+ChrisCarTheMarauder Must be a Skyrim baby. Skyrim's status was nothing new to ES players. Arena had dungeons that were randomly generated when you were in them, possibly getting stuck in there forever because it didn't spawn in stairs or something and you're down on the bottom. Morrowind and Oblivion had a lot of bugs as well. The community always stepped up and created unofficial patches for them and made mod after mod for them. ES games outside of ESO are not subscription based/cash shop and were a one time payment. Sitting there and tinkering with a single game that isn't generating revenue until your company is bankrupt isn't a solid business plan. That being said Bethesda has released patches for ES games < elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Patches_(Skyrim) > as seen here using Skyrim as an example with links to their blogs. Did they fix everything? No. By the time they had these patches out the community already had patches for a lot of stuff so no point in wasting any time fixing what has been fixed. Fallout 4 game play has been leaked and that is why people are saying that now, when originally it was just crying over the "terrible" graphics. In reality the graphics were low because they were using a console to play the game. A game can only be graphically as good as the hardware backing it, and consoles tend to be outdated PCs with a fraction of the functionality. If they brought in a gaming computer people would be saying it has amazing graphics then be disappointed when they put it on their console and say they were lied to. Blizzard is a developer and publisher. Bethesda is a subsidiary of Zenimax Media. Bethesda is the publisher while Zenimax Media is the developer, or hands off the development to one of their many subsidiaries. So basically Bethesda handles everything EXCEPT the creation of their games. So if you want to actually point the finger at not making patches it'd actually be Zenimax you'd want to blame, not Bethesda, since they are the parent company if you want to be politically correct here. tl;dr Blizzard will keep milking their fan base, Bethesda doesn't handle their game software, Zenimax Media handles Bethesda's game software, Fallout 4 will most likely be the game of the generation.
+ChrisCarTheMarauder I'll make this one short for you, even though I left a tl;dr on my other post. 1. You think Morrowind wasn't buggy or left like Skyrim? 2. I only stated facts of Bethesda as a publisher and Zenimax Media as the developer. Proving you to be ignorant on the topic you were ranting about. 3. If stating Fallout 4 is going to be a great game, the best we will probably see for a while, makes me a fanboy then almost everyone who knows about it is a fanboy.
40:05 "Trying to get to 'legend' for this video was one of the most tedious, useless things I have ever done with my life. And that includes going to university for a liberal arts degree, and trying to teach a cat to shit in a toilet." man i love your analysis
@@DankLordDemaar It pokes fun at the Warsong Commander nerf that made it have the same text. The card was effectively killed, and all nerfs since then have followed suit.
@@bluejay7058 So, Warsong Commander was nerfed to have it give +1 to minions with charge and now that is a common way to nerf cards, is that what you are saying?
@@bluejay7058 well I mean it is still used in one very stupid combo I don't remember how to execute it exactly but it has to do with leeroy and cloning him and the commander
not only can he predict the narrative of games with frightening accuracy, but he can also predict the real-world narrative with equally frightening accuracy. if ever there were a true clairvoyant o_O
You all prolly dont care but does someone know of a way to log back into an Instagram account?? I somehow lost my password. I would appreciate any help you can offer me!
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I love how every one of the cards he mentioned has been changed, and his analysis is STILL accurate. Blizzard introduces a broken combo, it’s obvious to everyone that it’s broken, and they wait ten months before doing anything about it.
Derek Zheng Last time I heard, the Year Of The Raven has passed, and the 2018 sets (including Witchwood with Shudderwock) has now went to Wild Mode. But man, I remember when I got my Shudderwock from a card pack like, a year late into the Shaman meta but I still kept him for decks such as Quest Shaman
+AwesomeStuff64 Thanks a lot. I really appreciate the support. Making these is a fun hobby so it's cool that people seem to like them. I know they're too long for some people, and I totally understand that, so it's surprising that so many people get through them.
+Joseph Anderson I thought i just look into this video for a few minutes, but somehow i watched it the whole way, something about the way you talk and the incredibly accurate statements are a perfect balance! Keep going :)
Hi, I am someone from the future going through some of Joe’s old videos and I’m seeing a parallel between Blizzard’s handling of Hearthstone “balances” and Overwatch “balances”: ignore the overpowered thing THEY created, then ignore reasonable balance suggestions from the community and just kill it. It’s 3 am I’m not ready for this.
Pretty much still accurate, some things got adjusted but we still for example are missing Auto Squelch, Animation Skipping and balance overall. Like Rock, Paper, Scissors is pretty much still what the game is about
I totally agree with you, Solem. Without Animation Canceling, Ysera Portals summoning Nozdormu and skipping your turn are just game-breaking. I also wished that they made an effort to balance multiple deck types for every class instead of printing OP legendarys that just improve existing decks instead of creating a new deck types like Cthun. I really like your Videos btw!
Imagine an mmorpg where in pvp every class has a skill which can be used once per fight and has 45% chance to instakill an opponent and 45% chance to suicide. That's how I see heartstone.
Hearthstone's big issue is how they removed many of the mechanics other card games (such as Magic) have to help deal with the numerous forms of RNG inherent to the type of game. Magic contains numerous cards collectively referred to as "tutors", after the black card Dark Tutor. Pay mana, maybe pay something else (usually life or other cards), and you're allowed to search your library for one or more cards of your choice. Sometimes you can only search for specific cards (cards referred to as "fetchlands" are designed to help you draw more lands, often very useful for mana-hungry Green decks), or sometimes you can search for any one card you want. These cards explicitly exist to deal with the inherent randomness in drawing cards. Many decks are built around specific cards or combinations of cards, but if you have bad luck on draws and can't ever seem to draw those cards... you're sunk. Tutors exist as a way of controlling for this RNG. Additionally, Magic is USUALLY played in best-of formats - best of 3, best of 5, etc. This allows the use of the sideboard - a sub-deck of 15 cards you bring with you to the table, but which are not part of your deck. In between games, you're allowed to swap cards in between your deck and sideboard. This idea is designed to deal with the inherent randomness in not knowing what kind of deck your opponent will be using. If blue decks are meta (they were the last time I played many years ago), maybe you'll sideboard some "Protection from Blue" cards, or "Blue hate" cards. If you run into a Blue-focused meta deck, you'll swap in those cards from your sideboard... of course, they might also have swapped in some cards to deal with YOUR deck, too! I think it's ultimately just up to how Blizzard makes and operates games these days, though. Your Diablo 3 breakdown already covered it perfectly. These days, making money is the focus over making great games, and balance generally isn't the focus of their games unless they're desperately trying to compete with Dota 2 and League of Legends for that esports money.
Why not? It has the same negatives - new cards being deliberately overpowered to coerce continuous purchases - but many more positives and much more strategy. Very rarely can you truly say you lost just due to having bad draws. It DOES happen, but if it happens more than once in a blue moon, it's because your build sucks. You can't really say the same about Hearthstone.
David Carper Why not? Because it is not Hearthstone anymore, its Magic, and i dont like magic, i like Hearthstone. And i want to play Hearthstone and all interesting cards, heroes it offers, not magic.
Why is every single one of your posts, trying to have a dialogue with the author? And why do you always shift goalposts, topics, or make the discussion to be not about the game but about third parties?
Man that part of "playing on curve is so real", there are several games where the paladin has the "perfect" curve (shilded minibot on 2, muster on 3, piloted on 4, beltcher on 5, mc on 6). Feels like "I know your entire deck but I just can't do anything about it" even though in a card game I know about 80% of my opponent's deck! " Same thing goes to the aggro part, I play this game for about a year now, and I lose so many games (I would say about 25% of my games) where I simple could not win, and looked like doesn't really matter how well or poor a play, I still lose, either because of meta-decks or bad draw. You were really on point in "The bad part" in my opinion.
Dr.6, Dr.7 and Dr.8 if you see those Dr. 6 may as well concede.. if you let him get Dr.7 and 8 out.. then good luck. I am glad these decks are crap now.. even in wild.
three years later, and little has improved. The standard cycle has helped a bit, but we still have way too many cards coming out each year, bloated with garbage legendaries. About the only sign of generosity Blizzard has shown is that you no longer get duplicate legendaries.......which should have been in the game from the fucking start...........
I think the point made at 22:30 is poor. The class specific 2-mana 3 damage spells are generally defined around the class identity: For example, Frostbolt is 3 damage with upside (freeze) because part of Jaina's identity is powerful and efficient spells, Wrath is flexible as 3 damage or a 1 damage cantrip but at the expense of not going face. In some sense Fiery War Axe even fits alongside these as 2-mana 3 damage cards and fits into how Warrior gains advantage utilizing health/armor as a resource (one can also consider Eviscerate for Rogues, and Lightning Bolt for Shaman). To this point, the reason Darkbomb is a "strictly worse" version of Frostbolt is because the Warlock is defined through the Life Tap hero power. Warlock's identity is designed around winning through card advantage over card quality, so giving a worse 2 mana removal spell is sensible. Similarly, why should Warrior get a removal spell comparable to fireball? One class utilizes weapons and armor for removal, while the other class specializes in spells. This is actually one of the cool things I appreciate about Hearthstone, this designed imbalance helps solidify separate class identities. That being said, blizzard does not make strong efforts to balance the classes, which I think is a bigger problem.
After your video I was stunned. Perfect. You covered everything. You put the exact amount of emphasis on the "on curve" play because it is as bad as it is. Even the small jokes you´ve slipped in were rounding up this video. I don´t know anymore man. 10/10 Really.
18:53 I have to wonder how long this little section took. In video editors I use, mashing together so many little clips from tons of files would have been an absolute pain in the ass. Anyway, great video that pretty much wraps up r/hearthstone the past few weeks. I hadn't even thought about the money side of it though.
+CutmanMike Oh god. Should I be honest about that? It's really embarrassing. Fuck. Yeah, so about three hours. For less than two minutes of video. And I'm not even sure if it was worth it. Some people have said they hated it and thought it went on too long, while others say they really love it. I thought it was hilarious when I watched it back because it sums up so much of the game that I find frustrating: "they ALWAYS have that card on turn 2".
+Joseph Anderson I know your pain, totally not surprised it took that long. But yes it is frustrating, as charming as the sounds and visuals are it gets tiresome hearing "SHIELDS AP, RED ALERT!" every turn 2. At blizzcon maybe we'll get some hope that steps are going to be taken to sort this game out, but I doubt it.
But if they always have those cards, doesn't this completely undermine your point of RNG and there needing to be help for you to curve out? If the first was so ever-deciding, wouldn't there be tons of times they did not have those cards? (There are, you just did not show those) If the second was to be implemented, there would be less RNG which would be horrible in this instance, because they would actually have those cards on their first/second turn a lot more often / always.
Hearthstone is just a game to play on my tablet when I'm bored at the bus or when I feel like multitasking. I honestly can't take it too seriously. Did people actually compare this to chess?.. Wow
Nowadays, many of the issues brought up in this vid have been addressed. Now it has also created new problems but I digress, the main thing is they waited far too long to fix things and went with the assumption of “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”. It was broke, just such an innovator at the time with such a powerful IP on so many platforms that people flocked to it. Hopefully future developers that end up with a success don’t just sit on their laurels
Hey Joseph, watched this video as well as your Diablo 3 one, and I just wanted to say that I appreciate the work you put into making these. Your sentiments echo those of many of us in the Blizzard fanbase, and I am a veteran who has been playing all of Blizzard's titles since Warcraft II's release. Thank you, and please keep up the excellent work.
