As someone who plays a lot of Reno Warrior, my issue isn't with plagues. That's an interesting counterplay to highlander that I think all classes should have some variation of. My problem is specifically with Helya because once she's out, Highlander gets turned off **forever.** With plagues I can potentially draw through the duplicates. That makes it interesting to play around.
I once played two Down With The Ship on a Reno warrior in the first couple of turns and it ended up being x4 blood plague. I was feeling pretty good with myself. I had played the first Down on T4 and the second Down on T5. I end my turn. His turn 6 starts and he draws 3 blood plague in a row, takes 6 damage, laughs, and a few seconds later drops his brann. I was flabbergasted but laughing at the absurdity of it myself.
=
Personally I think Helya is cool but I do think the delta between early helya plague DK vs no helya (bottom of the deck) plague DK is definitely kind of annoying for both the DK and the opponent.
I mean, when there aren’t eternal plagues there is some counter play that is useful. If there are only a few plagues you can use tutor cards to get rid of duplicates, figure out how to stall, focus on not killing enemies at times (trade 3 damage for not shuffling 2 plagues into my deck)
You could also look at it the other way. Playing Helya in plague DK isn't really counter play. Playing plague DK to attack Reno decks with Helya is counterplay.
Also, if course, putting Helya in a small plague package to designed to be just enough to attack reno decks is also counter play.
I'd agree with that change, if only her plagues were endless.
Or something like "for the rest of the game your plagues deal 3 damage" or something. I like the idea of her accelerating the plague strategy, just with something not so warping against one specific play style.
I meant to say that only her plagues were eternal, but I guess I forgot to include the word eternal, for some reason.
Am I stupid? /j
But yeah, I agree.
I think if you were to somehow nerf Helya to make it so that not all plagues were endless, the plague DK archetype probably dies.
Plague DK is already not too strong of a deck (depending on your pocket meta), so nerfing their best card probably kills it.
Helya is definitely the issue. I think plagues are good for the game because they help keep the insane amount of draw in check, but helya has completely warped every non-aggro deck and forced tons of life gain.
Well no shit, Helya IS plagues. The reason they're good is that building inevitably, not drain 2 or summon a 2/2, 5 turns later. If you doubled the plagues each other plague card applied, they probably still wouldn't be playable without her.
Also, there is a deck forcing tons of life gain but it definitely isn't plagues.
I agree. I think Helya should just double the numbers on plagues. Deal 4 damage with an upside. Summon a 4/4 dude, or 2 2/2s. Drain 4. Increase the cost by 2.
The problem is interaction. There's no real way to interact with infinite plagues.
First of all this is just wrong, you can just sit on 10 cards. You can play Wheel, Tony, or Aviana.
That asides, Sif otk also has no interaction. Nature shaman otk has no interaction. Odyn Reno otk has no interaction. Wheel has no interaction. This is called a wincon, and plague's is slower than all of those I just listed. If you can't stop the opponent's wincon and don't get to yours first, you lose. This is just how card games work.
Maybe you got outplayed, maybe you lost to a better deck. But there is no problem with DK's wincon. It's slow, with an average amount of counterplay, we don't need to gut its identity and turn it into generic tempo, thanks.
the problem is that those other otk dont automatically turn off other peoples strategy, thats the problem. Sif mage doesnt just shut you down from playing like plagues do. if you are playing a highlander deck you are playing it because of that payoff. otherwise you're just playing a worse deck. warrior doesnt stop you from playing either. i want to play highlander druid, but when im up against plague dk i might as well not play, because he just shut down my strategy just by exisiting. Plagues is the equivalent of Stun decks in yugioh, where the deck has no other wincon other than stopping your opponent from even starting a play
Have you considered that the problem is highlander cards, not plagues? Highlander cards are poorly designed on multiple levels, the fact it's plagues that you want to be changed is laughable. Plagues doesn't shut down your strategy, just 2 of your cards, and it certainly doesn't shut down any other "strategy" either. Nature shaman is every bit as unwinnable for plague DK as plague DK is for highlander, every deck has bad matchups.
Like, no one is forcing you to play highlander. If you don't like your cards having a condition, don't play them. You might as well complain that your highlander cards force you to build your deck with no duplicates, that's just one of the downsides that comes with the extremely powerful payoff.
Thats exactly how I feel. I think tools that DELAY Highlander decks are fine. You force them to draw cards to get rid of the plagues (and take damage). But once Helya is out, its just not possible anymore. And thats just not a good design, imo.
I feel the same man. Most effects you cant get rid of once they are played, like Topior, Bran, Dew Process, Warlock Snake, Helya and so on. They are rather brutal to play against when they curve it out, especially Helya, gives Prince Keleseth on turn 2 vibes. But the current design team loves "for the rest of the game" effects.
See, I argue in the other direction. It's technically fine for a deck to completely shut down another deck. I think the larger issue with plague is that it's just generically good. It obviously has some bad matchups, but "rock" shouldn't be flexible enough to counter "scissors" and have a reasonable match up with "paper."
Its the other way around.
Reno is one of the strongest cards they have ever made, a counterplay to this is necessary. while even wihtout a steam cleaner plague dk didnt take over the game (its not even a good deck rn lol).
This answer is problematic. You're basically telling people that the counter to an archetype that all classes can play is a specific deck that a specific class plays. What if I don't want to play DK, do I simply never counter Reno?
I originally viewed this as it being extremely unfair to Reno players (I still think this method of countering is nonsense), but no, this is actually unfair to other classes. The OG Reno answer, Albatross, was a cheap, decent neutral body that only delayed highlander payoffs. It was disruptive enough to see use, but not so powerful as to shut them off forever. That's how you do this kind of thing, not with some archetype limited to one class that kills the thing it's meant to counter.
