Hearthstone Has Changed WAY More Than You Think

Rarran watches all the hearthstone world championships to see how much hearthstone changed over the years
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Edited By: / mf_daveed
#hearthstone #Rarran #hs
How Much Has Hearthstone Changed?

[@BernieDSniper]

Dude is litteraly in the grand finals of the biggest tournament for the game and Rarran the Hearthstone goat is out here making fun of his class choices

[@FightingDirty]

first

[@adrianopatuzzi2771]

Rarran the what? Ahahahah

[@AifakhYormum]

​@@adrianopatuzzi2771goat stands for greatest of all time

[@ButtercoreFTW]

​@@adrianopatuzzi2771do you not know what goat stands for? Lol

[@adrianopatuzzi2771]

@@ButtercoreFTW I know what "goat" means, do you not know what irony is????? ROFLLLLL

[@Jonathan-hd3hg]

Thank you Rarran for still being a Hearthstone creator. It feels like basically everyone else is gone now, and with the game in decline. But I do like the kind of nostalgia, historical slant you take with things. Don't know how long the channel's been around, but it feels like you've emerged with just the right content at just the right time.

[@shubhod9569]

the game is definitely not in decline, they are just doing a bad job on the marketing side of things. In terms of actual game design and balance and affordability, hearthstone is way better now than it was in the past imo

[@pete5516]

@@shubhod9569 yeah the game has actually been on the rise in terms of player count since last September which is crazy

[@shubhod9569]

@@pete5516 I returned to the game after quitting for years and it's actually a good game now. It is strategic and feels rewarding to put time into

[@devilro]

this is well written

[@Rspsand07]

@@shubhod9569 For silliness, I guess it's alright. For what it was, not at all. It's just pure random. Nothing matters, because hunter will twisting nether you, shaman will play star power, and warlock will drop pack the house. Make the turn timer infinite so she can read, and my grandma who's never played could wipe the best hearthstone player in the world, because so much of the game is a coin flip. On top of that, catering to mobile kills the game, and catering to casuals/noobs to be more user friendly and mass appealable, makes the skill ceiling and plateau very low. Any time there's a playstyle that is too much APM for mobile, it gets removed. Everytime there's a deck that has any kind of skill ceiling and is't straight forward do this turn 1, do this turn 2, win or lose the game depending on if they draw X, it gets removed. The best examples of this are razakus priest, miracle rogue, patron warrior. There's a 4th deck here I can't remember. To some extent even classic handlock, freeze mage, and control warrior, but not as much they could win by anyone but not as consistently and dominantly. Razakus had a terrible win rate, same for patron warrior like 30-40%, miracoli was better but the difference between first time playing it or bad at it and great was huge. Forsen had way above avg win rate since it was his jam. On the battlegrounds side, they removed Chadgar because it took too much APM for mobile and people who couldn't do it weren't happy. Literally skill issue. It's quite frustrating and there's not much to actually get better on. Imagine if CSGO nerfed headshots and added more randomness to where the spread goes, because beginners couldn't aim as well. There's legit no reason to nerf Patron, it had dogshit win rate played by the average player. It was absolutely dominant played by a good player. Are they gonna get better? Nah, just complain till it gets nerfed. Am I supposed to get better at discover? 50/50 effects? Evolving my shaman board into the right cards? Like I'd rather just go play Valorant and progress.

[@ailospjellok7475]

2:48 dude imagine you play one minion on turn 4 and nothing b4 that, and you havent lost half health. #missoldhearthstone

[@gabbe4781]

there classic if you want to play that, but its full off bots. hmm i wonder why thats the case 🤔

[@poppers7317]

I remember playing against Undertaker Hunter and being dead at turn 4.

[@Minimal444]

Well not against face hunter

[@KartoffelKonig]

I miss old Hearthstone. Quit some years ago but aprecciate your videos of bringing the old legends back from time to time like Reynad or showcasing highlights of the big hearthstone era. Back in GvG and Grand Tournament Hearthstone was constantly up in the Top 5 most watched categories on twitch. Now it is barely in the Top 20 .. sad to see the decline but it was only natural with so many new sets and bad decisions from Blizzard

[@GlawiousAldredMarci]

The games were so much clear and it just became more and more chaotic and unpredictable lol

[@BBRocker75]

Whole agree. Just now is a roulette. Not an strategy game anymore.

