Hearthstone Players!

I'm back in! Sort of. It's better than it was! High praise indeed.

Battlegrounds
Wins with 19 characters, and a 6100 rating. Proudest of my Galakrond win, as that Hero is terrible. Huge Murlocs still finish most games, but huge Pirates can give them a run for their money. The best plan is to knock those players out before they get absolutely nuts.

Recent changes include Amalgadon at Tier 6, a 6/6 Amalgam (all types) who gets 1 Adapt per different minion type you have. So if you take Mixed Minions into Tier 5/6, you can score a Taunted Bubbled Poison 7/7 or so that can be buffed by everything or it's a 12/12 that makes plants. Alas. Pretty good, and less demanding than Holy Mackerel. They also swapped out Menagerie Magician and Zoobot for new minions that do the same buffs but apply them to any three types instead of just Dragon/Murloc/Beast. More flexible.

Some new Heroes too, I haven't had time with these as yet, they both seem a little bad: King Mukla Hero power gives you two +1/+1 Bananas and your opponents 1 Banana, and Mr. Bigglesworth lets you Discover a minion from a dead Hero's war band AND keep any buffs on it. Could get nuts, but does nothing in the early game. Solid addition to Heroes is Brann, who refreshes the Tavern with only Battlecry minions. You can do some cool stuff with this guy, score some early triples, and the temptation to hang out at Tier 2 and just roll Pogo-Hopper every turn is real.

Standard
Obviously, huge turnover on the Ladder. Priest is totally in the mix now, and might be even MORE annoying to players that hate Priest already. Cabal Acolyte (2/6 Taunt for 4) let's you Spellburst steal a minion à la Cabal Shadow Priest. Pretty effective with Lazul's Scheme. I stole a 16/16 Ysera from a Druid using this trick, it's for real. AoE has moved to Tempo as well, because you can swap out Breaths/Dragons for Wretched Tutor (2/5 for 4) who can Spellburst deal 2 to every other minion. This card is Neutral and likely makes some other decks viable, like a Controlly Hunter or some kind of Mage bullshit. Priest also got Raise Dead (Spell for 0) that deals 3 damage to you to put two minions that died this game into your hand. So those Spellbursts, Invokes, and Sethek Spellweavers come back for more. Following Zetalot gets you ahead of the Priest curve and he's running the package above with Hecklebots and Ogremancer (3/7 for 5, Whenever your opponent casts a spell, summon a 2/2 Skeleton with Taunt). Things are weird.

Highlander is largely on hiatus. It's out there, but like, Demon Hunters are using it. Terrible.

I've seen some fragile Combo decks in Mage, praying to not draw their second Potion of Illusion (Spell for 1, Add 1/1 copies of your minions to your hand, they cost 1,) so they can keep cycling their Tortollan Pilgrim and other minions turn over turn, ideally making a big… something. Frostbolt off Mozaki maybe? It's not great. Tempo Mage seems workable, they can make all kinds of spells and guys and accomplish things. Not sure it's enough to hang though. Mage stock seems down.

Warrior's are still out there trying. They are missing something in the midgame though, especially with the nerf to that big Rush fella last set. They are either going pure Pirate/Bombs or trying to go Control and play huge stuff off Dimensional Ripper. Eh.

Hunter is still good. Demon Hunters have access to Skull of Gul'dan upon request if they play Lorekeeper Pokelt. Druids are still cheating out stuff. Warlocks and Paladins explained above by Jackwraith.

Shaman. Hmm. Not much change there, for the most part. Spell Damage aggro would probably still work, gaining Lightning Bloom (Spell for 0, Gain 2 Mana Crystals this turn only. Overload: 2). Quest is largely unchanged, maybe adding Cult Neophyte (3/2 for 2, Battlecry: Your opponent's spells cost 1 more next turn.) Totems didn't actually gain much. That 4/5 Totem that makes the Totems is a little wonky, as noted by Jackwraith. Runic Carvings (Spell for 6, Choose: Summon 4 four 2/2 Treant Totems or Overload (2) to summon them with Rush) is too expensive. Trick Totem (0/3 for 2, At the end of your turn cast a random spell that costs (3) or less) is good; but I worry about it screwing me, and not recovering. That card is better in Mage.