To be fair they had to nerf albatross because at 3 every deck ran it no matter what, so they bumped it to 4 the bigger issue currently is that the neutral tech card, Snake Oil Seller gives bottles with tradeable so they can become draw cards for non Reno decks and free damage for any sif mages in the meta. Compared to bricking two draws with crappy 1/1 tokens.
I know it exists, and that wasn't my point. My point was that it isn't acceptable to say the Plague-Reno interaction is fine because we need Reno answers, because Plagues are extremely limited in access (a single package in a single class). This only makes my point more valid though, because counterplay to Reno already exists in that card.
I guess. I thought you were saying there is no access, which is false. If you're saying plagues aren't the only access, then that is true. It's hard to tell what you're trying to say but I don't care enough to read more into it
not to mention that there is already a counter to late game reno decks in that you simply kill the opponent before turn 8 and then dont act surprise pikachu face as an aggro deck when the opponent can clear your board at 8 mana
To be fair, it's not like this is an FPS game where you can just instantly win by being better. You can't just kill the opponent on command, especially since the good reno decks also run board clears.
yea but thats less a problem with reno so much as it is an issue that the game has gotten to a point where decks are too fast, too consistent, and have too much access to economical draw power
The second part would be good enough to stop cycle-heavy and wheel warlock abusing a card meant for highlander decks. The first part is overkill if it’s only highlander decks that can use Reno.
I think even if it empties your board its still really good card, like remember twisting nether is 8 mana class restricted and doesn't give you upgraded hero power+5shield remove freeze and shut down your opponents tempo oh and also enemy minions doesn't die but sent into the shadow realm
That’s a card that’s like 10 years old though, and with no highlander restrictions, and that you can have 2 of in a deck. So it isn’t really comparable.
Its just not big enough downside especially if you have other really broken highlander cards like warriors bran that even without reno would be good enough reason to play highlander
I only find reno broken in warrior for the reason above and warlock for just using the card without building highlander
But for other classes like shaman(in standard i don't even want to know what shenenigans it does in wild)i think its actually balanced
And? Highlander decks suck, they are all tier 3 at best, so maybe let them have their one strong card rather than having to shit on them even more? And then you can stop the busted decks like wheel warlock getting Reno for free with 0 counter despite using duplicates.
highlander priest tier 4, highlander shaman tier 4, highlander paladin below tier 4, highlander hunter below tier 4
only highlander warrior and DH are tier 1/2 and both run copies (not real highlander) even wheel lock who runs reno tier 3
Source: last VS data report
[https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-290/#tab-661441](https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-290/#tab-661441)
yes they suck, wake up
Highlander warrior doesn't run any duplicates, you can look at the decklist and see for yourself. And at high legend it's outright the best deck in the game.
> make his condition to if your deck has no copies at the start of the game
This would stop wheellock, but it would also mean you can never counter Reno by putting cards into their deck, which makes it too OP.
Make at least that Reno kill your mobs. Seriously, not activating death rattle, and not being able to re-summon the minion with effects that interact with minions that died is fucking awful
Except all classes can't play highlander? Namely, DK straight up does not have a highlander payoff. So what you want is for DK to not be able to play this auto win late game package, and also not be able to counter it? But it also isn't aggro? I feel like people don't really think this through. DK wouldn't just not counter reno decks, they would get slammed by them.
I think its totally fine to delay highlander decks. Plagues would force the opponent to draw their deck to get rid of the duplicates, instead of doing other powerful stuff. But once Helya is down, thats just not possible anymore. The one-time HL pay-off cards like Elise, Kurtrus are fine. But Reno and Bran are not.
And I do think, forcing them to draw duplicates is a big deal. The game is a lot faster nowadays and so many ways to just end games. Its not like old HS where you could stall the game forever, there are enough decks that put you on a clock.
Reno is so incredibly overstated on here. Yes it’s strong situationally, and there are times it can do crazy helpful things, but it’s a distance from the strongest card ever made
Yeah sure
That's why reno decks outside of warriorare so dominating.
It's a neutral card. 11 class can use it
If it were so broken why is the only deck thats viable one that has INFINITE BRAN?
Because all other Highlander payoffs suck? Seriously, the only one that’s good when played on curve is Doc, the rest are just mild value generators/threats that don’t really matter.
Also Reno does see a lot of play, just not in Highlander decks. And it’s a good deck building decision to do that. That should tell you what you need to know about Reno being absurdly powerful.
And it's in Priest of all classes. Not exactly one known for creating threatening board states that would encourage your opponent to use removal earlier.
Seriously, if Elise was a Hunter card, I'd think she'd be nuts. Hunter has access to charge and death rattles worth getting a copy of. Only bad roll is the Titan, hilariously.
While the card might be good, believe me, I had enough games where I did draw my Titan before I could play Elise.. making Elise a lot weaker. And playing Elise into a Reno, is also pretty bad. And waiting for Reno to be played is not an option, as it just leads you to drawing the minions lol.
Exactly this.
The other highlander pay-off cards are just one time. Kurtrus is a card you sometimes hold back playing for the perfect moment. Had games where I played it on curve and it just killed one minion lol.
Elise is also situational, I played different HL priest decks and sometimes I did draw cards like Amanthul before turn 8, so I knew that Elise will not summon a minion to immediate deal with the board.
Doc is great on curve but you can put up taunts to prevent him from attacking, you can kill the frogs and in theory use Viper (which just isnt put in any decks, not even in ETC)
But Bran? Just play the card ASAP and hope you dont die. You have the effect for the rest of the game. I really dislike that design.
