The return of the one and only CCI. Magic: The Gathering Arena Review. The return of the one and only CCG What is the essence and importance of blocks of cards in the arena

Hello WinCondition readers, today we will talk about rating system at MTG Arena.


Climbing to the rank of mythic in Mtg Arena resembles the torment of Sisyphus - the hero of ancient Greek mythology, after the death of the condemned by the gods, roll a heavy stone up the mountain, which, having barely reached the top, rolled down again and again. All rating ladder conditionally consists of three stages. This is clearly shown in the picture.

First stage- this is bronze and silver. To pass these levels, you need to breathe evenly and lay the cards on the table. Well, seriously, I think that no one has a problem with these ranks. There is no need for a positive win rate here, since you do not lose points for a defeat, or you lose less than you get for a victory.

Second stage- this is the gap from gold to mythic. This is where the bulk of the players are located. In order to advance in this interval, you need to have a win rate of more than 50% - that is, you need to win more than lose (thanks to the cap). Remember that there are safe steps on this slippery slope, once you reach platinum for the first time, you will not fall back onto gold. This applies to all ranks. But inside the so-called "shooting galleries" (for example, gold) you can hang out for a very long time until you manage to achieve a stable win rate. In fact, there is nothing difficult in overcoming these two gaps and taking the cherished mythic. Everyone who has the desire and the time can do it. Let's take a look at some approximate numbers. I made 3 tables showing how many games you need to play and how much winrate will be required if 50, 100 or 150 hours are allocated to play MTG this month.

I took 3 decks with different playstyles from the recent standard - control, midrange and aggro, added their average play time and got interesting conclusions.


First- the slightest change in winrate affects the duration of the rise in mythic. Just take a look at the last table. Increasing your winrate from 50.72 to just 0.53 percent will save you about 674 extra games!

Second- you need to play with the deck that consistently shows the best win rate, despite the fact that it can lose by the average game time. But, if you show equally good winrate and aggro and deck control, then it will be more effective in time, of course, to choose an aggro style.

Additionally, it matters whether you play bo1 or bo3. With the explosive aggro deck, it's easy for us to surprise our opponent with a quick hand and punish for greedy hands, but after the side, it will be difficult to repeat this trick. The opponent is already ready to restrain early aggression. I believe that the bo1 format is preferable for the aggro style.
Playing control, on the contrary, I prefer bo3, because after the side-board I can be ready for anything, even after losing the first game.

We figured out the ascent to mythic, but what if this is not enough for us? What if we want to take the top in the rating tables and qualify for cool tournaments from the Wizards? Then we have a long road to the heights of the myth.

There is already complete hardcore - no fireproof results, experienced opponents and ONLY meta decks (about three decks, that's all the variety. Seriously, don't bother playing without a specific goal, it's incredibly dull there). After you reach the rank of mythic, you are assigned a percentage, as in the picture.


Only the top 1200 players have places in the rating table - this is one percent of the total number of people at the Mythic rank. How do you know where you are? For example, if your account has 96 percent, then you are among the 4 percent of the best players of the Mythic rank - did you get the chip? For victories, the percentage may increase, or may not increase, but, be sure, the percentage will be removed for defeat for sure) Therefore, in order to advance here, you need to have a sooooo high win rate.


After you have managed to overcome the percentage line, do not rush to rejoice, close the game and not enter until the end of the season (month). You will definitely be smoked out of there while you are not playing. Mythic rating will constantly decline if not supported by victories. As the saying goes: while you sleep, the enemy is swinging. In my observation, in the last couple of days before the end of the season, when everyone starts rating fever, you can lose from 100 to 200 positions every hour. Therefore, if you decide on this, you need to play a lot. If you manage to hold out in the top 1200 until 11 pm Moscow time last day season, then, within a week, you should receive the coveted letter from the Wizard inviting you to the closed online qualifier as part of the Mythic Qualifier Weekend. Mine looked something like this


That's all! Hope the article was helpful. Believe in your topdeck and achieve all the necessary achievements for the emergency)

For WinCondition, the article was prepared

hearthstonetopdecks created amazing detailed guide on playing in the Arena for beginners. I just couldn't help but translate it. Caution, 14 A4 pages 🙂

This guide is designed to help beginners understand how the Arena works in Hearthstone. The main goal of this guide is to teach you how to play endless arenas. So you can get a source of infinite gold in Hearthstone and combine it with a very interesting gameplay... The guide is divided into several parts and will take you from a basic understanding of the arena to various game subtleties that only professional players... By studying the information in this article, you can become an Arena Legend.

