Hearthstone and the Caverns of Time
I was going to finalize changes and write some patch notes for Elemancer’s v7.1 update, which is essentially the second half of the “Elemancer 2.0” overhaul. But then the Hearthstone team dropped the 27.2 Patch Notes which includes their first direct-to-Wild expansion (Caverns of Time) and a bevy of changes. I simply have to talk about it, as I feel it is a commendable and intriguing new direction for Hearthstone. A lot of the changes center around the next Twist format, which is just the early years of Hearthstone: Legacy (2014) to Mean Streets of Gadgetzan (2016). Caverns of Time will contain 147 cards total: 113 buffed/reworked reprints and 34 new cards. So here are one designer’s unsolicited opinions on the changes at a meta level and personal anecdotes from this beloved era of Hearthstone. Note that all the image of cards I’m adding are for reference and reflect the card’s current attributes in Hearthstone. I do not own these images, but they break up the monotony of my blocks of text. Enjoy!
Wild Reprints
Hearthstone finally embraces reprints, which have been a crucial component of TCGs/CCGs for a long time. This will include “printing” some adventure-only cards into normal packs (for those of you who haven’t crafted Sludge Belcher yet). Let’s compare this to my other favorite card games: Magic and Eternal. Both leverage reprints to help shape limited formats, and when Eternal first did this I thought it was a great innovation that might seem counterintuitive in a digital card game. I very rarely play Hearthstone’s Arena format, but I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that it is much less compelling than draft formats in other card games. However, it also means that Hearthstone doesn’t need to fill out an expansion with a lot of cards that are too weak for constructed. Magic has been doing this for decades, and a few years ago in the Ixalan block they were even willing to reuse the same cards in both Ixalan and Rivals of Ixalan packs, which were drafted together back when they still had a block format. The point is that in Magic and Eternal, it is better to simply reuse an old design that fills the same hole for limited format purposes. Hearthstone doesn’t have that issue, though they do inevitably have underwhelming cards in each expansion that don’t see constructed play.
As alluded to above, there is more to this change than meets the eye. Reprinting cards that were previously only available in adventures and mini-sets provides an alternate means to obtain these cards without having to spend gold on an entire set. Even simply reprinting selected old cards means that newer players don’t have to purchase old packs to get them (the crafting system notwithstanding). Alongside duplicate protection, this setup is even more beneficial to enfranchised players as they will only open unowned cards. Eternal leveraged this curated reprint innovation before Hearthstone, but combined with duplicate protection Hearthstone’s implementation surpasses Eternal’s in terms of collection-building. Eternal’s crafting and card acquisition in general are exponentially better and more free-to-play friendly, but I’ll give Hearthstone props regardless.
Back to the point that Hearthstone expansions don’t need a ton of filler cards: typically sets are all highly focused on the expansion’s mechanics and theme. What this means going forward is that the Hearthstone team could revisit mechanics and reuse the designs, perhaps buffing the old card and reprinting that version into a new expansion. This is similar to how they’ve implemented the Core set, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see effective reprints in future sets. In fact, I’m looking forward to it, unless they also increase the total number of cards in each expansion, in which case there isn’t a benefit to already owning the reprinted cards.
Nostalgia Buffs
Whispers of the Old Gods and Mean Streets of Gadgetzan are certainly sets that I look back on with rose-tinted glasses. I think these sets in particular represent some of the best aspects of Hearthstone. Whispers gave us corrupted versions of previous cards and characters, and it featured a storyline that took creative liberties with the Warcraft lore. N’Zoth is one of the four major Old Gods but was first depicted in Hearthstone (the other three had previously appeared in World of Warcraft). One of my favorite twists of the expansion is that Ragnaros actually turned to the Light to combat the Old Gods’ corruption (something about a double negative).
Mean Streets of Gadgetzan introduced multi-class cards which batched together groups of three classes under one major mechanic. Aside from Jade Golems, these mechanics went on to become major archetypes in Hearthstone: singleton and handbuff. I have a soft spot for the Jade archetype, as I still have a Jade N’Zoth Rogue deck in Wild that I’ll occasionally bring out on the ladder and Druid and Shaman are two of my most-played classes. So it’s great to see buffs to so many cards from that era that have been largely power crept out of relevance. The buffs will have a much larger impact on the upcoming Twist format, but they may make a splash in Wild (C’Thun Druid back on the menu?).
There are some very interesting targeted buffs that clearly aim to bring old cards up to modern power levels. The main categories I see are significant mana cost reductions, tribe-specific buffs, strategy-focused buffs, and functional/mechanical updates. There are a few reversals of previous nerfs such as Mana Wyrm (back to a 1/3) and Aviana (back to 9 mana), which are great to see.
