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Mycelia Board Game Review

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Outback Crossing Review

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16 Mar 2018 18:59 #265870 by MacDirk Diggler
Ya I don't think Asmo is a deck builder. A good/great pilot no doubt. But I think he gets ideas/decklists from that HS pro deck twitter feed (@HSProDecks). if you are a steamer that twitter feed very helpful to find new decks that worked for someone... then you can sift through and find something that looks real fresh and stream it. He will be the first to admit he is not an innovator, but he has taken some decks to high legend that were previously under the radar. Some recent Hunters and the Control Priest are some that come to mind.

Regarding the expansion stuff... wow they are going balls deep on the even/odd thing. It seems like it will make it super easy to put you opponent on a build once you see his BEFORE GAME STARTS card. There will be one real good even Hunter deck in the meta or whatever so if you have been paying attention you will know every card in it, all the more so because of the mana restriction will make it harder for people to tech their deck. It would seem that a upgraded Hunter or Paladin hero power is going to lead to rise of Face Hunter and continued dude paladin. Unsubstantiated rumor.... new Shaman hero power will give a minion poisonous.

So couple of nights ago I caught Fr0zen Combo Priest vs Dog Dead Mans Warrior in the China tourney thats going on. Dog got off geist early enough to blow up Inner Fires. Fr0zen has a divine spirit in hand and shadow visions as well as Crazed Alchemist. Dog at like 60 health. Casters keep going on every turn that Fr0zen need to use his visions to pick up copy of Divine Shield before he draws it, turn after turn. Then Fr0zen draws his second divine shield and Thats Admirable says in his super dramatic caster voice "oh my god, Fr0zen may have just thrown the game". What they both missed is that he had gotten DMH from operative long ago. So he Dead Man's hands 2x divine shield and a Visions back into his deck. The Punchline? 364 OTK damage to Dogs face off Bookwyrm.

I am loving Priest myself right now. I like to think my deck that uses both combo and control keeps them guessing. It's working, I am climbing. Got off Twilight Acolyte on opponents Primordial Drake, potion of madness, divine shield, void ripper OTK and then pint sized,void ripper for full clear vs full pally board in back to back games. Feels good. I don't think Void Ripper is that common on ladder still. I image my opponents going WTF just happened?
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18 Mar 2018 01:01 #265922 by SebastianBludd
Replied by SebastianBludd on topic Hearthstone Players!

Jackwraith wrote: Same. Glitter Moth sounds pretty cool, but you're giving up a lot of options (SWP, Radiant Elemental, etc.) in order to play it. Oh, you're also giving up Divine Spirit, which means that your ability to take advantage of super-durable minions is almost entirely based on the Moth. (Kabal Talonpriest is, sadly, departing.) It does push a Priest player toward playing things like Unidentified Elixir.


I'm getting a Quest Warrior vibe from the forced synergy of cards like Glitter Moth and Baku. I could see their respective decks being pretty good in the early days of the expansion because, like Quest Warrior, the deck-building synergies will be obvious and they can exploit less-refined decks. But Quest Warrior stagnated relatively quickly and I'm skeptical that there will be enough odd-only/even-only-supporting cards in Witchwood to keep those decks relevant until the next expansion.

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21 Mar 2018 13:33 #266095 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
FYI: They're doing the "free pack every time you finish a daily" thing beginning on the 26th, so you might want to do the dailies normally until the 24th and then back off for a couple days, so you'll have three available on the 26th and are able to maximize your free Witchwood pack acquisition. (They're giving the option to get Un'Goro, Knights, and Kobolds packs immediately, rather than waiting for the middle of April for the new stuff, but who wants that?)

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21 Mar 2018 13:59 #266100 by jeb
Replied by jeb on topic Hearthstone Players!
Jackwraith saw me deMOLish a Warlock with Beast Hunter today. They died on turn 6, and had healed for 12 already. Just taken apart. They had a shot on turn 2 if they'd had a Defile, but I guess not so I destroyed them. I made it to Rank 6! Closing in on Dad Legend this month. Very excited. My goal was 8, so this is all just extra.

