The beginning of a season(month) will have many more people with good decks at lower ranks, since everyone loses ranks to some degree each month.
If you mean like right now, that’s because of the season reset. I got bumped down to 19, so you might be seeing me. 
I was using an old aggro mage deck though, 80% of the cards are basic and common. Only legendary is Thalnos, but I could have easily replaced him with somebody else, probably novice or Gnomish Inventor.
How far do you get bumped down? I’ve just lost 3 in a row, seeing a Murloc deck with 2 Old Murk Eyes and 2 Warleaders and a deck with 2 faceless manipulators, a Leroy, and a blood knight coming out in the second round. It’s annoying as hell.
You must be mistaken. It is not possible to have two of these cards in one deck.
I had one with my priest’s Mind Vision. Until you mentioned it and I looked further, I had assumed I was stealing the card (so the one I got would have been the second), and not just copying it. Good to know.
Sounds like a Murlock deck. You have to know how to handle these - blow all your removal, because he’s got nothing that’s worth removing until he gets a bunch and they all buff each other, then you’re totally screwed regardless of how much removal you have.
I got dropped from 11 to 19, it’s usual. Basically, you get a star for each rank you have, but the math is too complicated - just figure you’ll end up somewhere from 10-20, depending on how high you were before.
i’ll repeat this again - as it stands ranked is not for the casual player. at all.
iinm, the highest possible rank you can get after a reset is 16. with the monthly season resets and no real rewards for climbing the ladder, i’ll wag that half of the player base is around rank 20-15 throughout the season. if you need to rage, question why the system is the way it is rather than the hapless people forced to fight each other half of the time regardless of ability. i certainly have not found an answer.
the only reason i’m reiterating this yet again is because i too, was initially baffled by the rank system, but the sooner you realise that there is currently no good place in the rank system for lower level players the less frustration you’ll feel.
i also love priests, it’s my main character. but they are the hardest to play atm, especially so if you do not have access to all the priest cards.
but… but… I like seeing shiny stars. 
sorry that was a reply for Hamlet. i play ranked too - if you’re having fun, then that is all that matters 
Nowhere is for the casual player. Constructed is infested with netdeckers in both Ranked and “Casual” and sticking to Arena was deliberately designed to be impossible - you need at least a 70% win rate to fund a second round of Arena, and the only way that can happen is by driving “everyone else”'s win rate below 50%.
You’re going to stabilize at your skill level in either ranked or unranked play. Doesn’t matter which one you choose.
As I stated before, I don’t have a problem losing due to my “skill level”. I don’t have a problem being in rank 19, if that’s where my “skill level is stabilized”. What I hate is the sheer number of people with decks that are clearly far superior to mine being in the same level.
I tend to agree with both shijin and Grumann, there is no place for either low level players or for people with iffy decks to play without being frustrated. I should just make my peace with the fact it’s either grind through the frustration to get gold to get Arena to get passable cards or to pay money.
As I said, I really think it’s worthwhile to spend say $40, or even just $15, to goose your collection. You don’t need many rares, you very rarely need epics, and you definitely don’t need legendaries to do well. But using the basic deck will leave you with a sour taste in your mouth, and unless you have enough time and endurance to grind through it, you’ll end up hating the game.
That’s just how it is with all CCGs, unfortunately.
apart from the challenge, i love progressing piecemeal. every new card you get is another round of figuring out your own deck composition and whether the new card has a place for it somewhere. it’s nice, for example, to figure out decks like Zoolock before you found out it had a widely accepted name.
the thing is that it is not immediately apparent that Ranked has no place for matching people of your skill level in the long term, so a lot of new players get burned by it. iinm, Casual uses your MMR to match you so it is relatively better. relatively.
I’m beginning to think arena rewards should be more closely tied to results. The last couple of times I hit 10 wins I got something close to 150 gold which was pretty disappointing, but just now I hit 8 wins and got almost 250 gold for it. This happens between 4 and 7 wins too. Sometimes 6 wins get you less gold than 4 or 5. I know there’re random factors to the rewards, but its dumb. There’s already so much randomness in the game. Once I’ve run that gauntlet, let me have some more assured gold dammit!
if you got more gold with less wins, it probably means you’d got dust or cards instead.
Yeah, I think the arena rewards are set to be equivalent to a certain value (or small range of values). So you’ll always get <x> gold, but exactly how that’s split between real gold, dust, and expert packs is randomized.
I had the funniest arena match with a mage with a bunch of secrets. She must have thought I was insane or stupid giving her a bunch of yetis (given the “thank you” she said every time it happened), and vaporizing them on her. In truth, I was playing around her secrets. Those were the weakest monsters in my hand. I ended up stomping her once late game hit. (I unfortunately drew what amounts to a late game control deck in arena. Still 4-3 ain’t too bad).
Maybe, but I don’t even look at the dust/card rewards. Do you guys?
On a different note, one HUGE thing I think is missing from the game is stats tracking. I don’t understand why it isn’t there. It would be brilliant to be able to keep track of your statistics, with even a halfway powerful tracker that allowed you to look at win rates by class and time and match type.
Of course I look at the rewards! Man! I’m actually rather upset when I get cards/dust when I could be getting gold, I’d like to go infinite someday, but I seem to range between 1-6 wins in arena, never 7. Guess I’m just kinda bad at this, will probably come with experience.
Still the meta around 20 seems whack right now, so much taunt! Every game I see a Shieldmasta, it seems. I’ve basically stopped playing my Miracle Rogue and started playing my Mill Rogue, always fun to send cards back, and back, and back… managed to get someone to burn his Gagetzan (a miracle druid with Gagetzan and Moonfire), that was good.