blizzard Ben Brode Leaves Blizzard

[ShadowerDerek 69]

1 hour ago, EDL666 said:

I have to disagree with you a lot about what Quests and Death Knights do now, they aren't unfun at all IMO, they make sure that the game will end soon-ish rather than way too long to care at all like very old control matches did and THAT is not fun at all. Therefore I think late game was much improved, not ruined.

This is something very, very controversial. Some people, especially pro players, think that Control Warrior mirror match is one of the most fun matchup to play because of all the decisions you have to make every turn - one mistake and you lose. Casual players usually like shorter matches because they can play more matches, so those OP late game cards are more beneficial to them because they literally force the game to end soon.

[Guest]

7 hours ago, ShadowerDerek said:

 

The decks I mentioned, Patron Warrior, Freeze Mage and Oil Rogue, aren't decks that everyone can play to legend. These are the classic examples of 'specialist decks' that even if its overall win rate is not that good, a skilled player can still achieve really good results with it.

Personally Patron Warrior was the most fun deck I ever played.
(And it was the first I played to Rank 5).
You didn't need tons of Legendaries or Epics (iirc there were 2 legendaries and 0 epic), but you needed some skill to play it.
It wasn't self evident which cards you played in which turn. 
It was amazingly strong in the right hands, but it was not a deck the opponent had no chance to play against.
It was not a "I complete the mage quest and if I have the correct cards in hand I can now do 100 damage" or some other OTK deck. 
You played the game - instead of just playing more or less every card you draw or just waiting until you have your OTK Combo in hand.
Yeah, best deck ever IMO.

Hearthstone got worse later on.

[positiv2 955]

On 24. 4. 2018 at 4:02 AM, EDL666 said:

I have to disagree with you a lot about what Quests and Death Knights do now, they aren't unfun at all IMO, they make sure that the game will end soon-ish rather than way too long to care at all like very old control matches did and THAT is not fun at all. Therefore I think late game was much improved, not ruined. I like having decisions to make and I like the game to stay short

This isn't the biggest problem with them; it's that the late game now revolves way too much around drawing and playing the DK hero earlier than your opponent due to their massive power level. N'Zoth, the Corruptor had a similar issue where mirrors were a lot about playing the old god soon enough, but unlike DK heroes, you needed a build-up for the card to work, along with being counterable, but neither is true for most DK heroes. C'Thun presented a similar problem as well, but that was offset by the requirement to include subpar minions and basically build the deck around the card, which isn't true for DK heroes either, as you can usually just slot them in, which was in no way a good idea for C'Thun. 

So, the problem is that you do not give up anything, and get a very strong, uncounterable effect for the rest of the game. What's more, it revolves a lot around drawing the card early enough, which isn't healthy either.

On 24. 4. 2018 at 4:02 AM, EDL666 said:

The best way I see this is by having cards like Shudderwock and/or card generation that make you think about how you need to play your turns to maximize your chance to win.

Does that not go for basically any single card in the game, but without the need to include unnecessary RNG, uninteractive, or otherwise annyoing effects?

On 24. 4. 2018 at 4:02 AM, EDL666 said:

People say that RNG is bad, I mostly disagree, depending on what kind of RNG, as I think that having a stable meta with every single game being the same is the most boring thing you can get.

Having RNG in card games is nearly unavoidable, and it is a healthy part of those. However, I am not talking about RNG itself, but the excess of thereof. That's where skill begins to matter less, and the game becomes less fun for people that want to win when they deserve to, and don't mind losing when the loss is caused by their own mistake.

On 24. 4. 2018 at 4:02 AM, EDL666 said:

As for the budget legend thing, I think you're only calculating dust and that this is a mistake. The game is much more generous now than it was and you gain a lot more for your time invested than you did back then, accelerating how fast you can obtain the dust to craft said budget decks.

Even if the speed of dust gain increased by, let's say, a half (though for perma-arena players such as myself, it has even dropped since those days), the cost of the decks has increased by way more than that. So, budget is not nearly as good for ladder as it used to be.

[EDL666 18]

18 hours ago, ShadowerDerek said:

I think you misunderstand what I mean 'skill' in Hearthstone.

