HearthStone Heroes of Warcraft

Ramza

Kirby wrote: »

Miracle rogue is the epitome of a gimmick deck. The idea is to cycle through your whole deck until you have shadowstep and Leroy. It's effective and quite clever, but it's a gimmick. There is only one win condition, and every victory involves this combo. Me loving it or hating it doesn't change this fact and is rather irrelevant.




The most popular twitch hearthstone player, Amaz, plays Priest. That's the reason why. The second most popular guy called Reynad, plays warrior and hunter. Hence, there are tons of them about. People are quite simple, they see these guys play their decks and they copy it. Monkey see, monkey do. :P

Any deck with a 85-90% win rate against the whole field (at least pre naxx) is not gimmicky at all, it's practical. With regards to the leeroy finisher though, yes, I agree that is really silly! Cycling through your whole deck is by no means a gimmick There are other win conditions outside of the leeroy combo, I've won countless games without it. I ran a list pre naxx with no cold bloods, and almost always had overkill. Vancleef is a win condition in himself. The deck also has crazy face damage with spells. There are a lot of lines of play revolving around killing someone with Miracle. I will say though that getting decent cycling going is a win condition in ways. I have won some games with good draws outside of cylcing, but overall, if Miracle is allowed to get a ball rolling, your opponent automatically loses. Malygos is an example of a gimmick IMO

I agree, I stopped playing HS for a while because the netdecking is real. I can't talk, my main deck is Miracle which I picked up a couple seasons ago , Rogue always being my fave class (played a tonne of tempo rogue). When Hunter was the **** in Season 2 (I think?), Miracle spiked in popularity and I made the switch. Right now Hunter has come back in a big way, and everyone is netdecking Reynad's mad scientist hunter build atm. It's pretty dire

There have been tonnes of notable Priest players before Amaz. Zetalot is a much better priest player IMO. Gaara who is known for his ramp druid innovations is actually an amazing priest player. Amaz is just famous for his stream, he didn't innovate or bring anything new to priest at all, just made it more popular on ladder, esp after Naxx with the priest Buffs

Big Knox wrote: »

Again with hunter it is popular because it directly countered miracle rogue and does well in most match ups now with no real hard counter

In general, Miracle Rogue hard counters Midrange Hunter. Miracle has just fallen out of flavor because it is not as good against the whole field anymore, as well as only having an even matchup vs the new hunter. Hunter is the only deck along with Miracle with ridiculous amounts of cycling (along with broken deck thinning with flare and tracking). Tracking needs a nerf big time, as does flare. Tracking effectively makes your deck a 22 card deck.

Hunters will always be able to find loatheb consistently. Along with that I feel like the new naxx hunter is rly good vs miracles. Miracle though, It's still sick in tournament play and very good in its own right, just not as powerful because it can't shine in this meta. I think that's a good thing that it's not OP anymore. In a vacuum it is the strongest deck in the game but in this meta I think it is has balanced out, which is good IMO

Big Knox

Ramza wrote: »

In general, Miracle Rogue hard counters Midrange Hunter. Miracle has just fallen out of flavor because it is not as good against the whole field anymore, as well as only having an even matchup vs the new hunter. Hunter is the only deck along with Miracle with ridiculous amounts of cycling (along with broken deck thinning with flare and tracking). Tracking needs a nerf big time, as does flare. Tracking effectively makes your deck a 22 card deck.

I actually meant to type Handlock there sorry. Yeah it's good to see the meta moving away from miracle for now at least but I'm sure the Mad Scientist Hunter will probably be just as annoying soon. It doesn't seem anywhere near as strong a deck however! I may be wrong though, taking a break from Constructed for awhile to see how things play out after the dust settles from Naxx!

Ramza

Big Knox wrote: »

I actually meant to type Handlock there sorry. Yeah it's good to see the meta moving away from miracle for now at least but I'm sure the Mad Scientist Hunter will probably be just as annoying soon. It doesn't seem anywhere near as strong a deck however! I may be wrong though, taking a break from Constructed for awhile to see how things play out after the dust settles from Naxx!

Same, kinda fed up of constructed atm! Yeah, it's really strong, probably not as strong as Miracle but ATM is definitely the deck to beat

It's interesting, Miracle thrives in a meta with hunters (Miracle counters hunter itself, and Hunters help scare off the handlocks making Miracle even more viable), Loatheb has changed so much for this meta, probably the most significant/best Naxx card imo

Kirby

Ramza wrote: »

Any deck with a 85-90% win rate against the whole field (at least pre naxx) is not gimmicky at all, it's practical.

