Even with 0 wins (which means you REALLY suck) you get a pack plus one more prize. That's only a slight loss compared to the 1.5 packs you could have bought with the 150 gold in the shop. Plus you got the fun of playing in the arena.
If you get 4 wins, then you are going to get on average more than 150 gold worth of prizes. That's better than the shop.
One of the key ways to get stuff in this game without paying real money is to get good at arena. If you can win 10+ games on most arena runs (yes, people are this good) then you can actually just keep going in the arena over and over again until you are loaded.
My fav deck for this brawl is Warlock. Malchezar's Imp, Soulfire, Fist of Jaraxxus. Most decks didn't have an answer. Against Mill Druid, just hope you have a turn where you can kill them in one shot.
In Mage I really like Apprentice, Torch, Card Draw. You get 3 apprentices, and they are dead. Against Mill Druid, just hope you survive until turn 6 (5 with coin) and have 3 apprentices in hand.
However, the one deck I couldn't beat is Ice Block, Frostbolt, Ice Lance. It's not like you are bringing anti-secret tech. They play Ice Block every turn starting on turn 2/3. You need them to either get unlucky and run out of ice blocks or kill them before they can play one. Otherwise, they are invincible every turn until the turn they have enough damage for a OTK.
I've not lost to it. The problem mill Druid, as I've seen it, is that the 10 Natualizes aren't enough. Every card in my deck is a threat. His are not.
Scotts deck seems like it can potentially stop the hunter I've run but I'd have to see it played.
I also haven't seen the ice block Mage that Scott describes. My guess is that it would force them to never miss an Ice Block because the hunter can present lethal on turn 3 on a fairly regular basis.
I've not lost to it. The problem mill Druid, as I've seen it, is that the 10 Natualizes aren't enough. Every card in my deck is a threat. His are not.
Scotts deck seems like it can potentially stop the hunter I've run but I'd have to see it played.
I also haven't seen the ice block Mage that Scott describes. My guess is that it would force them to never miss an Ice Block because the hunter can present lethal on turn 3 on a fairly regular basis.
Yes, if they miss one ice block, they are dead. My torch apprentice mage kept them locked at one health. I just waited and hoped they didn't have enough ice blocks to hold out. The luck was with them that time, but there were definitely no guarantees.
The deck is really a tech choice to deal with spell users and mill druids, it works well against them. The core of the deck is the arcane shot and the fairy dragon. The hunters mark was included because I encountered several Deathlord, Divine Spirit, Inner Fire decks. The original was Fairy Dragon, Unleash the Hounds, Timber Wolf, but that wasn't fast enough against Mill. I do like this Sorcerers Apprentice, Flaming Torch, Arcane Intellect deck though, seems boss. Does it lose against anything?
I think there is the potential for an anti mill gang up deck. Like Gang Up, Deathlord, Preparation? Or Gang Up, Malchezaar, Preparation. Maybe Preparation, Eviscerate, Shiv would be better.
The deck is really a tech choice to deal with spell users and mill druids, it works well against them. The core of the deck is the arcane shot and the fairy dragon. The hunters mark was included because I encountered several Deathlord, Divine Spirit, Inner Fire decks. The original was Fairy Dragon, Unleash the Hounds, Timber Wolf, but that wasn't fast enough against Mill. I do like this Sorcerers Apprentice, Flaming Torch, Arcane Intellect deck though, seems boss. Does it lose against anything?
Edit: I HAVE ASSEMBLED EXODIA
Yes, the torch loses to anything that kills you before turn 5/6. It also loses to ice blocks (assuming they have one every turn).
Damn, I missed out on the Tavern Brawl discussion during my forum hiatus.
Even though I'm too late to the party, I figure I'd list some of favourites anyway. Top 3 Brawl — [Mage] Sorcerer's Apprentice + Frost Nova + Cabalist's Tome This one was super, super fun; you got to use minion decks as your plaything, although mill / burn decks would wreck you. Example game vs minion deck: - Get 2/3 apprentices down and delay with 0/1 mana novas - Cast a Cabalist's tome and get stuff like Arcane Intellect or Echo of Medivh to get more apprentices. - Have a full board of 7 apprentices and revel in the joy of playing 0 mana flamestrikes and 3 mana pyroblasts.
— [Rogue] Young Dragonhawk + Cold Blood + Conceal One of the fastest decks I tried. It was an auto-win vs Mill Druid and any burn-from-hand decks, but was an auto-lose vs any deck with taunts or AoE.