Trick Totem is the ultimate Team 5 HS card. It can be totally amazing (Reflection, Frostbolt something of your opponent's, etc.) Or it can be totally useless (Frostbolt itself, etc.) I was using it in my totem deck largely because it was an 0/3, which means it was mildly more difficult for opponents to kill so that I'd actually have something on the board to apply Reflection/Surge to in order to try getting something out of the board. But the randomness is something that neither Mage nor Shaman (or any class trying to be competitive) would want.

You're right that Runic Carvings is too expensive for what it does. But it's also the only thing that even vaguely resembles a reload or a finisher in totem.dec. I was trying it out, but it seems to be standard for a tier 4 deck, since Vicious Syndicate is running it in their list.

Raise Dead is also brilliant for that Warlock Pain deck I mentioned. Since they want to kill your Vultures and Darkglares ASAP, it's a great way to play them right back on the next turn.

So, I've barely played since my last post, but I've been having a conversation in the last couple days on Reddit over the problems with Shaman. Vicious Syndicate's latest meta report came out and basically condemned the class to irrelevance, where it has been for the past three expansions. Then, the NoPros report about the tournament scene was posted and, of course, there are decks from all 9 classes actually in the game (albeit few from Hunter, Paladin, and Warlock), but none from Shaman. I made a joke about it and the OP argued that Control Shaman is the second-highest win rate deck in their analysis. I said that seems to be a case of sample size. Another guy I was talking with in the VS thread said that he'd made legend with a control list, but was often frustrated with it because the smallest of mistakes would cost him games. Now, that can be said about most high-level play and I'm willing to accept that it's possible for Shaman to get there. It just seems, similar to Warrior and especially Priest at various times over the past few years, it takes a lot more thinking and niche scenarios to make it genuinely viable. Not wanting to talk without trying, I put his list together and tried a couple games:

### Control
# Class: Shaman
# Format: Standard
# Year of the Phoenix
#
# 2x (1) Devolving Missiles
# 2x (2) Diligent Notetaker
# 2x (2) Wandmaker
# 2x (2) Witch's Brew
# 1x (3) Instructor Fireheart
# 2x (3) Lightning Storm
# 1x (3) Plague of Murlocs
# 2x (3) Serpentshrine Portal
# 2x (4) Groundskeeper
# 2x (4) Hex
# 1x (4) The Fist of Ra-den
# 2x (4) Torrent
# 2x (5) Hagatha's Scheme
# 1x (5) Kobold Stickyfinger
# 1x (6) The Lurker Below
# 2x (7) Earthquake
# 1x (8) Tidal Wave
# 2x (8) Walking Fountain
#
AAECAaoIBuGlA4ixA+a3A5PCA5zOA67SAwz1BP4FrZEDipQDxZkDkKcD27gDk7kD4MwD4cwDodED/tEDAA==

I'm playing a Plague of Murlocs where he had a Gidra, because I don't have the latter. He said she was a recent addition, anyway.

hsreplay.net/replay/eiZLSeRwXo3Vi4UYCnPB8a

So, here's a game against Pure Paladin; a deck that's a frequent inhabitant of the ladder, but also not top tier. I mulligan the Groundskeeper and Fireheart because I want more active cards early on against Paladin, even as control. And the Tidal Wave, obvsly. But I keep the Portal because it's a great card for those early buffed minions that also leaves a pretty decent one behind. Most 3-drops these days are pretty solid. And, in fact, I Coin out a Portal on turn 2 because the last thing I want is a Priestess constantly buffing things like Goody Two-Shields...

Who shows up on cue. We do some trading and I use the other Portal. On turn 5, I'm thinking that I made a mistake. I could've let the Shotbot live instead of using a weapon charge and, instead, got yet another useful thing from it when I cast one of my multiple spells. Once he put down the Apt Pupil alongside the 2nd Goody, I was not at all interested trying to hammer through all of that, so I Plagued. It got me an Ace Hunter, which would've been kind of brilliant, but it also gave him Murlocs that were just as good, if not better, than mine. He cleared with the Skipper.