I feel people aren't understanding what gimmick actually means. I am not saying it's not practical or efficient or awesome. The fact that it has a 90% win rate proves that. It's godlike. And the current Hunter one is the same. It's terribly powerful.

But Hearthstone at its core is a fight for board control. You play your minion, I play mine, they hit each other, I play my spell, you play your buff and I silence it and so on. It's a tug of war and that's the design ethos behind the game. Even the aggro decks work the same. You play your minion, I play my taunt and so on. It's not about ONE single card. It's about a deck of them.

If you were to nerf a dozen random cards tomorrow, that wouldn't change. Be it playing Aggro or Control style, people would just use other cards and carry on as normal.

But One Turn kill decks operate entirely on a single card winning them the game. You nerf or remove ONE card and they fall completely flat. That's what makes it a gimmick. It's operating completely off a single mechanic.

Remove shadowstep and Miracle is trash. Rogue as a class survives, but the Miracle variant is dead. Same with Ramp druid. Without savage roar, it just isn't potent. Druid is still an awesome class, but that particular deck wouldn't see the light of day. Bloodlust Shaman is no different.

And that's why it's rightfully called a gimmick. Remove any card you want from the Warrior deck and control warrior would just adapt and move on. Same for paladin. Or priest control. Same with handlock or Zoo.

If a deck relies on a single win condition, it's the epitome of a gimmick. Not that there is inherently anything wrong with that. I've played gimmick decks before too. But I know exactly what they are.

Ramza

Kirby wrote: »

Remove shadowstep and Miracle is trash. Rogue as a class survives, but the Miracle variant is dead. Same with Ramp druid. Without savage roar, it just isn't potent. Druid is still an awesome class, but that particular deck wouldn't see the light of day. Bloodlust Shaman is no different.

And that's why it's rightfully called a gimmick. Remove any card you want from the Warrior deck and control warrior would just adapt and move on. Same for paladin. Or priest control. Same with handlock or Zoo.

If a deck relies on a single win condition, it's the epitome of a gimmick. Not that there is inherently anything wrong with that. I've played gimmick decks before too. But I know exactly what they are.

I think removing shadowstep wouldn't matter too much, would hurt the deck but it would still work with sub cards, but I get your point

And I feel like aggro is rewarded too much in HS, maybe that's not a bad thing. Zoo comes to mind, although it's the warlock hero power that makes zoo so good, IMO. It's OP, but Zoo isn't 100% an aggro deck so maybe not the best example! I know you have MTG experience too, so you know what I mean. How minions attack is different in HS compared to other TCGs/CCGs.

Ramp druid doesn't rely on FON/Savage, I think you mean Token? Without power of the wild and savage roar, token would be pointless for sure. But in general for druid, without FON/Savage roar, druid would still be a thing, would just kill off the token and midrangey archetype imo

I still disagree that Miracle is a gimmick deck (and this is an unbias opinion, not just a Miracle rogue fanboy defending his fave deck if it maybe seems that way^^). The deck does fight for board control and is 1/3 minions. It's midrange in essence, and does have a few win conditions outside of leeroy. I've won tonnes of games without shadowsteps and leeroy, so I don't think it falls flat without the leeroy one turn kill, but hey, this is just my opinion and I could be very wrong. An example that comes to mind is vs shaman and zoo, you dont even need gadgetzan in those matchups to win, or leeroy. Those 2 matchups are favored for miracle IMO heavily, I've destroyed countless shamans and zoos with just removal/minions.

My definition of a gimmick is probably different from yours, gimmicks are things that work once in a blue moon or have no real weight in the long run. Probably the easiest example I can give is some deck with 30 legendaries, or Malygos decks. They're usually the opposite of competitive or viable. Idk, I could be wrong though, that's just how I view the word gimmick.



