The following balance change will be made in an upcoming patch:
Warsong Commander now reads: Your Charge minions have +1 Attack.
Over the course of the short but impactful history of Hearthstone, we’ve taken a strong stance that we’d like to make changes to cards only when they are completely necessary. The direction of gameplay and the metagame should be defined by our players, and as the meta is evolving, many different types of decks can emerge. Cards that were once impactful in the meta can be less so once new strategies emerge, and that change is brought on by the constant need and drive for innovation by our players.
Innovation is just one way a game can evolve, and the best way to shake up the meta and innovate in Hearthstone is by introducing new cards into the game. Introducing new cards to Hearthstone is our preferred method of changing the current state of the game. It’s exciting to discover a deck that may have an advantage over a popular deck out there, and new cards lead to the discovery of new combinations, and new conversations. Hearthstone thrives off of stories about enjoying a fast-paced, fun game with friends that’s full of delightful surprises.
Going forward, we will continue to stand by our stance that we will only make adjustments to cards when we feel it is completely necessary and allow the injection of new cards into the game help our players define what the meta evolves into. In the case of Warsong Commander, we felt this change was necessary to help expand both future design space and to stand by our overarching game philosophy that battles between minions and fighting for board control is what makes Hearthstone fun and compelling.
Well, seems cool to see patron gone but the change itself its quite...meh. I mean it just follows path of starving buzzard (useless card). On the other hand why now? I feel like the deck itself was played less on both, ladder and tourneys while having lower win rate than before. It also was great counter to god damn secret paladins which i expect to increase numbers on ladder now :/.
On October 14 2015 02:17 alone wrote: Well, seems cool to see patron gone but the change itself its quite...meh. I mean it just follows path of starving buzzard (useless card). On the other hand why now? I feel like the deck itself was played less on both, ladder and tourneys while having lower win rate than before. It also was great counter to god damn secret paladins which i expect to increase numbers on ladder now :/.
I would rather see Patron Warrior get nerfed, see Secret Paladin become OP, and wait for that to get patched, than see 1 ridiculous deck being used to counter another. Long term health of the game is being considered here.
Wow, I'm excited to play ladder matches now that one of the most interesting decks to play with and against has been removed from the game, only to see mindless aggro replace it.
Not.
If they really wanted to "fix" the deck, just lower Frothing Berserker's health by 1. All the gross Patron Warrior plays were based around triple Whirlwind effects. Blizzard as skilled at balance as ever.
Oh, and to anyone thinking Secret Paladin is ever going to be patched... yeah fucking right.
Patron deck was rather cancer and also very draw-dependent so if they happened to have a good draw you just died without being able to do anything, while if they didn't draw Warsong Commanders or whatever they need you just won for free. It feels like no game is ever close vs Patron Warrior.
Still, the change's pretty bleh. I wish they had at least made the card something that might become useful down the road. And to be honest, I don't even hate playing vs Patron that much. Control Warrior with Justicar is the true cancer and even if you win against it, you need to spend an hour doing so.
By the way I agree with the above poster, lowering Frothing Berserker's health to 3 would make the deck far more manageable as the triple whirlwind effect combos are really the biggest problems(With only 2 its hard to kill you from full). It still wouldn't address the Patron clears with Patron + Warsong which invalidated tons of decks that play low health minions, Zoo for instance.
Also, I just had a Druid match where I practically oneshot the opponent with Thaurissan-reduced FoN FoN innervate Savage Roar. I really wish they would take a look at the druid combos, even if Patron combos are more powerful in ideal situations, Druid needs far less cards to perform his. Even before this nerf, Druid IMO was the #1 deck in Hearthstone, not Patron. See how many players don't bring a Druid to tournaments... 0?
Savage Roar is IMO the most powerful and versatile card in the entire game, by far. On the other hand, Warsong Commander is very niche that's only used in a single deck.
This is an ogre-like approach to balance. Either make it retardedly broken, or nerf it to oblivion and beyond. What was wrong about making the charge work with only creatures with less than 3 attack? This is not a nerf, this is more like murder.
Yeah, Combo Druid is definitely a problematic deck. Darnassus Aspirant really helps to demonstrate what was holding the deck back before: consistency. The issue with it is that a steady curve-out of one of their bulky minions each turn (Wild Growth into Shredder, Druid of the Claw, Sylvanas, Ancient of Lore, some combination of minions) allows them to just deal too much damage and establish too much board presence to withstand the eventual combo. It only takes one of their countless 4-attack minions to bump up the combo damage to 20, a pair to hit a ridiculous 26 total, and so on and so forth. Whether or not this will materialize is based entirely on the Druid's ability to start laying down those 4-mana plus minions and them drawing into the combo, which is totally based on luck. If Druid gets any more card draw attached to a body, the deck will actually be unbeatable. The solution is probably to just give FoN the Icehowl treatment, and maybe a fourth Treant to make up for it. Makes the card pretty excellent at clearing board (basically becomes Avenging Wrath Plus), and prevents the stupidity of the combo. Only problem there is that the deck and class might instantly hit Shaman tier.
And I'm saying this with Druid being my most-played class. This isn't just salt at losses; this is analysis of my own wins.
This should have been Blizzard's statement regarding the nerf:
"For too long, Patron Warrior has been near the top of the competitive scene. We feel that such a strong showing from this combo deck is unhealthy for the Hearthstone scene as a whole, and with this change, hope to revert to a more healthy metagame where Combo decks are brought back in line with Control decks- by which we mean that both types of deck will be nonexistent-, and ladder will be all Aggro all the time.
We take our commitment to ruining this game very seriously."
On October 14 2015 02:23 alone wrote: Dont get me wrong, im happy its getting nerfed but how is killing a deck completly healthy for a game?
Any idea when will the patch hit?
Killing a deck is healthy for the game when the deck in question was suppressing deck diversity and stagnating the meta.
I think the nerf to Commander may be a bit much, (+1, really?) but nerfing the deck that has been the uncontested top deck since early GvG is entirely sensible.
Edit: I meant to type BRM but failed utterly. Go me!
Introducing this right before Blizzcon's gonna really effect the tournament meta. People got into Blizzcon off the backs of Patron Warrior and its counter, Handlock (Druid remains relatively unaffected). Nerfing it right before Blizzcon's gonna make it awkward for players like Lifecoach who have been practicing it for months.
On October 14 2015 02:23 alone wrote: Dont get me wrong, im happy its getting nerfed but how is killing a deck completly healthy for a game?
Any idea when will the patch hit?
I think the nerf to Commander may be a bit much, (+1, really?) but nerfing the deck that has been the uncontested top deck since early GvG is entirely sensible.
Grim Patron and Thaurissan were released in Blackrock Mountain, which came out fully AFTER GvG.
Good thing, I don't like Patron Warrior at all. This nerf doesn't affect the Worgen OTK deck which is one of my favorite ones so that's cool, even if it's kind of the same style. What I don't like is that Warsong Commander will be completely shit, the impact is worse than on Starving Buzzard if we're talking about arena, and Warrior is already the worst class there.
Still cool to see them nerfing day 1 cards, knew it was gonna happen eventually as new cards are released.
On October 14 2015 02:23 alone wrote: Dont get me wrong, im happy its getting nerfed but how is killing a deck completly healthy for a game?
Any idea when will the patch hit?
Killing a deck is healthy for the game when the deck in question was suppressing deck diversity and stagnating the meta.
I think the nerf to Commander may be a bit much, (+1, really?) but nerfing the deck that has been the uncontested top deck since early GvG is entirely sensible.
Grim Patron wasn't even a card in early GvG. What are you talking about? Early GvG was Mech Mage and more Mech Mage. And what do you know, we still have a Mech Mage successor kicking about with Tempo Mage.
It was no Undertaker. The best Warsong-Patron combos couldn't kill you from full health without a Frothing Beserker. You'd often still have a turn to clear it. However, it's interesting that they listed limiting future design space as a consideration in the nerf. Hopefully they actually have some interesting designs in mind. In the meantime aggro and Handlock will go back to dominating.
Also, I completely agree with Shikyo about Savage Roar. Druid would be mid to low tier without that card alone. It's just on the right side of not being broken, but I find Druid as a class to be ridiculously boring because of it.
Stupid change. Few people were good enough to even play patron well, and even at the top level patron was on the decline. Beyond stupid to nerf an entire deck like this, especially when it is the most skilled deck in the game. Reminds me of how they killed miracle rogue and made the game that much more bland.
Warsong Commander was nerfed once : at game start it gave charge to any creature, which created decks (ab)using Molten Giand and Panda for an easy OTK
Since it was already nerfed once, it got the same treatment as Starving Buzzard : it they have to nerf a card a second time, this time it will be nerfed into oblivion.
Starving Buzzard, Gadgetzan Auctioneer, Undertaker, Warsong Commander : when they consider a card both too strong and unhealthy, they swig the nerfbat with great violence.
I wouldn't have mind Dr Balanced becoming 7/5 meanwhile.
On October 14 2015 03:19 StarMoon wrote: Damn, I'm not shocked to see patron nerfed a bit but holy crap they just completely removed one of the most interesting decks.
RIP patron specialists like Xixo and Lifecoach, gl finding a strong deck that rewards skill in casinostone.
they can switch to Oil Rogue, a deck that it is very complex, close to patron warrior but far more fragile
You know what was one of the best things about patron? It was VERY cheap to make, other than some adventures it was just a few rares and commons.
At the same time it was not easy to play, so it allowed someone to get into the game by studying it and playing well instead of spending a lot of money on packs.
Now that's gone; and its back to hunter and zoo for cheap effective decks. (yay....... -.-)
WTF.... Way way way too much, way too late. The change comes at least 3 MOTNTHS too late. But seriously, WTF is this? Patron Warrior is now completetely unplayable without any chance of revival. Patron was a cool deck, it was just a tad bit too strong. Why remove the deck from the game if you could just balance it a bit?
But once again they chose not to nerf but to effectively remove cards from the game. And not only for one card, but for 5 or so. Gnomish, Inner Rage, Frothing and Patron will most likely never see constructed play again. The card is now even worse than Starving Buzzard.
Just really glad I quit this crappy game a few weeks ago so I don't have to care too much. But still, this is so incredibly retarded that I get irrationally angry about a game I already quit.
Following the design philosophy of, "lets not nerf an op deck so its equal to other tier 1 decks, lets destroy the deck completely" making the effect an aura, so it doesn't forget Frothing Berserker, which would still make the deck good, with a high skill cap, just not the ridiculous op otk.
I mean, I'm glad Patrons will go away, but what kind of braindead nerf is this? Cuck me, fuck me, and buy me a nice seafood dinner- because this is the most backwards, senseless series of bullshit balancing I've seen out of our overlords in quite some time.
Overkill! But its not something new that they do such radical changes. See SC II. Instead of adjusting and balancing something they rather chicken their way out and nerf it to the ground. They do this a couple of years now with their games and its the wrong way.Why kill a whole Deck Archetype? (and maybe even more?) . I play games from Indie developers that are better at this.
