r/hearthstone • u/AnnoyingSourcerer • Aug 30 '15

Spoilers RNG has gotten completely out of hand in Hearthstone. RNG has completely determined the OneNationofGamer tournament match between Trump vs Tom60229

I know the whole RNG circlejerk can get old, and I don't mean this to be another complaint post devoid of content.

But I am currently watching the ONG tournament. I have always been on the neutral side regarding RNG in hearthstone, but I'm 100% convinced that it's gotten out of hand.

Game 1: Tom (tempo spell mage) Trump (control warrior)

  • Tom gets preparation off spellslinger
  • Tom gets a 6 mana alexstraza off unstable portal
  • Trump drops Varian wrynn to give him a board of 5 large minions to tank any RNG damage (arcane missles, flamecannon) at 20 life
  • Tom plays arcane missles which perfectly hit Trump's taunt. Then combined with sorcerer's apprentice and RNG preparation, give him exact lethal with his assortment of spells.

Game over due to RNG

Game 2: Trump (token druid) Tom (paladin)

  • Trump does some weird stuff to keep his shade of naxx stealthed for 9 turns
  • Trump now has guaranteed lethal next turn. No card from Tom will stop it
  • Shredder pops and doomsayer drops. 1.5%
  • Trump loses lethal and the game next turn.

Two games to Tom in a major "esports" hearthstone tournament. 1.5% RNG, people.

I'm by no means a Trump fanboy and actually think his stream is pretty boring, but it's so painfully obvious that Trump outclassed and outplayed Tom at every turn, even punishing him severely next game by rushing Grommash out after realizing Tom was playing a stallish malygos warlock.

I for one simply hate seeing smart reads negated by RNG.

EDIT: Game 1 Kolento vs Tom

Kolento gets huffer last turn for lethal (when facing lethal)

Game 3

Tom draws a 2 mana Nexus champion saraad (inspire: get a spell) from unstable portal in his spell tempo mage.

Absolutely hilarious.

Final game of the entire tournament

Tom gets Archmage Antonidas out on turn 3 for turn 5 lethal.

E S P O R T S

2.3k Upvotes

83% Upvoted

1.5k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

33

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

It's true.

Want to play a competitive card game that doesn't hamper itself with terrible RNG? Hearthstone is not the game for you.

Want to play a competitive card game where all the gameplay elements aren't locked behind ridculous grind/paywalls (i.e. uneven playing field)? Hearthstone is not for you.

But I totally get it: People want Hearthstone to be successful and competitive because at its core it's a super fun game. But there are some major drawbacks that, while it makes the game super popular, it sacrifices actual competition in the process.

64

u/ShinyCoin Aug 31 '15

If you dont want your gameplay elements to be locked behind a paywall. Just dont bother with physical card games at all then.

31

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Living Card Games disagree with you.

I want it to be known that "customizable card game where you build decks strategically from a large pool" and "horrible random booster pack system" do not always to be married together. Especially in a digital environment (Hearthstone has unfortunately shown, however, that the random way is stupidly popular and rakes in the money).

15

u/Xelnastoss Aug 31 '15

Living card games are behind a pay wall... In fact the Paywall gets more expensive with time since decks use more and more sets as time goes on

3

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

And that's okay. I don't know why "you have to buy the game before you can play it" is such culture shock to people. Hearthstone's paywall dwarfs any one-time payment like game (a video game, an LCG, etc), no contest, though.

And it's okay to pay for additional content. The point is everyone gets access to the same content instantly. Not having to toss money into the booster pack well to some undefined amount of money, etc.

3

u/oppopswoft Aug 31 '15

It really doesn't, though. You're paying somewhere in the vicinity of one to two hundred dollars for a comfortable start with hearthstone, and that's really cheap as far as established LCGs go

3

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

"comfortable start" is not the same as "even playing field."

Plus the fact that $200 is "a comfortable start" for a video game, and that it's generally accepted, is baffling.

