Everyone seems to be hating on HIr'eek because only two warlock handbuff cards have been revealed at this point. People. Have you seriously forgotten what they did with warrior in boomsday? They introduced pretty much an entirely new archetype for the class and made it into a relatively stable new aspect. Do you really think that Hir'eek and the totem are the only two handbuff cards? I'm betting dollars to donuts that at least two or three other cards in the warlock kit this time around are related to hand buffing. Like seriously, you think they'd just release a legendary with almost zero support? You guys really are underestimating all this in my opinion. Please, have an open mind to it and the other cards in the expansion.
It's not that I'm worried about other cards being printed as support, it's that I'm very very frightened that handbufflock will be discolock 2.0. a LOT of potentially cool cards were wasted on promoting discard and we all know how that turned out. I just don't want to see them going down the same road.
On top of that, bloodreaver is gonna rotate in about 5 months and with it controllock will lose a lot of it's most powerful tools like the spellstones and cards like defile. If we get another shitty-ass warlock archetype that doesn't work out, gul'dan is gonna be dead af for the next year.
Its simple. There is no deck that it currently fits in. It cant really go in Even Warlock because the best buff card Soul Infusion is a 1 mana spell. While the spirit is even, there is no guaentee the 1/1 buff will land on it, and once it loses stealth, its dead. It really doesnt fit in Zoo because by the 8 mana turn you have likely won or lost. The trick is how are you going to buff it and spend mana on the buffs and stay alive until turn 8?
Yeah it's not like blizzard has printed bad legendaries and given them close to no support and then dropping the entire archetype and not support it at all in the future... Oh wait, freeze shaman and [card]Moorabi[card/] would like to have a word with you.
Not saying this card is as bad as any of the cards printed for freeze shaman but blizzard does have a history on introducing bad archetypes to then not support them at all.
Im getting a lot of Possessed Lackey and Skull vibes from the critique of it, but handbuff has proven to not be the most viable in the past so I can see why they may think its not going to be super great.
Im sure we will have to see 2 or 3 more warlock handbuff effects to their kit for it to be viable, and they have to not be complete wastes of space if you cant draw hir'eek to use um.
For me, this card is very interesting but probably not so powerful. Ok, it can get more synergies, but it seems weak itself just because what stats make this minion worth to be put on board? For me it's like 10/10 and it's still weak to AoE like Brawl, Reckless Flurry, Psychic Scream, Equality, etc. Maybe the Warlock's Troll Champion will make him viable, but it has to be super OP. I also don't want to hate on him right now, because I can judge each card in 0-1 cathegories only when I start theorycrafting after all cards are shown
For me, this card is very interesting but probably not so powerful. Ok, it can get more synergies, but it seems weak itself just because what stats make this minion worth to be put on board? For me it's like 10/10 and it's still weak to AoE like Brawl, Reckless Flurry, Psychic Scream, Equality, etc. Maybe the Warlock's Troll Champion will make him viable, but it has to be super OP. I also don't want to hate on him right now, because I can judge each card in 0-1 cathegories only when I start theorycrafting after all cards are shown
Well, Whalen said that the champions are going to suit a completely different playstyle than their Loa so that might be out of the question. We'll just have to see the rest of the support.
And, to everyone in every thread: I don't know how many people will read this, but I beg you to stop writing "this card doesn't fit in any of current decks". Wasn't the 3rd expansion of each year the one with the biggest amount of new archetypes? Only the second one doesn't usually change anything because it contains mostly cards that support existing archetypes. Remember K&C? 3 types of Aggro Paladin, Big Spell Mage, Spell Hunter, Return of Quest Rogue, new Malygos Druid, Spiteful Priest, Big Priest (much better than the old one because of spellstone) and finally Cubelock and Control Warlock. This time it will also be same as in each of previous years
I don't get the hate either. I feel like people look at it like it needs to be an instant win when dropped. I just see it as another zool for Zoolock to play in the lategame. Like a mega-Emerald Spellstone.
Get one Soul Infusion on it and it's good value already. You don't even need to use the Spirit, whichmeans you can runKeleseth and also get a buff on it from that (board of 2/2s ain't that bad either, if you remember Living Mana in Aggro Druid).