+Rainesama Thanks! That means a lot, especially since it feels like there's a large set of fans so entrenched in their love for the company. I sadly think their focus has shifted too much toward making money. The common response I see--I think I even saw it today--was that "of course a company wants to make money! how dare they!" Which ignores the point that there's a right and wrong way to do that. I'm not so confident to say that Hearthstone is proof that Blizzard is cashing in fan loyalty at a broken exchange rate, but the class skins have got me wondering.
15:33 legit the most hysterical line I’ve ever heard in my life... beginning with “i wrote a story once about a guy from the future...” and ending with “...you are role playing a b**** AI so the other player can enjoy himself” 😂😂😂 such good reviews on this channel man
I've played Magic, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. Never played Hearthstone, but many of your points are reflections of these other card games. Great video very interesting.
"I am thoroughly sick of playing something that's the video game equivalent of a slot machine, both in how it plays and the money it wants from you." Joseph Anderson: Always ahead of the curve.
"Blizzard wants to avoid players ever feeling bad or confused". This is literally the reason every single one of their games, in particular WoW, hasn't been nearly as good as pre-Activision Blizzard games (think SC:BW, D2:LoD, WoW V-WotlK, WC3:TFT). They cater every decision, every mechanic, every aspect of their games to the lowest common denominator (ie. casuals) instead of catering to the people who actually play their games, and are passionate about them. From a business stand point, it makes the most sense to cast a wide net. I think we all understand as to why Blizzard makes the decisions, or ignores making decisions, in that regard. But the point is doing anything extreme that alters the game in a good way (ie. nerfing patron/secret paladin/face-lock and hunter, balancing arena in general, stop the creation of sticky minions, re-introduce control into the meta, etc) only effects players who play at a higher level anyway. Some casual hearthstone player who never makes it past rank 15 doesn't have a clue what the meta is. They don't understand the finer details of the game, nor do they even know what is WRONG with the game. So why make balance changes based around them? It doesn't make sense. D3 too. Instead of having skill trees, where people can make wildly different builds, they made everyone the same. Every season a new meta came and went, where every player played the exact same build depending on class. They don't want Mr. 1 hour a day player to have to restart his character because he fucked up the tree, or can't farm the gold to respec, or whatever.The removed all exclusivity with WoW, and players now expect to see content instead of earning their way into content. It's just all care bear bowlshit as far as I'm concerned. They muddy the waters with too many difficulties, then add random procs to increase iLevels of gear so that people INCAPABLE of doing higher difficulties can still get gear equal to said difficulties? Why? So that the 2 hour a week pet collector can get his/her transmog set while being carried by people who actually enjoy raiding for the difficulty, strategy, and teamwork. TL;DR - Blizzard likes to ruin the integrity of their games for the people who love them the most, and instead build their games around appeasing people who barely even play their games. I know the whole hardcore vs. casual argument is fucking stupid, and people are tired of hearing about it, and I'm sorry for that lmao. I'm just passionate about Blizzard in general, and to see their quality wane through the years just to make more money is infuriating.
Pretty much how I feel about Blizzard, but put into better words. I could not have said it better myself. It sickens me what this company has become. Now that Christ Metzen is calling it quits, I really don't know what to expect from Blizzard. Mike Morhaime is a douchebag (I've met him, don't waste your time). I mean, it makes sense from a business standpoint, but Blizzard was notorious back in the day for developing games at a caliber higher than any other company. Everything they pumped out turned to gold. Now it's like I can't play any of their games anymore because of how terrible they are in gameplay, mechanics, etc.
the saddest thing is, their games are still top notch compared to the rest of the field. the issue is, they could be SO MUCH MORE if they didn't always try and cast the widest possible net as far as demographics. they want everything to be far too inclusive. and like anything that was once amazing/niche and later becomes mainstream, it's qualities/integrity suffers. There is a difference between a developer like Blizzard, who make decisions based on the bottom line; and developers like Square who have essentially abandoned any and all understanding of their fan base (not a SINGLE turn-based game since X/X-2 - coincidentally, although not really, every major FF title since then has been absolute trash). Blizzard is still the shit in my book, even after that giant rant comment, but instead of being an A++ PC dev, they're like a B+. And, quite frankly, a B+ is still better than everything else in the field outside of maybe CDPR. *shrug* it's whatever, just frustrating is all.
I've been having that same problem with Blizzard. I'm finding it difficult to enjoy playing ANY of their games. I loved StarCraft and Brood war. That's where I got into the company. StarCraft 2 is... meh. I spent hours even after completing the campaigns of StarCraft just playing all the UMS games. Finding cool new things people played. Tower Defense, roleplay maps, rush maps, etcetera. StarCraft 2? It isn't even really worth it for me to play the standard multiplayer games in StarCraft 2. At least in StarCraft 1 and Brood War when I'd get my ass stomped (I am not very good at these games, but I used to find fun in trying to win) I was learning a new strategy, learning bits nd bobs about my own race's capabilities (I love playing as Zerg). StarCraft 2? Oh God, what a fucking nightmare. It always feels like I lost to cheap tactics... things that shouldn't be possible. Not some skilled person who does micro better than me (I suck at micro), but some douchenozzle who just has a gimmick that I just don't know how to counter. That's StarCraft 2. No strategy. No thought put into the game. Adopt a strategy before the game opens, make sure it wins the game as fast as possible, then cheese to victory. No time for attacks and counters, no time for skirmishes across the map. Rush a ton of units for your strat, if you lose them, concede the game. That's not fun. That's not even a GAME. I suck at RTS games, but I like when a legitimately better player BEATS ME 'cause he knows how to play the game better and knows more about it. I don't like the relentless bullshit cheese and 10 minute games. Hell, there isn't even any room in StarCraft 2 to really experiment much except against computer players... and unless you put them on something higher than "normal" difficulty, you're going to stomp them pretty easily. Hell, the jump between "Medium" and "Hard" in the multiplayer side is like going from punching hobos in a back alley to fighting Mike Tyson. I expected to be able to climb the difficulty ladder in AI fights so that I could gradually learn how to be better at fighting human opponents. Or at least... know enough about the game to not completely suck. StarCraft 2 doesn't even play like that in multiplayer. It only gets much worse when you play the 3 campaigns I bought. 90% of all missions in StarCraft 2 are "timed". Why? I genuinely like the base building aspect of RTS games. I like the gathering and securing of resources. I like the MAP CONTROL of RTS games. I don't like this, "beat the mission before the clock runs out" bullshit that takes the place of GOOD AI. I played the first two campaigns on Hard difficulty. Aside from getting the Hard Achievements, they gave me no issue... Except the last mission of the Terran Campaign where it's made ridiculously cheaty and difficult and the only option is to "turtle up", but you have to defend too much stuff, too far spread out, through too many holes in your defenses... Even worse when you've finally succeeded in figuring out how to defend all of that.... NYDUS WORMS SHOW UP BEYOND YOUR DEFENSES ANYWAY! Well, unless you've destroyed the nydus tunnels. The mission gets much easier if you did it that way. But, alas, if you were silly like me and didn't do things that way... well, consider yourself fucked and have to restart the whole campaign to get another shot at it. Blizzard has gone from "legitimate challenge" to "be as cheaty as fuck". That's why I quit playing Blizzard games. What's the point? If they don't care about the quality of their games, why should I care about buying any of them?
Couldn't have said it better for the games listed, but I actually think that somewhat of the opposite reason is why overwatch was ruined for me, and instead of dropping thousands of hours into it like i did others before, I only play it on occasion with friends. The actions taken show that the overwatch development team makes changes that the vocal minority on their forums ask for, who are the mega fans of the game who only play that game, so it makes sense that they obviously try to appeal to this crowd, but at the same time some changes made ruin most of the fun i can have with the game. Take the buff on symmetra, one of the most unpopular characters in the game. Even though she was weak, there generally not much talk about changing her aside from an uncommon discussion on it for, and she was thought as a class that had a higher learning curb, but in time, symmetra was buffed into a god of a character, instantly melting anyone under 200 health who didnt instantly run away from her. More recently roadhog, arguably the best tank/attack heroes since the release of the game was nerfed into oblivion, making him almost useless as a tank and an offensive hero alike. Both of these changes essentially ruined most of the fun I can have in the game anymore, as theres no idea into what will be changed next, and there isn't common denominator to the changes. While I can somewhat understand why the team had wanted to change roadhog, as his hook mechanics were changed a whopping 4 times, the changes that they made are too heavy handed. One of the main problems with overwatch is that it seems like blizzard doesn't know who they want to please. Do they want to make the game a dedicated e-sport that can compete with the dozens of others already popular, shown by the changes to roadhog? Or do they want to make a game that is aimed toward a more casual audience, demonstrated by the changes made to symmetra? The statement of "Blizzard wants to avoid players ever feeling bad or confused" is almost an oxymoron when talking about overwatch, as the game is touted as having a super competitive mode, while at the same time has a character where killing someone takes about as much skill as killing a monster in diablo 3.
Tf2 has the best free to play model ever. Purely cosmetic items cost money, everything else doesn't. The only advantage you can buy (more inventory space) can be gained by paying anything you want, even as little as €0.2. No pay to win, no pay to progress, nothing like that.
?? That's not true. Random weapon drops offer different playstyles at different power levels. TF2 went off the deep end years before even this old comment
I had very much enjoyed your Dark Souls critique and found myself thinking "I already know the problems with Hearthstone, why would I watch this guy tell me what they are"before watching this video. And yet here I am, with 42 minutes gone and no regrets. You put out a very well made video that takes on most of the problems in Hearthstone (except card text inconsistency as recently shown by Disguised Toast). Thank you for your work, I will now refer people to this video if I ever need a summary of Hearthstone. I subscribed.
I don't have many problems with the video, but the point made at 17:50 only shows a misunderstanding of how meta analysis of win rates in any competitive game works. Saying that it's crazy that >60% win rates are considered good is silly because >60% is good for every competitive game that allows you to make some sort of decision as to how you play. I think the easiest way to represent this is by comparing Hearthstone to fighting games, a genre no one thinks of as highly random. A common way of breaking down characters in a fighting game is the concept of match ups, or how each character fares against another. Match ups are often described in form of how many wins each character could expect in a set of 10 matches assuming both players are of equal skill level. So a 5-5 match up is a balanced one, where you could reasonably expect either party to win and it's highly dependent on each player's individual skill with neither character having significant advantages over the other. Anything other than that is considered a good (or bad depending on what end you're on) match up, so the disadvantaged character in a 6-4 match up has an uphill battle to fight. Something like a 7-3 match up is one where the disadvantaged character has to have significantly more knowledge about the match up than the advantaged character to close the gap. An 8-2 match up says that something is broken with the balance of the game that needs to be fixed. These all translate very cleanly into percentages, with 5-5 being 50% and so on. To go back to win rates in Hearthstone, for a deck to have a 70% win rate, this is the same as saying it has a 7-3 match up against *every single competitive deck.* Every other deck that people are playing has few ways to deal with it and they can't access those with any sort of consistency. Such a situation would be horrible for a fighting game, and that doesn't change with Hearthstone or any competitive game. It's also important to keep in mind that the ranking system means that players will eventually be playing people of roughly the same skill level. If someone is going up against people of the same skill level it's expected that they will lose about half of the time even in a purely skill based game like chess. That's not to say Hearthstone doesn't have a lot of randomness, or that you couldn't find some good ways to argue for it (some of which were brought up in the video), but looking at overall win rates is a horrible way to make that point.
