Of all the F2P games I’m familiar with, Hearthstone has always been the most respectful with my time. You can earn enough to participate in the game with only a tiny amount of time. (Probably as low as 20-30 minutes every 3 days if you push it.) The strong impression I get is that they want to barrier to entry to be low, and they expect people to keep playing the game after those 20 minutes just because it’s fun. (Imagine that!)
However, they have definitely not been as respectful with my money as other games. If you decide you really want to be competitive, it’s a minimum of $50 every 4 months, possibly much more. (I can say from experience that just buying the $50 preorders works, but it will take a few expansions before you can really stop looking at at budget decks.)
I have no reason to believe that they have changed their approach of rewarding play, and we have seen lots of signs recently that they’re adjusting their approach to the cost. It’s not that Blizzard isn’t focused on making money - of course that’s their end goal - but they’ve realized that they need to be more competitive to attract and maintain customers.
We’ll obviously need to see the details when the new system is revealed, but I am confident that they mean everything they’re saying about their intentions. There’s no way they could become more expensive and keep their customers, and they know it.
I’m curious about the focus on budget decks here. Does that really matter in Runeterra? I’ve been almost entirely a F2P player (other than the new player bundle), and I’ve had no trouble crafting a brand new deck every few weeks using the resources I get from the region road and my level 10 vaults (occasionally level 11). I won’t be able to dive into Targon as soon as the expansion comes out, but otherwise I have all the in-game resources I could want.
When I hear people talk about needing budget decks, I have to wonder: Am I just getting lucky somehow? Do they want to make entirely new decks more often than I do? Or are these people just unable to reach vault level 10 regularly?
I think this has been the best expansion launch in a long time. OP Demon Hunters dominated when Ashes came out, and it was OP Galakrond Shaman for Descent of Dragons. Both those build were so broken that no one really had another option. But right now, there are several viable decks that feel different than anything that was competitive a couple weeks ago.
Since the expansion came out, I have advanced on the ladder with two different decks, and I built a third one yesterday for even more variety. This is great!
Why does Duskrider say “we” instead of “you”? Is the effect different from “each time YOU activated Nightfall this game?”
I’m curious to see how Hearthstone’s “combo” keyword works in this game, with all its back-and-forth play. In Runeterra, I have to worry about things like whether I’ll have time to set up the two-card combo before my opponent attacks.
Flash Freeze is probably the better comparison, since it only hits one target. For 3, you set an attacking enemy to 0 attack but it keeps its health. With Whimsy, you set it to 1/1 and silence any special abilities it may have. So Whimsy costs 1 more mana, and is better in almost every situation. I think the extra power is more than worth it for 1 mana, but since Flash Freeze isn’t a common card in Frostbite decks, I think this will still be fair for the cost.
At first I assumed that Support would be a big focus for Targon, but the reveals from the past two days have included a lot of Support cards for Ionia as well. So I guess that Support is a general theme for this expansion.
I like that. Support has seemed underutilized so far, and I think it will lead to a lot of interesting decisions during the game.
I used to wish that Hearthstone had a lot more keywords. Then I started playing Runeterra, which has a lot of keywords, and now I see the Hearthstone team’s point. I would still clean up their keywords a bit (Recruit is unnecessary, and Rush vs. Charge is truly confusing to new players), but their approach works overall.
I am really looking forward to having a new set of cards available for each ranked season. It seems like a simple thing, but it will make each one feel special.
I called it “poor reporting”, because even though everything in this article is technically true, it is very misleading. Assuming the commenters are representative of the readers, most people are coming away with the impression that this is the new system (or at least something very much like it). Since even I have run into surveys like this before, I assume Flux should be able to give people some more context.
Yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if the new system at the end of the year looks like this one in a lot of ways. But I would be SHOCKED if it was this greedy. It will either have a lot more rewards, or it will be an extra bonus alongside the daily quests. The system in this article is obviously unviable, and it’s a big leap from “someone was asked about it in a survey” to “expect this to be the real thing”.
I expect Blizzard to try to maximize the money they can take from us. But based on their other recent changes, it looks like they think the best way to make money is to be more generous. Their special offers, especially preorder packs, have slowly improved in value over the past year, the duplicate protection makes it a lot easier for non-whales to flesh out their collection, and they’ve been quicker to nerf epic and legendary cards. We may end up with a new system that asks us to grind more or encourages us to buy another pass, but if you do those things you WON’T end up with fewer cards
Ok, everyone. Calm. The. Fuck. Down. This isn’t happening, and it’s very poor reporting on the part of Out of Cards.
Yes, we’re going to get some new progression system this year. It’s on the published roadmap. But we don’t know what the system will be like yet, and Blizzard doesn’t either. If they did know, they wouldn’t be doing these surveys.
