Hearthstone's Druid Power Level: IT'S OVER 9000!!!

Right now in Hearthstone, the Druid class is absurdly powerful, and it's actually a very bad thing for the health of the game. It's not just a single deck either, as both Token Druid and Jade Druid are equally strong. Unlike other decks that have stabilized over time, as new strategies and counters have arisen, the Druid problem is so severe that it's actually effecting the meta. Unconventional decks like Exodia mage, which were fun gimmicky decks, have actually become viable in the meta because they are so effective at beating druid. We've really got a whole "Grim Patron" situation on our hands now: every single deck is either A) Druid, or B) deck that is specifically good against Druid, and that's bad because it limits creativity, and lessens the impact of a lot of cool cards and archetypes.

Blizzard should not take a "wait and see" approach to this problem. The time for wait and see has passed, especially when you consider that 41% of all games being played are against Druids. They need to act right now.

How did Druid get so powerful?

Druid has always been a popular, powerful class in Hearthstone, but the latest patch has given it the exact tools it needed to propel it into the unstoppable monster it is right now. Specifically: Spreading Plague and Ultimate Infestation. To understand why these cards are so powerful, you first need to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the class.

Ramp it up

Ramp effects let you cheat out mana ahead of the usual curve, allowing you to play bigger minion and spells earlier in the game. They are countered by the fact that they cost a card, and have minimal effect on the board state. Playing Wild Growth on turn 2 means that you have one less card and no two drop on the board. Ramping has always been a gamble because it leaves you vulnerable, but Ultimate Infestation negates all of those negatives.

A Druid player can spend the first four turns ramping up (Wild Growth, Jade Blossom, Nourish), and then just innervate out an Ultimate Infestation. He now likely controls the board, has healed, has replenished all the cards he spent ramping, and is a full six mana ahead of you. Just watch this clip to understand how stupid this combination is.

Wall of Scarabs

Traditionally, Druid's weakness has been big boards. It lacks the hard removal of Rogue and Priest, and the AOE removal of Mage and Warlock. The best way to play against a Druid is to put down multiple, high health creatures. Once the board has been flooded, its quite hard for them to regain control. This is a natural counter to both Jade/Ramp Druid AND Token Druid. Against Jade/Ramp Druid, it stops them from being too greedy. They have to play minions and fight for board control or they will be overwhelmed. Against Token Druid, it helps control their own waves of minions it tries to flood the board with.

But here comes Spreading Plague, which a lot of the time reads: 5 Mana - Summon 7 1/5 Scarabs With Taunt. Not only does this card negate Druid's most major weakness by cockblocking the whole board, it also combos exceedingly well with cards like Power of The Wild, Mark of The Lotus and the new Bolster Bear. It's not uncommon for those 1/5's to become 2/6's, or even 3/7's within the same turn. Imagine a card that read: 6 Mana - Summon Seven 2/6 Scarabs with Taunt. Discard a card.

Innervation Intervention

All of these new tools circle back to Innervate, a card that has been a part of the core Druid kit since the beginning, and limits card design space more and more the longer it remains a part of the game. Again, Innervate is a card that was limited by the fact that it cost you a card. Yeah, you could cheat out a big drop on an early turn, but then you were down a card, and could get fucked over by hard removal. Now, Druids can use Innervate to cheat out Ultimate Infestation, which instantly replenishes their hand, negating its detrimental effect. Reynad made a strong case on the removal of Innervate from Standard, which is a possible solution to the Druid problem.

What's the solution?

Whatever Blizzard decides on doing, it needs to happen now, before we have another Grim Patron/Undertaker Hunter situation on our hand. Shifting Innervate to Standard is a good solution, but I honestly believe that the two most offensive cards: Spreading Plague and Ultimate Infestation need to additionally be directly nerfed. Possible solutions:

• Ultimate Infestation: 8 Mana - Deal 5 Damage, Summon a 5/5 Ghoul, Gain 5 Armor - This completely removes the card draw from the card, but still keeps it as a decent card, considering that Firelands portal is basically "Deal 5 Damage, Summon a 5/5", and is considered a good card for 7 mana. 
• Ultimate Infestation: 10 Mana. Deal 4 Damage, Summon a 4/4 Ghoul, Gain 4 Armor, Draw 4 Cards - This keeps the card draw but reduces all of the effects by 1. Honestly, I think it needs to go even further and reduce card draw to 3, but that would be a bit of overkill.
• Spreading Plague: 5 Mana. Summon a 1/5 Scarab with Taunt. If your Opponent Has More Minions, Repeat up to Two Times - This caps out the number of Scarabs that can be summoned at 3, which still provides a tool for defensive druid decks, but doesn't become absurdly powerful when combo'd with board buff spells.
• Spreading Plague: 4 Mana. Summon a 1/2 Scarab with Taunt for each enemy minion - Sound familiar? This is basically Protect the King, a Warrior card that never saw play. 1/1 Tokens are pretty terrible, so buffing them up to 1/2 means that they can't just be whirlwinded away, but still die to big AOE effects like Flamestrike or Holy Nova (as they should).

Review: Aven Colony (Video)

Hey guys! Had a bunch of free time on my hands this week so thought I would experiment with a video review. Haven't done one of these since waaaay back in 2012 with Dishonored so I'm trying the format out again.

I would really appreciate as much feedback as you can offer on this one. Is it too long? Too negative? Is the quality of the video bad? Please leave comments!

Enjoy!

Prey Ending Explained, Deconstructed, and Analyzed

Warning: before reading any further, you should know that this article contains heavy Prey spoilers. If you haven't already finished the game, you really should go and do that first.

So Prey's ending, or rather, endings, have left many fans scratching their heads thinking "what the heck just happened?" While it did consist of a rather cool twist, a lot of questions remained unanswered, and a lot of new ones are raised. We won't fully know exactly what the ending meant until the inevitable sequel, but for now, we can analyse the endings and come to some conclusions.

Prey technically has three "main" endings with a handful of variants, and two "true" post-credits endings that vary (ever so slightly) depending on the choices you made in the game. We will look at each ending one-by-one, try to explain them, and then finish up with an overall explanation at the end to try and tie up all the loose ends.

The December Ending: Escape in Alex's Escape Pod

This ending is presented to you fairly early on in the game, and can actually be completed as soon as you get access to the arboretum and crew quarters. If you follow this ending, a rogue operator named December claims that January, the operator with your voice who has been your guide for the game, is lying to you. December offers you an alternate to going through with January's plan to destroy Talos I - just high-tail it out of there in Alex Yu's secret escape pod.

If you go through with this ending, however, all that happens is your screen turns black, and you hear Alex lamenting you for "giving up". He then tells someone that "This isn't the one, start over," and you are prompted to reload an earlier save.

The Explanation: This is a false ending. In order to understand this ending you have to finish one of the other main endings that reveals that you are in fact a Typhon experiencing Morgan Yu's memories. In this ending you opted to escape rather than finish the simulation, which is why Alex simply "restarts" the simulation by having you load an earlier save.

The Alex Yu Ending: Destroy All Typhon

Towards the end of the game Alex Yu reveals an alternative plan to January's "destroy Talos I and everyone on it" solution. By scanning the Typhon coral, you're able to develop a kind of omega Nullwave transmitter that will kill all of the Typhon while keeping the station intact. The only "person" you will have to kill is January, who refuses to let you deploy the Nullwave transmitter unless you destroy him. This is usually considered the good ending, because by following this ending you automatically save everyone left on the ship, destroy the Typhon, and preserve all of the scientific advancements of Talos I. 

Completing this ending will lead you into one of the two "true" ending scenarios after the credits role.

The Explanation: Read on to the "true" endings to understand what this ending means.

The January Ending: Destroy Talos I

January's plan throughout the whole game, which he insist is your plan, is to simply get a hold of Morgan and Alex's arming keys and force Talos I's nuclear reactor to detonate, destroying the entire station and everything on it. If you choose to follow this ending, there are actually quite a few variants you can follow. 

No matter what happens, Alex dies, as he opts to go down with the ship. You can also opt to go down with the ship, and bring all of the other Talos I survivors with you. Or, you can save and reprogram Dahl so that he can pilot the shuttle containing you and the other survivors to safety. Or, you can simply get the heck out of dodge and take Alex's escape pod, leaving the rest of the survivors to perish in the explosion. Note that choosing to escape means you'll also have to destroy January, as he wants everyone to go down with the ship.