Playing cards on curve isn't skill. Creating decks with on-curve cards isn't skill. Understanding how to properly play your decks, especially hard decks, is skill. Calculating the risk you can take and play to win with your odds is skill.

The decks I mentioned, Patron Warrior, Freeze Mage and Oil Rogue, aren't decks that everyone can play to legend. These are the classic examples of 'specialist decks' that even if its overall win rate is not that good, a skilled player can still achieve really good results with it. I encountered many 'drooling noobs' that use all of his Fireball and Frostbolt to clear my board when playing Freeze Mage, and mess up their combos when playing Oil Rogue and Patron Warrior. 

If you still don't understand what I mean, you might want to watch Hearthstone World Championship 2015.

Man, people nowadays don't know what Combo decks are, because Blizzard had been actively killing them.

I was watching, it was incredibly boring and every person had the same lineup. I didn't say that there wasn't skill involved with those decks and didn't imply that playing on-curve or building on-curve was skill. As I said, it's more subtle now. If every pro has about the same skill to pilot the same decks(which is a very reasonable assumption btw) then it basically only boils down to who draws better. Yeah, they have skill, but it doesn't matter and THAT is what I think is important.

[EDL666 18]

9 hours ago, positiv2 said:

This isn't the biggest problem with them; it's that the late game now revolves way too much around drawing and playing the DK hero earlier than your opponent due to their massive power level. N'Zoth, the Corruptor had a similar issue where mirrors were a lot about playing the old god soon enough, but unlike DK heroes, you needed a build-up for the card to work, along with being counterable, but neither is true for most DK heroes. C'Thun presented a similar problem as well, but that was offset by the requirement to include subpar minions and basically build the deck around the card, which isn't true for DK heroes either, as you can usually just slot them in, which was in no way a good idea for C'Thun. 

So, the problem is that you do not give up anything, and get a very strong, uncounterable effect for the rest of the game. What's more, it revolves a lot around drawing the card early enough, which isn't healthy either.

Does that not go for basically any single card in the game, but without the need to include unnecessary RNG, uninteractive, or otherwise effects?

Having RNG in card games is nearly unavoidable, and it is a healthy part of those. However, I am not talking about RNG itself, but the excess of thereof. That's where skill begins to matter less, and the game becomes less fun for people that want to win when they deserve to, and don't mind losing when the loss is caused by their own mistake.

Even if the speed of dust gain increased by, let's say, a half (though for perma-arena players such as myself, it has even dropped since those days), the cost of the decks has increased by way more than that. So, budget is not nearly as good for ladder as it used to be.

I don't see how drawing OP cards early is bad for a card game, this is basically just an aggro deck perfect curving you to death and it happens more often than you'd think because of how those decks are built. There are ways to have a better chance against them, that is what matters.

About the skill for card generation, no, it's not the same skill for other cards because they don't usually put you in different situations that might require you to play a lot differently that what your deck usually does in a given situation. There's a higher skill required. That is the point I think most people miss.

My stance on RNG is also about how much there is and I think that Hearthstone has a good balance, maybe a little too much, but it doesn't miss the perfect mark by a lot. Removing all RNG except card draw boils the game down to essentially ONLY luck because people can perfect their skill to the point where everyone knows how to play the best deck and the games only come down to who drew better(therefore making the game worse and making cards like Quests and Hero cards much more problematic)

For the dust, my stance was for budget decks, mostly for very casual players, that means you cannot factor in long play sessions in arena or the such. It mostly comes down to Daily quests, Tavern Brawl, login giveaways and other events. That has sped up considerably. I have been playing for a long time and have been able to make non-budget high legend decks 100% with F2P via my gold acquisition and Arena prowess, but I didn't consider that in my statement otherwise it'd be super biased that F2P is EZ PZ let's go LEGEND BOIZ!! But no, it's not very realistic to think that other players have as much no life as I have.

Edited April 24, 2018 by EDL666

[Zadina 923]

I should probably have followed up with another article for this, but Hamilton Chu has also left Blizzard the same day as Ben Brode. Assumedly they will be working together.

