Well, if you're using spell damage for face damage, then that's been toned down, sure... but if the idea is to use spell damage to control the board, Shooting Star is a really potent recipient of that boost. Combustion *really* loves spell damage, too.
As for losing Polymorph, silence/transform effects got axed or toned down across the board. Between that and the return of Rivendare, I think the idea is to push Deathrattle minions back into the meta. Mage's solution will have to be spell damage-boosted burn and Devolving Missiles. Overall, it seems that mage is going to be stronger against wider boards and weaker against taller boards. The opposite of rogue, you know?
Yeah, no one's ever said "Darn, he played Umberwing on curve, I'm toast," but then you look back and it was worth five face damage and two good trades. It just does work.
"Forged in the Barrens"-- so, a reference to the fact that so many Horde lowbies spend a lot of leveling time in the Barrens.
Parallelism would seem to demand that the expansion to follow would center on an Alliance lowbie zone. The rough equivalents of the Barrens would be Westfall, or Loch Modan, or Darkshore. None of those can really match the Barrens, for several reasons.
-The Barrens has content for a huge level range. You get quests there as early as level 10 and there are still some in the low to mid 20s. The Alliance equivalents burn out by the high teens.
-The Barrens concentrates players; the Alliance zones divide them. Of the four Alliance starting races, two go to Loch Modan, one to Darkshore, one to Westfall. For the Horde, three get sent to the Barrens.
-Because of the first two points, population in the Barrens is far higher than in any equivalent zone, increasing the amount of chatter and so the phenomenon of shared experience.
I'm not saying the expansion after this won't be "Tour through an Alliance lowbie zone"... just that it seems less likely because of how singular the Barrens are.
Let's start by reprinting what we know about the contents of the new Core set:
88 cards returning from Classic (54 class cards, 34 neutral cards).
54 cards returning from Basic (41 class cards, 13 neutral cards).
55 cards returning from Wild (36 class cards, 19 neutral cards).
4 cards returning from Ashes of Outland (4 Demon Hunter Class cards).
4 cards returning from Demon Hunter Initiate.
1 card returning from Hall of Fame (Shadowform).
29 new cards (20 Class cards, 9 Neutral cards).
That breaks down to 75 neutral cards and 160 class cards, meaning sixteen cards per class across the ten classes. I did a cursory review, using the following criteria:
-For neutrals, "What cards see play today and/or are possible tech/synergy options?"; -For the classes, the above, plus "Which cards lend themselves to strategies/synergies per Mr. Ayala's "this should feel like a deck" desire?"
This turned out to be harder than it looked! It's like game designer is a tricky job or something.
-I'm quite surprised the team found 13 worthy neutral cards from Basic. I tried to find 13 neutral cards I liked in Basic. I did! It was hard! After you get past Acidic Swamp Ooze, Novice Engineer, and *maybe* Wolfrider and Stonetusk Boar for the most SMORC-y of SMORC, it's pretty bleak. Even tossing in some questionable murlocs for synergy purposes doesn't get you close to 13.
-Neutral classic is much nicer. I came out in the mid 30s, which feels right. I don't know if we think 7 legendaries is too many Core neutrals.
-My gosh, Mage's basic/classic selection is *so* much better than the other classes'. If we assume that secret classes need a minimum of four to preserve the mystery, then add in all the other good cards from Mage, we get... around sixteen, depending on how you feel about Water Elemental. Runner-up: Priest and its plethora of control tools.
-In contrast, my count for Warlock was only seven. Lots of demons with awful drawbacks and the like cluttering up the early sets.
-Hunter and Paladin only beat Warlock here because of their Secret packages.
-If Oh My Yogg! hadn't just come out, I would have said the time is ripe to cut Paladin's secret package from standard and substitute Rogue.
-King's Defender looks like an obvious replacement for Fiery War Axe- the Core set needs weapons, we're pulling from Wild, and KD is a FWA with upside. Or just bring back Death's Bite. Death's Bite is good.
-I'm not looking forward to Aldrachi Warblades being part of Core, but if eight out of the ten cards in the current DH Basic set make it in (as the numbers suggest), it's hard to exclude it.
I'm sure there's plenty more we can infer from this info but that's all I've got for now.
