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Hearthstone |OT4| The warsong has ended, please patron other decks

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W

WesternHeretic

Member
Doing an arena run and my 6th win was against Paladin, 7th was against Paladin, 8 was against Paladin, 9th against Paladin, 10th against Paladin, and currently playing against.. Paladin.

Good lord.
 
D

Dahbomb

Member
Patron punishing players/decks for brainlessly flooding the board with garbage minions was the best thing about the deck.

The worst thing about the Patron deck is the Frothing OTK. It's over the top no matter how you dice it. The Warsong change should've been that the charge didn't activate if the attack value went past 3 (kinda like Southsea Deckhand loses Charge when you lose your weapon). That way the deck would've retained its ability to deal with board flood without the punishment being too severe (ie. leading into a Frothing OTK).

But as stated before, it would still impact their design space. They can't introduce something like a neutral Dreadsteed card because of Warsong Commander. So I guess this is something that was bound to happen.


I just wish that Blizzard didn't employ this feast and famine type balancing approach and was more consistent in their changes.
 
M

Mobius and pet octopus

Member
If you're looking for a deck to run on ladder atm, try this tempo mage deck I modified off of hotform's list:

Hearthstone_Screenshot_10_14_15_23_19_20.png


I am currently 25-5 (83%) with this list and rank 2 currently (easy legend if I put more time into it).

You can even use hotform's mulligan guide as it is still pretty accurate. https://www.reddit.com/r/CompetitiveHS/comments/3j569e/tgt_tempo_mage_guide_beat_the_secretdins/

The modifications I made are primarily to cutting antonidas for ragnaros. Huge gains here.

Cut saraad, even though it is a fun ass card, for Sylvanas.

I also cut flamestrike for loatheb. I just never found that card performing too well.

So far the hardest match up has been hunter but I've only come across 2 hunters in the last 30 games.

The ladder I have seen mostly consists of warriors and druids. 6-1 vs druid and 10-1 vs warrior. I haven't lost to patron warrior yet, only once to a fatigue warrior. 3-1 vs paladin. 4-1 vs mage. 1-0 vs priest. No rogue or shaman or warlock (zoo lock is somewhat difficult, handlock is pretty good for mage in my experience).
 
T

toddhunter

Member
Dahbomb said:
Patron punishing players/decks for brainlessly flooding the board with garbage minions was the best thing about the deck.

The worst thing about the Patron deck is the Frothing OTK. It's over the top no matter how you dice it. The Warsong change should've been that the charge didn't activate if the attack value went past 3 (kinda like Southsea Deckhand loses Charge when you lose your weapon). That way the deck would've retained its ability to deal with board flood without the punishment being too severe (ie. leading into a Frothing OTK).

But as stated before, it would still impact their design space. They can't introduce something like a neutral Dreadsteed card because of Warsong Commander. So I guess this is something that was bound to happen.


I just wish that Blizzard didn't employ this feast and famine type balancing approach and was more consistent in their changes.
Click to expand...

Playing one single minion wasn't exactly flooding the board though. If the attack was less than 3, patrons fucked you. Three or over was suiciding ghoul time.

Limiting charge to 3 attack was a good solution. But again it does limit low attack dreadsteed type minions from existing.

miladesn said:
I was just playing good ol aggro paly on US ladder and it's very viable still if you know what you're doing.
Click to expand...

It still shits all over secret paladin.
 
B

bord

Neo Member
I honestly feel that the biggest problem with Patron Warrior is Battle Rage.
People usually cite OTKs as the issue, but I think the most infuriating part of playing against the deck was having the board flooded with patrons and having a battle rage go off at the end of it.

On a separate note, four arms men?
K0Pn84H.jpg
Click to expand...
 
V

veloxStrix

Banned
Does anyone else find it funny that, of ALL the cards involved in making Patron combo work - the Grim Patron, Frothing Berserker, Battle Rage, Warsong Commander - the one they decided to nerf was a female character? And not just any female character, a powerful female card?

Blizzard is misogyny. I can't play this pile of oppression anymore.
 