Introductory part
While playing in the arena, I see that a lot of newbies just enter this mode without any idea of ​​what actually needs to be done here, they have no chances to be crushed by players with experience, as a result of which beginners feel frustrated and get a very unpleasant experience of playing in the mode. they have no motivation to appear here anymore.
Hearthstone is only considered beginner friendly. Of course, there were some changes in order to improve the situation, but with each new addition, the game becomes more and more complicated and incomprehensible for those who start playing it.
Hearthstone has a reputation for “pay-to-win” games, and to some extent this is true. This seems to be true in the event that you want to collect a large collection of cards for competitive play... It is extremely difficult to do this as a beginner. I myself have been in the shoes of a “free” player and am familiar with this problem firsthand. Everything changed when I discovered the magic of the Arena.

The importance of the arena for newbies
With the release of each new addition, the importance of the arena grows more and more, as on this moment it is the main way to make a lot of gold in no time. Instead of spending gold on boosters (you should almost never do this, the only exception is if you only need cards from a specific expansion and have little arena experience), you need to invest your gold in the Arena and profit from it. Even if you play badly and only achieve 3 wins on average, 150 gold still pays off. You get a set of cards (100 gold), 20-25 gold, and you also get either an additional card, or an additional 20-25 gold or dust. By the way, as a rule, the value of dust exceeds the value of gold. Well, of course, our goal is to make sure that we don't stop at 3 wins. We need profit, a lot of profit!

The amount of gold received depending on the number of victories

Source: ArenaMastery

How to make it so that you can start taking a stable profit from the arena? You need to reach an average mark of 7. From that moment on, the pure gold received for the Arena will allow you to start the next one. If you play better than 7 wins, that will be your net, very high profit.

Average amount of gold depending on the number of wins.

Source: ArenaMastery

I will be honest with you, it is not so easy to achieve a stable seven wins in every trip to the arena. According to a reddit post, only 9% of players can reach this mark. I think this may demotivate you a little. The average player in the arena achieves 3 wins. However, there is no need to despair. When you are not achieving the desired result, you just need to focus on improving your own skills as a player. It will be useful. If you are able to identify your own mistakes, you will add from trip to trip.
Also, everything you learn in the arena will definitely help you in the ranked game. Especially your skill of correct exchanges grows.

Part 1: Arena Classes

As you know, there are 9 different classes in Hearthstone, each of them has unique abilities and features, it is very important to understand all the strengths and weaknesses of your class. This will help you choose the right cards in the arena to maximize your potential and minimize weaknesses. To help you understand which class is better to choose, just below you can find a tylist for all classes.
To maximize the chance of winning, we need to try to pick a class from Tier 1 whenever possible. The point is that these classes have the strongest arena toolsets. I am not saying that it is completely impossible to win 12 victories with a Warrior, however, it will be much more difficult, since the nature of this class, at the moment, is practically not designed for this mode.

  • Tier 1: Mage, Rogue, Paladin
  • Tier 2: Hunter, Warlock, Priest
  • Tier 3: Shaman, Druid, Warrior

In order for you to better understand these classes, I will tell you below about the strengths and weaknesses of each. This will help you understand what to expect when choosing or playing against all classes from Tier 1 and Tier 2.

Magician

Strengths

  • Universal hero power
  • Can adapt to any situation
  • Excellent class cards
  • Mass removal can win the match on their own

Weak sides

  • Few class creatures
  • May be in a situation where the hand consists of defensive and situational cards

Adapting to the situation
Games don't always go according to your plan, the main goal of a match is victory, not survival. So, sometimes you need to make risky decisions to win, especially if the game is not in your favor. Ask yourself this question more often:

  • "What can my opponent do in the worst case for me to get back into the game?"

