As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/
Options
[Hearthstone] - Blizzard's CCG - League matches must be complete by Sunday night!
TannerMS
"I'm confidence cause I'm zerg!"Registered User regular
"I'm confidence cause I'm zerg!"Registered User regular
Vent and Teamspeak for discussing games!
Tournament Bracket
(Liberally borrowing the best of our old OP and the beauty of SE++)
LAUNCH STATUS: Open beta - feast on the arenas of fresh meat.
THIS IS FOR: PC/Mac, and eventually Android and iDevices!
We like playing with each other sometimes: Add your Bnet Battletag here.
The game has THREE play modes:
Hearthstone revolves around two heroes summoning minions in a goal to bring the enemy hero to zero life. Think of it as a simpler version of Magic that favors quicker matches, and you're on the right track.
Here are class intros and pretty pictures:
Hero Power: Gain 1 Armor and +1 Attack this turn.
Style: Can accelerate with mana-boosting cards like Innervate. Many cards have two options, allowing for flexibility. Enjoys a good buff.
Weaknesses: Flexible cards tend to be overpriced. Weaker early game without acceleration. Lacks direct removal.
Hero Power: Deal 2 damage to opposing hero.
Style: Utilizes minions to rush down opponent. Great synergy with beast minions. Cheap removal.
Weaknesses: Removal tends to be random targets or secrets that can be played around. Beasts are typically mediocre without hunter synergies. Hero power has no effect on the board.
Hero Power: Deal 1 damage to any character.
Style: Lots of direct damage spells, and spells in general. Very control-oriented, using freeze and removal to keep enemies at bay. Polymorph is one of the best removal spells. Strong AoE damage. Strong finisher via Pyroblast.
Weaknesses: Only has a handful of solid minions. Incredibly vulnerable without any spells. Can be hamstrung if opponent heals enough.
Hero Power: Summon a 1/1 Silver Hand Recruit minion.
Style: Enjoys buffing minions and debuffing enemies. Great for weenie decks, but enjoys a slower, somewhat control-oriented game. Solid weapons, and lots of card draw.
Weaknesses: Has poor direct removal. Card draw is good, but either situational (Divine Favor) or expensive (Lay on Hands).
Hero Power: Restores 2 HP to a character.
Style: Control-oriented. Loves to buff minions, particularly HP. Steals opponents' crap, potentially resulting in massive card advantage. Lots of direct removal.
Weaknesses: Weak in the early game. Direct removal is conditional or expensive. People will think you're a jerk.
Hero Power: Summon a 1/2 weapon.
Unique Mechanic: Combo. Cards have an additional effect if you've already played a card earlier in the turn.
Style: Tends to go for rush-down. Lots of direct damage and weapons. Combo allows for cheap, powerful effects.
Weaknesses: Vulnerable late-game. Combo can lead to unfavorable opening hands. AoE spells tend to be poor.
Hero Power: Summons one of the following totems at random: Stoneclaw (0/2 Taunt), Healing (0/2, restores 1 HP to all friendly minions at end of turn), Searing Totem (1/1), Wrath of Air (0/2, +1 Spell Damage)
Unique Mechanic: Overload. You will be unable to spend X mana on your next turn. Think Echo from Magic and you're on the right track.
Style: Has a lot of play styles, being able to sling spells, use weapons, and solid minions. Overload allows for very efficient turns. Hex is among the best direct removal.
Weaknesses: Vulnerable on turns AFTER overload. Hero power is random, which will burn you.
Hero Power: Gain 2 Armor.
Style: Incredibly aggressive, favoring a lot of cheap enrage minions, charge, and great weapons.
Weaknesses: Worst Hero Power in the game. Removal tends to be random or conditional (Execute, Brawl). Damage spells, particularly AoE, are poor. Takes a ton of damage from weapon use.
Hero Power: Deal 2 damage to your hero. Draw a card.
Style: Can go for an aggressive early game with very cheap demons. Hero Power is among the best in the game. Good synergy with demons.
Weaknesses: Powerful cards tend to have bad drawbacks. Removal tends to be weak (Mortal Coil) or carry big drawbacks (Soulfire). Hero Power can hurt your late game.
