This is not “Nerf this because I hate it” thread, but rather opening the thought whether or not cost-reduction of cards be capped to 1? In other words, if this rule took place, it’d meant no cards could be reduced down to 0 mana and essentially be free.
It seems like a lot of spell-related meta in both standard and wild have it that players can freely reduce their spells to reduce down to 0 costs and then be able to pull off essentially free big spells and still have room for more stuff. This even leads to 1TK decks like Spell-Damage Mozaki and in some cases, Raza-Priest.
My thought is that all cards would no longer be able to be dropped down below 1. So essentially, every card would always cost at least 1 mana. We have seen this done before with Echo cards, such as with Sn1p-Sn4p, which before could be reduced to 0 costs under the right conditions and stick endlessly stuck to a machine monster, thereby creating a mega monster that can swat your opponent down in one hit.
This would hit mages hard, with Sorcerrer’s Apprentice and Incanter’s Flow. But this would be to prevent further abuse with all classes in the future too.
That being said, I can see some exceptions to the rule. For example, Y’sharrj Rage Unbound can keep his effect since it only works for the turn you used it and you have to have used Corrupted cards in the first place. Another example are the “Studies” cards, as they only reduce the next spell you cast and not future ones.
On the opposite side, we could also see a cap to mana increase to 10, so no card would become completly unplayable (such as if you attacked a Hunter with a lv.9 monster and then got it bounced back with Freezing Trap).
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Good news you solve how Fix Mage, Warlock, Priest and Rouge but I feel Coast down classes will try rip this idea apart
this how it should of been long ago (would save devs a lot time nerfing Mage, Warlock, Priest and Rouge)
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I think cards should not be able to be reduced to 0. Cards that are 0 already are fine because those spell effects are already set to be reasonable for the cost of 0 mana. But, I for sure think spells that cost more than 0 should not be able to be reduced to 0. For one thing, it’s not logical because spells can’t cost 0 mana. Mana is supposed to be the energy or essence that causes the spell. How can a spell happen using 0 of it? The second reason being that it creates unexpected advantages that are too strong for the mana cost.
Yeah, that I was thinking. Most cards who already cost 0 are small monsters or something not game-breaking. The new rule would just make it so all cost-reduction stops at one mana (And oppositely increases stop at 10).
A big thing I think the devs didn’t see or think fully on were twin spells or cards that add the deathrattle “return to your hand”. It basically can lead to card-generation abuse.
If this rule was to be played, it wouldn’t completely shut down a lot of decks that use cost reduction (Like libram paladin or Mozaki mage), just break their meta. For example, a Mozaki mage could still get their spell damage boost and finish off an opponent’s health; it would just mean they couldn’t cast more than 10 spells at the most in a turn and be more likely to finish off an already weakened player rather than be a otk.
I stated in the very first season with backstab that the game should NEVER have 0 cost cards.
A cap of minimum 1 well i would say it still depends,you definitely should NEVER be casting a 6/6 taunt for 0 or filling a board with 8/8 taunts for what is it 8 mana 9 mana?
The power curve of the game got way out of hand,the team could not control themselves creating cards and likely to encourage new release sales.
That will ALWAYS be a problem with p2w designs,you need to encourage spending on NEW cards or players simply won’t and remain using whatever broken cards still remain.So to outdo those the team creates even more broken cards.
Another example Dragonqueen Alexstraza should not be giving 2 free dragons.Instead we should stop the LAZY coding and have REDucTION costs based on the true value.So for example Dragonqueen reduces the cost of 2 dragons by 2 or 3 but never going below 1.So if yo uget 2 9 drops perhaps they are reduced to 6 or 7 drops,that would be FAIR unlike the 0 cost we see now.
Backstab has the drawback of only working on undamaged minions though.
The only thing with Dragonqueen is she gives two random dragons and no specific ones. She’s as likely to give you Deathwing as much as she can Fairie Dragon. Plus as a 9-cost mana monster, you can only use one of those dragons in the same turn. There’s also the fact you need your deck to be free of doubles, and that means specifically setting your deck to be that way when you play her (Not to mention it can be stopped by bomb warrior or Seagull in wild).
The problem with cost reduction is when a player can just generate dozens of cards in one turn for little to no mana, such as OTK Mozaki. By forcing a hard cap on the cost reduction of cards, the most a player can use in a single turn even with cost reductions would be 10 whole cards, not counting actual zero costs cards that start out as 0 to begin with.
only case by case a blanket nerf to all cards feels like a terrible idea to me
The idea is here that all mana-cost reductions as a whole get capped at 1. That’s easier than changing up dozens of cards and also prevents abuse in the future.
Let me give you an example of how this would work. Say a mage uses Incantor’s Flow and then puts out a Sorcerer’s Apprentice. They then play Ray of Frost. Now under current conditions, Ray of Frost is now 0-mana and they can cast it twice because its a twinspell. So they can freeze either two minions or do two damage to a minion for the cost of nothing. And this gets even worse if they have two ray of frosts in their hand.
Now with this hypothetical rule in place, Ray of Frost is capped at 1 mana. They can still use it, but it would cost two mana to use both twinspells in the same turn.
A smart enough player can still work out getting their huge spells, such as Fireballs, at the cost of 1. They could get Antonidas and have Sorcerrer’s Apprentice(s) to generate multiple fireballs to barrage the enemy player with. But under the new rules, each Fireball would still cost one mana each at the cap of cost reduction. They can still win that turn by using a single Fireball and continue chaining Fireballs, but would need to kill the enemy player before their mana runs dry.
hmm in that one id understand a nerf to apprentice but incanter flow is fine each incanter is only a 1 mana decrease and the spell have to be in deck so harder to use to discount generated spells in hand than apprentice
cards like incanter flow are the reason im so agaisnt blanket nerfs
That still doesn’t address the issue of other classes that can abuse it like priests with Palm Reading. This can be an even bigger problem when a priest can use palm reading to get another palm reading out. You can give some relief to that by changing it that discovery cards can’t discover themselves.
The point is its not just mages getting hit with the nerf bat; it’d be every class who can reduce the mana costs of their cards, regardless of spells or monsters. And its not stopping their strageties beyond being able to generate 20+ cards for 0-3 mana.
It should still not be free - my opinion anyway
Good news, this is a already been discussed over past YEARS.
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As I always say in discussions like this: cards original to the deck should be able to be reduced to 0, but other cards (copies, Discoveries, etc) shouldn’t be able to be reduced below 1, just like they did with Echo. However, 1 exception is fine and that’s cards that are originally 0-cost (like if you Discover a Desk Imp, it should of course still be 0).
No reduction cost should be a reduction of no more than 2.We are seeing 6/7/8/9 cost cards played for 0 which is just wrong and turning the game sour.
An 8 cost could reduce to 6 i am ok with that or a 5 to 3 etc etc.