I see it as a 1-card board refill against decks with moderate amounts of boardclear, so you can easily restock after they use their AOE on your other minions.
Best case scenario it's a tech card so people will have to guess whether to play aorund it or not
Well, I mean look at the card. You slam it down onto the board, it fills up the table, and looks menacing. It's a big dumb beater, that's all it is. Like Alana, or...like Doppleganster would have been in handbuff Warrior, had it worked. Let me put it this way: why is Mountain Giant a threat? Because it's a big dumb beater? Yes, but why? Because it comes out early. It locks up what options your opponent has because they got to draw so few of their cards to find an answer and they have so little mana, it takes them almost the whole turn to answer it, IF they can answer it.
Hireek comes out turn 8 at the earliest. And that is assuming you even had the opportunity to buff him by that point, which means he had to sit in your hand for a while, being useless and taking up your mana to make him stronger. Mana you'd rather have spent playing efficient, powerful things. By turn 8, most aggro decks will have killed you six ways till sunday, and most control decks just openly laugh at you as they sweep your board. Hell, a damn rogue Vanishes you and your hand is full of 8 mana 1/1s.
So you play cards like Soul Infusion and other potential handbuff cards, you invest resources into building this thing up and then it dies to a Twisting Nether, Psychic Scream (well, you wish it died, but no, you get to draw the 1/1s again), Dragon's Fury. Pick your poison. Either way, even if you just Soul Infusioned it and played one other card that buffs your hand, you just 3-for-1'd yourself by playing this thing. And you spent 8+ mana to do it.
Well, I mean look at the card. You slam it down onto the board, it fills up the table, and looks menacing. It's a big dumb beater, that's all it is. Like Alana, or...like Doppleganster would have been in handbuff Warrior, had it worked. Let me put it this way: why is Mountain Giant a threat? Because it's a big dumb beater? Yes, but why? Because it comes out early. It locks up what options your opponent has because they got to draw so few of their cards to find an answer and they have so little mana, it takes them almost the whole turn to answer it, IF they can answer it.
Hireek comes out turn 8 at the earliest. And that is assuming you even had the opportunity to buff him by that point, which means he had to sit in your hand for a while, being useless and taking up your mana to make him stronger. Mana you'd rather have spent playing efficient, powerful things. By turn 8, most aggro decks will have killed you six ways till sunday, and most control decks just openly laugh at you as they sweep your board. Hell, a damn rogue Vanishes you and your hand is full of 8 mana 1/1s.
So you play cards like Soul Infusion and other potential handbuff cards, you invest resources into building this thing up and then it dies to a Twisting Nether, Psychic Scream (well, you wish it died, but no, you get to draw the 1/1s again), Dragon's Fury. Pick your poison. Either way, even if you just Soul Infusioned it and played one other card that buffs your hand, you just 3-for-1'd yourself by playing this thing. And you spent 8+ mana to do it.
Yep. Getting him out is no guarantee of him being effective. It's like spellstoning a giant and next turn warrior plays brawl, then shield slams the last one.
Everyone seems to be hating on HIr'eek because only two warlock handbuff cards have been revealed at this point. People. Have you seriously forgotten what they did with warrior in boomsday? They introduced pretty much an entirely new archetype for the class and made it into a relatively stable new aspect. Do you really think that Hir'eek and the totem are the only two handbuff cards? I'm betting dollars to donuts that at least two or three other cards in the warlock kit this time around are related to hand buffing. Like seriously, you think they'd just release a legendary with almost zero support? You guys really are underestimating all this in my opinion. Please, have an open mind to it and the other cards in the expansion.
I believe Hireek can be a good card, but your argument is pretty weak. Odd warrior was a thing long before Boomsday, the fact that it got a possible different playstyle doesnt mean it is a completely new archetype.
8 mana, zero impact on the board on the turn it is played. Too slow.
It is possible that if they 'print' enough supporting cards it could become playable. But I suspect if that happens then the optimised version of that deck will still exclude this card due to being so slow.
