Hearthstone 16: Ia Ia! C'thun Fhtagn!

[Rodin]

Might Curator see play in Mill Rogue? Whenever I spectate people playing that deck they're often frantically digging for Coldlights. Still seems a bit weak, since you'd ONLY be dragging in the Coldlight.

Fireland Portal may push Flame Lance out of my Reno Mage. On the plus side, it can go face and puts a minion on the board that's likely to be bigger than most minions I can play naturally. On the down side, 8 damage is pretty much the perfect level for dealing with nasties like Ragnaros, and 5 damage dips under the level required to take down stuff like Tirion and N'Zoth. Fireland Portal is definitely more value, but I'm really not sure I'll have the ability to take advantage of it since my deck is permanently behind on board anyway.

[Gandariel]

My first reviews for Kharazan:
First off, i'm sad they didn't introduce a new mechanic (inspire or Discover) or sub-mechanic(joust). But maybe they will in other cards?
And i guess, if they have enough "distinctive" cards i don't mind keeping entire new abilities for future releases.

Enchanted Raven: Good. People play Living roots for two 1/1s on turn 1 all the time, and this is definitely good. Will it make Beast druid a thing? Who knows
Very good in Arena too.

Kindly Grandmother: Sick. I expect this to become an auto-include in Hunter decks.
Also crazy good in Arena

Firelands Portal: Very strong, but obviously slow. Might be a solid finisher for Tempo Mage (RDU crushed everyone at Dreamhack with a Tempo Mage featuring Faceless summoner and 2x Flamestrike), but then again it might not be fast enough depending on the meta.
It's also crazy good in Arena

Ivory Knight: A better Tuskar Totemic, basically. Stats are *slightly* too low, but the effect is very powerful. Should see play in control decks, but not 100% sure
Pretty good in Arena.

Ethereal Peddler: I don't think there are enough Burgle-like effects to make this worth the deckslot. But cool idea!

Barnes: Very RNG-dependent, but looks to be super strong. Hit any Deathrattle and you just got a ton of value. Tirion or Sylvanas are the jackpot, but even a Loot Hoarder would be great (Yeti + cycle).
If you miss, you still get almost a Yeti, which is not awful.
I'd say this will be autoinclude in N'zoth decks.

The Curator: Can't figure out an OP combo yet. The card is clearly good in terms of value, but its popularity in Constructed depends entirely on what combos you can pull out.
Alextrasza + Coldlight + Jeweled scarab(for Ice Block) in Freeze Mage? Can't really tell.

Overall all the cards look pretty interesting, i'm hyped for the other cards!

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Ivory Knight: Solid Reno Paladin tool. Otherwise, Paladin already has enough healing as it is. In Reno decks, this lets you dig for specific situational answers and get a heal off of it.

Enchanted Raven: A strong early-game minion for Druid, which promotes a different playstyle. Nice spin on Zombie Chow. Will be a very good Arena pick.

Kindly Grandmother: Fabulous card against slower decks. If you put this on the board and they don't have a minion to answer it with, it becomes a 3/2 after they ping it. Otherwise, a solid class card.

Firelands Portal: Mage's mechanical theme continues to be "anything you can do, I can do better". This is gonna be amazing in Arena, and will probably serve as the cornerstone for a new form of Tempo Mage, as a follow-up to Faceless Summoner.

Curator: Really really good Reno card, again. Stampeding Kodo is a beast. Azure Drake is a dragon. Finley Mrrgglton is a murloc (although he's not as useful in Reno decks, I feel...but does enable certain Reno decks better). Only big downside is that you're waiting until Turn 7 to play it. That might be way too late.

Ethereal Peddler: Great Arena card for Rogue, because they get another shot at a 5-mana 5/6, and it gets the "recent set" bonus. Otherwise, the Battlecry is just gimmicky, because there's so few ways to reliably steal your opponent's cards. Also, getting this Entombed or Thoughtstolen is going to suck. Like, why did they split the "stealing" mechanic across two classes? If effects like Entomb or Thoughtsteal were Rogue-only, Ethereal Peddler wouldn't be a liability in Constructed.

