I absolutely loved Hearthstone for many years, and played it hardcore for a good half a decade. By the time I made my final Standard mode finish at Legend in December of 2019, however, I was about finished with the game.
Randomness has always been a part of Hearthstone’s design, but I always felt that it was within acceptably narrow limits. This allowed you make smart strategic decisions based on what you think your opponent has.
As the game went on, randomness got worse and worse. Whereas early examples of random mechanics would be things like “discover a 1 mana spell” – thus giving you a narrow range of possibilities to deal with – later randomness became things like “discover a spell.” ANY spell? Yup. This means your opponent could have a 1 mana spell that does 2 damage, or a 10 mana supremely powerful spell that could end the game for you. You have absolutely zero way of knowing what the opponent chose, and thus more and more you’re playing completely in the dark and cannot, in my opinion, make smart choices.
This led to my quitting Standard Hearthstone after December of 2019. I had thought I was done with the game, preferring to play the Battlegrounds mode, which was much more casual.
However, with the introduction of the Classic format, I was drawn back in. Classic is literally that – the original, launch condition of the game, with its smaller card set and very limited set of random effects. Almost every single one of these random effects can be strategically played around, or you can structure your play in order to severely swing the randomness in your favor.
There is a wide variety of playable decks that can take you to Legend rank, and as of writing this, I’ve been having fun climbing to Legend each month, currently sitting at 6 straight Legend finishes. I didn’t expect to enjoy Classic this much, but its now the only competitive format I play.
If you ever liked Hearthstone, I would encourage you to give Classic a try!