On turn 7, another mistake, as I could've just hit the Mage with Murmy and gotten full effect on my Lurker, rather than wasting another weapon charge. But I also get the best possible 4 result off the Hex of Turalyon and play a Groundskeeper, too; completely assuming control from this point forward. Turn 9 is debatable. I could have Devolved the frog and taken a Libram from him, but I assumed he had Liadrin, anyway, so it wouldn't have mattered much in the late game, which is where we were headed. Plus, I wanted the missiles for the next play, which was Libram of Hope. Once I dealt with that, look at my hand. There was basically nothing that was going to survive.

Turn 10 is also debatable. I could've used Nozdormu to clear the taunt and kept the Fountain available for next turn as a 4/4, forcing him to either take 8 or 12. But I was kind of determined to press the issue before Liadrin arrived. With Instructor, my choices were based on building up board position and keeping the effect going for as long as possible (value.) I had zero worries about the 12/2. Drawing into the Notetaker just meant it was over before he could cast another Hope.

Keeping in mind my two mistakes, this also wasn't an optimal challenge, since he was playing Turalyon, which is an awful card, and because too many Pure Paladin players tend to get tempted into overplaying into something huge, which is exactly what Devolving Missiles is for. But it's a demo of what the deck can do.

New set, new game mode, new progression system, new everything(ish).


New set
Darkmoon Faire, themes include Corruption (cards in hand with the Corrupt keyword get a bonus if you play a card that costs more than it) and Old Gods are back.

For and example of Corrupt:
Strongman 6/6 Common for (7) Taunt Corrupt: This costs (0).
So if you play an 8- or higher cost card while Strongman is in your hand, its art updates and its cost changes to (0).

The Old Gods: N'Zoth, C'thun, Y'shaarj, and Yogg-Saron are Lovecraftian big bads that have very swingy effects on the game. They have high costs,, so getting a chance to play them can be challenging in some metas.

The most intriguing one to me is Y'Shaarj. Last time we saw Y'Shaarj it was a 10/10 for (10) that put a random minion from your deck into play at the end of the turn.* It's still a 10/10 for (10), but now:
Y'Shaarj, the Defiler 10/10 Legendary for (10) Battlecry: Add a copy of each Corrupted card you've played this game to your hand. They cost (0) this turn.
"Created By" has become a theme in HEARTHSTONE all by itself. There are a lot of decks that count on using cards in the deck to make other cards or copies of cards and hopefully cheating the mana costs down, which Blizzard thinks needed if you get a card "randomly." In early experiments I am trying to exploit Y'Shaarj in Quest Shaman (shh), especially the Dunk Tank card.
Dunk Tank Shaman Rare for (4) Deal 4 damage. Corrupt: Then deal 2 damage to all enemy minions.
If I manage to play two of these before Y'shaarj, I get a 10/10 and deal 8. Maybe more if I "Created By" myself into more copies. Good times.

Duels
The new mode is Duels. Which is basically competitive Dungeon Run, except you can bring a little of your own deck-building into it. You are offered four Heroes, which are tweaks to existing archetypes, but are familiar if you've done Dungeon Runs/Monster Hunts. You can build a 16-card 1-copy-of-each card deck and get a special Power that adds some effect to the game, like your enemy's first minion each turn takes 1 damage, or you start the game with two random secrets. As you win or lose (you get three "lives"), you add powerful Treasures, more Powers, and packs of themed cards, hopefully ending up with some crazy combo for huge effects. But of course, so has the opponent, and you might be challenged.

I thought I had a solid Warlock build, given that I could make 30/30+ Lifegain Rush Demons, but I lost consecutive matches to someone that had Deathrattles go off automatically (Sylvanas stole my huge Demon) or a weapon that silenced minions as it attacked them (my 30/30 was a 3/3). Oh well. It's very low stakes. I can't imagine anyone getting really excited for this, but it's a nice diversion.

Progression
Blizzard has tried to make the free-to-play experience of HEARTHSTONE as fun and interesting as it can be for the folks that pay big money. Money gets you cosmetic advantages and (by brute force) earlier access to all the cards (in that you bought more packs). The F2P experience was gathering "gold" by completing "Quests" like playing cards or games and a generic 10-gold-every-three-wins for just being around. The accumulation was slow, but it was steady. You could earn about 150 gold per day if you played about ten games. Once a set releases, packs cost 100 gold apiece, so if you spend everything and then accumulate until the next expansion, you'd have between 4k and 7k gold for 40-70 packs, which is a good chunk of the expansion.