I am wait and see on the rest of the set, of course. These huge rotations throw a whole bunch into the mix. I am not going to say anything is good or bad until we see what's up. Here's what I always look for though:
  • Cheap damage spells. These can be exploited by Malygos.
  • Cheap healing, especially if they can be exploited by Auchenai/Velen effects.
  • Resurrect/Evolve/Recruit effects that get minions into play for "free."
  • Weapons with Battlecries, these can't be countered or delayed by Loatheb/Neru'bar effects. Weapons "have haste" in the MtG parlance.
  • Alternate win conditions (eg, DK Uther)

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21 Mar 2018 15:08 #266102 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
Aside from the earth-shattering effects on a couple classes (Priest, Shaman (Can it get worse? I think it can!)), what I've found most interesting about dev comments on Witchwood is how they're going to try to push archetypes that didn't do well in the past year. To me, that means Quests, unused Death Knights (aka Uther) and weapons (aka everything but Skull, Aluneth, and Kingsbane), and some of the minor themes they introduced in the last couple sets.

I have no idea how they're going to do it in 10 class cards per class plus possible neutrals, but I'm interested.

Paladin: What do you do to revive Control Paladin in order to make the DK worthwhile, now that Light Rag and Rallying Blade are going away? The Djinn didn't have an impact, but seems like it's waiting there for some way to succeed as long as the Paladin player can keep it alive. More taunts? The Spellstone should be the obvious combination answer, but it's way too slow and, generally, sucks ass, since a single taunter, even for 2 mana, just isn't worth the card slot. The new Echo taunt? Maybe. I can see that being a Control Paladin card very easily, as a deck often looking for other late-game answers that aren't Tirion or Lay on Hands (which isn't really an answer, which is why it doesn't get played.) After the flop of Lynessa, is there something else that can make Quest Paladin viable? Waiting on super-beast to arrive is futile if your 5 in 15 chance doesn't produce Stealth. Finally, they pushed Divine Shield hard in the last couple sets and I've been playing my bubble deck regularly whenever I feel like finishing a Paladin quest in Casual. It's those last two words that are key: "in Casual" because it lacks a finisher other than Tirion, which many competitive decks are more than prepared for.

Priest: Does Big Priest disappear without Barnes and Y'Shaarj? Does Priest sink back solely to Control and Control-based Dragon? Can those decks work without the mass removal afforded by SWH and Dragonfire? If there's going to be more support for unplayed archetypes, what does Quest Priest need? I've said before that it's hilarious that Quest Priest, based solely on Deathrattle minions, can't find a place for the second-greatest DR-oriented minion of all time (Cube) because it lacks access to the burst and/or transformative effects that Warlock can take advantage of. That burst is a finishing element that Quest Priest utterly lacks. It doesn't have access to Charge minions (or even Rush ones, really) and all the Quest completion does is delay. Plus, what do Deathrattle decks do without N'Zoth? There's no endgame there anymore and there really wasn't one in the first place. Was Elemental Priest ever supposed to be a thing? Is there a possibility for Priest to play something resembling aggro? I tried playing Priest Zoo. It's just not competitive. Is that one of the archetypes they're hoping to see more of? Can Dragon Soul be made workable without being oppressive? The only way Minionless Hunter really worked is by running a degenerate combo of two actual minions. What would make "minionless" Priest work without access to that same degenerate combo (aka Big Priest)? Plus, if you don't draw the Dragon Soul, what do you do? (I usually lose.) Does it matter that the weapon is only producing vanilla 5/5s? Is there something that could improve that without arcing into Shaman's Evolve territory?

