Hearthstone [IRC Channel #Skillstone]

[Blazade]

Eh on ladder people tend to throw games often enough that RNG doesn't make much of a difference. Even so the game's simply been around and well researched long enough that there are enough people who can basically play a standard game with decent draws on both ends without fucking up. Let's face it, watch enough streams and tournaments and it kinda substitutes for not being an idiot. But yeah, if people tend to play really consistently (I think they do) then it's tough not to call the fame RNG dominated. Ladder feels like the battle tower to me but I'd argue that there's still intrigue on a macro level there.

That said I haven't played hearthstone in a while (I missed last month's card back) because there's not a deck I really enjoy playing right now, especially in this meta.

 

[Mr.E]

Probably the case, since the Legend grind used to be pretty effortless to me up till at least GvG and I still bothered to do it once post-BRM (not sure if I did for TGT or not). I can still identify obvious mistakes which I still see so many other players making on a relatively routine basis, so I'm not convinced I've simply gotten worse. Nobody is immune to misplaying but the Boy (Genny) Wonder would probably vouch for me. I'd say it's my decklists but I started copying the proven successful ones to remove that variable and RNG still takes a dump on me, so it isn't that. Oh well, I've nothing to prove to myself, it's just aggravating I wasted so much time over my lovely four-day weekend ending today, the only days I have off the entire month of March... Rather offputting when I damn well know I'm good enough to do it with even average luck.

In other news, I grabbed my Golden Warrior and win streaked my way back to Rank 5 with so-called "worst deck ever" (in the words of multiple Smogoners) Reno Druid... It is pretty fucking bad though. *ahem* Singleton ramp cards are rather sad at any rate. Kinda proves the point though, Reno Druid is somehow now 5-0 all-time.

 

[qsns]

I JUST HIT LEGEND IM SO HAPPY AHHHHHH

used a combination of kt druid that I saw at the American Winter Championships, Face Hunter, and Fatigue Warrior. Never had the time/motivation to do it before but seeing the orange gem on my rank makes me think I'm at least decent at this game :>

 

[Mulligan]

Triple post? Sure. Somebody post something, feeling awfully lonely ITT. :(

My favorite Naga Ball team...is Oats.....and Goats :)

Regarding everything else you said (and anyone else feel free to chime in on what I'm about to say), I dunno about you, but I swear I've been thrown into some different hard mode queue after coming back to HS after not really playing for 4 months. I struggled to even get to rank 10 non-Legend the last two seasons. Some of it was rust, but my play has not gotten objectively worse. Everyone between 15-10 I queued up against pretty much knew what they were doing which I don't think I've ever experienced before.

So this season I decided screw it, I'm gonna play something fun. I've been giving Mech Priest another shot...and it's the most fun I've had in a very long time and I really wish this deck wasn't rotating out. Rank 6 at the moment and climbing. It's not a Tier 1 deck by any means, but I really feel there's an optimal list out there that is Tier 2 worthy and it's sad we are probably not gonna find it unless someone is willing to put in the time and try to hit top 100 Legend and beyond with it.

 

[Matthew]

Probably the case, since the Legend grind used to be pretty effortless to me up till at least GvG and I still bothered to do it once post-BRM (not sure if I did for TGT or not). I can still identify obvious mistakes which I still see so many other players making on a relatively routine basis, so I'm not convinced I've simply gotten worse. Nobody is immune to misplaying but the Boy (Genny) Wonder would probably vouch for me. I'd say it's my decklists but I started copying the proven successful ones to remove that variable and RNG still takes a dump on me, so it isn't that. Oh well, I've nothing to prove to myself, it's just aggravating I wasted so much time over my lovely four-day weekend ending today, the only days I have off the entire month of March... Rather offputting when I damn well know I'm good enough to do it with even average luck.

In other news, I grabbed my Golden Warrior and win streaked my way back to Rank 5 with so-called "worst deck ever" (in the words of multiple Smogoners) Reno Druid... It is pretty fucking bad though. *ahem* Singleton ramp cards are rather sad at any rate. Kinda proves the point though, Reno Druid is somehow now 5-0 all-time.