They threw all that away. Now you have a little Adventure log that has experience points in it, which if you check a little map, turns into gold, or packs, or tickets or something. It's very confusing, and very BEJEWELEDesque. Per a Reddit thread, it's a raw deal for real diehards, but I haven't noticed as yet. I still get gold, and some of the log items are interesting, like "control a minion bigger than 25/25" or "win a game with your deck empty." The little map "reloads" every expansion, as do some log entries.

_{*It was abused by Barnes** (Barnes put a 1/1 copy of a minion from your deck into play). He only cost (4), so the idea was to play two minions, draw Barnes, have Barnes make a mini-Y'shaarj that would fetch the real one. Turn 4 10/10s are disruptive.}

**no relation

I see the Rewards system as a bait-and-switch. They put in a new system, claiming it was better than the much-criticized quest system from before, and then when people did the math and figured out that it's actually worse in terms of gold accumulation/ability to play for free, they made a statement today indicating that they just didn't communicate well enough about how great it's actually going to be. So, they're going to upgrade the worse-than-before system and a lot of people are going to walk away happy, thinking that they've gotten an improvement, when in fact it will probably still be worse than before. It's a system set up to instill little dopamine rushes that just getting 10g for 3 wins didn't create. That means you'll be spending more money than before, which is what they want.

They did this because even regular streamers (Dekkster, Regis, Solem) had started to talk about how they couldn't recommend the game to their friends because it was too expensive. This was pointed out in the backlash to the new system, where more than one person emphasized the fact that even after paying $120(US) for TWO pre-releases, they're still expecting another $20 for the Tavern Pass that makes the new system "better". This is on top of the fact that, out of the 120 packs for said two pre-releases, most people are still only getting 4 or 5 legendaries which, with the reintroduction of the Old Gods, are more crucial than ever to playing the decks that everyone wants to play. That means spending MORE money to get random cards that are worth 1/4th the dust needed to craft those legendaries in the best case scenario (i.e. scrapping legendaries that you don't want.) It's just not worth it. I can spend $180/year and $50 every three years and get the complete game experience playing a game like WoW. The only barrier is the time that I put in. I can spend over a grand every year playing Hearthstone and still not get all of the cards (i.e. the full game experience) that I want to play. Again, time could be the barrier, since if I play 8 hours/day, I'll probably accumulate enough gold to buy enough packs to hopefully get the cards I want. But probably not.

As for the cards, I really haven't looked that closely at any classes but the three I was playing regularly before I quit. They dumped face value stuff on Shaman, which makes everyone think that there will be something good about the class. But they also dumped what is a random selection of cards (one totem, one Murloc, one weapon (no Overload!)) on the class that lacks any obvious coherent theme like you see in Warlock (control theme and a Demon theme) or Paladin (control theme and a Dude theme) or other classes (Mage has Elementals and Secrets, for example.) And they gave Demon Hunter two of the best cards in the set, because they needed that! Ey'Sor is the perfect example of the half-assed approach they've taken to Shaman.

The long-memed legendary totem! Except... it's a card that does nothing when it hits the board, which makes it a minion that HAS to generate value of some kind. There are only three or four totem cards that are currently playable in the game: EVIL, Tide, Goliath and Flametongue, and the latter two are questionable. Thus, there are only six or eight cards in your deck that you'll be hitting with said legendary that make any difference, unlike Prince Whatshisname who boosted everything, and adding a +1/+1 to Goliath is a win-more effect. And this is, of course, assuming that you a) draw it in the early part of the game and b) play it on turn 3. It won't affect the totems that come from Goliath. It won't affect the totems that you produce with your hero power. Yes, it could be brilliant if you hit it with Reflection on turn 4, but that's a Timmy trap. It's an 0/4, so it can't affect the board (i.e. no attack value) and it's removed far more easily than it should be. If it were an 0/5, maybe. But it's also contrary to most totem decks that depend on tempo and aggro. Who's going to want to play an 0/4 that does nothing to the board on the turn it's played in those decks? Even if you have a totem in play, it makes your Healing Stream totem a 1/3 at the END of the turn. Your opponent removes one or both and the effect is basically gone. Are they building into a Control Totem deck in April? Good luck. When even Kibler looks at the collection of cards released and struggles to say he's excited about any of them, you know there's a problem.