Completing this ending will lead you into one of the two "true" ending scenarios after the credits role.

The Explanation: Read on to the "true" endings to understand what this ending means.

True Ending 1: Failure

After the credits role is when the weird shit starts to happen. If you did the Alex Yu or January endings (any variant), you'll be presented with a post credits scene in which Alex and four operators representing the major human characters on Talos I are gathered around you. You are strapped to a chair, and going by your wavy black tentacle arms, are a Typhon Phantom. Alex and the operators then run down a summary of all the big decisions you made throughout the game.

In this ending, Alex laments that the experiment was a failure, and you refused to show enough compassion. This is usually achieved by killing, or causing to be killed, the other human survivors on Talos I. You are then terminated, and the game ends.

The Explanation: Surprise! You're not actually Morgan Yu. You are a Typhon, and the entirety of the game has simply been a simulation of the real Morgan Yu's memories of the Typhon incident. The goal of the experiment was to try and instil human empathy and emotion into a Typhon, in order for both of the races to understand each other better, and you failed by being a psychopath. Sorry!

True Ending 2: Success

This is what I believe to be the canon, "best" ending of the game. This ending is the same as True Ending 1, but instead of being terminated by Alex, he and the operators offer you praise. To get this ending, you generally have to be the good guy throughout the whole game, by saving and helping the survivors on board Talos I.

Alex then shows you the real world. It's San Francisco, completely covered in Typhon coral. If you were paying attention, the game alluded to this with the visions it showed you when installing certain neuromods, or scanning certain Typhon. In the real world, the Typhon made it back to Earth, and are hard at work taking it over. 

He then gives you a choice. He believes that the experiment was a success, and he has succeeded in putting some humanity into you, a Typhon. If you think he's right, you can take his hand and offer to help. When you do this, you see your hand morph into a human one, showing the first step towards friendly Typhon/human relations. Or you can just choose to kill everyone. You monster.

The Final Explanation: 

Okay, so now we are finally at the end of all of the endings, and we can analyse what the hell just happened. The first thing we need to know is that the real Morgan Yu is dead, as are all of the other "survivors" from Talos I. What we can assume actually happened is that the real Morgan tried to stop the Typhon, either via Alex's plan or January's plan, and failed. Either he was killed by the Typhon, or killed by Dahl, or his plan didn't work, or something else happened. Alex, meanwhile, was able to escape - most likely on his personal escape pod - when the shit really hit the fan. The Typhon also make it back to earth somehow.

Alex then at some point, presumably on earth but possibly on another space station given he's still wearing his Transtar uniform, captures a Typhon phantom (perhaps even the Typhon phantom that rose from Morgan's corpse) and submits it to his experiment, alongside a group of operators instilled with the voices and memories of Talos I's former crew.

Alex believes the only way to save the world is for Typhon and human to coexist, and you are a result of that belief. He says that they spent so long putting "them" into "us", they never thought to put "us" into "them". Showing compassion, getting the True Ending 2, and choosing to side with the humans, is the "good ending," as it alludes to a future where things are patched up and everything goes back to normal (ish).

However, not every video game takes the "good" ending to be the "canon" one, as games like X-COM 2 memorably showed us.

Despite all of this, some questions still remain unanswered.

Who was December? As Alex says the whole thing is based on Morgan's actual memories of the situation, we can assume that December was real. So was December telling Morgan the truth, or was January?

What did the real Morgan try to do? Did he try to follow January's plan or Alex's? Or did he follow December's plan and book it out of there? Perhaps he's even still alive, or maybe he is the reason the Typhon made it back to earth?

How did the Typhon get back to earth? They were isolated on Talos I, and it looks like Alex was the only one who made it off. So either they hitched a ride with Alex, or brought the whole station with them. I find it hard to believe that earth wouldn't just nuke Talos I from orbit if it started flying towards it.

These questions may not be answered until Prey 2, but it's certainly fun to speculate!

Overwatch: an In-Depth Guide to Reinhardt

Hey guys! I've got some good news, and some bad news. The bad news is that due to a cut in budget, The Escapist has cancelled my current contract. I won't be writing for them for the foreseeable future (unless, of course, the same thing that happened last year happens, and they realize I make up the vast majority of their news views and hire me back next month...) That means for the moment, I'm back on the freelance market! The good news is that it's given me some time to pursue other projects.