Even if you think such situations are unlikely, it is very important to prepare for them. For example, if you are playing a mirror match with another Paladin, you have two other medium creatures on the table. You are in a leading position in this match and ignore the possibility that the opponent has. You summon a fourth creature, your opponent casts and takes yours. This is just one example.
However, if you find that your opponents' creatures are generally more valuable than yours and you are losing turn to turn, it probably makes sense to change your game plans and go for an aggressive match. You can start attacking your opponent's face much more often and try to play only those cards that have the highest tempo. In this case, ask yourself another question. For example:

  • "What risks can I take in order to get back into the game?"
    Sometimes you need to stop playing around your opponent's removal and play all the cards you have. Of course, if your opponent has a suitable removal, you will lose, however, this is the arena mode, not the rating mode. So, the opponent may not have any removal at all as such. In some situations, you will not lose absolutely anything. You would still lose, even if you didn’t commit aggression.

Part 4. Lessons from failure

Sooner or later everything comes to an end, including the trip to the Arena. Few of us have ever won 12 victories. If you've done this before, I congratulate you. If you have never succeeded in this, then nothing terrible has happened. The most important part is the experience you have gained. First and foremost, you must evaluate your choices when drafting. Have you had any cards in your deck that you thought were useful, but never came in handy? Maybe you got too many early creatures into the deck and completely forgot about the late game? What if you chose other cards? How would that make a difference in your situation?
Then you need to rate your play. There are two types of errors:

  • Technical
  • Errors when making decisions.

Technical errors in Hearthstone have practically no effect on the game, this applies more to games of a different genre, like Dota or League of Legends, where correct clicks, APM and other such things are important. However, they also exist in Hearthstone. For example, if you did not correctly compose the sequence of actions. Let's say you have 2 paladin recruits, there is between them, and your opponent has a creature with 6 units. health. You can make a mistake and start attacking from left to right, inflicting 2 damage from the first paladin recruit. damage, then 2 pts. damage with help and, after his death, the strengthening of the right paladin-recruit will disappear and he will only deal 1 damage. damage. Or, for example, you are playing against a Shaman and you have two creatures, one of them is wounded. You decide to attack with a wounded creature, it survives, your healing totem restores 1 health to it. health. However, if you attacked an opponent's creature with your creature at full health, the totem would restore 1 unit each. health to both creatures.
Mistakes in decision making are something that is very difficult to notice during the game, but very often understanding them helps you to improve your level of play very cool. If you are analyzing past matches, you should ask questions:

  • Did I play as optimally as possible?
  • Did I have a chance of winning?
  • Were there any risks I took on myself that I shouldn't have done?
  • Have I made any mistakes?
  • Should I be more patient with massive removal?
  • Should I have played more aggressively?

Also, when you watch streams of other players in the arena, read guides or study map ratings, keep in mind that among them there may be conflicts of opinion on any issue. The only opinion you should take into account is your own opinion, which is based on your personal experience.

So, gentlemen and ladies, there will be many letters further. The idea to write a guide came to me a long time ago, but the abundance of material on the Internet has always pushed this idea far back. But now, the hour has come. The guide will be more useful for beginners, but “ veterans“I think it will not be harmful to read it. This guide is devoted to the selection of cards in the arena.

Arena - game mode Hearthstone where you play cards that do not belong to you. You get a "random" set of 30 cards, sequentially choosing from 3 provided to choose the best in your opinion. The entrance to the arena costs $ 2 with change or 150 coins. The first entry is free!

Your goal for the best reward, win 12 matches and you shouldn't lose more than 3 times. If the number of your victories is 7 or more, then the gold spent on the arena is returned to you (+ \ -).

The essence of the selection of players in the arena is extremely simple. That is, if you, for example, won 7 games in a row, then you will come across the same rival who won 7 matches in a row. You can leave the arena whenever you want, just enter, the same principle when choosing cards.