Paladin got some cool Dude stuff and a couple menagerie and control tools. Warlock got some cool demons that probably still won't amount to a tribe deck of any worth. Deck of Chaos is pretty cool IF you can draw and play it without first drawing all of the massive stuff you're trying to mana cheat later in the game. That stuff looks interesting... but then I look at the four Old God legendaries and just recoil. Nope. No more. Too expensive and just not the game for me.

Jackwraith wrote: I see the Rewards system as a bait-and-switch. They put in a new system, claiming it was better than the much-criticized quest system from before, and then when people did the math and figured out that it's actually worse in terms of gold accumulation/ability to play for free, they made a statement today indicating that they just didn't communicate well enough about how great it's actually going to be. So, they're going to upgrade the worse-than-before system and a lot of people are going to walk away happy, thinking that they've gotten an improvement, when in fact it will probably still be worse than before. It's a system set up to instill little dopamine rushes that just getting 10g for 3 wins didn't create. That means you'll be spending more money than before, which is what they want.

Per their statement, they're slapping a band-aid on this mess by substituting gold rewards for the packs further on in the Tavern Pass track and they've promised that heretofore unmentioned seasonal events will offer bonus XP to ostensibly help make up for the gold deficit between the new and old systems.

Of course, we used to get bonuses from seasonal events in addition to the previous rewards structure, but that's small potatoes compared to the worst part of this new rewards system: the time sink they're dumping on F2P players. You're literally talking hours of playtime a day to max out the track and start accumulating bonus levels to farm gold. Not only that, but the amount of XP is tethered to game length, so now people are roping or, worse, using bots to rope and farm XP. One could purchase the Tavern Pass to get an XP bonus, but the Pass is at a ridiculous price point (battle passes for Fortnite and CoD:MW are about $10 each vs. the $20 Tavern Pass, and that's before one notices that the Fortnite Battle Pass can be purchased with in-game currency that can be earned by completing the Battle Pass...), as are the packs and cosmetics ($10 for a hero skin?).

I'm not opposed to spending money on HS, but it's been a long time since they've introduced anything in their shop that felt like it was worth the money. And now it feels like, as a F2P player, I'm being forced to supplement my farmed gold with pack purchases and bundles since, with this new system, I'm always going to come up short as compared to the daily quest model.

FFS, I didn't even remember the literal add-on to this whole debacle. Not only will there be 35 more cards added halfway through this expansion, but they'll be added to Darkmoon Faire packs. That means you not only have to try to hedge your gold for the following expansion in April, but you have to be prepared to buy MORE Faire packs and get MORE cards you don't need that will be scrapped in the shitty dust economy to try to score the new stuff. Remember how everyone complained that you would no longer be able to just pay for adventures to get the complete smaller set of cards that they delivered? Well, be prepared to be slapped in the face even harder, because now you not only can't pay a set cost of gold or $ to get a complete set, but you get tossed back on to the roulette wheel TWICE every expansion. You won't want to spend all of your release day gold now, since you'll want to save some of it for January when you have to buy more packs of the set you thought you were done with! Unfuckingreal. Take an already subpar experience and "fix it" by making it demonstrably worse (i.e. more expensive.)

At some point, you'd figure the regular content producers are going to have to speak up again, right? Because part of the appeal of watching Kibler and Dekkster play HS is the lure of trying out those decks yourself. But if a good chunk of their audience can't afford that anymore and stops watching them...?

I'm not as down on the game as others, I guess. I can't get too worked up; it's a diversion when I need it, and it's still hitting that for me.

In Duels, I'm using a Shaman build that is pretty gross. I went with the original hero power and treasure:
Hero Power (2): Summon a random Totem. If you are Overloaded, summon a non-basic Totem instead.
Treasure: Fluctuating Totem: 0/3 Totem for (2), Stealth for 1 turn. At the end of your turn, evolve adjacent minions.

Thematically, I try to make dudes and Bloodlust people out. So Runic Carvings is in there, Molten Blast, things like that to make dudes. As I played, I got:
Recycling: After a friendly minion dies, gain 1 armor.
This has been good because my guys all suck and die constantly. Then I got:
Band of Bees: Your minions that cost (2) or less have Poisonous.
And this is ridiculous. My guys basically all have Poison! So the Rush minions from Runic Carvings? From Thunderhead? PEN FLINGER? It is totally nuts. One of my cardpools was adding three Dr. Booms, and those Boombots have Poison. I also found Zentimo: 1/3 Shaman Legendary for (3), Whenever you target a minion with a spell, cast it again on its neighbors.. There is some synergy here with things like Hex, Crackle, and Hilt of Quel'Dalar.