D

Dahbomb

Member
veloxStrix said:
Does anyone else find it funny that, of ALL the cards involved in making Patron combo work - the Grim Patron, Frothing Berserker, Battle Rage, Warsong Commander - the one they decided to nerf was a female character? And not just any female character, a powerful female card?

Blizzard is misogyny. I can't play this pile of oppression anymore.
Click to expand...
Warsong has been changed multiple times already. Was one of the main candidates for a nerf to begin with.
 
M

Mobius and pet octopus

Member
Dahbomb said:
Quite a few cards actually. UTH and Battle Rage have been changed like 3 times already.
Click to expand...

Buzzard too. Started as a 2/2, at least when I was playing. Then nerfed to 2/1, then to what we have now.

I don't recall battle rage being nerfed, must be a pre-beta thing.

But in general, they really don't nerf that often. We've only seen like 2 cards nerfed since gvg came out. UT and soon WC.
 
V

veloxStrix

Banned
Dahbomb said:
Quite a few cards actually. UTH and Battle Rage have been changed like 3 times already.
Click to expand...

But never to the extent that Warsong Commander was! Also, it's a little known fact that both the dog in UTH and the Warrior in Battle Rage are both females. Even more evidence.

It's one in the morning here and I'm waiting for renders to finish up. I hope no one was actually taking me serious.
 
I

irfaanator

Banned
all this talking about mogor made me open him in a pack lol. close to another legendary. which should I get. Dont have

rag
baron
nexus
justicar
tirion
archmage
malygos

Archmage and tirion are two class ones I'm leaning towards, but I dont have a lot of the other class ones
 
D

Dahbomb

Member
Initial Battle Rage was Draw a card for each damaged minion (including enemy and yours) for 2 mana.

Obviously that was broken.

So next change they increased the mana cost to 3 but they included ALL characters (so all damaged characters on the board resulted in card draw). That was still obviously broken.

Final change was the one we have now in the game.
 
Z

ZealousD

Makes world leading predictions like "The sun will rise tomorrow"
Battle Rage is and was fine. it will be a necessary piece of the puzzle if Blizzard can ever figure out the couple more cards necessary to make some kind of aggro-enrage or MidRage warrior possible. Even in Patron it wasn't necessarily even as good as Divine Favor.
 
L

luoapp

Member
Dahbomb said:
Initial Battle Rage was Draw a card for each damaged minion (including enemy and yours) for 2 mana.

Obviously that was broken.

So next change they increased the mana cost to 3 but they included ALL characters (so all damaged characters on the board resulted in card draw). That was still obviously broken.

Final change was the one we have now in the game.
Click to expand...

and its update history is actually quite interesting:
Patch 1.0.0.3937 (2013-10-17): Now only works with damaged friendly characters. Now costs 2 mana, down from 3.
Patch 1.0.0.3890 (2013-10-02): Now works with all damaged characters, not just minions. Now costs 3 mana, up from 2.
Previously - Draw a card for each damaged minion. [2 mana, Common]
Click to expand...

so, in two weeks of time, they rushed out the third patch, which means as soon as the second patch released, they felt its so broken and had to push out the third patch immediately. Just how was the play test done? To be fair, they had a much smaller team back then, but still.
 
C

Cat Party

Member
ZealousD said:
Battle Rage is and was fine. it will be a necessary piece of the puzzle if Blizzard can ever figure out the couple more cards necessary to make some kind of aggro-enrage or MidRage warrior possible. Even in Patron it wasn't necessarily even as good as Divine Favor.
Click to expand...

Raging Worgen + Charge + Inner Rage costs 6 mana and gets you 16 damage. Add a Faceless (reduced by Emperor) and it's GG. I'm sure I'm not the only one messing around with this right now. You use the same strategies to build armor and draw cards (albeit with lesser potency) as you did with Patron. I think it's viable.
 
M

Mobius and pet octopus

Member
luoapp said:
and its update history is actually quite interesting:

so, in two weeks of time, they rushed out the third patch, which means as soon as the second patch released, they felt its so broken and had to push out the third patch immediately. Just how was the play test done? To be fair, they had a much smaller team back then, but still.
Click to expand...