Arena rewards: dust, boosters, gold, cards. The more victories you have, the more valuable the reward will be. You will get a booster in any case, no matter how many victories you have, at least 3 defeats and not a single victory. As I wrote above, at the 7th victory, you "beat off" the gold spent on the arena.

Further more interesting, my dear friend. Here you have earned 150 hard-earned gold on daily deals, click the coveted button and you are offered a choice of 3 heroes. We will consider in detail 3 strongest(in my opinion) class.

  1. Paladin

The first in this issue will be the Magician

So the Magician. In my opinion, Jaina has the best hero power in the game... She can hit a unit without taking damage, unlike other classes that have a similar (attacking) hero power.

But this is not the only reason why Jaina is in the top 1 line of our charts. Best Removals in the Game concentrated in the hands of one class. I think even HS beginners are familiar with them.

Meet:

  • Fire ball- costs 4 mana, deals 6 damage to the target.
  • Ice arrow- costs 2 mana, deals 3 damage to the character and freezes him.
  • Transformation- costs 4 mana, turns the selected creature into a 1 \ 1 sheep.
  • Well, the thunder of the "full table": - the cost of 7 mana, deals 4 damage to all enemy creatures.

The power of these spells lies not only in the fact that they are concentrated in the hands of one Jaina, but also in " rarities»Cards. Since these cards do not even have a crystal for "rarity", in the arena they will drop out very often.

If you find yourself in the choice of at least one of the above cards, do not think, feel free to take it (in the case of Ice Arrow 50 to 50).

There are 3 important factors I keep in mind when building a deck. Let's consider each of them.

The first important factor is the mana curve.

Depending on the style of play, you will have a certain value of the card prevail. The basic idea is that your deck must have an acceptable distribution of cards, depending on their price (although some preference should still be given to cheaper cards). This greatly increases the likelihood that during each turn you will be able to play cards with the most suitable price for it.

For each stage of the game (early, middle, or late), you have the deck should have several strong creatures and several useful spells that you could play. If you follow the tables, regardless of your deck's mana distribution curve, things can go unenviable.

For example, if you follow the tables completely, you can end up with a deck that consists of 75% cards worth two crystals. It is very likely that, individually considered, each of these cards will turn out to be much better than the other proposed options, but nevertheless, the results of using so many of these cheap cards can be dire.

It follows from this that when choosing cards you never forget your mana curve... The ideal shape for your distribution curve will depend on the type of deck you want to play ( in an aggressive deck designed for the early stage of the game, it is preferable to select a large number of cheap and slightly more expensive cards, and in a deck aimed at establishing control of the board in the late stage of the game, cards should be recruited according to the opposite principle). Anyway some balance should be sought.

In practice, this means that when choosing the 15th card between cards worth 2 crystals from the first group and the cost of 4 crystals from the second, when you already have seven cards in your deck for the price of 2 crystals and none for four, you should choose a card worth 4 crystal, even if it belongs to a lower group.

We will not go into details here, since there are a huge number of possible situations however, hopefully you understand the basic principles.

The second factor is synergy

Of course, the presence of synergy between some of the cards in your deck is a great bonus and allows you to add value to those cards. Sometimes you even get the ability to carry out cool combinations... However, in the Arena, you should avoid cards whose main value lies in their ability to effectively interact with other cards that you do not already have.

This is due to the fact that there is no guarantee that in the end you will be able to collect the cards you need. It may happen that, even after seeing them, you prefer to opt for more valuable cards that will appear with them in the same three.

The ideal approach when recruiting cards in the Arena is to choose cards in which you proceed from individual card value and only if you have them in your hand can you pick up some cards that form good interaction with them, in no case placing undue hopes on this interaction.

Some cards, such as Sindorei Priest and Dark Iron Dwarf, have great synergy with many cards, they will always be welcome candidates for your deck, and will be able to strengthen many of your creatures.

Some other cards that will restrict your play and force you to recruit unique ones are not suitable for an adequate card recruiting strategy. For example, a set of murlocs would be a bad idea anyway, because regular cards Murlocs do not perform well, and you will have to rely on rare Murloc cards to interact effectively with other cards.