Barnes: Two uses have been suggested to me. One: you run it in a deck similar to Yogg'n'Load, where you have mostly spells and only a few specific minions. Two: you run it in an N'zoth deck, because most of the minions you pull 1/1s of are going to have strong deathrattles.

[Joran]

As a complete and utter World of Warcraft philistine, would anyone please be kind enough to define Karazhan for me? It's main themes, it's setting, thee gist of some of the characters involved, perchance?

As mentioned previously, Karazhan is the tower of Medivh. In World of Warcraft, Medivh is long gone and the tower is haunted by dead guests from a party and a bunch of demons. The Hearthstone adventure seems to be taking place during the party, hence the disco theme. As someone who loved the raid, this is going to be fun, although the disco confused me for a bit.

Thoughts:

Ivory Knight: Going to be good in N'Zoth Paladin and AnyFin Paladin. Additional healing in control decks is good and this can even get an extra AnyFin; control decks are also reactive so grabbing the perfect card like a Consecration is going to be really important.

Only issue is that Paladin has a lot of low cost spells, so some poor bastard is going to get an option of Sacred Trial, Eye for an Eye, and Competitive Spirit. I think it's going to be playable, but it's really going to annoy people playing Paladin.

Breakdown of spells:

0 mana: 1
1 mana: 11
2 mana: 3
3 mana: 2
4 mana: 3
5 mana: 4
6 mana: 2
8+: 2

Kindly Grandmother: Going to steer Hunter towards more of a Zoo style playstyle. I've already started seeing people playing Argent Squire, Dire Wolf Alphas, and Abusive Sergeants in decks. So instead of King Elekk/Huge Toad, maybe this + Flame Juggler will be more common.

Firelands Portal: Good card, removal + development tends to be really good. Going to be seen in a Reno type deck and maybe a slower Tempo list. Also, not a bad draw out of Cabalist Tome or Discover.

Curator: Interested to see what people are going to do with it. I like build around cards like this.

Barnes: As mentioned previously, things like N'Zoth decks are going to love this card. Also, I could see a use for a Malygos deck. 3 mana Malygos is amazing and if Malygos is in hand, Emperor can be pulled.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Only issue is that Paladin has a lot of low cost spells, so some poor bastard is going to get an option of Sacred Trial, Eye for an Eye, and Competitive Spirit. I think it's going to be playable, but it's really going to annoy people playing Paladin.

Breakdown of spells:

0 mana: 1
1 mana: 11
2 mana: 3
3 mana: 2
4 mana: 3
5 mana: 4
6 mana: 2
8+: 2

So I ran the math on this, and the odds of pulling three secrets is 11/28 * 10/27 * 9/26 = 5%.

So it'll basically be like a critical fumble on a d20.

[PsyBomb]

Coldlight Oracle is a really good point on the Curator, and reliably ripping one out of your deck would be worth it alone. The above-theorized Zoo Hunter might use it to grab Coldlight plus a random Beast (of which they have several), and Ramp/Astral Druid might do the same due to their abundance of high-end threats of various types. Seriously, imagine someone getting Astral off, then going Curatior (nab Coldlight and a boss dragon, possibly also a high-end Beast such as Jormungar or Devilsaur) into Coldlight. Suddenly, they have OPTIONS for the rest of the game, and nobody carries enough answers to kill 15 threat cards. Still loses to aggro unless they get lucky with early taunts, but control is fading back in with Freeze Mage and Grinder Shaman popping up.

Other than Burgle and Huckster, what other theft cards exist in Rogue? I'm thinking about putting together Akido archetypes for Rogue and Priest utilizing a bunch of control combined with a "strength of my enemy" power base.

EDIT: Other than Burgle and Huckster, I found only Gang Up, with Unearthed Raptor able to copy Huckster's deathrattle. Unless 1-2 more good ones are coming in the adventure, the rogue card is pretty dead. Possibly better in certain Brawls where other-class cards are more common.