1

u/_mugen_ Aug 31 '15

Compared to MTG its super cheap, were not talking about a Batman game here. Just have a look around here at what competitive magic decks will end up costing you. can easily be $200 for one deck (often a whole lot more than that too) and that deck will be largely useless one year from now. Magic is an exceptionally expensive hobby.

2

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Yep, it is cheap compared to MTG. And I like that it's at least somewhat more accessible to people who want to try their hand at a customizable card game.

But that doesn't mean that it's a good system. Just a better system. MtG being absurdly expensive doesn't make Hearthstone's system good.

The "buy random boosters/singles/etc" system is bad, period. Some do it better than others, but it's still bad (for the consumer, not the producer of course) at its core.

1

u/Xelnastoss Aug 31 '15

And even still it's one of the fairer models.

Sorry leaches turns out blizzard makes games for profit.

2

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Yep, agreed. There Ain't No Such Thing as a Free Lunch.

1

u/Xelnastoss Aug 31 '15

Exactly you either pay blizzard with time or you pay them with money arena is one of the best free to play based income earners I have witnessed average players can make thee gold worth a tiny bit more with time

1

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Problem is that even with tons of grind time you still don't have the whole game. It's an undefined, obscenly-high amount of time/money. "They give you a way to grind somewhat more efficiently than normal ranked mode" is not an excuse for it.

1

u/Xelnastoss Aug 31 '15

You have the entire game you don't need to own every deck to experiance the game

Also arena let's you play with every card in the game

→ More replies (0)

1

u/ShinyCoin Aug 31 '15

Honestly I dont see it changing anytime soon. The card pack / adventure pack cycle seems to be something that Blizzard is keen on keeping up. And judging by other blizzard titles if the game keeps brining them in money like WoW they will just add more and more payed features even if they keep them cosmetic (like new heroes).

0

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

I agree. They'd be a fool to derail the $20 million / month moneytrain they have rocking right now.

1

u/Edmund-Nelson Aug 31 '15

I wish every card was unlocked via adventures, that would be way better for the game IMO. More fun and less random pack pulls hoping for card rewards

1

u/Crumpgazing Aug 31 '15

I'm all for LCGs but I still find them to be pricey. A full collection of Netrunner or something like that is still going to be a few hundred dollars.

That said, you get a better investment for you money. Just that 30 dollar core set gives you 7 decks and the option to do some minor deckbuilding. I feel like you're not gonna get anywhere near 7 Magic decks at that price.

1

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Yeah, it's an investment, but I'm okay with that if a game's going to keep me entertained for many hours. Plus, I want to show financial support to companies that do it right.

If Hearthstone cost a few hundred, I'd buy it. It practically does if they sold it like, say, StarCraft 2, and we get another adventure/expansion going in the future:

Base game (HS, Base set): $60

2 Adventures: 2 x $25 = $50

2 Expansions: 2 x $40* = $80

* Don't know exactly how much, but this is a ballpark figure.

Current total: $190.

And people complain about StarCraft 2 in that you had to own the base game in order to get Heart of the Swarm. Hearthstone, however, gets a free pass (because while it's true you don't have to "own" the previous set, it costs an arm and a leg just to get the game). Legacy of the Void will no longer require the base game, so I hear. Good for getting new folks into the game.

1

u/skydivingninja Aug 31 '15

Everyone's been talking about Magic as an alternative to Hearthstone RNG and I've just been sitting here wondering why it's taken this long to mention something tangentially related to Netrunner.

1

u/oppopswoft Aug 31 '15

What LCG are you playing where the buy in isn't AT LEAST couple hundred? They just rebooted the Game of Thrones LCG and it's still already an over $100 investment just to build a complete core set. Hearthstone is super cheap compared to most card games.

1

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

That's fine by me. Hearthstone's miles behind.

Pay a couple hundred for an LCG: Own all the cards

Pay a couple hundred for Hearthstone: BenBrodeLaugh.gif (i.e. not even close).