Even if initially you are offered extremely valuable rare card murloc, it would be much more far-sighted to choose another rare card, which will have a higher value compared to the murloc card, since in the future you will hardly be able to collect enough common murlocs with which your previously chosen rare murloc could effectively interact.

The third factor is determining the style of play

Deck style - aggressive, control, combo (I highly do not recommend it).

Aggressive Are my favorite type of decks. What could be better than killing your opponent on turns 5-6. Unfortunately, Jaina is not meant for this. The strength of the hero, the mana cost of removal and the lack of strong "basic" creatures ( Exception - . Ranked has several combo mage archetypes. Echo Mage and Freeze Mage are the most effective. I doubt very much that in the arena you will be able to collect anything approximately similar to these decks.

Possible sets of all sorts of ovs in the deck, one of the first cards, naturally, your further choice of cards will be based on creatures with an attack rate of - 1, to surprise your opponent later ejection of multiple creatures, enhanced.

If the gods of random were merciful to you and Archmage Antonidas came to you, you will try to hold back the removal in order to get more benefit. Also, with further choice of cards, you can look for creatures that give you a spare part, which will significantly increase efficiency Archmage Antonidas. As I said above, this style is very situational and it is up to each player to decide how to play. There are a lot of options.

I hope this article helped newcomers, and also opened something new for " experienced»Players. From SW. Edward

The Magic: The Gathering gaming community is huge. The presence of many experienced magicians does not scare off newcomers, and Wizards of the Coast is doing everything to remove obstacles between the game and the player, including releasing electronic versions of its most popular CCG. Magic Online was created for those who couldn't visit gaming clubs or didn't want to save up cards. But historically, it was chosen mainly by experienced players. Duels of the Planeswalkers and Magic Duels were the products for those who want to get comfortable with the game - as accessible as possible, but with limited functionality. Magic: Arena, currently in beta testing, combines elements from all its predecessors.

The main charm of "Magic" is in the plot and illustrations. Take them away and there will be one lifeless mathematics: this card allows you to deal damage by three, this one by two, this creature has more health than the other, and so on. But the striking design of the cards and artistic texts make the player feel like a commander. Magic: Arena pays enough attention to the atmosphere: for example, when you summon a creature with the type of "cat", you will hear meow or growl depending on its size. When casting powerful spells, there will be additional effects: for creatures - beautiful animation, for Planeswalkers - also voice acting for each attack.

Aurelia, Angel of the Boros Guild, enters the battlefield in spectacular fashion

The question about money is the most painful one for all magicians. We will answer right away: in Arena you can collect good deck... Perhaps it will not immediately be as good as your deck in the tabletop "Magic", but making something working on the fly is real. At the beginning of the game, you will be offered five decks of the same color, which already contain valuable cards. For completing game tasks (inflicting 50 damage, laying out 20 lands, playing 20 black spells), the player is awarded new decks or game currency - gold. For gold, you can buy boosters, one card in which will certainly be rare or mythical. Quests are updated once a day, so the game encourages regular visits, but does not require you to hang in it constantly.

It would be difficult to assemble a deck to your liking from the found cards, but the wild cards save the matter. These are special “blank” cards of a certain rarity, given for revealing a certain number of boosters. Wildcards can be turned into any card of a given rarity.

Successfully opened booster: a golden wildcard can be turned into any "rare" card

Of course, you can invest in the purchase of in-game items. Wildcards themselves cannot be bought for real money, but you can buy crystals, with which it is profitable to pay for participation in tournaments and buy sets. Crystals cannot be converted into in-game gold, but they can be won by playing well in the Fast Draft, a tournament that pays for participation in gold.

Do not rush to invest in the game while beta testing is in progress! On September 24, all cards from the collection will disappear, only purchased crystals will be saved on your account.

In a sense, wildcards gave Arena players more options than tabletop Magic players. Take, for example, the Nexus of Destiny card, which grants an additional turn. You cannot find this strong card in boosters, it was issued in stores for purchasing a booster display. However, in the Arena, any mythical wildcard can be turned into a Nexus of Destiny, and decks with it will cause a lot of problems for your opponents (as they delivered to me).