1. Without buffs, this is a 8-mana 7/7, kinda. That's really weak. Whenever an expensive card is pretty much a dead-draw in the late-game, that's a red flag. Now, even if there are a few more hand buff tools, you still have to draw everything in time, get the buffs to proc on this instead of something else. There's a lot of "ifs" there.
2. With buffs, this is Dragoncaller Alanna. That's fine, but it's hardly some sort of instant win card. I know a lot of big spell mages cut DCA. A zoo deck and a big spell mage look pretty different, but still. A big board of decent-sized vanilla minions can win a game if left alone, but it's also not that hard to deal with in a lot of cases. Lots of classes have access to the kinds of board clears which will stop Hir'eek, the Bat. Maybe Zoo has the minion flood to bait out the board clears before Hir'eek drops, since big spell mage certainly didn't, and that might be enough. But this is still just a giant pile of vanilla stats that you can't cheat-out early game.
Compare to Bloodreaver Gul'dan, which not only creates a giant board of minions, many will have Taunt or Charge or other abilities, and it also gives you a better late-game hero power. The two aren't really in direct competition, but the difference should be illustrative.
It's not that I'm worried about other cards being printed as support, it's that I'm very very frightened that handbufflock will be discolock 2.0. a LOT of potentially cool cards were wasted on promoting discard and we all know how that turned out. I just don't want to see them going down the same road.
On top of that, bloodreaver is gonna rotate in about 5 months and with it controllock will lose a lot of it's most powerful tools like the spellstones and cards like defile. If we get another shitty-ass warlock archetype that doesn't work out, gul'dan is gonna be dead af for the next year.
Which is a good thing. Warlock was disgusting in Kobolds and Catacombs. They have regularly made the most use out of Carnivorous Cube and Life Tap demands that Warlock's cards be sub par, because it has access to more of them earlier in the game with regular consistency.
Warlock can tap out for a while. This is how Blizzard balances the game, they let classes take turns being shitty. In my opinion, we are about to move into a meta where mage is absolutely unplayable (no Ice Block and no Frost Lich Jaina after rotation? Plus Mana Wyrm being slowed down and no Explosive Runes means that tempo will be bad.
Mage and Warlock can take some time off. They've been good since basically the game started, with the exception of Warlock in Journey to Un'goro.
Everyone seems to be hating on HIr'eek because only two warlock handbuff cards have been revealed at this point. People. Have you seriously forgotten what they did with warrior in boomsday? They introduced pretty much an entirely new archetype for the class and made it into a relatively stable new aspect. Do you really think that Hir'eek and the totem are the only two handbuff cards? I'm betting dollars to donuts that at least two or three other cards in the warlock kit this time around are related to hand buffing. Like seriously, you think they'd just release a legendary with almost zero support? You guys really are underestimating all this in my opinion. Please, have an open mind to it and the other cards in the expansion.
Seems like a weak argument in favor of Hir'eek, the Bat. I would argue that Zerek, Master Cloner and Dr. Morrigan were both legendary minions that were introduced with insufficient support. It's not totally uncommon to provide only limited support for a super powerful effect to avoid having it become OP too trivially. If buffing Hir'eek, the Bat is so easy that it's hugely consistent, you're going to see a lot of unfair tempo plays and continued player frustration around polarized match-ups.
Really, what Hir'eek needs is a set of other cards you'd be happy to buff, like Omega Agent. But at that point, Hir'eek, the Bat becomes more of a tech card, where the primary/consistent targets for buffs are rare and epic cards.
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Everyone seems to be hating on HIr'eek because only two warlock handbuff cards have been revealed at this point. People. Have you seriously forgotten what they did with warrior in boomsday? They introduced pretty much an entirely new archetype for the class and made it into a relatively stable new aspect. Do you really think that Hir'eek and the totem are the only two handbuff cards? I'm betting dollars to donuts that at least two or three other cards in the warlock kit this time around are related to hand buffing. Like seriously, you think they'd just release a legendary with almost zero support? You guys really are underestimating all this in my opinion. Please, have an open mind to it and the other cards in the expansion.
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It's not that I'm worried about other cards being printed as support, it's that I'm very very frightened that handbufflock will be discolock 2.0. a LOT of potentially cool cards were wasted on promoting discard and we all know how that turned out. I just don't want to see them going down the same road.