Current Meta
The current kings of constructed are still control decks and their variants. Druids are probably the most common class at the top of the ladder with good removal and finishing combos in their class specific kit. On the other side of the coin, Murloc Warlock is as popular as it has been for 3 months and new Warrior/Hunter aggro decks are flooding the lower ranks with legendary viable budget decks. Every class (arguably except mage) is viable at a legend level, but matchups are pretty lopsided. Priests perform very well against control Paladins, Druids, Warlocks, and Warriors but really struggle with aggro decks. Shaman is seeing increased play as a midrange anti-aggro class; The Black Knight has dropped in usage and their taunts are becoming formidable again. Rogues are playing everything from aggro to board control to hard control with Headcrack and spell power. For more information, make a post! Many of us are willing to share our feelings on the best way each class can find success.
Grobian's list of less intuitive facts:
Easy intro to Hearthstone in an image.
Full daily quest list here.
TeamLiquid's new Hearthstone siteLiquidHearth
TeamLiquid's Hearthstone Article Portal, a collection of all articles they've done. A good place to start.
HearthHead - Best Arena draft practice, decklists, deck builder, card db
Hearthpwn - Practice Arena drafts, decklists, deck builder, card db. Same stuff different layout.
Chrome Hearthstone Card mouseover extension - Easily find out what all those cards people are talking about do without leaving the thread!
Trump's Neutral Common guide for Arena
Decent streamers/youtube clips to watch, to learn!
Trump
Kripparian
Hafu
Ellohime
apDrop
ek0p
Reynad
Tournament Bracket
(Liberally borrowing the best of our old OP and the beauty of SE++)
LAUNCH STATUS: Open beta - feast on the arenas of fresh meat.
THIS IS FOR: PC/Mac, and eventually Android and iDevices!
We like playing with each other sometimes: Add your Bnet Battletag here.
The game has THREE play modes:
- Constructed - Build a 30-card deck and fight people in ranked or unranked matches. Ranked has recently been majorly revamped.
- Practice - Build a 30-card deck and fight really bad AI opponents to learn the INS AND OUTS of the game nothing.
- Arena - Pay 150g, then pick a hero from a random selection of 3 heroes and draft a deck from a random pool of cards presented to you three at a time. Then battle other people who went through the same process to receive treasures!
Hearthstone revolves around two heroes summoning minions in a goal to bring the enemy hero to zero life. Think of it as a simpler version of Magic that favors quicker matches, and you're on the right track.
Here are class intros and pretty pictures:
Hero Power: Gain 1 Armor and +1 Attack this turn.
Style: Can accelerate with mana-boosting cards like Innervate. Many cards have two options, allowing for flexibility. Enjoys a good buff.
Weaknesses: Flexible cards tend to be overpriced. Weaker early game without acceleration. Lacks direct removal.
Hero Power: Deal 2 damage to opposing hero.
Style: Utilizes minions to rush down opponent. Great synergy with beast minions. Cheap removal.
Weaknesses: Removal tends to be random targets or secrets that can be played around. Beasts are typically mediocre without hunter synergies. Hero power has no effect on the board.
Hero Power: Deal 1 damage to any character.
Style: Lots of direct damage spells, and spells in general. Very control-oriented, using freeze and removal to keep enemies at bay. Polymorph is one of the best removal spells. Strong AoE damage. Strong finisher via Pyroblast.
Weaknesses: Only has a handful of solid minions. Incredibly vulnerable without any spells. Can be hamstrung if opponent heals enough.
Hero Power: Summon a 1/1 Silver Hand Recruit minion.
Style: Enjoys buffing minions and debuffing enemies. Great for weenie decks, but enjoys a slower, somewhat control-oriented game. Solid weapons, and lots of card draw.
Weaknesses: Has poor direct removal. Card draw is good, but either situational (Divine Favor) or expensive (Lay on Hands).
Hero Power: Restores 2 HP to a character.
Style: Control-oriented. Loves to buff minions, particularly HP. Steals opponents' crap, potentially resulting in massive card advantage. Lots of direct removal.
Weaknesses: Weak in the early game. Direct removal is conditional or expensive. People will think you're a jerk.
Hero Power: Summon a 1/2 weapon.
Unique Mechanic: Combo. Cards have an additional effect if you've already played a card earlier in the turn.