In Magic, a deck can usually only hold four copies of one card. However, the Nexus of Destiny cannot go to the graveyard - when played, discarded, canceled, it will return to the deck. And what fewer cards remains in the deck, the more likely it is to have several "Nexuses" on hand at once, which means that it will generally deprive your opponent of the opportunity to play. It is very pleasant if you play this card yourself, and painful if it is used against you. And if Teferi's Planeswalker is already on the field, playing the Nexus usually means it's game over: Teferi will soon score points to drive out half of the opponent's table.

Rare outcome: Teferi played his last ability, but cannot win - the deck is over! He has to exorcise himself in order not to lose, but this will not save him from stubborn goblins.

It will hardly be pleasant for a beginner to come across a deck on the Nexus, but he will find out what kind of deceit is encountered in Magic tournaments. In general, the game offers a fairly convenient system for ranking the difficulty of opponents: for victories your rank rises, the higher the rank, the stronger the opponents. For defeat, the rating is lowered, and, as in life, you fall faster than you rise.

Such a system, along with a user-friendly interface, pleasant animation and the ability to play a game with an opponent from anywhere in the world at any time, makes the game really open to beginners.

"Magic" is good for the abundance of game formats and strategies. The Arena formats are divided into Constructed and Limited deck play. In the first case, the player uses a pre-prepared set of cards. In the second, for example, the draft is popular.

Five colors of mana allow you to build decks in a variety of combinations with all kinds of card combinations. Each new set introduces changes to the Standard format, adding cards and spawning new deck archetypes.

Currently, Kaladesh, Aether Revolt, Amonkhet, Hour of Destruction, Ixalan, Fight for Ixalan, Dominaria, Core Set 2019 are active in the standard format. Soon, with the release of Guilds of Ravnica, sets from Kaladesh to Hour of Destruction will be in rotation, and a new cycle will begin.

All Arena modes are open only to Standard-legal cards. You can play a quick match with a random opponent, you can try your deck in a competitive format, where a sideboard will come in handy (additional 15 cards with answers in case of specific problems), or you can craft. In addition, regularly held game events, for example, "Research" (the player's hand size is not limited, you can put two lands per turn) or "Pauper" (only cards of the lowest rarity can be put into the deck). The last example is Momir's Madness.

The deck is not needed, the player is invited to blindly summon creatures on the battlefield. Creatures become more dangerous with each turn

Are the developers going to extend the Arena's user-friendly interface to other formats (Modern, Legacy, Commander)? It is not yet known, but I would not count on this, since in this case Arena will become a direct competitor to Magic Online, which Wizards of the Coast themselves hardly want.

The interface also reliably conveys game actions - turning creatures, grouping lands and manipulating the graveyard of cards

The Guilds of Ravnica tabletop magic planeswalker decks will contain codes that unlock the same deck in the Arena. They will be admitted to a special event in the "Sealed Deck" format using a code from the Prerelease Kit.

On the whole, Arena is a successful collection of the best ideas from past games. The beta version still has its bugs, but in fact, all the improvements that come to mind are cosmetic. I would like to put on an avatar not only one of the Planeswalkers, but also a creature or even a favorite card (why not?). It would be nice if there were statistics on the total number of victories and defeats in specific tournaments somewhere.

Outcome:"Arena" is an excellent product, beautiful, adequately conveying the impressions of real game... It will be interesting for both beginners and experienced players. It is quite possible to play it for free, especially if you learn to win at tournaments. You can find your beta code on Twitter or request it by email at Magic: The Gathering. And from September 28, the beta version will be available to all players.

Saint George match: dragons vs. knights. The end is a little predictable

Once again, the release of a new expansion brings us a new arena meta. For successful game and the choice of cards in the arena, you will need not only playing skills, but also an understanding of how the developers operate with the chances of offering you certain cards for the draft.