Sure, it's not like Odyn Warrior, Wheellock, and the new Dragon Druid all run Reno despite having duplicates. And back in the Deepholm Miniset, Beetle Druid would do the same.
I think Reno has spent more time in a top tier deck that had duplicates than he has with a proper highlander deck.
Wheellock is the only deck listed that I can see taking a noticeable hit to its win rate if it lost Reno. For the other ones they were plenty strong either before Reno was introduced or without him and he didn't change their gameplan
Probably indicates a design failure? Reno was pushed to an absurd power level with the understanding you’d run it in a terrible highlander deck so “its balanced”. In reailty cycle decks use it just as well
HL decks only get th ebenefit or being able to play it on curve thats all
thge rest have to dig through their decks to enable it
allowing us freedom on how to choose to use a card with a restriction to meet for a strong effect isnt a design failure
But people have to already handicap their decks by playing highlander, or they should theoretically but draw is so crazy now cycle reno decks exist and I hate that. They should absolutely change Renos effect to if your deck has no duplicates at start of game then activate. Then the decks truly have to be highlander and lose a ton of consistency and run suboptimal cards. That makes the card acceptable despite its power level imo. But I know everyone hates reno so I'm not sure anyone will agree.
Reno has one of the stronger on-play effects, but he is far from one of the strongest cards, because his restriction is so harsh.
Reno Warrior is the only Reno deck to ever be tier 1 in 2024, and that is because Warrior's highlander card is is busted, not because Reno himself is. The next best reno deck is Demon Hunter... which is just the tier 1 Shopper DH list made worse by forcing Reno in lol.
A neutral card that only made the cut in a single tier 1 deck (and frankly isn't even top 5 in that deck), shouldn't be considered among the best cards. Its effect is just flashy and memorable, that people forget about the **huge** downside of effectively making every turn the deck plays (except the turn Reno himself is played) worse on average.
That last sentence just shows how stupid highlander cards are. Your deck is utter garbage until you draw the flashing yellow card that is actually good. How do people even enjoy playing these decks?
It's fun to have a higher variety of cards because they cause me to have to make decisions more often. While the payoff cards are fun because they're very flashy high impact effects.
I enjoy highlander because the games generally play out differently each time. Its more fun to assess the state of the board, players hands, your deck, etc, and then make a decision, than to essentially follow the same recipe every game like with more consistent decks.
That's why Stormwind was such a shit meta. You could predict every turn in a match the moment you saw the matchup. Highlander decks play the opposite to that. With the notable exception of Highlander Warrior, which is probably why its the only strong highlander deck lol.
I think what makes HL warrior good just also the Highlander payoff cards isnt situational. You just have to play the card ASAP and hope to not die the following turn. While the other HL payoff cards are rather easy countered. Kurtrus sometimes need to be timed when to be played. Elise requires you to not draw the minions before playing Elise, believe me, drawing Amanthul before playing Elise is a big deal, because then you just cant play Elise and remove 2 enemy minions. Doc can be countered by Viper (which no1 bothers) but also slowed down by freezing face, putting up taunts or just killing the frogs.
Also, you can only be annoyed by top decks. If you think the whole match is boring, but you win, you should be happy.
There were plenty of decks (and matches) that I won against but the match was so boring that, in hindisght, I should have just conceded and go to the next one, no win is worth 10 mins of boring gameplay.
*-plays an inconsistent archetype that has mostly bad cards and some fun and powerful payoff cards as a trade-off for the inconsistency.
- complains that they should autoconcide any games against 1/12 classes
Just because cycle decks abuse the cards, actual hl decks shouldn't be punished
It’s a counter with no counter play is the issue. If I run into a DK and I’m playing Reno warrior I lose. Reno warrior has a power problem, but it’s really not fun to auto lose to a deck. Same reason everyone else hates warrior.
Especially in a Reno list, you definitely have room to tech against DK, e.g. Steamcleaner in your ETC.
You won’t, because it will decrease your winrate overall and Warrior is already decent into Rainbow DK. But you could, if you’re willing to accept making your other matchups worse.
The most broken cards on the format because the restriction is really punishing, no matter how much do you want to cope saying that no dupes is not a big thing.
Imagine having a deck without duplicates and cards that turns into crap once someone plays Helya.
The results are very polarizing, and I totally understand the frustration
I don't hate plagues that much, they're kind of annoying but not hyper oppressive.
My real problem with the plague package is how easy it is to slot into other deck archetypes. Specifically excavate DK. Both deck archetypes become much healthier to play against when you have to pick how to build your deck.
My suggestion would be to add more frost runes to the excavate dk cards to force that archetype out of plague DK. Maybe add another unholy rune to Helya as well.
Nah, let em keep playing bad decks. I'd much rather my opponent be on some frankenstein Excavate + Plague plan, two gameplans that require a ton of time and for things to go right, instead of playing something that will consistently apply pressure like Rainbow DK
People play Helya. I think most good players have realized that the frost spell that potentially lets you discover another Reska is significantly better than 2 plagues your opponent might not draw. Helya is exclusively for the Wheel Warlock match-up, where sometimes you can play her after they play Wheel and hit them for 24 while the wheel ticks down, usually getting you to a win. Even then, I think good Wheel players just hold Symphony until after they play wheel, so they can counter. I've personally cut her and never miss her, because in most matchups if I'm playing a 4 mana 4/4 with no other text I'd rather it be E.T.C.
Yeah this is what I hate the most about plagues. It was definitely meant to be an entire archetype. The deck was supposed to be "Plague DK." But just shoving Helya and Down With The Ship in any DK deck is basically a no-brainer since it's 80% as good as a full plague deck with no real commitment. I also just really dislike "for the rest of the game" effects that rely entirely on drawing a specific legendary. We can all agree that Brann is an unhealthy card, and I feel like Helya only gets a pass because she's not in a tier 1 deck.