5-0 so far. I can definitely lose, as I am bad and the decks are as crazy as mine, but this has been fun.

And if you're still having fun with it, 's all good. I just find their business practices around the game to be despicable, personally. Doesn't mean that I'm judging anyone who continues to enjoy playing. Like you said, it's a diversion and we could all use some of those these days.

Jackwraith wrote: And if you're still having fun with it, 's all good. I just find their business practices around the game to be despicable, personally. Doesn't mean that I'm judging anyone who continues to enjoy playing. Like you said, it's a diversion and we could all use some of those these days.

I agree; I'm not here to tell anyone they're having fun wrong because they're spending money on or playing a game whose monetization practices I disagree with.

I still plan on playing, I'm just going to have to wait and see how the new F2P economy shakes out. I'm sitting on a hoard of dust but it might have to last me a while (forever?), and I might have to be more cold-blooded when it comes to dusting cards (I'm looking at you, golden Star Student Stelina).

BIG news, for those of you wondering what the state of the game is. Simply put, the entire Basic/Classic set is being overhauled and a new, annually rotating Core Set of 235 cards is being released in late March at the same time as the new set. Not only that, but everyone will receive the entire Core Set for free as long as it's in Standard. It's comprised of a combination of Classic, Basic, Wild, Hall of Fame (only Shadowform) and new cards, and some Classic/Basic cards are being buffed/nerfed for their inclusion in the Core Set. You can dust any of the cards soon to be rotating out, but you won't have access to them in Wild and other non-Standard game modes. Going forward, the Core Set cards will be non-disenchantable and are essentially "on loan" as long as they're in Standard.

This change was long-overdue and will be a HUGE shakeup for the game. Some notable cards that will no longer be in Standard: Wrath, Savage Roar, Swipe, Animal Companion, Kill Command, Unleash the Hounds, Eaglehorn Bow, Frostbolt, Sorcerer's Apprentice, Frost Nova, Polymorph, Blizzard, (several crappy Paladin spells), Inner Fire, Shadow Word: Pain, Shadow Madness, Mass Dispel, Eviscerate, Sap, Edwin, Fan of Knives, Earth Shock, Far Sight, Lava Burst, Flametongue Totem, Bloodlust, Spell Damage totem from the Shaman hero power (replaced by a 0/2 that gives a friendly minion +1 Attack), Soulfire, Voidwalker, Shadow Bolt, Shadowflame, Battle Rage, Shield Block, Kor'kron Elite, Southsea Deckhand, Doomsayer, Knife Juggler, Wild Pyromancer, Murloc Warleader, Dread Corsair, Twilight Drake, and all five big neutral dragons (Alexstrasza, Malygos, Nozdormu, Onyxia and Deathwing) are being replaced with newer versions.

In addition, some spells (both old and new) are going to be given one of the following "Schools", much like minions' tribal keywords (like "Beast," "Murloc," "Demon," etc.): Arcane, Fel, Fire, Frost, Holy, Nature, Shadow. This will allow them to create cards with targeted spell damage (for example, the Shaman Legendary in the new expansion, Bru'kan, is a 4 mana 5/4 with "Nature Spell Damage +3"), or to allow them to restrict the card pool to specific Schools for Discover or generation effects.

As for the Tavern Pass rewards track I'm happy to report that it is, in fact, more generous than the previous system for F2P players. As of today, having completed all of my weekly and daily quests (except for the first week of the new system when I forgot about the new weekly quests resetting on Monday), I've accumulated 8100 gold, which is considerably more than usual, and that's with about three weeks to go until the new expansion drops.

So, I've almost-exclusively been playing Highlander Hunter lately. It feels like an aggro deck a lot of the time, but the current build runs a lot of secrets and figuring out how to play them efficiently is key against other fast decks. And between Rampaging Rhino and Dinotamer Brann you can close out games against slower decks before they stabilize. Sure, it's nice to draw Zephrys, but I'd much prefer to play Dwarven Sharpshooter and Phase Stalker on curve, they're that good, and Tour Guide + Phase Stalker on Turn 3 is amazing.

