Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft

Oh, boy did I want to play Hearthstone when it was in closed beta. I took part in all kinds of Twitter and YouTube raffles in hopes of getting a beta key. In the end, I was finally given one by Blizzard itself a week before Christmas, on the same day the game's servers were down and no one could play...

After finally getting in the game myself and no longer having to watch others play it (though I still do the latter), I spent quite a bit of time with it. The excitement wore off eventually but I did continue playing the game, and have done so over a year now.

Hearthstone has less depth than Magic: The Gathering but it's not a bad thing. Probably because of it the game is better on digital form than MtG can ever be. All the phases and the possibility of responding to an opponent's spell etc. just require a too complicated interface on MTGOnline and Duels of the Planeswalkers. Playing MTG face to face with someone allows you to skip those phases like they never existed until needed.

Hearthstone fully embraced the fact it is digital. There are many effects that would not work or would be very cumbersome in a physical card game. Minions have lines they say when played/attacking/dying. The legendary minions also enter the battlefield accompanied by a short music theme. Of course, being based on Warcraft's lore also adds to the charm of the game.

Playing the game is effortless. It was probably primarily designed for touch devices, even though the first tablet release came after the PC one. But the interface is simple and feels very good. The menus could have been designed better, however. You need to go through unnecessarily many screens when you want to edit a deck you have just been playing in constructed. It is worse when playing the single-player adventure Naxxramas – even more screens to jump through if you need to change your deck a bit.

Editing a deck itself can be cumbersome as you often have to flick through many pages when searching for cards. The search box helps but only if you know what you want. One recent design flaw has made many accidentally buy wrong packs from the store. This could have been avoided by simply making the store not have a pack type selected by default and instead make the user pick one before a purchase is possible.

I mostly play in the arena mode where the game's pay-to-win aspect has no effect – only luck and your skill. You are given three cards at a time to pick one from until you have a full 30-card deck. Then you play against other drafted decks until you lose thrice or win 12 times.

The better your run goes, the better your rewards are. If you go less than four wins, you are better off just buying a pack for 100 gold. At seven wins and above, you start getting back the 150 gold entrance fee. And at the maximum 12 wins, the rewards are quite plenty, sometimes giving your gold back three-fold. I have had 19 of those glorious runs in total over the year.

I am not sure how achievable it is for a pure free-to-player with a pace like mine to ever get all the cards if Blizzard keeps adding new ones into the game. When Goblins vs Gnomes was released, I spent 6000 gold on the old packs (the first time I actually bought packs from the store) to complete my classic card collection. I got closer but am still missing seven legendaries and 11 epics.

I guess I could have bought the GvG packs instead to be at a better position in ranked, but I figured that since the arena now rewards those instead of the old packs, the completionist in me would prefer it this way. And unlike a year ago, I do now actually have a lot of cards to make competitive decks, so I am not at total disadvantage in ranked even if I am behind in the amount of new cards.

One that sparked off Hearthstone – maybe quite unexpectedly – was its huge competitive scene. In my opinion, what makes it a great esport is the fact how easy the game is to follow compared to things like StarCraft II and League of Legends. You do not have to rely on casters to show you what is happening.

I will definitely keep playing the game – getting all the cards some day would be a neat feat. I will keep on playing one arena each day as I have been doing for many months now. Sometimes the runs end quickly, and sometimes they go over two hours as a good one can last up to 14 matches. I would also like to reach legend rank in constructed one day. I think it might be doable but I will have to stop playing arena to have the time for it.