— [Shaman] Mechwarper + Explosive Sheep + Evolve A unique invention of my own; I don't think I saw anyone else playing it. It basically played out as a control deck, with different play styles depending on the opposition. Basically, the idea was that you can have Explosive Sheep to use as a board clear vs fast minion-heavy decks, whereas vs spell-based decks you could still use those cards as non-detrimental minions by evolving them.
— [Warlock] Mechwarper + Alarm-O-Bot + Mal'Ganis This was my attempt to make something like one of the Barnes/Innervate/[Y'Shaarj/Deathwing, Dragonlord/Ragnaos] decks without having those cards. It didn't work most of the time, but getting several Mal'Ganises out on the board early in the game is pretty awesome when it works.
Top 1 Brawl All-Star Squad I'm surprised Scott didn't comment on this brawl, since it was actually a great time for Babbling Book to shine; I definitely lost to a few Babbling Book mages, but I didn't get to try it myself since I hadn't yet unlocked the card.
This Reddit post pretty much sums up what the meta was like, except it's missing the one deck that I found was probably the strongest of all: — [Rogue] Buccaneer This one actually beat two out of the three meta-defining decks, which made it a super-good pick for the brawl. It beat Tidecaller Warlock because the Buccaneers trade 1-for-1 with the murlocs while also letting you use your hero power to kill off additional murlocs, and it also beat Mind Blast Priest because the 2-attack minions and extra dagger damage are enough to let you kill them before they kill you.
There were also some pretty good (albeit counterable) troll decks in the All-Star Squad brawl:
Ice Block Mage was a huge troll deck, since the only way you can lose is if the game goes to fatigue. Unfortunately, there also aren't really many ways you can win unless your opponent gets bored and concedes; all you can really do is keep pinging your enemy for 1 damage per turn and hope you get lucky with your 8 random class cards. After losing to one of these I realised that it's a lot weaker if you use the appropriate counterplay of never popping their block, so they end up with a full hand of Ice Blocks and mill their other cards.
Another huge troll deck was Power Word: Glory, which beats minion-based decks by neutralising their entire board so it can't actually do damage to you, and then winning the game in fatigue by using the Priest hero power. Presumably this loses to Druid and Warrior due to their armour gain, though.
Light of the Naaru Priest was also a fun one. The way you play it is to play no cards at all until your enemy does a bunch of damage to you, and then you play several copies of Light of the Naaru at the same time in a big swing turn, e.g. 5x Light of the Naaru to heal for 15 and make a 1/2, 3/2, 5/2, 7/2 and 9/2 in one turn.
All of my decks for those brawls were based on BABBLING BOOOOOOOOOK
The most recent brawl is the worst of all time. I put together the Dreadsteed thing, got a win on my first try, then never played it again.
I'm hoping for some excitement this week. I wish they would maybe give us random-ish decks that include spoiled unreleased cards so we can try before we buy. They did that in arena for some expansions, why not brawl?
I missed out on that brawl due to PAX AUS; seems I didn't miss much.
I too am a pretty big fan of "Who wants to cast a spell? I want to cast a spell", but due to not currently having Flamewaker unlocked I don't think I can play a deck with it.
That said, maybe Babbling Book could be playable in a Freeze Mage deck, in place of Novice Engineer. Drawing from your deck is better than a random spell, but it does cost 1 less mana.
Comments
If you spend 100 gold in the shop, you get one pack. The arena costs 150 gold. That's 1.5 packs of cards.
In the arena you spend 150 gold and get the following prize payout.
http://hearthstone.gamepedia.com/Arena#Table
Even with 0 wins (which means you REALLY suck) you get a pack plus one more prize. That's only a slight loss compared to the 1.5 packs you could have bought with the 150 gold in the shop. Plus you got the fun of playing in the arena.
If you get 4 wins, then you are going to get on average more than 150 gold worth of prizes. That's better than the shop.
One of the key ways to get stuff in this game without paying real money is to get good at arena. If you can win 10+ games on most arena runs (yes, people are this good) then you can actually just keep going in the arena over and over again until you are loaded.
In Mage I really like Apprentice, Torch, Card Draw. You get 3 apprentices, and they are dead. Against Mill Druid, just hope you survive until turn 6 (5 with coin) and have 3 apprentices in hand.
However, the one deck I couldn't beat is Ice Block, Frostbolt, Ice Lance. It's not like you are bringing anti-secret tech. They play Ice Block every turn starting on turn 2/3. You need them to either get unlucky and run out of ice blocks or kill them before they can play one. Otherwise, they are invincible every turn until the turn they have enough damage for a OTK.
