ShadowEra vs Hearthstone

[Gondorian]

That's a really sad excuse for the lack of development of the game. We've been in beta all this time? When does the ride starts exactly? Let me guess...soon, right?

Um, what? That's not an excuse for lack of development. My comment was aimed directly at the complainant, where "You" means him, and "the ride" is about the game having sufficiently popularity to offer some of the things he is seeing in Hearthstone (20+ fan sites, huge tournaments, etc.). I've had one hell of a ride over the past 3 years, regardless of the popularity, and the game has developed significantly. It just hasn't taken off on the same lines as Hearthstone due to lack of marketing.

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't SE kickstarter project ended successfully ?

The goals were hit. What's your point? I don't think any of that money will go into marketing, so SE can't bootstrap itself with marketing investment in a snowballing fashion like HS done. We rely on people discovering the game themselves. If you think this isn't about lack of marketing, then how about you help us spread the word about SE in an objective way and see what happens when people do discover it?

[Gondorian]

OK, I will bring my opinions with some points

I consider myself an experienced player on both games, for some time I have been pretty active on HS, I have reached legend rank on HS for the last 3 seasons and without spending any money I have already played almost all competitive decks and heroes.

1. Depth of Strategy (SE wins):
HS compared to SE has a very limited set of abilities, like ability removal, bounce, permanent and temporary buffs, traps,come into play abilities, SE here brings a lot more like graveyard interactions, discard effects, attachments, armours.


2 Variety (SE wins):
As said previously in the thread, all 9 heroes in HS are playable in QM and tournaments, well not all 32 SE heroes are good, but almost all can get a good rating in QM , in my opinion about 20 are tournament worthy and each one of them has many different decks. Also the limited card pool on HS and the limit of 2 copies of a card per deck makes the games pretty similar since you always know 90% of your opponent's deck and what is he likely to play.


3. Gameplay (HS wins):
HS is more polished than SE, the effects are nicer and you can chain actions without having to wait for the animations, that makes it smother, for me smothness is way more important than the 3d game field but not sure if that could be done in SE.

4. Community (HS wins):
SE community is nicer and more helpful than HS one, but there are at least 100 times more players in HS so there's lots of activities, streams, tournaments etc.., well nothing can be done here.

5. Arena-Meltdown (HS wins):
Despite being very luck reliant HS arena is nicer, allowing you to play a sort of tournament with your drafted deck makes it more enjoyable, well we will have to see how this feature is implemented in SE since is a kicktarter reward.


For me the future of SE totally depends on accomplishing the kick stater features that if done right would put SE on top

Thanks for this, GreyMouser. I agree with the assessment. I really wish those automated tournaments would hit, and the single-player campaign and the auction house. I'm loving the size of the card pool in SE now (spoilt for choice when I have time to brew a deck) and look forward to the finished art and nailed bugs.

If anyone is interested in helping, I have been wanting to see a relaunch of shadowera.net for a long time, but not had time to support that happening. I think there is enough sentiment here that a really good fan site for SE would be beneficial to it, so please get in touch if you want to help, and I will do all I can to help it happen.

[Misanthropic]

This is a harsh comparison given the backgrounds of the companies involved. Of course Blizzard has a well polished and pretty game with a great marketing team and built in fanboys.

I will even give them credit in saying they did a good job with the game. Its easy to get into, is well balanced, and has a satisfying feel when you attack or cast spells. Lastly I will also admit the coin system is one of the better answers Ive seen to first turn advantage.

But all the eye candy and fluff is only a distraction. Sure it looks awesome to launch a fireball and watch it smash your opponent. What the game lacks is depth. There is some strategy and like all games the current meta restricts variety to an extent but after watching and playing many games it all feels highly repetitive. Even the highly watched videos of HS are mostly of Arena gameplay. There is very little surrounding constructed decks and I feel this is because almost all the constructed decks end up the same.

I prefer SE because it has more depth and rewards creativity. You get a flavor of someones personality when playing them in SE. Every deck has something different in it. I just don't get that in HS, the mage plays like every other mage.

If I have one complaint about SE it is that it tries to add spells effects. The poor polygon animations not only look clunky and are in complete contrast to the rest of the feel of the game but can also be taxing on mobile devices causing them to lose frames or even freeze momentarily. I understand adding flare, by all means keep the card explosions and the underlying scratch and slash effects on attacks but remove the tidal wave of pixels or the final fantasy 7 fire balls flying around, loose the 3d sword and the powerless and impotent "slash" into a card.

Your not gonna match Blizzard in visual appeal, sorry but at this time you just don't have the assets required to develop and polish something like that. So stop trying. Keep it simple, you have the edge in tactics and strategy, in card design and card art. Take out the uneeded visual clutter, expand and build on the sounds in the game (music/effects) and keep putting the focus mainly on mechanics.

tl;dr
HS = Fisher price simplified ccg designed for players new to the genre.
SE = In depth ccg designed with the experienced ccg player in mind.

[the_MUKe]

Definitely Wulven should not spend extra time in special effects.
But I would say the current effects can stay and remain as they are - including Fireball, sword swing, etc. They are simple but not ugly, and certainly better than no effects at all.

[Airact]

But all the eye candy and fluff is only a distraction. Sure it looks awesome to launch a fireball and watch it smash your opponent. What the game lacks is depth. There is some strategy and like all games the current meta restricts variety to an extent but after watching and playing many games it all feels highly repetitive. Even the highly watched videos of HS are mostly of Arena gameplay. There is very little surrounding constructed decks and I feel this is because almost all the constructed decks end up the same.