I agree with the change, even with Warrior as my main class. Sure it is overkill to Warsong Commander but when you have pretty much only 3 deck choices if you want to move up the ladder it seems like a clear and easy move by Blizzard. Not game breaking imo, honestly it may bring about some more innovation in both competitive and ladder scenes.
So let's see. We'll probably see Control Warrior, Druid, Huntard and Secret Paladin the most. Tempo Mage should also see play... I'm predicting Handlock to die. Maybe we'll see Zoo, Patron was one of its strongest counters.
On October 14 2015 03:10 AssumedNewb wrote: Warsong Commander was nerfed once : at game start it gave charge to any creature, which created decks (ab)using Molten Giand and Panda for an easy OTK
Since it was already nerfed once, it got the same treatment as Starving Buzzard : it they have to nerf a card a second time, this time it will be nerfed into oblivion.
Starving Buzzard, Gadgetzan Auctioneer, Undertaker, Warsong Commander : when they consider a card both too strong and unhealthy, they swig the nerfbat with great violence.
I wouldn't have mind Dr Balanced becoming 7/5 meanwhile.
The one thing those cards (Buzzard, Gadgetzan, Undertaker, Warsong Commander) have in common is they have/had a powerful effect triggered by a certain class of cards (respectively; beasts, spells, deathrattle minions, minions with <=3 attack) which limited all such cards. Cheap spells indirectly make Gadgetzan stronger, so for example, introducing spare parts made Gadgetzan stronger because the spare parts became card draw.
Such cards are incredibly difficult (if not impossible) to make well-balanced, because they will often be critical components of decks that use them and so entire decks types can appear or disappear with even slight changes to the card, or a change can have no effect at all. And even if some semblance of balance has been reached, it will all change when new synergising cards are introduced.
(However, Dr. Boom has no such problems, it is individually a very strong card but it does not interact with a whole class of cards the same way. It is the opposite of the cards above. It fits into most decks as an after-thought, whereas the cards above are often designed around those cards.)
On October 14 2015 03:10 hunts wrote: Stupid change. Few people were good enough to even play patron well, and even at the top level patron was on the decline. Beyond stupid to nerf an entire deck like this, especially when it is the most skilled deck in the game. Reminds me of how they killed miracle rogue and made the game that much more bland.
I disagree. Nerfing miracle rogue made the game significantly more interesting. There was more new deck crafting and innovation the week after that nerf than there was with the last expansion release.
The blandest the game has ever been was the 3 months before the undertaker nerf. That is followed closely by the 3 months prior to this Grim Patron nerf. I do agree with many people that it is not the specific change I would have chosen, but the game will be unambiguously better for it. I'm really glad they decided to do something, and my true complaint is that I wish they wouldn't let the problems fester for so long.
What innovation and new deck crafting? By killing decks like patron and miracle rogue all they do is bring about the same old "boringly fight for board" in slightly different flavors of vanilla. I honestly believe the only reason HS is doing well at all is because they have no competition. If MTG were to make a good online client, and add the possibility of free or cheap to play like HS, I honestly believe HS would simply die due to blizzards stupid decision making and gigantic hard on for making things bland and simple.
Ben Brode said charge is the hardest mechanic to balance (being that you have to provide the tools - the reaction - in advance) so I understand the reason behind this severe change; they want to fix two problems at once. Get rid of the current patron's OTK and not have to deal with charge in the future anymore.
Starving Buzzard was much in the same vein - at the time it was very problematic and it limited future design. Ball of Spiders (okay, yes it's a bad card) probably wouldn't exist if Starving Buzzard was never changed. You have to think about the present and future.
On October 14 2015 03:10 AssumedNewb wrote: Warsong Commander was nerfed once : at game start it gave charge to any creature, which created decks (ab)using Molten Giand and Panda for an easy OTK
Since it was already nerfed once, it got the same treatment as Starving Buzzard : it they have to nerf a card a second time, this time it will be nerfed into oblivion.
Starving Buzzard, Gadgetzan Auctioneer, Undertaker, Warsong Commander : when they consider a card both too strong and unhealthy, they swig the nerfbat with great violence.
I wouldn't have mind Dr Balanced becoming 7/5 meanwhile.
The one thing those cards (Buzzard, Gadgetzan, Undertaker, Warsong Commander) have in common is they have/had a powerful effect triggered by a certain class of cards (respectively; beasts, spells, deathrattle minions, minions with <=3 attack) which limited all such cards. Cheap spells indirectly make Gadgetzan stronger, so for example, introducing spare parts made Gadgetzan stronger because the spare parts became card draw.
Such cards are incredibly difficult (if not impossible) to make well-balanced, because they will often be critical components of decks that use them and so entire decks types can appear or disappear with even slight changes to the card, or a change can have no effect at all. And even if some semblance of balance has been reached, it will all change when new synergising cards are introduced.
(However, Dr. Boom has no such problems, it is individually a very strong card but it does not interact with a whole class of cards the same way. It is the opposite of the cards above. It fits into most decks as an after-thought, whereas the cards above are often designed around those cards.)
The very same detail which makes these cards difficult to balance is what makes them so important to the continued health of the game: they generate archetypes all on their own. If there were no cards with powerful and unique interactions, then every deck would be some variant on a reliable curve, some removal, and maybe some card draw. Constructed would be nothing more than optimized Arena. It's not like removing those interesting cards is the only way to stop broken decks, either. You can just nerf some of the enablers, like Thaurissan or Conceal. Sure, there are some limitations down the line if you leave the core cards in place, but it would have been nice to actually see a Gadgetzan Spare Part deck before watching the card vanish from existence.
On October 14 2015 04:46 hunts wrote: I honestly don't think ball of spiders would ever see play even if buzzard wasn't nerfed.
I agree completely, but the point still stands true. They could be developing the next expansion right now and have some awesome cards that simply can't exist because Warsong Commander is a thing. Directly quoting the article, "we felt this change was necessary to help expand both future design space and...."
Okay I get the nerf but you all realize this is going to change nothing when it comes to the amount of diverse decks there are right?
Without patron nothing to punish midrange decks like paladin meaning that the heavier control matchups get phased out and the meta becomes a shit ton faster. Its basically going to be months of Druids / Paladins / hunter with a bunch of aggro decks sprinkled in
Is this change good for the game as a whole? Undoubtedly yes. But I do think they went overboard with it to a significant extent. There were plenty of other ostensibly sensible solutions being thrown around by the community, and they go ahead and do this? Basically eliminating the card from the game, even in arena? If they're going to do that at least make it a 3/3 so it doesn't make warrior even MORE of a shit-tier class in arena. But I digress.
This nerf reinforces the pattern we've seen before of charge being a very difficult mechanic to balance, and players not having enough tools to counter it because, as are the limitations of digital card games, there are no cards that players can voluntarily activate when it's the opponent's turn and react properly with. As people have stated and I've complained about for months, druid would almost never be seen if it weren't for The Combo, another charge-centered interaction that significantly shapes the meta. Instead of either doing nothing or nerfing such cards into oblivion, there should be some type of Loatheb or Mana Wraith-like effect that impacts charge cards.
It seems to me, for all the talk Blizzard gives about their preferred strategy of balance being introducing new cards, they do a piss poor job of actually identifying what cards are needed (Twilight Guardian being the only notably major recent exception that I can think of.)
On October 14 2015 04:59 NovaAurora wrote: Is this change good for the game as a whole? Undoubtedly yes. But I do think they went overboard with it to a significant extent. There were plenty of other ostensibly sensible solutions being thrown around by the community, and they go ahead and do this? Basically eliminating the card from the game, even in arena? If they're going to do that at least make it a 3/3 so it doesn't make warrior even MORE of a shit-tier class in arena. But I digress.
This nerf reinforces the pattern we've seen before of charge being a very difficult mechanic to balance, and players not having enough tools to counter it because, as are the limitations of digital card games, there are no cards that players can voluntarily activate when it's the opponent's turn and react properly with. As people have stated and I've complained about for months, druid would almost never be seen if it weren't for The Combo, another charge-centered interaction that significantly shapes the meta. Instead of either doing nothing or nerfing such cards into oblivion, there should be some type of Loatheb or Mana Wraith-like effect that impacts charge cards.
It seems to me, for all the talk Blizzard gives about their preferred strategy of balance being introducing new cards, they do a piss poor job of actually identifying what cards are needed (Twilight Guardian being the only notably major recent exception that I can think of.)
"players not having enough tools to counter it because, as are the limitations of digital card games, there are no cards that players can voluntarily activate when it's the opponent's turn and react properly with."
This is not a limitation of digital card games, it's a limitation of blizzards simple appeal to the lowest common denominator lazy game system. MTG has an online client with 100x the interactions that HS has, plenty of instant speed cards that can be played on your opponents turn.
On October 14 2015 04:59 NovaAurora wrote: Is this change good for the game as a whole? Undoubtedly yes. But I do think they went overboard with it to a significant extent. There were plenty of other ostensibly sensible solutions being thrown around by the community, and they go ahead and do this? Basically eliminating the card from the game, even in arena? If they're going to do that at least make it a 3/3 so it doesn't make warrior even MORE of a shit-tier class in arena. But I digress.
This nerf reinforces the pattern we've seen before of charge being a very difficult mechanic to balance, and players not having enough tools to counter it because, as are the limitations of digital card games, there are no cards that players can voluntarily activate when it's the opponent's turn and react properly with. As people have stated and I've complained about for months, druid would almost never be seen if it weren't for The Combo, another charge-centered interaction that significantly shapes the meta. Instead of either doing nothing or nerfing such cards into oblivion, there should be some type of Loatheb or Mana Wraith-like effect that impacts charge cards.
It seems to me, for all the talk Blizzard gives about their preferred strategy of balance being introducing new cards, they do a piss poor job of actually identifying what cards are needed (Twilight Guardian being the only notably major recent exception that I can think of.)
"players not having enough tools to counter it because, as are the limitations of digital card games, there are no cards that players can voluntarily activate when it's the opponent's turn and react properly with."
This is not a limitation of digital card games, it's a limitation of blizzards simple appeal to the lowest common denominator lazy game system. MTG has an online client with 100x the interactions that HS has, plenty of instant speed cards that can be played on your opponents turn.
I'm gonna be fair to Blizzard, which is rare for me. They succeeded in making an extremely streamlined and overall quite cleverly built system which allows players to get used to the interface very quickly, generally permits the game to progress at a rapid pace, and leaves relatively little room for errors operating the interface to decide the game. This form which they made naturally prevented all kinds of same-turn responses. This is why Charge has been and continues to be such an issue. However, I don't think that removing Charge is necessarily the answer: instead, it's possible to just remove or nerf the OTK aspects of it (via greater use of Icehowl-style mechanics).
Loatheb-style effects should definitely be a bigger thing, though. Hate cards can help muffle anything.
