I remember someone reporting a 3% winrate with suicide warlock on standard like a year ago. If a deck designed to kill itself wins 3% of the time, the basic cards deck will eventually win.

It's no secret that the power level of new expansion cards are INSANE to the point that a lot of uncommons and rares are better than a lot of core legendaries.. but, many core cards had to be nerfed and would have, in their unnerfed states, fit right in with today's cards... Get your ish together blizz

I remember back in the days when Chillwind Yeti was considered OP

Y'all laughing at boulderfist ogre, but when Hearthstone first launched that card was scary. It wasn't super powerful, but a vanilla 6/7 was a real threat when good removal was few and far in between.

Taking Goldshire Footman, Wolfrider, Reckless Rocketeer, and Boulderfist Ogre into a matches against Tamsin and Guff... Video instantly liked on my behalf you mad man.

Part of what chased me away from hearthstone was how they kept removing cards from the basic set! The few good ones that were in there (Ragnaros, Sylvanus, azure drakes, etc.) were removed so they could power creep even harder and force us to need even MORE new cards with every new set. I gave up on the game when dailies were no longer enough to keep current decks in even 3 classes.

It's crazy how much removal and healing added into the Game, back then you were actually able to stick an ogor for more than one turn, and chipping your opponent down over the course of the game.

I love how deadpan he was about boulderfist ogre. There’s really no ripping that bandaid off easily. He’s so unexpectedly strong.

I played Hearthstone pretty early on in its life and these starter cards are ones I know very well. At some point a couple years after the game’s launch, like after Goblins vs. Gnomes, I stopped playing. I keep coming back for a couple months every year or so, and each time the game seems so much unlike how I remember it. All the old cards I learned aren’t used, the feel of the game is different, there’s so much power creep, and everything is so much more complicated. Watching this video and seeing these old cards reminds me how simple Hearthstone was, and how much I appreciated it. Now all the low-cost simple cards do just as much or more than the old school legendary minions. (Side note: legendary cards used to feel special in classic HS and now they hand them out like it’s nothing) Idk, just feels like a different game. It seems like it can still be fun, but you have to keep up with it if you want to have an accurate understanding of what cards are good/bad, and how you can actually play the game.

To be fair with War Golem, you could intimidate the opponent so much that they'd promptly concede when you follow it up with two wisps after playing it. War Golem was the G, man.

Shattered sun cleric was a 3 mana 3/3 at one point. It was nerfed to 3/2 and saw a lot less play in constructed

As someone who has lost track of the expansions years ago, the basic deck is really all I have left to use. This is the exact reason I have been unable to play the game until now. Crawling your way back up to a 50% winrate with cards that are objectively 1-3 mana worse than anything your opponent has is such a nuisance, and if you keep losing you won't earn any cards. It's an endless cycle designed to make you cave in and buy card packs, I hate it.

Back in 2015ish, i beat a face hunter at rank 4 with a basic paladin deck and it was the top post on the hearthstone subreddit for nearly a week 😂… it was absolutely crazy

I thought this was going to be a 1-hour long video celebrating Silverback Patriarch, to redeem what the Hearthstone team put him through, but instead he got just a mention? He never catches a break!

There are players that reached legend with only basics for several expansions. It wasn't really that bad at release, many cards were really good and actually got nerfed, such as Shattered Sun Cleric which was a 3/3. Many class cards were absolutely ridiculous too, like Innervate and Preparation. Sure there were some poopy cards and Priest had total garbage, but overall it was not a weak set. It was in fact a frequent concern that decks included too many basic cards and didn't change enough for several years. The Freeze Mage deck for example was almost 100% basic cards, as was Control Warrior and Ramp Druid.

Reckless rocketeer, core hound, ironbark protector - nostalgic cards from the very beginning of my hearthstone days. They were also the best days, when I didn't know anything and just had fun playing big minions

Put it in perspective in yugioh. 2 sacrifices were tough , yet now decks vomit. How many people thought it would last?

I had been falling off for a while until I fully quit hearthstone during the reveal season for descent of dragons. I remember feeling like the power creep was huge and I just wasn’t interested in keeping up. Seeing cards like the demon hunter stuff or all of United in Stormwind really shows how nuts they’ve been making the powerlevel.

Lmao the chad solid stats vs the virgin combo spam

But the basic set had the EXTREMELY overpowered Silverback Patriarch! When a Teacher's Pet died, and you saw Silverback Patriarch come out, you just looked at your opponent and said "I have a SILVERBACK PATRIARCH! This game is over and we both know it!

