Yes, this is a QQ thread.
Been playing ranked in Standard since Hearthstone’s launch, got to Legend multiple (10+) times.
Current meta is broken in a way that is hard for me to understand.
Specifically, two decks:
- King Plush / Imbue Hunter
- Zarimi / Dragon Priest
I’ve seen broken mechanics in the past, but I don’t recall having two extremely broken mechanics coexisting at the same time.
Blizzard has removed most charge minions from Standard. Leeroy made a comeback for a year or so but rotated again to Wild. Also, Blizzard rotated Rogue’s Vanish, and Sap I’m not sure about because they deemed the mechanic to be too overpowered, because they hate the class, or both.
But here we have King Plush, which combined with the imbued hero power can literally turn it into the best charge minion ever, which you can play almost for free, and it has something even much worse than Vanish built in.
This deck goes against everything Blizzard deemed unbalanced in past years.
This card was a bad idea (as was Quasar, but at least it required building a whole deck around it, and it didn’t have that high win rate).
Hunters can’t have both things at the same time: imbued hero power and King Plush.
I think the obvious solution is to nerf King Plush.
On the other hand: Zarimi Priest.
Playing an extra turn is a more unbalanced mechanic, because once you get the pieces of the combo, you win the match 99% of the time (pretty much an Exodia combo).
Playing an extra turn is pretty much the same thing as playing a whole board with charge minions; in fact, it is worse, because you are also playing battlecries and other effects.
So what the hell, Blizzard — what’s the big deal with your policy against charge minions if you have two decks with OTKs based on charge-like mechanics?
I’ve lost interest in the game while the meta has these two decks — something that hasn’t happened to me in years. I hope these two decks are addressed in the next balance patches.
3 Likes
Zarimi isn’t the win card for that deck, It’s Naralex. And because they need to play 8 dragons just to meet the free turn requirement they have to use their resources on said dragon and anything that can put their Exodia cards in hand, leaving you free to smash their face while they’re busy doing that.
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I never said Zarimi (the card) was the problem:
- It is a Exodia combo, it’s not one card, it’s the combo.
- Statistics from hsreplay clearly show that the most important card is Zarimi:
87.9% win rate when played vs Naralex 84.1%
So no, you are wrong. Zarimi is the most important card, but it must be played along with Naralex and the rest of the combo (Ysera, Briarspawn Drake, etc)
Also, you say “smash their face” like they didn’t have the tools to survive.
(Fly off the Shelves is also pretty broken)
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I suppose you can see Zarimi as the key card, but without Naralex and Ysera it doesn’t have that huge swing turn. It would be as before and have to rely on the Priest having a pre-existing decent board to finish off the opponent. Zarimi was in the game for months and wasn’t a huge issue…it is only now an issue precisely because of its enablers. Remove Naralex from the game and Zarimi will drop quickly. Sure, the percentages may say Zarimi is more important, but looking a bit deeper tells you otherwise.
i find it hard to believe theere are zarimi decks without naralex out there
and i won every single game i pulled it with rat so it has to be important for zarimi decks running it
give it a try build 2 zarimi decks one without naralex
and tell us which one wins more games
As I said, I never said Zarimi was the problematic card. Raiden said (that I said) that. The problem is the combo. (Naralex + Zarimi + Ysera + big dragons)
However, I do think that mechanics that let you play an aditional turn are a cancer to the game.
Gotta test the other side of that as well. Make a dragon priest deck that runs naralex but not Zarimi. What’s the more effective combo, Naralex into two briarthorns or managing to get a preexisting board and dropping Zarimi to secure the kill? Honestly, there might be a tempo play out there if you get 3+ of those 4/5 summon when drawn dragons to show up the same turn you summon Zarimi. Especially if you have a good way to turn your mana into damage on your next turn, like that new buff spell that’s coming.
Nah. The worst was when for 3 to 6 months to a year the warriors with Reno were going 40 minutes terrorizing every board-based deck until they used a Boomboss and laughed.
That said I was disappointed when Drunk Paladin wasn’t nerfed weeks ago because when I go Legend with a board I get bored of it.
I didn’t say worst ever. I said “in years”.
Reno Boomboss spam was 2023 and 2024.
Ok, so we should be fine then?
Thank you for your contribution.
This is actually one of the most balanced metas in some time.
lol, think you need to actually play standard. If this whole meta revolves around Dirty Rat then its a bad meta.
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Dirty rat is great when it pulls their win card…but that’s a rare chance.
Here’s how it can most likely go; you’re playing against Zarimi priest, you drop rat…and get 1 of the Briarspawns, good job, you just handed them a win
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Are you playing a turn 2 rat? I very rarely will ever drop rat unless I am confident in my ability to remove what he pulls.
Sure, hail Mary’s, to not immediately lose the next turn, happen. However, I wouldn’t describe trying and missing one of those as “handing them the win.” They already had the win, you just had a snowball’s chance of stopping it. Ratting on turn two when you aren’t prepared for pulling a 10 mana beat stick is something else entirely.
Nah. Rogue decks are clearly the best and the runnerups are max ~3 major archetypes. One of these days they have to tone down the top players’ tendency to want the rogue decks to be the best.
Sure they’re high APM so the best players are attracted to that alone because it produces high skill cap on its own, but that means just produce more high APM on other classes too.
Well…
They aren’t really wrong on doing what they do now. It is Just that they need to outright stop producing the other side of the equation.
Someone has to Tell the Guy that don’t understand How the game plays that his place isn’t in top legend until he learns.
And while they are doing a good job at that there are 2 things that need to be done:
-
Expand on decks that require more of the player and by preference with different skillsets on each class.
This has some issues but It is job of the Company to make players give the minimal respect to each other regardless of How they evolve.
This means that the APM maniac deserve equal as the seasoned Gambler type of player and any opnion that claim otherwise should be considered at minimal ofensive.
-
Nerf the bogeyman to no existence.
While they aren’t good in a competitive way their design desincintivize people from learning taking potential engagement away from the game in the long run.
Stuff like zarimi are as good as dead.
This isn’t about being competitive. Is about a card losing money in the long run. They should just kill It like the damm capitalists they are.
And since the deck isn’t really good. No one trying to compete in a serious way would Care even If It was deleted.