[@ildathet]

we told them during the beta, no one listened

[@TreiberSeptim]

@@BBRocker75it was always roulette, you draw random cards. It got more gamefied, sure, but they didn’t really introduce that much rng.

[@Nate-wn2ef]

Dude it was a roulette before ​@@TreiberSeptim

[@DrBob66]

@@TreiberSeptim But in a meta you know what cards your opponent is running and what his possible outs are. Now people are discovering cards every turn and I don't know what he's going to play at any given moment. I just have to yolo and hope for the best. No counterplay

[@TheCotzi]

raran is on of the few creators where i watch a 80min video without skipping or getting board or even to lazy to click on

[@Andre-od5hf]

i miss dropping yetis and ogres on curve Sadge. And azure drake was like one of the best cards, 5 mana for a decent body, spellpower AND card draw? The value.

[@thesean161]

I've been watching old kripp and kibler videos from 6 or so years ago. So crazy to see how much as changed since then

[@43bg1]

Rarran questions at about 17:59 if grim patron was played in the non-combo form (without warsong commander). It was actually a good counter to secret paladin (they mostly didn't run equality). It was very possible to make four patrons on turn 5, and some decks actually still struggled to clear that board. I think tempo mage had issues too because flamewaker is obviously terrible against a board of patrons.

[@gundam0079]

Ah the day9 Druid jade idol rant. My favorite.

[@Valygar92]

23:10 you could show also next turn (I think) where Amnesiasc played Thaurisian and Pavel answered with second Babbling Book and Fireland Portal. And as cherry on top, later Ragnaros that hit 50-50 and killed Arcane Giant and Amnesiasc conceded that game.

[@ArtyomPlatonev]

there's a reason people called it Paveling book for a while after that. I was so salty when that happened, i was really rooting for Amnesiac.

[@lesiegelad]

Hunterace vs Viper was one of my very first experiences with competitive HS and it was a world championship at that. I remember how insane of a final it was to watch live as someone who had only started playing HS for like 3-4 months at that point.

[@meanberryy]

23:45 Tbf they did finley dirty. Every class have an insane autoinclude herocard, finly in coreset. No current herocards exist in standard, no finley in core.

[@gamerk316]

As you noted: Force of Nature->Savage War was busted, especially since you had it twice. And don't forget Force->Savage->Innervate->Savage *shivers*. I long held we needed Legendary spells, with Savage being limited to one per deck.

[@gamerk316]

And yes, classic Handlock was the best deck to play. I still remember a match I had against Control Warrior where I made a decision turn 9 to play Jaraxus on empty board with a War Axe in play because I knew I would die unless I started the 6/6 spam. Such a simple yet technical deck.

[@JudgeAnnibal]

@@gamerk316 Handlock was such an amazing deck to play. It played fair, yet strong.

[@Rspsand07]

@@gamerk316 Handlock vs control warrior was a pure skill issue. I had a positive WR playing either one vs the other. Which is ofc the kind of thing that leads them to nerfing/killing decks, to appeal to a more casual audience.

[@gamerk316]

@@Rspsand07 I played both, and honestly had very high win rates with both of them as well. But H2H it comes down to how well Handlock deals with Warriors removal tools. Druid was always the problem, since the fact they had two chances at hitting the 14 burst changed how you had to play. Especially handlock, since your Drakes were just Keeper of the Grove bait.

[@kenpatchiramasama1076]

​@@Rspsand07 good casual audience pays the bills, if skilled players paid more maybe they'd get catered to more lmfao

[@goShinigami]

Man, feeling old watching this. Remember 2015, what got me into watching Kripp and later 2016, I vividly remember just randomly tuning in into the tournament broadcast when Pavling Book was about to happen. Crazy that this was 8 years ago

[@ElusiveMirror]

Strifecro was one of my favorite hearthstone content creators, made some really cool deck innovations. His grinder/control mage he played in various alterations through the first year of hs sets is my all time favorite deck, Rarran please try and get him on the channel!

