People are again underestimating the impact of mana cost increase on cards. Combo decks need mana reduction to make their combo work. When the pieces have their cost increased this causes a chain reaction within the whole deck as the discounts aren't efficient anymore. The 2 mana increase on Il'gynoth just breaks Lifesteal DH. They will be forced to run both the quest and Skull of Gul'dan to have a better chance at making their combo work without having to wait for turn 10+. More card draw means less healing and less defense which makes them more susceptible to any kind of aggression and not just hyper aggression. The increased stats still allow the card to be played in other decks but they don't matter as much for combo because it is just to risky for a combo deck to drop their main combo piece on the board without having their otk ready. If the main combo piece is destroyed then it's an automatic loss. Tempoing the main combo piece just because of higher stats is still way too risky.
Darkglare is back to its original 3 mana 3/4 stats and that's a good thing. Reducing the cost during the original nerf was a mistake. The card is slower now and mana cheat is at its best when it is super fast. Even a 1 mana increase can make a huge difference. Same applies to Incanter's Flow. They didn't provide any compensation for mage so they are definitely going to feel the blow.
Kolkar Pack Runner being slower also allows board based strategies to have a better chance at pushing Hunter off the board. We already know that 3/4 stats for 3 mana isn't anything special nowadays.
Granite Forgeborn with Yeti stats was extremely silly so the nerf was needed. It isn't even that big of a hit. Just one less health. Easier to remove but the mana discounts are still there.
Battleground Battlemaster deserved a stronger nerf but they are also nerfing Paladin which was the main abuser. It shouln't be that easy to abuse it in very fast strategies anymore but the fact that is still playable is very worrisome. This card just doubles the damage output of 2 minions. It is still an extreme threat in any deck with sizeable minions or buffs (in hand or board). So, i believe it can still be problematic. I hope i'm wrong.
Conviction (Rank 2) at 2 mana is a bigger blow than expected. When cheap cards have their cost increased they lose a lot of flexibility. I don't think the card is unplayable but it is a lot worse because any attempts at comboing it with Battlemaster have been delayed by 2 turns (1 mana on each card).
Now, the truly puzzling one is Flesh Giant. A 1 mana increase on a card that is very easy to discount isn't going to do a whole lot. Not in Warlock anyway. This is a bigger blow on Priest as the class already can't discount the card fast enough to make it impact the game when it is most relevant (early to mid game). Non Shadow Priest decks already suffer from a lack of proactive plays. This card was one of the few that was worthwhile attempting to build around for a more proactive playstyle for Control Priest. A 1 mana increase just makes it a lot worse for the class. Warlock still has tons of self damage and healing so the one mana increase only makes things slightly worse. I think the most relevant hit here is Battlemaster. Now other decks have one extra turn to find a way to deal with the giants. The nerf on Darkglare should help as well.
I wish i got this error. I'd rather have 100 gold and open a pack of my choice instead of getting a completely useless pack with cards from the previous year.
DS + IF is probably the easiest combo to assemble in the whole game. When they announced the new core set for Priest and i saw that Inner Fire was gone, i became hopeful that Priest would be able to play a genuine buff based deck without resorting to a combo finisher. However, they also removed Power Word: Shield and Northshire Cleric which were the main cycle/reloading tool for the class. After that, they kept printing good tempo minions and buffs but all of these cards ended up as a complete failure. Priest doesn't have a hero power that creates minions like Paladin. Paladin can always throw their buffs into their 1/1s whenever they are out of minions. Priest, however, needs actual minions to buff and if their stuff gets removed there's a pretty high chance that they will become stuck with buff spells in hand that simply can't be used.