Shaman: The (ahem) mammoth in the room is clearly Freeze Shaman. "We want to make less played archetypes viable! Oh... and I guess that includes archetypes that weren't played at all, too." Is Hagatha going to impact Freeze Shaman? Doesn't seem like it. Totem Shaman? Hm. Maybe. Are they going to hang both of those not-played-at-all archetypes around the neck of a mandatory legendary? That seems unwise. Shaman loses all fhe Jade stuff, Thing from Below, and Evolve. That's basically anything even vaguely considered an archetype for Shaman for the last two years. Evolve decks have only the DK and Unstable remaining. Totem decks lose the one card that often made hitting the button worthwhile. Meanwhile, there's a bunch of shitty Freeze and Overload stuff clogging the pipes. What makes Runespear playable? What makes Ice Breaker playable? Quest Shaman is still in good shape, except that it's never been a seriously competitive deck because Shaman lacks the weenie utility cards (Righteous Protector, good weapons like Rallying Blade, card advantage like Hydrologist) and the god-awesome transformative cards (Tarim) to make it work. Maybe I'm just refusing to see it, because every time I play my Quest Shaman deck to finish a daily, it does pretty well, but I've just never felt comfortable trying to really advance with it because a) I'm not much of an aggro player and b) it lacks the durability (Divine Shield, Taunt) and recovery cards (Call to Arms) that Paladin has access to.

Warlock: To quote Mike Donais: "Is there a problem?" Seriously, what archetypes aren't working for Warlock? Control? Check. Aggro/Zoo? Check. Legendary weapon? Check. DK? Check. Quest? Oh. Ohhhhhh. They mean Discard! Yeah, fuck that noise. Warlock is fine without tying it to that bullshit. Moving on.

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21 Mar 2018 19:08 - 21 Mar 2018 19:09 #266121 by MacDirk Diggler
Disco lock needs a card that discovers a card you discarded. I had all the legendary crap that went with Discolock and it was during dungeon run I could see what a bad idea it was. I took all the Discard packages offered in the run trying to get the quest off. The Dungeon run really emphasizes how critical the resource game is in HS. You just lose way too many resources when completing the quest and the result isn’t easily leveraged for a quick win.

I was on a blistering hot streak for couple of days with combo control priest. Was seeing all the lines, drawing all the cards, making all the plays. Made it as high as rank 2.3. I was going to tell you about a 6 card combo I pulled off, me no minions, him full health and 3 operatives on board. But it was typical pint sized, yoink, buff thing... you have seen before. Here is a better one...

Battle with Cubelock getting lots of hits to his face and him healing and around 15 health. He Guldans and I am seeing the game slip away. He brings back a Doomguard, a Voidlord, and rest weenie 1/3. Here is the play of my HS life.... pint-sized drops all his stuff to 0 attack except Doomguard. Potion of madness the Voidlord. Play inner fire on it and Divine shield 2x. Voidripper kills his weenies and flips Voiidlord to 36 attack. GG.

But alas I have been on an equally cold streak losing to Shaman and Quest mages etc. barely rank 3. Need my mojo back. It’s crazy how swingy the game can be.

Ok I know you guys loves you some Paladin and I have a new emerging deck for you....Rally Vally Pally it’s called. Ike is author. I originally came across it yesterday? Zalae, Purple, Ike and some other guy are in joint stream and Ike is piloting. Then this AM Thijs is streaming a deck called “Ike Paladin”with same core, some changes. He was 8-3 with it at high legend. Ike is legend rank 9 trying for 1 with it. The nutty thing it does as far as I saw was interaction with Valanyr and Chain Gang. You get it to hit and you get 2 Valanyr, suddenly +2/+2 starts hitting all your minions in hand as you keep proc ing the weapon Deathrattle. The huge downside to the weapon is that there is still a bit of Silence around The meta and 6 mana is a lot for a Truesilver without the heal. I have seen the deck with the Deathknight, Tirion, Ragnaros mixed in. This is Ike’s current version.

### Rally Vally Pally
#
# 2x (1) Righteous Protector
# 2x (2) Dirty Rat
# 2x (2) Equality
# 2x (2) Loot Hoarder
# 2x (2) Plated Beetle
# 2x (2) Wild Pyromancer
# 2x (3) Rallying Blade
# 2x (3) Stonehill Defender
# 1x (4) Blessing of Kings
# 2x (4) Call to Arms
# 1x (4) Consecration
# 2x (4) Saronite Chain Gang
# 1x (5) Fungalmancer
# 1x (6) Argent Commander
# 2x (6) Spikeridged Steed
# 1x (6) Sunkeeper Tarim
# 1x (6) Val'anyr
# 1x (7) Lynessa Sunsorrow
# 1x (8) The Lich King
#
AAECAZ8FCJkC3AOvB7nBAsLOAtHhAuPjArfpAgv7AfQF9gfZrgKbwgLfxAKIxwKbywLjywL40gLq5gIA
#
# To use this deck, copy it to your clipboard and create a new deck in Hearthstone
Last edit: 21 Mar 2018 19:09 by MacDirk Diggler.