On top of that, bloodreaver is gonna rotate in about 5 months and with it controllock will lose a lot of it's most powerful tools like the spellstones and cards like defile. If we get another shitty-ass warlock archetype that doesn't work out, gul'dan is gonna be dead af for the next year.
That's Incredible!
Its simple. There is no deck that it currently fits in. It cant really go in Even Warlock because the best buff card Soul Infusion is a 1 mana spell. While the spirit is even, there is no guaentee the 1/1 buff will land on it, and once it loses stealth, its dead. It really doesnt fit in Zoo because by the 8 mana turn you have likely won or lost. The trick is how are you going to buff it and spend mana on the buffs and stay alive until turn 8?
If you are in your first year of playing please read this post.
Dust does not burn a hole in the jar. Be careful what you craft, especially before and right after a rotation.
Yeah it's not like blizzard has printed bad legendaries and given them close to no support and then dropping the entire archetype and not support it at all in the future... Oh wait, freeze shaman and [card]Moorabi[card/] would like to have a word with you.
Not saying this card is as bad as any of the cards printed for freeze shaman but blizzard does have a history on introducing bad archetypes to then not support them at all.
its just shit.. way to slow. loses to too many board clears
Im getting a lot of Possessed Lackey and Skull vibes from the critique of it, but handbuff has proven to not be the most viable in the past so I can see why they may think its not going to be super great.
Im sure we will have to see 2 or 3 more warlock handbuff effects to their kit for it to be viable, and they have to not be complete wastes of space if you cant draw hir'eek to use um.
For me, this card is very interesting but probably not so powerful. Ok, it can get more synergies, but it seems weak itself just because what stats make this minion worth to be put on board? For me it's like 10/10 and it's still weak to AoE like Brawl, Reckless Flurry, Psychic Scream, Equality, etc. Maybe the Warlock's Troll Champion will make him viable, but it has to be super OP. I also don't want to hate on him right now, because I can judge each card in 0-1 cathegories only when I start theorycrafting after all cards are shown
Well, Whalen said that the champions are going to suit a completely different playstyle than their Loa so that might be out of the question. We'll just have to see the rest of the support.
And, to everyone in every thread: I don't know how many people will read this, but I beg you to stop writing "this card doesn't fit in any of current decks". Wasn't the 3rd expansion of each year the one with the biggest amount of new archetypes? Only the second one doesn't usually change anything because it contains mostly cards that support existing archetypes. Remember K&C? 3 types of Aggro Paladin, Big Spell Mage, Spell Hunter, Return of Quest Rogue, new Malygos Druid, Spiteful Priest, Big Priest (much better than the old one because of spellstone) and finally Cubelock and Control Warlock. This time it will also be same as in each of previous years
I don't get the hate either. I feel like people look at it like it needs to be an instant win when dropped. I just see it as another zool for Zoolock to play in the lategame. Like a mega-Emerald Spellstone.
Get one Soul Infusion on it and it's good value already. You don't even need to use the Spirit, whichmeans you can runKeleseth and also get a buff on it from that (board of 2/2s ain't that bad either, if you remember Living Mana in Aggro Druid).
I see it as a 1-card board refill against decks with moderate amounts of boardclear, so you can easily restock after they use their AOE on your other minions.
Best case scenario it's a tech card so people will have to guess whether to play aorund it or not
I tried having fun once. It was awful.
Well, I mean look at the card. You slam it down onto the board, it fills up the table, and looks menacing. It's a big dumb beater, that's all it is. Like Alana, or...like Doppleganster would have been in handbuff Warrior, had it worked. Let me put it this way: why is Mountain Giant a threat? Because it's a big dumb beater? Yes, but why? Because it comes out early. It locks up what options your opponent has because they got to draw so few of their cards to find an answer and they have so little mana, it takes them almost the whole turn to answer it, IF they can answer it.
