend right now (53% WR) due to bless priest being top tier, and WR is also going down on diamond (4th in terms of WR in diamond currently). All data from HS Replay right now.

It will probably get nerfed, but I think it’d be sensible to let the meta balance itself out a bit before we potentially find ourselves in March of the OTKing again

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Yeh I just destroyed a DR Rogue with Quest Priest because I run silence. I feel bad for any other deck not running some sort of silence because you just run into an Infectious Ghoul or Invincible with location brick wall where your attack phase decisions are almost meaningless.

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yeah, because priest has really strong aoe silence. With the neutral aoe silence neutered there´s little counterplay for many other classes.
So if you leave it be everyone will either play rogue, priest or quit.

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Agreed, although I think things like aggro Druid; while it’s not really very good overall, has a decent chance against DR rogue. Regardless, the point isn’t that every class should have good counterplay against it. The point is that as soon as more and more hard counters begin seeing more play, counters of counters will have more and more WR. That’s where the meta can slowly balance itself out and I don’t think we have reached a point where the meta is fully settled.

Then again, you all are right in saying the deck is too polarizing to many others so that in itself warrants a nerf. I am just saying I would like to see where the meta lands; because it hasn’t fully landed yet.

edit: besides, DR rogue has <50% WR against evolve shaman, most mage decks, aggro druid, implocks, frost DKs and every priest deck. That’s 6 classes with a viable deck against it, not counting rogues themselves.

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I feel like priest is currently underplayed, because it does smth very similar to Miracle rogue but is much harder to play. But it is REALLY strong and I fear the meta once people learn to play it #prayforradiantnerf

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Is DK bad or is the meta we are in farming it?

Isn’t DR rogue, ramp druid, and a couple of different DH among the worst match ups for DK?

I don’t feel like they are bad as much as they are being farmed by broken things.

I

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This assumes that CCG metagames are more than glorified paper rock scissors. Which they aren’t.

I can summarize pretty much every meta ever thusly:

  1. We have the Funsies. These are decks that do cool things, albeit sometimes “on rails” because it’s obvious that the designers intended those deck archetypes to exist. But they fall victim to…
  2. The Deck. This is usually some hybrid of designer intent like a Funsie deck plus some cards the designers didn’t anticipate being used in tandem. A great example would be DH just prior to Drekthar nerf during Sunken City. It just plays the game better than any other outwardly synergistic deck. But it loses to…
  3. The Custom Counters. These normally aren’t super fun or fit a theme, but they exist precisely because The Deck is popular. There’s normally a couple different versions, but they normally lose to the Funsies because they’re not tailored specifically to beat them. (Note that these counters are NOT always control — for example, in a meta where The Deck is combo and there are no tools like Theotar or Dirty Rat, you’re going to see a lot of aggro here, “controlling” the opponents combo by killing them before they can go off.)

Now I might be biased here, but the deck type I respect most is #3. (I think I personally get more enjoyment from, and am better at piloting, #1 when it leans towards combo, but I’m talking about deck building aesthetics here — I view building/tweaking combo decks as relatively straightforward bordering on boring.) So I personally find the meta more entertaining when there is a single Big Bad.

But perhaps more to the point, I think the model I give above, while not necessarily omnipresent, is at the very least inevitable. As I’ve said before, I see balance as an illusion, by which I don’t mean something nonexistent, but something that exists as an illusion exists — and which erodes over time as an illusion erodes. I think every meta, if it existed long enough, would eventually devolve into paper rock scissors, and that metagame positioning is basically knowing how popular the three types are.

So I don’t see things like 30% popularity as a sign that a meta is fundamentally broken or unfun. I see it as a sign that it’s partially solved. And I don’t think the answer to that is nerfs. I think the answer to that is buffs. New things, real alternatives. And as per usual, I say the only valid justification for nerf is winrate.

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Its honestly absurd that they let boon priest stick around so long…the best deck being one designed to create non-games and win based on matchup is so unhealthy

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Whats the playrate of the 3 most popular dk decks?

You did omit dk completely,probably because its tier 3 officially and you conveniently cut of at tier 2.
But since its the new class,the focus of this expanion,would it not be reasonable to include the playrate of dk decks?

Every class is represented besides for DK lol. Even warrior is in there.
How can you take a post serious that is this biased and manipulative in presenting information.