Scotts deck seems like it can potentially stop the hunter I've run but I'd have to see it played.
I also haven't seen the ice block Mage that Scott describes. My guess is that it would force them to never miss an Ice Block because the hunter can present lethal on turn 3 on a fairly regular basis.
Edit: I HAVE ASSEMBLED EXODIA
Maybe Preparation, Eviscerate, Shiv would be better.
Even though I'm too late to the party, I figure I'd list some of favourites anyway.
Top 3 Brawl
— [Mage] Sorcerer's Apprentice + Frost Nova + Cabalist's Tome
This one was super, super fun; you got to use minion decks as your plaything, although mill / burn decks would wreck you.
Example game vs minion deck:
- Get 2/3 apprentices down and delay with 0/1 mana novas
- Cast a Cabalist's tome and get stuff like Arcane Intellect or Echo of Medivh to get more apprentices.
- Have a full board of 7 apprentices and revel in the joy of playing 0 mana flamestrikes and 3 mana pyroblasts.
— [Rogue] Young Dragonhawk + Cold Blood + Conceal
One of the fastest decks I tried. It was an auto-win vs Mill Druid and any burn-from-hand decks, but was an auto-lose vs any deck with taunts or AoE.
— [Shaman] Mechwarper + Explosive Sheep + Evolve
A unique invention of my own; I don't think I saw anyone else playing it. It basically played out as a control deck, with different play styles depending on the opposition.
Basically, the idea was that you can have Explosive Sheep to use as a board clear vs fast minion-heavy decks, whereas vs spell-based decks you could still use those cards as non-detrimental minions by evolving them.
— [Warlock] Mechwarper + Alarm-O-Bot + Mal'Ganis
This was my attempt to make something like one of the Barnes/Innervate/[Y'Shaarj/Deathwing, Dragonlord/Ragnaos] decks without having those cards.
It didn't work most of the time, but getting several Mal'Ganises out on the board early in the game is pretty awesome when it works.
Top 1 Brawl All-Star Squad
I'm surprised Scott didn't comment on this brawl, since it was actually a great time for Babbling Book to shine; I definitely lost to a few Babbling Book mages, but I didn't get to try it myself since I hadn't yet unlocked the card.
This Reddit post pretty much sums up what the meta was like, except it's missing the one deck that I found was probably the strongest of all:
— [Rogue] Buccaneer
This one actually beat two out of the three meta-defining decks, which made it a super-good pick for the brawl. It beat Tidecaller Warlock because the Buccaneers trade 1-for-1 with the murlocs while also letting you use your hero power to kill off additional murlocs, and it also beat Mind Blast Priest because the 2-attack minions and extra dagger damage are enough to let you kill them before they kill you.
Ice Block Mage was a huge troll deck, since the only way you can lose is if the game goes to fatigue. Unfortunately, there also aren't really many ways you can win unless your opponent gets bored and concedes; all you can really do is keep pinging your enemy for 1 damage per turn and hope you get lucky with your 8 random class cards. After losing to one of these I realised that it's a lot weaker if you use the appropriate counterplay of never popping their block, so they end up with a full hand of Ice Blocks and mill their other cards.
Another huge troll deck was Power Word: Glory, which beats minion-based decks by neutralising their entire board so it can't actually do damage to you, and then winning the game in fatigue by using the Priest hero power. Presumably this loses to Druid and Warrior due to their armour gain, though.
Light of the Naaru Priest was also a fun one. The way you play it is to play no cards at all until your enemy does a bunch of damage to you, and then you play several copies of Light of the Naaru at the same time in a big swing turn, e.g. 5x Light of the Naaru to heal for 15 and make a 1/2, 3/2, 5/2, 7/2 and 9/2 in one turn.
The most recent brawl is the worst of all time. I put together the Dreadsteed thing, got a win on my first try, then never played it again.
I'm hoping for some excitement this week. I wish they would maybe give us random-ish decks that include spoiled unreleased cards so we can try before we buy. They did that in arena for some expansions, why not brawl?
I missed out on that brawl due to PAX AUS; seems I didn't miss much.
I too am a pretty big fan of "Who wants to cast a spell? I want to cast a spell", but due to not currently having Flamewaker unlocked I don't think I can play a deck with it.
That said, maybe Babbling Book could be playable in a Freeze Mage deck, in place of Novice Engineer. Drawing from your deck is better than a random spell, but it does cost 1 less mana.