I fail to see how in the current Meta Mage is the class out of all the other classes (11 total) that is the most capable to reguarly get 30+ armor. Traditioanlly we’ve always seen Druid and Warrior do this but in the current Meta it’s just Mage. Yes Warrior can do it, but they can’t do it with reguarlly consistancy as Mage currently can. I would like to understand how the developers thought this was the right pathway/move to give this class the ability to reguarlly get 30+ armor.
What other meta/expansion have we seen this? Is this basically well we removed Ice Block so let’s just give Mage the most armor? Is that the logic here?
I don’t agree with you here because in my earlier statement we have and had precidence* years and expansions of it and then all of a sudden a drastic change. What you speak about doesn’t have nearly the amont of presidence of what I’m talking about here.
I mean do I really need to say this but ummm Druid and Warrior are the only two classes that have Hero Powers that actually produce armor? Do i really need to go on further to tell you the history here thoughout each expansion from the original on how that armor gain has evolved for both Druid and Warrior? and now for some reason Mage surpases both of them?
The thing is that Protoss Mage doesn’t have a lot of board prescence, and relies on spells to stay alive (and power up Colossus) until it can drop Colossus (twice if necessary) for game. Shield Battery exists purely to help with that.
Its a spell heavy deck, so Arcane Artificer works very well. Ice Block really isn’t that good, and that’s been around for ever.
The only armour generating card that leaves is Sleet Skater, which not only gains armour, it also stops a big minion from attacking. That would be nice enough, but using the mini version to do it all over again for just 1 mana does seem a little much.
Of course, you don’t have to play Protoss to get value from Artificer and Sleet Skater.
Well druid / warrior certainly have more class cards that allow for much higher armor generation (outside of fringe sleet skater scenarios).. so the answer to your questions is there arent really any good ways to leverage armor gain in either druid / warrior presently while shield battery being a protoss spell fits into the colossus otk gameplan. If there was still odin in standard warrior would still be the king of stacking armor .. but since theres no real good warrior stall decks and no warrior decks that leverage armor (outside of getting 5 for part scrapper) thats why you see mage as the big armor gain class.. because they’re the only one with a deck that wants an armor gain card.
Sure, but mage also doesn’t have lifesteal cards. They’ve always focused on armor gain as their recovery (ice barrier, artificer, deepwater evoker, cold case…)
Mage has always had a spattering of armor gain. They don’t have anywhere near the highest armor potential unless you are doing things like summoning khelos to get frozen by sleet skater repeatedly.
Even though Arkonite defense crystal is a neutral, other classes can loop that for armor gain way more effectively than mage.
Armor has been a thing for Mage since the beginning. Is the concern just that it’s more than Druid or Warrior usually get atm or that the amount is too much (regardless of which class has it)?
Most original class cards have been power crept or nerfed. Taking inspiration from previous cards is a cornerstone of the genre.
I don’t think that’s what he was saying, though I could be wrong. Regardless, it’s a pretty trivial line imo. Is there really a big thematic difference between casting a Water Elemental and casting a spell that summons a Water Elemental? Spells and minions are still tied to their class and do similar things. It’s only natural to expand on mechanics over time and develop new ways to try and keep them fresh.
I say there is, for the fact that mages are casters, not sword wielders. Like I touched on earlier: In Wow, Mage Warlock and Priest all wear cloth.
Evolution is natural and desreable, yes, but continuity is equally important in a game where the structure is what made it engaging and diverse.
Casters, weapons users, and combinations fighters: (Which should be capable of many things, but not the best at any one thing). These are the rules that were created with the game, and the demolition of those rules is the reason that the game has, imo, become increasingly stale.
What possible attraction is there in a game where every single class can do every single thing, and the only variables are RNG and draw?
So someone managed to make a hostage mage deck in standard. Absolutely bonkers. I finally conceded after 22 straight turns of blizzard via a permanent copy of projection orb they were able to generate.
More to the point of this thread, they also had well over 100 armor at that point as well.
What I’m saying is that what were the reasons to remove Ice Block? how was the gameplay when Ice Block was around? How was that Meta? Since removing Ice Block and giving mage 30+ armor (No other class is gaining 30+ as easily as mage currently) how is the gameplay any different from when we had Ice Block…. Because I simply don’t see it might as well just put Ice Block back in.
Mages don’t wear actual armour, but they do cast spells that give them magical armour. At least that’s the way I think of it. It also explains why you can start a battle without armour but “magically” generate it.
Also, how does warrior get extra armour from his hero power? Does he just dig some random piece of armour from his backpack and equip it? And if so, why not do that before the battle starts?
Everytime I hear about Sleet Skater I can’t help but to go back to posts like this
Where it contains a thread inside that thread where people insisted Sleet Skater wasn’t as good as I was insisting it was. And when I called them out on it, they doubled down. And then I called them out again, and they continued to insist I was wrong.
And here we are, again, another thread about how good Mage armor is with this card.
This card is amazing and has been since it was first revealed and people still won’t admit it.
I never said it was a bad card it’s a crazy good card on par with Ice Block but at the same token if you’re going to create a card like that, then why remove ice block as it was from the original collection.