I ended up going with the alternate Hunter portrait when I hit Rank 50 in the Tavern Pass, and after seeing how F2P-friendly the new system is I might buy the pass once in lieu of getting one of the periodic pack bundles. However, at $20 it probably won't be a regular purchase for me.

I'm dreading the loss of Zephrys in the upcoming rotation at the end of March because I really like highlander decks and on balance they felt more fair and interactive than a lot of the mana cheating in other decks. I'll be disappointed if the new dominant Hunter archetype is some Beast or OTK thing (or some unholy combination of both) that just relies on plopping down buffed beasts and daring your opponent to figure out how to remove it.

Yeah, Jeb and I were talking about the Core set overhaul the other day. A lot of the changes were really interesting and it was, of course, amusing to see Kibler's reaction, since he's been calling for just this kind of move for 4 or 5 years now. Wizards figured out that this was necessary a quarter-century ago and, yet, Blizzard refused to see the reality because of confused new players or some such thing. One of the things that's interesting is that almost all of the new base set cards they introduced last year, like Righteousness, are being removed because they were base set quality (i.e. never played.) You want players to have options, not dead weight or, FFS, "cards that they'll learn not to play" like Magma Rager.

Demon Hunter: You can see the acknowledgment of how insane many of their Standard cards, like Twin Slice and Altruis are.
Druid: I expected the rotation of Swipe. I did not expect the rotation of Wrath, but it makes sense, given its ubiquity. I have a hard time seeing Druid being able to incorporate the Beast theme (Menagerie Warden) alongside Treants, spells, and ramp, but maybe. Nice to see the original 1 mana 2/2 returning.
Hunter: This is one of the classes that's being basically transformed. Unleash, Bow, (s)Kill Command, Animal Companion(!), all departing. And they're bringing back Lock and Load... Um. Good luck. Bold new direction here.
Mage: Absolutely necessary changes, with Apprentice, Frost Nova, Blizzard, Frostbolt, and the largely unused Secrets going away. Freeze effects are no longer board-wide and have to be targeted. Much better. The new legendary seems pretty cool.
Paladin: Speaking of unused Secrets... I know they expected Crusader to be good, but most people didn't use it because of the absolute trash that was most of the Paladin basic set. The new Secret is at least properly targeted, since a minion will have to do at least 3 damage to remove it. Still don't think Secret Paladin will ever be a thing again without MS. The rest of it is fairly uninspiring, but they have a lot of good stuff in Standard now.
Priest: On top of the cards introduced last year that are being dumped, they also got rid of buffed cards like Thoughtsteal. At least they were willing to cut to the bone. I'm not sure what I think about Shadowform. Yes, it'd be nice for Shadow Priest to have an expression in the game and Priest to be less mono-dimensional ("We keep things from dying and then steal other classes' more effective cards to win!") but it still basically requires two wholly different frameworks (i.e. once you go Shadowform, a lot of your heal cards aren't as good.) Plus, removing Mind Spike means that once you cast one copy of Shadowform, you basically have a dead card in your deck.
Rogue: In contrast to Hunter, Rogue kept most of their identifying stuff, other than Eviscerate and Sap. I think the changes to the 3/4 weapon could make it really significant with all the current weapon buff stuff available. Deadly Poison makes it a 4/5 weapon. That's 2/3 of your opponent's life total right there.
Shaman: Save me, jeebus. Finally! Overload that actually seems like it's a benefit to the class! Only took 7 years. The new 3/2 guy is really solid. And no more high rolling on Storm. Earth Elemental might even be a thing. Like Paladin, Shaman benefits from this change more than any other class just because of the high amount of trash in the base set. Even less card draw than before, though, without Farsight. But I think the hero power change is almost universally a good one. Reduces randomness for the opponent and the player and makes otherwise useless totems something that have to be heeded.
Warlock: Eh? There's a couple nice buffs and RIP Voidwalker and Soulfire, but it looks like they're angling back toward the other mechanic that never worked (along with Overload) with more discard crap. Lakkari Felhound is still awful. 4 mana and two cards needs something that really has impact on the board and a 3/8 Taunt is not that, especially since that minion is the definition of a control deck minion which doesn't want to reduce its card advantage. The whole idea of this change was to introduce cards that would actually be played, right?
Warrior: Is the other class that direly needed a fresh look with Mage. Getting rid of some of their card draw and replacing it with different kinds of card generation is a good thing. Shield Slam is still there, but not quite as easily enabled. Brawl is still stupidly OP. I think their new version of Hunter's Pack will work a lot better for them, since most of their decks are more likely to have the time to take advantage of a random selection of cards.