[@mango6894]

this video was super cool and reaffirmed my decision to quit, card games are supposed to be thinking games with outplay. rng was a good way to increase the scenarios to increase how much you had to think, but at this point when its just finding your own combo faster than them (with one printed disruption piece in glide you pray to get) its not better than yugioh OTKing so pple pray to go first.

[@Luzarioth]

GvG was the point where I gave up on Hearthstone Tournaments & HS as a competative Game in general.

[@night4345]

OMG, Day9's legendary rant on Jade Druid. Iconic.

[@dracoblizzard7944]

I always cite Descent of Dragons as the "Age of Powercreep" in Hearthstone. I felt like before that, the most broken decks of prior formats would still be broken in each other format if they hadn't been nerfed, and in general the power level had not risen that much from classic. You still saw basic and classic cards in people's decks fairly often. I think DoD was the first set where you read the cards and just went "these cards are just better than everything else". It might not seem that crazy now, but I remember seeing cards like Dragon's Pack, Scion of Ruin and even Amber Watcher and just questioning what the hell they were doing. 5 mana 4/6 heal 8 is nothing special at all nowadays, but keep in mind it hadn't been that long since people were playing Earthen Ring Farseer for healing.

[@quisait5794]

I agree, I remember playing Hearthstone since Old Gods but the powerlevel really generally skyrocketed with Descent of Dragons, every card just had a good effect AND good stats, and following expansions just kept on getting slowly stronger and stronger, DH release following DoD shows how much they pushed the powerlevel too

[@deejayf69]

Reliving the United in Stormwind meta gave me Vietnam flashbacks.

[@itachiuchiha5035]

Rarann does really good videos. The people he gives homage to is what got em into hearthstone in the first place I think. More of the Bazar creater plz

[@k4rnage218]

The fact rarran doesnt know how strong Ostkaka's patron warrior post warsong was is crazy. It was still an S tier deck that dominated the meta

[@nova_supreme8390]

The good old days when innervate+innervate+Yeti on turn one had your opponent sweating.

[@gregcruz6517]

Played hearthstone up until the Tiawan player lost his money

[@WowOafus]

Same here.

[@AndreLuiz-sr1ro]

Rarran has to be the best consistent Hearthstone content creator rn. The criativity this man has for daily videos is unmached. Also, play Amnesia: The Bunker on stream lmao

[@ArtyomPlatonev]

he's almost as creative as your spelling of the word creative.

[@Cuestrupaster]

Fun fact the reason why Pavel stood there holding up the trophy was because Doug said to them, whoever won the tournament should hold the trophy for a little while to people take photos and give it impact so they were supposed to hold it for a while, but Pavel went kinda took it too far hahaha...

[@Nano4life09]

I remember watching the tournament live at work and I was yelling about paveling book getting a polymorph They had a betting system for the packs and I put amnesiac as my vote lmao Excellent video :D 😮

[@SkrappyQ]

Really nice to look back at older Hearthstone. I agree that Un'Goro was the "golden age" for a lot of people, lots of fond memories of that era.

[@professional.commentator]

23:47 Omg the battle between DrHippi vs Pavel was freaking legendary!

[@shoeless1137]

Old Gods was the best state the game ever was in.

[@chaslyndrilling7380]

2017 was the best and worst time in hearthstone's history. Not only were a lot of the decks really fun to play, but after so many years of having hearthstone be soooo expensive, it finally hit a breaking point. People didn't want to justify spending so much money on digital cards and in 2018 Ben Brode stepped away from the game.

[@Karax166]

1:19:28 I think it speaks volumes that people just watched the final game of the championship and everyone in chat just asks for drops. No congrats or anything. No one is there because they want to be.

