Be Excellent To Each Other

For discussion about Blizzard's CCG game Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft which finally came out of Beta and was launched for Microsoft Windows and OS X in March 2014.

The iPad version was released in April 2014 and the Android and iOS versions are due in the second half of 2014.

I've been keeping an eye on this and have reasonable hopes it'll turn out to be a decent game. Certainly being Blizzard it should be polished to a fine shine if nothing else, although Diablo 3 and to a lesser extent Starcraft 2 have knocked my faith in them a bit (the Zerg campaign for SC2 picked it up very nicely though).

Thanks for the offer of the key but TBH I just don't do betas at all (I've never ventured into WoW's PTR realms for example), I like to spend my time playing a game that's finished!

Fair enough.

I could have posted this on Reddit or the Hearthstone forums and it would have quite literally been snapped up within 30 seconds, but thought I'd give someone else a chance instead.

Seems no-one is interested though so I'll offer it up elsewhere.

Offer withdrawn. No worries.

A lot of people don't visit the forum at the weekend, plus you put it up late at night on a Saturday before withdrawing it ten hours later.

As there isn't another thread, I might as well hijack this one to discuss the game.

I got a beta key last week, and have ploughed many hours into this since. If you've watched any YT videos of people playing it, it's pretty much that. I don't do WoW, or card games, but find this one fascinating. Lots of nice strategising to get synergies and a variety of tactics against different players. Some things seem absurdly over-powered and yet in the main most classes can defeat any other depending on the skill of the player.

The only thing I refuse to do is cough up real life money for packs and arena games. I can grind out gold for that, and at least initially there's a lot of grinding to be done to get every character up to at least Level 10 to acquire all of the basic cards for each class. Legendaries and above come from card packs either bought or won as prizes in the arena.

I've only done one Arena run so far, and came out of it 3/3, which I thought was pretty fair for a first spin. In one fairly impressive casual game, I lost magnificently to a player that used a card combo to get a minion up to 27 attack damage. I was dead anyway, but it was quite impressive to behold.

So yeah, Hearthstone. Fun.

Yeah, it can be fun but it can also be extremely frustrating - partly this is down to the 'in the works' matchmaking, but also my incompetence as a player.

I probably win about half of the games that I play as I've always been really lousy at strategy.

I've uninstalled the game twice in the past week out of sheer frustration, but for some reason I then re-install it a couple of days later.

BTW, have changed the thread title - this can now be about general Hearthstone chat (no doubt it will liven up a tad when the game eventually goes into Open Beta - maybe January???).

Meanwhile, best site for info seems to be hearthpwn.com - it also has a forum which I would recommend instead of the official forum (which mainly appears to be inhabited with people who have the same emotional development as your average 12 year old).

I really like it, and I don't mind losing. Sometimes I get defeated from a top-decking card draw, but equally I sometimes win for the same reason. I think I'm pulling at least a 75% win rate at the moment, so I feel about as smart as you can playing a card game. Arena is a bit more hardcore though. I had a priest down to 1 heath for at least 3 turns but I just couldn't get anything out to hit him, and he ended up killing me.

The official forum when I briefly looked at it didn't impress me. There have been authentication problems this week, and it was literally 3 pages of new threads of everyone saying 'Can't login!!11'. Why they were all so incapable of contributing to one of the many other threads on the same subject probably demonstrates why some matches in this game are laughably easy.

Cheers for changing the title

For the first few weeks I really liked it too, even though I lost most games. I guess I now expect more of my gameplaying abilities (or lack of) so get more frustrated when I lose a few games in a row.

The authentication problems with Blizzard's Euro servers on Sunday and Monday created a whole lot of petulant outcries from the wailing masses - I don't know how Blizzard put up with such childish behaviour from so many people. I'd ban the lot of them, but I guess that Blizzard then wouldn't have any customers.

Looks like it's just you and me playing this then Mr Candles.

My tag is Druss#2204 if you'd like to have a match up some time. My major weakness is that none of my characters have any legendaries because a) I'm too much of a tightarse to buy decks with real money, and 2) I haven't played enough Arena to win packs/get excess cards/create from dust.

Been playing since yesterday. This thing is like a drug.

Expensive and dangerous?

Alcohol isn't expensive!

I'll be all over this once it comes out of beta, although everything I've read about it thusfar does make it sound very tasty indeed.

Just changed the thread title to reflect the fact that Hearthstone has gone into Open Beta.

As for the game, I stopped playing about 2 weeks ago - not because my skill level sucked (I got up to level 13, which isn't bad) but because I just got bored with playing against the same decks/strategies time and time and time again. Let's hope that the developers can soon introduce far more variety into the game as a whole and also encourage more variable decks and play styles.