I think he's comparing winrates to ye olden days of multiplayer in games where matchmaking consisted primarily of just finding just any server with a low ping and throwing you in there. This effectively meant matches were filled with completely random people who ran the gamut from "Just installed 5 seconds ago" and "Been playing for 10 years straight." Because of this, if you had a 75% winrate across all your matches then it usually meant you were roughly in the top 25% of players who used the random matchmaking. Of course, a lot of multiplayer games completely ditched that system in favor of always trying to make sure you fight people who are at your skill level.
+JacenLP Thanks! Are there any digital card games that sell entire collections like that? There's hardly any competition for Hearthstone at all, actually. At least nothing close to the amount of care put into Hearthstone's UI that I've seen.
+Joseph Anderson Not really I am afraid. FFG (Fantasy Flight Games) is refusing to enter the digital market. WotC's digital Magic versions are usually botched and the only I know of who has at least a decent digital version alongside the print run is Star Realms by the relatively new White Wizard Games. It's not nearly as polished, but got a very solid core for a product from a company that small. For non-competitive, Obsidian is working on a digital adaption of the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game (though I find that to be really shallow, game wise). Maybe the digital market is too volatile for some of the publishers? Maybe the products usually are too complicated to port? Writing code is considerably more effort than printing text on cards after all. Not sure ... the guys from FFG I had contact with were all tight lipped.
+Joseph Anderson There's been talks of an Elder Scrolls card game. I hope it pans out and is good enough to steal Hearthstone's player base, so Blizzard can stop coasting on the original success of Hearthstone when it was first released and people recognized the potential it had (which it has by now squandered).
+Joseph Anderson I don't think there's anything like that today. Yomi and Puzzle Strike are great even playing field online card games, but the UI is not on Hearthstone's level, and the gameplay is like a turn-based fighting game (Yomi) or like Dominion (Puzzle Strike), so they might not appeal to the same sensibilities as MtG or HS or whatever. In a couple years there will definitely be a game like that though.
Anyone that reads this in 2017: All that the standard system changed is that the TOP OP Class now rotates from Secrete Paladin to Shaman and now to Jade Druid (Or what ever aggro shit will creep up after that). And it means that cards I bought a year ago are now worthless. RNG and imbalance is untouched, infact Balance changes will never ever happen now that Blizzard just needs to wait a year until the cards rotate out anyway.
I have no idea how a person like you only has 200 subs yet shits of youtube have so much more. Grate job on the video, keep them coming i at least will be back for more
I want to push back a bit on the idea that a 55-60% win rate being considered good is bad. Consider that in a ranked competitive setting, you're supposed to be pitted against an opponent of similar skill level. If you're winning more than 50% of the time, it is a sign that you are not ranked as highly as you should, and vice versa. I do agree that winning only every other game sucks (it's also a big reason why I don't play these games), but this is an inherent feature of ranked competitive video games, not a design flaw of this game in particular.
You’re not wrong but you’re referring to something different, the win rate in this case is about something else, what they’re really measuring is the RNG, there are many decks where if you get the perfect cards you will do amazing but how often is that? If the chances are 1 in 100 and 99 of those games mean losing then that deck has 1% win rate, just one perfect game isn’t enough for a deck to be viable and consistency is a huge part of the meta game When he says 70% is godly, it means that out of 100 games 70 of those will give you good card combinations while 30 will give you bad card combinations, the skill factor is separate from that and becomes super hard to accurately work because of the randomness, you can get 10 unlucky draws in a row while your opponents get amazing draws causing the game to think you’re worse than them, you can also get 10 amazing draws while your opponents get 10 mediocre ones and yet you still lose 4 games, this means that you’re not on the same level as them since you should never have lost if that was the case but since it’s a positive win ratio the game will still bump you up, you can’t fight that unless the game accounts the randomness of each deck in the ranking system which it never will
@@Gellus Hm. I'm not sure this makes sense to me. I don't play Hearthstone but that's not how MMR is determined in competitive online games I'm familiar with. Like in DotA or LoL the MMR logic doesn't care if you got a bad team comp, and indeed it seems like it would be really, really difficult to objectively determine 'good' or 'bad' RNG in games with their level of complexity.
@@SacredDaturaa From a meta perspective getting a bad team comp is simply not a factor since it’s not built around playing with randoms but RNG is still a huge factor at all levels of HS and pros have to plan their whole gameplan around it, from a MMR perspective it does affect things and even pros will be seen raging while streaming and losing a match because of a bad team, complaining about bad match making is super prevalent in those games as well because of it
Just randomly watching this 5 years later: 17:30 - that was a pretty smooth move to kill your scientist and pull the flame trap (then win next turn w/ the old charging arcane golem). It is kinda funny though, you put that under a part where you were talking about actually playing with skill, which you were doing, but then I'm sure you had to bite your fingernails waiting to see how much Dr. Boom's bombs were gonna hit you for (RNG).
I just wanted to say that even listening to this 3 years later has the same light as it did back then. Even now there are overarching decks that break the meta, like kingsbane mill rouge, jade druid, or even cube warlock. I will tip my hat to you sir. NAILED IT
31:20 “they asked me how good my stats were. I said as good as any other 4 cost minion i’d ever met. They asked me if i summon any minion against the opponent, i said i summon a random 1 cost minion for the opponent. They said welcome aboard”
Blizzard's idea of Balance haven't changed. And for those who don't remember, Rogues are Scissors, Warriors are Rock.. Hunters, Druids, Paladins, Priests, Mages and Shamans are Paper. Warlocks, are Mushroom.
I love watching Hearthstone from time to time and after playing it myself, I recognized that it isn't a game that appeals to me personally. However, massive drama coupled with the popular streamers with zero skill can be a really fun to see play out. Even watching the sad realities of a streamer who hates the game (this applies to other popular streamed games) who continues to play it because they are known for playing it, has a degree of value. In my humble opinion, Blizzard knows exactly what they are doing and they are responding to the market dominance of particular types of games and "payment methods".
"I am done with Hearthstone" I have said the exact same thing at least 3 different times now, yet every time I end up crawling back a month or two later since there really isn't any other game out there like Hearthstone. Its really aesthetically pleasing, and feels great to play (smoothness and the flow of things), and it's one of those games where winning a match almost seems to make losing the previous 5 games worth it. Hearthstone is almost a guilty pleasure of mine. I usually don't play for weeks on end out of frustration, but its guaranteed i'll be back to play some more during the next season
same i went back a few times, was about to go back again before i played something better and realized that hearthstone is essentially the curer for a tcg itch, beyond that its just not good enough to keep me
Same here. Though this is a year old video, I "quit" when the last winter's expansion came out because of certain deck archetypes that rose up that time. I came back to the game a few days ago and it's probably the most balanced I've seen for a long time. At the same time, this is right before another expansion is going to be released so I might just say I'll be on "hiatus" instead of "quitting". I've also played other CCGs during that time and yet Hearthstone is the game that brings me back in. I hate and love it at the same time when I think about it.
I think after the adventure from Descent Of Dragons, the one adventure where you actually have to pay for getting new cards which could *slightly* shift the meta game of December-March, yeah I think I'm actually done. After years of matches with RNG and a game of rock-paper-scissors, obtaining the late legendaries that are probably out of Meta by the time I got them (I got shudderwock a year after Kobolds was already rotated out) and uninteresting gameplay. Now I have shifted to Gwent and I found it a lot much better and rewarding than doing two quests just to buy 1 pack after spending and opening it only to get nothing but a few commons I already have and a rare. I'm Free-To-Play and I don't think I would ever spend my money on something as random and ridiculous than this. In gwent at least there's a goal to work towards!
This is probably the best video about Hearthstone i've ever seen. Everything was explained so well and you were spot on. Also, the video editing was perfect. Well done :)
Regarding Ben Brode and your assessment, that Blizzard doesn´t seem to know how to balance their own game: It´s pretty much the same for WoW these days. And their reasoning for nerfing (or buffing) is the same. They nerfed a class, then 3 weeks later buffed it again "because they FEEL that players are now used to play against them."
Joseph probably never plays hearthstone anymore (and good for him for that) so he'll never know not only how right he was at the time but also how right he remains. So many of the issues he brought up 7 years ago either remain an issue to this day, or have been fixed with his exact suggestion.
Came here right after watching your no mans sky video, so I've got to ask: Which was worse, trying to get to legend in Hearthstone or trying to get to the center of galaxy in No Mans Sky? P.S: Love these videos, just subscribed, looking forward to seeing more!
No Man's Sky. I occasionally still fire up Hearthstone and see what's new and think about doing another video on it. I'll never play No Man's Sky again. Even if it got a patch or an expansion.
No Man’s Sky. When you get a legendary in Hearthstone, you actually get some sweet sweet dopamine but No Man’s Sky you just cry in disappointment at the end.
As someone who played hearthstone in 2014-2016, this video is nostalgically aggravating & probably the best explanation and analysis of hearthstone i've ever seen.
I actually watched the whole video and can't say I disagree with anything what you said. It actually just confirmed my feelings and opinion that I've developed towards the game and Blizzard in general after TGT was released, after having played Diablo 3 since Vanilla and after putting myself through the grind to legendary for the first time this season in Hearthstone. For both games I feel like the developers either don't care what sophisticated players think about the game as long as it sells many copies or they really have no clue what they are doing. Sadly, Hearthstone, like Diablo 3, is suffering from a tremendous amount of wasted potential. Personally I don't see a reason in playing either of them any longer, at least for the time being, if Blizzard continues to handle those games like they did until now.
37:00 that's exactly how FFGs LCG format is working and they managed to cut insanely into the market share of Magic with very new games. I just wish FFG would just port their games to video games so Blizz would lose some market share with HS ...
Did I ever mention how much I like listening to you talk? Like, I’ve watched your videos several times, but also leaving them running like podcasts is perfect for my farming sessions.
After this analysis I'm really interested in what you would say about Magic: The Gathering Arena. I think it's way more fun and better balanced than any of the Hearthstone spawns.
The idea that aggro and dying from burst damage is bad for the game is really interesting and I think it highlights a flaw in the game's groundwork. In hearthstone, to act on your opponents turn you have to play a secret on your turn, that triggers in a specific situation. Compare this to say, Magic the Gathering, which has cards you can cast on your opponent's turn. This opens up interaction with your opponent a lot more and means you can do a lot more about your opponent playing aggro or burst damage from the hand. In magic, aggro isn't really seen as something bad, at least not by most players, because it can be well countered by the high interaction of a control archetype if done properly. In high level play, the increased interaction is seen as one of the game's high points. A match being fought between two control players is often talked about as being an intense game of skill and restraint, not a guessing game like in Hearthstone, because you can instantly (no pun intended) answer your opponent's threats without them having a whole turn before you can do anything about them.