They did have a smaller team. But it was also really early in beta testing when cards were being much more aggressively balanced.
 
S

Super Nothing

Member
irfaanator said:
all this talking about mogor made me open him in a pack lol. close to another legendary. which should I get. Dont have

rag
baron
nexus
justicar
tirion
archmage
malygos

Archmage and tirion are two class ones I'm leaning towards, but I dont have a lot of the other class ones
Click to expand...

Baron and Justicar are pretty much Warrior only cards. They occasionally see play in other classes, but they're probably not worth crafting outside of Control Warrior. Malygos is a niche card that can be fun but has no real competitive value. Nexus is a decent card, but he's not really a key part of any competitive decks. Antonidas and Tirion are both great cards. Rag isn't quite as good as he used to be. He's usually pay 8 mana to remove a cheap minion and summon BGH. Note: I've crafted every card on your list except for Malygos (which I pulled from a pack), and the card I get the most use out of is probably Antonidas.
 
T

toddhunter

Member
ZealousD said:
Battle Rage is and was fine. it will be a necessary piece of the puzzle if Blizzard can ever figure out the couple more cards necessary to make some kind of aggro-enrage or MidRage warrior possible. Even in Patron it wasn't necessarily even as good as Divine Favor.
Click to expand...

We have had those decks for ages, long before Patron.

The big difference was emperor screwing it up by giving 0 mana whirlwinds and other shit. Basically it lets you play everything at once.

It'll still be a problem.
 
N

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
Dahbomb said:
Patron punishing players/decks for brainlessly flooding the board with garbage minions was the best thing about the deck.
Click to expand...
toddhunter said:
Playing one single minion wasn't exactly flooding the board though. If the attack was less than 3, patrons fucked you. Three or over was suiciding ghoul time.

Limiting charge to 3 attack was a good solution. But again it does limit low attack dreadsteed type minions from existing.
Click to expand...
Right, there are lots of decks that punish flooding with board clears. This didn't just wipe your board and result in a notable tempo advantage though.

It was also very hard to do a reverse clear due to how patrons work.
 
C

Chmpocalypse

Blizzard
Nirolak said:
I feel the Patron nerf came far less from the one turn kill and more how it impacted the other player.

1.) Patron punished hurting the enemy due to battle rage.
2.) Patron punished playing minions with two or less damage, and could generate huge card draw off of doing so.
3.) Patron punished playing a large number of minions due to how Frothing Berserker works.
4.) It was hard to play something that was a great solution to both the Grim Patrons and the Frothing Berserkers instead of dealing with one while potentially buffing the other.
5.) It enabled one turn kills against very high health and armor totals instead of just specifically 30 health or 22 health.
6.) The Patron wombo combo often happened pretty early in the game.
7.) The card limited what they could feasibly print in the future as further buffs to the deck would make it seem increasingly unbearable to large parts of their player base.

If we boils this down, I see the driving factors as:

1.) The Patron player was not engaging in minion combat was fine, because they were opting to do so, similar to how Freeze Mage has been left alone for quite some time. However, it was notably hampering minion play *for the other player* as well, which is where I feel it upset Blizzard the most. It's similar to why Unleash the Hounds + Buzzard was nerfed.
2.) It was hard to play around without picking specific deck archetypes that were often expensive, and thus not nearly as accessible to their more casual audience who would be most upset. You can't tell the vast, vast majority of players to pull out Handlock.

A Malygos Shaman OTK deck or a Velen/Aucheni OTK deck on the other hand would not have many of these properties.
Click to expand...

Great analysis. Definitely more thorough and reasoned than my own irritable posts.
 
B

Brawndo Addict

Banned
Still think the better and more effective nerf was to address Emperor because he's applicable to so many other decks and a huge problem for future cards. He should not be able to reduce card costs below 1 and/or his effect should be a battlecry and not an ongoing end of turn effect.