On October 14 2015 05:57 Volband wrote: Finally. Better late than never. Seeing all the delusional patron tears are just icing on the cake.
Just remember that this nerf is going to be the reason the ladder becomes even more aggro / mid range heavy. This isn't that great of a change given it removes the biggest check on those decks. While the patron tears are delicious the ladder is gonna suck until the next set
Another archetype bites the dust. I'm not impressed by Blizzards balance team. Not at all. This could've been handled better. For instance, by changing Frothing Berserker to only gain attack from damaging your own minions. This would accomplish smaller Berserkers obviously, but most importantly: It would solve the problem of the opponent not being able to play cards in fear of the Berserker.
Back to just one Warrior archetype it is. That said; I made a Bolster Hobgoblin deck and no I never played Patron apart from the very beginning when I wasn't already bored of it.
On October 14 2015 05:57 Volband wrote: Finally. Better late than never. Seeing all the delusional patron tears are just icing on the cake.
Just remember that this nerf is going to be the reason the ladder becomes even more aggro / mid range heavy. This isn't that great of a change given it removes the biggest check on those decks. While the patron tears are delicious the ladder is gonna suck until the next set
Annoying deck will always exist, to each their own. Super-aggro facehunters, million years long freeze mage games, insanely draw (therefore luck) based decks, annoying mid-range decks who just doesn't let you put that Ragnaros down, etc. Everyone has his/her own hated decks.
I don't care if all I'm gonna see on the ladder is [insert ANY deck here], hell, maybe it will discourage me from playing the game until the next adventure/expansion hits. But I do not care. Why?
Because Patron was simply broken. No other (current) deck has ever made me afraid to play and not to play cards at the same time. It was a joke, and a terrible experience from game to game. I even hated beating them, I just didn't feel good after the games. The deck is (soon was) a contender for the all time most broken decks which ever existed with the old Buzzard+UTH. There is only one reason this deck should get any grief - it had a high skillcap, but that's all.
But do not pretend this deck had a high skill entry. Yeah, I saw people playing warsong+armorsmith and ending the turn without attacking. This was on rank 19. But even at lower 10s people could do the basic math. I just can't bear it when patron-fans keep talking about how hard the deck was.
Crying over keeping some decks in check is also pointless. Geez, Blizz releases new content rather frequently, so no one has to worry. Dang it, I can even play my Midrange Pally now for ~1,5 months at least. Unheard of!
Whether Warsong had to be killed or not... that one is debateable, but as long as Blizz keeps their word and try their best to give Warriors a new identity beside control, I am fine with that.
Edit: though Blizz should just "disable" it for Arena. That portion of this gutting was pretty bad. Arena Warriors have enough problems as it is.
To be honest I think for blizzard this is less of a balance issue and more a design space issue. With Warsong Commander in the game you are cutting off all future cards with three and under attack and special abilities, by the way I just realized that Warsong Commander + Emperor Cobra could have been a thing if Warrior didn't have a ton of cheaper removal already, but that's still the point, with Warsong Commander in play every single card you make with three or less attack can't be 'cool', so you can't make a 2/10 legend with some cool on hit attack because Warsong Commander. I think changing it is a must going forwards. I hope you guys like playinga against zoo and pally, cause here, they, come!
On October 14 2015 05:57 Volband wrote: Finally. Better late than never. Seeing all the delusional patron tears are just icing on the cake.
Just remember that this nerf is going to be the reason the ladder becomes even more aggro / mid range heavy. This isn't that great of a change given it removes the biggest check on those decks. While the patron tears are delicious the ladder is gonna suck until the next set
Keep in mind that taking away the combo-deck that combo'ed so strong it denied almost all defensive decks will allow for decks with taunt to return. No longer is the Sludge Belcher just a liability that gives an extra Patron Patron was actually one of the reasons WHY there was so much mid-range and aggro on the ladder, you had to kill your opponent by applying super pressure before the unstoppable combo hits.
Now I can finally go back to playing control Priest And all the other decks I shelved because of too much Patron.
On October 14 2015 06:28 IcemanAsi wrote: To be honest I think for blizzard this is less of a balance issue and more a design space issue. With Warsong Commander in the game you are cutting off all future cards with three and under attack and special abilities, by the way I just realized that Warsong Commander + Emperor Cobra could have been a thing if Warrior didn't have a ton of cheaper removal already, but that's still the point, with Warsong Commander in play every single card you make with three or less attack can't be 'cool', so you can't make a 2/10 legend with some cool on hit attack because Warsong Commander. I think changing it is a must going forwards. I hope you guys like playinga against zoo and pally, cause here, they, come!
Exactly. I'm not saying entirely killing off Warsong was definitely a good decision, but if some people really think Blizz has been failing to come up with anything for months, so they panicked and did this... yeah, no.
Look at Hunter. They had zero identity, just a bunch of random minions and spells with a useless hero power. Now not only they have a very powerful aggro and mid-range deck, the beast and lock-and-load archetypes are already set in motion, all they need is more cards to emerge in the future. Slowly but surely Hunter is growing into a pretty good class design and health wise. Yes, I hate losing vs smorc hunters, but I know that we need them.
Shaman, on the other hand is still struggling, so let's hope Blizz will do a better job with Warriors.
Happy to see it go. Secret paladin is much much much much much easier to build decks around. Honestly, I don't struggle with doctor 6 nearly as much as the unstoppable 1-2 turn lethals that Patron Warrior dished out every single game.
On October 14 2015 06:48 Nisticism wrote: Happy to see it go. Secret paladin is much much much much much easier to build decks around. Honestly, I don't struggle with doctor 6 nearly as much as the unstoppable 1-2 turn lethals that Patron Warrior dished out every single game.
Hah, how could I forget. I actually like to sit down and think about what cards to tech in vs the current strongest deck, so I'M not worried about secret pally. Yeah, it's a very strong deck, but at least I have a saying in how the matches will go, and not just be depressed by turn 2.
On October 14 2015 05:57 Volband wrote: Finally. Better late than never. Seeing all the delusional patron tears are just icing on the cake.
Just remember that this nerf is going to be the reason the ladder becomes even more aggro / mid range heavy. This isn't that great of a change given it removes the biggest check on those decks. While the patron tears are delicious the ladder is gonna suck until the next set
Keep in mind that taking away the combo-deck that combo'ed so strong it denied almost all defensive decks will allow for decks with taunt to return. No longer is the Sludge Belcher just a liability that gives an extra Patron Patron was actually one of the reasons WHY there was so much mid-range and aggro on the ladder, you had to kill your opponent by applying super pressure before the unstoppable combo hits.
Now I can finally go back to playing control Priest And all the other decks I shelved because of too much Patron.
I'll be honest I actually forgot Belcher can now be played again which is pretty funny. But I do think that its just going to increase the win rates of druids and the other 3 decks which was already being debated as maybe edging out over Patron (Okay 1 dude each power rank) and thats just going to replace patron as "the deck" to counter / build the meta around.
That said Tempo mage is sure gonna be fun to play now without patron existing although I feel kinda bad for Dragon priest since there is less reason to run Chillmaw now
I've sat on it for a while and I sincerely can't put myself in the shoes of someone who thought this was even remotely a good idea. What kind of mental gymnastics do you have to do in order to end up here?
Can I get my money for Magni back please? I hate playing suuuper boring Control Warrior, which is now again the only playable Warrior Deck. Fuck you Blizzard, it would have been possible to nerf patron in a way its still playable. After all the Deck was fun to everyone at the beginning when it wasnt figured out and not OP, so why not make it again just decent but fun again?
And I dont even want to think about the amount of Secret Pallys I gonna face now. I fucking hated this Deck from Day 1...
On October 14 2015 06:48 Nisticism wrote: Happy to see it go. Secret paladin is much much much much much easier to build decks around. Honestly, I don't struggle with doctor 6 nearly as much as the unstoppable 1-2 turn lethals that Patron Warrior dished out every single game.
Secret Paladin isn't even that bad, in my last 20 games I think I've played at least 15 vs the same casino Mage that wins the game by turn 3 if they have good draws.
Why not use one of the many ideas people gave? Most of them wouldn't kill the deck, at most they would put it alongside Control Priest, for example. The idea I liked the most was changing Warsong Commander effect to "minions with 3 or less attack have charge", that way Grim Patron combos would still work, but not Frothing Berserker, what actually killed the other players.
My question is what happens now?
We all know secrets pally will take over the ladder and, according to team Liquid's rankings, the only good counter to it (besides Patron) is Freeze Mage, which I doubt many people will use, and it is favored against Druids, meaning that deck also loses its position at the top. In this case, what will people play to beat it? Handlock and Control Warrior are my bets and that also shuffles the positions in the power ranks quite a lot, to a point where I'm not really sure how it will stabilize.
I would love to hear you guys and the pro's opinions on this. Do you think I am right about the moments right after the nerf? And what do you think will happen in the long term?
The best part about that nerf is not that patron warrior is dead-ish It's reading the post of obviously butthurt pro-patron players in that thread.
The nerf is very encouraging because it shows that blizzard is working against non-interactive decks; may it be one at a time and very slowly, it's still happening.
I'll always think a better nerf to patron and aggro or combo in general would be to introduce the block or instant spell mechanism of real card games.
On October 14 2015 08:39 The_Masked_Shrimp wrote: The best part about that nerf is not that patron warrior is dead-ish It's reading the post of obviously butthurt pro-patron players in that thread.
The nerf is very encouraging because it shows that blizzard is working against non-interactive decks; may it be one at a time and very slowly, it's still happening.
I'll always think a better nerf to patron and aggro or combo in general would be to introduce the block or instant spell mechanism of real card games.
Agreed. Perhaps a minion like this would be an effective way to stop the un-interactivity of the Charge mechanism - a creature with permanent effect while in play, like Mana Wraith. The language on the card can undoubtedly be improved, but at least you get the idea:
Such a card would just be a Loatheb for charge, it would just delay the charge minions by 1 turn (stuff isn't supposed to survive more than a turn in even games); which might be cool in some situations but that is not a real solution.
If you could fish in the opponents deck and remove all copes of a chosen card (or of a card you removed on board) this might also help change the interations; make people run more 1 of and increase deck diversity with more than 1 win condition.
Also permanent spells would help greatly against the over aggressive/comboish meta. Take your yogg-saron example, if it's a permanent spell instead of a minion, it would only be countered by other spells; opponent could not just silence it or remove it with minions. This would force the opponent to build his deck with 1-2 counterspells and thus prevent full minions deck like mech mage (or druid) to just do what they like no matter what, playing 1 minion a turn no matter what; it would break or slow down the perfect curve you see in most top decks now, and having holes in the curve is not that bad for the game as we could see in beta and pre expansions.
They could also fix combo druid by having savage roar read "Give +2 attack to your character and up to 3 friendly minions"; which would keep the 14 damage combo and prevent 20+ damage bullshit.