[Yael]

Barnes: As mentioned previously, things like N'Zoth decks are going to love this card. Also, I could see a use for a Malygos deck. 3 mana Malygos is amazing and if Malygos is in hand, Emperor can be pulled.

This.

Barnes may open the chance for Mage Malygos to attempt to return as a decent deck. Also, Shaman will greatly benefit because this gives him two ways of summoning Malygos without the humongous mana cost (Ancestor's Call, and Barnes).

Looking forward for him!

[Chen]

Curator: Really really good Reno card, again. Stampeding Kodo is a beast. Azure Drake is a dragon. Finley Mrrgglton is a murloc (although he's not as useful in Reno decks, I feel...but does enable certain Reno decks better). Only big downside is that you're waiting until Turn 7 to play it. That might be way too late.

Corrupted seer is the key Murloc to grab for a Reno deck. You get single target removal with Kodo (or silence with Owl) and a board clear with Corrupted seer. For dragons azure drake is good, as is twilight drake or any big dragon finisher. Curator looks like an excellent card for Reno lock or even some sort of control paladin. I think it's excellent in Wild for Murloc Paladin.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

EDIT: Other than Burgle and Huckster, I found only Gang Up, with Unearthed Raptor able to copy Huckster's deathrattle. Unless 1-2 more good ones are coming in the adventure, the rogue card is pretty dead. Possibly better in certain Brawls where other-class cards are more common.

It's gonna be a really silly grab in the Unstable Portal Brawl.

[gomipile]

New adventure: Karazhan, BUT as a funky disco pad.

One Night in Karazhan.

One night in Karazhan, you'll see masonry crumble.
But when the bricks fly they don't fall "down," see?
You'll find a boss in every wing and tower.
Not much between defeat and victory.

[heretic]

So Kindly Grandmother is probably going to compete with Injured Kvaldir in the Camel Hunter lists.

[Chen]

So Kindly Grandmother is probably going to compete with Injured Kvaldir in the Camel Hunter lists.

Kindly Grandmother is 2 mana. It would be absolutely ridiculous at 1 mana.

[Thialfi]

As a complete and utter World of Warcraft philistine, would anyone please be kind enough to define Karazhan for me? It's main themes, it's setting, thee gist of some of the characters involved, perchance?

I quit playing World of Warcraft seven years ago when my wife got pregnant with our second child. Karazhan and Naxxramus are the raids that I ran the most. Naxx was the initial raid in the Frozen Throne expansion and Kara was the initial raid in the Burning Crusade expansion. As the initial raid, they were the least difficult and most accessible to the average player, so a lot of people ran them numerous times. I certainly ran each one dozens of times. It was really fun. The Barnes character that was announced was basically an announcer. The whole raid would sit and wait to see which of the three fights you were going to have (Wizard of Oz, Little Red Riding Hood, or Romulo and Julienne). I always liked Red Riding Hood the best because anybody could be debuffed with the cloak and then you spent time running away from the wolf.

It's disappointing that we only get a handful of Legendaries and several have already been announced. Maiden of Virtue would have been real fun. It's basically a fight against a giant female paladin statue. There are two different dragons and both fights were real fun. Shade of Aran is the ghost of Medivh's dad. There wasn't much to that fight other than standing still if you are surrounded by fire or run around in a circle if you are being chased by a blizzard. Malchezaar was the big bad end fight.

I liked the raid because all of the fights were very different and memorable. The original event gave reputation with the kirin tor and was very mage themed with lots of undead and demons. The disco [party theme lets them lighten things up. I'm really looking forward to it.

[heretic]

Kindly Grandmother is 2 mana. It would be absolutely ridiculous at 1 mana.

Oh right, I mixed up Camel with the Divine Shield guy in Paladin. Thought it triggered on 1 health, not 1 mana.

Camel players, carry on.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Oh right, I mixed up Camel with the Divine Shield guy in Paladin. Thought it triggered on 1 health, not 1 mana.

Camel players, carry on.

The dreaded Hunterdin meta is thankfully not upon us.

