Hearthstone Hunter too 'dominant' for comfort, says Blizzard

Blizzard says it found the Hunter in Hearthstone is becoming too dominant, and has made a slight change to one of its most powerful cards to even the odds.

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Hearthstone has been on PC for months, but the iPad version expanded the player base and has had some impact on the meta-game. Recently, some fans have been griping about the Hunter class being overpowered, and Blizzard signaled its agreement with a small change to one of its signature cards.

In an update on the official forum, Blizzard said the Hunter decks have become "increasingly more dominant and are doing better than we are comfortable across many levels of play." But the studio isn't taking a wild swing, and has instead changed a minor aspect of just one card. "Unleash the Hounds," which grants the Hunter a charged hound for every enemy minion on the board, now costs three mana instead of two.

"We do like the idea of decks that have a really big turn and pull off a sweet combo, but when playing against Hunter decks, you may feel punished too much for playing minions," the post reads. "Playing minions is one of the key, fun pieces of the overall Hearthstone puzzle, and feeling like your options are limited by the opponent creates a play experience that may not be particularly enjoyable."

Players on the forum seem skeptical that the change is enough, as some are calling for a higher cost or others for the card to be removed altogether. Blizzard says it only wants to make changes when they're "completely necessary," which probably means they'll watch the stats to see if this change had the desired effect before changing anything else.

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  • reply
    May 7, 2014 1:30 PM

    Steve Watts posted a new article, Hearthstone Hunter too 'dominant' for comfort, says Blizzard.

    Blizzard says it found the Hunter in Hearthstone is becoming too dominant, and has made a slight change to one of its most powerful cards to even the odds.

    • reply
      May 7, 2014 1:33 PM

      Probably a good idea. Greatly increases the cost of the double release the hounds From 4-6 and still allows for decent combos with alpha wolf or starving buzzard, just can't have all 3 till 5 mana.

    • reply
      May 8, 2014 7:17 AM

      Charge is just such a powerful mechanic. (Like haste in Magic). Hearthstone feels like it rewards you for getting your damage in when you can. Given that you can't play spells on your opponents turn, when you play a non-charge minion, you're "hoping" it survives to the next turn so it can actually attack. Worse, they may play a taunt creature which would negate the direct damage route you were planning all along.

      Most of my decks are built around charge at this point. I play cards like wolf rider, reckless rocketeer and stormwind knight a lot. I wish I had a king krush, that seems like a good "top end" for that style of deck, but I've yet to crack one, and it'll be a LONG while before I gather 1600 dust.

      • reply
        May 8, 2014 2:48 PM

        The problem with this is that the only health point that matters is the last one. You can nuke someone down to 1HP but if you're trading badly because of it they get more and more likely to take board control and card advantage. Once you're in that position it's very hard to win.

        Not saying charge isn't good, but charge decks are good for rushing but if you don't kill them quick you get more and more likely to loose.

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