Hearthstone in open beta

[Spud1]

As per the title, hearthstone is now finally open to all

http://eu.battle.net/hearthstone/en/...ere-22-01-2014

Go go go and sign up, we need some new players to beat err play with.

For those who don't know what it is or why you should give it a go - i'd start with saying its the latest free to play game from Blizzard, and it's based in the Warcraft universe (covering the entire series/lore, not just WoW). That's enough for most gamers out there to warrant giving it a try

For those who want to know a little more..well it's an online card game, very similar in many aspects to games like Magic: The Gathering, but not quite so geeky. Great for a quick "pick up and play" session, and insanely addictive..personally I have barely played anything else since I got my beta key in December, which is a touch frustrating but at the same time is a great indicator as to the game's quality..as i'm far from the only one. I had never played a card game previously, but it was easy to pick up and became addictive very quickly.

Well worth a download and a quick play, no need to spend any money. The beta keys were one of the most sought after commodities in the gaming world for the past few months, so i'm expecting open beta signup to become restricted before long..get in now whilst you can

[Infinite]

I been playing this for a few month. Its good stuff but I'm awful at it. Making bad plays all the time and only realise what i should have done minutes later XD

We should put our battle tad id things on here for friendlies. I put mine out when I get home.

[GeorgeStorm]

I've had it for a couple of months now, watch it a lot more than I play it.
My opinion of it varies greatly day to day, it's also a game that I get very little enjoyment out of when losing games (unless they were very close) whereas with a lot of others just the act of playing the game can be fun, regardless of how well you're doing.

I guess it's to do with CCGs in general, but this is the first I've properly played so I've no real experience.

No idea what my battle thing is, if I remember I'll try to find out tonight and post it.

[Blackfudge]

Had no idea that it had come out in open beta for europe though it was only north america i saw total biscuit playing it and I'm interested downloading now.

[Willzzz]

I'm playing this.
Losing isn't too bad, like most card games there is a fair luck element, so I don't feel bad.

[snikez18]

i hate polymorph so much.....my blood boils when i play ancient of war and then straight away they whip out polymorph

[Crhis]

Having a lot of success in ranked with a slightly modified version of this basic priest deck.

-Minions (18)

Chillwind Yeti x2
Gurubashi Berserker x2
Gnomish Inventor x1
Nat Pagle x1
Ironfur Grizzly x2
Northshire Cleric x2
Novice Engineer x2
River Crocolisk x2
Sen'jin Shieldmasta x2
Shattered Sun Cleric x2

-Spells (12)

Holy Nova x2
Holy Smite x2
Mind Control x2
Power Word: Shield x2
Shadow Word: Death x2
Shadow Word: Pain x2

The daily quests are such addiction fodder, definitely what draws me in.

[emjay2d]

Great game! Unfortunatly my love for it has died down, considering I play against players with crazy good decks/skill and I'm not that good, and I lose 70% of the time. Everytime I lose I generally get pretty angry for some reason.. Games really good, regardless.

[Willzzz]

Surely the ladder system should mean you always settle around a 50% winrate? You may get streaks of course, but you should encounter these both ways.

Plus it's always fun to smash a player who has a deck full of legendaries.

[Spud1]

Surely the ladder system should mean you always settle around a 50% winrate? You may get streaks of course, but you should encounter these both ways.

Plus it's always fun to smash a player who has a deck full of legendaries.

Not quite sadly - the ladder is full of flaws as its not based on any sort of MMR/Skill, purely on ranking. Due to regular resets you always get good players who have to rise through the ranks again, meaning that it can be a real pain sometimes.

That said, it is much more about skill (and a small amount of luck) than anything else - I went from rank 25-15 with a "standard" warrior deck - that means no rare, epic or legendary cards..its about making sure there is synergy between your cards, a purpose for your deck (e.g is it rush? control? giants?) and planning moves throughout the game. Took me a while to get that though, I was almost agreeing with those people screaming "its pay to win!!" etc etc, but it's really not, just like any game..you need to learn the strategy and don't make daft moves like playing ragnaros when your opponent has sylvanas on the board, or loading the board full of minions on turn 6 against a mage (who will likely have a flamestrike on turn 7).

The really fun thing about hearthstone though is that it's constantly changing (the "meta") - last week I could kick ass with my warlock control deck, but this week it's been absolutely useless and my warrior deck just got me a 6 win streak. Next week i'll have to re-adjust again to something else. It can be incredibly frustrating at times when your opponent seems to get all the right cards at all the right times, but it does cut both ways, honestly

[Twitir]

Loving this game so far. I'm running a priest deck. Still waiting for my first leg that I can build a decent deck around =/