Aren't Zoo and handlock technically gimmicks then? They both abuse warlock hero power. If lifetap didn't behave like it does now, or was changed somehow, handlock would die and zoo would be extremely less viable. It's why warlock is OP. Even though both lock decks are extremely strong, are they gimmicky by that definition? On a side note, IMO removing Doomguard from zoo would make Zoo WAY WAY less powerful and snowbally, that card is ridiculously OP, I sometimes feel like zoo is a gimmick, albeit extremely powerful, so I can see what you mean. Come to think of it, there are some classes that if you removed one card from their arsenal, would make it way less powerful. Hunters with tracking is another example. Freeze mage with no iceblock etc. Do you really think all these are gimmicks? Most decks have a win condition. Hunters want their highmanes, freeze mage wants ice blocks and alex, fast druids want their force combo, warrior wants grom. Without being extremely far ahead on board, which rarely happens, most classes need certain cards to form win conditions. Albeit board control is a win condition in itself, but s there anything wrong with a win condition coming from certain cards/combos, when they are not OTKs? I personally don' think so

My head hurts from thinking too much this late :L

Tar.Aldarion

although I can see that some of those are somewhat gimmicky, freeze mage especially (they've stated that it could be a problem and they are keeping an eye on it), most others are much less so than rogue imo, I just don't lose to rogues that didn't finish with Leeroy. Maybe with rogue myself learning it vs you dunno haha. It's a complete matter of what you draw, not what they do. You get it or you don't and without leeroy the deck would be hit very hard, would losing gadgetzan be even worse though? For me vancleef is never a finisher because most decks have hard removal sitting in hand not being used until he comes out.

JaffOs

I discovered something interesting with the shamans new card, its great againts Van Cleef, it brings it back without its buff so it effectively is another silence for buffed cards. This is why I love shaman for the versatility of there cards.

Seifer

Kirby wrote: »

I feel people aren't understanding what gimmick actually means.

What do you think gimmick means?

Picking the first definition off Google: "a trick or device intended to attract attention, publicity, or trade." None of which a miracle rogue deck is. There are other definitions listed but none of them support the point you're trying to make. Just because you think it relies on one card heavily (it doesn't, it's the cycling that matters as Ramza said) doesn't make it a gimmick.

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

For me vancleef is never a finisher because most decks have hard removal sitting in hand not being used until he comes out.

Concealed VanCleef can be a bitch.

Nody

JaffOs wrote: »

I discovered something interesting with the shamans new card, its great againts Van Cleef, it brings it back without its buff so it effectively is another silence for buffed cards. This is why I love shaman for the versatility of there cards.

I've seen it used on the Egg; pops a 4/4 and you get a second egg for a second 4/4.

Seifer wrote: »

Concealed VanCleef can be a bitch.

It's one turn of damage; if the Rogue is lucky it's a 10/10. It's the same as me popping down Rag on an empty board or Hellscream with an enabler. I can't recall the last time I saw a VanCleef and went "Damn, I'm screwed" because the only time I see a Miracle rogue kill me is with double or triple Jenkins with possibly Cold Blood or Eviscerate thrown in.

Tar.Aldarion

if people are gonna call it gimmicky, it's definitely because of Gadgetzan and not leeroy.

Seifer

Nody wrote: »

It's one turn of damage; if the Rogue is lucky it's a 10/10. It's the same as me popping down Rag on an empty board or Hellscream with an enabler. I can't recall the last time I saw a VanCleef and went "Damn, I'm screwed" because the only time I see a Miracle rogue kill me is with double or triple Jenkins with possibly Cold Blood or Eviscerate thrown in.

What does one turn of damage mean? Leeroy hitting you for 26 is one turn too.
10/10 VanCleef plus one cold blood and one eviscerate is 18 in one turn. Poison + Blade flurry is another 6.

Obviously he's not nearly as important as Leeroy; some Miracle decks don't even use him but he can still unload a lot of damage in one go.

Nody

Seifer wrote: »

Obviously he's not nearly as important as Leeroy; some Miracle decks don't even use him but he can still unload a lot of damage in one go.

He unloads as a 8/8 or 10/10 at best one turn later (because I'll most likely have removal for him after his one turn of damage if not before); in most cases it's a 6/6 or worse. You also have 1 turn to prepare (taunts, AoE removal/freeze/hex etc.) vs. a charge minion (Jenkins) which you don't know is coming (you can guess it but you don't know) and can't do anything to (you can play taunts but you only have so many after all). Miracle rogue with Van Cleff? Not worried. Miracle rogue with Jenkins? I got pain coming my way.

JaffOs

Nody wrote: »

I've seen it used on the Egg; pops a 4/4 and you get a second egg for a second 4/4.

*Edits Deck* I did hear deathrattle shaman was the new black.

Kirby

The thing about Miracle is that its not really about Leroy and removing him would be a mistake because people would just replace it with Arcane Golem and effectively do the same thing.

The issue is being able to cycle every game for free, and also using shadowstep to play a minion, buff it, attack with it, and then attack with it again in the same turn with ZERO board presence. It's essentially giving rogue windfury which is as insane as it sounds.