"The cynic in me thinks the Legendary effect is intentional" That's called realism, not cynicism. "It's not Blizzard's responsibility to help the minority of people with impulse control problems" It kinda is.
I have way more fun playing Tavern Brawls that let you play as the bosses or with a fixed synergy/combo deck. This game is meant to be casual yet so many people take it so seriously.
I don't understand the "this game is not just a card game"-thing, and the comparison to Rocket League. There's no racing at all in Rocket League, but you could very easily make a paper-version of Hearthstone, just... make it, it's already just a regular MtG-like card-game. The only thing you'd have to change is that now you can only buy boosters, not win them. Also, the "fix" you described at the end in the ugly-section is just turning the game from a CCG to an LCG. Some people, like myself, immensely enjoy the random-factor inherent in CCG's where you DON'T own all cards, have to make do with what you have, and open boosters in search for great cards (which is pretty much half the enjoyment of a CCG). LCG's in contrast feel sterile and lifeless, and while I enjoy several CCG's, there's literally just ONE LCG that I can stand playing (Android Netrunner).
I've never played Hearthstone but I play Magic every once in a while. Seeing how they've nerfed that Grim Patron deck I'm wondering why they didn't just limit the number of possible Grim Patrons on the board. Just make the card say "There can only be three Grim Patrons in play at the same time." and that's it. The combo would still be viable but wouldn't spiral out of control entirely. It would even passively nerf the deck even further by gimping the strategy against another Grim Patron deck. The one that got to play his combo first would rob the combo from the other player, who in turn would have to use his removal to challenge that. Players would have to prepare for that eventuality. Am I mistaken in that assumption?
DerPafferfish the problem wasn't just the patrons. it was the frothing berserkers which got more damage each time a minion is hit. patron actually has a niche ability due to its natural low hp.
+OxfordOctopus They could've also made it so minions could no longer get the charge buff if their attack exceeded the required 3 or lower. That way, frothing berserkers couldn't charge for 20 attack after getting buffed.
Kodo Elder-Groebe Yeah, something like that would've fixed the deck already without making the card useless. But I guess Hearthstone has got bigger problems than that.
The last time I played Hearthstone, the player I matched against was barely doing anything to defend themselves, but just before I could finish them off, they pulled off some combo that allowed them to summon an infinite amount of fireballs, killing all my minions and taking all my HP in one turn. Of course, their deck depended entirely on luck to draw the right cards for a one turn win, but that proved just how RNG-dependent Hearthstone was, so I quit. Not to mention how nearly all the cards they used for their free win were ones I hadn't unlocked due to being f2p.
Just remember that you guys are wasting money on digital cards. Let that sink in for a moment. Unlike physical cards where you can at least have a collection and make your own rules, digital cards are just a cheap substitute.
All these Questions u askd are easy to answer, the tweak between competetive and casual is something that has to be considered in everygame. They want a new player to have the same chance of winning while still getting him interested enough to keep playing. Good Video as usual
Winrates, above 60% is good, above 70% is godly. What sort of numbers would you want to indicate that the game is skillbased and not rngbased? In professional Brood War, there was the concept of a 'bonjwa', one single player dominating for a long period of time. During the 2 years 'Savior' was the bonjwa, he had a 66% winrate. The best player to ever play the game, Flash, is the only player ever to have more than 70% winrate in all of the three matchups. Bobby Fischer, regarded as the greatest chess player ever, has a lifetime 72% winrate.
To put it into perspective: I could play the best Starcraft player in the world 100 times and I would be lucky to ever win once. If I played the best Hearthstone player in the world 100 times, I would win just under half of the games. That's why those winrate percentages are so important. Because even players who are good and understand the game stay at those percentages at (almost) every rank on the ladder.
The thing is that this may be why games that do this are so popular. It gives the 'not good' players a decent chance to win...which they can pretend is because of their 'skill'. It's like flipping a coin and getting 'heads' half the time...and feeling good about it.
I would argue that rng leads to as many feels bad moments as it does feels good. You see, eventually when new players become skilled, they now realize that the same rng they felt great winning with feels terrible to lose to. So it isn't all happy giggles and fun with rng and only experienced players getting upset or losing to it like you believe. It upsets everyone eventually.
Just wanted to say that is untrue. If you were to play somebody who is widely regarded as a god in this game, say for example Kolento, you would certainly NOT win just under half of the games. You would win far less. There certainly is a skill element in Hearthstone, and professional players do see the game differently. Pro players are capable of calculating the mathematically best outcome for each action and plan their turns accordingly, something that the average player does not do. However, that being said, I think you are right in that Hearthstone is extremely RNG-reliant. I just think that winrate is not the best way to go about analyzing it, as the best teams in the world in other, skill-based games also have relatively 'low' winrates. Instead it's important to look at HOW games are won and lost, which you addressed. In the case of Hearthstone, it's incredibly random events and draw order that determine wins and losses, and this random nature isn't something which is easily reflected by quantitative data. Basically, what I'm saying is that while you're right in that Hearthstone is less skill-reliant than other games, winrate isn't a good metric to demonstrate that. Rest of the video was great though and sums up my qualms with the game perfectly. Keep up the good reviews!
Being a professional Hearthstone player is determined more by your twitch fame than by your hearthstone skill simply because the highest level of skill in the game is really not that hard to reach. This is because each turn has on average less than 1.5 moves that could be played. Figuring out what these moves are is where the skill comes in but it's just as glaringly obvious to people who have put in some time to learn it as it is to people like Reynad, Hafu, and Kolento. Pros aren't the only people who percentage crunch in their head, the game trains you to do it. The reward for getting those numbers accurately still comes down to something akin to needing to roll dice to make the chess move you want to. Like JA said, the game is deeply broken in this regard. I would agree with your point that "win-rate isn't the best way to determine skill level at hearthstone" but that's precisely what's broken. Why isn't it? Hearthstone simply isn't a competitive game due to its focus on making everyone feel like a winner around 50% of the time regardless of skill.
There was a Hearthstone ad before the video 😂 This is an amazing video btw, I've been watching through lots of your content and I just want to say I really appreciate all the effort you put into your work. It's really refreshing to watch such clever and insightful videos!
I think the reason that Blizzard took so long to nerf Patron is the same reason why they're waiting to nerf Mysterious Challenger, and why they will never nerf Dr. Boom, is simply $$. You could only get the BEST DECK IN THE GAME by BUYING the Blackrock Mountain xpac (or paying a ridiculous amount of gold). You can only get Myserious Challenger or Dr. Boom by BUYING card packs, praying that you get an epic/legendary, and then hoping that it's the one you want. You can of course craft these Dr. Six and Seven, but think of how long that will take for someone who doesn't spend money on Hearthstone. You'd be getting 1 pack at a time, and will rarely ever get duplicates to disenchant. You'd have to suffer for so long before finally getting a few cards that are actually good!
+Ronaldinho Gaucho " You could only get the BEST DECK IN THE GAME by BUYING the Blackrock Mountain xpac" You do realise that all cards you needed for patron that came from BRM were available in the very first wing? The only "expensive" card in the deck was Death's Bite which iirc is from the 4th wing of Naxx. The deck was, in fact, extremely powerful AND quite cheap to craft.
Usually I can watch your videos and enjoy them even if I never played the game you are talking about and I don't plan to. But this video is 80% incomprehensible to me.
Holy shit, I watched this 1 year ago and commented.... I still occasionally play, but this video holds up so fucking well. I really appreciate the fact that you made this (and all the effort you put into it)
Why fix the problems when people keep buying our shit regardless lol
-Blizzard, 2015
+ChrisCarTheMarauder Must be a Skyrim baby. Skyrim's status was nothing new to ES players. Arena had dungeons that were randomly generated when you were in them, possibly getting stuck in there forever because it didn't spawn in stairs or something and you're down on the bottom. Morrowind and Oblivion had a lot of bugs as well. The community always stepped up and created unofficial patches for them and made mod after mod for them. ES games outside of ESO are not subscription based/cash shop and were a one time payment. Sitting there and tinkering with a single game that isn't generating revenue until your company is bankrupt isn't a solid business plan. That being said Bethesda has released patches for ES games < elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Patches_(Skyrim) > as seen here using Skyrim as an example with links to their blogs. Did they fix everything? No. By the time they had these patches out the community already had patches for a lot of stuff so no point in wasting any time fixing what has been fixed.
Fallout 4 game play has been leaked and that is why people are saying that now, when originally it was just crying over the "terrible" graphics. In reality the graphics were low because they were using a console to play the game. A game can only be graphically as good as the hardware backing it, and consoles tend to be outdated PCs with a fraction of the functionality. If they brought in a gaming computer people would be saying it has amazing graphics then be disappointed when they put it on their console and say they were lied to.
Blizzard is a developer and publisher. Bethesda is a subsidiary of Zenimax Media. Bethesda is the publisher while Zenimax Media is the developer, or hands off the development to one of their many subsidiaries. So basically Bethesda handles everything EXCEPT the creation of their games. So if you want to actually point the finger at not making patches it'd actually be Zenimax you'd want to blame, not Bethesda, since they are the parent company if you want to be politically correct here.
tl;dr Blizzard will keep milking their fan base, Bethesda doesn't handle their game software, Zenimax Media handles Bethesda's game software, Fallout 4 will most likely be the game of the generation.
+ChrisCarTheMarauder I'll make this one short for you, even though I left a tl;dr on my other post.
1. You think Morrowind wasn't buggy or left like Skyrim?
2. I only stated facts of Bethesda as a publisher and Zenimax Media as the developer. Proving you to be ignorant on the topic you were ranting about.
3. If stating Fallout 4 is going to be a great game, the best we will probably see for a while, makes me a fanboy then almost everyone who knows about it is a fanboy.
+ChrisCarTheMarauder You sound triggered, bro.
- Activision Blizzard 2015.
update for 2017, basically the same
Funny how 4 years ago Joseph had to suggest his viewers watched a 40 minute video in multiple sittings cuz he considered it lengthy
I think he said a similar thing in either Diablo 3 or Darkest Dungeon, and neither of those videos come close to the length of either Witcher videos.
40:05
"Trying to get to 'legend' for this video was one of the most tedious, useless things I have ever done with my life. And that includes going to university for a liberal arts degree, and trying to teach a cat to shit in a toilet."
man i love your analysis
The good: 5min
The bad: *start *
Me: this is gonna get bloody
True
RNG is good, actually.
666th like
That line about nerfing shredder to give minions with charge +1, was hilarious.
...why?
@@DankLordDemaar It pokes fun at the Warsong Commander nerf that made it have the same text. The card was effectively killed, and all nerfs since then have followed suit.
@@bluejay7058 So, Warsong Commander was nerfed to have it give +1 to minions with charge and now that is a common way to nerf cards, is that what you are saying?
DarkLordDemaar Sort of, he's poking fun at how Blizzard nukes cards from orbit rather than just reducing their power level reasonably
@@bluejay7058 well I mean it is still used in one very stupid combo I don't remember how to execute it exactly but it has to do with leeroy and cloning him and the commander
The fact this is still relevant 5+ years later is equal parts impressive and depressing
It's still relevant
STILL relevant @@nik1maxim
Joseph predicted diablo immortal + recent microtransation leak for d4 at the end, ahead of the curve as always man
Jo cor wahts up
not only can he predict the narrative of games with frightening accuracy, but he can also predict the real-world narrative with equally frightening accuracy. if ever there were a true clairvoyant o_O
You all prolly dont care but does someone know of a way to log back into an Instagram account??
