Falling up the stairs (09) - Adventure Resumee: League of Explorers

As I told you last friday, I plowed through the League of Explorers, finally. So today I'll talk you about LoE in the same way I did talk about BRM (in order to create a comparability. It'll come to fruition with the next adventure).

To reiterate, these are my four points:
 > Optics
 > Plot
 > Bosses
 > Cards

See you after the break!Optics: The predominant colour of LoE is a sandy yellow, and added on top of that are a variety of other colours - it's pretty colourful, all in all. Compared to BRM (also Naxx), this adventure wins the optics aspect hands and pants down. From the revelation animation with the ticket and map to the small images showing the area of incident, LoE really shows the progress the graphic design of the adventures has made (and undergone). It makes me excited for the next one, to say the least.

Plot: Compared to BRM (of which I watched videos), this is another step up. While it's the shortest adventure to date (13 Bosses), it takes you to the most places and tells the most (flamboyant, even) story, especially in the last wing which really evokes the feeling it's going for. You travel around the world, gather the pieces of the staff, it gets nicked (D'uh), you take it back. Simple, clearcut, refreshingly varied in themes and even boards.

Bosses: Again I'll split this into general and Heroic. I, again, liked them all except one - you might think there's always that one fight. Yes, Rafaam1, I'm looking at you. Or the lack of deckbuilding skills among the LoE... Also, the call it a tournament deck when it breaks a good number of the deckbuilding rules. It was hard to find a deck you could defeat with it.
I'd say that the Temple Escape, Mine Cart Ride and Rafaam1 are the most memorable ones here since they are unlike any adventure fight before. SURE they are among the more RNG-y fights (well, except for the temple escape), but they are still great at telling their particular story without resorting to the old "Here's a boss with an advantageous (or in heroic: BULLSHIT GOOD) ability" scheme.
Speaking of Heroic mode... So far I have defeated the first wing, 2/3 of the second and 1/3 of the third. Haven't attempted the fourth (also, Rafaam2 being passively immune? WTF?) so far, too busy gathering gold for Arena. Shouldn't be too hard, though, I've seen a bigger number of people with the LoE cardback than with the Naxx or BRM one. On that note: Defeating a heroic LoE boss didn't give me the same amount of satisfaction as defeating a heroic boss in BRM... it had more of an "was bound to happen sometime" vibe.

Yet again: It's bad that neither Rafaam1 nor Rafaam2 have individual emote responses like Kelthu-Freakin'-Zad!

Cards: Compared to BRM cards, which were kinda bland in their design, LoE cards heavily sport the Discover mechanic. They are also not so tied to a certain theme as to be pigeonholing their applicability. I can only recall one card where I thought "Really? What's that for?", and that's the 7/7 statue which can't attack unless it's all alone. Might still work with a silence. As for memorable cards, there are so many. My personal favourites, though, purely by use I got out of them, are the Jeweled Scarab, the Rumbling Elemental, and the Raven Idol. Not to mention the orgasm that Brann Bronzebeard can be (ever had him still on the field and got to play a C'Thun? Well, then you know what I mean.).

Resumee: I not only liked this adventure, I seriously enjoyed it and if you're new to Hearthstone and wonder whether you should do it: Hell yes. What are you waiting for? I'm really gilding Hearthstone's lily here, but I'm seriously convinced that this adventure is top-notch, and set the bar for good adventures REALLY high. And that's an after-the-fact opinion.

There's just one thing... when I hadn't done all adventures, I had a drive and reason to gather those 700g as quickly as possible (in general, two weeks). Now that all is done, all I can do is gather them in anticipation. But I'll do that by a) gathering gold for arena, and b) keeping the arena spoils for adventures. That'll result in some major bookkeeping, but eh, I like bookkeeping.

Thanks for reading, and remember:
It's all fun and games until somebody runs out of cards!