If he gets nerfed you would get back the full 1600 if you disenchant him in the first couple days after the nerf, then it returns to normal, as opposed to the 400 you would get otherwise (not sure I’m recalling the numbers exactly right, but you definitely get full refund for a while after the nerf unless they change that policy).
50 Pack pre-purchase yielded just 1 legendary (Eydis Darkbane) and 13 epics (no dupes) so I’m a little disappointed but not distraught.
prolix
2805
I got a copy of Astral Communion in my decks also, but have no idea how on earth to run that thing. Clearly you want a bunch of high cost minions. But you also need insane card draw if you’re dumping your hand. In the end, it seems like a fun, gimmicky, and hellaciously unreliable card. Any chance you want to share your deck?
Yeah, I assume the deck is basically: card draw + astral communion + innervate + huge minions. Then, you mulligan for Innervate + Astral communion, ideally you can cast it turn 1 or 2 to minimize the cost of discarding.
Seems like a bit of a gag deck rather than a competitive one: you might have to just concede by turn 4 if things haven’t gone your way.
Edit: I guess the other alternative is to have nothing in the midrange at all in the hopes that you dump your entire hand of weenies by turn 3, then cast Communion turn 4/5 and hope you can rebuild. Still super risky though.
I quickly decided it wasn’t a very good deck. I basically put as many card draw (Starfire, Coldlight Oracle, Novice Engineer, Loot Hoarder, Azure Drake, Acolyte of Pain) and high cost minions as I could, as well as Innervate for the off-chance I could reach for AC on turn 1 or 2. My dream scenario was playing an Acolyte of Pain or Loot Hoarder on turn 3 into Astral Communion on turn 4 so that they could draw some cards for me after I played AC, but it was much more likely they would get cleared off the board that same turn or get drawn post-AC and kill my whole turn. I would definitely remove those two cards in any future attempt at this deck. I think 2x Ancient of Lore are also rather necessary for this to work at all, but I don’t have those cards. I think this type of deck works even less if you have only 1 Astral Communion, because your chances of drawing it at the start of the game are super low.
The biggest problem is that it takes so much time for it all to unfold unless you get the dream starting hand of Innervate + AC. If you wait until turn 4 to AC, your opponent probably has a strong presence on the board and a life lead by then, and you’re only dropping at best 1 big minion each turn.
prolix
2809
Still, the card is so crazy there must be SOME way to make it work. I just thought of Jeeves, it’s perfect for this deck. Also, you didn’t mention Nourish.
I think, at a minimum, this deck has to have:
Astral Communion x2 (the extra card will probably end up a waste but if you are committing to this deck you need to ensure you get one as soon as possible)
Innervate x2
Jeeves x2
Ancient of Lore x2
Coldight Oracle x2
Nourish x2
…and then fill in with big minions and removal cards like Wrath and Starfire/Starfall. Azure Drake is good since it’s a solid body plus card draw.
I guess the dream start is coin, Innervate, Astral Communion, turn two DEATHWING.
Ah yes, I do have Nourish in there as well. I’m probably just going to craft the Ancient of Lores since I have a bunch of dust currently and it is a solid card to have in a lot of Druid decks.
Jeeves could probably be a good addition, but I don’t have that card either. Maybe I’ll craft that as well. I think a potential problem with Jeeves is that it has kind of an awkward mana cost in a deck with so many expensive cards, and it doesn’t bring much value aside from the card draw. You may spend a whole turn getting Jeeves on the board only to draw 3 high cost cards that you’ll only be able to play one of per turn anyway.
prolix, right after you left I hit the dream starting hand against a Dragon Warrior with probably every legendary dragon plus Varian Wrynn. It was a tight game for a while, but I eventually lost the board to his deck and then ran out of cards to draw. I’m thinking of trying to remove some of the big minions and maybe try to get a little better tempo out of it with more mid-costing stuff. Of course, I’m probably not going to be able to beat a killer deck like that guy’s anyway.
prolix
2812
It may just end up as one of those beguiling cards that looks soooo good but can’t really ever be played effectively. Big kudos to you for trying to get it to work, though.
Spock
2813
Thanks – that’s great to know. I suppose one risk of crafting a nerfable legendary is that I might take a hiatus from the game in the future and lose track of what’s nerfed when. But I can manage that risk, I imagine, so I’m inclined to go for it. Thanks.
Does Blizzard publish this “post-nerf refund” policy somewhere?
Looking over the cards I’ve gotten in packs, I feel like the net result of TGT might be to just make Silence/removal/direct damage even more important than it was before. Previously, most of the continuing effects were fairly limited, most of the good stuff happened on deathrattle or battlecry.
But now, with various inspire abilities as well as new static buffs, leaving stuff on the table at all might just be a complete non-starter.
Joust in general is a pro-control mechanic, and I think a lot of cards are going to push players towards control.
I guess the intended case for these expansions is that aggro gets more aggro, control gets more control, etc. But I wonder if synergy/theme heavy decks will suffer vs the purer versions.
Prior to TGT the meta was overwhelming in favor of aggro. The ladder was dominated by various stripes of aggro hunter, aggro warlock, aggro paladin and aggro rouge. The only really viable control deck was Grim Patron Warrior and that was due to a completely overpowered and broken mechanic.