Speaking of mana cost reductions, let’s talk about the big, 2+ cost reductions, of which there are quite a few. Acidmaw goes from 7 to 3 (!!!), Ball of Spiders from 6 to 3, King of Beasts from 5 to 3, Lay on Hands from 8 to 6, Blade of C’Thun from 9 to 6, Poisoned Blade from 4 to 2, Dark Bargain from 6 to 3, C’Thun from 10 to 8, Don Han’Cho from 7 to 5 (also nerfed from a 5/6 to a 5/5), and Lotus Agents from 5 to 3 (also nerfed from a 5/3 to a 3/3). These are mostly cards that play into their class’s core mechanics, designs that are very flavorful but historically too weak to see play.
Ball of Spiders always seemed egregiously overcosted, but C’Thun and Blade of C’Thun were strong enough to warrant the high mana cost (at least back in 2016). C’Thun from 10 to 8 mana speeds up the point at which a C’Thun deck can hit its power spike, and I’ll touch on the other buffs to this archetype later. I see the Blade of C'Thun cost reduction as akin to the buffs to Siphon Soul, Assassinate, and Hex over the last couple years. These are all aimed at making targeted removal much more cost-effective in an attempt to match the increased impact and power level of the threats you’re answering.
Several of the buffs push specific tribes, notably Beasts in Druid and Hunter, Totems in Shaman, and Demons in Warlock, all of which are part of the class’s core identity. An interesting shift is Addled Grizzly, which previously buffed all minions and fit very well into Druid’s go-wide token strategy. Now it becomes a 2 mana 2/3 that only gives +1/+1 to Beasts that you summon. King of Beasts and Ball of Spiders were noted above, each receiving a significant mana discount. Meanwhile, Shaman gets some cost reduction on several Totem-related cards, allowing the strategy to hit power spikes earlier. Thunder Bluff Valiant is particularly interesting, now acting as a mini-Bloodlust effect as a battlecry in addition to its Inspire effect. This is also a trend for several other Inspire cards where you effectively get one hit for free when the minion is played. Tuskarr Totemic and Wicked Witchdoctor each get a 1 mana discount. Demonfuse is slated to lose the huge downside of giving your opponent an extra mana crystal, it’ll simply be a +3/+3 buff to a Demon.
Inspire is a very slow mechanic that presents an ongoing threat on the board. Even back in The Grand Tournament it was slow, so I’m glad to see several of these cards buffed. The way in which they’ve been buffed is interesting, as I mentioned earlier they essentially get one Inspire effect for free either as a static effect or as a battlecry. Dalaran Aspirant starts with +1 spell damage, Confessor Paletress summons a legendary on battlecry, and Thunder Bluff Valiant buffs your Totems on battlecry. They’re still pretty slow ways to accrue value, but being able to double-dip on their effects the turn they are played may be strong enough for some of them to see play.
As I’ve noted, Jade N’Zoth Rogue is a pet deck of mine, so I’m thrilled to see buffs to two of its key cards: Jade Swarmer and Jade Shuriken. 7 of the 10 Jade cards are getting a buff, the three exclusions being Jade Idol, Jade Blossom, and Jade Claw. Most of the buffs are simple and straightforward: cost reductions and attack increases. Jade Behemoth, Jade Swarmer, Jade Lightning, and Jade Chieftain all get a 1 mana cost reduction. Jade Lightning gets a requisite nerf to its damage (4 to 3), but Jade Shuriken gets a buff from 2 to 3 damage. The multi-class Jade cards, Jade Spirit and Aya Blackpaw herself, get a +1 attack increase. These are all largely non-factors if you’re playing a Jade Golem deck, since you probably want to run every effect that you can (though I’ve definitely cut Jade Spirit in the past in Druid and Rogue, at times).
I just want to point out that Jade Swarmer at 1 mana makes it exceptionally more flexible. Though the curve of playing it on turn two into Unearthed Raptor on turn three wasn’t bad, I’d much rather have the Swarmer in-play on turn one. 1-cost cards in Rogue are especially useful for activating Combo effects.
I’m hoping there are one or two new Jade Golem cards in this expansion, as this may be the only opportunity to print them and have some support in the surrounding set. I don’t think we need Jade Golems to be a class’s featured mechanic in a future expansion, but a couple more cards would do a lot of work to make it a playable strategy.
C’Thun returns in a big way, and it is a parasitic strategy that was entirely confined to Whispers of the Old Gods. A reprint-heavy set is the best place to revisit this archetype, as the alternative is to make it a core focus of a new expansion. Three C’Thun minions are increasing their C’Thun buffs by +1/+1 (Dark Arakkoa, Twilight Geomancer, and C’Thun’s Chosen), and we even get a new payoff card: Eyestalk of C’Thun.