Hireek comes out turn 8 at the earliest. And that is assuming you even had the opportunity to buff him by that point, which means he had to sit in your hand for a while, being useless and taking up your mana to make him stronger. Mana you'd rather have spent playing efficient, powerful things. By turn 8, most aggro decks will have killed you six ways till sunday, and most control decks just openly laugh at you as they sweep your board. Hell, a damn rogue Vanishes you and your hand is full of 8 mana 1/1s.
So you play cards like Soul Infusion and other potential handbuff cards, you invest resources into building this thing up and then it dies to a Twisting Nether, Psychic Scream (well, you wish it died, but no, you get to draw the 1/1s again), Dragon's Fury. Pick your poison. Either way, even if you just Soul Infusioned it and played one other card that buffs your hand, you just 3-for-1'd yourself by playing this thing. And you spent 8+ mana to do it.
Yep. Getting him out is no guarantee of him being effective. It's like spellstoning a giant and next turn warrior plays brawl, then shield slams the last one.
I believe Hireek can be a good card, but your argument is pretty weak. Odd warrior was a thing long before Boomsday, the fact that it got a possible different playstyle doesnt mean it is a completely new archetype.
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Hir'eek looks like a bad card to me.
8 mana, zero impact on the board on the turn it is played. Too slow.
It is possible that if they 'print' enough supporting cards it could become playable. But I suspect if that happens then the optimised version of that deck will still exclude this card due to being so slow.
It's a shity card. If you want to play it for some reason why not just play Omega Agent instead? Which is awesome btw and overall a much better card.
Here's why:
1. Without buffs, this is a 8-mana 7/7, kinda. That's really weak. Whenever an expensive card is pretty much a dead-draw in the late-game, that's a red flag. Now, even if there are a few more hand buff tools, you still have to draw everything in time, get the buffs to proc on this instead of something else. There's a lot of "ifs" there.
2. With buffs, this is Dragoncaller Alanna. That's fine, but it's hardly some sort of instant win card. I know a lot of big spell mages cut DCA. A zoo deck and a big spell mage look pretty different, but still. A big board of decent-sized vanilla minions can win a game if left alone, but it's also not that hard to deal with in a lot of cases. Lots of classes have access to the kinds of board clears which will stop Hir'eek, the Bat. Maybe Zoo has the minion flood to bait out the board clears before Hir'eek drops, since big spell mage certainly didn't, and that might be enough. But this is still just a giant pile of vanilla stats that you can't cheat-out early game.
Compare to Bloodreaver Gul'dan, which not only creates a giant board of minions, many will have Taunt or Charge or other abilities, and it also gives you a better late-game hero power. The two aren't really in direct competition, but the difference should be illustrative.
Which is a good thing. Warlock was disgusting in Kobolds and Catacombs. They have regularly made the most use out of Carnivorous Cube and Life Tap demands that Warlock's cards be sub par, because it has access to more of them earlier in the game with regular consistency.
Warlock can tap out for a while. This is how Blizzard balances the game, they let classes take turns being shitty. In my opinion, we are about to move into a meta where mage is absolutely unplayable (no Ice Block and no Frost Lich Jaina after rotation? Plus Mana Wyrm being slowed down and no Explosive Runes means that tempo will be bad.
Mage and Warlock can take some time off. They've been good since basically the game started, with the exception of Warlock in Journey to Un'goro.
Hir'eek, the Bat, Spirit of the Bat, Soul Infusion, Doubling Imp, Omega Agent, Saronite Chain Gang, even Void Analyst at some point, that looks like the beginning of something to me :)
Handbuff is just weak, we already saw this in gadgetzan.. it's a throwaway mechanic.. cause warlock is currently too strong and it's not druid.
Seems like a weak argument in favor of Hir'eek, the Bat. I would argue that Zerek, Master Cloner and Dr. Morrigan were both legendary minions that were introduced with insufficient support. It's not totally uncommon to provide only limited support for a super powerful effect to avoid having it become OP too trivially. If buffing Hir'eek, the Bat is so easy that it's hugely consistent, you're going to see a lot of unfair tempo plays and continued player frustration around polarized match-ups.
Really, what Hir'eek needs is a set of other cards you'd be happy to buff, like Omega Agent. But at that point, Hir'eek, the Bat becomes more of a tech card, where the primary/consistent targets for buffs are rare and epic cards.