On October 14 2015 08:39 The_Masked_Shrimp wrote: The best part about that nerf is not that patron warrior is dead-ish It's reading the post of obviously butthurt pro-patron players in that thread.
The nerf is very encouraging because it shows that blizzard is working against non-interactive decks; may it be one at a time and very slowly, it's still happening.
I'll always think a better nerf to patron and aggro or combo in general would be to introduce the block or instant spell mechanism of real card games.
I like my afking during the enemy turn
Sadly I doubt non-interactive decks are going anywhere we still have freeze mage and while its a little dead rogue is still a class (Barely) with the capabilities for miracles not to mention Zeus Shaman will eventually become viable. Personally I'd rather open secrets up to more classes and build stuff around that rather than clogging up the screen with options whenever your opponent uses a card.
Something like a 3 mana spell reflect secret for warrior "If a targeted damaging spell is used towards your hero reflect it to the enemy hero". Obviously we'd have to nerf Secretkeeper but i'm sure it'll be fine.
On a unrelated note. Given Handlocks lose their good patron matchup will they even still exist anymore given control warrior is on the decline and control priest is kinda rare right now
I think the death of Patron will see a rise in facehunter and zoo. Thus a decline in handlock and midrange hunter and druid (and with them tempo mages); thus a rise of dragon priest (with maybe pyro for secret paladins), all of this putting in check the so massively predicted raise of secret paladin since it's not great vs facetard/priest/ zoo? And of course control warrior shall return if druids and handlocks decline (which might in fact prevent those from actually declining, don't all switch to control warrior too soon dear patrons :O) Or maybe it's all gonna be perfectly balanced like in a nerdy tale and patron was the big ugly vilain all along.
You think TempoMage is going to go the way of Handlock and Midrange Hunter? You realize that the Patrons were keeping TempoMage in check, and now they're just going to go absolutely bananas considering they have no reason not to send 1-damage pings all over the place.
No i am saying they will go down if druids go down a bit as it used to be like their best matchup; which might not be true anymore because darnassus aspirant kind of ruins mirror entity, but still.
Really odd. I don't really know why this is happening. I don't mean that Patron isn't fairly obnoxious, it's just that it's been so long. What caused the nerf after several months? If anything, it's a lot better now than before, when Patron was kind of heads above the other decks. You can say that Patron is limiting what can be played, but it's still way better than early Patron era. What I'm saying is that Patron has gotten a lot more manageable over time and while it is true that it was the "deck to beat", it was like that to a greater extent before. The nerf would have been fine a few months ago, but there's absolutely no point in it now,
And fuck you blizzard. I don't even play Patron, or warrior at all, but if you're going to change Warsong at least change it to something good. Make it a 3/3. Change the battlecry to "damaged minions with under 3 attack gain charge" or whatever. But don't try and fool people into thinking you're changing it when instead you're smashing it into the ground with Magni's fucking hammer.
They could have just removed the card from the game honestly. This is like Raidleader, but worse and even Raidleader is not played anywhere. Removing Warsong Commander is nice, because OTK Frothing always is like meh since you can't really interact with it (similar to the old OTK Hunter builds).
On October 14 2015 09:28 The_Masked_Shrimp wrote: No i am saying they will go down if druids go down a bit as it used to be like their best matchup; which might not be true anymore because darnassus aspirant kind of ruins mirror entity, but still.
As a midrange druid player (since I started hearthstone), my mage matchups have gotten WAY better with aspirant and I found I actually struggle more vs hunter then before in TGT.
I still don't like seeing tempo/mechmage but it feels winnable now, like maybe 40-45/60? On the other hand face hunter used to be a free win for me and midrange wasn't bad, now midrange still seems fairly reasonable but I might have lost every game vs facehunter (I think this is due to having a more aggressive list myself with less taunts).
The control matchups (handlock, warrior) feel way better, and I agree with the sentiment that druid beats control warrior.
Basically, if druids want to beat face decks (especially zoo and facehunter) they are going to have to move away from double drake, double combo lists into more defensive lists with chow and more taunts then DotC.
For those asking "why now": I would think because of the post-TGT issue with everyone bringing Patron to every tournament and Blizzcon coming up. They are looking to force more variety at Blizzcon. Yes, Midrange Druid has the same issue but because that only became a big issue after TGT thanks to Darnassus Aspirant they are not in so much of a hurry to nerf it. Still, I expect we'll see Savage Roar raised to 4 mana at some point soon.
Reading between the lines, Blizzard doesn't like OTK decks becoming more than an occasional curiosity. See the Leeroy nerf for another example of this. Midrange Druid kind of feels like OTK thanks to the combo, but you still at least typically have to get the other guy down to 16 health for combo to kill on its own. I view Blizzard choosing to nerf Warsong Commander instead of Frothing Berserker as a sign they just don't like Charge shenanigans and want to discourage decks based around abusing Charge. This seems much more likely to me than the more popular explanation which is apparently "Blizzard just doesn't understand what they're doing." I mean they designed this game, it's not very likely they understand it less than people on a forum.
On October 14 2015 13:35 Yakikorosu wrote: For those asking "why now":
In fact it's obvious why now. Because there will be blizzcon and the main tournament of the year. And they simply want to shake meta and make blizzcon tournament more interesting for viewers.
90% of players used patron, now some of them will use hunter some control war, some paladine or priest. And even handlock will be less popular because it was counter for patron but now if there is no patron but there are more hunters, handlock might become less popular.
So you guys understand that fairness, balance is secondary to show, sales and manipulating the players ? It's funny how a company can get away which such things. For the last motnh I have heared that 3deck meta is awesome and amazing. Numerous statements that patron is fine. Now evrything changed ?
On October 14 2015 12:47 leathergloves wrote: They charged (pun not intended) the wrong guy. Warsong was innocent, Frothing Berserker and Battle Rage were the guilty ones.
I have played extensively as a Patron Warrior and lost to them as well.
The proper adjustment would be Warsong give charge to minions with 3 or less attack so that Frothing Berserker will lose charge when attack > 3 so that people can still react. Patron will still be problematic but not OP wth Frothing Berserker combo. Also Battle Rage should draw cards to own damaged minions only and not own characters.
Anyway, Patron Warrior are less successful now as TGT Dragon Priest eats them for breakfast. Not to mention Control Warrior, Handlock/Demonlock etc.
RIP, Patron Warrior.
Of course it was the correct card to nerf. They would have had a hard time adding new cards that get charged enabled by Warsong.
Now they don't have to even consider Warsong when they are adding new cards to the game because Warsong enables shit.
Frothing Berserker is no different from any other big minion card. As long as it doesn't to immidiate damage your opponent is given the chance to react which isn't the case when you have a card like Warsong.
Die Patron, you won't be missed.
Next card up to the nerf hammer - Mysterious Challenger.
I am so disappointed with this change that I might just quit the game.I was playing patron for weeks and enjoying it.I watched streams for hours and took notes on mulligans.I admit that 50+ damage combos were broken but you would get those kind of combos 1 in 50 games or so.It was perfectly fine if they lowered frothing hp by 1, since deck has around %50 winrate anyways.My biggest joy was killing cancer hunter and paladin decks. Now they are removing patron deck and keeping cards like savage+fon, Mysterious challenger, dr.boom, shredder and mad scientist.If they hate charging minions so much that why the hell they dont touch savage+fon combo.It's same shit since game released.You can literally make any viable deck with druid by just adding the combo.Two cards for 14 damage, four for 22 damage even if your board is empty is so fucking retarded.With patron, at least you have to have shitton of cards with reduced cost to do that.
On October 14 2015 06:48 Nisticism wrote: Happy to see it go. Secret paladin is much much much much much easier to build decks around. Honestly, I don't struggle with doctor 6 nearly as much as the unstoppable 1-2 turn lethals that Patron Warrior dished out every single game.
Secret Paladin isn't even that bad, in my last 20 games I think I've played at least 15 vs the same casino Mage that wins the game by turn 3 if they have good draws.
Tbh casino mage beats patron with those kind of hands too.
On October 14 2015 05:57 Volband wrote: Finally. Better late than never. Seeing all the delusional patron tears are just icing on the cake.
Any decent patron player can learn how to play secret paladin and face hunter in one week.But its mindless grind and playing decks like that is super boring. The reason that patron was fun to play was you had so many options in your turns and it required lots of skills even in a game like hearthstone.I am an old BW player so I liked the challenge.I never played patron because I thought it was super broken or something like that. The biggest joy I got from HS was miracle rogue era.That deck was really fun to play, you could draw your entire hand in one turn and you could do silly stuff.After they nerfed that, I only did my quests and havent played seriously again.But after the new expansion I started playing patron again and it felt like miracoli again.And now blizzard nerfs it into oblivion again. Seriously, fuck you blizzard.
On October 14 2015 13:35 Yakikorosu wrote: For those asking "why now":
In fact it's obvious why now. Because there will be blizzcon and the main tournament of the year. And they simply want to shake meta and make blizzcon tournament more interesting for viewers.
90% of players used patron, now some of them will use hunter some control war, some paladine or priest. And even handlock will be less popular because it was counter for patron but now if there is no patron but there are more hunters, handlock might become less popular.
The thing I'm wondering is whether the gamble pays off. I don't know how well the results can be predicted and there's always a possibility that something goes bonkers and the game ends up in even worse place short term. Lots of patron might still be more exciting than some very simple deck dominating the whole tournament.
Also, it's interesting to see whether this starts up a period of stronger involvement from Blizz and their expanded design space. If this was a single occassion, the nerf certainly seems overblown. Meanwhile if they're actually setting up with a decisive plan for better HS experience, the heavy trashing seems a lot more reasonable approach.
I understand Warsong Commander is a problematic card for future card design but then why nerf it now when they are not releasing new cards in the next months?
And to remove Patron from the meta... wasn't really needed. In ladder Patron is not even top 5. Paladin, Hunter, Druid, Mage and Warlock see more play.
I don't even think this nerf will change ladder meta by much. It does impact tournament meta that's true.
What seems right is that this nerf main goal is to shake things before Blizzcon. But tournaments should be a sideshow around the game not the opposite.
this gave me such a laugh ... nearly chocked myself ! :D thumbs up for the picture ! R.I.P. patron deck .. will be dancing on your grave cos playing Uther !
Ok, so Blizzard wanted to remove patron Warrior by changing Warsong Commander but why making it such a useless card is beyond me. It's even a class card.. Give it the ability to give 1/1 or +2 or better, give it a proper interesting mechanic like still have it give charge to units but with an inspire requirement. This removing of cards is so weird. Same with their completely unnecessary power creep decisions. Who comes up with these?
Meh, this is one of the saddest changes. Patron was a fun and skillful deck, and it kept most of the aggro in check, now there will be nearly nothing to stop aggro and we'll have to wade through 6+ months of abuse at its hands, which will be far, far worst.
This was worse than an amateur attempt at balance, they just dropped a nuke and destroyed everything. I don't buy the "it's better for the future of the game excuse" (They're not releasing any cards that required the Warsong change and they could've waited till then), if Blizzard could be honest they would say this is a pure greed move to destroy the cheap deck and force players into buying expensive P2Warrior instead of being F2Patron.
