Patch 6.1.3 – Thoughts on the Announced Nerfs

by OtakuMZ - 8 years ago     show comments

Introduction

Yesterday, the nerfs of 7 cards were announced. Some of these were long anticipated and demanded by the community, namely Yogg-Saron, Hope’s End and Tuskarr Totemic. Other changes were quite unexpected, e.g. Charge and Execute. The thoughts presented are totally subjective and I am sure Blizzard has the numbers to justify them. Yet, I do not agree with all the conclusions Team5’s balance team took.

Nerfs

Shaman

Rockbiter Weapon (RW)

I see the point Blizzard has made that RW is one of the most burst heavy cards in Shaman. But is it bad. I don’t think so. Every card needs strong cards and areas in which they excel. Atop, some players already swapped out RW for Lightning Bolt because Doomhammer isn’t played in the more and more popular Midrange / Spellpower Shaman. It does also synergize better with Tunnel Trogg and Spellpower minions like Bloodmage Thalnos and Azure Drake. I think the card is on the fringe of being unplayable outside of Doomhammer-Aggro Shaman. Lightning Bolt and even Stormcrack are outright better in my opinion.

Tuskarr Totemic

I know this one was criticized heavily and rightfully so. Getting a non-basic totem, especially Totem Golem has been just too frustrating for opponents. Anyway, I think it should have ended as a 3/3 or a 2/2 for 2 mana. As it is, it will likely be dropped from competitive decks. I am not sad about that, but I would have loved to see it stay as it was for Wild making it more RNG with new totems released.

Warrior

Charge

IMHO Arcane Giant is the reason this card got nerfed. It also wasn’t in line with the “non-interactive” policy the Hearthstone developers follow. Nevertheless, this is the nerf I most dislike because OTK decks popped up once in a while taking players by surprise was just hilarious. I also do not think the nerf was a necessity because these decks were never a problem winrate-wise and the decks were very skill intensive.

Execute

The nerf was long overdue to be fair. Execute is still powerful and a good card in control decks and will most likely stay in these late-game oriented Warrior decks. Faster Warrior decks might rotate them out though, because the increased mana cost might be an issue there (e.g. Dragon Tempo Warrior). In this regard, I think it is a really clever nerf, well done Blizzard!

Hunter

Call of the Wild

The card is a powerhouse and I agree with the mana cost increase. It was cheaper than three Animal Companions and taking into account that combined effects are usually considered more powerful than each individual card, it was heavily undercosted. From my experience, the card felt 99% powerful and swingy and that might have been a little too much ;-). The only thing that makes me sad about this nerf is that the 9-mana slot is vastly inferior to the 8-mana one regarding minions summoned by Medivh’s Atiesh which I loved to play in my more late game oriented Secret Hunter.

Neutral

Abusive Seargent

I already suspected Abusive being nerfed last time when Standard hit. Now his time has come, he tortured one soul too many! The effect was just too strong for 1 mana and it helped aggressive decks to do unfair trades. TLDR: this nerf is reasonable, although unexpected.

Yogg-Saron, Hope’s End

The nerf feels right although I will miss my good old Yoggi quite a bit. Nevertheless I totally agree with the nerf and it is in line with the overall mechanic of the card: Yogg-Saron already casts spells for your opponent from the moment it is stolen by an opponent’s Sylvanas Windrunner.

Conclusion

I mostly understand the measures taken with the exception of Rockbiter Weapon and Charge. Yet I am glad to see the changes before the Hearthstone World Championship Tour (HCT) Finals happen. I was very much tired of all the Yogg-Saron rant which did  render watching tournaments unpleasant. All in all well done, although I hope they do release more “skill cards” like Charge in the future. There should be cards in the game that reward highly skilled players with higher than expected winrates without being unbalanced for the rest of us or the other professionals that know how to play around certain strategies.