by JR Cook - 10 years ago     show comments

It’s April 22nd. In eight days, Hearthstone’s first official ladder season will come to a close. Ranks will be reset, and the grind will begin anew.

I have not yet reached legendary, despite 30+ hours of grinding the ladder. It’s admittedly frustrating. What I lack in completion of my goal however, I make up for in lessons, some hilarious, others painful, and I feel they’re worth sharing with the class. If you’ve never hit legendary before and are considering making the trek, here are (read this next bit dramatically for maximum effect)  ZENSTYLE’S OBSERVATIONS FROM THE GRIND.

You are not a visionary

I wrote an article earlier this month talking about how I wanted to innovate, and blah, blah, blah. I was going to make a Priest deck and totally show all those Hunters and Warlocks. I tried. It didn’t happen. I now use Hunter and Warlock. It’s a vicious and terrible truth. Most of us are not good enough at this game to create our own awesome, top tier decks. We might create fun decks, but we likely will not create decks that counter enough of the current builds to be useful past say, rank 12. Accepting this fact will save you a lot of heartache.

You will use multiple decks

At the time of this writing, I’m at rank six. I’d reached rank four and then hit an awful streak, which began when I unexpectedly encountered a Mage deck three times in a row. It had apparently been picked up because it countered Zoo Warlock decently, which I happened to be running. I picked up Zoo after running UTH Hunter, Watchers Druid, Control Hunter, Board Clear Priest, Midrange Druid, Tempo Rogue, Control Paladin and even a weird Hunter deck I concocted for a stint. Your deck might be awesome, but some nights it just seems like the ladder has its number, and you need to make a change. If Control Warrior is wrecking your Midrange Druid, switch it up. Try something more aggressive. You’ll need multiple weapons in your arsenal if you want to succeed.

You will need breaks

Hearthstone is, in a vacuum, a super fun, heartwarming, awesome, very zen game. It’s great for stress relief. Grab some tea, put on some chilled out music and play something fun. Grinding the ladder is not relaxing. It is terrifying. You’ll get up to a new rank and immediately feel horror at the thought of queuing up. What if you lose your rank? What if all that you did in the last hour goes down the drain because of a super unfortunate match-up? Avoid this sort of mental anguish by giving yourself breaks. Do two, three games per sitting. Between those sittings, make food, take your dog on a walk, pop on Netflix. The goal might be legendary, but the primary objective should be enjoying it. The last thing you want to do is make Hearthstone a second job you get to dread.

Your opponent is not the enemy

You’re going to get incredibly frustrated when someone lifetaps the Soulfire that seals your fate. You might slap your desk, you might angrily chug a Red Bull. Don’t take it out on your opponent, however. You’ll just feel awful afterwards. I had one game where I got really uncool to someone because I won a very close match at 3:30 in the morning. It was uncalled for, and I still feel like crap. The Shaman I was playing had not been at all rude. He or she was just trying to get to legendary. That doesn’t make them your enemy, just your opposition for a few minutes.

You will spend a lot of your time trying to get to legendary

I walked into this goal with the incorrect assumption that this grind would not be a long one. I figured I’d bolt up to eight with no problems and then do something like a 60/40 split and be there before the month was half over. It does not work like that. Even the best battle plans will be thwarted and you’ll spend entire evenings howling in rage as you lose to the blight known as RNG. On top of that, you’ll just plain get outplayed sometimes. Grinding to legendary takes time, even for top tier players. It just takes longer for the rest of us. Expect to commit a lot of time to the grind. If you can’t do it while also being mindful of school, work, family and social obligations, don’t try to do it.

Again, eight days left, there’s still time for me to make it, but it’ll definitely be an uphill battle. Hopefully these tidbits of wisdom will make your legendary road a bit easier to walk.

If you’ve been grinding the ladder this month, or in months prior, what advice do you have for people considering making the trek?