If this was for the good of the game they would've balanced it during BRM instead of now when they have shiny new TGT packs to sell. This isn't good for Hearthstone, it's good for Blizzard. This is the undertaker nerf all over again, waiting until everyone has bought naxx so they can ruin it and force you into buying GvG, they ruin BRM to force you into TGT.
Out of all the balance possibilities (buffing unplayable cards like poisoned blade) they choose to completely destroy a cheap skill orientated deck. Not only that, but they do it by changing the soul-bound card that can't be disenchanted. Their claim that "we don't want people to work hard towards something to take it away for nothing" is proven to be utter lies as they take away an entire deck (many cards that are useless outside the patron combo deck) without any compensation.
On October 14 2015 02:11 Aceace wrote: , we felt this change was necessary to help expand both future design space and to stand by our overarching game philosophy that battles between minions and fighting for board control is what makes Hearthstone fun and compelling.
yes i always fight aggro minions for board control..... lol
This nerf makes one class card useless, hobgoblin works better that it now.
Warsong however has been an issue for a long time, the main reason is that the CHARGE mechanic is broken as it gives the opposing player no right to reply. Under the statement from blizzard why does charge remain a "thing" in the game .
On October 14 2015 02:11 Aceace wrote: , we felt this change was necessary to help expand both future design space and to stand by our overarching game philosophy that battles between minions and fighting for board control is what makes Hearthstone fun and compelling.
yes i always fight aggro minions for board control..... lol
This nerf makes one class card useless, hobgoblin works better that it now.
Warsong however has been an issue for a long time, the main reason is that the CHARGE mechanic is broken as it gives the opposing player no right to reply. Under the statement from blizzard why does charge remain a "thing" in the game .
[/i] Because charge is still allows for more board interaction than Freeze / Control warrior where its simply play removal until you can 1a2a3a into your win condition (or cause the enemy to afk concede)
People seem to forget that the super control decks are also against Blizzard's vision because in their minds everything would be midrange decks and play like arena - aka pretty damn boring
On October 14 2015 18:38 MarKeD wrote: This was worse than an amateur attempt at balance, they just dropped a nuke and destroyed everything. I don't buy the "it's better for the future of the game excuse" (They're not releasing any cards that required the Warsong change and they could've waited till then), if Blizzard could be honest they would say this is a pure greed move to destroy the cheap deck and force players into buying expensive P2Warrior instead of being F2Patron.
If this was for the good of the game they would've balanced it during BRM instead of now when they have shiny new TGT packs to sell. This isn't good for Hearthstone, it's good for Blizzard. This is the undertaker nerf all over again, waiting until everyone has bought naxx so they can ruin it and force you into buying GvG, they ruin BRM to force you into TGT.
Out of all the balance possibilities (buffing unplayable cards like poisoned blade) they choose to completely destroy a cheap skill orientated deck. Not only that, but they do it by changing the soul-bound card that can't be disenchanted. Their claim that "we don't want people to work hard towards something to take it away for nothing" is proven to be utter lies as they take away an entire deck (many cards that are useless outside the patron combo deck) without any compensation.
STOP YOUR LIES BLI$$ARD
Was wondering yesterday why they made such bad nerf. And my thoughts were same as yours. They nerf patron this way coz it was cheap deck to get. And most powerful. Blizzard shows again how greedy bastrads they are. I've read somewhere that Hearthstone earns 20.000.000 $ pro month. But i think it is too few for them still.
On October 14 2015 18:38 MarKeD wrote: This was worse than an amateur attempt at balance, they just dropped a nuke and destroyed everything. I don't buy the "it's better for the future of the game excuse" (They're not releasing any cards that required the Warsong change and they could've waited till then), if Blizzard could be honest they would say this is a pure greed move to destroy the cheap deck and force players into buying expensive P2Warrior instead of being F2Patron.
If this was for the good of the game they would've balanced it during BRM instead of now when they have shiny new TGT packs to sell. This isn't good for Hearthstone, it's good for Blizzard. This is the undertaker nerf all over again, waiting until everyone has bought naxx so they can ruin it and force you into buying GvG, they ruin BRM to force you into TGT.
Out of all the balance possibilities (buffing unplayable cards like poisoned blade) they choose to completely destroy a cheap skill orientated deck. Not only that, but they do it by changing the soul-bound card that can't be disenchanted. Their claim that "we don't want people to work hard towards something to take it away for nothing" is proven to be utter lies as they take away an entire deck (many cards that are useless outside the patron combo deck) without any compensation.
STOP YOUR LIES BLI$$ARD
Was wondering yesterday why they made such bad nerf. And my thoughts were same as yours. They nerf patron this way coz it was cheap deck to get. And most powerful. Blizzard shows again how greedy bastrads they are. I've read somewhere that Hearthstone earns 20.000.000 $ pro month. But i think it is too few for them still.
Well I've never bought a pack. I also have never done arena seriously - + Show Spoiler +
and yet I have every good TGT card / 90% of GvG minus the trash legendaries / all the good classic cards which means that I am never going to be in a position where I need to buy packs / expansions with real money as from this point on I've got no reason to spend gold and instead I'll just stockpile it.
Which means that everyone else like me who has been playing from closed beta should be in a similar position and that removes a % of people who would be customers, not to mention everyone who actually enjoys arena and would have been earning cards / dust quicker than me also is in this position. Which means that the only way Blizzard will actually ever make money is if they ramp up their expansion releases to every 3 months or so rather than 6 which surprise surprise would be a smarter way of balancing anyway.
So honestly I don't think this has much to do with money given this won't hurt or help their pockets seriously. Given the next cheapest deck from Patron is only 400 dust more expensive
On October 14 2015 02:11 Aceace wrote: , we felt this change was necessary to help expand both future design space and to stand by our overarching game philosophy that battles between minions and fighting for board control is what makes Hearthstone fun and compelling.
yes i always fight aggro minions for board control..... lol
This nerf makes one class card useless, hobgoblin works better that it now.
Warsong however has been an issue for a long time, the main reason is that the CHARGE mechanic is broken as it gives the opposing player no right to reply. Under the statement from blizzard why does charge remain a "thing" in the game .
Because charge is still allows for more board interaction than Freeze / Control warrior where its simply play removal until you can 1a2a3a into your win condition (or cause the enemy to afk concede)
People seem to forget that the super control decks are also against Blizzard's vision because in their minds everything would be midrange decks and play like arena - aka pretty damn boring
[/i]
You can silence a freeze and playing removal is minion interaction
As much as this was needed, all it really does is assure Druid will dominate the ladder for a while. As a Druid player, I am not complaining. I just wish I could find a good, viable, non-combo Druid deck.
On October 14 2015 02:11 Aceace wrote: , we felt this change was necessary to help expand both future design space and to stand by our overarching game philosophy that battles between minions and fighting for board control is what makes Hearthstone fun and compelling
yes i always fight aggro minions for board control..... lol
This nerf makes one class card useless, hobgoblin works better that it now.
Warsong however has been an issue for a long time, the main reason is that the CHARGE mechanic is broken as it gives the opposing player no right to reply. Under the statement from blizzard why does charge remain a "thing" in the game .
Because charge is still allows for more board interaction than Freeze / Control warrior where its simply play removal until you can 1a2a3a into your win condition (or cause the enemy to afk concede)
People seem to forget that the super control decks are also against Blizzard's vision because in their minds everything would be midrange decks and play like arena - aka pretty damn boring
You can silence a freeze and playing removal is minion interaction
And that is where we disagree. Only playing removal like freeze mage does isn't board interaction. Its board clearing its the less interaction than a charge just hitting face and then you clearing it off except its longer and more tedious
I believe there are three major reasons why the Warsong Commander Nerf was unnecessary.
Firstly, the current tournament environment suggests Patron Warrior deck has consistently, albeit slowly, declined in its power. The evidence is there. The win rate of Patron Warrior decks in major pre-TGT tournaments is slightly below .500. The data is collected by Team Liquid for all to freely examine. Furthermore, the evolution of other decks (tech choices such as Flamestrike in Tempo Mages) and acclimatization of users to the Patron Warrior deck made the power of the deck diminish in both the ladder and the tournament scene over time. People no longer give outright value to Battle Rages or give time to Patron Warrior to draw cards. Moreover, recent tournament events show pro players making strategic decisions to avoid the Patron deck altogether in their lineups. In summary, the Patron deck has lost its initial dominant position when it first entered the scene.
Secondly, the nerf should have been focused on the Emperor Thaurissan, not the Warsong Commander. Blizzard has again neglected the primary reason that makes the Patron Warrior so strong - Emperor Thaurissan. The Patron deck is naturally strong against aggro decks and weak against midrange and control decks. The reason is simple, patron lacks hard removals to control the board that can be dominated by midrange and high cost minions the non-aggro decks employ. The only way the Patron warrior can steal games from its natural counter decks is to manipulate the mana costs by putting down the Thaurissan once the key cards for the OTK are drawn. If this strategy fails, Patron warrior simply cannot deal with both midrange and control decks, then loses the game. Hence, if Thaurissan were to be nerfed to, say, 7 mana, the Patron deck would never have achieved the current position in the meta game. It would still be powerful against aggro decks, but it would fail to steal games against its natural counter decks.
Consider Patron's matchup against the Control Warrior. In the normal course of the game, the Patron Warrior has only one viable win condition. That is to collect a Warsong Commander, two Frothing Berserkers, Grim Patron and some cards with Whirlwind effects to initiate the OTK. The ONLY way for the combo to work would be to abuse the Thaurissan. If, however, there were no Thaurissan, Warsong Commander (3) + 2 Frothing Berserker (6) + Whirlwind (1) would already cost up to 10 mana. AND this 4 card combo combinations will only generate 24 damage in one turn IF the opponent has (a) Full Board and (b) No Taunts. Nobody really argues about the ridiculous Force of Nature + Savage Roar + Innervate + Savage Roar Combo because it is highly unlikely to happen. However, people do have concerns when Thaurissan reduces the mana costs and enables the Druid to initiate the double combo with relative ease.
Put it simply, if Blizzard leaves Thaurissan the way it is now, another combo deck that exploits and abuses the power of Thaurissan will simply reappear in the future. Analytically, Thaurissan poses a bigger threat to future design constraints on Blizzard compared to the ones caused by the Warsong Commander. Blizzard is simply kicking the can down the road by refusing to fix the balance of Thaurissan and I believe this will further exacerbate the problem in the future.
Thirdly, and most importantly, nerfing the Patron Warrior deck will only make the current meta game even more stale. Removing the Patron from the meta simply makes the meta regress to the pre-BRM meta. If Blizzard believes TGT has failed to influence the meta because of the Patron deck, they are dead wrong. TGT failed because the inspire mechanic failed. And inspire mechanic failed because Blizzard failed to provide incentive to use the hero power over the cards during the early phases of the game. This by the way, is entirely Blizzard's fault by designing the game in such a way that low cost minions are disproportionately efficient in comparison to high cost minions.