Style: Tends to go for rush-down. Lots of direct damage and weapons. Combo allows for cheap, powerful effects.
Weaknesses: Vulnerable late-game. Combo can lead to unfavorable opening hands. AoE spells tend to be poor.
Hero Power: Summons one of the following totems at random: Stoneclaw (0/2 Taunt), Healing (0/2, restores 1 HP to all friendly minions at end of turn), Searing Totem (1/1), Wrath of Air (0/2, +1 Spell Damage)
Unique Mechanic: Overload. You will be unable to spend X mana on your next turn. Think Echo from Magic and you're on the right track.
Style: Has a lot of play styles, being able to sling spells, use weapons, and solid minions. Overload allows for very efficient turns. Hex is among the best direct removal.
Weaknesses: Vulnerable on turns AFTER overload. Hero power is random, which will burn you.
Hero Power: Gain 2 Armor.
Style: Incredibly aggressive, favoring a lot of cheap enrage minions, charge, and great weapons.
Weaknesses: Worst Hero Power in the game. Removal tends to be random or conditional (Execute, Brawl). Damage spells, particularly AoE, are poor. Takes a ton of damage from weapon use.
Hero Power: Deal 2 damage to your hero. Draw a card.
Style: Can go for an aggressive early game with very cheap demons. Hero Power is among the best in the game. Good synergy with demons.
Weaknesses: Powerful cards tend to have bad drawbacks. Removal tends to be weak (Mortal Coil) or carry big drawbacks (Soulfire). Hero Power can hurt your late game.
The current kings of constructed are still control decks and their variants. Druids are probably the most common class at the top of the ladder with good removal and finishing combos in their class specific kit. On the other side of the coin, Murloc Warlock is as popular as it has been for 3 months and new Warrior/Hunter aggro decks are flooding the lower ranks with legendary viable budget decks. Every class (arguably except mage) is viable at a legend level, but matchups are pretty lopsided. Priests perform very well against control Paladins, Druids, Warlocks, and Warriors but really struggle with aggro decks. Shaman is seeing increased play as a midrange anti-aggro class; The Black Knight has dropped in usage and their taunts are becoming formidable again. Rogues are playing everything from aggro to board control to hard control with Headcrack and spell power. For more information, make a post! Many of us are willing to share our feelings on the best way each class can find success.
Grobian's list of less intuitive facts:
- Max handsize is 10 cards. Any card over that is drawn then immediately destroyed.
- You can't have more than 7 minions on the board.
- If you draw from an empty deck, each "card" you draw instead damages you, beginning at 1 damage and increasing by 1 damage each draw.
- If multiple things happen at the same time (e.g. trigger at the end of the turn) they happen in the order their respective cards have been played.
- There are hidden quests/achievements that award gold, notably: 100g for beating all Expert AIs, 100g for playing every class to level 10 and 300g for 100 wins total.
- The Shaman hero power always calls one of the 4 totems that isn't out yet. If you get a totem bounced to your hand, you can play a second one, though.
- The hunter spell Animal Companion just calls a random of the 3 possible minions.
- The Warlock spell Sense Demons gives you 1/1 imps for 1 mana if you don't have (any more) demons in your deck.
- Stealth overrides Taunt, not the other way around.
- Stealth is only for the enemy, you can buff your stealthed minions.
- Priest: Shadowform refreshes your hero power, so you can use it twice in a turn.
- Druid: Wild Growth at 10 mana crystals awards you a spell "Excess Mana" which draws a card for 0.
- More comprehensive list of oddities here
Easy intro to Hearthstone in an image.
Full daily quest list here.
TeamLiquid's new Hearthstone siteLiquidHearth
TeamLiquid's Hearthstone Article Portal, a collection of all articles they've done. A good place to start.
HearthHead - Best Arena draft practice, decklists, deck builder, card db
Hearthpwn - Practice Arena drafts, decklists, deck builder, card db. Same stuff different layout.
Chrome Hearthstone Card mouseover extension - Easily find out what all those cards people are talking about do without leaving the thread!
Trump's Neutral Common guide for Arena
Decent streamers/youtube clips to watch, to learn!
Trump
Kripparian
Hafu
Ellohime
apDrop
ek0p
Reynad
TannerMS on
+1
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
Trump's Neutral Common guide?