I somehow lost my password. I would appreciate any help you can offer me!
@Peyton Emmitt instablaster =)
Dead verified account
"No strong pirate or murloc deck"
So I guess we have you to blame?
Could you enlighten us non-players what you're alluding to?
@@SuperZez There was an overpowered meta pirate deck after this video
@@justanothernamejustanother5814 Ah.
Remember that the video was made 2-3 years before your comment
Pirate Warrior needs to never come back
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
My jaws that bite, my claws that catch!
I love how every one of the cards he mentioned has been changed, and his analysis is STILL accurate. Blizzard introduces a broken combo, it’s obvious to everyone that it’s broken, and they wait ten months before doing anything about it.
Here a joke for ye
Shudderwock is still in standard and is played by literally every shaman above rank 20
Derek Zheng Last time I heard, the Year Of The Raven has passed, and the 2018 sets (including Witchwood with Shudderwock) has now went to Wild Mode. But man, I remember when I got my Shudderwock from a card pack like, a year late into the Shaman meta but I still kept him for decks such as Quest Shaman
I was stuck dealing with this in two of the games I played online. Which is to much for me honestly.
The amount of effort put into this it is outstanding. No matter what anyone says,
"You did a Fine Job."
+AwesomeStuff64 Thanks a lot. I really appreciate the support. Making these is a fun hobby so it's cool that people seem to like them. I know they're too long for some people, and I totally understand that, so it's surprising that so many people get through them.
+Joseph Anderson I thought i just look into this video for a few minutes, but somehow i watched it the whole way, something about the way you talk and the incredibly accurate statements are a perfect balance! Keep going :)
+Joseph Anderson the way you talk and what you say really helps get through all the video :)
Hi, I am someone from the future going through some of Joe’s old videos and I’m seeing a parallel between Blizzard’s handling of Hearthstone “balances” and Overwatch “balances”: ignore the overpowered thing THEY created, then ignore reasonable balance suggestions from the community and just kill it. It’s 3 am I’m not ready for this.
18:53 - 20:30 This is probably the best summary of Hearthstone I've ever seen.
+Simen Westgaard Thanks! It took me a long time to put that section together.
Pretty much still accurate, some things got adjusted but we still for example are missing Auto Squelch, Animation Skipping and balance overall. Like Rock, Paper, Scissors is pretty much still what the game is about
I totally agree with you, Solem. Without Animation Canceling, Ysera Portals summoning Nozdormu and skipping your turn are just game-breaking. I also wished that they made an effort to balance multiple deck types for every class instead of printing OP legendarys that just improve existing decks instead of creating a new deck types like Cthun. I really like your Videos btw!
Hey look it's the guy who reacted to this
Lol. I lost it at the "Combo: Make Your Opponent Want To Kill Himself" part. :D
I played mainly miracle rogue.
Dasky14 xD
Meanwhile pre-nerf Shudderwock this year...
5:27 is the end of the "good". Full length of video is 42:26. This gon' be good.
Imagine an mmorpg where in pvp every class has a skill which can be used once per fight and has 45% chance to instakill an opponent and 45% chance to suicide. That's how I see heartstone.
@jocaguz18 Nothing. c:
@jocaguz18 It deals 1 damage. Can't make it more, would become overpowered.
To me, hearthstone became pay to win UNO with a few extra steps.
What happens the other 10% of the time?
Hearthstone's big issue is how they removed many of the mechanics other card games (such as Magic) have to help deal with the numerous forms of RNG inherent to the type of game.
Magic contains numerous cards collectively referred to as "tutors", after the black card Dark Tutor. Pay mana, maybe pay something else (usually life or other cards), and you're allowed to search your library for one or more cards of your choice. Sometimes you can only search for specific cards (cards referred to as "fetchlands" are designed to help you draw more lands, often very useful for mana-hungry Green decks), or sometimes you can search for any one card you want. These cards explicitly exist to deal with the inherent randomness in drawing cards. Many decks are built around specific cards or combinations of cards, but if you have bad luck on draws and can't ever seem to draw those cards... you're sunk. Tutors exist as a way of controlling for this RNG.
Additionally, Magic is USUALLY played in best-of formats - best of 3, best of 5, etc. This allows the use of the sideboard - a sub-deck of 15 cards you bring with you to the table, but which are not part of your deck. In between games, you're allowed to swap cards in between your deck and sideboard. This idea is designed to deal with the inherent randomness in not knowing what kind of deck your opponent will be using. If blue decks are meta (they were the last time I played many years ago), maybe you'll sideboard some "Protection from Blue" cards, or "Blue hate" cards. If you run into a Blue-focused meta deck, you'll swap in those cards from your sideboard... of course, they might also have swapped in some cards to deal with YOUR deck, too!
I think it's ultimately just up to how Blizzard makes and operates games these days, though. Your Diablo 3 breakdown already covered it perfectly. These days, making money is the focus over making great games, and balance generally isn't the focus of their games unless they're desperately trying to compete with Dota 2 and League of Legends for that esports money.
well this is not magic, and if it were, and had similar features i would probably not play it, along with many others...
Why not? It has the same negatives - new cards being deliberately overpowered to coerce continuous purchases - but many more positives and much more strategy.
Very rarely can you truly say you lost just due to having bad draws. It DOES happen, but if it happens more than once in a blue moon, it's because your build sucks. You can't really say the same about Hearthstone.
David Carper Why not? Because it is not Hearthstone anymore, its Magic, and i dont like magic, i like Hearthstone. And i want to play Hearthstone and all interesting cards, heroes it offers, not magic.
It's a why would you not play it, not a "do you play magic" question... please elaborate
Why is every single one of your posts, trying to have a dialogue with the author? And why do you always shift goalposts, topics, or make the discussion to be not about the game but about third parties?
Man that part of "playing on curve is so real", there are several games where the paladin has the "perfect" curve (shilded minibot on 2, muster on 3, piloted on 4, beltcher on 5, mc on 6). Feels like "I know your entire deck but I just can't do anything about it" even though in a card game I know about 80% of my opponent's deck! "
Same thing goes to the aggro part, I play this game for about a year now, and I lose so many games (I would say about 25% of my games) where I simple could not win, and looked like doesn't really matter how well or poor a play, I still lose, either because of meta-decks or bad draw.
You were really on point in "The bad part" in my opinion.
+João Antonio Carvalho T7 Dr. Doom T8 Tirion T9 Lay Hands. try to beat that shit...
Dr.6, Dr.7 and Dr.8
if you see those Dr. 6 may as well concede.. if you let him get Dr.7 and 8 out.. then good luck.
I am glad these decks are crap now.. even in wild.
29:34
Fucken savage...
Full Health
There are more tidbits like this throughout the video. Best review, 5/7
three years later, and little has improved. The standard cycle has helped a bit, but we still have way too many cards coming out each year, bloated with garbage legendaries. About the only sign of generosity Blizzard has shown is that you no longer get duplicate legendaries.......which should have been in the game from the fucking start...........
@jocaguz18 Definitely. Play gwent or runeterra instead.
It's great how this holds up almost 4 years later
Well, it sucks for the players, since the game ain't been improved/fixed
some things have changed, they patch more than they did 4 years ago for sure
I played during the time right after this video was made, gadgetzan/ungoro, and some of the rbg stuff I can see in the video gives me ptsd
@@terreliv o
Looking back it wasn't as money hungry ad it is today
I think the point made at 22:30 is poor. The class specific 2-mana 3 damage spells are generally defined around the class identity:
For example, Frostbolt is 3 damage with upside (freeze) because part of Jaina's identity is powerful and efficient spells, Wrath is flexible as 3 damage or a 1 damage cantrip but at the expense of not going face. In some sense Fiery War Axe even fits alongside these as 2-mana 3 damage cards and fits into how Warrior gains advantage utilizing health/armor as a resource (one can also consider Eviscerate for Rogues, and Lightning Bolt for Shaman).
To this point, the reason Darkbomb is a "strictly worse" version of Frostbolt is because the Warlock is defined through the Life Tap hero power. Warlock's identity is designed around winning through card advantage over card quality, so giving a worse 2 mana removal spell is sensible. Similarly, why should Warrior get a removal spell comparable to fireball? One class utilizes weapons and armor for removal, while the other class specializes in spells.
This is actually one of the cool things I appreciate about Hearthstone, this designed imbalance helps solidify separate class identities. That being said, blizzard does not make strong efforts to balance the classes, which I think is a bigger problem.
can only agree here, this point in the video made me cringe xD its like playing magic and complaining that blue gets all the counter spells or draw.
You two idiots actually missed the point so hard.
I can't say "You activated my trap card" in Hearthstone so I don't care about it
"You activated my Secret"
You can in Legends of Runeterra. Well, not really, it's "Not so fast. You've activated my burst card".
@@MRC76582 runeterra shits und hearthstone sooo fck hard haha
You can totally say "You activated my trap card" in Hearthstone. It just won't mean anything. But you _can_ say it.
Just you wait until I have 10 mana!
After your video I was stunned. Perfect. You covered everything. You put the exact amount of emphasis on the "on curve" play because it is as bad as it is. Even the small jokes you´ve slipped in were rounding up this video. I don´t know anymore man. 10/10 Really.
18:53 I have to wonder how long this little section took. In video editors I use, mashing together so many little clips from tons of files would have been an absolute pain in the ass. Anyway, great video that pretty much wraps up r/hearthstone the past few weeks. I hadn't even thought about the money side of it though.
+CutmanMike Oh god. Should I be honest about that? It's really embarrassing.
Fuck.
Yeah, so about three hours. For less than two minutes of video. And I'm not even sure if it was worth it. Some people have said they hated it and thought it went on too long, while others say they really love it. I thought it was hilarious when I watched it back because it sums up so much of the game that I find frustrating: "they ALWAYS have that card on turn 2".
+Joseph Anderson I know your pain, totally not surprised it took that long. But yes it is frustrating, as charming as the sounds and visuals are it gets tiresome hearing "SHIELDS AP, RED ALERT!" every turn 2. At blizzcon maybe we'll get some hope that steps are going to be taken to sort this game out, but I doubt it.
+Joseph Anderson I loved it, it was my favorite part of the video ! :D
But if they always have those cards, doesn't this completely undermine your point of RNG and there needing to be help for you to curve out? If the first was so ever-deciding, wouldn't there be tons of times they did not have those cards? (There are, you just did not show those) If the second was to be implemented, there would be less RNG which would be horrible in this instance, because they would actually have those cards on their first/second turn a lot more often / always.
@@DJcs187 The point was a lack of variety.
You do an amazing amount of research before making your own review.
Hearthstone is just a game to play on my tablet when I'm bored at the bus or when I feel like multitasking. I honestly can't take it too seriously. Did people actually compare this to chess?.. Wow
Nowadays, many of the issues brought up in this vid have been addressed. Now it has also created new problems but I digress, the main thing is they waited far too long to fix things and went with the assumption of “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”. It was broke, just such an innovator at the time with such a powerful IP on so many platforms that people flocked to it.