The future Warsong Commander nerf should worry people in the community because it will pose a threat to the health of the game.
So I wonder if people are going to start using Warsong Commander + Unleash the Hounds now. Oh wait, you could already do that with Raid Leader *facepalm*
People should stop acting as if warsong was played in any other deck. They did not want to nerf the neutral cards and the other cards could see some plays in other warrior decks without being OP, nerfing the least played minion of the pack is the right choice to kill the deck without impacting any other deck.
On October 14 2015 21:23 Freezard wrote: So I wonder if people are going to start using Warsong Commander + Unleash the Hounds now. Oh wait, you could already do that with Raid Leader *facepalm*
There's a fairly obvious reason why Warsong Commander + UTH will never be a thing... and no its not because Timber Wolf is strictly better.
I also think Commander is the right target to nerf.. but a lesser nerf, not the huge nuke he received.. something like this should have probably worked fine:
- Make Commander a 2/1 (so you can only whirlwind once) - Make Commander give charge only to 3 or less power minions, as long as they KEEP staying at 3 power or less (no frothing berserker) - Make Commander effect a battlecry, only working for creatures in play already (this would have been a REALLY big nerf against patron, but not as much as it was Blizzard's one
On October 14 2015 21:42 nojok wrote: People should stop acting as if warsong was played in any other deck. They did not want to nerf the neutral cards and the other cards could see some plays in other warrior decks without being OP, nerfing the least played minion of the pack is the right choice to kill the deck without impacting any other deck.
Are you implying that Frothing Berserker was playable in a single other Warrior deck? The card takes serious work with enablers to make it noteworthy over any of the game's viable 3-drops and dies to basically every removal spell. It's only scary when you can give it Charge. Otherwise, it just dies. Even the best "realistic" play with it, trading 2-drop for 2-drop so that you end up with a turn 3 4/4, is kinda useless because the class has access to Fiery War Axe and Death's Bite.
Lowering its health by 1 would not have been such a big deal.
On October 14 2015 21:51 Malhavoc wrote: I also think Commander is the right target to nerf.. but a lesser nerf, not the huge nuke he received.. something like this should have probably worked fine:
- Make Commander a 2/1 (so you can only whirlwind once) - Make Commander give charge only to 3 or less power minions, as long as they KEEP staying at 3 power or less (no frothing berserker) - Make Commander effect a battlecry, only working for creatures in play already (this would have been a REALLY big nerf against patron, but not as much as it was Blizzard's one
I agree too that the nerf was needed, but way too big. Now with the patron gone, we will see Face Hunters flood the meta again. Hell, i prefer like 100 times to play against patrons than against Face Hunters...
P.S The 2/1 Warsong commander is probably the best idea here - it still makes frothing combos very strong but nerfing patrons from awesome to good.
On October 14 2015 20:24 FueledUpAndReadyToGo wrote: Well I'm glad the patron combo is nerfed.
But why did they have to kill warsong commander...?? A 3 mana dire wolf alpha with 1 extra health, who also has a conditional use... just terrible.
I'm surprised that this was the best they could come up with. You can't even pretend that Warsong Commander is still playable (like they did with Starving Buzzard).
On October 14 2015 21:42 nojok wrote: People should stop acting as if warsong was played in any other deck. They did not want to nerf the neutral cards and the other cards could see some plays in other warrior decks without being OP, nerfing the least played minion of the pack is the right choice to kill the deck without impacting any other deck.
Warsong Commander was a key cog of other decks that have been nerfed in the past (Molten Giants warrior notably). Charge itself was nerfed from 0 to 3 mana. Ben Brode has even said that Charge is a hard mechanic to balance due to it's non-interactivity and to back that up - Leeroy Jenkins was nerfed over a year ago for it's OTK combo potential.
The key here has always been charge. Makes me surprised that combo is still allowed to exist (especially given how strong Druid is currently).
I agree that Warsong had to be nerfed, it's just... less than useless now.
I would have ideally preferred a less drastic nerf that would keep patron around but diminish its "out of nowhere instakill" ability. However, I'm not super upset at this change, as imo the fact that Patron was so ridiculously strong for so ridiculously long, and resistant to the TGT meta-shift, means Blizzard is entirely justified in nerfing it to the ground. We desperately needed a new meta.
Patron might be gone for good, but I do remember that there used to be a Face Warrior super aggro deck out there, and I wonder if this change to Warsong Commander will help it come back.
And blizzard have just shown that they'd rather kill the deck completely than try to fix it with a marginal nerf.
Jesus christ I am so disappointed, nerfing patron was definitly a good decision but nerfing =/= killing it for crying out loud.
Lowering the health of warsong commander or frothing or mby even reducing dmg of patron by 1 or something woulda been so much better without killing it completely.
On October 15 2015 01:29 jubil wrote: I would have ideally preferred a less drastic nerf that would keep patron around but diminish its "out of nowhere instakill" ability. However, I'm not super upset at this change, as imo the fact that Patron was so ridiculously strong for so ridiculously long, and resistant to the TGT meta-shift, means Blizzard is entirely justified in nerfing it to the ground. We desperately needed a new meta.
Patron might be gone for good, but I do remember that there used to be a Face Warrior super aggro deck out there, and I wonder if this change to Warsong Commander will help it come back.
Commander is utter trash now. If you ever are in a situation where you might use it, you should put in Abusive Sergeant or Dire Wolf Alpha instead. Even Leper Gnome will do more for less, and it doesn't even do the same thing.
I hate the change, but it could have at least been +2/0 or they could have made it a 2/4 or something. Just something to make it theoretically "bad" instead of essentially deleting it from the game.
edit: Also, based their statement, they should really look into the Hunter hero power. Once this goes through, we're going to experience a lot more of this "interaction."
On October 15 2015 02:10 Kickboxer wrote: Nerfing the wrong card in the wrong way, just what we've come to expect from blizzard next nerf will be to secret pala by nerfing Tirion and get down.
It was absolutely the right card to nerf.
They probably went too far but if it opens up interesting design options in the future maybe it was a good choice to effectively kill it. We'll see.
What kind of "design options" does this conceivable open up? It's worse than Raid Leader, a card that has never seen constructed play (I won't use "strictly better" because of the health discrepancy and the fact that I believe the buff sticks beyond death) and Warrior struggles to play any deck that isn't Control or Patron.
Relevant: Ben Brode went to YouTube to discuss the reasoning behind the nerf. I'll link the video, but major points include:
-Brode figures giving other minions charge was kind of a broken mechanic anyway, in that charge minions are difficult to balance, and being able to give non-charge minions charge automatically constricts the design space significantly. As an example, he brought up Dreadsteed, which was originally planned to be a neutral card in the Shade of Naxxramas expansion, but couldn't be because it was so broken with Warsong Commander. Thus they chose to nerf Warsong Commander rather than Frothing Berserker or Grim Patron. -In choosing a new design for the unit, Brode notably does not emphasize any need for the card to be viable. He does emphasize that the card is a common card, so it shouldn't be too complicated, and that as it is now, it's a "build-around card," meaning that it has the kind of effect that a new player can use as inspiration for a deck. So if you look at Gadgetzan you can say "ah, I'll build a spell deck," and if you look at Old Murkeye you can say "ah, I'll build a murloc deck." Similarly Warsong Commander should remain the kind of card that makes you say "ah, I know what kind of deck to put that in." -Another aspect Brode emphasizes is the sort of core of the card, which is a 3 mana 2/3 that says "Charge forward!" when you play her, and then interacts with charge in some way. In changing a card, its core should remain intact. Therefore the card keeps its stats, and instead gives charge minions +1 attack. -Brode regretfully acknowledges that nerfing cards is always really unfortunate, and they don't like to do it when they can avoid it because it kills decks and results in a lot of un-fun occurrences like someone not reading the patch notes and then going into a game to find that their deck doesn't work anymore. He also acknowledges that this doesn't do arena warrior any favors, and that they'll have to try to remedy that in some future set.
Notably unaddressed: -He doesn't say anything about what will happen to the meta with patron warrior gone. Since he specifically mentions that he read all the commentary about the change from around the internet, and since the biggest ciriticism I've seen is "now secret pally will be totally broken," this is potentially a pretty big oversight. -He doesn't really make clear what makes something "core" to a card. Making it a 3/3 or 3/4, or dropping the mana cost to 2, would certainly have alleviated some of the concerns for arena warrior, and almost certainly not be broken.
fuck patron decks. im glad to see that bullshit gone. as for secret paladins, i dont see a problem with them (no i dont play secret pally). people need to stop bitching and find their own solutions, instead of waiting for the pros to come out with new decklists
On October 15 2015 08:30 Mortal wrote: What kind of "design options" does this conceivable open up? It's worse than Raid Leader, a card that has never seen constructed play (I won't use "strictly better" because of the health discrepancy and the fact that I believe the buff sticks beyond death) and Warrior struggles to play any deck that isn't Control or Patron.
The kind of design options for future cards where Warsong doesn't immediately make them broken? This isn't the first time they had to nerf Warsong (and warrior charge), the mechanics she grants have always been problematic to balance around.
On October 15 2015 16:21 Asha` wrote: The kind of design options for future cards where Warsong doesn't immediately make them broken? This isn't the first time they had to nerf Warsong (and warrior charge), the mechanics she grants have always been problematic to balance around.
And why nerf it now that Warsong Commander is not problematic? They could nerf the card in same patch they add new cards that would be broken with Warsong. At that point breaking a deck like patron is also less problematic since people has more reasons to try new decks when a new set of cards is released.
Yay! Finally warrior is being nerfed! I've been struggling in the recent meta since I play all classes except warlock and warrior. There's only so much midrange Druid that is fun playing!
So I was thinking- perhaps this meta shift could re-introduce the aggro warrior? Since warsong commander now seems to benefit that archetype 😀
Nice to see Ben Brode mentioning the impact on arena and Warrior being the worst class, saying they'll buff Warrior in arena in the future gives me hope. Warsong Commander has helped me get a few 12 wins with Warrior, always in combination with Frothing Berserker or Raging Worgen, usually you need something like that to get far.
Dreadsteed was going to be a neutral?? ARG!! Picture using that in shaman.
-Another aspect Brode emphasizes is the sort of core of the card, which is a 3 mana 2/3 that says "Charge forward!" when you play her, and then interacts with charge in some way. In changing a card, its core should remain intact. Therefore the card keeps its stats, and instead gives charge minions +1 attack.
I agree with what hes saying about why warsong changed but keeping the old stats makes no sense. The core of the card in this case is the effect not the stats as its a combo card. The combo potential as i see it is now less so higher stats should compensate for that. A 3 mana 2/4 would put it next to flamewaker at least.