Far and away the thing i want to see most is a huge buff to all the old shitty cards. Like go through and buff so much stuff. Not to be broken but to have a purpose. Like if its a cool card but it never sees play just drop the cost by 1 or 2 and let it ride.

It’s always fun to build a full basic set deck and play with a friend, it’s sure as hell not high power but it’s nostalgic for somebody like me who got into the game playing a lot of games like this

Rarran i really like your vids man. Glad to see someone bringing a new style of content to the HS community!

It would be interesting if in some expansion, or a mini-set they revisited some of these old cards and created spiritual successors to them or just straight up rebalanced them... look I just want 2 mana 3/3 River Crocolisk.

They were not "weak" some were Hearthstone just did massive powercreep to force people to buy new expansions to not be heavily disadvantaged on the ladder

I remember the first time I was really put off by what Blizzard was doing with Hearthstone was whenever they added a straight upgrade to one of the basic cards. The Evil Heckler from Grand Tournament was a Booty Bay Bodyguard but one mana less. At that point I was like "Are we really going to do this Blizzard?". Today I don't even know if I was right to be put off by power creep but at the time I felt real bad about it.

I still remember when the most balanced card in my opinion is senjin shieldmasta

I feel like Wildheart Guff is a really good example of how ridiculous the power creep is. Back in the day, 5 mana could get you a decent spell/minion or two. But with Guff, 5 mana gets you armor, draw power, and the ability to get a giant pile of mana really quickly and drop down multiple huge cards before the enemy would even be able to coin into one similarly big card

I mean, some legendaries have been power crept to the point of literally losing when puting them next to a comperable common card. The 9 Mana 5/9 taunt untargetable or the 7 Mana 7/7 taunt untargetable with dragon type. I sometimes consider conceeding to players I see using the basic cards, because I stomp them to the point of feeling bad about it. I remember how rough the early slog for cards was, and I imagine it's only worse now, with the rewards track making gold more scarce, and it being damn near impossible to win with those cards, since they have become so much worse

I have not played the game since 3 years and when I watch games it feels like cards are doing so much things. Old sets was not that good but that was so fun to play old HS

That tree of life was unbelievable, poor mage never had a chance 😦

Shattered Sun Cleric didn't see much play as a 3/2. It did as a 3/3 before getting nerfed.

That druid played some very dusty card too actually.

I'd love to see you play more wild games. As a wild player myself, it is very satisfying to see someone not understand what is happening.

Most of those basic cards, like Goldshire Footman, weren't playable back before nax either. There are equally garbage cards printed today. The power level of cards in the basic set was fine. A 3-2 knife juggler is still good. Auctioneer is still broken after multiple nerfs. A lot of cards in the basic set are still deck defining today.

Has anyone ever experienced a game against Druid in the last time where your opponent was not able to play Overgrowth early, Guff turn 5 and then Scale of Onyxia after that?? It works EVERY single time and your board is gone and then the Mana Party goes on and on.

You say that Mage had the best Basic set, but it was actually Druid before their Basic+Classic core was nerfed hard. Innervate, Wild Groth, Savage Roar and Swipe all saw heavy, heavy play during the early years of HS.

Back in my day shattered sun cleric was a 3 mana 3/3 😭

“With the very first expansion in the game-“ *starts talking about the second expansion*

2:27 I'd like to point Shattered Sun Cleric used to be a 3/3 for most of the time it was played. Dark Iron Dwarf also got nerfed from giving permanent +2 to just a single turn effect which used to be Abusive Sargeant's gimmick, I say used to be because Abusive Sargeant was actually a really potent way for priest to deal with 4 attack minions since it could target enemies to push them into Power Word Death range. Novice Engineer was a no brainer include when she was a 1/2 minion until the common rarity Loot Hoarder took over hardcore after her nerf, and Acolyte of Pain and Kodos began to prop up more and more. Those aren't all basic cards but the cards that were the easiest to play with were the commons and multipurpose rares for the new players, so it hurt the extra bit when cards like Ancient of Lore, a class specific Epic got nerfed, or Blade Flurry, a core Rare on every rogue deck, gets destroyed. Decks like Handlock were full of epics that were specific to it and if you were a f2p player you wouldn't wanna invest so hard into one deck.

seeing rarran use a deck tracker has got to be one of the most uncanny things I've ever seen

Taunt back then was much better than it is now, because there was so much less options to silence or destroy them with spells, and also way less options to deal damage to face beyond a taunt. However Sen'Jin Shieldmasta was just so much better than all other taunt minions and you rarely needed a taunt before turn 4 anyway, so it kinda made all the other taunts obsolete.