Hopefully future developers that end up with a success don’t just sit on their laurels
Hey Joseph, watched this video as well as your Diablo 3 one, and I just wanted to say that I appreciate the work you put into making these. Your sentiments echo those of many of us in the Blizzard fanbase, and I am a veteran who has been playing all of Blizzard's titles since Warcraft II's release. Thank you, and please keep up the excellent work.
+Rainesama Thanks! That means a lot, especially since it feels like there's a large set of fans so entrenched in their love for the company. I sadly think their focus has shifted too much toward making money. The common response I see--I think I even saw it today--was that "of course a company wants to make money! how dare they!" Which ignores the point that there's a right and wrong way to do that. I'm not so confident to say that Hearthstone is proof that Blizzard is cashing in fan loyalty at a broken exchange rate, but the class skins have got me wondering.
"Or it could be changed to 'add +1 attack to minions with charge'." - Brilliantly put :')
chess be like, "talk to me when people are playing you in 1,200 years."
15:33 legit the most hysterical line I’ve ever heard in my life... beginning with “i wrote a story once about a guy from the future...” and ending with “...you are role playing a b**** AI so the other player can enjoy himself” 😂😂😂 such good reviews on this channel man
I've played Magic, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Pokemon. Never played Hearthstone, but many of your points are reflections of these other card games. Great video very interesting.
"I am thoroughly sick of playing something that's the video game equivalent of a slot machine, both in how it plays and the money it wants from you." Joseph Anderson: Always ahead of the curve.
"Blizzard wants to avoid players ever feeling bad or confused".
This is literally the reason every single one of their games, in particular WoW, hasn't been nearly as good as pre-Activision Blizzard games (think SC:BW, D2:LoD, WoW V-WotlK, WC3:TFT). They cater every decision, every mechanic, every aspect of their games to the lowest common denominator (ie. casuals) instead of catering to the people who actually play their games, and are passionate about them.
From a business stand point, it makes the most sense to cast a wide net. I think we all understand as to why Blizzard makes the decisions, or ignores making decisions, in that regard. But the point is doing anything extreme that alters the game in a good way (ie. nerfing patron/secret paladin/face-lock and hunter, balancing arena in general, stop the creation of sticky minions, re-introduce control into the meta, etc) only effects players who play at a higher level anyway. Some casual hearthstone player who never makes it past rank 15 doesn't have a clue what the meta is. They don't understand the finer details of the game, nor do they even know what is WRONG with the game. So why make balance changes based around them? It doesn't make sense.
D3 too. Instead of having skill trees, where people can make wildly different builds, they made everyone the same. Every season a new meta came and went, where every player played the exact same build depending on class. They don't want Mr. 1 hour a day player to have to restart his character because he fucked up the tree, or can't farm the gold to respec, or whatever.The removed all exclusivity with WoW, and players now expect to see content instead of earning their way into content. It's just all care bear bowlshit as far as I'm concerned. They muddy the waters with too many difficulties, then add random procs to increase iLevels of gear so that people INCAPABLE of doing higher difficulties can still get gear equal to said difficulties? Why? So that the 2 hour a week pet collector can get his/her transmog set while being carried by people who actually enjoy raiding for the difficulty, strategy, and teamwork.
TL;DR - Blizzard likes to ruin the integrity of their games for the people who love them the most, and instead build their games around appeasing people who barely even play their games.
I know the whole hardcore vs. casual argument is fucking stupid, and people are tired of hearing about it, and I'm sorry for that lmao. I'm just passionate about Blizzard in general, and to see their quality wane through the years just to make more money is infuriating.
Pretty much how I feel about Blizzard, but put into better words. I could not have said it better myself. It sickens me what this company has become. Now that Christ Metzen is calling it quits, I really don't know what to expect from Blizzard. Mike Morhaime is a douchebag (I've met him, don't waste your time).
I mean, it makes sense from a business standpoint, but Blizzard was notorious back in the day for developing games at a caliber higher than any other company. Everything they pumped out turned to gold. Now it's like I can't play any of their games anymore because of how terrible they are in gameplay, mechanics, etc.
the saddest thing is, their games are still top notch compared to the rest of the field. the issue is, they could be SO MUCH MORE if they didn't always try and cast the widest possible net as far as demographics. they want everything to be far too inclusive. and like anything that was once amazing/niche and later becomes mainstream, it's qualities/integrity suffers.
There is a difference between a developer like Blizzard, who make decisions based on the bottom line; and developers like Square who have essentially abandoned any and all understanding of their fan base (not a SINGLE turn-based game since X/X-2 - coincidentally, although not really, every major FF title since then has been absolute trash). Blizzard is still the shit in my book, even after that giant rant comment, but instead of being an A++ PC dev, they're like a B+. And, quite frankly, a B+ is still better than everything else in the field outside of maybe CDPR. *shrug* it's whatever, just frustrating is all.
I've been having that same problem with Blizzard. I'm finding it difficult to enjoy playing ANY of their games. I loved StarCraft and Brood war. That's where I got into the company. StarCraft 2 is... meh. I spent hours even after completing the campaigns of StarCraft just playing all the UMS games. Finding cool new things people played. Tower Defense, roleplay maps, rush maps, etcetera. StarCraft 2? It isn't even really worth it for me to play the standard multiplayer games in StarCraft 2. At least in StarCraft 1 and Brood War when I'd get my ass stomped (I am not very good at these games, but I used to find fun in trying to win) I was learning a new strategy, learning bits nd bobs about my own race's capabilities (I love playing as Zerg). StarCraft 2? Oh God, what a fucking nightmare. It always feels like I lost to cheap tactics... things that shouldn't be possible. Not some skilled person who does micro better than me (I suck at micro), but some douchenozzle who just has a gimmick that I just don't know how to counter. That's StarCraft 2. No strategy. No thought put into the game. Adopt a strategy before the game opens, make sure it wins the game as fast as possible, then cheese to victory. No time for attacks and counters, no time for skirmishes across the map. Rush a ton of units for your strat, if you lose them, concede the game.
That's not fun. That's not even a GAME. I suck at RTS games, but I like when a legitimately better player BEATS ME 'cause he knows how to play the game better and knows more about it. I don't like the relentless bullshit cheese and 10 minute games.
Hell, there isn't even any room in StarCraft 2 to really experiment much except against computer players... and unless you put them on something higher than "normal" difficulty, you're going to stomp them pretty easily. Hell, the jump between "Medium" and "Hard" in the multiplayer side is like going from punching hobos in a back alley to fighting Mike Tyson. I expected to be able to climb the difficulty ladder in AI fights so that I could gradually learn how to be better at fighting human opponents. Or at least... know enough about the game to not completely suck. StarCraft 2 doesn't even play like that in multiplayer.
It only gets much worse when you play the 3 campaigns I bought. 90% of all missions in StarCraft 2 are "timed". Why? I genuinely like the base building aspect of RTS games. I like the gathering and securing of resources. I like the MAP CONTROL of RTS games. I don't like this, "beat the mission before the clock runs out" bullshit that takes the place of GOOD AI. I played the first two campaigns on Hard difficulty. Aside from getting the Hard Achievements, they gave me no issue... Except the last mission of the Terran Campaign where it's made ridiculously cheaty and difficult and the only option is to "turtle up", but you have to defend too much stuff, too far spread out, through too many holes in your defenses... Even worse when you've finally succeeded in figuring out how to defend all of that.... NYDUS WORMS SHOW UP BEYOND YOUR DEFENSES ANYWAY! Well, unless you've destroyed the nydus tunnels. The mission gets much easier if you did it that way. But, alas, if you were silly like me and didn't do things that way... well, consider yourself fucked and have to restart the whole campaign to get another shot at it.
Blizzard has gone from "legitimate challenge" to "be as cheaty as fuck". That's why I quit playing Blizzard games. What's the point? If they don't care about the quality of their games, why should I care about buying any of them?
at least in aRPG there is alternative called PAth of Exile
Couldn't have said it better for the games listed, but I actually think that somewhat of the opposite reason is why overwatch was ruined for me, and instead of dropping thousands of hours into it like i did others before, I only play it on occasion with friends. The actions taken show that the overwatch development team makes changes that the vocal minority on their forums ask for, who are the mega fans of the game who only play that game, so it makes sense that they obviously try to appeal to this crowd, but at the same time some changes made ruin most of the fun i can have with the game.
Take the buff on symmetra, one of the most unpopular characters in the game. Even though she was weak, there generally not much talk about changing her aside from an uncommon discussion on it for, and she was thought as a class that had a higher learning curb, but in time, symmetra was buffed into a god of a character, instantly melting anyone under 200 health who didnt instantly run away from her.
More recently roadhog, arguably the best tank/attack heroes since the release of the game was nerfed into oblivion, making him almost useless as a tank and an offensive hero alike. Both of these changes essentially ruined most of the fun I can have in the game anymore, as theres no idea into what will be changed next, and there isn't common denominator to the changes. While I can somewhat understand why the team had wanted to change roadhog, as his hook mechanics were changed a whopping 4 times, the changes that they made are too heavy handed. One of the main problems with overwatch is that it seems like blizzard doesn't know who they want to please. Do they want to make the game a dedicated e-sport that can compete with the dozens of others already popular, shown by the changes to roadhog? Or do they want to make a game that is aimed toward a more casual audience, demonstrated by the changes made to symmetra?
The statement of "Blizzard wants to avoid players ever feeling bad or confused" is almost an oxymoron when talking about overwatch, as the game is touted as having a super competitive mode, while at the same time has a character where killing someone takes about as much skill as killing a monster in diablo 3.
Tf2 has the best free to play model ever. Purely cosmetic items cost money, everything else doesn't. The only advantage you can buy (more inventory space) can be gained by paying anything you want, even as little as €0.2. No pay to win, no pay to progress, nothing like that.
Hedning1390 And it makes them billions of dollars.
?? That's not true. Random weapon drops offer different playstyles at different power levels. TF2 went off the deep end years before even this old comment
I had very much enjoyed your Dark Souls critique and found myself thinking "I already know the problems with Hearthstone, why would I watch this guy tell me what they are"before watching this video. And yet here I am, with 42 minutes gone and no regrets. You put out a very well made video that takes on most of the problems in Hearthstone (except card text inconsistency as recently shown by Disguised Toast). Thank you for your work, I will now refer people to this video if I ever need a summary of Hearthstone. I subscribed.
In the footage you showed of all the clips you took, one of the clips is labeled "no one will read this. nobody will believe you"
I believe you.
nah you’re definitely lying
I don't have many problems with the video, but the point made at 17:50 only shows a misunderstanding of how meta analysis of win rates in any competitive game works. Saying that it's crazy that >60% win rates are considered good is silly because >60% is good for every competitive game that allows you to make some sort of decision as to how you play. I think the easiest way to represent this is by comparing Hearthstone to fighting games, a genre no one thinks of as highly random.
A common way of breaking down characters in a fighting game is the concept of match ups, or how each character fares against another. Match ups are often described in form of how many wins each character could expect in a set of 10 matches assuming both players are of equal skill level. So a 5-5 match up is a balanced one, where you could reasonably expect either party to win and it's highly dependent on each player's individual skill with neither character having significant advantages over the other. Anything other than that is considered a good (or bad depending on what end you're on) match up, so the disadvantaged character in a 6-4 match up has an uphill battle to fight. Something like a 7-3 match up is one where the disadvantaged character has to have significantly more knowledge about the match up than the advantaged character to close the gap. An 8-2 match up says that something is broken with the balance of the game that needs to be fixed. These all translate very cleanly into percentages, with 5-5 being 50% and so on.