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21 Mar 2018 20:06 - 21 Mar 2018 22:12 #266127 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
Heh. Yeah. I just played Jeb yesterday with a version of that deck. It's OK, but Val'anyr is still overpriced crap without specific circumstances.like the one you mentioned with Chain Gang. I've had nothing but Chain Gang and Tirion in my hand when my Val expired and, of course, the buff landed on Tirion. It's just too random and, as you say and I've said before, ends up being an overpriced Truesilver that doesn't even heal you, especially if Silence comes out. I don't really see the point of Lynessa in that list with only a single targeted spell (BoK), since Val's buff isn't targeted or a spell. Did they think that it was worth 7 mana for a vanilla 5/12 that's that "good" only if you've already played BoK? Hadn't thought about using Argent Commander with Val, though.

I think you're right about the need for Discard to have something to retrieve cards that were discarded. The resource loss is just too devastating, otherwise, especially in control decks that need to maximize advantage AND aggro decks that need to have minions placed on the board every turn. It's just not a viable system for a game with 30 card decks and no deck manipulation, in the same way that Overload isn't viable in a game with uniform resource gain.
Last edit: 21 Mar 2018 22:12 by Jackwraith.

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21 Mar 2018 21:19 #266131 by jeb
Replied by jeb on topic Hearthstone Players!
Malchezaar's Imp powers discard effect just fine when Zoo is the deck folks are playing. But the meta is SO goddamned greedy for singleton effects now no one dares. You don't need the cards you discarded as much as you just need cards in a deck like Zoo.

I've seen the Val buff on Leeroy before. It was a thing briefly, but it's just not as good as the CtA builds. I thought the good cards on Lynessa were Spikeridged Steed and that draw-a-card-bubble- minibuff (/rummages: Potion of Heroism). Does BoK even need to be in the mix? 7 mana for a 3/7 Bubbled Taunt that turns into a 2/6 Taunt and draws you two cards? I would play that. I would also draw it off my mulligan and never want to play it again. I am fickle.

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21 Mar 2018 22:16 #266136 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
Ah. Right. Totally overlooked the two Steeds in the list. I guess that would make Lynessa work? Eh. Still seems to draw dependent to me and what does that deck lack other than two Hoarders? Oh, yeah. Draw. If there's anything I'm hoping for in Witchwood as far as Control Paladin, it's something to free up the six mandatory deck slots known as 2 x Equality, 2 x Consecration, and 2 x Wild Pyromancer.

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22 Mar 2018 07:48 #266166 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
One interesting thing to note: Of the four even/odd class cards revealed (confirmed by Ayala that those and the two legendaries are the only ones using that mechanic in the set), they come from the four classes that seem to be losing the most/lacking archetypes in the rotation: Priest, Shaman, Mage (Ice Block), and Druid (Jade, Ramp.) I guess that could be an indication that the power cards of the new set will come with the appropriate type of integer, for whatever that's worth.

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22 Mar 2018 13:20 #266194 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
Heh. So, if you didn't believe in it for some reason, Echo is going to have a huge presence in both Standard and Wild:

Warrior card (common): Warpath: 2 mana, Echo, Do 1 damage to all minions.
Rogue card (legendary): Face Collector: 3 mana, 2/2, Echo, Battlecry: Add a random Legendary minion to your hand.

Face Collector is kind of a conceit, although I love the creative theme behind it, since it means they're really getting into the horror aspect of the Witchwood and not just doing more goofy stuff, as with Kobolds. But Warpath almost resurrects Control Warrior by itself, since it can be used to repeatedly feed Warrior's self-damage effects (Armorsmith) and clear in the later game. It also potentially makes Grim Patron decks in Wild a thing again. Pretty cool.