I prefer SE because it has more depth and rewards creativity. You get a flavor of someones personality when playing them in SE. Every deck has something different in it. I just don't get that in HS, the mage plays like every other mage.

Wait... what?

Maybe I'm spoiled by Magic but I don't find this true at all. How does SE reward creativity? How does every deck have something different (enough for it to be a different thing) in it?



Agreed on the rest. Fix your goddamn game first, the rest comes later.

[Zigbigwig]

This is a harsh comparison given the backgrounds of the companies involved. Of course Blizzard has a well polished and pretty game with a great marketing team and built in fanboys.

I am not referring to you, but tbh SE purists/fanboys are even worse.

[Demnchi]

I am not referring to you, but tbh SE purists/fanboys are even worse.

While I get what you're saying, trust me when I say it's generally the same for any game.

Also, from another thread:

Last time we talked you didn't enjoy Advance Wars? (Or was I dreaming that?!)

You were totally dreaming that. I have very fond memories of Advance Wars and I sincerely hope it will get a 5th installment sometime soon.

[Zhou86]

OK, I will bring my opinions with some points

I consider myself an experienced player on both games, for some time I have been pretty active on HS, I have reached legend rank on HS for the last 3 seasons and without spending any money I have already played almost all competitive decks and heroes.

1. Depth of Strategy (SE wins):
HS compared to SE has a very limited set of abilities, like ability removal, bounce, permanent and temporary buffs, traps,come into play abilities, SE here brings a lot more like graveyard interactions, discard effects, attachments, armours.


2 Variety (SE wins):
As said previously in the thread, all 9 heroes in HS are playable in QM and tournaments, well not all 32 SE heroes are good, but almost all can get a good rating in QM , in my opinion about 20 are tournament worthy and each one of them has many different decks. Also the limited card pool on HS and the limit of 2 copies of a card per deck makes the games pretty similar since you always know 90% of your opponent's deck and what is he likely to play.


3. Gameplay (HS wins):
HS is more polished than SE, the effects are nicer and you can chain actions without having to wait for the animations, that makes it smother, for me smothness is way more important than the 3d game field but not sure if that could be done in SE.

4. Community (HS wins):
SE community is nicer and more helpful than HS one, but there are at least 100 times more players in HS so there's lots of activities, streams, tournaments etc.., well nothing can be done here.

5. Arena-Meltdown (HS wins):
Despite being very luck reliant HS arena is nicer, allowing you to play a sort of tournament with your drafted deck makes it more enjoyable, well we will have to see how this feature is implemented in SE since is a kicktarter reward.


For me the future of SE totally depends on accomplishing the kick stater features that if done right would put SE on top

I agree with GreyMouser's assessments. Right now what SE needs is progress (finish SF first, then start another) and Official Tournaments from Wulven. Because now it seems the atmosphere surrounding SE is more of Casual Play, with nothing to play for, and nothing at stake.

[Proditer]

Let me start by saying I've only just started playing Hearthstone and like what I've seen so far. I've dumped £70 on it for 80 packs because I get addicted to things easily and I like the thrill of opening packs



I find this opinion interesting. One pack per day is not really very much. Not when you can grind for gold in SE and then buy anything you want. The dust system in HS is quite the ripoff. If you hope to build decks by opening packs, you will need to open a lot to get a card you want (either through luck or turning a huge pile to dust).

Looking back over 3 years of playing SE, I wonder where we would be if SE had different economy, like Merchant giving a quarter of card value for each instead of half. When I started SE, I spent about £30 of mobile phone credit on SC and had a whole playset of the 140ish cards there were at the time. If I was a new player starting now, my £70 would get me close to a play set of CotC and DP. I think I'd need to drop about £300 to get a playset of Hearthstone. (I've not done much research, so someone can correct me if I'm wrong.). Thank God for the 2x card limit and only 1 of each Legendary! Sure, if I had played the Beta for a year, I might have a whole set.

I think SE will benefit a lot from HS finally going live (we have been waiting a long time for it). A lot can be learned and borrowed from things they do well, and a lot of people will discover SE via Hearthstone (we could do with many people making Hearthstone vs Shadow Era threads/videos EVERYWHERE! ... Hint hint)

I forgot to mention that with the gold you earn from daily quests, you will be able to play the Arena. Just by getting 7 wins in arena will allow one to get a pack AND enough gold for another arena run. Getting 12 wins will get one 1-2 packs and 300-400 gold. Enough for 4 packs. The dust system is actually a really good system in my opinion. If a card has been recently changed in HS, one will be able to get full value off of it when he/she disenchants it. Now with Blizzcon and Hearthstone world championships live, I think Hearthstone still wins Shadow Era. Despite this, I still believe that Shadow Era has tons of potential to beat Hearthstone in the future if the developers are willing to do so.

[oggtheman]

I don't understand why coin is considered a new mechanic. I'm sure people have used coins for a long time in physical games as a method to determine who goes first. In Pokemon TCG there were coins. In online game there is coin too IIRC. Carté uses something similar but it's an adaptation of rock-paper-scissors with 3 cards. Is there more to HS' coin than just determining the first player?

Sorry if this has already been awnsered but the coin in hs gives you 1 mana for that turn only when you play it