[TechnoWarforged]

I quit playing World of Warcraft seven years ago when my wife got pregnant with our second child. Karazhan and Naxxramus are the raids that I ran the most. Naxx was the initial raid in the Frozen Throne expansion and Kara was the initial raid in the Burning Crusade expansion. As the initial raid, they were the least difficult and most accessible to the average player, so a lot of people ran them numerous times. I certainly ran each one dozens of times. It was really fun. The Barnes character that was announced was basically an announcer. The whole raid would sit and wait to see which of the three fights you were going to have (Wizard of Oz, Little Red Riding Hood, or Romulo and Julienne). I always liked Red Riding Hood the best because anybody could be debuffed with the cloak and then you spent time running away from the wolf.

It's disappointing that we only get a handful of Legendaries and several have already been announced. Maiden of Virtue would have been real fun. It's basically a fight against a giant female paladin statue. There are two different dragons and both fights were real fun. Shade of Aran is the ghost of Medivh's dad. There wasn't much to that fight other than standing still if you are surrounded by fire or run around in a circle if you are being chased by a blizzard. Malchezaar was the big bad end fight.

I liked the raid because all of the fights were very different and memorable. The original event gave reputation with the kirin tor and was very mage themed with lots of undead and demons. The disco [party theme lets them lighten things up. I'm really looking forward to it.

I'm really looking forward to the opera event... I think this time Blizzard can have us face a random boss at that stage.

WoW wise I don't remember much about Karazhan because as a healer all i need to do is to make bar go up and watch bar goes down... and yes put your hands against the wall when Shade of Aran blows up or something.

Isn't there also a fight where there's a dragon and you have to not cross streams?

I also remember the final boss being very anti-climatic... nothing remarkable about him at all.

[Yana]

The dreaded Hunterdin meta is thankfully not upon us.

This statement made me chuckle for some reason. Thanks, I needed the laugh.

[Nerocite]

In case you missed them, here are the cards from the trailer intro.

Spoiler: Romulo and Julianne

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Spoiler: Moroes

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Spoiler: Sheep?

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[TechnoWarforged]

New Karazhan Gameboard?

Spoiler

Show

Looks kinda bland.

Also One night in Karazhan reminds me all the other horrible films I've watched... like One night in Paris and One night in Chyna.

[Rodin]

Bland-looking on the surface is fine, as long as they put plenty of stuff to fool around with. And this being Karahzan, I'll be rather disappointed if they don't.

WotOG board looks nice, but it has one of the lowest interactivity rates out of all the game boards. At least, that's the impression I get. The only thing I find myself messing with is the eye on the tentacle - can't resist poking that thing for some reason.

Compare to the GvG board, with explosives to light off, a teleporter that materializes random items, a laser beam that you can use to launch a rocket ship...

One thing that was pointed out to me - Firelands Portal is a Common. And in Arena, the downsides pretty much don't exist.

...Yeah. Mage is going to be even MORE OP in Arena. Oh frabjous day.

[Yael]

...Yeah. Mage is going to be even MORE OP in Arena. Oh frabjous day.

Kripparian also talked about this; Firelands Portal will be a major boost to mage decks, and they will have at least one in each (x4 on draft).

[Anarion]

One thing that was pointed out to me - Firelands Portal is a Common. And in Arena, the downsides pretty much don't exist.

...Yeah. Mage is going to be even MORE OP in Arena. Oh frabjous day.

Kripparian also talked about this; Firelands Portal will be a major boost to mage decks, and they will have at least one in each (x4 on draft).

I think it makes sense, personally. Mage's power is in the classic set. Frostbolt, fireball, flamestrike are the core of a good mage deck, not to mention polymorph, mana wyrm, sorcerer's apprentice, and water elemental. Another new set, with high appearance rates, is going to further dilute that pool and make it harder for mages to draft well. So adding a power common does a lot to keep them more or less on par with where they are now.

[Rodin]

I think it makes sense, personally. Mage's power is in the classic set. Frostbolt, fireball, flamestrike are the core of a good mage deck, not to mention polymorph, mana wyrm, sorcerer's apprentice, and water elemental. Another new set, with high appearance rates, is going to further dilute that pool and make it harder for mages to draft well. So adding a power common does a lot to keep them more or less on par with where they are now.

