Hearthpwn

Didn't they say they wanted cards that represent the classes well? Since when did mages start to play Warlock? All you need is a mountain giant before turn 5 and a coin use the spell on mountain giant and you have two 8 cost minions by turn 5 and if you fail to kill both the 8 cost minions you can just do it again next turn because it's a Twinspell.

The biggest problem with this spell is only due to how it functions with 10+ cost minions. Since the pool is extremely low, the spell is essentially a 3 mana duplicate a minion spell with a bonus. More on this later.

Currently in the entire game there are:

• 11 mana - Snowfury Giant
• 12 mana - Mountain Giant, Clockwork Giant, Arcane Giant, Grave Horror
• 20 mana - Molten Giant
• 25 mana - Shirvallah, the Tiger

Fortunately for standard, only 3 of these (Mountain Giant, Grave Horror, and Shirvallah) exist and Shirvallah is a non-mage class card so no easy shenanigans there. So now we only have two problem cards left: Mountain Giant and Grave Horror.

The main problem here is that it's easy for a mage to play a Mountain Giant. With Book of Specters, Research Project, and the old standby of Arcane Intellect it's very possible and can be done as early as turn 3. This is something that has been in the game and while very powerful is not an automatic win condition. Conjurer's Calling turns it into a near automatic win condition though.

Playing Conjurer's Calling on a Mountain Giant has two potential outcomes. Either it destroys the giant and summons two fresh ones or it destroys the giant and summons two fresh Grave Horrors. Either outcome is fantastic!

Scenario 1: Turn 3 - Play Mountain Giant. Turn 4 - Play second Mountain Giant. Net outcome is 2x Mountain Giants.

Scenario 2: Turn 3 - Play Mountain Giant. Turn 4 - Play Conjurer's Calling. Net outcome is 50% 2x Mountain Giants or 50% 2x Grave Horrors.

So it doesn't seem that unfair on the surface. It's still a nuts draw that will usually win the game at that point. There is a notable difference of the fact that the first scenario requires both copies of Mountain Giant and the second scenario only requires a single copy of Mountain Giant and a single copy of Conjurer's Calling. This is not insignificant and while it makes the draw into the second scenario essentially twice as likely, this isn't the main problem with this card.

We can compare Conjurer's Calling in this respect to similar card effects. Faceless Manipulator could be used in a Scenario 3 to get a second giant on the board (Faceless is 5 mana so it would be slightly slower) at essentially the same draw rate as the second scenario. So being a class card and having lower mana cost is par for the course, except it also has Twinspell which creates another 8/8 or 7/8 taunt next turn. It also has synergy with Khadgar so for the same cost as a Faceless, you can get four giants and have the twin spell copy for making another one (or three if Khadgar remains) next turn! Yes, this is stupid powerful but it's still not the problem with this card.

If we compare it to the priest spells of Vivid Nightmare or Unsleeping Soul we get a better look at what the power level should be. Vivid Nightmare is the same cost but would make an 8/1 so not ideal. Unsleeping Soul costs 1 mana more but at least it would copy the health as well. It's lacking twinspell too so it's not as good. Compare Mark of the Lotus to Blessing of the Ancients; Twinspell is essentially costed at 2 mana.

No, the main problem with this interaction is that the opponent must completely destroy the 8/8 giant on the turn it comes down. If it is still alive, Conjurer's Calling will essentially heal it to full and then duplicate it! This means that the giant can even make an unfavorable trade and then be "copied" and still be fresh for next turn should it need to trade and then be "copied" again. The closest card effect I can point to would be Ancestral Healing with this only having a 50% chance of giving it taunt.

Clearly a large part of this is with the mana cheating ability of Mountain Giant. If the summoned minions were the same cost of the giant when it was played to the battlefield, this wouldn't be as bad of an issue. The randomness Spiteful Summoner was nerfed nearly a year ago for a similar minion "mana cost" small pool sizes in standard. This is a similar problem. If Spiteful Summoner was only generating 4 mana minions from Fireball or something, there would be dozens of choices (102 to be precise) ranging from high rolls (Houndmaster Shaw, Lakkari Felhound, Pit Lord) to low rolls (Keeper of the Grove, Wicked Skeleton, Rattling Rascal, or god forbid, The Darkness). However, when generating only 10 cost minions the pool was only 5 (Deathwing, Tyrantus, Ultrasaur, Emeris, and Sea Giant) a low roll wasn't a possibility. For 6 mana, you were getting at least 11 attack and 12 health of stats.

So how can this be fixed? Should this even *be* fixed? Am I making a mountain (giant) out of a molehill?

Possibility 1: Increase the cost of Conjurer's Calling. This seems to be the standard Blizzard response to these types of problems. From my listed mana calculations for the Mountain Giant interaction only, the cost would be around 6 or 7 mana. While this solves this particular problem, it makes the card unplayable for people using it as its likely desired use - on smaller minions. Not ideal.

Possibility 2: Change the cost of either Mountain Giant or Grave Horror to not be 12. While this doesn't directly fix most of the interaction problems (Conjurer's Calling would still heal and then duplicate Mountain Giants), it would destroy the possibility of gaining taunt so the traditional rock-paper-scissors gameplay of Hearthstone where control beats aggro which beats combo which beats control would still be preserved. Trying to simply mass giants against token druid would likely result in a loss. While it would still be very possible to have 2 early giants with taunt via Sunfury Protector, trying to heal those giants via additional casting of Conjurer's Calling would remove taunt. This is perhaps inelegant but very manageable at least in the short term; making Grave Horror an 11 mana card (potentially with a stat change to 6/8) would keep the 11 mana slot to class minions in classes that hopefully won't have any offending mechanics.

Possibility 3: Change the mana cost of a played giant to be mana that was spent placing it on the battlefield. While this solves the interaction problem completely, this would be a major mechanics change and one that would severely impact evolve decks and possibly create a whole new series of issues.  This may be the best choice long term, but I couldn't say for sure.

If you made it this far, have a cookie or at least watch a humorous clip of what happens when this goes wrong.

TL;DR Conjurer's Calling and Mountain Giant interaction is broken. It is currently being exploited. Could be a big problem.

This is gonna be a one of the most important cards in this expansion and in the future. It's one of the best cards ever!

This card is broken, either needs Twinspell removed or mana cost increased to 5

before this card get nerfed they should nerf about 100 other cards

This card is bullshit, especially for 3 mana.

Already won me several games. The tempo swing is potentialy insane. when used on  5+ mana minions.

Hit my deranged doctor with this. KT and the Boogeymonster pop out. Hit Boogeymonster with calling and highroll Tirion and Batterhead. Res all the 8 drops I destroyed. Opponent concedes. It's nuts. Should be in the fireball, flamestrike, poly bucket. So filthy

Greedy and slow af.

Wonder if I can find a way to insert this as an activator in my Deathrattle Mage.

At least it is "destroy". I'm tired of polymorph shenanigans. 

Well with Khadgar and a minion sticking you can replace one minion by 6 other of the same cost (first replace it with 4 others, and then the worst one replace one more with twinspell copy)

Brilliant design! It’s a Twinspell, remove an enemy minion, transform your big and damaged minion into two new (or more with Khadgar). Good job!

When you remove an enemy minion, it just summons 2 of them for the opponent. I mean, its a plus that you have the option to target enemy minions if the situation favors you, but very situational. Can be very good though with yours.

This has to be one of the best cards in the expansion imo! I'll probably craft both in gold, as it will most likely be nerfed at some point.

I do not think you reading the card correctly....