I'm not desperate for the birth of a super good aggro/tempo priest because i'm sure it will be infuriating to deal with. What annoys me is the fact that they keep printing these tempo cards and buffs that serve no purpose outside of discover/generation. Precious slots in card sets are wasted with cards that are simply hopeless. The strongest example is Scholomance Academy. This set brought a few cards that see play all the time (mainly Draconic Studies and Raise Dead) but both dual class legendary slots failed completely within the class because they were supporting buff/tempo playstyles. High Abbess Alura was a huge success in Paladin and even took a nerf because of that but the card simply doesn't work with any reliable Priest strategies. And Disciplinarian Gandling was simply insanely overrated and failed even within Warlock. There's also Frazzled Freshman (people were worried because it was a 1/4) and Power Word: Feast. If they just gave Priest a basic Arcane Intellect, these cards would probably be playable, at least. If they have no intention of doing this then i would wish for them to stop printing useless stuff and give the class cards that actually support its slower nature.
Priest's card draw is in a healthy spot but only for Control. The class will never find any success outside of Control without real card draw. Shadow Priest is just another Control Priest. Quest Priest is Control as well. Priest literally can't do anything else. It doesn't have access to burst for any sort of Combo and fast strategies will die from an inability to reload efficiently throughout the game.
I opened around 25 packs. I got two legendaries: Anetheron and Sheldras Moontree. I also obtained around 9 epics and i'm not far from getting all commons but there are a ton of rares missing. It was an okay start for someone with few resources.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I haven't been able to test it myself as i wasn't fortunate enough to open the quest on this first day. Quest Priest is going to be a prime target of any burn strategy. I beat a lot of Control Priests with a similar list that i was using before the expansion dropped. I'm mostly worried about more aggressive strategies. Fire Sale is certainly a big boost for those matchups but i don't know if it will be enough.
I played against Quest Warrior a few times. It is slow. It can beat both slow and fast strategies when the deck is built correctly but the Juggernaut is inconsistent. It doesn't activate on the turn Cap'n Rokara is dropped and that gives the opponent one extra turn to finish them off. Even if it goes off, you don't get any consistent damage because Warrior weapons have a wide range of attack values, the cannon shots land on minions often and the current pirates in standard provide little to no initiative. The Warrior quest is fine and doesn't feel bad to play against.
I played against a few other quests but no Quest Hunter. Here are my impressions:
Quest Mage can otk you very easily after dropping Arcanist Dawngrasp. The no minion mage package seems consistent enough for the quest.
Quest Priest is insanely slow but their defensive capabilities allow them to drag the game easily. If your deck doesn't pack a ton of burn then they will heal constantly and eventually beat you.
Quest Paladin seems pretty fast to complete. I played against one with a secret package that proved to be pretty annoying and disruptive. He completed the quest on turn 5 and after that it was an onslaught of dudes that became worse after Lothraxion was played.
Quest DH surprised me a lot. The guy used a lot of tradeable cards that helped accelerate his quest progression quickly without depleting his deck too fast. He finished it around turn 6. However, i didn't see any signs of an otk or other win condition so i just beat him, eventually.
Quest Warlock gave up on turn 4 after i played Dark Alley Pact and summoned an 8/8. He was trying something using Runed Mithril Rod.
That's it. I played against most of them using Handlock (i opened Anetheron so i crafted a few other cards for it). I beat Quest DH with Libram Paladin with no cards from the new expansion.
When it comes to Handlock, it felt worse than i expected. I used a Soul Fragment package and the support cards that were introduced (except for Goldshire Gnoll). It seemed too fair. I dropped Anetheron a few times on turn 3 and the minion was removed every single time. Dark Alley Pact and Flesh Giant were a lot better but the deck still depends a lot on minions to deal damage and the big vanilla stats weren't enough. There were a lot of problems when it comes to enemy taunts, enemy removal and enemy healing. Entitled Customer and Spice Bread Baker are definitely great but they don't seem enough to carry the archetype into viability.