I was asked to participate in a market research survey for them last year. I won’t go into the details, since I had to agree to keep silent, but I will say a few things about it:
Almost nothing that they asked me about came to pass. The things that did happen were still very different from the way they had been explained in the survey.
The system they asked me to judge was actually pretty complicated. I had to re-read a few times to understand it.
They asked my opinion about a variety of options, and many were similar variations of each other. It was clear that they were considering many variables, and that I wasn’t even seeing every possibility in my own survey.
Maybe some people saw a chart like this on their survey. That doesn’t mean that it’s Blizzard’s serious choice, even if the survey-taker understood everything that was explained to them. Blizzard is still considering options.
Whatever the final choice is, I’m sure some people will be disappointed in it. I’m sure other people will like it. I’m sure it WON’T be exactly like the one described in the article, which is clearly such a bad deal that it would drive most players away.
Since the plan isn’t finalized, and Blizzard didn’t say anything directly to Out of Cards, we can hope that a lot of these details are wrong. As everyone is pointing out, the system listed here is so stingy with cards that it just wouldn’t be fun. (And I’m not even F2P - I usually buy the $50 preorder with each expansion, and I count on that PLUS my gold to make my collection good. With such a stingy list of packs, my preorder purchase wouldn’t be enough to keep me in the game.)
The thing most people miss is that Hearthstone’s system is much MORE generous than other games, if you play about 20 minutes per day. Beyond those initial couple games, though, Hearthstone gives you almost nothing while other games keep handing out rewards. My hope has been that they keep the daily quests that give you an easy pack every other day, but replace the “3 crowns” system with something that’s actually worthwhile. If Blizzard is smart, that’s how this will work.
I interpreted it the same way. They already promised the next expansion sometime in August. It’s certainly possible that the release could slip, but it would be weird if they planned out a schedule through September without mentioning a big change like that.
Also, August 26th is the end of the Spirit Blossom festival and 2 months since the ranked season began, so I would expect the new expansion to hit right then.
I agree. There’s nothing too flashy here, and no common theme to attract attention, but a lot of the cards are just strong. There has to be a deck that makes these cards work.
I think this card will be better than a lot of us are assuming. It’s not good on its own... but Hearthstone offers plenty of mana-cheating options for your “fragile” minion. Just immediately upgrade it with your Witchy Lackey or play Conjurer's Calling. Bamboozle has potential, though your opponent can usually play around it.
I don’t think this is nerf-bait, but I see it surprising us all in a tier 1 deck before the end of the year.
Yes, I’m implying that. Maybe (hopefully!) I’m not accounting for the rarity of getting the combo pieces together properly, but I still think this is a huge buff to Galakrond Rogue. That deck runs two cards that discount your draws to 0 or 1, and it was just nerfed because of the huge swings that those can give you.
I guess the counter-argument is that you’ll only get the perfect combo in 1 of 10 games. I know that I’ll be trying this on day 1 of the release, though
I have to agree. I don’t usually say things like “this breaks the game”, but this card seriously might.
Paladin’sHoly Wrath is now a TRIVIAL OTK in Wild, and an easy 10 damage in Standard. The Galakrond Rogue nerf means nothing now that you can guarantee all your best cards are discounted.
In my experience, Expedition games can easily take 15 or more minutes - those are like Hearthstone’s Arena, but fun. Apparently the game slows down when both players are using an unfamiliar deck and there are rewards at stake.
But regular Ranked and Casual games are maybe only a minute or two longer than my games with a midrange Hearthstone deck.
Even if the games aren’t significantly longer, they DO require more attention. I can play a game of Hearthstone on my phone while I put away dishes or keep half an eye on my kids. If I try to do that with Runeterra, I’ll lose bad.
Vault level 1 is automatic. Levels 2-6 each require 1000 XP, 7-10 require 2000 XP, and 11-13 require 4000 XP. After that, every 4500 XP earns you a capsule (5 cards, but not shards). If you get 25 of those extra capsules in a week, you’re a bot and the rewards stop.
The sweet spot is level 10. It upgrades your random champion (earned at level 5) to a champion wildcard, and it only requires 13,000 XP in 7 days. If you win a game or two a day and complete your quests, you’ll get there. To go beyond level 10, the XP thresholds get higher, the new bonuses are less important, and your easy sources of XP have already been used up. (That’s not to say you shouldn’t do it, but at that point you’re playing because you love the game, not because you’re focused on rewards :)
It really is amazing how much you get, especially with the wildcards. I get to Vault level 10 or 11 every week. After 4 or 5 weeks, I was able to copy a top tier deck without any worries about having enough resources. 3 weeks later, I could do it again. In contrast, I spent months playing Hearthstone, AND buying expensive preorders, before I could move beyond extreme budget decks.