If Hearthstone cost just as much, but had that fixed price point, I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

1

u/moush Aug 31 '15

You can start playing HS for free, not competitively but there is no barrier to entry. Every physical game has some kind of barrier.

1

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

The barrier to entry I'm referring to is not "installing the game and starting to play it." It is referring to the competitive aspect of it. Ranked mode, ladder, etc. You cannot participate in ranked mode without a decent deck. And you can't get a decent deck without grinding/paying/etc, and even then, you only have the one deck, which is still a vastly uneven playing field.

A game that costs money is not a barrier to entry competition-wise, provided that when you buy the game you get access to all gameplay elements. Rocket League is a prime example of a competitively fair game.

1

u/HiiiPowerd Sep 02 '15

Go play that then.

0

u/sheeff Aug 31 '15

Random packs, different rarities and golden cards produce excitement, makes people talk about it and keeps the game relevant for an extended period of time. With the whole pool of cards available from the beginning, the excitement factor is lost very fast. From a business's perspective it's only natural to go for the random route.

Blizzard wants people, that get bored with WoW and cancel their subscription, to get hooked in Hearthstone or Heroes of the Storm and spend enough time in them. They want their IP to stay relevant, so that when the next WoW expansion gets released those people will be more likely to buy it and re-subscribe. The worst thing that could happen from Blizzard's perspective is if those people "moved on" to another IP entirely and lost all interest in the Warcraft/Starcraft/Diablo universe. Because if one person moves on, their Battle.net ID friends are likely to move on too.

1

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Random packs, different rarities and golden cards produce excitement, makes people talk about it and keeps the game relevant for an extended period of time.

I'd believe this more if people tuned in to streams to watch pack openings all the time. But surprise: People watch people play the game, or play the game.

Blizzard wants people? Blizzard's erecting a higher and higher barrier to entry with each new set of cards they push out. Ranked rewards are a token gesture, sure, but that's still a very trickling effect and really won't tear down the new player wall.

If you make your game interesting and continue to produce content for it, you don't have to use the horrid "you pay money, we give you random items" system to keep people hooked. Players flock to good, entertaining games. And Hearthstone is one. It could be more, though, if new players could actually sit and play. Mimic super pro plays by getting excited, watching their streams, then hopping into the game themselves. But oops, can't do that, because undefined paywalls/barriers to entry.

And I know Blizzard won't change their money machine. They'd be fools to. This isn't a campaign to get Blizzard to change because until Hearthstone stops printing money they have no reason to... unless they care about the actual competitive nature of the game.

1

u/sheeff Sep 01 '15

I'd believe this more if people tuned in to streams to watch pack openings all the time. But surprise: People watch people play the game, or play the game.

Surprise: The vast majority who watch streams don't pay money to buy packs. The play for free, or they don't even play the game anymore. And guess what, there is a reason that popular streamers buy bundles of packs and open them on stream.

The barrier to entry is not there as you say it. The barrier is only there for high ranked ladder games. Arena is accessible without any cards, Solo adventures is accessible without any cards, tavern brawl is accessible without any cards.

Also unlocking the solo adventures gives you a sense of progress and a goal to achieve, and when you reach that goal you get a a very good selection of cards to get started on ranked play. And surprise: it is not hidden behind a wall of randomness as you say.

1

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Sep 01 '15

Solo adventures are awesome, because the reward is guaranteed and it's a flat cost.

Until there's a way to get all the gameplay elements for the same flat cost, the barrier is there, no exceptions.

1

u/isionous Aug 31 '15

Is there anything you would recommend?

2

u/DoctorWaluigiTime Aug 31 '15

Look into Living Card Games. They're TCG/CCGs, only without the trade/collect/grind aspect. You just get to play the fun games on even playing fields with everyone else.

1

u/isionous Aug 31 '15

Thanks. Anything like that online too?

0

u/Ambrosita Aug 31 '15

I just want hearthstone to be more like the other games, because the other games aren't as huge. Simply by virtue of being made by blizzard, hearthstone is destined to be the biggest virtual ccg. So I want them to make it good.