The frequency of expansions

Community Discussion
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Is it just me who think the expansions are to many and close between? I understand there are players playing this game day in and day out, who obviously dont think so. But the casuals, like me, like my girlfriend, cant quite keep up with all the cards added, so much so that one of us has completelly lost interest in this game.

I think this is a shame. I struggle to see the need for an expansion every 4 months or so. And what did blizzard do? Wasnt enough obviously, they added mini releases in between there aswell. I struggle to see the thought behind this.

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I have to agree. Too many cards are being put out. Blizz should slow it down a notch.

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Too many cards and yet only a small % of them sees play in their whole standard time.

Quantity over quality at its finest; but still better than the alternative no quantity and no quality

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I think three per year is perfect. Four would be too many and two would be too little. If they slowed down, more paying people would leave, because of stale metas, and the game would just fizzle out. It takes me about two months to get my fill of the meta, and start getting bored, AKA achievement hunting, lol…
Short version, game designers don’t design games around casuals, that is why they are called casuals, lol…

A lot of the cards are made for other modes other than Standard. If Arena didn’t have those cards, it would be a choose your own meta deck…

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It is all about how much those groups of players spend. If you play a couple times a month but spend nothing, then you are the small filler base of casual players. You are free but the design is not catered to you.

The small end of the player base are the regular spenders and they make up a small portion but big revenue. These players play a lot and expect a number of things like play style changes, big reversals (versus incremental gain), and if not balance, then frequent power shifts so one oppressive deck or playstyle isn’t king for long.

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I can see why someone would feel pressured to keep up if don’t play this game a lot, but I’m happy with it.

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The easiest way to cover up your shoddy work is to offer something new and shiny (though still likely crap). Some gullible fish will jump and spend money to be ahead at the newest shoddy version. Once people start to realize the new generation is half baked @ss you need to distract again and throw out new shinier distractions. Duration shortens as spending slacks. Sadly just a spiral of sh1t

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Believe it or not, this sentiment has existed since 624 BC (and possibly longer).

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I am superior to later generations.

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Totally dissagree. I as a paying player, paid premium for expansions before expansions became mundane. I dont anymore. Its exactly as people has pointed out… Quantity over quality… I have stopped paying for it. I miss the quality behind each expansion. Now its just a card toss. Where “Wild” is turned into a dumpster for any old new release… No quality what so ever.

Standard Diamond 9 atm. Used to pay. Dont anymore.

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seems like a bad idea because what people often call quality …are just competitive cards

and i love the meme cards we get for fun decks and people who want less cards always want less fun cards for casual players!!!

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Internal data probably suggests they hit the best interval in which to release expansions.

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It’s ok to disagree, we’re all on different paths of life, and I’m not only responding to you, but others that may read the post, and I was in the mood to write.

I feel like a parrot on here… “SQUAAAAKKKKK! 94¢ per day! 94¢ per day! Polly Wanna cracker!” But all jokes aside, well a little, there is more…

I eyeroll a bit when I see the word premium. By my math, it’s 94¢ per day to have the whole collection, day 1 each expansion, for the whole year. It feels like things are getting more expensive, but really it’s the value of the dollar that is dropping, thanks to the powers that be…

I’m in marketing, and like @Killuminati said, I’m sure their internal data suggests 3/year, with mini sets, and nerfs equal the perfect pace to keep paying players engaged. FTP is only to get people in the door. I’m not saying they don’t care about the FTP people, just that these decisions are primarily to keep paying people engaged…

Imagine owning a board game store… We’ll call it “Steve’s You Better Not Put Another Orc, Be More Original, Board Game Store.” The only way these places stay in business is having game nights, where people come to play said board game, and talk about other board games. You can think of the FTP being the game nights. Well, Steve isn’t going to keep his doors open very long if people come only to game nights, and never walk out with one themselves, so he has to sell his games at a rate a customer is willing to pay, and make enough money to pay the bills. He also has to find the perfect schedule to keep people engaged. Steve decides to rotate in/introduce a new top selling larger board game, like Betrayal at House on the Hill, every 4 months, and a mini game, like Sushi Go!, every 2 months, “That actually sounds really good…” The juice is only worth the squeeze if it gets more people in the door, who pay for games, because the broke people, who he also loves, don’t pay the bills.