[@rotonek2887]

Nothing wrong there though

[@Karax166]

@@rotonek2887 oh absolutely not. I do the same thing. It just shows that people don't really care about the tournament

[@vic_torugo]

I felt so nostalgic watching this video, I miss the old Hearthstone

[@RMGamer31O]

It’s funny how the scariest thing in Hearthstone initially was 14 damage from hand, when nowadays there’s decks that can deal 36 from hand, and that’s just on the low end. It also assumes the games last that long with how hyper-tuned aggressive decks are. That’s why when I play I stick to the solo content (such as Tombs of Terror and Dalaran Heist) and to Battlegrounds for the most part.

[@lartonki]

Actually not, rogue was able to play leeroy 3 times on turn eight.

[@RMGamer31O]

@@lartonki Leeroy did used to cost 4, huh? I forgot.

[@lartonki]

@@RMGamer31O yeah leeroy was orginal 4 mana, but allready 2014 it was nerfed to 5 mana

[@fzoid3534]

Back then when card management was important. You simply draw and especially discover too many cards now. Counting the opponent's outs is kinda useless now. I still wish they would make that every discovered card is shown to the opponent as well. So you still get your card advantage but you can also try to play around cards again.

[@AlexandrYudin77]

It kinda works in mtg. If you have to dig up your card in a deck you have to shot it your opponent most of the time

[@fzoid3534]

@@AlexandrYudin77 because you usually dig for specific card types - creature, sorcery, instant etc. or specific tribals. You show the card to show you took the correct one. I played a few tournaments in MTG and people are cheating like crazy.

[@AlexandrYudin77]

@@fzoid3534 yeah, but anyway. It could be used in hs as mechanic too

[@fzoid3534]

@@AlexandrYudin77 definitely. As if it is now discover is out of hand imo. The pool of cards is too big to play around stuff. Your opponent could get nearly everything. Either show the cards or limit the pool of cards you can get from discover by a lot. That's me as an old school HS player talking

[@AlexandrYudin77]

@@fzoid3534 I’d donated to this garbage more than 2000 dollars, before I quit in 2020. Cause it became impossible to have fun for me. So randomly, so op some cards. I logged in yesterday, to see if something changed. No it’s worse even it was, so I’ll stay in mtg for a while

[@datboi_gee]

That Pavel polymorph was nasty. Top-decks a random chance at an answer, gets the perfect RNG back to back. "Lemme just win real quick."

[@DuskoftheTwilight]

For that first finals you looked at, both players also brought Hunter and Warlock, it's just that one of them banned Hunter and the other banned Warlock. Priest vs. Rogue was the only difference in classes in their lineups.

[@teamredshirt]

For those who don't know him, the host standing to the far left of frame @ 13:04, Is DJ Wheat. Not sure what hes up to these days, but back then he was a streamer and commentator who had been involved with casting since the early years of esports. At one point, i want to say early 2000's, he did audio only casts of games. He did so much in the early streaming era that i can't actually remember it all. Long story short, he was among the first (a.k.a the pre-youtube) wave of full time content creators, and is one of the people who kinda paved the way for the modern content creator. [Edit] Maybe literally paved the way, as he ended up working for twitch. Not sure, havent really followed him since OneMoreGameTV spun down.

[@amberlee4536]

i've just noticed that rarran is now selling a shirt that says you got jailed! and i can't stop laughing real ones remember how difficult it was for him to remember his own famous catchphrase

[@Weebfox]

Un'Goro/Knights of the Frozen Throne was peak Hearthstone

[@darkjackl999]

That first jade game all i could think of was the day9 clip

[@YourName_2023]

Thanks, great video and a reminder why I quited the game :). Good memories and nostalgy, just what I needed.

[@BullBarnet]

As a Swede. I think we should start saying "Ostkaka" the way you did.

[@KkeojyeoOW]

This was such a nice blast from past, thanks for this Rarran. I also used to love Handlock, did quit when they introduced standard/wild.

[@YoungClarke]

Awww, firebat. I always looked forward to his videos back when he was making content. Miss that guy

[@TheRunner999]

Short answer: A LOT.