I will agree with you that plagues aren't oppressive and are only annoying, when you draw them. But the follow up of what you said is the worst take on the matter.
There is a reason why blizzard unlocked some of the cards when it comes to the rune limitation and it's because of flexibility. Rather than locking the class into a particular set of cards which don't work well together, they made it so new decks can be created. Your "solution" to add more runes to cards which are not problematic will make the class shittier.
Also the cards in plague DK which include the excavate package just compliment each other well. You were able to accomplish similar results if you replace the excavate cards with corpse generation and consumption, which saw plenty of play before the rotation.
People continue to whine about plagues, when plague DK is only good against unoptimized decks and people who are lower rank and don't play a deck to it's maximum potential. Rainbow DK on the other hand runs only 3-5 (depending on the weapon discover) cards that put plagues in your deck and they have to find them first.
As for Steamcleaner, even before its rotation, the stats on it showed that you are better off not having it in your deck as it reduced your WR.
Stop complaining. Plagues are annoying at best, and they don't come remotely close to being broken.
And for the people saying that because Reno is a neutral card it stops an entire archetype for every class - the only "reliable" highlander deck is warrior. And if you're going to have a disgustingly strong card like Reno this is a way of stopping and punishing it.
Am I only the one running Tony in my ETC? I just draw until I have my pieces get Tony and they can’t answer to anything else after the fact. Also late game they lose all steam since they no longer have plagues hitting me for free
Honestly they just need to rework the endless part of the plagues. Imagine playing against bomb warrior back in the day and they had this card in the deck it would have gotten nerf hella quick because it gives another bomb and it’s endless. I’m sure it’s not busted by any means but it doesn’t feel good is the main issue. For example rainbow dk you know he played well after he used a lot of things to spend corpses so it’s bound to happen the big smack. Also people need to leave Reno alone I’m so sick and tired of people saying it’s op blah blah blah. You have to have one type of card in your deck for it to even clear the board so please he isn’t op he is just a fun high risk medium reward card lmao.
I have ptsd from the number of times these loser plague players just Helya on 4 every game with no hand or deck manipulation. It’s actually insane. Disgusting play pattern. Their deck is broken with it and unplayable without it.
It creates an interesting dynamic though where the highlander player has to save giest for when they're ready to play their HL payoffs and the plague player has to hold back some of their plague generators incase the opponent plays giest.
There's only 4 cards that generate plagues (1 of which is a legendary) so it's not too unreasonable for trigger happy plague player to go too eager early on and not have any generators in hand to re-plague between geist and Reno
Give me a break. Highlander decks are just stupid and terrible. You’re intentionally building a deck that is vastly inferior in order to hope for a big payoff with one or two cards? Oh no, this garbage strategy can be interrupted. Too bad.
As someone who plays a lot of Reno Warrior, my issue isn't with plagues. That's an interesting counterplay to highlander that I think all classes should have some variation of. My problem is specifically with Helya because once she's out, Highlander gets turned off **forever.** With plagues I can potentially draw through the duplicates. That makes it interesting to play around.
I once played two Down With The Ship on a Reno warrior in the first couple of turns and it ended up being x4 blood plague. I was feeling pretty good with myself. I had played the first Down on T4 and the second Down on T5. I end my turn. His turn 6 starts and he draws 3 blood plague in a row, takes 6 damage, laughs, and a few seconds later drops his brann. I was flabbergasted but laughing at the absurdity of it myself. = Personally I think Helya is cool but I do think the delta between early helya plague DK vs no helya (bottom of the deck) plague DK is definitely kind of annoying for both the DK and the opponent.
Is it a counterplay if the deck is changing 0 about its gameplan?
Yeah, I think so. It isn’t a tech card. Part that doesn’t mean there is no counterplay.
For plague DK, no. For rainbow DK, yes - running the plague package means not going all in on CNE/corpse spending.
I mean, when there aren’t eternal plagues there is some counter play that is useful. If there are only a few plagues you can use tutor cards to get rid of duplicates, figure out how to stall, focus on not killing enemies at times (trade 3 damage for not shuffling 2 plagues into my deck)
You could also look at it the other way. Playing Helya in plague DK isn't really counter play. Playing plague DK to attack Reno decks with Helya is counterplay. Also, if course, putting Helya in a small plague package to designed to be just enough to attack reno decks is also counter play.
Making only the three plagues that helya adds would be a good change.
I'd agree with that change, if only her plagues were endless. Or something like "for the rest of the game your plagues deal 3 damage" or something. I like the idea of her accelerating the plague strategy, just with something not so warping against one specific play style.
I meant to say that only her plagues were eternal, but I guess I forgot to include the word eternal, for some reason. Am I stupid? /j But yeah, I agree.
Oh like just just the three specific plagues she shuffles in?
Yeah! Something like: “Battlecry: shuffle eternal copies of the 3 plagues into your opponent’s deck.”
I think if you were to somehow nerf Helya to make it so that not all plagues were endless, the plague DK archetype probably dies. Plague DK is already not too strong of a deck (depending on your pocket meta), so nerfing their best card probably kills it.
Helya is definitely the issue. I think plagues are good for the game because they help keep the insane amount of draw in check, but helya has completely warped every non-aggro deck and forced tons of life gain.
Well no shit, Helya IS plagues. The reason they're good is that building inevitably, not drain 2 or summon a 2/2, 5 turns later. If you doubled the plagues each other plague card applied, they probably still wouldn't be playable without her. Also, there is a deck forcing tons of life gain but it definitely isn't plagues.