Will these buffs be enough to make it a viable deck? It’s unclear, but buffs to Twin Emperor Vek’lor (from 4/6 to 6/7) and Klaxxi Amber-Weaver (gains Taunt baseline), two of the better defensive payoffs for slower C’Thun decks, and the addition of Eyestalk may buy the decks enough time to get to their C’Thun turn. And again, the cost reduction of C’Thun from 10 to 8 is huge, meaning your biggest payoff can come down 2 full turns earlier.
Warlock is getting buffs to its discard strategy, which is also supported by recent discard-related cards. Here we have a few old classics like Silverware Golem and Tiny Knight of Evil alongside previously unplayed cards like Dark Bargain. Silverware Golem gets a marginal buff from a 3/3 to a 4/3, but Tiny Knight of Evil now gets +2/+2 whenever you discard rather than just +1/+1. That’s double the rate for those counting at home. Dark Bargain being reduced from 6 to 3 mana is huge, as previously noted, so I’d expect at least some players to experiment with it.
Discard is a Warlock strategy that is seeing a resurgence, at least from the design perspective. 11 of Warlock’s 38 discard synergy cards were printed within the last standard rotation (2 years). There’s definitely a push for more targeted discard effects recently, such as Disciple of Sargeras and Wing Welding from TITANS.
I’m hoping one or two of the 34 brand new Caverns of Time cards will be discard payoff cards to round out the strategy and complement these buffs.
Some cards are getting numeric buffs to meet modern standards, such as Snipe from 4 to 6 damage and Flame Lance from 8 to 25 (!!!) damage, while others are getting significant mechanical updates. Three examples are Knight of the Wild, Anub’arak, and the Iron Juggernaut.
Knight of the Wild changes to a static cost reduction for every Beast you’ve summoned this game, rather than only being reduced while in your hand. The old iteration made it very unwieldy in the aggressive Beast decks that would actually want to play it. Oracles of Elune rejoice!
Anub’arak is getting a cost reduction from 9 to 8, and the Nerubian he summons now has a Deathrattle that resummons Anub’arak directly rather than having him bounce back to your hand. This makes him much more similar to Sherazin, Corpse Flower, except with better N’Zoth synergy (a board full of Sherazins is not great, actually). This makes Anub’arak an infinite board presence barring silence and transform effects. The closest comparison is probably Rattlegore, except Anub'arak fluctuates between an 8/4 and a 4/4 rather than shrinking out of existence.
Iron Juggernaut now shuffles a bomb as a battlecry AND deathrattle, making it twice as potent while opening up a new deathrattle angle. Deathrattles are much easier to duplicate than battlecries (unless you’re Shaman). Warrior doesn’t have as much synergy with deathrattle as say Hunter or Rogue, in fact it has the fewest deathrattle minions of any class (yes, including Death Knight and Demon Hunter!), but it does make a N’Zoth strategy more compelling.
Next we have some buffs to staples of old. Goblin Blastmage, a cornerstone in Mech Mage back in GvG and during subsequent years, is increased to deal 6 damage randomly split among all enemies. One of its partners in crime, Soot Spewer, becomes a 3/4 that also generates a random Fire spell if you control another Mech, which might be enough for it to make the cut in a modern Mech Mage. Mysterious Challenger, the menace of curve-out Paladin and bringer of Christmas trees, gets reduced to 5 mana while neutral all-stars Acolyte of Pain and Sludge Belcher both get +1 health. Street Trickster doubles its spell damage to +2, making it a much more potent static spell damage effect. Blackwing Corruptor, a classic midrange minion, is buffed to a 5 damage battlecry, while combo-enabling Emperor Thaurissan gets a cost reduction of his own down to a 5 mana 4/4.
All of these appear to be aimed to meet current power levels, increasing damage, health, potency, or speed. This is the general flavor throughout all the buffs, but this set of cards in particular were already playable or were back in their heyday. Ok, Street Trickster is a stretch, but his spell damage literally doubled so he deserves some special attention.
Penultimately we have updates to some interesting cards that were overcosted or underwhelming at the time, including one of my favorite designs of all time: Charged Hammer.
Charged Hammer becomes a 3 mana 2/3 weapon that still transforms your hero power into Lightning Jolt. It’s still not very strong, and Totem strategies are much better than they used to be so losing that hero power could be considered a downside. But cards that transform your hero power are an interesting design space that is unique to Hearthstone. As evidenced by OG Sir Finley, Justicar Trueheart, Genn Greymane, and Baku the Mooneater, hero powers can be pivotal to a deck’s gameplan.
Lock and Load used to be 2 mana, but now it will become 0, which is the cost it always should have been. Ok, if it had been released at 1 mana, that would’ve seen play in the TGT era. Now that it’s free I think it’s high time to dust off those Zul’jin Hero cards and take him for a spin in Wild.