I think the problem is that you do tilt and are unable to recognize that you are tilting. When you are raging on IRC or to me on battle.net you are tilting, and that is probably the biggest thing to recognize when playing. I tilt all the time, I play drunk all the time, and my legend rank accurately represents that and I'm fine with it. I can even tell when I'm tilting and sometimes I simply do not care and don't take a break to cool down after dumb losses.

Tilting in Hearthstone is different than other games because you focus on what the other player does so much because of lack of interruption (aside from secrets which aren't interruption) and in that even a bad mulligan is going to really change your game. People always mulligan for "the perfect hand" where as a pretty good hand is still going to win you games and you don't have to sacrifice a good curve for your best cards.

Play has essentially been perfected by now, though I'm sure I could sit down and go through proper zoo placement with most people in this thread but we're talking about a 1% of situations where it actually matters. Everyone on the ladder is on equal standings, the problem is that everyone throws away "pretty okay" hands for god hands 100% of the time, and that's just bad play.

Being said not changing decks when faced with bad matchups after bad matchups is also tilting. "My deck is fine the other person is just lucky," is an excuse for just playing a deck that isn't suited for that time of day. I'm the most guilty of this but changing decks and not just sticking to one is best for ladder.

EDIT:

I will say that Mr.E does play a pretty decent micro game, one of the better players on my friends list.

 

[the pugilist]

My deck IS fine I'm just never lucky

 

[Mr.E]

Druid was my main forever and yet I've lost to at least four straight Freeze Mages (I've lost count) with it which is one of the more "free" matchups in this game. I can bitch on IRC all day and still coherently play the game. Raging is not tilting. Losing is not tilting. Even making mistakes isn't tilting, everyone makes mistakes, but it's about why and how often.

Now the mulligan thing is more interesting to discuss. Been doing more Oil Rogue lately than anything and it's so hard for me to figure out when I want dudes and want early removal. It sucks ass when you just get facemashed down because you don't have early Backstab or Toast, sometimes even Prep, but it's no better when your opponent kinda stumbles and you can't take advantage of it because your hand is like double Prep and removal overkill but no dudes to play. It's much easier for a linear deck like Zoo, Secret Paladin, Dragon Priest to mulligan.

 

[Matthew]

Druid was my main forever and yet I've lost to at least four straight Freeze Mages (I've lost count) with it which is one of the more "free" matchups in this game. I can bitch on IRC all day and still coherently play the game. Raging is not tilting. Losing is not tilting. Even making mistakes isn't tilting, everyone makes mistakes, but it's about why and how often.

Now the mulligan thing is more interesting to discuss. Been doing more Oil Rogue lately than anything and it's so hard for me to figure out when I want dudes and want early removal. It sucks ass when you just get facemashed down because you don't have early Backstab or Toast, sometimes even Prep, but it's no better when your opponent kinda stumbles and you can't take advantage of it because your hand is like double Prep and removal overkill but no dudes to play. It's much easier for a linear deck like Zoo, Secret Paladin, Dragon Priest to mulligan.

I try to express this to you a lot and it doesn't really stick and that's fine but luck does not exist. You losing to a game where you have double prep and nothing else is the same as a perfect curve. There is no difference in how the game was played.

For example I asked you today whether or not I misplayed by playing my gorrnok without a BR or if it was right to trigger my creeper for the Battlecry. I won in the end but the more I think I misplayed.

When you get down to mulligans, no matter the deck, you're looking for a game plan. Am I going to curve axe into acolyte? Growth jato shredder? Si:7 into teacher? All these matter. And if you're always looking for the best possible hand you're really losing the good hand you have right now.

Stop trying for god hands (everyone) and sometimes settle if you're doing okay.

 

[Matthew]

Alright I'm going to gripe once, and I'm going to make it relevant to things that happen to people I'm playing against.

Stop. drawing. last. EVERY fucking person I'm playing against is fucking drawing with Wrath after a Swipe. Tapping after their play. Arcane after fucking nothing. I understand that maybe sometimes it doesn't matter the order but the order does fucking matter. Mr.E watched me draw first before trading in a Scientist and that is super bad play. So this is probably a reminder to myself while I'm less drunk but come the fuck on. Always draw first. Always, always, always.