I've had some good times in heroic duels trying out some of the new toys.
-Stormbringer Shaman is delightful, especially with Chaos Storm. Shaman's weakness has always been resource generation/draw. Chaos Storm and Fireheart both get around that weakness. Chaos Storm is especially delightful if you can duplicate it with Diligent Notetaker. I found best results with either Plaguebringer or the stronger Scrying Gem for discounts to really make those power turns roll.
-Soulciologist Warlock is fun to combo with Demonizer. Soulciologist is strongest in the beginning of your run, before your deck is big enough that your Soul Fragment generators get diluted. Conversely, Demonizer is strongest late run, where his resource/tempo generation is insane. So, as your hero power tapers off in influence, your treasure takes over.
-I haven't tried Illidari Demon Hunter yet, but I want to. It's seemed pretty potent the last few times I've run into it. There's incredible synergy there with any combination of Double Time, Recycling, From the Swamp, and Cannibalism.
-I've run into a LOT of token druid. Pack your board clears or get trampled. Some combination of Rocket Boots or Caltrops is also useful for slowing down their first few turns. An opener of Tour Guide -> Harvest Time is super strong, and if you don't have a response you can be overrun in no time.
Just took the warlock deck to 12 wins, huzzah! Never played C'Thun, but I used all the C'Thun spells; Heart was particularly useful given the abundance of token druids. I took Demonizer as my treasure, which worked nicely. It's harder to leverage the Soulciology power as the deck fills up and the Soul Shard generators get diluted, but Demonizer filled the power gap and won several late-run duels basically by himself. Fun times!
I gave that Spell Shaman deck a whirl. Not too shabby! Warrior kept pushing me out of range but most games felt pretty winnable. The highroll potential from Guidance is real.
I ran into a variant on Quest Warlock that included the new Warlock legendary, and it makes a ton of sense in that deck, since it puts more bodies in your deck and the primes tend to be high impact (particularly when free). Seems like a solid inclusion. Happily, the Casino (mage) was on my side that time. :)
I used this deck to finish my legend climb today. Overall win rate from Diamond 5 to Legend was ~67%. It is close to the ideal F2P ladder-climbing deck: cheap, fast, and murderously effective.
The matchup spread seems, anecdotally, very nice: -Strongly favored against Paladin and Totem Shaman; the deck is too fast and has too many tools to keep the board clean for them to stabilize; -Favored against Hunter and Rogue, for similar reasons; -Slightly favored against Disco-lock and Revolve Shaman; if the Shaman draws into his Coasters he can keep up, otherwise you run away with it; against Disco-lock, silencing (or failing to silence) Expired Merchant swings the game; -Slightly favored against warrior and priest
-Disfavored against Control Shaman (Tidal Waves = GG) -Strongly disfavored against Soul Demon Hunter-- this matchup is heavily stacked against this deck
The deck is generally favored against Mage and generally disfavored against Druid, but I didn't face enough of either to have a definitive opinion.
In most aggro matchups, you have just enough healing to keep ahead. Dreadlord's Bite and Altruis are great for regaining the initiative. This deck can generate some ridiculous Altruis turns, especially if you're able to Skull into Altruis, but you shouldn't feel compelled to try and squeeze or delay to max Altruis. There were plenty of times for me where just two ticks of Altruis to clean up the enemy board was plenty. You need to assess whether you'll need Altruis to push finishing damage through. If you won't, don't be greedy.
The Pariahs are interesting because they create a different threat than the rest of the board. When you have several small minions *and* a medium-sized Pariah it can complicate the enemy's life trying to figure out what to counter. They're a little slow, though.
Line Hopper is variably valuable. The body is nice, but mostly that's just because it's harder to remove than most of your chaff. His true function is to enable reloads with Runners and Spectral Sight on the cheap.
This deck is all about Outcast. If you don't like the Outcast mechanic, or feel you can't manage it well, choose a different deck. You have to think about it well in advance, even during your mulligan phase. Usually, draw tools aren't worth keeping in your opening hand. I will sometimes keep a Crimson Sigil Runner *if and only if* it's on the left or has a clear path to get there. (A Pariah in-hand can change that thinking.) Keep Beaming Sidekick only if you have another one-drop in your hand.