I spent a long time without playing. I was completely tired of the game. I still kept paying attention to the meta situation and things seemed pretty bad so i didn't bother playing and lost an incredible amount of gold/exp. I finished at level 57 and got Neeru Fireblade at level 50 which was the worst possible card to receive (this card became completely pointless thanks to the new Warlock quest). I came back now and i'm definitely completely behind. I'm not going to preorder anything anymore so i'll start with just 15 to 20 packs at best. I'll mostly go budget for now and use cards from previous expansions.
The inclusion of this card in the set tells me that they setting up for a mech expansion in the near future. All sets from next year have already been decided so it's very likely this is an early setup for the next year. Right now, this obviously isn't a viable card but in a mech expansion this becomes very strong. It's a discover with a built-in mana discount. This is never a bad thing. So, i believe this is here as a hint for what to expect next year.
I have been playing Spell Damage Mage since Scholomance so this new quest gives me hopes that the archetype will finally become more viable for ranked. It will always be fun though.
The reward is strong but the main question is the consistency in playing the required cards for each step within a reasonable time frame. If it is too slow to complete consistently then it's better to just use regular spell damage minions (like Imprisoned Phoenix). If it isn't too slow to complete then it's possible that it will allow Spell Damage Mage to cut some slower cards (Phoenix is pretty slow) for more early game tempo. I think the quest will work fine with or without minions if it isn't too slow. The main problem are the frost spells which are pretty underwhelming. I'm playing with a Spell Damage Mage deck and it is pretty decent but i'm not really using any frost spells. They can be useful when discovered but adding them directly to the deck isn't really worth it imo.
Yeah, everything you said is better. But you are talking about wild and i'm talking about standard. I should have stated that so my bad again. I'll make it more clear next time.
Of course this isn't going to be all that good in wild. The power level of most cards has dropped significantly over the last few years after the insane power level from older expansions (most notably, Knights of the Frozen Throne and Kobolds and Catacombs). And Druid certainly had some of his best cards ever released in those two expansions. If they release stuff that can beat the power of Ultimate Infestation and Branching Paths then the class will break the game completely. And you talked like you strictly have to use this to remove things. You can hit face if possible. Also, i don't see the point in comparing this to the Amara quest. Copying things is a very common theme in Priest and that class has better defensive tools (and the best board clears). They have a much easier time working with greedy stuff like that. Amara itself has a broken effect that is better than Reno. It isn't competitively successful because combo decks are even more broken. Wild is an environment that is completely out of control and quests themselves already have several issues (start with 1 less card, sacrifice turn 1) that aren't being fixed. So, i would never expect any of these new quests to have a lasting impact on the format.
Here we have a contender for the most underestimated card of the reveal season. I still remember people shitting all over E.T.C., God of Metal and being terrified of Scabbs Cutterbutter. And then E.T.C. became a solid win condition for Warrior that is still playable even after rotation while Scabbs did nothing and still does nothing. This kind of stuff always happens. Edit: I confused the release window of these two cards. My bad. What i meant with this comparison is this: there are always overrated and underrated cards at each reveal period and people tend to just glance at the text and not analyze things thoroughly.
This quest is relatively easy to complete, one of the cards that helps complete it has synergy with Y'sharrj and it provides a good deal of survivability and damage for a slower archetype. Clown Druid struggles to deal with aggro but this gives the deck a lot of armor over the course of the game. The reward doesn't win the game but protects you against aggression and burn and gives slower Druid archetypes a better chance of achieving their late game win conditions. This isn't a direct win condition but it can win games against passive decks. Just ask Warlocks how much they love getting punched in the face. Also, the minion has taunt which makes Mark of the Spikeshell a great option for stalling. I'm not going to say that this is a 5/5 but it certainly isn't as weak as people claims.
This should be fine for a Guardian Animals deck. The tradeable keyword helps a lot because you can use it to draw a better card in the early game and shuffle this thing back into the deck to be summoned by Guardian Animals. But the nerf to GA really hurt the card for Hunter. It's really difficult to make anything this slow work in the class. Even a big mana cheater like Beastmaster Leoroxx struggles to have any impact within the class.