The neutral changes all seem to make sense: clearing a lot of dreck and removing some key cards that were always around. The high-end dragon changes seem solid, although Nozdormu will still never be played. Onyxia, OTOH, seems like a real card now, as does Deathwing. Clockwork Giant... WTF? The two new legendaries seem interesting, though.

I wasn't going to bring all this up, felt like I was chatting into the void a little. Nice to see folks still playing.

I'm really excited for these changes. As noted, I have some favorites (Priest! Shaman!) and they've been ...tough. Priest just can't close the deal any longer. It is weird. I can still win, but I don't know how I am going to win when the game starts. There's no "theme" in the deck that makes me win except card advantage, I suppose? So, it's built to win in the abstract. Don't mock Shadowform, that card lets Priests win. It gives Priest Hunter's hero power, and that's been oppressing the game since Day 1. So wear them out, then wear them down.

//edit I've since watched Kibler's take on the Core Set changes and I think he doesn't understand Shadowform. Going to Mind Spike was never that amazing. I think Hotform crystallized this for me, noting that Shadowform takes you from Heal 2 to Deal 2, which is an enormous change. Worth paying 3 mana for, game-warping stuff. Going from Deal 2 to Deal 3 is the kind of effect you'd want from just having a card in your deck or something, not something to pay 3-mana in the late game for. It just doesn't matter that much. You might have a dead card, true, but only in decks that need to have that switch happen early. I think Shadowform ends up in Control decks as a win condition, and a 1-of there is routine.

I am fired up for the Shaman changes. Even something like Tundra Wolves going to 1 Overload is a big deal. That goes from the "Absolute Garbage" pile to the "Hmm, Maybe" pile with that little tweak. And knowing you'll roll 3s with Lighting Storm? I don't need much, but I do need to know how much damage I will deal.

My best performing deck of late is actually Quest Shaman, which hsreply says is the worst performing deck. But my build (shown below) is so distinct as to be unrecognizable from what I see there.

playhearthstone.com/deckbuilder/AAECAaoI...A7PcA6feA4KxA7rhAwA=

It's a combo deck, get the Quest done, get those Circus Medic and Dunk Tanks Corrupt and Hero Power into Yshaarj, using either Tour Guide or Lightning Bloom. Even 1 Medic and 1 Dunk Tank played earlier becomes 24 dmg from the hand. (Medic battlecry is also doubled by the Hero Power, and Yshaarj will put two copies of each into hand). It's a little heavy with the Faceless Corrupters and Claw Machines, but you need to make sure the Corrupts hit those 4-cost cards. Claw Machine doubles as a card draw to fetch Yshaarj or even just to make a 4/4 Tour Guide or something. It's been great. Very puzzle-y. The build that does badly is a card advantage engine with Vulpera Scoundrel and Inspector Fireheart. In the late game I actually need to get rid of cards to make room for the 4-6 cards Yshaarj will pump into my hand. I think folks are thinking about this archetype wrong.

I still play Hearthstone every day. But it's become an almost mechanical thing know, an automated distraction to pass time and pick up quests. I don't think I've been really excited about playing a particular deck for a long time. Dragon Hunter was the last one I think I particularly enjoyed.

I don't know if that's down to the ongoing state of the meta or simply burnout. I'm guessing the latter. I tend to like midrange decks that let you combine effects to get flexible outcomes, and Whirlkick Rogue in theory has that in abundance but it isn't going it for me.

Been having more fun with Battlegrounds. I like the balance of skill in building your board and randomness in minions offered. The thing where there's a limited pool of each minion type sucks though, as you can be chasing the same minions as 2-3 other players and not realise until it's too late. Still playing a lot of Standard tho, just to get the quests.

Can't get much enthusiasm up for these changes, either. They'll come, I'll play some new decks which I may or may not enjoy. We'll see.