NERFS WERE ANNOUNCED! Read more here!
Keep in mind that we do NOT have an official English confirmation that it’s true yet, so take it with a grain of salt!
Apparently, China Gold Series (the biggest tournament circuit in China, somewhat similar to HS Grandmasters in the west) group stage is starting on December 20th, and the initial deck submission deadline was December 15th. But it was moved to 19th because of the upcoming nerf patch, which is supposed to drop tomorrow (18th).
You can find the source below. But, of course, we’re still waiting for the official English confirmation, which, we would imagine, should come very soon. Unless they will drop the patch with no prior announcement, but that would be interesting and unheard of so far.
Probably better to share the context too:
Gold Series finals group stages begin 20 Dec, deck submission was 15 Dec.
This message is informing players when the patch is dropping and when the new deck submission deadline is.— Chua Zhihong (@czhihong) December 17, 2019
Update: The patch was delayed until tomorrow.
Nerfing shaman but leaving rogue as it is. Good f#$@ing job. And now there won’t be any changes until 2020.
when will it get online? oppened the app but everything looks the same for now.
i don’t want to play before the nerfs.
Ugh; last year’s nerfs on my Birthday were HORRIBLE;
No Deja Wu, please.
If they had no intention of announcing what the nerfs were before launching them I almost wish they hadn’t told us to expect them… I mean after all this meta could have been a lot like when Shudderwock Shaman was going crazy and then burnt out.
“How long can this go on?”
-Saronite Chain Gang
Nerfing something before the Meta had setteled is never a good idea. As we have learned in the past. You probably have to do it again.
Not communicating about it is even worse. And disrespectfull to the whole playerbase.
From people saving dust to get their hands on the best cards or the one deck they can afford, to pro-players preparing for a tournament.
While it is so easy. And rewarding when you do..
I agree too that the idea to announce nerfs only for Shaman so early is too risky.
Now, we already have three decks from three classes that seems to be very strong with so much aggressiveness…
If Shaman goes from tier0 to tier 2 or lower meta will face a huge problem with no real midrange deck and a very few slower decks like Highlander Mage or Handlock (?) that will be playable only on high legend rank.
The fast and aggressive decks are a big part of HS but is this what the majority really wants ?!
In fact, I can’t understand how the devs translate the word “fun”… Is not fun to play against decks that highroll a lot (deathrattle rogue aka quest rogue v2.0) and can win in 4th round without any interaction to be possible (face hunter).
If they only fix 2-3 problematic cards from Shaman and the mutate highrolls would be fine.
But I’ve never seen in HS a tier0 and some tier1 decks to survive from nerfs!
Always, they went from being unstoppable to oblivion !!!
I think that HS is stιll on “ER”…
When they started in the middle of this year possitive changes in the end of it they turned around again, e.g. adding wild cards was nice idea but bad implementation. Same goes for creating BG, was very wrong time to bring it in Blizzcon (I think more earlier could be better), cause they couldn’t focus and do right moves on HS core game let alone to have many problems on different modes same time.
I don’t believe and haven’t convinced that Blizzard overall wants to be back where was in the past old good days… They just pretend that they want to…
I only hope that will interact in good way next year when they will have infront of them the real problem that is coming soon… aka Riot!
The fact that they haven’t announced what the balance changes will be makes me think they’re still fussing over the finishing touches.
Significantly, the win rates have evolved since the shaman nerfs were anounced, with Hunter climbing to be neck and neck with Shaman at the top, with Warrior as a (very) distant third.
With the way things are looking, if Shaman gets nerfed and Hunter doesn’t, Shamanstone might just be replaced with Hunterstone. Will Hunter see nerfs as well? Or will Hunter slingshot to the top once again, as they did after the Warrior, Mage and Priest nerfs from Saviors of Uldum?
Face Hunter is way easier to counter than Shaman so after nerfs will see more tech cards to survive Hunter’s aggression.
Yeah, I also think that’s the case. The truth is that this patch comes too early. Nerfing something before the meta has settles is not the best idea, because that thing might not be AS overpowered as it immediately seemed, and other too powerful decks might be discovered that might also warrant a nerf.
But they didn’t want everyone to quit over Shaman so they had to take drastic measures. I hope that if something won’t work out and one OP deck will be replaced by another OP deck, they won’t be scared to act again after 2-3 weeks.
It would not count as unprecedented:
they did the exact same thing last year at this very time too.
Except last year they announced the nerfs out of the blue on the very same day.
You’re right, I forgot about it – the changes were announced like less than 10 hours before the patch has dropped if I remember correctly.
will there also be updates and changes on battlegrounds? i only play hs to do quests honestly lol.
In the past time, once every two weeks there was an update on BG. The last update was that the murloc that creates other murlocs went to tier 5.
I guess there will be more updates in the future, but for the balance patch today (or tomorrow) will only be for constructed.
No BG changes were announced, we had Primalfin Lookout nerf in a recent hotfix, and I don’t suspect seeing more BG changes until after Christmas. But they might always surprise us and take this opportunity to slip in some nerfs/buffs.
it’s better than a ugly galakrond chaman, deathrattle rogue face hunter.
Prepare 2-3 days of Meta in one day? Good luck…