Even if they wanted to nerf patron specifically, they had much better ways of doing it as identified in this thread. I like battle-rage only applicable to minions as well as the Warsong 'your minions with 3-attack have charge'.
 
M

Miletius

Member
I'm somewhat surprised to see some folks defend Patron. As Nirolak mentioned, the biggest problem with Patron is that it actively punished people for playing minions. I'd even add to that point and say it actively punished people for playing ANY minion past a certain point, as a Warsong/Frothing combo could easily get out of control even if the enemy had robust, high health minions that could avoid feeding the patron spawns. When pretty much 99 percent of all decks require minions on the board to win there is no way Patron was ever going to be fair.

I get that people want interesting strategic decks and alternate strategies. But Patron was not a) interesting, and b) an alternate strategy. It used to be interesting as people found ways to refine it. It's now just as interesting as every other deck out there. And it's simply not really an alternate by this point. Patron has dominated the ladder meta for a long time now.
 
H

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
They would've done the same to you if they opened 3 murloc knights.

It's either you or them!
 
Haunted

Haunted

Member
New Brawl seems designed specifically for new players who were complaining about not being able to win against people using netdecks filled with legendaries.

50/50 every time
 
I

Ikael

Member
I am 100% behind Broder's analysis (that Patron was indeed a problematic deck and that Warsong heavily limited the design of future cards) as he pinpointed its problems correctly, but his solution to these undisputable problems have been abysmal. There were far better options for nerfing it without rendering useless AND retaining "the spirit of the card" (creature that helps charge-centric gameplay):

>> Warsong commander

Battlecry: Enemies with charge doesn't take damage until the end of this turn (encourages the use of charging enemies as removals, increases their survivability, rewards stablishing board control with charging minions)

or

Battlecry: The next minion that enters under your control during this turn gains charge (a "one off" type of bonus great for making finishing combos without failing into the "KO in one single turn" trap)

or

Draw a card whenever a minion with charge enters under your control (could give birth to a fun aggro / control hybrid style of gameplay)

However, we got a shitty, uncreative, unplayable +1 attack per charge minion instead. Horrible.
 
L

Lyng

Member
Chmpocalypse said:
Well look at that, the guy who designed the game knows far more about game design than any of the people in this thread shitting on others for pointing out the problem with the patron deck. What a surprise!

I love Brode. : D
Click to expand...

Except he doesnt. If you didnt play minions and didnt put the warrior under pressure you where playing wrong against patron.
Ben Brode just wants a very fast aggro centric cardgame that has a very low skill ceiling and is rng heavy.
It would be nice of him to be honest about it instead of comming up with bullshit all the time.
 
S

sgjackson

Member
so i just had a situation come up where i was playing warlock, i was at 1 life, and had tournament medic in play. can i life tap?

i'd have tested it if i was dead on board but i ended up winning, lmao

warsong commander nerf chat nobody cares about: as an arena player i'm irritated they didn't make the new commander a playable vanilla 3 drop. hell, making it a spider tank would be a step towards improving warrior's arena viability without affecting its constructed non-viability much (i'm assuming). so on that front, hearing that they kept it a 2/3 because of the "soul of the card" is frustrating.

i'm not a person who thinks bad cards don't have a place - there's a natural progression in learning why cards are bad or good that feels good and helps players stick to the game - but having a card's vanilla stats stay the same for a card literally nobody is ever going to see now strikes me as less important than a step towards fixing a major class balance issue in a game mode.

like, yo, seriously, it's a tree falling in the forest and making a sound thing. a card's soul doesn't matter if nobody's ever going to see it, and nobody is playing new warsong commander in constructed and it will be picked less than a percent or two of the time it is an option in warrior drafts, which are already like seeing fucking unicorns. sad, sickly unicorns you beat the shit out of.
 
G

giapel

Member
Warsong should've stayed the same but give charge only to played minions and not the summoned ones. Would have fixed patron and ease up design space.
 
F

Forkball

Member
Warlock is pretty useful in the brawl. You will often get a deck with Deathsteed and the Anima mech. INFINITE 9 DAMAGE STRIKES. Went 4-0 so far.
 
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