Of all the F2P games I’m familiar with, Hearthstone has always been the most respectful with my time. You can earn enough to participate in the game with only a tiny amount of time. (Probably as low as 20-30 minutes every 3 days if you push it.) The strong impression I get is that they want to barrier to entry to be low, and they expect people to keep playing the game after those 20 minutes just because it’s fun. (Imagine that!)
However, they have definitely not been as respectful with my money as other games. If you decide you really want to be competitive, it’s a minimum of $50 every 4 months, possibly much more. (I can say from experience that just buying the $50 preorders works, but it will take a few expansions before you can really stop looking at at budget decks.)
I have no reason to believe that they have changed their approach of rewarding play, and we have seen lots of signs recently that they’re adjusting their approach to the cost. It’s not that Blizzard isn’t focused on making money - of course that’s their end goal - but they’ve realized that they need to be more competitive to attract and maintain customers.
We’ll obviously need to see the details when the new system is revealed, but I am confident that they mean everything they’re saying about their intentions. There’s no way they could become more expensive and keep their customers, and they know it.
Maybe there are even cards in this reveal that help...
I’ve been missing articles like this. Thank you!
I’m curious about the focus on budget decks here. Does that really matter in Runeterra? I’ve been almost entirely a F2P player (other than the new player bundle), and I’ve had no trouble crafting a brand new deck every few weeks using the resources I get from the region road and my level 10 vaults (occasionally level 11). I won’t be able to dive into Targon as soon as the expansion comes out, but otherwise I have all the in-game resources I could want.
When I hear people talk about needing budget decks, I have to wonder: Am I just getting lucky somehow? Do they want to make entirely new decks more often than I do? Or are these people just unable to reach vault level 10 regularly?
I think this has been the best expansion launch in a long time. OP Demon Hunters dominated when Ashes came out, and it was OP Galakrond Shaman for Descent of Dragons. Both those build were so broken that no one really had another option. But right now, there are several viable decks that feel different than anything that was competitive a couple weeks ago.
Since the expansion came out, I have advanced on the ladder with two different decks, and I built a third one yesterday for even more variety. This is great!
Why does Duskrider say “we” instead of “you”? Is the effect different from “each time YOU activated Nightfall this game?”
I’m curious to see how Hearthstone’s “combo” keyword works in this game, with all its back-and-forth play. In Runeterra, I have to worry about things like whether I’ll have time to set up the two-card combo before my opponent attacks.
Flash Freeze is probably the better comparison, since it only hits one target. For 3, you set an attacking enemy to 0 attack but it keeps its health. With Whimsy, you set it to 1/1 and silence any special abilities it may have. So Whimsy costs 1 more mana, and is better in almost every situation. I think the extra power is more than worth it for 1 mana, but since Flash Freeze isn’t a common card in Frostbite decks, I think this will still be fair for the cost.
At first I assumed that Support would be a big focus for Targon, but the reveals from the past two days have included a lot of Support cards for Ionia as well. So I guess that Support is a general theme for this expansion.
I like that. Support has seemed underutilized so far, and I think it will lead to a lot of interesting decisions during the game.
I used to wish that Hearthstone had a lot more keywords. Then I started playing Runeterra, which has a lot of keywords, and now I see the Hearthstone team’s point. I would still clean up their keywords a bit (Recruit is unnecessary, and Rush vs. Charge is truly confusing to new players), but their approach works overall.
I am really looking forward to having a new set of cards available for each ranked season. It seems like a simple thing, but it will make each one feel special.
I called it “poor reporting”, because even though everything in this article is technically true, it is very misleading. Assuming the commenters are representative of the readers, most people are coming away with the impression that this is the new system (or at least something very much like it). Since even I have run into surveys like this before, I assume Flux should be able to give people some more context.
Yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if the new system at the end of the year looks like this one in a lot of ways. But I would be SHOCKED if it was this greedy. It will either have a lot more rewards, or it will be an extra bonus alongside the daily quests. The system in this article is obviously unviable, and it’s a big leap from “someone was asked about it in a survey” to “expect this to be the real thing”.
I expect Blizzard to try to maximize the money they can take from us. But based on their other recent changes, it looks like they think the best way to make money is to be more generous. Their special offers, especially preorder packs, have slowly improved in value over the past year, the duplicate protection makes it a lot easier for non-whales to flesh out their collection, and they’ve been quicker to nerf epic and legendary cards. We may end up with a new system that asks us to grind more or encourages us to buy another pass, but if you do those things you WON’T end up with fewer cards
Ok, everyone. Calm. The. Fuck. Down. This isn’t happening, and it’s very poor reporting on the part of Out of Cards.