Flame Leviathan was from a much different era of Hearthstone, one where Sea Reaver was arguably playable (not really, but it had some synergies at least). Now it’s getting Rush and it’ll only deal damage to non-Mechs (your face is not a Mech, at least until the dev team adds tribes to Hero cards).
Cult Apothecary is being reduced to 4 mana, which makes it a much more palatable tech card against go-wide aggro strategies. If I recall correctly, it saw some play as a counter to zoo decks. It still wasn’t very strong, but fortunately the aggressive decks were also not as fast as they are now.
Finally, following from the above, I wanted to single out a cycle of cards from Mean Streets of Gadgetzan that were largely underwhelming, but represented a satisfying and unifying design. These are the multi-class minions that discovered a card from the Jade Lotus, Kabal, and Grimestreet Goons, respectively: Lotus Agent, Kabal Courier, and Grimestreet Informant. They are all being buffed to become more in-line with each other. Lotus Agent will become a 3 mana 3/3 while Kabal Courier and Grimestreet Informant will both become 2 mana 2/2’s.
These cards represent a good semi-open-ended Discover effect, while also allowing for interesting gameplay opportunities where you Discover a card that you wouldn’t normally have access to in your deck (unless you’re playing Thief Rogue or Thief Priest). I’d love to see more of these kinds of cards in the future: restricted Discover effects that provide access to cards from multi-class sets/pairs. For example, Druid was paired with Hunter and Shaman in Scholomance Academy and Priest and Warlock in Festival of Legends. We didn’t get Discover effects across these pairs, but there were also fewer multi-class card slots in those expansions in contrast to Mean Streets where it was the major focus.
The bodies themselves are largely irrelevant, and the minions have no keywords nor tribe. It’s interesting that the Druid/Rogue/Shaman entry is still 1 mana more, but I figure that’s because Druid ramps and Rogue might actually consider playing it in a Thief deck. That’s a theory, at least. Alternatively, the dev team wanted to leave parts of the original card intact, so 3 health was the only remaining anchor point for Lotus Agent.
In Conclusion
I haven’t included all 111 buffs/updates, but I wanted to highlight some interesting groups of cards and speculate on the rationale behind them. There are two more cards getting a rework from that era that will be included in the expansion, but we’ll have to wait and see what they are. I’m hoping for Renounce Darkness, but notably each class has 10 buffed entries already so that is unlikely. In which case, my wild speculation will be Barnes because he’s caused so many issues in the past and Shifter Zerus because its effect is currently too slow.
Barnes could be changed to “Summon a random minion from your deck as a 1/1 that returns to your hand when it dies” which kind of keeps the spirit of the card that kind of gives you an extra copy. I envision that effect working as a deathrattle. It would then have some interesting synergies with battlecry minions. The more reasonable rework would be “Summon a random minion from your deck, set it’s Attack and Health to 1.” You could even throw “and cost” to attempt to stymie Evolve shenanigans. I think generating extra copies of cards in your deck is too strong a mechanic for Hearthstone, as it undermines the deckbuilding restriction of 2 copies of each card and 1 copy of legendaries. Jade Idol gets a pass, but I think the infinite potential value on that card was a big part of the reason players took umbrage to it.
Shifter Zerus simply needs to transform into a random minion on the turn its drawn. Zerus’s biggest drawback is not that the pool of minions is ever-expanding, but rather that when you topdeck it later in the game it is almost entirely useless. If you’re waiting for the best time to play it, you’re already committed to holding onto it for a few turns, but making it transform immediately means it’ll be one turn closer to being useful.
It would be cool to see a rework of an OG like Lorewalker Cho or Nat Pagle, or an obscure card like Auctionmaster Beardo (hero powers are interesting). I’d love to see Soggoth the Slitherer buffed, but that’s because I have a soft spot for taunt Druid. But if Soggoth were to get a buff, we’d have seen it in this batch, so that’s out the window.
Looking to the Future (or the Past)
This is the final final word. In case you didn’t read the Hearthstone article yourself, here are all three brand new cards revealed today:
Importantly, I wanted to shout out to the Wrath of Air Totem making its return as inferred from Totally Totems. The other information we glean from this, and something I’ve referenced previously, is the revamp of old archetypes. I talked about C’Thun extensively and mentioned singleton strategies getting a new spotlight during Mean Streets of Gadgetzan. Obviously Murozond, Thief of Time is another singleton payoff. Kazakus and friends apparently needed no buffs, as the existing payoff cards such as Reno Jackson and Dragonqueen Alexstrasza are powerful enough. That’s fair, as singleton strategies are still viable in Wild. I should note that another of my longstanding pet decks in Wild is Reno N’Zoth Warlock (I really like deathrattle shenanigans).
Suffice to say, I’m excited for the next Twist format and the future potential of reprints and direct-to-Wild expansions. Hopefully you found this walk down memory lane interesting and found my commentary insightful.