For more than the last year as everyone has fine tuned their decks the only solution to beating an aggro deck was just making an even more aggressive deck. It’s a big disappointment because it pretty much means that cards with mana costs 6 or greater can’t be put into a ladder deck. Well, you can put them in there – but it’s usually a mistake. Ragnaros is awesome, but at 8 mana, the game is already decided by the time you play him, and he’s a good legendary. Those 6+ mana cards are just too slow to make a difference. The only exception was, again, for completely broken and overpowered cards like Dr. Boom. Prior to TGT, most ladder games you know who was going to win by the end of turn four.
I’m skeptical that TGT is changing this. I think it did a good job at trying to avoid giving aggro decks even better cards to hit face. But, I don’t think there is much in the way of effective punishment for aggro decks because there isn’t anything that slows them down. TGT introduced two new mechanics and they are both pretty slow.
- Inspire - It takes two mana to trigger these effects and while some of them are powerful this effectively raises the price of these cards. Two quick examples: Silver Hand regent, 3/3 creature with 3 mana cost. Inspire effect summons a 1/1 minion. So that’s five mana for effectively 4/4 in stats. That’s horrid. There is a lot better ways to spend 5 mana. Sludge Belcher for one. Other example: Kvaldir Raider, 4/4 creature with 5 mana cost, inspire gives +2/+2. So for seven mana for 6/6 stats. Or for seven mana - you can have Dr. Boom.
To make it into a decent constructed deck these days the cards have to very powerful if not outright overpowered.
- Joust mechanic. This would in theory punish aggro decks which rely on low cost minions as those decks should consistently lose a joust. The problem is that even a control deck needs some low cost minions to establish some board control in the early game and those low cost minions will lose a joust. The other problem is that there aren’t that many joust cards - so it’s difficult to build a deck with them.
I have a pretty big collection of neat cards with cool effects – a lot of them legendaries – not only are they aren’t viable in most decks, they aren’t viable in anyway. That just seems like a sad waste.
As a consequence of this, I despise Hunter and Warlock players in the same way that I hate the New York Yankees.
PantsVZ
2816
I put some of the cheaper TGT cards in a face Paladin deck. One thing I’ve learned is that I might as well not play against dragon priests. Their turn 2,3 and 4 cards are absurdly strong(such as the 2/4 taunt). I don’t see how ANY aggro is supposed to go through that, even with two owls in their decks. Even if you somehow got through that, you’re in holy nova range so no more low cost minions for you.
I see that people are playing dragon priest even in legend, I always hated playing against priest, it seems I won’t be playing as much anymore.
To me, the broken control warrior and the dragon priest decks are gonna dominate as long as Blizzard refuse to nerf anything.
@HiredGoons - you’re counting the cost of the hero power in your math, but not the effect. I’m still figuring out my inspire mage deck, but the cost is frequently split across multiple inspire effects, and the benefit can be impressive with cards that boost hero powers
I think a lot of what you said makes sense, Hiredgoons. I admit that I don’t pay that much attention to the higher-level meta, but I do also have my doubts about whether Joust will be an effective mechanic in use. It’s an interesting concept, because it works directly against meta-considerations: i.e. the overall deck makeup. In theory that could help it be self-balancing, but I don’t think that’s what the game really needs right now.
I think part of the problem with Joust is that if it’s supposed to be a pro-control deck mechanic, it should have things that control decks want, like the ability to slow down the game, but none of the Joust effects really do that until 5-6 mana (Master Jouster / Tuskarr Jouster). And if I’m paying 6 Mana for a Master Jouster to be a taunt, I should probably just use a Sludge Belcher instead. I guess there’s probably a deck with no minions below 3 or 4 cost, e.g. Paladin (Noble Sacrifice, tokens, etc) / Shaman (tokens) / Mage (Mirror Image / removal), but that’s a long way to go to get slightly above cost value for 2-3 cards.
It’s also pretty tedious to see the animations play out, which makes me just not want to use the mechanic at all.
Spock
2819
I do think the Inspire and Joust mechanics may slow down the Arena meta, which I care about more than Constructed, as I prefer Arena. The Arena meta has become somewhat more aggro over the past couple expansions, but TGT may push things back in the other direction a bit, which would be a good thing as far as I’m concerned. (I prefer the control/trading game to the aggro game.) Not sure yet.
I play arena far more than constructed but I think TGT has some potential to slow aggro. The only deck I’ve made so far is beast druid which has done pretty well vs face hunters; Living Roots for the saplings on turn 1 has been fantastic and later than turn 1 works well for sniping a knife juggler when you just know you’re going to get snake trapped. And the saplings are so cute I actually splurged on the dust to craft them golden.
I haven’t really looked into the joust mechanic yet but I’d imagine it’d work fairly well in a deck heavy on early spells, either removal like mages or perhaps a hunter or druid that can summon creatures via early spells and fill the rest of the early game with weapons or removal.
Man, theres a couple new cards that could work in a token paladin deck, but that shit is pretty expensive (2x quartermaster, 2x Garrison commander, etc).
Also, Light’s Champion: worst ability yet?
Thank goodness nobody ever climbed any ladder with control warrior, midrange hunter, midrange priest, control hunter, handlock, freeze mage, demonlock, healadin, […]