On the otherhand I think I did some pretty good play this evening aside from the Warrior I couldn't burn down in time, another weird mage that I played too passively against, and a reno mage that there was no way in defeating with my damage output.

 

[the pugilist]

Alright I'm going to gripe once, and I'm going to make it relevant to things that happen to people I'm playing against.

Stop. drawing. last. EVERY fucking person I'm playing against is fucking drawing with Wrath after a Swipe. Tapping after their play. Arcane after fucking nothing. I understand that maybe sometimes it doesn't matter the order but the order does fucking matter. Mr.E watched me draw first before trading in a Scientist and that is super bad play. So this is probably a reminder to myself while I'm less drunk but come the fuck on. Always draw first. Always, always, always.

On the otherhand I think I did some pretty good play this evening aside from the Warrior I couldn't burn down in time, another weird mage that I played too passively against, and a reno mage that there was no way in defeating with my damage output.

In Romanian village there is very little water. Papparian is thirsty and asks Kripparian to get some water for him from the water tap 2 miles away. Kripp decides to go to the store first. A few hours later Kripp brings Papparian his water, only to find Papparian has had a heat stroke. With his dying breath, Papparian asks "My son, why did you tap last?"

 

[Mr.E]

Well, you don't always draw first, perfect example being the "drawing before trading in Scientist" deal. Drawing first gives you the chance to grab your secrets so your Scientist can't. Drawing first is usually the best idea because it's a reliable source of information and you do it when you're pretty sure you're gonna spend some of your mana drawing on that turn no matter what. Occasionally you want more information elsewhere first, like what pops out of the Shredder or where does your Juggler proc(s) go, what does Avenge land on. Sometimes it doesn't matter because you already have a perfect play set in stone with the rest of your mana so there's no way in hell anything else you draw is going to change your play, but it's still good practice to draw first in that case anyway and help ingrain that mindset.

Ultimately, 'tis about thinking through your plays before you execute. That doesn't mean you have to be a Ropecoach though.

 

[Mr.E]

plays monkey and gets four-mana legend to drop alongside it (feugen), al'akir to clear patrons, deathwind to clear follow-up board flood threatening lethal and my second execute is in the bottom four cards, topdeck ragnaros and hits face for kill

#justskillstonethings

 

[SlottedPig]

this game is easy

 

[Nova]

wow gz, that's amazing

 

[Matthew]

Yeah I'm pretty impressed let me talk about how to improve my play with you

 

[Mr.E]

I thought he was showing off having duplicate-class Dominance quests. Haven't seen that in a while myself. :(

 

[Matthew]

Alright so this season I'm in the upper ranks already and have been playing a lot of Freeze Mage and Burst Shaman to round out my playstyle.

I've learned thus far:
I am not nearly as multi-turn ahead thinking as I should have been. If I'm Freeze Mage (the new variant) then I should be looking at all the burst in my hand and planning a 2-3 turn kill, I have four board freezes and two blocks, that's a lot of time. I've gotten a lot better at thinking all the turns through though, so that's an improvement.

When playing Burst Shaman I'm not nearly as aggressive as I should be. My deck can burst down twenties pretty easily, I don't need to go for board as much as I thought. I mostly think that stems from playing nothing but Zoo for a season, but it's still a negative thing for this deck.

Those are my thoughts at the moment.

 

[Frank Enzo]

First time posting here (I actually didn't know we had a HS thread)

Sitting at around rank 10 the meta looks really bad on EU, lots of Secret Pally and Face Shaman, so I decided to make a midrange pally with a lot of stally early game and some big late game hits (Tiri, Dr 7 etc). Winrate's looking pretty good as of yet, considering I haven't ranked up much this season at all. I'm gonna drop the deck I'm using because like I said it's actually doing pretty well (might remove one of the jugglers in favour of a second equality).

