December 3, 2014 – Me Vs. Myself and I

Here’s the links to the other parts in this series: Part One, Part Two, Part Three.

This is going to be the final post. In the first three, I went over the initial reveal of the Goblins vs. Gnomes cards that were revealed at Blizzcon last month. The cards represented in this post are those that were revealed since then. We’ve got a few more class-specific cards, along with a few more neutrals. I’m not going to split these up, so this post might be a little on the long side, but I’m committed to getting this done. For further information, follow this post over on PCGamer for further additions if they are to pop up. I have a feeling a little will be left to mystery for the actual release happening this month. So let’s get to it, shall we?

That’s a hell of a heal! A 3/3 for 5 mana isn’t that great, but restoring 8 health is on par with the Druid, and this being a neutral card means those classes without inherent heals can keep up. Nice.

This is an interesting mechanic, apparently this guy gains strength while your other minions die. Good for the Paladin class since their disposable minions are readily cast. However, this also means you have to hold onto this guy til he gains some strength. Not bad if you can get a few deaths before turn 5, or hold onto him for the killing blows late game. This does mean you need him in your hand early though, which could put you at a disadvantage.

Nice counter for spell heavy decks (like Mage/Priest/Shaman). A 3/5 for 4 mana isn’t bad either.

I like this, as with flare and track the hunter has some viable card draw options again. I’ll forever miss starving buzzard + call the hounds but it is what it is.

A rechargeable divine shield? Nice! Sucks that the health on this guy is so low, and that it’s a Paladin card. Still, a good addition to a pally-mech deck.

Nice battlecry on a decent weapon. Yeah, it’s a good card.

As if Shamans don’t already have enough direct damage spells. The random factor can be screwy, but up to 6 damage for 2 mana? I don’t care about the overload this is OP.

A nice sized buff for the warlock class, also a nice sized damage spell. Need to make a demon deck methinks.

Well that’s just ridiculous. 7/7 for 5 provided you have a beast out. Not hard to do.

This one seems a little backwards. 50% chance to attack something besides what you want? Not that great. Unless that means you can side step something with taunt. Then that would be kind of good.

This is a little unclear. Do you get to keep all of your minions + trigger their death rattles, or does it kill them in the process. Will have to find out. The former option would be nice. The latter, situational at best.

A 6/9 for 7 isn’t bad, and is a nice big beast option for the Hunter. Being able to damage it is a little harder to do, but being able to double that attack to 12 is phenomenal. This plus a King Krush on the next turn will most definitely end a game.

Good for a mech deck, but I haven’t seen a whole lot of synergy between mechs and the Rogue class.. Guess we’ll have to wait for the full card list to see.

A counter for deathrattle decks. I’m not sure that meta completely took off, at least I didn’t see a lot of deathrattle themed decks while I was playing more regularly. Still, there might be more of those in the coming months, and this could be a nice way to stave off some of them.

Another card with the Spare Parts. Still don’t know what that does, but a 7/6 for 6 isn’t bad anyhow.

A nice little bolster your forces card, complete with a weapon. I’d use this in my Pally deck, for sure.

This card also suffers from stupid, like the Shaman card mentioned earlier. I like a 6/6 with stealth, but not when I can’t control who it attacks. Unless there’s no minions on the board, or you can bypass taunt like I said earlier.

This card is nice for the destroy as it costs 1 less than execute, though you can’t control the target (unless you clear out the lesser threats). The bonus of destroying a weapon is also nice, but only useful for a couple classes. I think it will still see some use.

Another deathrattle deck counter. Again, not sure on the meta after this set releases, but it’s good to know that there will be some counters. However, you might end up benefiting your enemy a bit too much.

2/3 for 2 with a freeze bonus. Not bad. Not great, but not bad.

This is pretty cool. Rarely do we see cards that affect hero powers. I can see where the Hunter power would be nice to use elsewhere, but only occasionally.

More spare parts. Sigh. Wish I knew what the hell that did. It’s probably useful if they devoted this many cards to it. Either way, 5/7 for 6 is good.

3/2 for 2 with windfury, no overload. Pretty good Shammy card. Too bad I hate Shammies.

And there you have it. All of the cards we know about to this point. Like I said, I’m not going to bother talking about any more, my job here is done. Follow the PCGamer link at the top of this post for any further info that might come out between now and release. Looking forward to actually playing with some of these.

EDIT: the release date of Dec. 8th has been announced here.

#hearthstone #goblinsvsgnomes #expansion

Syl, of MMO Gypsy and Battle Bards (also a member of the esteemed group of podcasters that Couch Podtatoes calls home, TGEN) fame has called for another blogosphere event where members of our community come together to create an online Advent Calendar. Each day, two members of the ‘sphere will post their thoughts on gaming and community, and the entirety of the project will culminate with the Calendar, which you can view here. I was given December 3rd as my day to create the window dressing, and as such here is my post for Bloggy Xmas.