Before I get bombarded by the normies, I agree, that the game could be better, I’m not saying that Blizzard isn’t on the greedy side, but since we know how much money they make, we expect nothing less than perfection, I get that, but more from games like Diablo, StarCraft, Overwatch, WOW, etc… Hearthstone is a card game, and really, other than some crazy balance issues, which they’ve been better at squelching, I can’t think of a lot they could do better, maybe a couple things, seen below…

Give Classic Mode a ride. The quality is there, like you described, with more balanced decisions, and less RNG. I’ve been playing the mode to pop some achievements, because I’m a masochist, and it’s dull as F’. It would be ok if it’s new to you, and you missed the experience, but it isn’t fun.

I love Wild, but it was always going to turn into a crazy OP unbalanced mess. You have to find your fun. I enjoy watching Roffle, and MarkMcKz come up with wacky combos, and trying them myself. It would be fun if they added some type of filter, like you get to nerf 1 card, and/or a hero not to play against. Maybe they could rotate cards in and out once a month, to shake up the meta. These things take a massive amount of forethought. If it was easy, Hearthstone would have more competition…

I don’t see success in climbing the ladder, I have to be in a competitive mood to play that way, and I end up getting angry once I hit diamond. So if you’re that type of player, I understand the frustration. I think MMR should be used to a point, maybe gold or platinum, but after that you should only play people at the same level, then once you hit Legend the MMR takes over again. I used to think I wasn’t that good, but when I hosted Fireside Gatherings I found I stomped most people and there were only a couple people who’d come that I enjoyed playing against. I miss those days…

A little about myself, to save you some time reading past posts, and since you shared your street cred, but it doesn’t really matter…
I’ve been playing almost daily since 2014, have every card, 63,200 gold, 267 unopened packs, “because why, I have every card,” 33,920 achievement score, and 13,525 ranked wins. I only play fun decks now, or achievement hunt. Climbing the ladder is irritating, because I like control decks, which take longer to climb, almost always get nuked when one is good, and I can’t stand playing aggro decks. Basically I find my fun…

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Bli$$ard figured out a way to print more cards so people spend more MONEY.

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Can you show your math on getting a full collection at 94c per day?

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It’s in past posts of mine, shouldn’t be hard to find. That is of course once you are all caught up, so cost per expansion, I’m not crafting past cards. You’ll still have to throw money at the wall if you want everything, but you don’t need to have everything, and it would be even less than 94c… I enjoy not being in a box of what I can play…

Edit:
I had time to find and share the post of my method…

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Would be a nice argument, if not for the fact im a casual myself.

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I mostly buy just the pass and sometimes the pre-order depending on different factors. I think the amount of content is good now. You can buy the mini-sets for 2000 gold, which is very cheap and you can craft at least 2-3 good decks from each new expansion. I think that is a fair balance. If you want all the cards you have to open the wallet, nothing is free and their cosmetics suck big time so I don’t see too many people buying those.

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Think people missunderstood me. I actually dont care about the cost. Could cost 150-250 bucks an expansion for all i care. I just wish each one wasnt so frequent. Im casual, and i feel like there is an expansion or new mini release, or new cards around every corner.

There are just to many cards added, to frequently, wich negates the hype from the new cards, new expansions, new content added.

Iv gone allmost f2p, not quite, but i would pay premium if the hype, care behind each expansion came back. Now its just a spaghetti toss, to see what sticks i feel.

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Well, not everyone feels the same way as you. I personally get tired of cards very quickly. If there was like an expansion each 4 months I’d quit the game a lot more (I was doing that when we had less expansions per year). 3 months is like the maximum I can wait without new cards. Also I’m aware we have an expansion each 4 months, but the mini-sets while not having so many cards makes it so that you have to wait just 2 months between new cards.