Any feedback at all would be cool on it

 

[Matthew]

First time posting here (I actually didn't know we had a HS thread)

Sitting at around rank 10 the meta looks really bad on EU, lots of Secret Pally and Face Shaman, so I decided to make a midrange pally with a lot of stally early game and some big late game hits (Tiri, Dr 7 etc). Winrate's looking pretty good as of yet, considering I haven't ranked up much this season at all. I'm gonna drop the deck I'm using because like I said it's actually doing pretty well (might remove one of the jugglers in favour of a second equality).

Any feedback at all would be cool on it

View attachment 60029

Honestly I'd cut the Knights and Sylv for double chow, equality, and quartermaster.

All of those are way too strong to not run doubles and it makes your deck way more consistent.

Also as a shameless plug freeze has gotten me to rank 1 today and legend probably tomorrow

 

[ryan]

if you have justicar, it needs to be in your deck. if you don't, you need to craft it and put it in your deck. it's like the elise of midpally where it just lets you win control matchups in one card.

definitely cut murloc knights. way too slow and not that strong vs control anyways (warrior has brawl + weapons for it, priest has a billion aoe clears). too many 5s, definitely dont need all of double belcher, lay on hands, and healbot. probably wouldn't even run harrison tbh, but it's good if you're seeing tons of aggro shaman.

i haven't played much this season but here's the midppally list i've used over the past season and a half:

wow that's really tiny. double chow at the top, tirion at the bottom, all cards shown. i like kings more than truesilver, but i think the 1/1 split is best. kings is more impactful, truesilver is easier to play. fight hard for the early game vs aggro/temp decks, win with justicar vs control. justicar lets you thin out the late-game slots a lot. extra emphasis on early tempo enables stuff like kings/coghammer/double uldaman. loatheb might be good somewhere, but idk what i'd cut. the list is so tight.

freeze mage is probably really good right now, but it's so boring and it's stupid frustrating to play it well. like it's one of the higher skill cap decks out there, but it's still not that hard to play perfectly. it just takes a frustrating amount of thinking in comparison to every other deck except for maybe priest. like even the most controlling deck in the game is autopilot. kill stuff, stack armor, cycle, play elise.

stoked for nerfs/standard. won't be stoked for old gods til nerfs show us what's going to be good.

 

[TheValkyries]

When playing Burst Shaman I'm not nearly as aggressive as I should be. My deck can burst down twenties pretty easily, I don't need to go for board as much as I thought. I mostly think that stems from playing nothing but Zoo for a season, but it's still a negative thing for this deck.

The lower need of playing minions is why I hate lists that run Knife Juggler as opposed to the stickier Flame Jungler.

For me I always run into the problem with being too greedy and aggressive for face damage with the deck, and end up losing to an irrecoverable board state while drawing dead on my burst enablers.

Meanwhile: I am largely much better at aggro than I am at everything else, but boy howdy I love playing fatigue decks even if I lose, and I'm v much looking forward to Concede Mage with Cabalist's Tome in old gods. Probably need to tweak my Control Priest deck a tiny bit, but I love Museum Curator too much when Naxx is still around to change stuff and I largely perform pretty okay when I have such a ridiculous amount of board clear.

 

[Mulligan]

It took a LOT of work, but it's finally done. A full written guide with deck tech and gameplay videos on the Mech Priest I played last season. Haven't hit Legend with it (went from 16 to 5 playing Mech Priest exclusively), but I plan to try to go for it this season. I'm just gonna link to the thread in the CompetitiveHS subreddit where you guys can find all the other links and tell me what you think. Feedback is much, much appreciated.

Season 24 Mech Priest

 

[Nova]

oh I read that guide last night when browsing competitivehs, didn't know it was you. Gonna give it a try

 

[Mulligan]

I know that none of y'all would ever play around this

 

[Matthew]

The Giant Faceless Charge combo is about as common as the Axe Flinger Faceless Rampage Bouncing Blade combo and the Worgen Inner Rage Charge combo and it's almost impossible to tell since it's just a normal control Warrior shell and then they pull out their combo given they've had enough time to do it. I would never actually know when to play around one of those combos and I'm pretty sure it's incorrect to play around them at any situation.