If you took out shadowstep, it wouldn't function. To answer Seifer's point, you are wrong. Gadgetzan helps a lot with cycling but if he was gone, Miracle still has other ways to cycle its deck. It would be weaker, but not dead. Shadowstep's removal would eliminate the burst.

I'm not picking on rogues. I play mostly paladin and we have the same thing. That Athene gobsh*te does the same thing all day. Cycles rogue style until he has his OTK in hand. Arcane Golem, Blessing of might it twice and faceless it. 20 damage in one turn.

It's stupid as hell and just as gimmicky because without faceless, the entire deck is worthless. It's a single win condition, just like Miracle. It's not quite as strong because miracle has more consistent removal and better cycling but it's the same principle.

Seifer

Kirby wrote: »

The thing about Miracle is that its not really about Leroy and removing him would be a mistake because people would just replace it with Arcane Golem and effectively do the same thing.

The issue is being able to cycle every game for free, and also using shadowstep to play a minion, buff it, attack with it, and then attack with it again in the same turn with ZERO board presence. It's essentially giving rogue windfury which is as insane as it sounds.

If you took out shadowstep, it wouldn't function. To answer Seifer's point, you are wrong. Gadgetzan helps a lot with cycling but if he was gone, Miracle still has other ways to cycle its deck. It would be weaker, but not dead. Shadowstep's removal would eliminate the burst.

What are you saying I'm wrong about? You still haven't told us what you think gimmick means.

Before you said Leeroy was the core card and now it's shadowstep?

Miracle requires Gadgetzan; he is the core cycler. Using him with preparation allows for huge multi-draw turns.

I run a rogue deck that cycles using loot hoarders, novice engineers, shiv, azure drake, acolyte of pain and aims to finish with the same Leeroy, shadowstep, cold blood combo but it is not a Miracle deck because it doesn't have the core miracle cycle provided by Gadgetzan.

Kirby

Seifer wrote: »

What are you saying I'm wrong about? You still haven't told us what you think gimmick means.

To be frank, I've said it repeatedly. I'm sure people are sick of me explaining it. If you haven't gotten it by now........

Seifer wrote: »

Before you said Leeroy was the core card and now it's shadowstep?

No I didn't. As I've said repeatedly, if you changed Leroy it wouldn't stop the deck being effective. People would just use Arcane Golem. The mechanic would survive. Shadowstep is the crux of it. The charge card is not the problem and people thinking changing Leroy would solve this issue are blind to the actual problem.

Seifer

Kirby wrote: »

To be frank, I've said it repeatedly. I'm sure people are sick of me explaining it. If you haven't gotten it by now........

Maybe you can link to the post where you define the word gimmick and explain how the miracle rogue deck fits that definition? Because I must've missed it.

Kirby

It's on the last page. Not hard to find.

Ramza

VanCleef is a win condition, and has been for me so many times, when you conceal him for an all in play or when you know your opponent just can't deal with it. Miracle would be fine without Leeroy, without Gadgetzan, it wouldn't work in the long run. If you want to nominate a single card that makes Miracle work, then it's auctioneer. But, I don't agree with the opinion that 1 card or a certain combination of cards makes a deck gimmicky. Ramp Druid without wild growth wouldn't be ramp Druid. In fact, in the druid mirror match, the first person to wild growth almost always wins, so is ramp druid a gimmick? I don't think it is, but I could be misunderstanding things.
Other examples I gave in my previous posts with regards to hunters with tracking etc, sure, if you took these cards away the deck would function a lot differently, but it wouldn't kill it. But with Miracle, removing Auctioneer would for sure. Most miracle decks only have 5/6 cantrips outside of auctioneer, it's not enough to rely on.

On the flipside like I said, he's not needed in every matchup as I've won countless games without him, but there are certain matchups where you absolutely need auctioneer, so I suppose it depends how you look at it. Only in certain matchups is it an insta loss if you don't get a gadgetzan going

One of The problems is preparation, that card is insanely OP. Nerfing that would be a big nerf to miracle itself, with auctioneer out it basically becomes 0 mana draw 2 cards and cast a free spell (or draw 3 if you prep > shiv/Fan of knives). Insane.