The first of which is a collaboration with my good friend Kyle Best to produce a series of Overwatch guides. Here is the first in the series: Reinhardt. I hope you enjoy it!

Next up will be Zennyatta. We hope to cover all of the game's 24 playable heroes.

Back on The Market

Hey guys. Bit of sad news if you haven't already heard. The Escapist has closed up its Connecticut office, and let go the vast majority of its staff. This, unfortunately, included me. I'm incredibly grateful to Susan Ardent, the EiC at the time of my appointment three years ago who took a chance on a cocky, young, smart-mouthed kid. Additionally, I'm thankful to Greg Tito and Joshua Vanderwall, Susan's successors, for fostering my writing and editing ability.

I am a thousand percent better of a writer thanks to this experience. You can write, and write, and write, but you will never get any better unless you have someone better than you look over your work. More than anything else, this is what I took from The Escapist, and it is ultimately this experience that will lead to me finding the job I want to do long term.

Here's the last article I wrote for them. So long, Escapist, it sure was fun while it lasted!

The Balances Overwatch Needs Before Launch

So, I'm back on the market! Ideally, I would like to find something similar to what I did at The Escapist: video game-related freelance work that I can carry out from the comfort of my own home. That said, beggars can't be choosers, and while I do have a 1-year "safety net" of my teaching job, come April 2017 I will be back in Australia with no job, and my new wife. I will of course entertain all offers from all types of jobs around the world, as eventually I'll need to find myself a proper full-time gig to support myself.

If you know of anything, anything writing related, in either the US, Japan or Australia, please feel free to drop me a line.

In the interim, I'm going to take a short break from writing. Since being made editorial staff at the beginning of the year, I've been basically running myself ragged juggling the two jobs. It's good to actually have free time - to lesson plan at school, to spend time with Laura in the evenings, and of course play video games! I'm looking forward to my first holiday that I don't have to lug along my laptop just in case I have to write up an article...

Eventually though, I will start up writing again, if nothing else than to keep my skills keen, and my knowledge up-to-date. I will probably do something similar to what I used to do on this blog: a weekly news round-up with occasional features and reviews. After-all, it was in no small thanks to this blog that I ended up getting The Escapist position!

As always, thank you for all of your support, and stay tuned.

The "Gamer Gate" Post

Hey guys. There has been a lot of talk about "Gamer Gate" in the gaming media world as of late. I would like to say a few words on the matter. You may be wondering why its taken me so long to post a statement, and why it's appearing here, instead of on The Escapist. Well, after a whole lot of back-and-forth with Defy Media (The Escapist's parent company), we have been told that we must post a collective "group" statement, rather than personal statements. I respect Defy as a company, and I don't even feel that strongly about Gamer Gate, but forcing us to act as a "collective" rather than an individual really bugged me. Maybe it's because of all my time living in Japan's "collective-focused" society.

That said, here is what I have to say about Gamer Gate:

When I started my career as a journalist, I chose to go into gaming journalism for two reasons. The first, is because I am passionate about (read: obsessed with) video games. The second is because I didn't want to end up writing gossip tabloid stories for some bottom-of-the-barrel mainstream media publication, digging into people's private lives and attacking their character and reputation. But, in the weeks surrounding the "Gamer Gate" controversy, I was ashamed to see so many outlets in the gaming media and community descend into the exact kind of "he-said, she-said" bullshit that I tried to avoid by entering this industry.

I just want to write about video games. I want to write about what people say about video games, and occasionally, I want to write about cool science, tech, and geek culture tidbits. I don't care what these people do in their private lives. I don't care if so and so slept with so and so, and I certainly don't want to write about it. The vitriol from both sides of Gamer Gate made me sick and ashamed, and I vowed to have as little to do with it as possible. This statement will be the first, and last, time I address my views on the controversy.

While sexism, equality, and journalistic ethics in the gaming industry are definitely discussions worth having, Gamer Gate was certainly not the way to go about having them. We, as gamers, should be better than this. I thought we were above this kind of tabloid-newspaper garbage.

-Steven Bogos

PS: Just to end on something a little more lighthearted, here is my League of Legends World Championships Cosplay Gallery!