After the release of the Saviors of Uldum expansion, the following packs became available in the arena:

  • Basic set
  • Classic set
  • Saviors of Uldum
  • "Rastakhan's games"
  • "Expedition to Un'Goro"
  • "Kobolds and Catacombs"
  • League of Explorers

The return to the Expedition to Un'Goro arena means that the most powerful cards ever released for this format will be back in business and have a significant impact on the meta. It is still too early to draw definitive conclusions about the Saviors of Uldum cards, which first appeared in this format, because they have not yet accumulated enough statistics to compare with other sets.

What is the essence and importance of the arena card blocks?

As of March 2018, Arena Draft card selections are no longer based on Gem rarity. Now all cards are divided into blocks, where there are cards of approximately the same power, regardless of the rarity of their gem. The developers are responsible for the uniform distribution of cards in blocks, who take into account the statistics and composition of the current sets for the current pool of arena cards. Cards from the best and worst blocks have additional penalties on their chances of being drafted. All other class-based micro-changes are done on top of this block system.

However, very importantly, these blocks are sometimes modified based on player behavior in the card selection process, and the movement of cards through these groups is usually based on how often they are drafted rather than based on winrate. Dean Ayala, that this system of dividing cards into blocks offers players interesting selections of cards, and not standing nearby cards of the same strength. But even that can't explain some of the odd card selections in the draft. For example, Candle Horn is in a block that is one level worse than the Crimson Crusader block. This resembles a similar situation where the Sunreaver Spy was more worst card for all classes than River Crocolisk. All class-based micro-changes are reset with every rotation of the arena sets, which leads to such oddities at the very beginning of the season.

The problem with this system is that glaring errors occur when evaluating the strength of the cards, which leads to the appearance of a domino effect in the meteorological arena. If Team 5 underestimates a card, then it will be offered in the draft on a par with cards of obviously worse power. Knowledgeable players will choose it automatically if they want to achieve better results, which will lead to the emergence of many identical decks in the arena.

It follows from this that class cards combined in the "wrong" blocks will lead to the emergence of certain archetypes. You will always choose the card that is better than the proposed alternatives. If this map matches the control strategy, then at the end we will try to adhere to the control archetype for a particular class.

Weaknesses and strengths new system are actively discussed by the hardcore community of players in the arena. But we, ordinary people, do not need to know these subtleties. We just need to decide on the list of cards whose strength was initially underestimated, and they fell into weaker blocks. First of all, they should be taken into account in the draft and it should be assumed that similar cards will be chosen by the opponent in accordance with his class.

The developers' policy in this direction was inconsistent. If earlier the developers published the composition of blocks for public access, now they have decided not to disclose these lists. But we know that the joint efforts of the community will quickly lead to the collection of the necessary information, which will be little different from the official one. In any case, the most dubious and egregious data will be quickly calculated and eliminated.

Knowing how bid odds are weighted is important for an effective draft. different maps... Recently, cards with a lower rarity are being offered more often. This began to resemble the old system, where cards were drawn based solely on the rarity of their gems. The latest datamining (the study of game resources) shows that no additional bonuses are given for the Saviors of Uldum cards at the moment, at least for cards of common rarity. Recall that previously, for the cards of the last set in Hearthstone, for a certain period from the time of its start, they were given increased coefficients of their drop in the draft.

Saviors of Uldum key neutral cards for the arena meta

Overall, the high power level of Saviors of Uldum cards from an arena perspective means that the gameplay will be more dynamic and less dependent on the early game pace compared to the Rise of Mechanisms meta. This also means that you will often find it difficult to play around a variety of potential threats. As a rule, these types of metas force you to take more risks, especially when you don't have a tool to turn the situation on the board at hand. However, most of the cards listed below can get you out of the race early if you don't prepare for them. The real problem is that you often cannot prepare for them, even if you try. Also, keep in mind that rebirth is triggered after deathrattle effects. This rather illogical game element can significantly affect the exchange strategy.