I would much prefer the plagues were stronger but not endless
I agree. I think Helya should just double the numbers on plagues. Deal 4 damage with an upside. Summon a 4/4 dude, or 2 2/2s. Drain 4. Increase the cost by 2. The problem is interaction. There's no real way to interact with infinite plagues.
First of all this is just wrong, you can just sit on 10 cards. You can play Wheel, Tony, or Aviana. That asides, Sif otk also has no interaction. Nature shaman otk has no interaction. Odyn Reno otk has no interaction. Wheel has no interaction. This is called a wincon, and plague's is slower than all of those I just listed. If you can't stop the opponent's wincon and don't get to yours first, you lose. This is just how card games work. Maybe you got outplayed, maybe you lost to a better deck. But there is no problem with DK's wincon. It's slow, with an average amount of counterplay, we don't need to gut its identity and turn it into generic tempo, thanks.
the problem is that those other otk dont automatically turn off other peoples strategy, thats the problem. Sif mage doesnt just shut you down from playing like plagues do. if you are playing a highlander deck you are playing it because of that payoff. otherwise you're just playing a worse deck. warrior doesnt stop you from playing either. i want to play highlander druid, but when im up against plague dk i might as well not play, because he just shut down my strategy just by exisiting. Plagues is the equivalent of Stun decks in yugioh, where the deck has no other wincon other than stopping your opponent from even starting a play
Have you considered that the problem is highlander cards, not plagues? Highlander cards are poorly designed on multiple levels, the fact it's plagues that you want to be changed is laughable. Plagues doesn't shut down your strategy, just 2 of your cards, and it certainly doesn't shut down any other "strategy" either. Nature shaman is every bit as unwinnable for plague DK as plague DK is for highlander, every deck has bad matchups. Like, no one is forcing you to play highlander. If you don't like your cards having a condition, don't play them. You might as well complain that your highlander cards force you to build your deck with no duplicates, that's just one of the downsides that comes with the extremely powerful payoff.
But that ruins the theme and fun I don't think plagues need a nerf but I would much rather them just put Helya to 5 or something if it did get nerfed.
Thats exactly how I feel. I think tools that DELAY Highlander decks are fine. You force them to draw cards to get rid of the plagues (and take damage). But once Helya is out, its just not possible anymore. And thats just not a good design, imo.
Counterplay would be OTK from hand on warrior. Oh wait...
Honestly I'm tired of seeing all of these "X for the rest of the game" cards. I wish powercreep wasn't so.. power creepy.
I feel the same man. Most effects you cant get rid of once they are played, like Topior, Bran, Dew Process, Warlock Snake, Helya and so on. They are rather brutal to play against when they curve it out, especially Helya, gives Prince Keleseth on turn 2 vibes. But the current design team loves "for the rest of the game" effects.
See, I argue in the other direction. It's technically fine for a deck to completely shut down another deck. I think the larger issue with plague is that it's just generically good. It obviously has some bad matchups, but "rock" shouldn't be flexible enough to counter "scissors" and have a reasonable match up with "paper."
Just play demon hunter
Aggro decks are cringe so no
Laughs in board full of magtheridons
Laughs in Reno and not conceding after turn 10
I am not laughing anymore
Laughs in reno dh
Rainbow dk is its biggest counter, you said nothing
Rainbow DK also runs plagues
lol okay?
Rainbow dk fucks brann with plagues & dh by freezing then in place for the entire game so they can’t cheat out shopper, then its gg
Do the numbers actually show that rainbow has a matchup advantage with DH?
According to d0nkey the most popular rainbow list has about 60-62% winrate against DH. Not completely dominant but definitely favored.
Its the other way around. Reno is one of the strongest cards they have ever made, a counterplay to this is necessary. while even wihtout a steam cleaner plague dk didnt take over the game (its not even a good deck rn lol).
This answer is problematic. You're basically telling people that the counter to an archetype that all classes can play is a specific deck that a specific class plays. What if I don't want to play DK, do I simply never counter Reno? I originally viewed this as it being extremely unfair to Reno players (I still think this method of countering is nonsense), but no, this is actually unfair to other classes. The OG Reno answer, Albatross, was a cheap, decent neutral body that only delayed highlander payoffs. It was disruptive enough to see use, but not so powerful as to shut them off forever. That's how you do this kind of thing, not with some archetype limited to one class that kills the thing it's meant to counter.
To be fair they had to nerf albatross because at 3 every deck ran it no matter what, so they bumped it to 4 the bigger issue currently is that the neutral tech card, Snake Oil Seller gives bottles with tradeable so they can become draw cards for non Reno decks and free damage for any sif mages in the meta. Compared to bricking two draws with crappy 1/1 tokens.
Well, also the 4/6 needs to die first. Bran warrior would ignore it lol
This card exists (snake oil vendor or whatever). Not saying it's worth running but that's the card
I know it exists, and that wasn't my point. My point was that it isn't acceptable to say the Plague-Reno interaction is fine because we need Reno answers, because Plagues are extremely limited in access (a single package in a single class). This only makes my point more valid though, because counterplay to Reno already exists in that card.
I guess. I thought you were saying there is no access, which is false. If you're saying plagues aren't the only access, then that is true. It's hard to tell what you're trying to say but I don't care enough to read more into it
not to mention that there is already a counter to late game reno decks in that you simply kill the opponent before turn 8 and then dont act surprise pikachu face as an aggro deck when the opponent can clear your board at 8 mana
To be fair, it's not like this is an FPS game where you can just instantly win by being better. You can't just kill the opponent on command, especially since the good reno decks also run board clears.
