For me this game is casual, very casual and for just like WoW, I don't want to spend a lot of time experimenting with class builds, which over there has been simplified greatly. Bottom line I want to quickly identify something that works and use it.
I had been doing best with a Mage, so I found
this page, used that build, read about the author's control strategy and started winning a significantly higher percentage of my games against the A.I. and real players. It's enjoyable, but is it something I'm going to invest in, competition or $$ wise? Unlikely. It's casual very casual for me. Now what I might do, is go find a suggested deck and strategy for another class and play with that a little.
One of the pages I read about at a Hearthstone related link was the concept of control versus aggro/rush strategy. I'm definitely playing a control game, a strategy that maintains minion dominance through slow, but steady control, versus using mass quantities of low mana cards to overwhelm the other player early in the game. I looked for advice on a basic deck for doing this and could not find one without crafting or buying cards. Hmm, another strike as I have no real inclination to craft playing cards. As it is, the grind for earn gold (by winning matches) to buy more card packs feels excessive for the amount of time I want to devote to the game.
I know that
Blizzard Watch her published a couple of class-based guides for building an optimal deck.
Thanks for the link, but did not see any decks over there, not I spent a lot of time looking. They did not pop,out for me.
I've spent probably $200 or so on Hearthstone since it came out, between the two adventures, expansion, and various packs over time. I feel I can definitively say, it's not pay-to-win.
Yes, you end up getting access to cards faster, but it's completely moot if you don't know how to best use those cards in conjunction with other cards. Likewise, as with any other card game, RNG plays a factor too, and knowing how to best mitigate the RNG (or harness it in your favor) is also key to victory.
At the start of every "season" (monthly Play-mode ladder reset), skilled players are shuffled higher up in the ladder, so newer players will encounter them more often. You'll also occasionally have folks coming back after a hiatus with more cards, etc.
You can also look into Arena, where everyone is on an even playing field, since you choose cards from a random draw to build a deck to play with. There's still tremendous skill and RNG involved here, but there's no issue of card collection size.
I wouldn't give up if you've had a couple rough games here and there. The game is excellent once you get your head around it. Worst case, wear out practice mode, or invest in the adventures/expansion and do that single-player content to help build your card collection.
Thanks for the insight. That's the key to my criticism, is that this is a card game, and if you have special cards it's like having an extra ace up your sleeve playing poker, which would be cheating.
And if you can buy extra aces, there is a real problem for me at least when it comes to match making and who you play. In my opinion, beside card play, part of the skill should primarily come from having a large but consistent deck pool for any two players, who get to build a deck from the same content. Once players can buy extra unique cards it seems like the way way blizzard makes money, but gives an unfair advantage. I say that not knowing the limits of match making as far as how it matches up player win rates, versus comparative decks. Obviously I'm not in the spirit of how this game works.