To go back to win rates in Hearthstone, for a deck to have a 70% win rate, this is the same as saying it has a 7-3 match up against *every single competitive deck.* Every other deck that people are playing has few ways to deal with it and they can't access those with any sort of consistency. Such a situation would be horrible for a fighting game, and that doesn't change with Hearthstone or any competitive game.
It's also important to keep in mind that the ranking system means that players will eventually be playing people of roughly the same skill level. If someone is going up against people of the same skill level it's expected that they will lose about half of the time even in a purely skill based game like chess.
That's not to say Hearthstone doesn't have a lot of randomness, or that you couldn't find some good ways to argue for it (some of which were brought up in the video), but looking at overall win rates is a horrible way to make that point.
I think he's comparing winrates to ye olden days of multiplayer in games where matchmaking consisted primarily of just finding just any server with a low ping and throwing you in there. This effectively meant matches were filled with completely random people who ran the gamut from "Just installed 5 seconds ago" and "Been playing for 10 years straight." Because of this, if you had a 75% winrate across all your matches then it usually meant you were roughly in the top 25% of players who used the random matchmaking. Of course, a lot of multiplayer games completely ditched that system in favor of always trying to make sure you fight people who are at your skill level.
Thank you! This cured me from self destructive behavior. You are Awesome and I appreciate you!
This was very well done. I'm surprised I watched all of it and it was worth every second. Really echoes sentiments of the community.
5 years old is this video and this guy is right in like 90% things. crazy
"It could be another 10 hours before you see Rogue or Shaman again"
The good old time...
And yes, these videos are very much appreciated. Good work!
+JacenLP Thanks! Are there any digital card games that sell entire collections like that? There's hardly any competition for Hearthstone at all, actually. At least nothing close to the amount of care put into Hearthstone's UI that I've seen.
+Joseph Anderson Not really I am afraid. FFG (Fantasy Flight Games) is refusing to enter the digital market. WotC's digital Magic versions are usually botched and the only I know of who has at least a decent digital version alongside the print run is Star Realms by the relatively new White Wizard Games. It's not nearly as polished, but got a very solid core for a product from a company that small. For non-competitive, Obsidian is working on a digital adaption of the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game (though I find that to be really shallow, game wise).
Maybe the digital market is too volatile for some of the publishers? Maybe the products usually are too complicated to port? Writing code is considerably more effort than printing text on cards after all. Not sure ... the guys from FFG I had contact with were all tight lipped.
+Joseph Anderson There's been talks of an Elder Scrolls card game. I hope it pans out and is good enough to steal Hearthstone's player base, so Blizzard can stop coasting on the original success of Hearthstone when it was first released and people recognized the potential it had (which it has by now squandered).
+Joseph Anderson I don't think there's anything like that today. Yomi and Puzzle Strike are great even playing field online card games, but the UI is not on Hearthstone's level, and the gameplay is like a turn-based fighting game (Yomi) or like Dominion (Puzzle Strike), so they might not appeal to the same sensibilities as MtG or HS or whatever.
In a couple years there will definitely be a game like that though.
Anyone that reads this in 2017: All that the standard system changed is that the TOP OP Class now rotates from Secrete Paladin to Shaman and now to Jade Druid (Or what ever aggro shit will creep up after that).
And it means that cards I bought a year ago are now worthless. RNG and imbalance is untouched, infact Balance changes will never ever happen now that Blizzard just needs to wait a year until the cards rotate out anyway.
This is pretty much the most accurate Hearthstone video ever made.
Liked, favorited, and subscribed.
I have no idea how a person like you only has 200 subs yet shits of youtube have so much more. Grate job on the video, keep them coming i at least will be back for more
WOW, he only had 200 back then, seems crazy
I want to push back a bit on the idea that a 55-60% win rate being considered good is bad. Consider that in a ranked competitive setting, you're supposed to be pitted against an opponent of similar skill level. If you're winning more than 50% of the time, it is a sign that you are not ranked as highly as you should, and vice versa.
I do agree that winning only every other game sucks (it's also a big reason why I don't play these games), but this is an inherent feature of ranked competitive video games, not a design flaw of this game in particular.
You’re not wrong but you’re referring to something different, the win rate in this case is about something else, what they’re really measuring is the RNG, there are many decks where if you get the perfect cards you will do amazing but how often is that? If the chances are 1 in 100 and 99 of those games mean losing then that deck has 1% win rate, just one perfect game isn’t enough for a deck to be viable and consistency is a huge part of the meta game
When he says 70% is godly, it means that out of 100 games 70 of those will give you good card combinations while 30 will give you bad card combinations, the skill factor is separate from that and becomes super hard to accurately work because of the randomness, you can get 10 unlucky draws in a row while your opponents get amazing draws causing the game to think you’re worse than them, you can also get 10 amazing draws while your opponents get 10 mediocre ones and yet you still lose 4 games, this means that you’re not on the same level as them since you should never have lost if that was the case but since it’s a positive win ratio the game will still bump you up, you can’t fight that unless the game accounts the randomness of each deck in the ranking system which it never will
@@Gellus Hm. I'm not sure this makes sense to me. I don't play Hearthstone but that's not how MMR is determined in competitive online games I'm familiar with.
Like in DotA or LoL the MMR logic doesn't care if you got a bad team comp, and indeed it seems like it would be really, really difficult to objectively determine 'good' or 'bad' RNG in games with their level of complexity.
@@SacredDaturaa From a meta perspective getting a bad team comp is simply not a factor since it’s not built around playing with randoms but RNG is still a huge factor at all levels of HS and pros have to plan their whole gameplan around it, from a MMR perspective it does affect things and even pros will be seen raging while streaming and losing a match because of a bad team, complaining about bad match making is super prevalent in those games as well because of it
Just randomly watching this 5 years later: 17:30 - that was a pretty smooth move to kill your scientist and pull the flame trap (then win next turn w/ the old charging arcane golem).
It is kinda funny though, you put that under a part where you were talking about actually playing with skill, which you were doing, but then I'm sure you had to bite your fingernails waiting to see how much Dr. Boom's bombs were gonna hit you for (RNG).
I just wanted to say that even listening to this 3 years later has the same light as it did back then. Even now there are overarching decks that break the meta, like kingsbane mill rouge, jade druid, or even cube warlock. I will tip my hat to you sir. NAILED IT
Very good video.
+Wicke Danneh No it isn't, it's garbage.
+Asdayasman it's actually great.
Wicke Danneh very well produced at the very least
31:20 “they asked me how good my stats were. I said as good as any other 4 cost minion i’d ever met. They asked me if i summon any minion against the opponent, i said i summon a random 1 cost minion for the opponent. They said welcome aboard”
Glad to know nothings changed
Excellent video, I am definitely getting more and more put off by how they approach maintaining and supporting hearthstone. Youve got another sub.
Blizzard listened!! there's now a prompt when you open the game on what's gotten changed
Blizzard's idea of Balance haven't changed.
And for those who don't remember,
Rogues are Scissors,
Warriors are Rock..
Hunters, Druids, Paladins, Priests, Mages and Shamans are Paper.
Warlocks, are Mushroom.
I love watching Hearthstone from time to time and after playing it myself, I recognized that it isn't a game that appeals to me personally. However, massive drama coupled with the popular streamers with zero skill can be a really fun to see play out. Even watching the sad realities of a streamer who hates the game (this applies to other popular streamed games) who continues to play it because they are known for playing it, has a degree of value. In my humble opinion, Blizzard knows exactly what they are doing and they are responding to the market dominance of particular types of games and "payment methods".
"I am done with Hearthstone"
I have said the exact same thing at least 3 different times now, yet every time I end up crawling back a month or two later since there really isn't any other game out there like Hearthstone. Its really aesthetically pleasing, and feels great to play (smoothness and the flow of things), and it's one of those games where winning a match almost seems to make losing the previous 5 games worth it. Hearthstone is almost a guilty pleasure of mine. I usually don't play for weeks on end out of frustration, but its guaranteed i'll be back to play some more during the next season
same i went back a few times, was about to go back again before i played something better and realized that hearthstone is essentially the curer for a tcg itch, beyond that its just not good enough to keep me
Same here. Though this is a year old video, I "quit" when the last winter's expansion came out because of certain deck archetypes that rose up that time. I came back to the game a few days ago and it's probably the most balanced I've seen for a long time. At the same time, this is right before another expansion is going to be released so I might just say I'll be on "hiatus" instead of "quitting".
I've also played other CCGs during that time and yet Hearthstone is the game that brings me back in. I hate and love it at the same time when I think about it.
Try "Eternal" on Steam! It's fantastic and has similar polish.
I think after the adventure from Descent Of Dragons, the one adventure where you actually have to pay for getting new cards which could *slightly* shift the meta game of December-March, yeah I think I'm actually done. After years of matches with RNG and a game of rock-paper-scissors, obtaining the late legendaries that are probably out of Meta by the time I got them (I got shudderwock a year after Kobolds was already rotated out) and uninteresting gameplay.
Now I have shifted to Gwent and I found it a lot much better and rewarding than doing two quests just to buy 1 pack after spending and opening it only to get nothing but a few commons I already have and a rare. I'm Free-To-Play and I don't think I would ever spend my money on something as random and ridiculous than this.
In gwent at least there's a goal to work towards!
I think, Legends of Runeterra does a great job so far. You should take a look at this.
This is probably the best video about Hearthstone i've ever seen.
Everything was explained so well and you were spot on. Also, the video editing was perfect.
Well done :)
Joseph: "Let's remove the overload penalty"
*Kripp releases the overload trogg video*
Me: "I quit card games..."
"Shaman is the worst class"
THAT'S INCREDIBLE
Regarding Ben Brode and your assessment, that Blizzard doesn´t seem to know how to balance their own game: It´s pretty much the same for WoW these days. And their reasoning for nerfing (or buffing) is the same. They nerfed a class, then 3 weeks later buffed it again "because they FEEL that players are now used to play against them."
Joseph probably never plays hearthstone anymore (and good for him for that) so he'll never know not only how right he was at the time but also how right he remains. So many of the issues he brought up 7 years ago either remain an issue to this day, or have been fixed with his exact suggestion.
Came here right after watching your no mans sky video, so I've got to ask: Which was worse, trying to get to legend in Hearthstone or trying to get to the center of galaxy in No Mans Sky?
P.S: Love these videos, just subscribed, looking forward to seeing more!
No Man's Sky. I occasionally still fire up Hearthstone and see what's new and think about doing another video on it. I'll never play No Man's Sky again. Even if it got a patch or an expansion.
i played no mans sky for 8 hours and almost cried at the end of your video
No Man’s Sky. When you get a legendary in Hearthstone, you actually get some sweet sweet dopamine but No Man’s Sky you just cry in disappointment at the end.
Joe, you have to stop me, I‘m rewatching all of your Videos in anticipation of the Witcher 3 one, this will destroy me
"Let's remove Overload cost from Shaman cards, since it, like, shittiest class in the game."