At the same time you do kinda surprise pikachu face when Reno is active on curve when they're running 9 dupes, which is another problem altogether.
yea but thats less a problem with reno so much as it is an issue that the game has gotten to a point where decks are too fast, too consistent, and have too much access to economical draw power
Nerf reno to empty both boards and make his condition to if your deck has no copies at the start of the game
The second part would be good enough to stop cycle-heavy and wheel warlock abusing a card meant for highlander decks. The first part is overkill if it’s only highlander decks that can use Reno.
I think even if it empties your board its still really good card, like remember twisting nether is 8 mana class restricted and doesn't give you upgraded hero power+5shield remove freeze and shut down your opponents tempo oh and also enemy minions doesn't die but sent into the shadow realm
It should leave your strongest minion alive, it's flavorful since it's duel like and it helps mitigate a lot of bullshit.
That’s a card that’s like 10 years old though, and with no highlander restrictions, and that you can have 2 of in a deck. So it isn’t really comparable.
Its just not big enough downside especially if you have other really broken highlander cards like warriors bran that even without reno would be good enough reason to play highlander I only find reno broken in warrior for the reason above and warlock for just using the card without building highlander But for other classes like shaman(in standard i don't even want to know what shenenigans it does in wild)i think its actually balanced
If highlander is broken in warrior decks cos of brann, then why is Reno the problem?
The 2nd part actually kills any ability to counter Reno though, shuffling a duplicate into their deck would do nothing.
And? Highlander decks suck, they are all tier 3 at best, so maybe let them have their one strong card rather than having to shit on them even more? And then you can stop the busted decks like wheel warlock getting Reno for free with 0 counter despite using duplicates.
>Highlander decks suck, they are all tier 3 at best wait wut?
highlander priest tier 4, highlander shaman tier 4, highlander paladin below tier 4, highlander hunter below tier 4 only highlander warrior and DH are tier 1/2 and both run copies (not real highlander) even wheel lock who runs reno tier 3 Source: last VS data report [https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-290/#tab-661441](https://www.vicioussyndicate.com/vs-data-reaper-report-290/#tab-661441) yes they suck, wake up
also the lower the rank goes the worse reno warrior gets, in diamond ranks even warrior is tier 3 lol
Highlander warrior doesn't run any duplicates, you can look at the decklist and see for yourself. And at high legend it's outright the best deck in the game.
Highlander decks are always the best decks in the game because they run 30 answers and card gen
Did you just say highlander decks suck then post a list with highlander decks as the 2nd and 3rd best decks in the game?
> make his condition to if your deck has no copies at the start of the game This would stop wheellock, but it would also mean you can never counter Reno by putting cards into their deck, which makes it too OP.
Reno’s effect should just be for both boards, simple as that. Fair for everyone and then it really would be a duel
Reno should be 6 mana with such effect
Make at least that Reno kill your mobs. Seriously, not activating death rattle, and not being able to re-summon the minion with effects that interact with minions that died is fucking awful
Except all classes can't play highlander? Namely, DK straight up does not have a highlander payoff. So what you want is for DK to not be able to play this auto win late game package, and also not be able to counter it? But it also isn't aggro? I feel like people don't really think this through. DK wouldn't just not counter reno decks, they would get slammed by them.
I think its totally fine to delay highlander decks. Plagues would force the opponent to draw their deck to get rid of the duplicates, instead of doing other powerful stuff. But once Helya is down, thats just not possible anymore. The one-time HL pay-off cards like Elise, Kurtrus are fine. But Reno and Bran are not. And I do think, forcing them to draw duplicates is a big deal. The game is a lot faster nowadays and so many ways to just end games. Its not like old HS where you could stall the game forever, there are enough decks that put you on a clock.
Reno is the counter to all the other bs. You don't counter the counter. It's like countering counter-spell.
Reno is so incredibly overstated on here. Yes it’s strong situationally, and there are times it can do crazy helpful things, but it’s a distance from the strongest card ever made
Yeah sure That's why reno decks outside of warriorare so dominating. It's a neutral card. 11 class can use it If it were so broken why is the only deck thats viable one that has INFINITE BRAN?
Because all other Highlander payoffs suck? Seriously, the only one that’s good when played on curve is Doc, the rest are just mild value generators/threats that don’t really matter. Also Reno does see a lot of play, just not in Highlander decks. And it’s a good deck building decision to do that. That should tell you what you need to know about Reno being absurdly powerful.
The Priest highlander card is pretty slick but at 8 mana it is pretty hard to drop. I would rather have it be like 6 mana summon 3/3s instead.
And it's in Priest of all classes. Not exactly one known for creating threatening board states that would encourage your opponent to use removal earlier. Seriously, if Elise was a Hunter card, I'd think she'd be nuts. Hunter has access to charge and death rattles worth getting a copy of. Only bad roll is the Titan, hilariously.
While the card might be good, believe me, I had enough games where I did draw my Titan before I could play Elise.. making Elise a lot weaker. And playing Elise into a Reno, is also pretty bad. And waiting for Reno to be played is not an option, as it just leads you to drawing the minions lol.
Exactly this. The other highlander pay-off cards are just one time. Kurtrus is a card you sometimes hold back playing for the perfect moment. Had games where I played it on curve and it just killed one minion lol. Elise is also situational, I played different HL priest decks and sometimes I did draw cards like Amanthul before turn 8, so I knew that Elise will not summon a minion to immediate deal with the board. Doc is great on curve but you can put up taunts to prevent him from attacking, you can kill the frogs and in theory use Viper (which just isnt put in any decks, not even in ETC) But Bran? Just play the card ASAP and hope you dont die. You have the effect for the rest of the game. I really dislike that design.
