Upcoming Hearthstone Balance Changes - Wild Growth, Nourish, Level Up!, Saronite Chain Gang, Leeching Poison CHANGES ARE NOW LIVE
Five card changes are coming to Hearthstone on December 19th, which is... today!
- [Discuss this Change] Wild Growth now costs 3, up from 2.
- [Discuss this Change] Nourish now costs 6, up from 5.
- [Discuss this Change] Level Up! now costs 6, up from 5.
- [Discuss this Change] Saronite Chain Gang now summons another Saronite Chain Gang, instead of a copy of the minion.
- [Discuss this Change] Leeching Poison now costs 1, down from 2, and only gives Lifesteal for 1 turn.
Check out Blizzard's post below for more information on each of the changes.
Quote from BlizzardIn an update scheduled to arrive December 19 PST, the following cards will be changed.
Developer’s Note: This balance update is focused on improving the long-term health of both Standard and Wild. We've opted to make these changes earlier in the expansion cycle than we normally consider; we'd like to hear your feedback on the timing of this update, in addition to what you think of all the individual card changes.
Wild Growth – Will cost 3 mana. (Up from 2)
Nourish – Will cost 6 mana. (Up from 5)
Wild Growth and Nourish have been present in every mid-range, combo, and control Druid deck since their introduction in the Basic and Classic set. When cards from the Basic and Classic set are too powerful, they can have negative long-term effects on the game. Continuously playing against these cards can start to feel repetitive, and they can feel so mandatory that they stifle creative deckbuilding decisions. By increasing the mana cost of both cards by one, we expect them to be considerations in late-game control Druid decks, but more difficult to fit in strategies that don’t directly take advantage of ramping mana.
Level Up! – Will cost 6 mana. (Up from 5)
Odd Paladin has consistently been one of the most powerful and most played decks since its introduction in The Witchwood. By removing Level Up from Odd Paladin, we still expect it to be a competitive board control deck, just with more consistent damage output that should be easier to play around.
Saronite Chain Gang – Now reads: Taunt. Battlecry: Summon another Saronite Chain Gang.
Shudderwock brings an interesting combo to the table, but playing Shudderwock multiple times in a single game can be frustrating. Changing Saronite Chain Gang makes playing multiple Shudderwocks in a game much more difficult. Shudderwock should now exist as a powerful one-turn effect rather than constantly copying itself with Saronite Chain Gang’s Battlecry.
Leeching Poison – Will cost 1 mana. (Down from 2). Now reads: Give your weapon Lifesteal this turn.
We love the fantasy of building a powerful weapon over the course of a game with Kingsbane, but granting it a permanent Lifesteal effect with Leeching Poison resulted in an endgame with few weaknesses, as well as conflicting with our philosophy that Rogues should not have persistent self-healing effects. Making the Lifesteal effect only active for one turn should address some of the power level issues with Kingsbane Rogue’s late game.
Kiwii's Thoughts
Resident deck architect Kiwiinbacon had some thoughts on the nerfs.
Lesser Emerald Spellstone is not ridiculous. Let's compare to Level Up!. Both cost 5 mana, both create 3/3's, both require significant set up. Paladin's set up can be wiped more easily, but that is more than made up for by the fact that if you have set them up on a previous turn, the 3/3's created effectively have charge, as well as taunt. ES requires adding a large amount of usually not super-powerful cards (secrets) to your deck, whereas LU! works off of Paladin's Hero Power and several already-used cards (Lost in the Jungle, etc.) Plus, ES only ever creates a maximum of 4 3/3s, whereas it is not uncommon for LU! to create a whole board of 7. Yes, both cards are strong, but I think this comparison demonstrates both why LU! should be 6 mana, and why ES is fine being 1 mana less.
Not defending level up, both it and ES are broken cards acept it, only diference is one is finally being nerfed, cube should also had been looked at IMO.
At any rate, I fundamentally disagree that ES is a broken card. Yes, it creates 12/12 for 5, but only after investing 4 mana and 2 other relatively underpowered cards. And even then, there is no immediate board impact, and all that investment can be deleted with one 3 damage board clear.
Carnivorous Cube, however, you might have a point with. It is even-statted for a 5 drop, and yet has that insane effect. It should have its stats decreased, or cost increased. Preferably cost, because decreasing its health could actually be seen as a positive if you're looking to kill it off asap.
Hmm... now Druid gonna have room for Prince Keleseth
Is it going to open anything for them ??
Just wondering, I'm not a dudu player :P
Their main Prince Keleseth deck so far has been Spiteful Druid. But you don't want a 3 mana spell in spiteful decks haha.
I think the main reason they changed both is they still want odd druid to be a thing, and they wanted odd druid to still have access to ramp.
Leeching is a good nerf for Kingsbane, Saronite a good nerf for Shudderwock. Wild Growth will probably be unplayable and I'm not sure if it needed a nerf. Nourish nerf is alright. Level Up nerf is good as well, I wonder if people will come up with good Level Up decks for Even Paladin. It'll still be playable, especially in Wild.
I don't think Wild growth will be unplayable, because you can still draw cards from it later in the game, will it be worse sure.
I'm happy with the speed at which they're delivering these nerfs. I've always been driven crazy by the 'announce the change and then implement it two weeks later' strategy that they used to have. I'm sure there are some people (maybe at the pro level) that would prefer some reaction time, but for a perpetual shitty player like me, I appreciate knowing that the dude who just played Kingsbane rogue against me w/ a 12 damage lifesteal dagger is going to be out of luck in a few hours.
Dust for christmas, noice
Wait... Grumble and Zola are useless for Shudderwock now??? :////
As a Druid main this it a tough pill to swalllow!
Beautiful. Thank you, Blizzard!
It's worth noting that Shudderwock will still work in Wild due to Doppelgangster.
Yeah but that would mean he hunts alone. I'm pretty sure they would make that clear if so! :)
Odd Warrior Approves
All fantastic changes.
TBH I dislike these changes. Those cards feel like class identification and stuff...
What do I do now Blizz? Buy packs with money ASAP cuz I have nothing to play? Is that what you want? No...
Damn, I crafted Odd Pala yesterday. Just to have a chance against the meta decks at rank 19 :(
It's a cheap deck with the nerfed cards offering full dust refund. Other cheap decks are available though slightly less strong.
You were supposed to destroy them, not join them!