The other day Blizzard announced the introduction of new functionality in its card collectible game Hearthstone. The project has templates for composing game decks.
The essence of the innovation: the ability of players not to make decks themselves, but to choose for themselves a set of cards already balanced by the developers.
Each game class has three similar collections. One is standard, consisting only of the cards of the basic and classic sets. Two are thematic, which, respectively, consist of temporarily relevant maps.
Blizzard itself does not explain the appearance of templates in any way, but says that they will be useful both for beginners “who are just learning deck building skills” and for veterans who want to “try something new” or “reduce the time spent on thinking over a new tactical move.”
It seems to us that innovations pursue a set of goals at once.
First, lowering the entry threshold. It is quite difficult for a new player to make a good deck. Working with the selection of cards in Hearthstone requires time, diligence, constant experiments, for which — at first — not every player is ready. Templates allow you to focus on tactics that require less effort.
Secondly, this step is quite capable of having a positive impact on the monetization of the project. The fact is that the presence of a template does not imply the presence of cards for it. In other words, in order for it to work, you need to find/ collect / purchase the necessary cards (although Blizzard helps with choosing a card to replace the missing one, who guarantees that you will have alternatives available).
A beginner is similarly motivated to pay immediately. This can work with more experienced players as well. For example, if a player has three favorite heroes and, accordingly, there are decks only for them. And when a quest comes with the requirement to pass something by the hero who does not have a deck, it is easier to use a selection, spending a certain amount of money or dust, than to collect it from scratch.
Thirdly, it is possible that the templates will somehow be used in competitions so that rivals use only guaranteed balanced decks.
And what do you think about the innovation? Shouldn’t it be taken into account by all those who work on projects with the need to make decks? Won’t this kill the meta of similar projects?
The editorial board thanks Kirill Kataev for his help in writing the material