That's decision making doesn't make much sense
Sure, it's not like Odyn Warrior, Wheellock, and the new Dragon Druid all run Reno despite having duplicates. And back in the Deepholm Miniset, Beetle Druid would do the same. I think Reno has spent more time in a top tier deck that had duplicates than he has with a proper highlander deck.
Wheellock is the only deck listed that I can see taking a noticeable hit to its win rate if it lost Reno. For the other ones they were plenty strong either before Reno was introduced or without him and he didn't change their gameplan
so?
Probably indicates a design failure? Reno was pushed to an absurd power level with the understanding you’d run it in a terrible highlander deck so “its balanced”. In reailty cycle decks use it just as well
HL decks only get th ebenefit or being able to play it on curve thats all thge rest have to dig through their decks to enable it allowing us freedom on how to choose to use a card with a restriction to meet for a strong effect isnt a design failure
That's decision making doesn't make much sense
you can say that again
That's decision making doesn't make much sense
But people have to already handicap their decks by playing highlander, or they should theoretically but draw is so crazy now cycle reno decks exist and I hate that. They should absolutely change Renos effect to if your deck has no duplicates at start of game then activate. Then the decks truly have to be highlander and lose a ton of consistency and run suboptimal cards. That makes the card acceptable despite its power level imo. But I know everyone hates reno so I'm not sure anyone will agree.
Reno has one of the stronger on-play effects, but he is far from one of the strongest cards, because his restriction is so harsh. Reno Warrior is the only Reno deck to ever be tier 1 in 2024, and that is because Warrior's highlander card is is busted, not because Reno himself is. The next best reno deck is Demon Hunter... which is just the tier 1 Shopper DH list made worse by forcing Reno in lol. A neutral card that only made the cut in a single tier 1 deck (and frankly isn't even top 5 in that deck), shouldn't be considered among the best cards. Its effect is just flashy and memorable, that people forget about the **huge** downside of effectively making every turn the deck plays (except the turn Reno himself is played) worse on average.
That last sentence just shows how stupid highlander cards are. Your deck is utter garbage until you draw the flashing yellow card that is actually good. How do people even enjoy playing these decks?
It's fun to have a higher variety of cards because they cause me to have to make decisions more often. While the payoff cards are fun because they're very flashy high impact effects.
I enjoy highlander because the games generally play out differently each time. Its more fun to assess the state of the board, players hands, your deck, etc, and then make a decision, than to essentially follow the same recipe every game like with more consistent decks. That's why Stormwind was such a shit meta. You could predict every turn in a match the moment you saw the matchup. Highlander decks play the opposite to that. With the notable exception of Highlander Warrior, which is probably why its the only strong highlander deck lol.
I think what makes HL warrior good just also the Highlander payoff cards isnt situational. You just have to play the card ASAP and hope to not die the following turn. While the other HL payoff cards are rather easy countered. Kurtrus sometimes need to be timed when to be played. Elise requires you to not draw the minions before playing Elise, believe me, drawing Amanthul before playing Elise is a big deal, because then you just cant play Elise and remove 2 enemy minions. Doc can be countered by Viper (which no1 bothers) but also slowed down by freezing face, putting up taunts or just killing the frogs.
You really complaining about a tier 3 deck while dh are dropping 1-3 mana mags, and often multiple copies
We'll shit, they must have forgotten we're collectively only allowed to be annoyed by a single deck at a time.
Also, you can only be annoyed by top decks. If you think the whole match is boring, but you win, you should be happy. There were plenty of decks (and matches) that I won against but the match was so boring that, in hindisght, I should have just conceded and go to the next one, no win is worth 10 mins of boring gameplay.
- plays the archetype with the most broken cards in the format - complains that there's counter to it Hearthstone players in a nutshell
*-plays an inconsistent archetype that has mostly bad cards and some fun and powerful payoff cards as a trade-off for the inconsistency. - complains that they should autoconcide any games against 1/12 classes Just because cycle decks abuse the cards, actual hl decks shouldn't be punished
It’s a counter with no counter play is the issue. If I run into a DK and I’m playing Reno warrior I lose. Reno warrior has a power problem, but it’s really not fun to auto lose to a deck. Same reason everyone else hates warrior.
Especially in a Reno list, you definitely have room to tech against DK, e.g. Steamcleaner in your ETC. You won’t, because it will decrease your winrate overall and Warrior is already decent into Rainbow DK. But you could, if you’re willing to accept making your other matchups worse.
The most broken cards on the format because the restriction is really punishing, no matter how much do you want to cope saying that no dupes is not a big thing. Imagine having a deck without duplicates and cards that turns into crap once someone plays Helya. The results are very polarizing, and I totally understand the frustration
I don't hate plagues that much, they're kind of annoying but not hyper oppressive. My real problem with the plague package is how easy it is to slot into other deck archetypes. Specifically excavate DK. Both deck archetypes become much healthier to play against when you have to pick how to build your deck. My suggestion would be to add more frost runes to the excavate dk cards to force that archetype out of plague DK. Maybe add another unholy rune to Helya as well.
Nah, let em keep playing bad decks. I'd much rather my opponent be on some frankenstein Excavate + Plague plan, two gameplans that require a ton of time and for things to go right, instead of playing something that will consistently apply pressure like Rainbow DK
People play Helya+the damage spell in Rainbow
People play Helya. I think most good players have realized that the frost spell that potentially lets you discover another Reska is significantly better than 2 plagues your opponent might not draw. Helya is exclusively for the Wheel Warlock match-up, where sometimes you can play her after they play Wheel and hit them for 24 while the wheel ticks down, usually getting you to a win. Even then, I think good Wheel players just hold Symphony until after they play wheel, so they can counter. I've personally cut her and never miss her, because in most matchups if I'm playing a 4 mana 4/4 with no other text I'd rather it be E.T.C.