Bandaged Golem- Without exaggeration, we can assume that the entire meta arena revolves around this one map: although it is not used in rating mode, it is a monstrous pile of resources that are very difficult to completely eliminate. You will need a total of 7 damage in 3 steps only after it appears on the board. The situation will worsen if he survives and begins to summon additional scarabs. Arena veterans will surely remember how good the Obsidian Crusher was for a warrior. Now all classes have a similar tool. On top of that, he got into a block with weak cards, which gives him a penalty on the chance of being drafted. The fact that the Bandaged Golem is still ubiquitous in high level victories testifies to his incredible strength, which will make it inevitable for him to move to a higher block, where he will have a better chance of appearing on the draft with an accompanying increase in games with his participation.

Vulpera cheat- This seemingly modest card compares favorably with the Inventor Dwarf and is already an acceptable draft option. Excavating a spell is often stronger than a siphon additional card from the deck. Her high level of strength is already evidenced by the fact that she found a place in the decks of highlander mages.

Ritualist from Neferset- He gives a monstrous reward for establishing leadership on the board. He turns killing creatures into a benefit in the form of a free spell. If you do not take the initiative to capture the board, then your opponent may hurt you with this card.

Quicksand Elemental- He is a less insane tool for a profitable exchange, but will be a good help for him in the battle of creatures, which is the bread and butter of the arena.

History buff- He's already good for his vanilla stats for the early game. Its effect also allows you to cast strengthened creatures ahead of the mana curve. All this makes the choice of this card for playing in the arena obvious.

Location of classes in the Saviors of Uldum arena meta

Robber(55.8% win rate according to HSReplay) - Lack of micro-tweaks always helps a rogue a lot. His great hero power will also effectively fight reincarnated creatures. His strong set of evergreen cards will also inevitably lift him high. Even the Plaguebringer will give the class an effective removal tool. The absence of the Scoundrel EVIL will not prevent the robber from doing his favorite things.

Hunter(52.9% win rate according to HSReplay) - He finished in a clean runner-up thanks to excellent cards from Saviors of Uldum. Efficient removal tools such as Desert Lance and Locust allow you to effectively distribute damage without excess. Ramhaken Trapper provides a consistent card advantage for all class builds.

Warlock(50.9% win rate according to HSReplay) - This win rate seems to be understated given the Zoo-friendly Kara Fire removal. Don't be fooled by the text of the card: you are looking at the Twisting Nether, which costs (1) mana and is placed in a block with a low load chance.

Magician(50.5% win rate according to HSReplay) - Mage is a class that depends on the random factor of Yogg-Saron's Puzzle. The effectiveness of the Artillery Mage will depend on the secrets to be found in the draft. If you have secrets, it can be compared to several Consecration draws and become an excellent claim to win. But winning requires drafting mediocre Secrets cards, which makes a large win-win range when playing this archetype.

Paladin(49.2% win rate according to HSReplay) - Paladin currently offers few opportunities to innovate in the draft or in gameplay... His simple plan in terms of tempo and buffs is based on cards that fall short of the levels of the first two classes. But with his simple style play this class remains viable for arena play.

Priest(46.0% win rate according to HSReplay) - One of four classes that is at a lower level than expected. The priest has difficulty anchored to the board. It is also difficult for him to resist the creatures with rebirth and the incredibly aggressive tactics of many hunters and robbers.

Warrior(44.3% win rate according to HSReplay) - Rejoice at the fact that the warrior is no longer the worst class to play in the arena. It still has a shadow of the past imprinted on it, but it now has more control tools, including AOE and map generation, that allow it to compete. Please note that the conditions for weapon drafting have now been improved, and they are located in more favorable selections. Electropics alone is already good in itself.

Druid(43.5% win rate according to HSReplay) - His lordship has dropped low. For a long time, the druids remained at least viable. Their strategy was based on the ubiquitous tokens, which are now seriously affected by the availability of a huge number of neutral AOE tools. Druid's total has dropped good cards with the introduction of weak removal, making him an undesirable draft class. As good as Oasis Surge is, it cannot pull druids alone on it.

Shaman(42.7% win rate according to HSReplay) - Currently the shaman does not have any significant tools to organize a consistent aggressive strategy. If you are not a fan of this class, then you should avoid it.



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