Even with every loss, you get a moral victory. Each person that beat you, feels bad beating a Basic-only deck.

I love how half the video is analyzing and the second have is you playing on the analysis!!!!!

It's funny to think Druid can have a whole deck of minions, and with just Brann and the 7/7/7 guy that double every stats of every minions in your deck, the druid can pretty much become invincible with his infinite healing.

I think if you would try a zoo type deck with some charge minions and the ability to keep drawing cards with warlock's hero power, you could steal a win at some point.

I actually forgot that "War Golem" even existed

Shattered sun cleric was 2 mana before getting nerfed :) I had a goldshire footman in my face hunter deck to stop big minions in the race for face, got legend with that shit

2nd game proved that basic cards suck because no rng

Remember when Hearthstone was hella fun and an all around great game? Pepperidge Farm remembers😢

Tbf even back then 90% of basic neutrals werent played unless they were stated or had charge. Now every card needs to be curved stats ie 3 mana 3/4 +effect to be played.

Sen'jin shieldmaster is one of my favorites because of its voicelines JAHAHAAA MON!

I never thought I would hear the words "Goldshire Footman is sick".

Before Hearthstone even had deck copying capabilities and you had to manually create all decks (and netdecking was way rarer!), I remember a website with a F2P guide which would give you a basic set deck for all classes. And I remember some of the decks were REALLY legit. That was circa Old Gods if I'm not mistaken.

2:17 only the OG's remember 3 mana 3/3 Shattered

Those fights were painful to watch damn. Just wiped by a single card while you gotta throw down like 4 to deal with a board of average cards.

Where are my chillwind yeti bros at? Never played without em when hearthstone released

3:27 way back there were popular decks only with even or only with odd cards. Thats why taking a goblin made sense

I noticed that some of the early hearthstone cards were based on and is sometimes 1 to 1 copies of the old Warcraft card game's cards. Quite s different pace nowadays compared to there original time.

Goldshire footman was a meme even before expansions came out

I feel old af now , played a lot with basic cards in middle school back in the day recently came back to HS and its a completely different game now

Blizz needs Hearthstone Classic servers now

Ooooh man I remember my full tank Druid deck, and wondering why I could never get to rank 19

Booty Bay Bouncer was actually a pretty interesting tech card in the base set mirror match, because it could trade with Sen'jin Shieldmasta as well as go 1 for 1 with Lord of the Arena, which was also a very commonly used taunt minion.

Idc hearing stormblade champions " FOR THE ALLIUNCE" will never get old

Alternativ Title: Can you win a match in "fReE" game without paying?

I never drew the connection between War Golem and Dr. Boom. Crazy how those two 1/1's made a completely unplayable card meta-defining.

StoneHill Defender was my favorite card at once. Journey To UnGoro !

It's not that old cards were bad. New cards are just more and more powerfull casue blizz after 3 expansions wasn't able to invent something different and original, just something more OP. The more cards the more money to spend on them. That's the reason that I and many more people left the game years ago, despite having a lot of fun earlier where there were less cards but a lot more joy and need for creativity instead of just buying victory with new, OP cards

While you were talking about the War Golem, you forgot to mention one of the best meme cards of all time, the FOUR MANA SEVEN SEVEN

Damn, this video makes me feel old when I look at some of the cards and go “they’re not that bad” lol

I don’t find any hearthstone player more funny than you, gold 😂

I don't even play HS, your content is just top tier. Keep it up man!

To be fair, I knew River Crocolisk was bad even in the tutorial.

This was the reason why I left. I can't win against whales as f2p player and dusting felt like huge scam.

should have taken yeti instead of the 1/2 mana garbage (shield bearer/arcane explosion) and probably no rocketeer. probably some more 2/3 drops to get a good curve for early board.