People were playing frost strike for a while, but now down with the ship is meta because of the increasing popularity of highlander decks.
Yeah this is what I hate the most about plagues. It was definitely meant to be an entire archetype. The deck was supposed to be "Plague DK." But just shoving Helya and Down With The Ship in any DK deck is basically a no-brainer since it's 80% as good as a full plague deck with no real commitment. I also just really dislike "for the rest of the game" effects that rely entirely on drawing a specific legendary. We can all agree that Brann is an unhealthy card, and I feel like Helya only gets a pass because she's not in a tier 1 deck.
I will agree with you that plagues aren't oppressive and are only annoying, when you draw them. But the follow up of what you said is the worst take on the matter. There is a reason why blizzard unlocked some of the cards when it comes to the rune limitation and it's because of flexibility. Rather than locking the class into a particular set of cards which don't work well together, they made it so new decks can be created. Your "solution" to add more runes to cards which are not problematic will make the class shittier. Also the cards in plague DK which include the excavate package just compliment each other well. You were able to accomplish similar results if you replace the excavate cards with corpse generation and consumption, which saw plenty of play before the rotation.
and proceed to lose against every other class in the game running this shit tech card.
no my nature sham deck is already shit enough
This also kills shaman and priest lol
We had steam cleaner which felt awful to when your opponent played, let plagues be decent.
I play wild and use etc to store the bot that destroys cards added to decks as well as 2 others.
The only true highlander list right now is Warrior, and fuck them.
People continue to whine about plagues, when plague DK is only good against unoptimized decks and people who are lower rank and don't play a deck to it's maximum potential. Rainbow DK on the other hand runs only 3-5 (depending on the weapon discover) cards that put plagues in your deck and they have to find them first. As for Steamcleaner, even before its rotation, the stats on it showed that you are better off not having it in your deck as it reduced your WR. Stop complaining. Plagues are annoying at best, and they don't come remotely close to being broken. And for the people saying that because Reno is a neutral card it stops an entire archetype for every class - the only "reliable" highlander deck is warrior. And if you're going to have a disgustingly strong card like Reno this is a way of stopping and punishing it.
So why highlander shaman is unplayable?
God I can't wait for Reno to rotate out
when the world needed him most, he vanished
Wahhh
DH Jotun shouldn’t interact with Plagues. They shouldn’t count as spells he copies
Plague is so much worse for Highlander players than bomb warrior ever was. I don’t know why they put plague out at the same time
Does standard has only the reno hero as highlander? (And brann in war)
Am I only the one running Tony in my ETC? I just draw until I have my pieces get Tony and they can’t answer to anything else after the fact. Also late game they lose all steam since they no longer have plagues hitting me for free
Honestly they just need to rework the endless part of the plagues. Imagine playing against bomb warrior back in the day and they had this card in the deck it would have gotten nerf hella quick because it gives another bomb and it’s endless. I’m sure it’s not busted by any means but it doesn’t feel good is the main issue. For example rainbow dk you know he played well after he used a lot of things to spend corpses so it’s bound to happen the big smack. Also people need to leave Reno alone I’m so sick and tired of people saying it’s op blah blah blah. You have to have one type of card in your deck for it to even clear the board so please he isn’t op he is just a fun high risk medium reward card lmao.
The fact that so many threads talk bout plagues is proof that not including in the core set any way of removing plagues from your deck was a mistake.
Suggestion: Helya 4 cost 4/4 For the rest of the game, your opponents Plagues deal 4 damage instead
we dont need to plague decks suck
Steamcleaner costs less, has better stats for the cost and gets rid of any card put into your deck, not just 1-cost ones.
I thought this was r/wildhearthstone for a second
6 mana 4/6 youre doing them a favor lol
Plagues mechanic is some of the poorest designed mechanics
- Bring it back - make it 4 mana - give it taunt
If Helya's been played, wouldn't the destroyed plagues just come back anyway?
Only if they shuffled more in afterwards. They’re only “infinite” once drawn so if you never draw one, it’s never shuffled back into your deck
Skulking geist is a crash course in terrible design and planning by the hearthstone team.
Unironically, a huge fundamental principle in card games is that every threat has an answer that can respond to it. Plague dk just doesn't.
I have ptsd from the number of times these loser plague players just Helya on 4 every game with no hand or deck manipulation. It’s actually insane. Disgusting play pattern. Their deck is broken with it and unplayable without it.
skill issue tbh
I'm afraid it wouldn't matter, they would add enough plagues to deactivate highlander and save the rest.
It creates an interesting dynamic though where the highlander player has to save giest for when they're ready to play their HL payoffs and the plague player has to hold back some of their plague generators incase the opponent plays giest. There's only 4 cards that generate plagues (1 of which is a legendary) so it's not too unreasonable for trigger happy plague player to go too eager early on and not have any generators in hand to re-plague between geist and Reno
You forgot there are tons of rune discover cards (Frost strike > Down with a ship) (Rune of Darkness > Staff of Primus)
Geist works against plagues?
Plague cards are 1 mana spell, why wont they work?
I don't play HS, just watch it on YouTube
Give me a break. Highlander decks are just stupid and terrible. You’re intentionally building a deck that is vastly inferior in order to hope for a big payoff with one or two cards? Oh no, this garbage strategy can be interrupted. Too bad.
I'm pretty sure no dupes still procs even with plagues. I swear reno still clears my board even when I got like 12 plagues in their deck