Okay, that was funny. In a sad, miserable way.
Fast forward to current meta with tunnel trogg, etc. HAHAHAHA
As someone who played hearthstone in 2014-2016, this video is nostalgically aggravating & probably the best explanation and analysis of hearthstone i've ever seen.
I actually watched the whole video and can't say I disagree with anything what you said.
It actually just confirmed my feelings and opinion that I've developed towards the game and Blizzard in general after TGT was released, after having played Diablo 3 since Vanilla and after putting myself through the grind to legendary for the first time this season in Hearthstone.
For both games I feel like the developers either don't care what sophisticated players think about the game as long as it sells many copies or they really have no clue what they are doing.
Sadly, Hearthstone, like Diablo 3, is suffering from a tremendous amount of wasted potential.
Personally I don't see a reason in playing either of them any longer, at least for the time being, if Blizzard continues to handle those games like they did until now.
More relevant today than it was 7 years ago when this was posted
37:00 that's exactly how FFGs LCG format is working and they managed to cut insanely into the market share of Magic with very new games. I just wish FFG would just port their games to video games so Blizz would lose some market share with HS ...
Did I ever mention how much I like listening to you talk? Like, I’ve watched your videos several times, but also leaving them running like podcasts is perfect for my farming sessions.
After this analysis I'm really interested in what you would say about Magic: The Gathering Arena. I think it's way more fun and better balanced than any of the Hearthstone spawns.
The idea that aggro and dying from burst damage is bad for the game is really interesting and I think it highlights a flaw in the game's groundwork. In hearthstone, to act on your opponents turn you have to play a secret on your turn, that triggers in a specific situation. Compare this to say, Magic the Gathering, which has cards you can cast on your opponent's turn. This opens up interaction with your opponent a lot more and means you can do a lot more about your opponent playing aggro or burst damage from the hand. In magic, aggro isn't really seen as something bad, at least not by most players, because it can be well countered by the high interaction of a control archetype if done properly. In high level play, the increased interaction is seen as one of the game's high points. A match being fought between two control players is often talked about as being an intense game of skill and restraint, not a guessing game like in Hearthstone, because you can instantly (no pun intended) answer your opponent's threats without them having a whole turn before you can do anything about them.
"The cynic in me thinks the Legendary effect is intentional"
That's called realism, not cynicism.
"It's not Blizzard's responsibility to help the minority of people with impulse control problems"
It kinda is.
This video speaks so closely to mtg arena it's amazing
I have way more fun playing Tavern Brawls that let you play as the bosses or with a fixed synergy/combo deck. This game is meant to be casual yet so many people take it so seriously.
Still accurate more than a year later. Great video.
I don't understand the "this game is not just a card game"-thing, and the comparison to Rocket League. There's no racing at all in Rocket League, but you could very easily make a paper-version of Hearthstone, just... make it, it's already just a regular MtG-like card-game. The only thing you'd have to change is that now you can only buy boosters, not win them. Also, the "fix" you described at the end in the ugly-section is just turning the game from a CCG to an LCG. Some people, like myself, immensely enjoy the random-factor inherent in CCG's where you DON'T own all cards, have to make do with what you have, and open boosters in search for great cards (which is pretty much half the enjoyment of a CCG). LCG's in contrast feel sterile and lifeless, and while I enjoy several CCG's, there's literally just ONE LCG that I can stand playing (Android Netrunner).
you're missing the other half of the sentence - "it's also a video game". In the digital sense. There's nothing to do with CCG or LCG
You just made me quit hearthstone entirely. Thank you.
Cant believe I was borderline addicted to this shit.
I've never played Hearthstone but I play Magic every once in a while.
Seeing how they've nerfed that Grim Patron deck I'm wondering why they didn't just limit the number of possible Grim Patrons on the board. Just make the card say "There can only be three Grim Patrons in play at the same time." and that's it. The combo would still be viable but wouldn't spiral out of control entirely.
It would even passively nerf the deck even further by gimping the strategy against another Grim Patron deck. The one that got to play his combo first would rob the combo from the other player, who in turn would have to use his removal to challenge that. Players would have to prepare for that eventuality.
Am I mistaken in that assumption?
DerPafferfish the problem wasn't just the patrons. it was the frothing berserkers which got more damage each time a minion is hit. patron actually has a niche ability due to its natural low hp.
+OxfordOctopus They could've also made it so minions could no longer get the charge buff if their attack exceeded the required 3 or lower. That way, frothing berserkers couldn't charge for 20 attack after getting buffed.
DerPafferfish Maybe like Progenitor Mimic from MTG, the ability only triggers on the original copy.
Kodo Elder-Groebe
Yeah, something like that would've fixed the deck already without making the card useless. But I guess Hearthstone has got bigger problems than that.
DerPafferfish lol yeah I guess. They're still taking in cash
The last time I played Hearthstone, the player I matched against was barely doing anything to defend themselves, but just before I could finish them off, they pulled off some combo that allowed them to summon an infinite amount of fireballs, killing all my minions and taking all my HP in one turn. Of course, their deck depended entirely on luck to draw the right cards for a one turn win, but that proved just how RNG-dependent Hearthstone was, so I quit. Not to mention how nearly all the cards they used for their free win were ones I hadn't unlocked due to being f2p.
You nailed this harder than that 12 year old ginger from minecraft, nailed my mom.
Man, those videos of yours are brilliant. It's like I am sitting on game design lecture except it's far more entertaining.
Just remember that you guys are wasting money on digital cards. Let that sink in for a moment. Unlike physical cards where you can at least have a collection and make your own rules, digital cards are just a cheap substitute.
Im just saying, irl cards are a waste of money too. Print a pic on cardboard and the same game can be played
All these Questions u askd are easy to answer, the tweak between competetive and casual is something that has to be considered in everygame.
They want a new player to have the same chance of winning while still getting him interested enough to keep playing.
Good Video as usual
Winrates, above 60% is good, above 70% is godly. What sort of numbers would you want to indicate that the game is skillbased and not rngbased?
In professional Brood War, there was the concept of a 'bonjwa', one single player dominating for a long period of time. During the 2 years 'Savior' was the bonjwa, he had a 66% winrate. The best player to ever play the game, Flash, is the only player ever to have more than 70% winrate in all of the three matchups. Bobby Fischer, regarded as the greatest chess player ever, has a lifetime 72% winrate.
To put it into perspective: I could play the best Starcraft player in the world 100 times and I would be lucky to ever win once.
If I played the best Hearthstone player in the world 100 times, I would win just under half of the games.
That's why those winrate percentages are so important. Because even players who are good and understand the game stay at those percentages at (almost) every rank on the ladder.
The thing is that this may be why games that do this are so popular. It gives the 'not good' players a decent chance to win...which they can pretend is because of their 'skill'. It's like flipping a coin and getting 'heads' half the time...and feeling good about it.
I would argue that rng leads to as many feels bad moments as it does feels good. You see, eventually when new players become skilled, they now realize that the same rng they felt great winning with feels terrible to lose to. So it isn't all happy giggles and fun with rng and only experienced players getting upset or losing to it like you believe. It upsets everyone eventually.
Just wanted to say that is untrue. If you were to play somebody who is widely regarded as a god in this game, say for example Kolento, you would certainly NOT win just under half of the games. You would win far less. There certainly is a skill element in Hearthstone, and professional players do see the game differently. Pro players are capable of calculating the mathematically best outcome for each action and plan their turns accordingly, something that the average player does not do.
However, that being said, I think you are right in that Hearthstone is extremely RNG-reliant. I just think that winrate is not the best way to go about analyzing it, as the best teams in the world in other, skill-based games also have relatively 'low' winrates. Instead it's important to look at HOW games are won and lost, which you addressed. In the case of Hearthstone, it's incredibly random events and draw order that determine wins and losses, and this random nature isn't something which is easily reflected by quantitative data.
Basically, what I'm saying is that while you're right in that Hearthstone is less skill-reliant than other games, winrate isn't a good metric to demonstrate that. Rest of the video was great though and sums up my qualms with the game perfectly. Keep up the good reviews!
Being a professional Hearthstone player is determined more by your twitch fame than by your hearthstone skill simply because the highest level of skill in the game is really not that hard to reach. This is because each turn has on average less than 1.5 moves that could be played.
Figuring out what these moves are is where the skill comes in but it's just as glaringly obvious to people who have put in some time to learn it as it is to people like Reynad, Hafu, and Kolento.
Pros aren't the only people who percentage crunch in their head, the game trains you to do it. The reward for getting those numbers accurately still comes down to something akin to needing to roll dice to make the chess move you want to.
Like JA said, the game is deeply broken in this regard. I would agree with your point that "win-rate isn't the best way to determine skill level at hearthstone" but that's precisely what's broken.
Why isn't it? Hearthstone simply isn't a competitive game due to its focus on making everyone feel like a winner around 50% of the time regardless of skill.
There was a Hearthstone ad before the video 😂
This is an amazing video btw, I've been watching through lots of your content and I just want to say I really appreciate all the effort you put into your work. It's really refreshing to watch such clever and insightful videos!
Hearthstone: Rock Paper Scissors, right?
Magic: yes. *prepares Pebbles Shredder Elves...
Another Magic Player: *prepares Goblin Game
Oh man, what a great video. I watched the whole thing, and I don't usually sit still for this long unless I'm actually playing a game.
I think the reason that Blizzard took so long to nerf Patron is the same reason why they're waiting to nerf Mysterious Challenger, and why they will never nerf Dr. Boom, is simply $$. You could only get the BEST DECK IN THE GAME by BUYING the Blackrock Mountain xpac (or paying a ridiculous amount of gold). You can only get Myserious Challenger or Dr. Boom by BUYING card packs, praying that you get an epic/legendary, and then hoping that it's the one you want. You can of course craft these Dr. Six and Seven, but think of how long that will take for someone who doesn't spend money on Hearthstone. You'd be getting 1 pack at a time, and will rarely ever get duplicates to disenchant. You'd have to suffer for so long before finally getting a few cards that are actually good!
+Ronaldinho Gaucho " You could only get the BEST DECK IN THE GAME by BUYING the Blackrock Mountain xpac"
You do realise that all cards you needed for patron that came from BRM were available in the very first wing? The only "expensive" card in the deck was Death's Bite which iirc is from the 4th wing of Naxx.
The deck was, in fact, extremely powerful AND quite cheap to craft.
Usually I can watch your videos and enjoy them even if I never played the game you are talking about and I don't plan to. But this video is 80% incomprehensible to me.
Alongside dropping tabloid newspapers, quitting Heartstone was one of the better decisions ive made in my life. Never going back.
14:25 Yes, I am watching your videos 5 years later and you got me, are you happy now ?
This is practically a prophecy for how Blizzard handled Overwatch's loot boxes
Holy shit, I watched this 1 year ago and commented....
I still occasionally play, but this video holds up so fucking well. I really appreciate the fact that you made this (and all the effort you put into it)
Dang dude, you even called Diablo Immortal there at the end of the video lol
So old, yet still so relevant. Great video.
A comment from a time traveler: Blizzard gets way worse.
who knows what they’ll do next - barbequing puppies every saturday using the workplace flamethrowers maybe
this is the only man who can keep me interesting in a video about hearthstone for an hour