It's fine as a support for Handlock. Boring but doesn't seem weak. Well, at least there will be a lot of videos of people making the mistake of trying to Coin into this. Just like in the good old Mountain Giant days...
People are again underestimating the impact of mana cost increase on cards. Combo decks need mana reduction to make their combo work. When the pieces have their cost increased this causes a chain reaction within the whole deck as the discounts aren't efficient anymore. The 2 mana increase on Il'gynoth just breaks Lifesteal DH. They will be forced to run both the quest and Skull of Gul'dan to have a better chance at making their combo work without having to wait for turn 10+. More card draw means less healing and less defense which makes them more susceptible to any kind of aggression and not just hyper aggression. The increased stats still allow the card to be played in other decks but they don't matter as much for combo because it is just to risky for a combo deck to drop their main combo piece on the board without having their otk ready. If the main combo piece is destroyed then it's an automatic loss. Tempoing the main combo piece just because of higher stats is still way too risky.
Darkglare is back to its original 3 mana 3/4 stats and that's a good thing. Reducing the cost during the original nerf was a mistake. The card is slower now and mana cheat is at its best when it is super fast. Even a 1 mana increase can make a huge difference. Same applies to Incanter's Flow. They didn't provide any compensation for mage so they are definitely going to feel the blow.
Kolkar Pack Runner being slower also allows board based strategies to have a better chance at pushing Hunter off the board. We already know that 3/4 stats for 3 mana isn't anything special nowadays.
Granite Forgeborn with Yeti stats was extremely silly so the nerf was needed. It isn't even that big of a hit. Just one less health. Easier to remove but the mana discounts are still there.
Battleground Battlemaster deserved a stronger nerf but they are also nerfing Paladin which was the main abuser. It shouln't be that easy to abuse it in very fast strategies anymore but the fact that is still playable is very worrisome. This card just doubles the damage output of 2 minions. It is still an extreme threat in any deck with sizeable minions or buffs (in hand or board). So, i believe it can still be problematic. I hope i'm wrong.
Conviction (Rank 2) at 2 mana is a bigger blow than expected. When cheap cards have their cost increased they lose a lot of flexibility. I don't think the card is unplayable but it is a lot worse because any attempts at comboing it with Battlemaster have been delayed by 2 turns (1 mana on each card).
Now, the truly puzzling one is Flesh Giant. A 1 mana increase on a card that is very easy to discount isn't going to do a whole lot. Not in Warlock anyway. This is a bigger blow on Priest as the class already can't discount the card fast enough to make it impact the game when it is most relevant (early to mid game). Non Shadow Priest decks already suffer from a lack of proactive plays. This card was one of the few that was worthwhile attempting to build around for a more proactive playstyle for Control Priest. A 1 mana increase just makes it a lot worse for the class. Warlock still has tons of self damage and healing so the one mana increase only makes things slightly worse. I think the most relevant hit here is Battlemaster. Now other decks have one extra turn to find a way to deal with the giants. The nerf on Darkglare should help as well.
I wish i got this error. I'd rather have 100 gold and open a pack of my choice instead of getting a completely useless pack with cards from the previous year.
DS + IF is probably the easiest combo to assemble in the whole game. When they announced the new core set for Priest and i saw that Inner Fire was gone, i became hopeful that Priest would be able to play a genuine buff based deck without resorting to a combo finisher. However, they also removed Power Word: Shield and Northshire Cleric which were the main cycle/reloading tool for the class. After that, they kept printing good tempo minions and buffs but all of these cards ended up as a complete failure. Priest doesn't have a hero power that creates minions like Paladin. Paladin can always throw their buffs into their 1/1s whenever they are out of minions. Priest, however, needs actual minions to buff and if their stuff gets removed there's a pretty high chance that they will become stuck with buff spells in hand that simply can't be used.
