The Pre-Launch party has begun! We've got a round of theorycrafting streams today from some of Hearthstone's best and with it, plenty of freebies!
- There are 16 streamers participating in the event. More on that in a moment.
- Each streamer has been given 10 codes for Mega Bundles to giveaway to their own streams.
- Blizzard will be giving out hundreds and potentially thousands, Twitch subs via gifting in participating channels.
The action begins 2 hours from this post going live - 9 AM Pacific (12 PM Eastern, 17:00 CET).
Quote From Blizzard Starting at 9:00 a.m. PST on March 23, Hearthstone creators will showcase the new set and their respective contest-winning decks on their personal streaming channels, using at least 10 Forged in the Barrens cards in each deck they play. This time around we’ll be gifting 100 subs in several participating creator channels during Theorcrafting Livestreams, and each creator will give away 10 Mega Bundle codes throughout the day!
The Streamers
Sixteen streamers are taking part in the festivities today. Let's see who they all are!
| Brian Kibler | Alliestrasza | Thijs | RegisKillbin |
| Trump | Dog | Slysssa | Firebat |
| RDU | tylerootd | Avelline | Kripparrian |
| Feno | Lt. Eddy | Dekkster | Sinedd92 |
Full Forged in the Barrens Pre-Launch Schedule
Comments
I didn´t win a Bundle, nor subscription, but watching tylerootd having fun and chilling was good enough :)
So I watched some of the streams, mostly Kiblers. Here's some thoughts (I know some people hate this, so click on spoilers below at your own volition)
- Mage looks really busted, especially if the games drag. Wildfire and Mordresh Fire Eye more or less finishes every game of mage I saw. Guess hitting both face and board for 10 is kinda busted. Who'd knew. Couple that with so much discover options from mage, there's a legit chance you can get your hp to hit upwards to 3-4 damage on average, and that's insane. The only time mage seems to suffer is against aggro, but that really goes without saying. Needless to say, if mage is tier 1 for the first month I'd expect some nerfs incoming for wildfire in particular.
- Warrior and paladin looks solid. There's kinda a lot of things you can get warrior to do now, from copying rush to massive taunts. As for paladin, if you're playing secrets, having Sword of the Fallen is pretty much the only thing you want off your mulligan because every time I see this on 2 its kinda busted.
- Rogue is a mixed bag, since everyone is trying lots of new stuff. What I saw however, was how stupidly powerful wicked stab was (fully upgraded it deals 6 for 2). Efficient Octo-bot is predictably powerful and scary. Swinetusk Shank is alright, but I still think its just worse than SSS.
- Shaman. Elementals or murlocs. Murloc builds are fast, like really fast. If they curve out 1-2-3 you just lost the game. There's actually quite a good deal of midgame elementals to be honest, I think I'll be jumping in on a few midrange shaman myself. Don't expect too much though. Shaman still cant draw to save their life, so you clear their board once and that's pretty much it.
- Priest looks poor, but that's more or less always the case the first few weeks anyway. Warlock also looked pretty beaten, especially with so many guys trying to make Neeru Fireblade work in all sort of weird decks. I think Neeru only really functions well with less minions in the deck, so you can just tutor him out with Free Admission and then proceed to burn your opponent's and your deck fast.
- Dhunters with deathrattles can hold their own, but is slow and I kinda think this is not really going to make any waves.
Well, see you guys when Barrens come out next week.
Just worth bearing in mind some streamers are increasing win bias for subs up to 1000% (with a helpful prompt to sub to increase chances), or alternatively restricting entry to those following for 1 month plus etc.
Doesn't feel good but no idea if that's against Blizzard or Twitch terms or not.
Some fun decks being played though :)
Who's doing this?
I wasn't sure if it was appropriate to name names. But at least a quarter of streamers from what I saw.
You can spell their names in Pig Latin if you want to be discreet.
If a staff member comments and says it's ok happy to do so. Otherwise I'll just assume not.
Lol, I'm just kidding man - no need to do that.
Do we have details on the Reddit giveaway?
They will likely announce on the day, and the thread will be pinned to the top of the subreddit. Expect something of the "post a comment" sort.
Upping this, not sure how to be electible for the giveaway there
If you already purchased a mega bundle are these codes still usable for the packs and legendaries? or does the code have to be used on a new account?
If you purchased the mega bundle from Blizzard directly (not Amazon Coins or something like that) then it's worth contacting them about a refund so that you might be able to use the code. Outside of that, yeah new account, or give it to somebody.
If I understand it correctly it's first come first served for the codes right? Whoever nabs the code the streamer provides first is the one who gets it. So...no opening 5 streams in the background while you're doing something else and hoping you end up getting picked?
The wording "throughout the day" would not seem to indicate "first come first served."
In the past, I've seen them do something like tell people to type a certain word in chat, and they pick a winner from everyone who participates. That makes it so lurkers running the stream in the background do not get codes.
It is also worth pointing out that the winner might have to message the streamer to then confirm they are still in chat or simply say something in chat to win. I've seen so many people enter the word to join a raffle, leave or go afk, and then lose out on it because they weren't around to pay attention.
This makes idling several streams at once to win more difficult so if you do want to try and hit up multiple, definitely don't bother with a stream like Kripp's since your odds are already super low.
usually its raffles the streamer opens.
So the 10 mega bundle giveaway codes given to each streamer are separate from the codes given to the players that won the deck submission contest which was spoken about on last night's stream?
Correct.
Yes.