Hamilton Chu was more active in public (aka he gave interviews) in the first year of Hearthstone, but then he just faded into the background. He was responsible for strategic planning and operations in both Hearthstone and WoW.

[positiv2 955]

6 hours ago, EDL666 said:

I don't see how drawing OP cards early is bad for a card game, this is basically just an aggro deck perfect curving you to death and it happens more often than you'd think because of how those decks are built. There are ways to have a better chance against them, that is what matters.

The best way to counter DK hero is to kill the opponent before they get to play it. That is one of the main reasons why we see so many aggro decks around, because there isn't really any point in playing control or fatigue decks if you do not run DK as well. There are DKs that are mostly okay, like the shaman DKs, as they require you to change the deck you are playing to have synergy with them. They are the power that is strong enough to definitely deserve an inclusion in many decks, but not to the extent to require the opponent to race the face or include a DK hero as well in order to win.

6 hours ago, EDL666 said:

About the skill for card generation, no, it's not the same skill for other cards because they don't usually put you in different situations that might require you to play a lot differently that what your deck usually does in a given situation. There's a higher skill required. That is the point I think most people miss.

Let's take for example two cards that have similar effects - Brawl and Enter the Coliseum. While you can simply slap Brawl on the board and have highly varying results due to the card being imbued with RNG. On the other hand, Enter the Coliseum has a similar way of clearing the board, but unlike Brawl, it requires actual setup to be made, which requires skill. 

As for discovers, they do require skill, but again, when my opponent gets two extra Tirions from the bloody turtle, it is not very fun, is it? Let's not forget Primordial Glyph, which is probably the worst of them all. 

6 hours ago, EDL666 said:

My stance on RNG is also about how much there is and I think that Hearthstone has a good balance, maybe a little too much, but it doesn't miss the perfect mark by a lot. Removing all RNG except card draw boils the game down to essentially ONLY luck because people can perfect their skill to the point where everyone knows how to play the best deck and the games only come down to who drew better(therefore making the game worse and making cards like Quests and Hero cards much more problematic)

The best example of skill-based game without RNG is in my opinion chess. You can try all you want to perfect your strategy, but winning 100% of the time is just not attainable. What does the game boil to? 

Hearthstone is not a solved game and will never be, not only due to card draw, but also due to the match-making system. Additionally, what I am saying that not all RNG should be removed, just a lot of it. Keeping some amount of it is healthy for the game, as you say, but right now, in equally skilled opponent mirrors, what wins the game is often RNG, and not whoever makes the first mistake. I have seen games where a player played basically flawlessly, but still ended up losing and vice versa. This is just bad and should not be happening.

[ShadowerDerek 69]

7 hours ago, EDL666 said:

I don't see how drawing OP cards early is bad for a card game, this is basically just an aggro deck perfect curving you to death and it happens more often than you'd think because of how those decks are built. There are ways to have a better chance against them, that is what matters.

About the skill for card generation, no, it's not the same skill for other cards because they don't usually put you in different situations that might require you to play a lot differently that what your deck usually does in a given situation. There's a higher skill required. That is the point I think most people miss.

If the whole meta/matchup is revolving around drawing an OP card before your opponent, then there's absolutely no skill involved: whoever has the luckier draw wins. 

If you think card generation mechanics make the game more skillful, then you might want to watch HWC 2016 Amnesiac VS Pavel -- aka the infamous Paveling Book. Can you say Amnesiac is not skillful enough to play around the Babling Book into Polymorph? No, right? Can you say that Pavel getting a Polymorph from Babling Book is skill? No, right?

RNG itself isn't the problem. But if RNG can single-handedly decide the result, THEN it's a problem, especially on an e-sport title, which Hearthstone has been actively promoted into.

[Caldyrvan 377]

Maybe you should split this thread into 2.

Some posts are related to Ben Brode leaving and how this affects HS, other posts are totally not and just a discussion about the game :D

One making a post, and they get longer and longer referring to one or both in a mix, not fun to read. At least for me.

[Fash 7]

Monster hunt will never truly distract me from his absence.

[Valks 2,407]

On 27/04/2018 at 4:46 AM, Fash said:

Monster hunt will never truly distract me from his absence.