Early Years

The early years of gaming were getting their start right around the same time I was born. There were video games before 1982, but my birth year saw the crash and almost demise of gaming as a whole. E.T. and Atari could be blamed, but those relics of the past are now for sale on eBay, and we all know that gaming did not go the way of the Dodo. My earliest memories of gaming were both console and computer based, be it on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) or my father’s Atari ST, and I moved forward with a split interest throughout the years. I’ve always owned a console, and I’ve typically had a computer as well, though Atari doesn’t make them anymore, nor are they called IBM Compatibles, and my love for Nintendo waned right after the NES. Still, gaming has been a staple form of entertainment in my life for basically the entirety of it.

When I was young, I played games by myself. When I was a bit older, I had that community feeling via friends coming over to play, or I would venture to their houses for game time. It didn’t matter that I moved away and started school in a new town, I still managed to find the gamers in my area so I always had someone to play with, or a group to discuss gaming. These were the way things worked before the Internet became the culture changer that it is today. If you wanted to play or discuss games with others, you needed to have face time to do so.

The Internet Age

The Internet Age dawned in the mid 1990’s. I was an early adopter, but we still played/discussed games in the traditional face-to-face manner as well. Being a teenager at the time, I didn’t have free reign to the net, particularly because it would tie up the phone line (those pesky modems!). This meant console play and sharing TV space were still a premium, though I did manage to play Counter-Strike and Starcraft with friends over the Internet, usually at night when family wouldn’t be expecting phone calls. My community didn’t really grow at this point, it was still people I knew in real life that were the ones whom I’d game with over the net. We did have a new place to talk about games and whatever else was going on in our lives though, with web logs gaining popularity towards the end of the century. This new form of community was one that we all embraced, starting clans for various games and using discussion boards and blogs to communicate with people outside of our “real life” grasps. I still mostly played video games with friends, and most of the time we’d hang out with each other while doing so, but the other options were there when we couldn’t get together. Internet cafes starting cropping up as well, so we could go play on someone else’s machinery (that was typically better than what we had) and get better ping because they were all hooked together on a LAN. Many an hour was sunk here, with many different friends coming together to form groups and play games against each other. This wouldn’t last long though, as high speed internet was about to be available to nearly everyone, at an affordable price.

The Past Decade – To Today

The Internet has truly changed the way a community can work. The general definition of community is a grouping of people living in close proximity that have common values and goals. Generally speaking, the people in your neighborhood and small surrounding area are your community, as you all have a similar income level, are members of a family/have your own family, and generally want to see everyone succeed at living for lack of a better term. Not only has the Internet changed the way we interact with our immediate neighbors and community, but it has allowed people to form communities around common interests that may live in the next town, next state, or on the other side of the world. Also, as we age we tend to get more involved in our own families and less involved in the social circles we once held dear. Of course there are exceptions to every rule, but most people get to a point in their lives where they no longer hang out with friends from high school, or even college. They focus on their own, and get further away from social events than they once enjoyed. That’s not to say that we’re all introverts or anti-social, but it seems to be the natural progression of life as an adult. Partying gives way to a career or a family or both.

With the Internet being the driving force in many of our lives, we keep up with news, gaming, social events and everything else via different channels streaming to your house via a series of cables or satellite signals. This can be a good or a bad thing depending on how you choose to look at it, but either way, this is the way life works in the 2010’s. I choose to look at it as a good thing, in that I can go literal months without going to a face-to-face social gathering but still feel like I belong to a group of peers. Not only do social networks like Facebook and Twitter keep me connected to people I know in “real life,” but they keep me informed of things that interest me, and keep me in touch with people from around the world who have similar interests. Gaming via the Internet also keeps us connected because we can play games together, and maintain relationships with people whom we might not ever meet face-to-face. Some may see that as a bad thing, in that we don’t have that same social connection without face time, but I see it as a way to maintain sanity in a life that would drive me crazy otherwise.

You see, I moved a few months back. Away from a place I lived for 15+ years, where everyone that I knew from old social circles lives. Away from anything I could remotely call a “life.” I am now in a position to make new social circles, but there were things to take care of first. In the interim, I have made friends with a large group of people from varying backgrounds and from around the world whom I do consider real friends. People that I would have never met were it not for gaming and community. My interest in gaming lead me to the point where I enjoyed writing about it, which lead to the discovery of the NBI which lead to the discovery of a slew of blogs that I didn’t know about, which lead to being involved in a community encompassing a vast number of people I didn’t know. I have gamed with many of you. I have argued with many of you. I have written with/about many of you. My podcast wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for you. This blog would still be relatively stagnant if it wasn’t for you. As much as I will say “don’t write for others, write for yourself” I still much prefer writing for you. Just knowing that people read my opinions and care enough to comment or write retorts on their own blogs makes me feel like I belong to something greater, and that’s been my goal for a long time. So thank you, dear readers, for making me feel like I belong. I owe it to you.

#bloggyxmas #community #gaming