[@crunchytoast6007]

“One of them loses an it’s not the one with priest” wait…

[@cowmousedog]

Tom vs Frozen really was the peak for me, that whole tournament was such an exciting time

[@StriderYGO]

Thanks for reminding me to keep my hatred for Druid high at all times - cannot ever slack off!

[@jaxsonbateman]

I forgot how insane that Hunterace/Viper Rafaam game was. Freaking insane. Just haymaker after haymaker after haymaker, and Hunterace stands victorious at the end, bruised but not broken.

[@lookitsrain9552]

Better title: Why hearthstone is a bot infested unbalanced meme with turn 3 OTK combos, every deck discovers or steals cards, and losing and winning relies entirely on card draw and discover/theft effects in many matchups.

[@jaeusa160]

@31:20 For that year in particular, it needs to be noted Jade Druid is a dominating force even though Frozen Throne printed a neutral "Destroy All Jade Idols" ghoul to dismantle the deck's inevitability. That is how broken Jade Druid was. Better nerf Priest though, right? >:(

[@F2PAlius]

Its wild how you can remember who wins a world championship because of the card that was released with their name on it

[@christianhatch7842]

Ok so now I need the most upset full play moments of all qualifiers, all games full moments. Every game. Ppppppllllleereeaaaaasssseeeee

[@AuraXars]

55:40 i loved the power level of Tomb, if i remember correctly both untapped potential druid going inf with copying your hand and nzoth priest with 3 10 drops and an insane curve was allot of fun to play :)

[@Soulless_Elf]

Did i really just watch 1 hour 20 min vid? Omg I didn't notice it at all. What a great video!

[@PresidentScrooge]

Handlock was the second most fun Warlock deck ever. The most fun was deck destruction with Fel Reaver and Treachery. Actually got that thing to topr200 legend.

[@kevinjohnson4498]

I got my first Legend push with Miracle Rouge before the Leeroy Nerf. A real OG. Now I just come back every year or so to see whats new and play some arena.

[@GoodGoga]

Very interesting video. As a 10+ year player of HS i feel the biggest problem in game design and balance is the discount on resource generation. Draw, discover and random generation is way too good nowadays. Power creep is unavoidable in storied card games, but if you scale all the stats and abilities upwards then resource replenishment automatically becomes better too, since the generated resources themselves are better. If your aggro deck doesnt't have to make any compromises to replenish their hand, or if your combo does not need to have slow turns to set up Thaurissan, or if your control deck has infinite value within just 1-2 cards then the game loses any semblance of rock-paper-scissors balance and the devs MUST step in more often to quell the objectively best strategies, rather than letting the playrate balance itself out.

[@123pa1n]

thank fuck i stopped playing hearthstone years ago...

[@Nankeroo]

1 and a half hours of Rarran? Hell yeah!

[@jobooiii]

For me peak hearthstone was around 2015-2017. I stopped in 2019. Watch these video's for nostalgia but have no idea how hearthstone is nowadays lol. I liked the slow gameplay alot and can't handle quick pasted card games

[@megalogoro6388]

Oh man, when blade dance used to hit face 😂

[@fredcole6844]

Man that first game...The WORLD TOURNAMENT...BOTH players brought Yeti.

[@thepanic17]

Great Video Rarran. Thanks a lot for doing so good but still different content!

[@alucard5714]

WOW FROM FUNNY GAME TO P2W GAME FOR SWEATS NOWAY WHAT A CHANGE LES GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[@jmaniak9]

nostalgia is a crazy drug thank you

[@byVariations]

Canadian accent so strong I thought he said "story emote" and not sorry emote

[@lartonki]

1:06:40 I started playing 2015 but just after 2 weeks when they release demon hunter i stop playing and i have never come back after that.

[@jinoobtube]

perfect time i needed a vid rn

[@GravitoRaize]

This is the first Hearthstone video I've watched in years. After watching these last two grand finals shown here, with one being an hour long fight between two control decks and the one previous being a game where players are fishing through their decks for some combo that just autowins them the game, I'm pretty sure I made the right decision to quit playing years ago. They started killing the game with randomness a long time ago and the boring control deck play. The game was much more entertaining with tempo and face-hitting and with relatively little randomness. As others have stated, the game was also more enjoyable when they only real "combo" from hand dealt 14 damage and it was in the Druid deck, where it wasn't with a class that was hyper-aggressive.

