Blizzard is Planning to Ban Over 40 Hearthstone Cards from the Arena in the Next Patch

[ffronw]

Blizzard is Planning to Ban Over 40 Hearthstone Cards from the Arena in the Next Patch

//cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/1348/1348471.jpgThe Hearthstone Arena is in for a shakeup in the next patch, as Blizzard plans to exclude a number of popular cards from the format.

If you've got a few favorite cards that you like to see pop up in Hearthstone's Arena mode, you might have to rethink your strategies soon. In a blog post [http://us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/blog/20271286/] yesterday, Game Designer Dean Ayala discussed the next patch for Blizzard's digital card game.

The short version of the post is that Blizzard wants to bring the Arena game mode into balance, so that you can choose any class without "feeling disadvantaged." If you haven't played Arena, it offers you the choice of random cards to build a deck, and then see how many matches you can survive. Your Arena run ends with 12 wins or three losses, whichever comes first.

While a number of different ideas for balancing the game mode are discussed, but the first one that's coming in an upcoming patch is the removal of a whole bunch of cards. With the exception of Paladins, every class will be losing some cards. Here's the full list of cards that are getting the boot:

Mage

Forgotten Torch
Snowchugger
Faceless Summoner

Rogue

Goblin Auto Barber
Undercity Valiant

Shaman

Vitality Totem
Dust Devil
Totemic Might
Ancestral Healing
Dunemaul Shaman
Windspeaker

Warlock

Anima Golem
Sacrificial Pact
Curse of Rafaam
Sense Demons
Void Crusher
Reliquary Seeker
Succubus

Druid

Savagery
Poison Seeds
Soul of the Forest
Mark of Nature
Tree of Life
Astral Communion

Warrior

Warsong Commander
Bolster
Charge
Bouncing Blade
Axe Flinger
Rampage
Ogre Warmaul

Hunter

Starving Buzzard
Call Pet
Timber Wolf
Cobra Shot
Lock and Load
Dart Trap
Snipe

Priest

Mind Blast
Shadowbomber
Lightwell
Power Word: Glory
Confuse
Convert
Inner Fire

There may be more changes coming down the road, as well. The blog post mentions giving designers the ability to adjust the rate at which particular cards appear in drafts, as well as the possibility of drafting by card rarity. Those are possible future changes, but for now, players will need to be prepared to adjust to the removal of these popular cards. There's no word on when the patch might be released, and the blog post simply refers to it as "an upcoming patch."

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[Dr. Crawver]

While there is a number of cards being removed that struck me as weird (like they're not that bad, are they? Snipe? That's a functional and functionally useful card. Not the best, but there's worse out there), I approve of the change in general and find the overall theme of the removed cards amusing. Top tier arena classes are rogue and mage. They lose exclusively great cards. Paladin is seen as the 3rd best and is left untouched, and the rest have some of their absolutely worst cards removed. This won't fix arena balance, but it will help.

 

[Battenberg]

Devs once again showing awareness that there's issues with arena balance but completely failing to enact the kind of changes that will actually fix it. Taking some of the crappier picks out from bad arena classes won't change the fact mage, rogue, and paladin, have a lot of hugely powerful cards at common rarity and that's what's putting them so far ahead in terms of winrate (especially since they're only removing 2, maybe 3 of said powerful cards). It also totally fails to address the huge disparity in winrates between going first and second which has developed.

Even when the ranked meta got horribly stale for months at a time in the past (*cough* secret paladin *cough*) arena always gave me a reason to keep playing HS but every expansion they've made ridiculous decisions (mainly based on card rarity) that make arena less and less fun to play. Hell the recent Karazhan expansion they gave mage one of the best arena cards ever in firelands portal and wanted to give priest one of the worst arena cards with purify; both in the common slot (until the backlash actually forced them to make a change). Absolutely no reason for the rarities to fall that way since it was an adventure but they did it anyway, almost like they're actively trying to make arena exclusively 2-3 classes.

 

[ron1n]

Wow never thought I'd see the day.

I get the impression this is sort of a 'test' run, dipping the toes in so to speak. They probably didn't want to risk doing too many card omissions all at once. Still, great sign that they are at least going to be balancing arena more in the future. I might even consider reinstalling it some day if they keep at it.

Still, it says a lot about how useless and meaningless many of the cards in the game currently are when they are never used in constructed and can't even make the cut for Arena.

I mean, why do Starving Buzzard and Warsong Commander even exist? This is basically them admitting that there are core class cards in the game that serve no purpose whatsoever.