Yes, we’re going to get some new progression system this year. It’s on the published roadmap. But we don’t know what the system will be like yet, and Blizzard doesn’t either. If they did know, they wouldn’t be doing these surveys.
I was asked to participate in a market research survey for them last year. I won’t go into the details, since I had to agree to keep silent, but I will say a few things about it:
Maybe some people saw a chart like this on their survey. That doesn’t mean that it’s Blizzard’s serious choice, even if the survey-taker understood everything that was explained to them. Blizzard is still considering options.
Whatever the final choice is, I’m sure some people will be disappointed in it. I’m sure other people will like it. I’m sure it WON’T be exactly like the one described in the article, which is clearly such a bad deal that it would drive most players away.
Since the plan isn’t finalized, and Blizzard didn’t say anything directly to Out of Cards, we can hope that a lot of these details are wrong. As everyone is pointing out, the system listed here is so stingy with cards that it just wouldn’t be fun. (And I’m not even F2P - I usually buy the $50 preorder with each expansion, and I count on that PLUS my gold to make my collection good. With such a stingy list of packs, my preorder purchase wouldn’t be enough to keep me in the game.)
The thing most people miss is that Hearthstone’s system is much MORE generous than other games, if you play about 20 minutes per day. Beyond those initial couple games, though, Hearthstone gives you almost nothing while other games keep handing out rewards. My hope has been that they keep the daily quests that give you an easy pack every other day, but replace the “3 crowns” system with something that’s actually worthwhile. If Blizzard is smart, that’s how this will work.
I interpreted it the same way. They already promised the next expansion sometime in August. It’s certainly possible that the release could slip, but it would be weird if they planned out a schedule through September without mentioning a big change like that.
Also, August 26th is the end of the Spirit Blossom festival and 2 months since the ranked season began, so I would expect the new expansion to hit right then.
I agree. There’s nothing too flashy here, and no common theme to attract attention, but a lot of the cards are just strong. There has to be a deck that makes these cards work.
This is nice. The set has a ton of interesting cards, and I have no idea what decks will come out on top.
Contrast that with the last couple expansions. We all knew EXACTLY what was going to dominate the meta before those sets were released.
I think this card will be better than a lot of us are assuming. It’s not good on its own... but Hearthstone offers plenty of mana-cheating options for your “fragile” minion. Just immediately upgrade it with your Witchy Lackey or play Conjurer's Calling. Bamboozle has potential, though your opponent can usually play around it.
I don’t think this is nerf-bait, but I see it surprising us all in a tier 1 deck before the end of the year.
Yes, I’m implying that. Maybe (hopefully!) I’m not accounting for the rarity of getting the combo pieces together properly, but I still think this is a huge buff to Galakrond Rogue. That deck runs two cards that discount your draws to 0 or 1, and it was just nerfed because of the huge swings that those can give you.
I guess the counter-argument is that you’ll only get the perfect combo in 1 of 10 games. I know that I’ll be trying this on day 1 of the release, though
I have to agree. I don’t usually say things like “this breaks the game”, but this card seriously might.
Paladin’sHoly Wrath is now a TRIVIAL OTK in Wild, and an easy 10 damage in Standard. The Galakrond Rogue nerf means nothing now that you can guarantee all your best cards are discounted.
Wow.
In my experience, Expedition games can easily take 15 or more minutes - those are like Hearthstone’s Arena, but fun. Apparently the game slows down when both players are using an unfamiliar deck and there are rewards at stake.
But regular Ranked and Casual games are maybe only a minute or two longer than my games with a midrange Hearthstone deck.
Even if the games aren’t significantly longer, they DO require more attention. I can play a game of Hearthstone on my phone while I put away dishes or keep half an eye on my kids. If I try to do that with Runeterra, I’ll lose bad.
Vault level 1 is automatic. Levels 2-6 each require 1000 XP, 7-10 require 2000 XP, and 11-13 require 4000 XP. After that, every 4500 XP earns you a capsule (5 cards, but not shards). If you get 25 of those extra capsules in a week, you’re a bot and the rewards stop.
The sweet spot is level 10. It upgrades your random champion (earned at level 5) to a champion wildcard, and it only requires 13,000 XP in 7 days. If you win a game or two a day and complete your quests, you’ll get there. To go beyond level 10, the XP thresholds get higher, the new bonuses are less important, and your easy sources of XP have already been used up. (That’s not to say you shouldn’t do it, but at that point you’re playing because you love the game, not because you’re focused on rewards :)
It really is amazing how much you get, especially with the wildcards. I get to Vault level 10 or 11 every week. After 4 or 5 weeks, I was able to copy a top tier deck without any worries about having enough resources. 3 weeks later, I could do it again. In contrast, I spent months playing Hearthstone, AND buying expensive preorders, before I could move beyond extreme budget decks.