Basic's neutral minions are mostly garbage, although some of them were playable when the card pool was tiny, like Yeti, Tazdingo, Shattered Sun Cleric and Acidic Swamp Ooze actually saw a very decent amount of play in plenty formats, Elven Archer in some decks, Stonetusk Boar and River Crocolisk in Hunter waaaay back before Naxxramas etc. But some of the class cards in Basic are absolutely defining for the classes they're in. For quite a few formats, they were some of the best cards in these decks. So calling the Basic set bad is a little bit oversimplifying. Just a few examples of the top of my head: Paladin: Truesliver, Consecration, Hammer of Wrath, Guardian of Kings Mage: Fireball, Frostbolt, Flamestrike, Water Elemental, Sorcerer's Apprentice, Arcane Intellect, Frost Nova Rogue: Backstab, Deadly Poison, Sprint, Assassin's Blade Hunter: Hunter's Mark, Kill Command, Animal Companion, Houndmaster, Tracking, Tundra Rhino Druid: (arguably every single card that defined early Druid was basic, as in their ramp, and their Savage Roar to enable token decks and/or the combo) Innervate, Wild Growth, Swipe, Savage Roar Warrior: Fiery War Axe, Execute, Arcanite Reaper, Shield Block, Whirlwind, Kor'kron Elite Priest: Northshire Cleric, Power Word:Shield, Shadow Word Pain/Death Warlock: Soulfire, Voidwalker, Mortal Coil, Hellfire Shaman: Hex, Rockbiter Weapon, Fire Elemental Notice how many of these cards (Innervate, Wild Growth, Fiery War Axe, Backstab, Hunter's Mark, Execute, Soulfire, Hex, Rockbiter Weapon) were indeed so good they got nerfed at one point. So yeah, calling the Basic set particularly weak is just ignorant.

To this day Reckless Rocketeer looks like some kind of bird creature to me. It took me like a year of arena to realize it was, in fact, a goblin. Anyways, power creep sadge.

The thing is that the basic set wasn't actually bad. The problem was the expension, that always bring new cards that are stronger and stronger to a point where it's ridiculous now. If you would have bring just one card from the newest expensions to the og heartstone, it would have gotten nerf. Hearstone become more and more op each expension, and this why we get to see turn 5-6 wins more often and to balance that there is now more healing, 40 max hp and more stronger control cards.

Chillwind Yeti was the GOAT back in the day!

Funnily I managed to win a match few years ago by Goldshire Footman stopping Deathwing.

My best success with only basic cards was Warrior, 2x Fiery War Axe and 2x Arcanite Reaper was sometimes just enough to end the game if my raw stats got in enough chip damage. That was 3 years ago that that deck would sometimes win, though, so not even sure that would have success in the modern meta

Shattered Sun Cleric started out as a 3/3 and was nerfed later.

I remeber my debut with Hearthstone, I put nightblade in my deck and I was proud of it

I once met guy who played only basic cards in wild bronze. It was about a few weeks ago

Based on his pronunciation of Gnomeregon, this guy never played Vanilla WoW.

Maybe with a spell damage build for burn combos its possible

I loved war golem as he was part of the Dr. Boom for the poor if you played it with 2 golden wisps (I actually played it once xd)

"Do you like to play with.." "..basic cards?" "Mmh, I like it!"

There was only 2 examples of real power creep in this video. Who would have thought over years the cards would get better.

Looking like a death angle wpgg we shilling 😎

We're gonna need to a rip a Boulderfist Ogre off the top... Lol 😂😂

That's the classic Blizzard modus operandi. You either play or buy constantly or you'll get behind. Power creep in every game, just to make us chase that rabbit. I want an hackandslash, I don't want it to be Diablo4 thou

Man...I remember play whit the basic cards, and litteral play warcraft III whit them, full of goldshire footmans, and champions of the alliance, whit the dwarf shooters. And murlocs with charging, approaching occasionally charge. Basics cards they got a trash treatmean, whit every expansion and update, but, they will forever have my heart. Beceaus, whit all the weakness and all the superior options, they are very cool and emblematic cards.

Hmm Shattered Sun Cleric seems still pretty decent when you compare it like that.

1:51 River Crocolisk compared to the cards you've shown; What if it's your opponents turn, they have only two health, and also has "The Black Knight", and "Hungry Crab" in their hand? River Croc would be the best card to have on your side of the field here from the four cards you've chosen!

You haven't even tried the best starter deck with face hunter. I'd always start with that on new accounts

I played when all the basic were good and I’m back playing now after a long break obviously. Hearthstone is completely different.

Goldshire Footman is so powerful, Savjz insta-conceded that one time. Goldshire too op

yeah when you add ten mechanics since then they lose relevance, they were fun as all hell at the time, the mage was op