I'm not desperate for the birth of a super good aggro/tempo priest because i'm sure it will be infuriating to deal with. What annoys me is the fact that they keep printing these tempo cards and buffs that serve no purpose outside of discover/generation. Precious slots in card sets are wasted with cards that are simply hopeless. The strongest example is Scholomance Academy. This set brought a few cards that see play all the time (mainly Draconic Studies and Raise Dead) but both dual class legendary slots failed completely within the class because they were supporting buff/tempo playstyles. High Abbess Alura was a huge success in Paladin and even took a nerf because of that but the card simply doesn't work with any reliable Priest strategies. And Disciplinarian Gandling was simply insanely overrated and failed even within Warlock. There's also Frazzled Freshman (people were worried because it was a 1/4) and Power Word: Feast. If they just gave Priest a basic Arcane Intellect, these cards would probably be playable, at least. If they have no intention of doing this then i would wish for them to stop printing useless stuff and give the class cards that actually support its slower nature.
Priest's card draw is in a healthy spot but only for Control. The class will never find any success outside of Control without real card draw. Shadow Priest is just another Control Priest. Quest Priest is Control as well. Priest literally can't do anything else. It doesn't have access to burst for any sort of Combo and fast strategies will die from an inability to reload efficiently throughout the game.
I opened around 25 packs. I got two legendaries: Anetheron and Sheldras Moontree. I also obtained around 9 epics and i'm not far from getting all commons but there are a ton of rares missing. It was an okay start for someone with few resources.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I haven't been able to test it myself as i wasn't fortunate enough to open the quest on this first day. Quest Priest is going to be a prime target of any burn strategy. I beat a lot of Control Priests with a similar list that i was using before the expansion dropped. I'm mostly worried about more aggressive strategies. Fire Sale is certainly a big boost for those matchups but i don't know if it will be enough.
I played against Quest Warrior a few times. It is slow. It can beat both slow and fast strategies when the deck is built correctly but the Juggernaut is inconsistent. It doesn't activate on the turn Cap'n Rokara is dropped and that gives the opponent one extra turn to finish them off. Even if it goes off, you don't get any consistent damage because Warrior weapons have a wide range of attack values, the cannon shots land on minions often and the current pirates in standard provide little to no initiative. The Warrior quest is fine and doesn't feel bad to play against.
I played against a few other quests but no Quest Hunter. Here are my impressions:
That's it. I played against most of them using Handlock (i opened Anetheron so i crafted a few other cards for it). I beat Quest DH with Libram Paladin with no cards from the new expansion.
When it comes to Handlock, it felt worse than i expected. I used a Soul Fragment package and the support cards that were introduced (except for Goldshire Gnoll). It seemed too fair. I dropped Anetheron a few times on turn 3 and the minion was removed every single time. Dark Alley Pact and Flesh Giant were a lot better but the deck still depends a lot on minions to deal damage and the big vanilla stats weren't enough. There were a lot of problems when it comes to enemy taunts, enemy removal and enemy healing. Entitled Customer and Spice Bread Baker are definitely great but they don't seem enough to carry the archetype into viability.
I spent a long time without playing. I was completely tired of the game. I still kept paying attention to the meta situation and things seemed pretty bad so i didn't bother playing and lost an incredible amount of gold/exp. I finished at level 57 and got Neeru Fireblade at level 50 which was the worst possible card to receive (this card became completely pointless thanks to the new Warlock quest). I came back now and i'm definitely completely behind. I'm not going to preorder anything anymore so i'll start with just 15 to 20 packs at best. I'll mostly go budget for now and use cards from previous expansions.
The inclusion of this card in the set tells me that they setting up for a mech expansion in the near future. All sets from next year have already been decided so it's very likely this is an early setup for the next year. Right now, this obviously isn't a viable card but in a mech expansion this becomes very strong. It's a discover with a built-in mana discount. This is never a bad thing. So, i believe this is here as a hint for what to expect next year.
I'll try to bleed opponents to death using Grand Empress Shek'zara. It's going to be quite a spectacle!