Oh yes, and the dev's seeming inability to fix game-breaking bugs (which have existed for months) also ticked me off (I mainly refer to 'dancing' minions, floating minions and overlapping cards in your hand, as well as random video corruption when you ALT-TAB).

Meanwhile, here's some interesting info about some planned changes:

http://www.liquidhearth.com/forum/viewm ... pic_id=756

Installing now

My battletag for WoW is Trooper#2226, I assume this uses the same.

Man, i'm getting destroyed all the time, even by the AI. Not sure what i'm doing wrong, i'm usually ok at these type of games and I can only play the cards I get dealt!

Ah, it seems playing as a mage to start with wasn't the best idea, as it's a pretty shitty class if you don't have any good cards! Won a few games playing as a warrior instead.

The mage got mega-nerfed recently as well, apparently. (Story was at Eurogamer.)

I'm still resisting the urge to play a beta though!

Since swapping to literally any other character (I've played as a warlock, hunter, warrior and paladin now) i've now won the last 8 matches on the trot!

This is bloody great.

I think it's the Warlock which is overpowered. I play with him, and it seems most people also do.

I suspect the open beta will be when they'll really start to get to grips with the balancing, and knowing Blizzard it'll probably need a lot of balancing.

I cracked and downloaded the beta - it's a bit bloody good isn't it?

Indeed it is.

Goodness me how much fun is this!

What do they say? 'Easy to learn but difficult to master'......

I've unlocked all the classes now (mostly through practice matches with the AI but a couple through real matches), although my score at the moment is pretty woeful when it comes to the real matches. (Lost five and won two IIRC.)

I'm sticking with the mage even though I know she's supposed to be a bit rubbish, did have a go with a custom deck but that went all kinds of wrong so I'm back on the basic deck albeit with all the basic cards unlocked.

A perfectly charming little game and absolutely perfect for 10-15 bursts and fits wonderfully around evening family commitments. (The AI waits indefinitely but against a real opponent you do have a time limit, but the matches are so short that's no problem either.)

The satisfaction of stacking up a total smackdown on an opponent in a final flurry of carnage is immensely satisfying. (But also stings when you get on the wrong end of one......)

Free to play for those thinking of having a punt, and I haven't felt the need to spend a penny yet. Going off the various reviews of where it's at for the moment, you get a good 15-20 hours of gameplay before you're properly nudged towards starting to buy cards, as the game gifts them fairly generously early on - which is my experience thusfar certainly.

Nowadays i just grind for gold to play in the Arena. For me that's the most fun part of the game.

Well it's still very early days for me, doubtless there'll be plenty of chance for fatigue to set in later on

I've finally managed to get at least a couple of the regular Battlefield crew to install the game and give it a try, one of whom is INSANELY COMPETITIVE, once he gets his arse handed to him on a plate in his first game against a human being, he'll be hooked.

I remember duelling him outside Stormwind in WoW back in the day, and my hunter wiped the floor with his warlock time and time again, to the extent that he felt it necessary to go away and become a PvP master, just so he could beat me.

I think I've moved up a tier behind the scenes since I won a few matches, and now I'm properly getting my arse handed to me on a plate TIME AND TIME AGAIN.

Determined to make this fucking mage work though.

I spent £1.99 on two packs of cards.

You do get a legendary for making a purchase during the beta though!

It is faintly ridiculous that I'm sat in front of a seriously capable gaming PC, and I'm using it to play a card game with.....

Who cares though, it's fun!

The game is just incredibly good. They managed to cut the chaff of Magic the Gathering that didn't belong on a videogame environment and made an incredibly slick and addictive experience without sacrificing too much depth.

Since Hearthstone came out i hardly play MTG online.

I've kept up playing this on-and-off since my earlier posts.

If you're playing constructed, you will eventually get invisibly tiered up. In the early days I was chuckling at the ease at which I beat everyone, and now I'm lucky if I can win 50% of games. Sometimes I'll have a massive loss of runs because of the BULLSHIT cards the opponent draws, specifically the exact bastard things needed to beat me.

But if you don't have the card packs, you don't have any hope of winning Casual or Ranked play really. There are too many strategies involving rares or character-specific cards that even the best, most carefully-played generic deck won't be able to beat 90% of the time. The Shaman is absolutely and utterly fucking useless until you've unlocked several of his basic removal and area of effect cards.

So, for cards you either buy them for 100g or win them in the Arena. On balance I think Arena play is better, as wins are down to your skill (and the balance of your Arena draw) and if you can at least get a 2/3 or a 3/3 run, chances are you'll get enough from the reward to justify it over just buying packs.

