the players that enjoy the cards that they print that support mill deserve
You lost me with the word 'deserve'.
It is impossible for every deck to be perfectly balanced against every other deck. Some will be stronger than others overall. If we accept this premise, then on what basis does Blizzard choose which decks should have an edge and which should be on the weaker side? If you're in the business of selling a game, then you will tend to favor playstyles that more people enjoy. It's not "braindead" to make weaker those things that are less fun to more people; it's business. The company follows its incentives.
I, for one, am glad the following sequence won't happen again:
-Okay, so I'm up against ramp druid, I'll need to push tempo and get them down quick before... -*Druid gains 20 armor for three mana* -...well, so much for that.
Tickatus Warlock actually had only a slight positive win rate to a negative win rate for most of its time in Standard, and then it was still nerfed, and the deck's winrate dropped even further. Your own example is a perfect reference to the same attitude Blizz is displaying now.
I don't like Druid having access to such a big defensive body as Gloomstone Guardian. One of the weaknesses of most ludicrous druid decks is "folds to early pressure"; I get nervous when Druid gets tools that protect it from early pressure. I love the design of the Gyreworm, though.
Well, that achievement is a reference to Theldurin's whole thing. In Badlands, after the Cataclysm, there's a trio of questgivers who allow you to experience their, uh, *takes* on what happened when Deathwing emerged. Some are elaborate and detailed; Theldurin's is that he just punched everything, including Deathwing himself. He's a simple dwarf.
Deepholm is "under" the rest of Azeroth proper. The elemental planes form a kind of parfait with the "world" of Azeroth as we know it, and Deepholm (perhaps understandable given the name) is the lowest level. That suggests the tie-in to the Badlands set: all those bad guys trying to mine up Azerite just keep going down, beyond any semblance of reason or restraint, and somehow end up breaching the border into Deepholm.
Deathwing chilled in Deepholm while recovering from injuries. All that armor plating he's got? Yeah, that was welded on to him while he was in Deepholm. Of course, half the reason he needed the plating was to hold his body together so all the power within him wouldn't explode him, and the process was incredibly painful (apparently no aesthetic is powerful enough to work on a Dragon Aspect, or no one could be bothered to give him any), so it was the opposite of helpful for his mental state.
Deathwing's transit from Deepholm to Azeroth was the Cataclysm.
Deepholm has stone dragons! There's an elemental dragon in Battlegrounds that gives you an idea of what that's about. Also mushroom forests, Earthen, and Stone Troggs. (Which required some retcon and finessing, because troggs were initially presented as devolved Earthen.)
In WoW, a lot of the enemies here are cultists from the Twilight's Hammer (devotees of the Old Gods). That seems less likely here, since the Hammer and the Old Gods usually get whole expansions to themselves.
Right on schedule: heroic brawleseum comes along to soak gold from the unsuspecting, with the mini set announcement following immediately. Pretty gross.
The deck with the strongest boards also having the strongest board clears was a bit bizarre, especially in contrast with Dragon Druid, which has only its bodies (and Yogg, if you're into that) for the same purpose. Hi Ho Silverwing is making all the difference for Paladin, I think.
As far as Dragon Druid goes: if there's going to be a top deck, this is the kind of deck you want it to be. It's board-based. It has limited reach. It has no charge and limited rush. Its power turns are mostly 5-8. It's notably light on generation, meaning it'll rarely scam a win the way even other board decks can do (looking at you, The Countess). In short, it won't just win out of nowhere, and there are opportunities to both get underneath it and respond to the best things it can do. That's, like, the perfect top deck you could have!
Also to elemental mage and/or shaman. I love the aesthetics of elementals, I love the momentum mechanic, but those decks are entirely too fair. The other board-based classes (Paladin and Druid) easily stomp elementals off the board, while control decks built to withstand Paladin and Druid have no problem sweeping elementals away. It's rough.