[@vaccaria3351]

the funny thing is, swipe is in standard again and wild growth is 2 mana again

[@BIueharvest]

it must be incredibly frustrating to be a professional HS player in a high stakes tourney and then to lose through no fault in your own play to randumb bullshit cards lmao

[@G.Aaron.Fisher]

In the Last Hero Standing format, you didn't have the option to switch decks after winning. So Firebat had to play Druid in the second and third game.

[@MattBiersackSanders]

Man this made me sad. I miss firebat :(

[@irishpotato8786]

0:30 Was poggers a thing back in the day.... You know I think poggers originated shortly after overwatch 1 released, so probably

[@datadude295]

Going back and playing classic hearthstone has made me realize there hasn’t been a single expansion in the game that actually improved the game

[@benzibi]

I found it amusing when Pavel didn't know about Rogue secrets whilst playing on stage.

[@An.Unsought.Thought]

I really miss old Hearthstone, I'll be honest. I have played it around 2015/2016 ... took a break and came back around 2020.. and I'm playing it again. I do love that I can scrap all the wild cards and craft cards for Standard. I was always a fan of that as a f2p player. But man, I swear Its much harder to run Taunt cards nowadays. It used to be "Okay, I'll throw down a taunt so that I can at least stave the opponent off for a turn". Now they literally silence your taunt and beat your face in on the same turn like there was no taunt card to begin with. I also really miss frost mage.

[@queequeg00]

its sick to see when i left hearthstone, but then realize i was completely in the right to leave. your vids are awesome and love seeing aything oldschool

[@xing378]

1:18:29 perfect emote they are practice mates and it was indeed a fulfilling journey ❤

[@ericmuller3307]

It is sad that I have no other content creators to watch other than Rarran

[@kestelllaurie3224]

Pavelling book - the card was called that after pulling that Polymorph.

[@ButtercoreFTW]

Dougdoug has a funny story about one of the winners. I think pavel, who held up the trophy for waay too long

[@tahmthetankengine8557]

"When covid first came Out, acting like a company released it". Me :👀wellllll... 😂😂

[@zuni3474]

this video makes me so sad, i miss when you could play hearthstone how you wanted to, now its just aggro, control aggro, midrange aggro, combo aggro

[@violablecrab3858]

30:18 Dude i love DisguisedToast!!!

[@wolffang21burgers]

21:25 hero power does change the break point here. Lethal without azure drake is just Blade flurry, destroy taunt and hero power for the last damage.

[@af5013]

The Babbling Book incident followed by the Jade mirror match reminded me why I quit HS.

[@Profundis2137]

Around 9:00 mark you get so excited that he plays around board clear, but the other bloke had like 8 cards in hand, meaning 9 next round, it is normal to assume, that with 4 cards that screw you up, at least one of them has already landed in his hand, since he's been through more than 50% of the deck already. Its normal plays, not 200 IQ plays you make it out to be :D

[@snaxximan5737]

bm, bm kibler, kibler is such a classic caster

[@sirmonticus4319]

Oh man I miss Firebat :(

[@ryanchristenson1059]

Seeing a jade druid take fatigue is so dumb, that deck quite literally had infinite deck size

[@minigamit]

VKLiooon vs bloodyface was just sad The stomp. She was like "Yeah, another walk into the park"

[@KixMusaid]

I have never played this game but I still watched till the end😅

[@huggelion]

everyone complained about the large men but i think that was when hs peeked

[@nathanfiske390]

Rarran perfect pause on Frodans accidental pog face 17:42

[@electricVGC]

Rarran coming out against DH which is so crazy, after this video they only printed one good DH card per year

[@Mathematicall_Waterfall]

i FEEL OLD WHEN I LOOK AT OLD Hearthstone i want the First Hearstone story back when i got the Beta Key