On October 15 2015 16:21 Asha` wrote: The kind of design options for future cards where Warsong doesn't immediately make them broken? This isn't the first time they had to nerf Warsong (and warrior charge), the mechanics she grants have always been problematic to balance around.
And why nerf it now that Warsong Commander is not problematic? They could nerf the card in same patch they add new cards that would be broken with Warsong. At that point breaking a deck like patron is also less problematic since people has more reasons to try new decks when a new set of cards is released.
Warsong is problematic though. As people rightfully pointed out, Leeroy was doing 15+ damage and nerfed a year ago for being too bursty.
Frothing Berserkers are hitting 40+ damage and without Warsong they can't do that from hand anymore (well technically they can still get close if you swap Warsong for Charge and just use Patrons for self-damage fodder, but you lose a ton of utility in clearing a path / self damage without charging Patrons).
On the other hand, Undertaker and Starving Buzzard were both nerfed when GvG came out because expansion launch is when decks get thrown away and reworked anyways so I don't disagree with your thoughts on timing.
Also, Blizzcon is in a few weeks, that's a little close to throw away a key meta deck no matter how problematic it is (especially when they've let it stand for months).
On October 15 2015 16:21 Asha` wrote: The kind of design options for future cards where Warsong doesn't immediately make them broken? This isn't the first time they had to nerf Warsong (and warrior charge), the mechanics she grants have always been problematic to balance around.
And why nerf it now that Warsong Commander is not problematic? They could nerf the card in same patch they add new cards that would be broken with Warsong. At that point breaking a deck like patron is also less problematic since people has more reasons to try new decks when a new set of cards is released.
Warsong is problematic though. As people rightfully pointed out, Leeroy was doing 15+ damage and nerfed a year ago for being too bursty.
Frothing Berserkers are hitting 40+ damage and without Warsong they can't do that from hand anymore (well technically they can still get close if you swap Warsong for Charge and just use Patrons for self-damage fodder, but you lose a ton of utility in clearing a path / self damage without charging Patrons).
On the other hand, Undertaker and Starving Buzzard were both nerfed when GvG came out because expansion launch is when decks get thrown away and reworked anyways so I don't disagree with your thoughts on timing.
Also, Blizzcon is in a few weeks, that's a little close to throw away a key meta deck no matter how problematic it is (especially when they've let it stand for months).
Starving Buzzard was nerfed waaaaaaay before GvG. It was nerfed before Naxx, even. People were bemoaning Hunter's fate before the entire class got revived with a set of cards that seemed designed for it, and which the class simply does not operate without even now. And then people started saying "See? The Buzzard nerf was fine! Hunter is more resilient than that!" when the class was given some of the most inherently broken cards in the game to work with. In fact, it's the shift between Basic and Naxx which has shaped Hunter into the face class which it has never gone beyond since.
This is one of the things that frustrates me about nerf apologists. There's no understanding about the history of the game, which lends itself to a distorted view of what this nerf means.
They coulda done something like "Your other minions with three or less attack have charge." That would exclude Warsong giving itself charge, and any minion that had charge from WC would lose it as soon as its attack was buffed over 3 (probably wouldn't lose it in the case of enrage activating on Explosive Trap).
I'm fine with the current nerf though. If they nerfed it less, or nerfed something else, Warsong would continue to be a thorn in the side of Blizzard and players. But it really begs the question, if charge combos are too strong, what about druid? I'm just glad Warsong is not a shredder drop, or that'd be one more way combo can kill you even faster than the usual 14 HP danger zone.
Poor Starving Buzzard. Blizzard didn't care enough about its soul to keep its mana cost or statline the same.
Also, the best way to open up design space is by having set-rotating formats, and that would actually be less brutal to new players than only having eternal ones. Then you don't have to destroy cards. But it would make them less money, so it's not happening any time soon.
Arena, at least, really does need card-limiting formats. The more sets get released, the weaker each synergy card gets and the more it drifts towards just having a good curve and dropping a ton of minions without any respect to AOE or MCT. I'd like if Constructed could get the same.
On October 15 2015 17:46 FamousJoshy5 wrote: Yay! Finally warrior is being nerfed! I've been struggling in the recent meta since I play all classes except warlock and warrior. There's only so much midrange Druid that is fun playing!
So I was thinking- perhaps this meta shift could re-introduce the aggro warrior? Since warsong commander now seems to benefit that archetype 😀
Why would run a 2/3 for 3 that gives +1 to only charge minions in any deck ? The effect is at best OK but the minion has terrible stats for its cost which the new effect does not make up for.
So no we are definitly not going to see aggro Warrior played because of measly +1 to charge minions if for some miracle Warsong sticks around ( which there aren't that many and aggro Warrior does his most damage which Weapons/Spells anyway )
Not to mention aggro Warriors biggest problems are the terrible heropower for an aggressive deck and its incosistency because of lack of draws . Neither of which are adressed in any way. A way to make it work better would for example to have Oggrimar Aspirant give +1 durability and not +1 attack for weapons which almost useless.
On October 16 2015 04:04 Acritter wrote: Arena, at least, really does need card-limiting formats. The more sets get released, the weaker each synergy card gets and the more it drifts towards just having a good curve and dropping a ton of minions without any respect to AOE or MCT. I'd like if Constructed could get the same.
Personally that is the main reason I hate arena it just becomes the exact same minions / game each time you draft and its incredibly stale. I like my constructed having insane combos / synergies its what makes hearthstone interesting.
As for the rotation sets It just wouldn't work with how slow Hearthstone produces expansions and how few cards get added with each one. We are 2 months into TGT and I have all the TGT cards (Minus the terrible legendaries and epics) without doing arena or buying packs. Blizzard just doesn't produce enough cards for anyone but newer players to justify buying packs / expansions.
Hearthstone being an eternal format will inevitably lead to these nerfs. The cards with creative/unsual effects will always become a problem for future card design. Leaving them unchanged will just lead to less and less creative space. At some point they need to start considering implementing set rotations. I can't imagine this game surviving 10+ expansions with all the cards in the pool...
Yup i thought about how that charge spell could work with patrons and stuff. Hope its not broken lol. You can still do your turn 5-6 flood the board with patrons into a charge worgan next turn.
Yup i thought about how that charge spell could work with patrons and stuff. Hope its not broken lol. You can still do your turn 5-6 flood the board with patrons into a charge worgan next turn.
Without charging the Patrons you have no comeback mechanic against faster decks so you need to run at least one Brawl if not two. My first cuts to make that Worgen deck work would be Patrons and Battle Rage because both cards kinda rely on you not being behind which is alot harder to archive now.
I don't understand why there is so much crying over the death of a deck that was widely hated.
I for one am glad to see Patron die. Heavy-handed nerf? Yes, but having faced it for six months already on ladder, I won't miss the deck at all. The only criticisms I have of the decision are 1) it's right before the HWS which is pretty unfair to players who have spent hundreds of hours practicing with Patron and 2) the nerf makes Warrior even worse in arena.
People complain about the deck for months, and then when it dies it suddenly becomes their long-lost puppy. Patron did have some things going for it. It was difficult to play, and interesting for a limited period of time, but having it repeatedly shoved in your face on ladder and in every major tournament quickly put an end to that. Sorry Tiddler, but not everyone agrees that your "beloved Patron" was a deck worth saving. Like many, I am sick and tired of the deck's constant presence, and I'm happy to see it forever removed. Patron had a good run and now it's time to play something else.
Yup i thought about how that charge spell could work with patrons and stuff. Hope its not broken lol. You can still do your turn 5-6 flood the board with patrons into a charge worgan next turn.
Without charging the Patrons you have no comeback mechanic against faster decks so you need to run at least one Brawl if not two. My first cuts to make that Worgen deck work would be Patrons and Battle Rage because both cards kinda rely on you not being behind which is alot harder to archive now.
The spirit of the deck is patrons after all else its a just a charge worgen deck. The site lists a frothing version which id like to see top players try and pilot, maybe its semi competitive, maybe its competitive.
On October 15 2015 16:21 Asha` wrote: The kind of design options for future cards where Warsong doesn't immediately make them broken? This isn't the first time they had to nerf Warsong (and warrior charge), the mechanics she grants have always been problematic to balance around.
And why nerf it now that Warsong Commander is not problematic? They could nerf the card in same patch they add new cards that would be broken with Warsong. At that point breaking a deck like patron is also less problematic since people has more reasons to try new decks when a new set of cards is released.
Warsong is problematic though. As people rightfully pointed out, Leeroy was doing 15+ damage and nerfed a year ago for being too bursty.
Frothing Berserkers are hitting 40+ damage and without Warsong they can't do that from hand anymore (well technically they can still get close if you swap Warsong for Charge and just use Patrons for self-damage fodder, but you lose a ton of utility in clearing a path / self damage without charging Patrons).
On the other hand, Undertaker and Starving Buzzard were both nerfed when GvG came out because expansion launch is when decks get thrown away and reworked anyways so I don't disagree with your thoughts on timing.
Also, Blizzcon is in a few weeks, that's a little close to throw away a key meta deck no matter how problematic it is (especially when they've let it stand for months).
Starving Buzzard was nerfed waaaaaaay before GvG. It was nerfed before Naxx, even. People were bemoaning Hunter's fate before the entire class got revived with a set of cards that seemed designed for it, and which the class simply does not operate without even now. And then people started saying "See? The Buzzard nerf was fine! Hunter is more resilient than that!" when the class was given some of the most inherently broken cards in the game to work with. In fact, it's the shift between Basic and Naxx which has shaped Hunter into the face class which it has never gone beyond since.
This is one of the things that frustrates me about nerf apologists. There's no understanding about the history of the game, which lends itself to a distorted view of what this nerf means.
I went back and looked up the patch timings since I was going off memory when I posted.
Both Starving Buzzard and Leeroy were nerfed roughly a month after Naxx came out (Naxx was mid June - August, nerf was in September). The stated reason was because they hoped the Naxx meta would 'fix them' but since it didn't so in came the nerf bat.
The exact same timing applied to Undertaker, GvG came out December, Undertaker was nerfed January.
I got the expansion wrong for the Starving Buzzard nerf but it pretty much coincided with an expansion release is my point. I guess in that light, Warsong was also nerfed because TGT couldn't 'fix' the problems with it.
If you're going to give me crap about 'not understanding the history of the game' then maybe you should check your facts too?
I tried building a hybrid Patron/Control Warrior, basically replacing both warsongs and frothings with Control Warrior's lategame threats, while keeping the core of the Patron deck intact. After a few games of testing, it feels surprisingly effective still.
Death's bite on 4 into Patron/Inner Rage + swing is still a very powerful opening. Most aggro decks will still straight up lose to this. On the flip side, not having your win condition revolve completely around OTK'ing control decks is kind of nice.
Don't get me wrong, this nerf will hurt a lot, and the deck can no longer do disgusting things, but I'm not convinced that this is the last we will see of the Grim Patron card in Warrior.
I think after the patch every minion card with 3 or less attack that warrior can put in deck should be disenchanted at full price since that's all the cards that Warsong Commander affected.