Well, if you're using spell damage for face damage, then that's been toned down, sure... but if the idea is to use spell damage to control the board, Shooting Star is a really potent recipient of that boost. Combustion *really* loves spell damage, too.
As for losing Polymorph, silence/transform effects got axed or toned down across the board. Between that and the return of Rivendare, I think the idea is to push Deathrattle minions back into the meta. Mage's solution will have to be spell damage-boosted burn and Devolving Missiles. Overall, it seems that mage is going to be stronger against wider boards and weaker against taller boards. The opposite of rogue, you know?
Yeah, no one's ever said "Darn, he played Umberwing on curve, I'm toast," but then you look back and it was worth five face damage and two good trades. It just does work.
So demon hunter continues to be a rare holdout for the Charge keyword. I don't mind that, really.
I like the Fire Elemental buff. I've always liked that card and I like Elemental archetypes more generally.
Warsong Commander lives!
Looks specifically like Alterac Valley to me. Alliance versus Horde in the context of snow.
"Forged in the Barrens"-- so, a reference to the fact that so many Horde lowbies spend a lot of leveling time in the Barrens.
Parallelism would seem to demand that the expansion to follow would center on an Alliance lowbie zone. The rough equivalents of the Barrens would be Westfall, or Loch Modan, or Darkshore. None of those can really match the Barrens, for several reasons.
-The Barrens has content for a huge level range. You get quests there as early as level 10 and there are still some in the low to mid 20s. The Alliance equivalents burn out by the high teens.
-The Barrens concentrates players; the Alliance zones divide them. Of the four Alliance starting races, two go to Loch Modan, one to Darkshore, one to Westfall. For the Horde, three get sent to the Barrens.
-Because of the first two points, population in the Barrens is far higher than in any equivalent zone, increasing the amount of chatter and so the phenomenon of shared experience.
I'm not saying the expansion after this won't be "Tour through an Alliance lowbie zone"... just that it seems less likely because of how singular the Barrens are.
Let's start by reprinting what we know about the contents of the new Core set:
That breaks down to 75 neutral cards and 160 class cards, meaning sixteen cards per class across the ten classes. I did a cursory review, using the following criteria:
-For neutrals, "What cards see play today and/or are possible tech/synergy options?";
-For the classes, the above, plus "Which cards lend themselves to strategies/synergies per Mr. Ayala's "this should feel like a deck" desire?"
This turned out to be harder than it looked! It's like game designer is a tricky job or something.
-I'm quite surprised the team found 13 worthy neutral cards from Basic. I tried to find 13 neutral cards I liked in Basic. I did! It was hard! After you get past Acidic Swamp Ooze, Novice Engineer, and *maybe* Wolfrider and Stonetusk Boar for the most SMORC-y of SMORC, it's pretty bleak. Even tossing in some questionable murlocs for synergy purposes doesn't get you close to 13.
-Neutral classic is much nicer. I came out in the mid 30s, which feels right. I don't know if we think 7 legendaries is too many Core neutrals.
-My gosh, Mage's basic/classic selection is *so* much better than the other classes'. If we assume that secret classes need a minimum of four to preserve the mystery, then add in all the other good cards from Mage, we get... around sixteen, depending on how you feel about Water Elemental. Runner-up: Priest and its plethora of control tools.
-In contrast, my count for Warlock was only seven. Lots of demons with awful drawbacks and the like cluttering up the early sets.
-Hunter and Paladin only beat Warlock here because of their Secret packages.
-If Oh My Yogg! hadn't just come out, I would have said the time is ripe to cut Paladin's secret package from standard and substitute Rogue.
-King's Defender looks like an obvious replacement for Fiery War Axe- the Core set needs weapons, we're pulling from Wild, and KD is a FWA with upside. Or just bring back Death's Bite. Death's Bite is good.
-I'm not looking forward to Aldrachi Warblades being part of Core, but if eight out of the ten cards in the current DH Basic set make it in (as the numbers suggest), it's hard to exclude it.
I'm sure there's plenty more we can infer from this info but that's all I've got for now.
I've had some good times in heroic duels trying out some of the new toys.