I haven't spent a penny of real money and must have bought 20 or 30 packs with just gold by now. Even now I rarely have to disenchant anything as I still don't have most of the basic or character-specific stuff.

My favourite play is typically a Priest. I can turn a 1/7 taunt into a 28/28 with just 5 mana. If the opponent isn't expecting it they're dead-diddly-ed.

It all depends on what your endgame is. I only play constructed so i can grind for gold to play Arena.

Arena is by far the most fun to be had, so i'm not worried about not having those legendary and epic rares.

Still, even without spending money on packs, my Warlock control deck is almost as good as i want it to be. It lacks Ragnaros and the Warlock specific legendary, but besides that it's good to go. I disenchanted two legendary cards that i didn't needed for the molten giants.

I only disenchant stuff if I've got over the two-card minimum in the event I'd ever want to put both of them in a constructed deck. I have however disenchanted any gold cards that I can, as that's pure vanity and the dust is much better used getting the rest of the basics.

If I keep playing for so long that I've got all cards, then I might start to think about spunking disproportional amounts of dust on a gold version of a standard card.

Just had my first foray into arena. Lost the first two HORRIBLY but then pulled one back, lost terribly in my fourth game.

I was rewarded with 30 arcane dust and a pack of cards, but now it wants £1.49 off me to play Arena again or 100 gold.

I'm clearly still far too shit at this game so will carry on playing normal ranked matches I think, and return to Arena at a future date.

Some games seem to go very well but in others I properly get my arse handed to me on a plate, I may even have to start reading up on some of the Hearthstone sites at this rate.

Bastard priest just did some tricky shit with a load of low-value cards and next thing I know he's got an 18 /18 on the battlefield.

Needless to say this one didn't end well.

I really am fumbling around with this game and persisting with my mage, and I appear to be missing a lot of 'must have' cards for the class too, if Hearthpwned has it right.

Just keep playing Arena would be my advice, that's how you start to know which cards are better than which, and its also fairer as you don't need a great deck of your own to start with. My first go in Arena I didn't win a single game, these days average 3 wins I would say, and for that I get a card pack, some dust and some gold.

It costs 100 gold to buy a pack of cards, or 150 gold to enter the arena and you are guaranteed a card pack even if you lose every game, and more than that if you win a couple or more, so it's pretty much a no brainer to go to the Arena rather than buy packs IMO

Hmmm alright then so whilst it costs me £1.99 for two packs of cards in normal play mode, £1.49 gets me an Arena entry and I'll get a pack of cards even if I totally fuck everything up?

Up to now I've only spent £1.99 on two packs of cards, but I can quickly see myself racking up the costs if I get hooked on Arena, 'cause I'll be buggered if I'm going to grind out gold for entries.....

Still, I've cancelled my WoW subscription until the next expansion comes out so I could logically spend £10 per month on Hearthstone Arena entries and not be any worse off overall

I don't think I'm totally rubbish at the game, just had a match against another mage where it was totally obvious he was holding on for his Flamestrike on Turn 7, so I whacked him around enough before that to guarantee victory even though I knew he'd destroy my entire minion line-up on Turn 7.

I've had a lot of matches that had far more subtle strategies than that going on, I win comfortably (or opponent concedes) and I think to myself 'Yeah I'm getting the hang of this' but then I have a couple of matches where I'm pounded into the ground and decide maybe not.....

Fantastic game though, the amount of properly enjoyable time you could get out of it without spending a single penny really is to be commended (a mate at work has been playing it since the closed beta with his missus and they've not spent a penny between them and have never really felt stymied) - so it's nice to see Blizzard getting the Free-To-Play model right.

That aside though, I think they'll made an absolute fucking fortune with it - some folks just aren't going to be able to resist the lure of buying new packs of cards and other goodies. Me included probably.... Gonna wait for the full release before dropping too much cash though.

If you don't keep trying you won't get better at arena. And while i regularly do 6-3 or 7-3, sometimes i also do 1-3. The fact is, better players last longer in the Arena so it's easier to be paired up with them. That means it's a very competitive environment.

Stuff you should know when playing in the Arena:

- Watch your mana curve when building the deck. Most spells should cost between 2 and 4, with the peak at 4. That means some of the most important creatures are some 4 cost ones like the Yeti, Spellbreaker and Dark Iron Dwarf.

- Arena is mostly about the minions. Usually prioritize top creatures over spells.

- Weapons are very important in this environment because of the card advantage they provide (each weapon usually kills 2 creatures). Thus, Paladin and Warrior are probably the best classes.

- Hunter and Warlock aren't good in this environment. Since Warlock is my favourite class i can't help myself in choosing him, but my results are never any good.

