It was pretty bad starting as a new player at the end of closed beta too, and I tried telling people this, but they simply didn't understand. I think alot of the problems could be alleviated if Blizzard didn't sacrafice their match making algorithm in favor of finding a player a match.
I have to admit I have played Heartstone for a while now and I recently quit because I finally realized that if i didnt have all the cards in the right builds, I would never win past a certain level. Also, the cards you really need are the legendary ones that are so rare. You have to spend at least 300 dollars on packs to get one good competent competitive deck. If you dont you will just lose. You could try to do this with grinding the free gold, but that will take you several months. If you do take that route you wont keep up with the number of new cards coming out. Remember you have to have 700 per wing for nax. TBH its not really the game, but the nature of collective card games. They were never really made to be competitive tournaments, but a casual game of random risk vs rewards. The problem is the market is flooded with people with money to blow on it that forces you to spend the same money to be competitive. Either way they are making shit tons of money. I chose not to be another sheep and get my monthly sheering.
Like I said earlier, Hearthstone is a Vertical Progression competitive game where how well you do in competitions affects your vertical progression when you're using play time to advance it. Paying also advances you up the progression ladder.
Whether that's pay-to-win or not depends on your definition of pay-to-win.
Either way, it definately makes the game very un-newbie friendly. I see people in this thread posting "It's not pay-to-win. I've been playing since Beta and I'm doing fine!" and it's like "Well duh". The earlier you got in, the easier your vertical advancement will be in a game where your vertical advancement is affected by your competition. People who've been playing from the start only had to compete with other people who were also new for their rewards to advance. People playing now need to compete with those veterans who have much more powerful decks (from playing for such a long time) FOR THE SAME REWARDS, so they basically have to work much harder for their vertical progression compared to those who've been playing since earlier times, just to try to catch up to those people who are now way ahead.
Or jump start things with paying, of course. Again, whether that's pay-to-win or not depends on your definition of pay-to-win.
True! Very true!
BUT , Blizzard is limiting you to catch up! THAT is a game-breaker for me, unless of course, you pay to catch up. Because basically, you are limited to 1-2 card packs per day. And that's it. You want more to compete with the veterans? Pay , or .. come back tomorrow for another 1-2 card packs. ( I am talking strictly from a beginner perspective player ).
Even if you grind hours and hours, in ranked or causal, you are earning nothing. And this is the reason why I said, enough. In my very first 5 days of HS I paid 20E and I saw a small boost. Imagine if you are paying nothing. How hard it will be to catch up!
Actually, I have played since launch and I have never purchased a card pack at all. The only place that I think I'm lacking is in Legendaries and Murlocs (if I wanted to do a Murloc deck). In the first month I got 2 legendaries (King Crush and Gruul). A buddy of mine spend $50 on card packs and got something like 3 legendaries out of it. So ouch, just ouch! In the end, though, I will use Gruul in my deck, but I usually play a Druid taunt deck, so there's probably only a couple times when he's really bailed me out. Plus he gels well with the deck since he's behind a wall of taunt cards.
The only thing I paid for in the game was the Naxx unlocks ($20). It was a bad buy, though, since I had already slowed down playing. Naxx gave me like 6 more legendaries, but I haven't even played with them. I finished up the PvE and haven't been back since. I'll probably go back to it, but I just wasn't interested in keeping up with all the updates and mechanics, and decks floating around, etc. Just too time consuming when I have other games I'd rather be playing.
As far as TCG go, though, I'd play it over Magic.
You've played since launch. Re-read my post (it's the first one in the set of quotes in this reply). The whole concept of "catching up" doesn't apply to you. "Catch up" as stated by IceAge in reply to me (that you then replied to) means the person joined the game late. You didn't.
Originally posted by BizkitNL Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't the free basic decks having reached legendary rank pretty much nullify anything in this topic? Or are we just ignoring that fact?
The free basic decks have not reached legendary rank. Cannot remeber the exact details but fairly sure he used gold from quests or winning games to buy packs.
I stand corrected. However, wouldn't that still prove the " Its P2W" theory wrong?
A very easy way to get around the problem of trying to get more cards is to just concede as soon as you enter to lower your rank. High rank doesn't get you anything. This way you can win 3 games easier. 10g and quests.
It's not heavy p2w unless you want to be top 100 every season. Arena is exact opposite of it. Learn cards by playing the game. Do arena. As you get better in arena, you'll win more, thus making the game free. Arena is basically a pack plus usually 50g.
It's not heavy p2w unless you want to be top 100 every season.
Does being top 100 in the season give any tangible and significant (or perhaps worse of all, exclusive) rewards? That's a typical F2P P2W whaling technique if it does.
i suck at card games. Hearthstone was my first TCG ever. With that said, i stopped playing Hearthstone when i couldnt get the mount for WoW by winning 5 games in a row. All i had was starter decks, and all the people i played against had a bunch of legendary cards. I got slaughtered every time before i could even blink. After losing my 5th match against a priest who took 95% of my health in one shot, i realized i wont be able to get the WoW mount, quit the game, and have no plans on coming back. If i do, it will only be for PvE (Naxx and future similar content). I dont care about PvP that is unbalanced through real money.