I personally don't think nerfing shadowstep would change it, Miracle is a lot of things combined. Finding shadowsteps and cycling through your deck to consistently find damage is more important, so I think directly hitting auctioneer would kill the deck. Blizzard have said before they want lots of different deck types to be viable and fun, but right now Miracle is not fun to fight. If they toned down the deck somewhat it would make it more fair and balanced, killing it outright would suck because it is a really solid deck in tournament play and could be brought down on par with other decks, balance wise, instead of outright killing it

Kirby

True about VanCleef. He's usually dealt with it so I didn't really count him as a game ender. He definitely counts though.

nesf

Gimmick decks aren't about having a particular card or two, they're decks that normally have an extremely specific win condition that isn't normally seen (so, e.g. charge+shadowstep or Shaman windfury combo decks). The less fight starting term for them is combo decks but normally you only see "combo deck" applied to decks that actually work. :P

Is Miracle Rogue a gimmick deck? Depends on whether you want to annoy Rogue players I guess...

Cuddlesworth

Or shade of Noxramus, windfury, faceless and rockbiter. Son of a bitch.

Nody

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

Or shade of Noxramus, windfury, faceless and rockbiter. Son of a bitch.

Leeroy + Power Overwhelming + Faceless; wins me more games as Handlock then my giants

nesf

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

Or shade of Noxramus, windfury, faceless and rockbiter. Son of a bitch.

Yup, the key though is only Rogue at the moment has the card draw ability to build a deck around a combo like that. For everyone else it's throw in a Leeroy and a Power Overwhelming or whatever as a second win condition in case you draw them but your deck will normally win without using this combo.


Ramza is completely correct, the issue is simply Rogue's reliable card draw in Auctioneer + Conceal which turn Prep + Shadowstep + Stuff from nice if you draw them to borderline OP. I don't see an easy way for Blizzard to tweak this as low cost spells are a class feature for Rogue and making Auctioneer once per turn would turn it instantly into junk. I lean towards Conceal being the issue here as screwing that a bit would hurt the fewest amount of other decks but nerfing conceal would do horrible things to Miracle Rogue's win rate not a simple bringing it back towards normality.

Tar.Aldarion

Maybe conceal could lower the life total for a turn or some other random nerf that doesn't increase its cost. Even at 2 mana that would be a huge nerf.

Ramza

Yeah conceal is definitely a big player in the effectiveness and success of Miracle, indeed I've won games without it (have cycled tonnes of cards with preps etc and no conceal, when I had no other options), but overall conceal is a big addition and neccesity of the deck. If you don't draw it with your auctioneer it's not the end of the world, but it definitely helps in a big way.

Seifer

Seifer wrote: »

Maybe you can link to the post where you define the word gimmick and explain how the miracle rogue deck fits that definition? Because I must've missed it.

Kirby wrote: »

It's on the last page. Not hard to find.

Didn't think so; thanks for playing though.

Just FYI this is a definition: gimmick
And the Miracle rogue deck fits that in no way.

BeerWolf

Christ I suck at this game... playing in Nexx, I'm getting trashed by that Widow that just spams her friggin hero ability doing damage according to the amount of cards I got in hand

nesf

Seifer wrote: »

Just FYI this is a definition: gimmick
And the Miracle rogue deck fits that in no way.

That's a dictionary definition. Dictionary definitions of words aren't exactly very useful when it comes to CCG jargon, or jargon in general.

Gimmick in CCGs refers to a very specific way in which the deck either functions or is made. So Zoo cannot use many spells and needs tons of creatures that aren't colour/class specific. Ramp decks need to "cheat" the usual resource building that limits the speed of other decks. Crucially, they must differ markedly from "standard" deck archetypes and must be noticeably different to what's considered a "normal deck build". Usually the deck heavily leverages some mechanic, e.g. the old Warrior OTK deck which combined the Warrior's ability to give Charge with cheap giants.

Normally, after they've become accepted, they stop being called gimmick decks and get their own name. E.g. OTK Giants or Miracle Rogue or whatever. They're still gimmick decks though, they require to be built around some very, very narrow design principle. Ramp druid requires Wild Growth and maybe Nourish sure but it also has very specific mana curves attached to it, it's not merely a regular Druid midrange or control deck with 2 x Wild Growth added.


Some people throw around gimmick like it's a bad word in CCGs really it just means a deck has an extremely strong theme in how it was constructed when talking in the most general terms. Murloc Warlock is a good example, it's a gimmick deck simply because, well, it's a Murloc deck and really stands out from more typical ways to build decks in Hearthstone.

Nody

BeerWolf wrote: »

Christ I suck at this game... playing in Nexx, I'm getting trashed by that Widow that just spams her friggin hero ability doing damage according to the amount of cards I got in hand

Cheap mana cost rush deck (i.e. all cards costing 4 or less mana, Murloc is perfect for it)