I think it's going to take a combination of both culling cards from the current Arena pool as well as giving weaker classes better class commons and rares and giving Mage/Rogue shittier commons for the next few expansions to actually see an even playing field of some sort.

They're always going to have to deal with the inherent imbalance of the hero powers as well.

 

[RedDeadFred]

Devs once again showing awareness that there's issues with arena balance but completely failing to enact the kind of changes that will actually fix it. Taking some of the crappier picks out from bad arena classes won't change the fact mage, rogue, and paladin, have a lot of hugely powerful cards at common rarity and that's what's putting them so far ahead in terms of winrate (especially since they're only removing 2, maybe 3 of said powerful cards). It also totally fails to address the huge disparity in winrates between going first and second which has developed.

It's strange to see such a timid approach concerning Mage when you look at the balancing team's track record. Usually it would result with Mage in the gutter, but it seems like they're taking a more incremental approach for the first time in.... I don't know if they've ever done it. Then again, the impact might be greater than we think because not only are they getting a few powerful commons removed, others are getting a lot of shitty commons removed. This means that while a class like Priest will not have the same power ceiling as a Mage, they might be able to consistently draft a deck that competes (who am I kidding though, that hero power...). This does potentially offer a major shake up, though, like you, I don't see Mage or Rogue going anywhere, but it's a step in the right direction. I actually like the idea of removing cards from Arena instead of just adjusting rarity because with a smaller card pool, you can actually play around things. With the card pool as huge as it is right now, there's just no point of playing around any specific cards anymore unless you're in a specific situation (high wins against a Mage? They probably have Flamestrike).

 

[Newage]

What is a "Core class card"? How would you define it?

I think he just means class cards that are part of the core set (or classic set).

 

[Atratzu]

It'll be interesting to see how this works when it comes to the balancing between the different classes... and maybe I'll actually be able to finish my priest dailies...? ...Nah. Being on a losing streak doesn't change with cards.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

What is a "Core class card"? How would you define it?

I think he just means class cards that are part of the core set (or classic set).

He's talking about the "Basic" cards. The ones that have no rarity gem because they are just earned by sheer virtue of starting the game (not counting the ones that are unlocked by getting the first 10 levels in a class).

 

[TilMorrow]

I always thought they were going to change arena in some way instead of sticking with their comment that it wouldn't be changed like Wild and that there was no way they were going to stick with keeping all cards in the game available for the random drafts just by the sheer number of them and how useless some can be. Although there are some surprising cards chosen for removal it seems, Barber, Windspeaker, Sac Pac, Poison Seeds, Charge and Convert all seem like odd choices for removal. They're not bad cards and are extremely situational ones that when used right can bring the match back in your control but at the same time aren't overpowered cards. Still they would also do better to remove some of the worse neutral cards from the draft in addition to the removal of class cards.

 

[Kahani]

I mean, why do Starving Buzzard and Warsong Commander even exist? This is basically them admitting that there are core class cards in the game that serve no purpose whatsoever.

No it isn't, it's simply that arena is a very different format in which cards that rely on combinations or themes are virtually useless. Starving Buzzard is no longer a must-have since its nerf, but it still has a place in some beast decks. But in arena where you might not get a single other beast, it's completely pointless. Some of the other cards removed are actually quite powerful - Inner Fire can be part of some truly silly combos, for example - they're just not much use in a deck that probably won't have the cards needed to set those combos up. That said, Warsong Commander is completely useless, but that's been obvious to everyone since its nerf.

This also explains why the top three classes in arena are mage, rogue and paladin, since they're the ones that generally rely less on building around a theme to get combos. Pick a bunch of random mage cards and you'll have a variety of useful spells plus probably some minions to buff them in some way. You don't need to rely on those minions being beasts or totems or whatever in order for them to work. Rogue and Paladin have some of that element, but also have combos that are built around their hero power and therefore guaranteed to be usable, even if they're less powerful than in a constructed deck. Try making a hunter beast deck without knowing if you'll get any beasts, or a Warrior enrage deck without being able to damage your minions, and it should be obvious why these classes tend to be weaker in arena.

Still they would also do better to remove some of the worse neutral cards from the draft in addition to the removal of class cards.

As I understand it the point is to try to balance the classes against each other, not simply remove bad cards. As explained above, situational cards are generally much less useful in arena since you're unlikely to actually be able to set up the situation in which they're useful. Since everyone has an equal chance of getting good or bad neutral cards, removing them wouldn't do anything to help matters, and that element of chance is pretty much the whole point since without it you're just playing constructed.

 

[Battenberg]

So these changes fixed nothing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUP4GR9lrFY