Thanks for the tips Mr San, I shall have another go in Arena, once I have enough gold.....

As a general rule of thumb what sort of card balance should you have in a constructed deck? Out of the 30 cards how would you want the various mana costs of cards to be distributed, is it the same as Arena or do different guidelines apply?

When playing constructed there's no rule for that since mana curves may vary with the strategy. A rush deck has a totally different curve than a control deck.

As for arena, since i can't draw here, i just googled for magic the gathering draft mana curves and this one applies perfectly to hearthstone arena (the average curve that is):



More tips:

- When choosing your starting hand avoid keeping spells that cast over 3. Unless it's one of those that are good for early game control like Conflagration or Hellfire.

- Drawing cards is good. Cult master is one of the best minions to draft. Try to play him before you trade blows, because he has a got a huge target on his head and won't last long.

- Silencers are very good. Sometimes they are as good as removal. Spellbreaker is better than the Owl though.

- The Mage class is also very good for the Arena. I forgot to mention it. If you play with Jaina just draft every fireball you can find and try to have 2 Flamestrikes. I don't think more is necessary.

- That 7/6 Goblin that costs 5 is amazing. Draft him. He may backfire if you're playing against the Paladin or Mage through (Freezing and Humility).

I've seen some spectacular plays. Games where I've had full health and strong board control, just to go to dead within a single turn due to an awesome combination.

Mogushan Warden is one of my favourites. If you were to get him out on turn 5, he'll be ready to attack turn 6 at which point you can do a Power Word: Shield, Double Divine Spirit, and an Inner Rage to turn him into a 36/36 that kills the enemy dead, and then some.

Of course, having all of those cards conveniently in your hand to pull it off is the problem. I've died a lot on games I should have won to a Mage's Pyroblast doing a buffed 11 or 12 damage, urrrgh. So annoying! I've also managed to die a lot with my opponent on 1 health. Fun game. I play it enough to complete the daily quests to keep the gold flowing.

Had a terrible run of cards today, bad cards in the arena selection, and even the best of those never drew.
Compound that with the season restarting, so that you are back up against people at the lower ranks with unbeatable decks, and I have gone 0-10 so far today...

It can be annoying when you go up against someone with an uber deck, but I just write those matches off without getting too aerated about it since you'd never really be expected to win anyway.

I do get very pissed off if I make some sort of dreadful mistake that loses me a match though, or see one that looked like a victory be snatched away from me with a fantastic play by my opponent right at the end.

One of my mates went a bit bonkers today and bought 40 packs of cards for £36.99, so not very free-to-play in his case. He did very much enjoy opening them all though.

I'm exactly the same.



I did that once - never again! Such a rip-off for what you get. Total waste of money.

This fucking game!

I've gone from winning 50% of the games I played last week, to going 2 for over 20 matches the past couple of days.

...and since saying that i've won the last 4 games on the trot.

That's Hearthstone for you!

I actually lost this game. Fucking wanker wouldn't even finish me off on the last turn when all he had to do was attack me with the minions that were already on the board, but instead he started tossing himself off by throwing a legendary down and healing himself up and shit like that so I conceded before he could actually kill me.

I hate it when they wank themselves off rather than just taking a basic killing blow.

YES YOU'VE FUCKING WON I UNDERSTAND THAT I DON'T WANT YOUR FUCKING SPUNK IN MY FACE AS WELL YOU CUNT.

Yeah he played the end game very well and he had the cards for the plays so fair play on that, but I also made a couple of mistakes early-mid game that cost me dear (one was a minor mistake but the other definitely cost me the game), burned out the cards in my hand and didn't land the winning blow that I needed to.

God damn this game winds me up far more than it should....

When they do that i just click concede in a hurry. It also annoys the hell out of me.

Erm, bear in mind they're probably doing it for other reasons, like completing a quest to cast spells or play minions worth 5 or more. Very few people waste time for other reasons.

You're not dead until you're dead. I had the most awesome match recently where the guy had lethal on me, but rather than concede I played my Ysera card. It scared the idiot so much that he threw all his minions at it instead of killing me. It gave me just enough of an edge to stay alive, and the game played out to the point where we'd both run out of cards, but because I was a priest and could heal myself every turn, he ended up dying to the card fatigue before me. The guy could have probably killed me at least 3 times but allowed himself to be distracted by what was on the board. Funniest game I've had yet - I think it was in Arena too.

Total amount spent on this game so far: £0.

In that case they can wait a few minutes and do that next turn. Still seems like they're just being asses to me.

Oh, and fuck Priests. Through the face. Multiple times. Them and their cowardly plays, healing spells, health and "attack is equal to health" spells. Etc. They are so incredibly annoying to play against.