I think a mana cost increase to Always would do more than we might think. The combo decks I've seen using Always and cleavers have been using the Castle Nathria cleaver over the Hollow Hound, even though the Nathria one requires infusing first, because it's cheaper and so lets you do more things the turn you unleash your combo.
Those three, plus The Garden's Grace. Basically, it gets Paladin access to a number of powerful combos that can be pulled off quickly, and they all mana cheat. As a bonus point, it lets you sneak those Sea Giants into "Pure" Paladin and still have it work.
The timing of this works out for me pretty nicely. I was still doing Mercenaries for two reasons: first, to semi-AFK myself some cheap XP, and second, because I was gunning for the Bounty Rush 250 achievement. (The 350 and 500 can sod off-- the diminishing returns on upgrades after level 20 ramp up stupidly quickly.) Delightfully, the last Boss Rush of this week was a total gimme, and whereas I had been doing bounties in the 210 range I was able to leap up and knock out the 250. So... now I'm done, well and truly done. Sweet.
If no one else has the courage to mention this, I will: Reno had the foresight to sew a mustache onto his duster, so that, even when his face was covered, none were deprived of his glorious facial hair. Truly a man of the people.
Questlines as a concept are great, but Final Showdown was interactive compared to the mage questline. The mirror matches for those were excruciating as both players strained to avoid playing minions the opponent could target; the key play was often to drop a minion and immediately blow it up yourself. It was even worse than non-interactive: it was anti-interactive.
On a personal note, I get plenty of predictions wrong about future card power levels, but I'll take credit for calling Barak Kodobane. Card draw in classes that usually don't have it is nearly always great!
You say Benedictus was bad, but plenty of control priest decks of the era used that as their "win condition" (or at least to enable their win condition, which was to wait for the heat death of the universe). Maybe we just remember things differently, or maybe control priest was worse than I remember.
You lost me with the word 'deserve'.
It is impossible for every deck to be perfectly balanced against every other deck. Some will be stronger than others overall. If we accept this premise, then on what basis does Blizzard choose which decks should have an edge and which should be on the weaker side? If you're in the business of selling a game, then you will tend to favor playstyles that more people enjoy. It's not "braindead" to make weaker those things that are less fun to more people; it's business. The company follows its incentives.
I, for one, am glad the following sequence won't happen again:
-Okay, so I'm up against ramp druid, I'll need to push tempo and get them down quick before...
-*Druid gains 20 armor for three mana*
-...well, so much for that.
Tickatus Warlock actually had only a slight positive win rate to a negative win rate for most of its time in Standard, and then it was still nerfed, and the deck's winrate dropped even further. Your own example is a perfect reference to the same attitude Blizz is displaying now.
The patch notes provide the exact answer to your question.
I don't like Druid having access to such a big defensive body as Gloomstone Guardian. One of the weaknesses of most ludicrous druid decks is "folds to early pressure"; I get nervous when Druid gets tools that protect it from early pressure. I love the design of the Gyreworm, though.
Well, that achievement is a reference to Theldurin's whole thing. In Badlands, after the Cataclysm, there's a trio of questgivers who allow you to experience their, uh, *takes* on what happened when Deathwing emerged. Some are elaborate and detailed; Theldurin's is that he just punched everything, including Deathwing himself. He's a simple dwarf.
Deepholm is "under" the rest of Azeroth proper. The elemental planes form a kind of parfait with the "world" of Azeroth as we know it, and Deepholm (perhaps understandable given the name) is the lowest level. That suggests the tie-in to the Badlands set: all those bad guys trying to mine up Azerite just keep going down, beyond any semblance of reason or restraint, and somehow end up breaching the border into Deepholm.
Deathwing chilled in Deepholm while recovering from injuries. All that armor plating he's got? Yeah, that was welded on to him while he was in Deepholm. Of course, half the reason he needed the plating was to hold his body together so all the power within him wouldn't explode him, and the process was incredibly painful (apparently no aesthetic is powerful enough to work on a Dragon Aspect, or no one could be bothered to give him any), so it was the opposite of helpful for his mental state.