On October 17 2015 03:12 Madars wrote: I think after the patch every minion card with 3 or less attack that warrior can put in deck should be disenchanted at full price since that's all the cards that Warsong Commander affected.
You could hardly have made that sound more like entitled whining if you tried.
On October 16 2015 10:36 FuRong wrote: I don't understand why there is so much crying over the death of a deck that was widely hated.
I for one am glad to see Patron die. Heavy-handed nerf? Yes, but having faced it for six months already on ladder, I won't miss the deck at all. The only criticisms I have of the decision are 1) it's right before the HWS which is pretty unfair to players who have spent hundreds of hours practicing with Patron and 2) the nerf makes Warrior even worse in arena.
People complain about the deck for months, and then when it dies it suddenly becomes their long-lost puppy. Patron did have some things going for it. It was difficult to play, and interesting for a limited period of time, but having it repeatedly shoved in your face on ladder and in every major tournament quickly put an end to that. Sorry Tiddler, but not everyone agrees that your "beloved Patron" was a deck worth saving. Like many, I am sick and tired of the deck's constant presence, and I'm happy to see it forever removed. Patron had a good run and now it's time to play something else.
The deck was not hated that much. Vast majority of people wanted a slight nerf. Not complete removal. The deck was not even that powerful except in the hands of the top .01% of players.
Even at it's height Patron Warrior was a deck that I preyed upon when climbing to legend as these 15-5 rank Patron players where often easy wins.
On October 17 2015 03:12 Madars wrote: I think after the patch every minion card with 3 or less attack that warrior can put in deck should be disenchanted at full price since that's all the cards that Warsong Commander affected.
You could hardly have made that sound more like entitled whining if you tried.
True, but I bet a good number of people crafted golden Dread Corsair, Inner Rage, Frothing Berserker, Battle Rage, and Grim Patron, many of which may not see play again.
On October 17 2015 03:12 Madars wrote: I think after the patch every minion card with 3 or less attack that warrior can put in deck should be disenchanted at full price since that's all the cards that Warsong Commander affected.
You could hardly have made that sound more like entitled whining if you tried.
True, but I bet a good number of people crafted golden Dread Corsair, Inner Rage, Frothing Berserker, Battle Rage, and Grim Patron, many of which may not see play again.
Crafting gold cards is a committment to the deck you use them in, whatever may happen. And honestly, if you crafted numerous golden cards for your Patron Warrior deck thinking it wasn't going anywhere, I don't know what to say. At the very least, several pros began practicing with other decks for fear of the deck getting nerfed, the public was outraging, the writing seemed to be on the wall.
if anyone's curious sjow's trying to play a warsongless patron deck. it's interesting. has a couple late game cards but a lot of similar cards to old patron list. he's currently 4-2 atm
i will only complain about the fact that patron kept in check many pre BRM hated decks and now they simply emerge out of nowhere .. freeze mage , zoo lock , face hunter , mid range pally ... all those annoying decks that BRM tried to save us from are now back in play . The ladder is absolute chaos right now ... I'm going up / down rank 7 to rank 5 like an elevator in a hotel . in my humble opinion this is one of the worst HS months ever no meta pulse what so ever .
On October 18 2015 05:12 Iknowwhy wrote: nerf a complex and fun to play deck into oblivion.
Yeah, because being fun to play or complex matters when compared with being able to OTK your opponent through taunts who's at 40+ life.
If you want to blame a card, blame Thaurissan. What felt like was going to be a great card for control decks with big hands ended up benefiting combo decks a lot more. Which only means a harsher, faster OTK. Force/savage/savage ring any bells? 14 damage of charge at turn 7 with no board ring any bells? Not sure if you could die at 50 life vs patron sound familiar?
On October 18 2015 05:12 Iknowwhy wrote: nerf a complex and fun to play deck into oblivion.
Yeah, because being fun to play or complex matters when compared with being able to OTK your opponent through taunts who's at 40+ life.
If you want to blame a card, blame Thaurissan. What felt like was going to be a great card for control decks with big hands ended up benefiting combo decks a lot more. Which only means a harsher, faster OTK. Force/savage/savage ring any bells? 14 damage of charge at turn 7 with no board ring any bells? Not sure if you could die at 50 life vs patron sound familiar?
On October 20 2015 08:26 RogerChillingworth wrote: Show nested quote +
Yeah, because being fun to play or complex matters when compared with being able to OTK your opponent through taunts who's at 40+ life.
If you want to blame a card, blame Thaurissan. What felt like was going to be a great card for control decks with big hands ended up benefiting combo decks a lot more. Which only means a harsher, faster OTK. Force/savage/savage ring any bells? 14 damage of charge at turn 7 with no board ring any bells? Not sure if you could die at 50 life vs patron sound familiar?
Fuck that deck. Druid's next.
Woah Woah Woah
Freeze mage is next.
Freeze mage?? -It has almost no board -It has an almost 0% matchup vs Control Warrior with Justicar Trueheart -It is countered very well by any deck with Kezan Mystic and Loatheb. -Its combos does not go nuts with a board (like druid) or punish the enemy's board (like patron.) -A simple Antique Healbot saved for after Alexstrasza can screw a freeze mage. -Bad draws can screw a freeze mage. -It was already targetted by the biggest nerf in HS history: Frost nova was 2, cone of cold was 3, blizzzard was 5 and (for a while longer) pyroblast was 8.
And of course all the pro scene is going to say the best deck is balanced. They won't discredit their wins by saying they are using something OP or unbalanced, that would just be shooting themselves in the foot. A lot of people in this thread surprised because they kept hearing in articles that patron is fine and complex/high skillcap; they heard it so much they ended up believing in it.
oh man, look how hard you are. How hard are you? so hard. how hard are you? so hard, bro this deck is so hard hard enough for you? yeah man, hard enough for you? damn hard. oh man
On October 20 2015 08:26 RogerChillingworth wrote: Show nested quote +
Yeah, because being fun to play or complex matters when compared with being able to OTK your opponent through taunts who's at 40+ life.
If you want to blame a card, blame Thaurissan. What felt like was going to be a great card for control decks with big hands ended up benefiting combo decks a lot more. Which only means a harsher, faster OTK. Force/savage/savage ring any bells? 14 damage of charge at turn 7 with no board ring any bells? Not sure if you could die at 50 life vs patron sound familiar?
Fuck that deck. Druid's next.
Woah Woah Woah
Freeze mage is next.
Freeze mage?? -It has almost no board -It has an almost 0% matchup vs Control Warrior with Justicar Trueheart -It is countered very well by any deck with Kezan Mystic and Loatheb. -Its combos does not go nuts with a board (like druid) or punish the enemy's board (like patron.) -A simple Antique Healbot saved for after Alexstrasza can screw a freeze mage. -Bad draws can screw a freeze mage. -It was already targetted by the biggest nerf in HS history: Frost nova was 2, cone of cold was 3, blizzzard was 5 and (for a while longer) pyroblast was 8.
Exactly
- has almost no board interaction - matches play themselves with no actual input for either player in some match ups - Its combos can go overboard depending on the version you run - Its too heavily draw dependent when you face a freeze mage there isn't any interaction other than "Does the freeze mage draw what they need" - It was targetted for the biggest nerf because it was the most boring deck to go against at the time and no one enjoyed playing verses one. That hasn't changed in nearly 2 years
I do think it's pretty sad to see stuff like Patron go, and if secret pali (and freeze mage) ended up going that'd be really sad. I don't think a card game can be good without fringe decks, or the really weird/janky decks. It's pretty hard for blizzard because of their slow card release cycle, but if there were more cards like Wailing soul to get rid of freeze effects, or more secret interactions, I think those decks could be managed.
Very few cards should be up for nerf unless really, really broken. It's wrong to say that Warsong hurt future design space, because the cards that blizzard might be making aren't out and wouldn't be out for a while, and, most importantly, Blizzard aren't as good as the actual top players of the game who are much better testers of what's too broken. The real reason is that Patron was keeping several decks down. But that's to be expected, as that's what the top deck does. Secret pali and Driud are now the ones keeping several decks down now. Whatever decks might come up now that Patron is gone will also shape the meta. No matter what, most decks are going to be bad because there will be some which are just better. It reminds me a lot of League of Legends, where Riot would nerf certain champions and then other champions would come back into the meta because they're no longer being held down and they would in turn keep other champions down.
I find that when a solution can be reached by nerfing a card, the same solution can probably be reached by introducing more hate cards or introducing cards which interact more with the problems of a deck. Chillmaw didn't work out as well as Blizzard had hoped, but it was a good idea. Maybe more cards that went against charge could have worked, or more silence cards. If you have a problem with 1-turn kills, maybe make a card that prevents attacks for a full round. If secret pali is a huge problem, what if there were more cards like Kezan and flare? If combo druid is a problem, maybe more cards like Loatheb.
On October 21 2015 18:06 Alej wrote: anyone denying that patron warrior (or freeze mage, or miracle rogue) are hard to play decks, has never tried them.
It's a children card game; it's easy by essence. There is no outstanding complexity in decision making for any turn in any match-up and in any card game. If by hard you mean making simple additions well, not good for you ! And hearthstone is even easier than the others because it has such a low variety of mechanics.
Do patron and freeze mage require you to make some more additions than some other decks? Sure, but it is still pretty damn easy. So yes I tried them, and no they are not hard to play, no deck of any card game of any kind is hard to play. However, it was an obviously superior deck to the rest with both high versatility and high power while being a combo deck so without real counter.
Freeze mage is less outrageously powerfull because it is very much more unlikely to do an OTK with it and it has some terrible matchups. And often BGH + healbot after alex is enough to destroy the whole purpose of their deck.
On October 21 2015 18:06 Alej wrote: anyone denying that patron warrior (or freeze mage, or miracle rogue) are hard to play decks, has never tried them.
It's a children card game; it's easy by essence. There is no outstanding complexity in decision making for any turn in any match-up and in any card game. If by hard you mean making simple additions well, not good for you ! And hearthstone is even easier than the others because it has such a low variety of mechanics.
Do patron and freeze mage require you to make some more additions than some other decks? Sure, but it is still pretty damn easy. So yes I tried them, and no they are not hard to play, no deck of any card game of any kind is hard to play. However, it was an obviously superior deck to the rest with both high versatility and high power while being a combo deck so without real counter.
Freeze mage is less outrageously powerfull because it is very much more unlikely to do an OTK with it and it has some terrible matchups. And often BGH + healbot after alex is enough to destroy the whole purpose of their deck.
I, uh.
I guess you thought you had a lot of unwinnable games with that deck which actually weren't.
EPT
and no I never played Patron apart from the very beginning when I wasn't already bored of it. ![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/SDcP8Vr.png)
![[image loading]](https://pp.vk.me/c629305/v629305757/189e5/lsn34YThbxA.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/PlX67wk.png?1)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/BOFfDU2.jpg)
