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My question "Will cards obtained during the Hearthstone beta be lost after the game goes live?" has been put on hold as off-topic:

This includes speculative questions about developer intent, as well as lore questions not addressed directly through in-universe sources.

fbueckert and I discussed the merits of the question in comments and obviously others in the community also felt that the question should be closed. I'm not really looking for an answer to the question as I provided one when I asked it. My goal was just to put a sign post on the internet to hopefully slow the number of forum posts all over the internet asking this exact question.

The question combined with the (well referenced if I do say so myself) answer is not speculative. In this case Blizzard has provided a definitive answer. If they change their minds the answer can be edited. I don't see how this is much different from the answer to "How should we deal with out of date questions/answers?."

  • How is this any different than a patch which fundamentally changes a game's play mechanic (for instance the Diablo III real money auction house)?
  • Is there anything that can be done to this question to make it on topic?
  • Is it that this class of question is typically problematic so we should burn them all or is there something wrong this particular question?

To be clear I am not upset about the question being put on hold. If it's off topic, it's off topic. I am just trying to increase my understanding of the community's reasoning.

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    As a rule of thumb, if your question involves verbs in the future tense to describe anything other than an in-game action, it's almost certainly off topic, and no amount of rewording is going to fix that.
    – LessPop_MoreFizz
    Nov 25, 2013 at 23:57
  • It's not about the wording of your question, it's about the information it's asking for. That information is inherently speculation, even if the dev gave a word on it (as that word is, by no means, binding).
    – user98085
    Nov 26, 2013 at 0:07
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    +1, thanks for the understanding
    – badp
    Nov 26, 2013 at 0:25
  • While having a "sign post on the internet to hopefully slow the number of forum posts" is a noble cause, people will still ask the question without doing any research. If they did not check with Blizzard then why assume they would check with Arqade?
    – Batophobia
    Dec 4, 2013 at 21:54
  • @Batophobia no but they might check with Google which would lead to Arqade given Stack Exchange's excellent SEO. You are correct however that without the slightest investment by the inquirer they wouldn't find my sign post. That said, single canonical answers are the bread and butter of Stack Exchange.
    – ahsteele
    Dec 4, 2013 at 22:08
  • @ahsteele then multiple answers are the ice cream and duplicates are added chairs at the table. This is turning out to be a delicious service.
    – Batophobia
    Dec 4, 2013 at 22:25
  • @Batophobia that made me smile.
    – ahsteele
    Dec 4, 2013 at 22:54

1 Answer 1

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You really can't. The question is fundamentally asking about the intent of a game's developer(s), and also is asking about something that hasn't happened yet; both are pretty much entirely off-topic, for the simple reason that they can't be answered for certain. We can't read the minds of the people at Blizzard to know what will happen, and even if we could, the answer can change between now and then. Unfortunately, without a crystal ball or time travel, no answer can really be anything more than speculation, no matter what statements or evidence you may have backing it.

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  • Sounds good to me. As I said just looking for clarification if it could have been "saved." :)
    – ahsteele
    Nov 26, 2013 at 0:07

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