It's doing a pretty good job so far, though. :D

[EDL666 18]

You guys didn't even try or ask what I meant if you did try and failed to understand what I meant. I don't see a point in trying to discuss this more. I conceded some of your points and said that I understood what you meant, but you just repeated them when I brought alternate points of view. Also very poor comparison with chess that absolutely doesn't apply to any card game that requires you to draw cards at random from a deck.

[positiv2 955]

15 hours ago, EDL666 said:

You guys didn't even try or ask what I meant if you did try and failed to understand what I meant.

The meaning of this sentence eludes me. Are you saying that if we tried and failed to understand, we did not even try in the first place?

15 hours ago, EDL666 said:

I brought alternate points of view.

From my point of view, what this mostly meant was that instead of 2+2=3, it was 2+2=5. That is why I often repeated and just reworded my points accordingly; I did not consider them countered.

15 hours ago, EDL666 said:

Also very poor comparison with chess that absolutely doesn't apply to any card game that requires you to draw cards at random from a deck.

I was not comparing a board game to a card game, but rather a complex game with nearly no RNG to a complex game with an abundance of it. You said that one could learn to play perfectly with the lack of RNG, but that is way more easily said than done, and is near impossible.

Come to think of it, that would actually be perfect in my opinion. You would need to play perfectly to win, and if two players with flawless strategy and such face each other, only then the game would be decided by RNG.

[EDL666 18]

On 5/5/2018 at 12:55 PM, positiv2 said:

The meaning of this sentence eludes me. Are you saying that if we tried and failed to understand, we did not even try in the first place?

I'm saying that you either didn't try or, when you tried and failed to understand what I meant, you didn't ask what I meant.

 

On 5/5/2018 at 12:55 PM, positiv2 said:

From my point of view, what this mostly meant was that instead of 2+2=3, it was 2+2=5. That is why I often repeated and just reworded my points accordingly; I did not consider them countered.

That is because I didn't counter them as I understand people have different opinions on what is better, I was trying to bring a different view, not necessarily a better one because I do not believe there is an objective "better" opinion on the matter. My goal was to make you understand that other view, not reject yours, you can keep that and are entitled to it.

 

On 5/5/2018 at 12:55 PM, positiv2 said:

I was not comparing a board game to a card game, but rather a complex game with nearly no RNG to a complex game with an abundance of it. You said that one could learn to play perfectly with the lack of RNG, but that is way more easily said than done, and is near impossible.

Yes, but I was staying in the context of a card game in which you know your deck and mostly know the opponent's deck. You can look at Yu-Gi-Oh! and MTG and how competitive games are rarely decided by skill and mostly by either one deck being super favored over the other or the luck of the draw. Skill doesn't actually factor in because both players are extremely skilled and play their deck almost perfectly. There is basically no RNG except card draw in those games and despite MTGs great success(that is mostly due to their very aggressive rotation and ban of OP cards from Standard), Yu-Gi-Oh! is distilled cancer with games ending in 5 turns or less from perfect combos(or lasting longer than that because both players got a crap hand).

 

On 5/5/2018 at 12:55 PM, positiv2 said:

Come to think of it, that would actually be perfect in my opinion. You would need to play perfectly to win, and if two players with flawless strategy and such face each other, only then the game would be decided by RNG.

 

That was exactly the point I was making and that would mean that eventually any competitive game would ONLY come down to RNG and never any skill actually showing. It would only seem like very OP cancer blizzard plz nerf decks are playable and the game would quickly become extremely stale. That is my take on it. If the game was like that, I would stop playing completely because it would be fun anymore. I said earlier that I do think there is too much RNG, but I do not think they missed the good balance by far. There are effect that are worse than others, like random pings(or random 8 dmg that's just worse). But I don't think that things like getting a bunch of cards from your opponent's class is bad for the game in any shape or form. It makes for a different kind of skill and forces the opponent to play against tools of their own class, and allows you to make the best of cards you otherwise wouldn't play like Snap Freeze.

But I'm tired of this discussion. Hopefully you got something of those last things I said along with what I said before, if not, I tried.