Upgrades
Learn more about Kobolds and Catacombs
Want to learn more about Kobolds and Catacombs ? Head on over to our Kobolds and Catacombs guide!
Discuss this Card on the Forums
Join the discussion on our forums! Come discuss Lesser Sapphire Spellstone over in our dedicated Lesser Sapphire Spellstone discussion topic.
The problem is that it's pretty difficult (apparently) to find a reward for overloading yourself that makes you want to overload, but doesn't break everything. For example, Unbound Elemental has been in the game since launch but even at times when overloading yourself was a good thing, it wasn't run because it's just not good enough. On the complete opposite end of the scale, you have Tunnel Trogg who turned out to be playable, but his effect was so good that shaman now wanted to run things with overload attached just to buff the trogg. Something with overload 2 essentially became "Cast a spell/minion two turns early and give your tunnel trogg +2 attack". I think this is probably a lot healthier than Tunnel Trogg though since it's much slower. Tunnel Trogg was for all intents and purposes an aggressive card and so you also ran other overload stuff aggressively, overload be damned. This doesn't give you on board benefit right away and is also very expensive. I think it needs to be in your hand to get upgraded as well so I don't think this will usher in a new era of overload text being positive text. Although the idea of that many giants kind of frightens me, you'd require a lot of setup to get that far. You have to have the giant down to 3 mana at least and a shaman deck overloading that many crystals may be harming his longevity too much. Maybe if there was a fatigue shaman, then that would be a pretty decent very late game-ending threat.
At the very least, good luck getting that 4 giants in one turn strat out before Raza Priest gets their 2-card combo.
As long as a card or maybe 2 cards exist like Eternal Sentinel in the limited environment once Old Gods rotates out it could work. Without a way to reset a bunch of overload in a turn it just won't happen unfortunately.
Greater Sapphire Spellstone? Nah, you're just seeing triple.
Overload Shaman is a few cards away from being viable in my opinion. Cards like Spirit Echoes and Snowfury Giant aare already pretty neat. this could creat huge Board swings.
Just imagine 4 8/8s in one turn for 8-mana only. (and you can do that twice)
2 arcane giants discounted to 0 and 2 snowfury giants also discounted to 0 + the greater version of the sapphire spellstone (3 copies) + spirit echo is a potential 10 mana full 8/8 board combo with seamingly guaranted replayability.
This card has so much potential in wild with alakir or malygos through ancestor's call (Thaurissan needs to discount atleast 2 cards among these two and lightning bolts).
It should also be noted that this is the first high mana spell so perhaps shaman could start using medivh. Can also be combo'd with Shallow Gravedigger for 10 mana for some deathrattling mayhem (could be a gimmicky randomzoth deck).
However, since this is a high cost spell that needs to first overload your crystal, i highly doubt you will ever be able to make a tempo play ouf ot it let alone beinb able to use it on curve.
N'zoth doesn't bring back minions who were given deathrattle. Only those who have it in their vanilla card. Otherwise, Unearthed Raptor would get resurrected by N'zoth which it does not (probably for the best really). But yeah all in all I don't see Shaman having the sustain to pull off something as masochistic as overloading yourself for a really late game play that doesn't end the game instantly. As for comboing this in wild with Malygos or Al'akir with Ancestor's Call... As someone who's played a decent amount of Shaman Malygos combo decks, for every game that you manage to pull off having spells discounted by thaurissan and then drawing/playing Maly so that you can use those spells, there's at least 4-5 games where you end up getting forced to use a lot of your spells just to live, malygos never gets drawn...etc. Adding ancestor's call into the mix doesn't add that much either from what I've played with. Removing all minions except Malygos and Thaurissan means you're not running Azure Drakes, Earth Elementals (The variant I most often ran used ancestral spirit and reincarnate to get multiple earth elementals in order to stall/give the opponent targets for removal that aren't Malygos), also you can't run Mana Tide Totem which cuts out another essential card draw option for Shaman in wild, Thalnos needs to be cut along with Loot Hoarders. Essentially your only draw power would have to come from Far Sight (Which isn't great) or ancestral knowledge (Which really hurts unless you're playing it later). Not saying you shouldn't experiment, just that I think there are more effective ways to play a Malygos Shaman than relying on Ancestor's Call.
Overload Shaman HERE I COME
If you played something that Overloaded 6, would it go immediately to Greater Sapphire Spellstone or just upgrade to normal?
One at a time. Same applies to all Spellstones.
EDIT: I'M A MORON DISREGARD THE CROSSED OUT STUFF I DIDN'T REALIZE THERE WERE TIERS TO THE SPELLSTONES! Considering this, then yeah it makes sense that doing 6 mana crystals at once wouldn't jump you straight to the end. Likely because of the way events are stacked in hearthstone, you'd overload your 6 and the card would turn into the normal one. It wouldn't transform further because technically the card for the normal one didn't exist when you overloaded yourself so its effect wouldn't trigger. This does make the spellstones seem rather clunky (or at least this one) because that means you have to overload three to transform it. Any extra crystals overloaded are "wasted". So if you were to cast Elemental Destruction then it'd only become the normal spellstone and you'd still need to overload three crystals to make it the greater spellstone... Drakkari Defender buff! He overloads exactly the amount of crystals you need for the upgrade! EFFICIENCY!!!!!!!!!!!!! *barf*
RaptorWithWings Do you have a source? The two spellstones posted on this site don't have anything in their text that suggests you have to do their conditions one step at a time. The Druid one would be really painful if that were true and interpreting "Gain 3 armour" as "Gain armour three times" seems a stretch. If that is what it's supposed to do, then they worded the card poorly (Not that they haven't done so in the past). I think that considering this spellstone just says "Overload three mana crystals" then that has two possible interpretations. Either it means you must overload at least three crystals across potentially multiple turns, or you must overload at least three crystals in one turn in a pseudo Corpse Flower type effect. Not saying you must be wrong, just asking if you have a source to support that interpretation.Upgrades into Sapphire Spellstone and Greater Sapphire Spellstone.