Witty signature comment goes here...
wra
ChanManV streams Hearthstone occasionally, but, in particular, has the ValueTown show (on stream and on YouTube).
PSN: Vorpallion Twitch: Vorpallion
pictured: all i've goddamn played, argus is the first battlecry of the game
like come on, it's clearly just shitty random bullshit
1-3, 0-3, 3-3, 2-3.
No idea what is happening, but I don't like it.
Presumably, I sapped all of your luck.
It's all the new players. There are clearly outrageous amounts of beginner's luck swirling about in the ether right now.
PSN: Vorpallion Twitch: Vorpallion
Yeah the worst part about my recent arena losses is that the people beating me are drafting magma rager gold shire footman etc.
3DS Friend Code: 3110-5393-4113
Steam profile
I think blizzard just expects everyone to run some form of AoE pretty much, so the imp doesn't live that many turns.
Also I just lived the dream of mindgaming out a Tirion - he never got far enough in his deck to draw it himself.
Specifically in arena, then, where AoE is not as guaranteed
3DS Friend Code: 3110-5393-4113
Steam profile
It's more of a nerf the more other creatures you have with it. That makes it a pretty big nerf to the warlock aggro, but not so bad at all in arena when your curve is basically guaranteed not to produce a creature every turn.
EDIT: to make that make sense
the nerf was not targeted at arena
Origin: KafkaAU B-Net: Kafka#1778
There is always Artosis' Dream: turn 2 coin into injured blademaster, circle of healing. voila! turn 2 4/7.
If you were offered 9 fireballs, how many would you take? How about swipes? Question is to everybody.
EDIT: Followup: if you were playing an arena deck with 9 fireballs in it, and you were going second and were dealt 4 of them in your opening hand, how many would you mulligan?
mulligan one of them
hero power up and let them build that board until turn four, then obliterate it
3DS: 0447-9966-6178
I'd probably take at least 4 fireballs and damn near all of the swipes. After the 3rd or 4th swipe, I'd grab Kobold Geomancer over literally anything. Don't know if any of that is "smart play," but it sounds fun.
Also, to the second question, I would mull all 4 of them. You are all but guaranteed to get at least one back, and having too many in your starter is bad news with that deck.
I went 9 wins with a 5 assassinate deck before, back when the cap was 9 wins. I'd think Fireball is better than Assassinate as a "many of" card.
Swipes I'd take all 9. I had a 6 swipe deck before. Ironically all my losses were to super fast decks because I couldn't draw a swipe.
Origin: KafkaAU B-Net: Kafka#1778
spoilered for tall
It rocked face, I think he got 12 wins but I am not 100% on that.
I would replace that core hound with another boulderfist this very moment. Honestly, i think if boulderfist cost 7, I would still prefer it to a core hound. Similarly, I would replace the dragonling mechanic with a yeti. Same stats, major difference is that the mechanic is more susceptible to AoE, which pretty much everyone runs. Also, one big dude just plays better.
The geomancer and the forked lightnings are both suboptimal. I'd replace them first, probably as a group.
Shattered Sun cleric is actually not great in the deck as constructed, because you have so few 2 drops. Honestly, the kobold is the only minion you have I'd play on turn 2. Unless and until you get more 2drops in, the SSC is not good because you'll rarely get to use the ability until later, when it's not nearly as good. I think Harvest Golem or Scarlet Crusader would be much better for you.
EDIT: given how few 2drops and how much removal you're playing, you're clearly playing a more controlly style. That's fine, but the SSC really isn't very good in that situation. I might add another unbound elemental too, honestly.
For additional context:
Yes, you can correctly assume from that one-durability Stormforged Axe in my hand that there were once two more Murlocs on that board.
Depicted: literally every two-mana minion in my deck other than a Kobold Geomancer.
Also depicted: every multi-target spell I was offered in that draft.
The good news is that I'm not going 0-3 with that awful deck, because in Game 2 a Druid naturalized my healing totem on turn 2 and then left the game on turn 3.
EDIT: Okay, I'm totally not being fair to this deck at all. If I don't get murloc rushed, I do have two Spellbreakers, three Fire Elementals and an Earth Elemental.