Even though i got bored of playing i have still followed the game closely.It is a pay to win for awhile then once you get your foothold everyone is on even terms,it takes about 3 months otherwise pay up front to catch up more quickly.
I will say this however,having been through the whole grind,that you are better off going the long slow route because even if you pay up front and get all the cards,your lack of knowledge would leave you well behind.Point being that by time you get most cards the hard way,your knowledge will be way higher and then warrant spending money.
Now on to the problem with the system...
There are tons of players with multiple accounts.Seems all they care about is attaining Legendary then they go on to play with alt accounts.Your knowledge with starter cards will get you destroyed by a veteran player MOST of the time,yes there is a huge RNG factor but a well designed deck with a vet player behind it is tough to beat.Trump proved it both laddering and in Arena,he started EVERY class with noob cards from scratch and laddered up in dominant fashion.
A hint,go watch streamers in Twitch Tv you should learn a lot from the better players on how to play the game but again you actually need to have a vast knowledge of the cards to predict proper plays.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Wow.. I think ppl have way too much expectation out of a side project F2P game.
Yes, the ranked games at the higher tiers will have more ppl who have tossed hundreds of dollars for them cards. But does this mean you cannot enjoy this gem of a game without playing against those?
I personally play HS as a "relax after work" kind of game where I spend roughly 30 mins to an hr a day. This time is usually sufficient to finish the daily of the day and if I have the 150g for the arena i go ahead and play that.
Arena is your answer here regarding all your arguments as to why its unfair for the guy who refuses to pay. It is half luck and half strategy here, compared to the loaded dice a guy wth 15 OJ's in his deck will play with.
There are so many AA titles out there with subs where you can enjoy a good time without having to worry about these kind of things. I do not think you should have HS as your primary game especially if you are refusing to pay!
In the last 6 months or so that I have been playing this game, I only spent about 20 dollars total in the beginning to get a few cards going. Other than that I have not paid a single dime and I have more than 10 OJ's and tons of Purps right now which can get me easy to 15.
But if you are aiming to become legendary without spending bucks in a legendary fashion, forget about it. this should not bother you really..
Comments
It was pretty bad starting as a new player at the end of closed beta too, and I tried telling people this, but they simply didn't understand. I think alot of the problems could be alleviated if Blizzard didn't sacrafice their match making algorithm in favor of finding a player a match.
You've played since launch. Re-read my post (it's the first one in the set of quotes in this reply). The whole concept of "catching up" doesn't apply to you. "Catch up" as stated by IceAge in reply to me (that you then replied to) means the person joined the game late. You didn't.
I stand corrected. However, wouldn't that still prove the " Its P2W" theory wrong?
Arena is pay to win? Lol what?
A very easy way to get around the problem of trying to get more cards is to just concede as soon as you enter to lower your rank. High rank doesn't get you anything. This way you can win 3 games easier. 10g and quests.
It's not heavy p2w unless you want to be top 100 every season. Arena is exact opposite of it. Learn cards by playing the game. Do arena. As you get better in arena, you'll win more, thus making the game free. Arena is basically a pack plus usually 50g.
Does being top 100 in the season give any tangible and significant (or perhaps worse of all, exclusive) rewards? That's a typical F2P P2W whaling technique if it does.
Even though i got bored of playing i have still followed the game closely.It is a pay to win for awhile then once you get your foothold everyone is on even terms,it takes about 3 months otherwise pay up front to catch up more quickly.
I will say this however,having been through the whole grind,that you are better off going the long slow route because even if you pay up front and get all the cards,your lack of knowledge would leave you well behind.Point being that by time you get most cards the hard way,your knowledge will be way higher and then warrant spending money.
Now on to the problem with the system...
There are tons of players with multiple accounts.Seems all they care about is attaining Legendary then they go on to play with alt accounts.Your knowledge with starter cards will get you destroyed by a veteran player MOST of the time,yes there is a huge RNG factor but a well designed deck with a vet player behind it is tough to beat.Trump proved it both laddering and in Arena,he started EVERY class with noob cards from scratch and laddered up in dominant fashion.
A hint,go watch streamers in Twitch Tv you should learn a lot from the better players on how to play the game but again you actually need to have a vast knowledge of the cards to predict proper plays.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Wow.. I think ppl have way too much expectation out of a side project F2P game.
Yes, the ranked games at the higher tiers will have more ppl who have tossed hundreds of dollars for them cards. But does this mean you cannot enjoy this gem of a game without playing against those?
I personally play HS as a "relax after work" kind of game where I spend roughly 30 mins to an hr a day. This time is usually sufficient to finish the daily of the day and if I have the 150g for the arena i go ahead and play that.
Arena is your answer here regarding all your arguments as to why its unfair for the guy who refuses to pay. It is half luck and half strategy here, compared to the loaded dice a guy wth 15 OJ's in his deck will play with.
There are so many AA titles out there with subs where you can enjoy a good time without having to worry about these kind of things. I do not think you should have HS as your primary game especially if you are refusing to pay!
In the last 6 months or so that I have been playing this game, I only spent about 20 dollars total in the beginning to get a few cards going. Other than that I have not paid a single dime and I have more than 10 OJ's and tons of Purps right now which can get me easy to 15.
But if you are aiming to become legendary without spending bucks in a legendary fashion, forget about it. this should not bother you really..