The problem is that they were already top. They have the best hero power for Arena, bar none. Their spells are best suited for board control out of any class, and board control is king in Arena. They've also already been benefiting from great commons, thanks to amazing Arena cards like Ethereal Conjurer and Faceless Summoner. They're the class least in need of a power boost, and diluting the card pool and tilting things a bit in favor of the other classes would have been very beneficial to having a diverse Arena that isn't 90% Mage decks once you get above 4 wins or so.

[turbo164]

It's at least nice to see Mage's power common being a spell again instead of a creature; some of my recent Mage drafts have ended up with 27 minions, Mirror Image, Mirror Entity, Flame Lance... That early Mana Wyrm is much more of a gamble than it was in vanilla.

Meanwhile, did two more brawls for quests. First round enemy warlock got 3 Spreading Madness...also had a Doom, which like many draw effects replays the animation on each draw because of the brawl trigger lol. Second game I had turn 3 Ancient Protector+Echoing Ooze, turn 4 Cenarius + Wisps of the Old Gods. Good times.

[The Glyphstone]

Incidentally, it looks like the Opera is Wing 2 of the adventure. So we'll probably get all of the random bosses in succession, capping out with the Wicked Witch.

[Yael]

Two new cards were just introduced

• Mage
Raving Grimoire: 1/1 for 1 mana rare minion.
Battlecry: Add a random Mage spell to your hand.

Spoiler: Raving Grimoire

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• Warlock
Imp of Malcheezar: 1/3 for 1 mana common demon minion.
Whenever you discard a card, draw a card.

Spoiler: Imp of Malcheezar

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I think these are legit, as both the #OneNightInKarazhan and the #PlayHearthstone hashtags are included. Here's the source.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Cards are legit.

Also, I know the Imp isn't going to see play, but for a wild deck, I would appreciate playing a demon discard focused deck.

By the way, the grimoire is just broken :/

[Gandariel]

Holy cow that grimoire.

Yeah the Imp is cute, maybe will become decent after they print 2-4 more discardy cards.

But holy cow grimoire.
It's not really OP (I'd generally prefer to just put in another good spell), but still.
This expansion seems to have some pretty evident power creep.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

I like that the Grimoire is looking to be a great fit for less-typical Mage styles. Like, it fits Reno Grinder really well, since it's a third of a Cabalist's Tome, and it slots into a lot of random turns, still letting you play the spell you pull.

I really like the Imp, because for just 1 mana you can basically negate the downsides of some pretty potent cards. Curving into Darkshire Librarian is fantastic here, and playing this T6 along with a Doomguard or using this to mitigate the card loss from Soulfire is really strong. It's bad for combo decks, but in terms of sheer tempo/value, it lets Warlock aggressively cheat out high-tempo minions without sacrificing card advantage for it.

[Zevox]

Grimoire is good, yeah. It's not just 1/3 of a Cabalist's Tome, it's 1/3 of a Cabalist's Tome with a body attached for 1/5 of the cost. Quite nice, both for arena and constructed.

That Imp should be good, too. I think we might another good discard card or two, but that should be an important step towards making that mechanic and cards that synergize with it (like Tiny Knight of Evil or Fist of Jaraxxus) actually work. I mean, at the moment, we've got 3-4 good discard cards lying around that would combo well with the Imp: Darkshire Librarian, Soulfire, Doomguard, and maybe Dark Bargain. If that's not enough yet to work with the Imp and Knight and make this synergy set viable, it's probably only missing one card, probably something in the 3-4 cost range, since low- and high-cost discards are covered.

[gomipile]

I've been running into a lot of players who when in a losing position, play a bunch of cards that don't help unless they have multiple of the non-class quests that benefit from those things at the same time, then rope, pass at the last second and concede immediately after passing.

It's the rope, pass, concede thing that really gets to me, though. "Not letting it get to me" isn't working, and hasn't as a strategy.