Deathwing's transit from Deepholm to Azeroth was the Cataclysm.
Deepholm has stone dragons! There's an elemental dragon in Battlegrounds that gives you an idea of what that's about. Also mushroom forests, Earthen, and Stone Troggs. (Which required some retcon and finessing, because troggs were initially presented as devolved Earthen.)
In WoW, a lot of the enemies here are cultists from the Twilight's Hammer (devotees of the Old Gods). That seems less likely here, since the Hammer and the Old Gods usually get whole expansions to themselves.
Right on schedule: heroic brawleseum comes along to soak gold from the unsuspecting, with the mini set announcement following immediately. Pretty gross.
The deck with the strongest boards also having the strongest board clears was a bit bizarre, especially in contrast with Dragon Druid, which has only its bodies (and Yogg, if you're into that) for the same purpose. Hi Ho Silverwing is making all the difference for Paladin, I think.
As far as Dragon Druid goes: if there's going to be a top deck, this is the kind of deck you want it to be. It's board-based. It has limited reach. It has no charge and limited rush. Its power turns are mostly 5-8. It's notably light on generation, meaning it'll rarely scam a win the way even other board decks can do (looking at you, The Countess). In short, it won't just win out of nowhere, and there are opportunities to both get underneath it and respond to the best things it can do. That's, like, the perfect top deck you could have!
Buffs to priest, maybe?
Also to elemental mage and/or shaman. I love the aesthetics of elementals, I love the momentum mechanic, but those decks are entirely too fair. The other board-based classes (Paladin and Druid) easily stomp elementals off the board, while control decks built to withstand Paladin and Druid have no problem sweeping elementals away. It's rough.
Is the plan for dragons really "hope you get Drakkari Enchanter so all these end-of-turn effects amount to something"? Yeesh.
Also, a fond farewell to the memory of Menagerie builds. Alas.
I think a mana cost increase to Always would do more than we might think. The combo decks I've seen using Always and cleavers have been using the Castle Nathria cleaver over the Hollow Hound, even though the Nathria one requires infusing first, because it's cheaper and so lets you do more things the turn you unleash your combo.
Those three, plus The Garden's Grace. Basically, it gets Paladin access to a number of powerful combos that can be pulled off quickly, and they all mana cheat. As a bonus point, it lets you sneak those Sea Giants into "Pure" Paladin and still have it work.
The timing of this works out for me pretty nicely. I was still doing Mercenaries for two reasons: first, to semi-AFK myself some cheap XP, and second, because I was gunning for the Bounty Rush 250 achievement. (The 350 and 500 can sod off-- the diminishing returns on upgrades after level 20 ramp up stupidly quickly.) Delightfully, the last Boss Rush of this week was a total gimme, and whereas I had been doing bounties in the 210 range I was able to leap up and knock out the 250. So... now I'm done, well and truly done. Sweet.
If no one else has the courage to mention this, I will: Reno had the foresight to sew a mustache onto his duster, so that, even when his face was covered, none were deprived of his glorious facial hair. Truly a man of the people.
I like Naga with demon hunter, it feels good. I also love the flavor on Blindeye Sharpshooter.
Questlines as a concept are great, but Final Showdown was interactive compared to the mage questline. The mirror matches for those were excruciating as both players strained to avoid playing minions the opponent could target; the key play was often to drop a minion and immediately blow it up yourself. It was even worse than non-interactive: it was anti-interactive.
On a personal note, I get plenty of predictions wrong about future card power levels, but I'll take credit for calling Barak Kodobane. Card draw in classes that usually don't have it is nearly always great!
Farm Hand wins for best confluence of theme and art. Look at its little hat!
Good gravy, the theme game has been strong these past few sets.
You say Benedictus was bad, but plenty of control priest decks of the era used that as their "win condition" (or at least to enable their win condition, which was to wait for the heat death of the universe). Maybe we just remember things differently, or maybe control priest was worse than I remember.