I have been playing Spell Damage Mage since Scholomance so this new quest gives me hopes that the archetype will finally become more viable for ranked. It will always be fun though.
The reward is strong but the main question is the consistency in playing the required cards for each step within a reasonable time frame. If it is too slow to complete consistently then it's better to just use regular spell damage minions (like Imprisoned Phoenix). If it isn't too slow to complete then it's possible that it will allow Spell Damage Mage to cut some slower cards (Phoenix is pretty slow) for more early game tempo. I think the quest will work fine with or without minions if it isn't too slow. The main problem are the frost spells which are pretty underwhelming. I'm playing with a Spell Damage Mage deck and it is pretty decent but i'm not really using any frost spells. They can be useful when discovered but adding them directly to the deck isn't really worth it imo.
Priest can finally deal damage again! Now it's finally possible to win games without dragging it for all eternity!
First came Delete Warlock and now we are getting Self Fatigue DH. What is next? Suicide Priest? Broken Armor Warrior?
Further support for my Ticket Master/Grand Empress Shek'zara shenanigans. I approve this.
Yeah, everything you said is better. But you are talking about wild and i'm talking about standard. I should have stated that so my bad again. I'll make it more clear next time.
Of course this isn't going to be all that good in wild. The power level of most cards has dropped significantly over the last few years after the insane power level from older expansions (most notably, Knights of the Frozen Throne and Kobolds and Catacombs). And Druid certainly had some of his best cards ever released in those two expansions. If they release stuff that can beat the power of Ultimate Infestation and Branching Paths then the class will break the game completely. And you talked like you strictly have to use this to remove things. You can hit face if possible. Also, i don't see the point in comparing this to the Amara quest. Copying things is a very common theme in Priest and that class has better defensive tools (and the best board clears). They have a much easier time working with greedy stuff like that. Amara itself has a broken effect that is better than Reno. It isn't competitively successful because combo decks are even more broken. Wild is an environment that is completely out of control and quests themselves already have several issues (start with 1 less card, sacrifice turn 1) that aren't being fixed. So, i would never expect any of these new quests to have a lasting impact on the format.
Here we have a contender for the most underestimated card of the reveal season. I still remember people shitting all over E.T.C., God of Metal and being terrified of Scabbs Cutterbutter. And then E.T.C. became a solid win condition for Warrior that is still playable even after rotation while Scabbs did nothing and still does nothing. This kind of stuff always happens. Edit: I confused the release window of these two cards. My bad. What i meant with this comparison is this: there are always overrated and underrated cards at each reveal period and people tend to just glance at the text and not analyze things thoroughly.
This quest is relatively easy to complete, one of the cards that helps complete it has synergy with Y'sharrj and it provides a good deal of survivability and damage for a slower archetype. Clown Druid struggles to deal with aggro but this gives the deck a lot of armor over the course of the game. The reward doesn't win the game but protects you against aggression and burn and gives slower Druid archetypes a better chance of achieving their late game win conditions. This isn't a direct win condition but it can win games against passive decks. Just ask Warlocks how much they love getting punched in the face. Also, the minion has taunt which makes Mark of the Spikeshell a great option for stalling. I'm not going to say that this is a 5/5 but it certainly isn't as weak as people claims.
5 stars from me as it is extra support for Grand Empress Shek'zara, a card that i really like.
This should be fine for a Guardian Animals deck. The tradeable keyword helps a lot because you can use it to draw a better card in the early game and shuffle this thing back into the deck to be summoned by Guardian Animals. But the nerf to GA really hurt the card for Hunter. It's really difficult to make anything this slow work in the class. Even a big mana cheater like Beastmaster Leoroxx struggles to have any impact within the class.
It's fine as a support for Handlock. Boring but doesn't seem weak. Well, at least there will be a lot of videos of people making the mistake of trying to Coin into this. Just like in the good old Mountain Giant days...