-Stormbringer Shaman is delightful, especially with Chaos Storm. Shaman's weakness has always been resource generation/draw. Chaos Storm and Fireheart both get around that weakness. Chaos Storm is especially delightful if you can duplicate it with Diligent Notetaker. I found best results with either Plaguebringer or the stronger Scrying Gem for discounts to really make those power turns roll.
-Soulciologist Warlock is fun to combo with Demonizer. Soulciologist is strongest in the beginning of your run, before your deck is big enough that your Soul Fragment generators get diluted. Conversely, Demonizer is strongest late run, where his resource/tempo generation is insane. So, as your hero power tapers off in influence, your treasure takes over.
-I haven't tried Illidari Demon Hunter yet, but I want to. It's seemed pretty potent the last few times I've run into it. There's incredible synergy there with any combination of Double Time, Recycling, From the Swamp, and Cannibalism.
-I've run into a LOT of token druid. Pack your board clears or get trampled. Some combination of Rocket Boots or Caltrops is also useful for slowing down their first few turns. An opener of Tour Guide -> Harvest Time is super strong, and if you don't have a response you can be overrun in no time.
Just took the warlock deck to 12 wins, huzzah! Never played C'Thun, but I used all the C'Thun spells; Heart was particularly useful given the abundance of token druids. I took Demonizer as my treasure, which worked nicely. It's harder to leverage the Soulciology power as the deck fills up and the Soul Shard generators get diluted, but Demonizer filled the power gap and won several late-run duels basically by himself. Fun times!
Wrong article for this complaint.
I gave that Spell Shaman deck a whirl. Not too shabby! Warrior kept pushing me out of range but most games felt pretty winnable. The highroll potential from Guidance is real.
I ran into a variant on Quest Warlock that included the new Warlock legendary, and it makes a ton of sense in that deck, since it puts more bodies in your deck and the primes tend to be high impact (particularly when free). Seems like a solid inclusion. Happily, the Casino (mage) was on my side that time. :)
I used this deck to finish my legend climb today. Overall win rate from Diamond 5 to Legend was ~67%. It is close to the ideal F2P ladder-climbing deck: cheap, fast, and murderously effective.
The matchup spread seems, anecdotally, very nice:
-Strongly favored against Paladin and Totem Shaman; the deck is too fast and has too many tools to keep the board clean for them to stabilize;
-Favored against Hunter and Rogue, for similar reasons;
-Slightly favored against Disco-lock and Revolve Shaman; if the Shaman draws into his Coasters he can keep up, otherwise you run away with it; against Disco-lock, silencing (or failing to silence) Expired Merchant swings the game;
-Slightly favored against warrior and priest
-Disfavored against Control Shaman (Tidal Waves = GG)
-Strongly disfavored against Soul Demon Hunter-- this matchup is heavily stacked against this deck
The deck is generally favored against Mage and generally disfavored against Druid, but I didn't face enough of either to have a definitive opinion.
In most aggro matchups, you have just enough healing to keep ahead. Dreadlord's Bite and Altruis are great for regaining the initiative. This deck can generate some ridiculous Altruis turns, especially if you're able to Skull into Altruis, but you shouldn't feel compelled to try and squeeze or delay to max Altruis. There were plenty of times for me where just two ticks of Altruis to clean up the enemy board was plenty. You need to assess whether you'll need Altruis to push finishing damage through. If you won't, don't be greedy.
The Pariahs are interesting because they create a different threat than the rest of the board. When you have several small minions *and* a medium-sized Pariah it can complicate the enemy's life trying to figure out what to counter. They're a little slow, though.
Line Hopper is variably valuable. The body is nice, but mostly that's just because it's harder to remove than most of your chaff. His true function is to enable reloads with Runners and Spectral Sight on the cheap.
This deck is all about Outcast. If you don't like the Outcast mechanic, or feel you can't manage it well, choose a different deck. You have to think about it well in advance, even during your mulligan phase. Usually, draw tools aren't worth keeping in your opening hand. I will sometimes keep a Crimson Sigil Runner *if and only if* it's on the left or has a clear path to get there. (A Pariah in-hand can change that thinking.) Keep Beaming Sidekick only if you have another one-drop in your hand.