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23 Mar 2018 20:06 #266297 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
Kibler making the pitch again:



He is, of course, completely right.
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26 Mar 2018 14:56 #266388 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!
Woof. Watched the reveal stream. Let me say that a few of the cards are utterly cool. Glinda Crowskin for Warlock is brilliant, since she can work as a lockdown control device and a recovery method for Zoo (and has nothing to do with Discard.) Rebuke is potentially great for both aggro and control Paladin, since it protects your board and inhibits the opponent. Vivid Nightmare has incredible uses in Priest, not least because the copy comes in wounded and not just with 1 health, so you can do Cleric tricks with it. And Nightmare Amalgam may be one of the coolest cards ever, since it can fill a gap for any tribe-based deck. It's too bad The Curator is rotating out.

And then we get to the Shaman cards... Great news, everyone! The Shaman is now officially the RNG class. Oh, you thought it was before because it was the only class burdened with an RNG hero power. But, no, they've ramped it up. Not only does Shaman get a slightly better version of Babbling Book in Witch's Apprentice, but Hagatha, the new hero card, totally belies the nature of Shaman's hero power. Remember that whole board full of totems that you tried to construct? Well, Hagatha's going to clear them. So... yeah. And then, even better, when you've cleared the all of your own minions, you then get a RANDOM spell every time you play another minion. So, just go ahead and drop Hagatha into your minion-heavy deck, because she'll kill all of them... or, you know, be a dead card in your hand because you don't want to wipe your own board while clearing the opponent's. Ah, but wait, You've gotten into that rare situation where you do want to Twist the board and then repopulate it with weenies. So, every time you drop that Fire Fly, you'll get a Frost Shock. Or a Far Sight. Or a Cryostasis. Do you think they included those three cards in the stream just to stomp all over the already dire expectations?

Yes, I'm probably overreacting since we haven't seen the rest of the set but... wow. I admit to being wrong about Lyra. She turned out to be cool in a Timmy kind of way, since you can't keep her alive for longer than a turn and many of the spells you get are situational, at best. Maybe this will work the same way. But I look at what's currently available and how Hagatha calls for an abrupt strategy turn in the late game and... I'm just not seeing it. Everything else looks pretty interesting, though.
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26 Mar 2018 17:54 #266400 by SebastianBludd
Replied by SebastianBludd on topic Hearthstone Players!
I'm reserving judgment on Shaman but I'm not impressed so far. It's disappointing that Hagatha's hero power isn't anything clever and is about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the face.

My son is still playing his weird, off-meta Zoolock, so when I was trying to think of a good Glinda combo the first thing that came to mind was Glinda -> Drain Life/Fungal Enchanter -> board full of Happy Ghouls. I'm sure there are myriad other shenanigans but, looking at Warlock's minions, there aren't a lot of cheap ones you'd like to play multiple times in a turn unless your hand is already empty or you can comfortably take a lot of damage (Flame Imp, etc.).

Rebuke is Loatheb's effect attached to a spell, I like it. However, I question the wisdom of giving it to the strongest aggro class right now.

Houndmaster Shaw might have to go in a deathrattle token deck to get the most out of him since the best minion to play with him - Highmane - is a 10 mana combo, thus you'll usually be wanting to use him with what's on board or something cheap (and Rat Pack and Infested Wolf are rotating out...).

Vivid Nightmare looks fun/annoying (depending on if you're playing it or playing against it) and it will almost certainly be used in Malygos/Velen OTK decks as either a backup to, or replacement for, Faceless Manipulator.

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27 Mar 2018 08:15 #266419 by Jackwraith
Replied by Jackwraith on topic Hearthstone Players!

SebastianBludd wrote: I'm reserving judgment on Shaman but I'm not impressed so far. It's disappointing that Hagatha's hero power isn't anything clever and is about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the face.


The big topic on the Reddits has been Shaman's shitty spell pool for Hagatha to deliver into your hands. Donais showed up to declare that the new spells coming in Witchwood are "above average and pretty interesting in the context of Hagatha/her apprentice." But now that we've seen three Shaman cards, that means there are only seven slots left. How many good spells can there be out of seven that will outweigh trash like Totemic Might, Cryostasis, Primal Talismans, Forked Lightning, etc., etc.?

I agree that Rebuke seems insane to add to aggro Paladin, but Paladin is losing some really useful tools (SAD, Rallying Blade) in that respect.

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