My gamer persona is extremely one
dimensional, I only play one game and that game is Magic: The Gathering. To be
fair there are a lot of sub games within Magic and I will venture between any
and all formats to get some more variety (minus casual/edh). I am not sure if
my approach to games and gaming is different than most other people but it
seems to be different than the majority of my Magic friends since they
generally play at least one other game if not several.
So despite passing on the World of Warcraft
TCG and PC, League of Legends, Heroclix, Pokemon, L5R, Netrunner, Warmachine
and all manner of other paper, metal and electronic games why did I give
Hearthstone a try? Timing is part of it; I had been planning on buying a new
PC/Laptop so that I could play MODO. I guess that I need to mention that I have
taken my viewpoint of only playing Magic so far as to classify MODO as a
different game. I am often asked when and how I test for Magic events…well the
answer is that generally speaking I don’t. Most of my testing is done by
reading articles, researching metagames and by mentally playing out games. Back
on point, my search for a laptop has been slow mostly because I have been
waiting for a good deal to jump out at me. So after months of seeing Facebook
posts and comments regarding Hearthstone I downloaded the game on my IPad. It
didn’t take much more than that until I was running through the Arena and
making my way up the ladder despite not knowing what on earth was going on. People
seemed really bad at the game and I had a lot of fun just making bad decks and
killing people. Winning is fun…even if your opponents are bad (at least for a
little while).
Eventually, I started to hit a wall where
people were doing things that were much more powerful than me and I started to
see people playing legends/mythics that I had never seen before. When these
cards got played I would bemoan the power level of the card and disconnect or
let myself time out as revenge for my opponent having access to stronger cards
than me. Aside - On the plus side for my
opponent you time out very quickly in Hearthstone, so I am sure this was little
more than a minor inconvenience for them. I had previously done some
reading on how to get as much free gold out of the game as possible, so I was
gladly battling away at Arena trying to make my entries neutral + the free pack
of cards. I got quite a few cards this way and when I started looking into
decks I saw that there was basically only one constructed deck choice that
could be easily built with no money needing to be spent on buying packs. I
disenchanted all the cards I wouldn’t be using and built Warlock Zoo minus 2
cards.
My early Hearthstone experiences are remarkably
similar to those that new Magic players may find themselves in. It has been a
long time since card availability has been an issue for me in Magic. Nowadays I
have a huge network of friends who can lend me cards as and when I need them.
Or alternately, I will pony up the money if I think the card is vital to my
performance at a particular event. I also realized that my frustration at
seeing overly powerful cards being utilized against me was again one that new
Magic players also have to deal with.
So with the above as a backdrop Warlock Zoo
became my weapon of choice. It holds a lot of similarities with Burn/Zoo/Sligh
decks in Magic. I was drawn to the deck not only because of the low barrier to
entry but also because it would allow me to finish games quicker and log up
more games in a shorter time period. Do you remember when you first started
playing Magic? I do and I remember wanting to play as many games as possible, I
felt the same way about Hearthstone.
Playing Warlock Zoo brought back a lot of the
passion that I had for turning guys sideways in Magic. Over the years I have
lost a lot of that desire as I discovered the joys of control decks, combo
decks and tempo decks. It has been a long time since I have played a balls to
the wall aggro deck in Magic. Thankfully between a perceived hole in the
metagame and my newly restored love of attacking I took a mono red aggro deck
to SCG Invitational Columbus Ohio.
I have talked up the game to quite a few
Magic players and this is essentially what I want to convey:
Pros
1.
“Free”
a.
The cost to download the game
$0
b.
The cost to play games against
other players $0
c.
The cost to buy booster packs
100 Gold or $1.49
d.
The cost to Arena 150 Gold or
$1.99
i. Your first entry is 100% free
e.
You get 10 gold for every 3 wins
f.
You can get between 40-100 free
gold for completing a daily quest
g.
If you complete a quest every
day you can essentially go infinite if you are moderately good at Arena
2.
IPad
a.
The IPad interface is what MODO
and Duel of the Planeswalkers wishes it could be
b.
No PC/Laptop needed
3.
Pick up and put down
a.
You only play 1 game against an
opponent so your games are over relatively quickly
b.
You can “draft” an arena deck
and play 1 game and not play again for 3 days
c.
I often play while sitting on
the sofa watching TV with my wife, the multi-tasking aspect is very nice
4.
Magic skills can be honed and
utilized
a.
While you cannot hone a lot of
the nuanced skills that I have learnt in Magic, Hearthstone has been a great
resource for me to practice race math on (especially utilizing Warlock Zoo)
5.
Magic Break
a.
As much as I love Magic I think
that taking a break every now and then actually improves my game. While taking
a break it is hard to go cold turkey and playing Hearthstone functions as a
nice exercise while you are away from the game
6.
Card Evaluations
a.
Evaluating cards in Hearthstone
has led me to revaluate some cards in Magic which is a useful exercise that too
few Magic players do
Cons
1.
It isn’t magic
a.
The game play is simply not as
involved and interesting as Magic, which is partly because Hearthstone is
basically Portal Magic which in magic terms is about 16 years out-of-date.
Hearthstone isn’t anywhere close to
replacing Magic (for me) but I will continue to recommend it to Magic players and I
think Magic players will continue to flock to it.
-Cheers-
PS – Wizards please stop hating on Apple
products.
