So, the point of this thread is to balance all the cards in the game to be viable, while perhaps toning down some of the stronger ones. It’ll take some time for me to finish all the sets, so I’m posting this already so people can comment if they think I messed up. I know that it's bad to make changes to too many cards, this is a waste of time blah blah… I’m only doing this because I love balancing things in video games, so it’s a lot of fun trying to make bad cards viable while seeing other people’s comments and ideas. I haven’t played during the Naxx or GvG eras, so I really am not as well informed of the viability of all the cards from those sets.
Another argument against these kinds of threads that I've seen is cards that give you cards in the middle of a match, like Babbling Book or discover effects. Now, this isn't actually a problem at all. The value of cards that give you random stuff will become a bit better, but now be less RNG-reliant, since it won't be as likely that you get trash. When talking about discover, these buffs are only good news. When you discover a card, it's often clear what you'll choose, since two of the options can be terrible. With cards becoming better, it will be more difficult to choose which one you want to pick, which forces you to study the situation more closely and decide based on that and not make the decision based on which one of the cards sucks the least. Feel free to comment if you think I missed a card or made a bad change.
Now, with the explanations out of the way, let’s get started!
With this change, Claw can remove 2-drops and even 4-drops. The downside is that you’ll take more damage, since the armor effect has been removed. Basically a bit of a worse pre-nerf Rockbiter Weapon.
Healing Touch: 3 mana. Restore 6 health. Draw a card.
Now, hold your horses, I know what you’re saying: “B-but Ice Barrier is 3 mana restore 8 health and it’s good!” Well, there are a lot of differences between these two cards. First of all, Ice Barrier is a secret. Normally secrets are cheaper than a card of similar effect (i.e. Consecration and Explosive Trap), but in that example the cards are AoEs. With AoEs, you usually want to cast them immediately and play a couple of minions on the same turn for a huge tempo swing. With Explosive Trap that is not possible, because a skilled opponent can first trade the minions that would die to the secret into your minions and then trigger it. That’s why Consecration is more expensive. With Healing Touch vs. Ice Barrier however, the situation is the opposite. When you have to heal, it’s usually because your opponent has lots of minions on the board and is threatening your life total. In that kind of situation Healing Touch would take a large amount of mana out of clearing their minions, and also being a dead card in control matchups, it’s not worth running. Ice Barrier is an excellent card for healing, since it can be used on an earlier turn on which you weren’t going to do anything anyway, to later activate when your opponent attacks. It’s actually even faster healing than other methods, since it happens as soon as you need it on your opponent’s turn instead of on the turn after, giving you more mana to use for clearing. In addition to this, it gives armor, so the effect won’t be wasted even at full HP. Also, being a secret, it synergizes with solid cards like Arcanologist and Medivh's Valet, making them more useful even in a non-secret deck. It even forces the opponent to play around possible secrets like Duplicate, Mirror Entity, Counterspell and in some situations Ice Block. By adding the card draw effect to Healing Touch, it becomes a weaker Shield Block that is now useful in control matchups as well as aggressive ones.
Ironbark Protector is just very weak for an 8-mana minion, which was made even more obvious with the release of The Lich King. This change not only makes it more powerful against aggro, but also works with Druid's theme of gaining armor.
Hunter:
Arcane Shot: 1 mana. Deal 2 damage. If you control a Beast, deal 3 damage instead.
Thanks to Likafoss for the idea. Now it's a smaller Kill Command.
Multi-Shot: 5 mana. Deal 4 damage to two random enemy minions. (Can also be cast with only one enemy minion in play.
This card, along withCleave and Forked Lightning, are not only bad, but also for some reason only castable only when the opponent has multiple minions. With this change, you can use it one on minion if you want to. Also, 4 damage is way better than 3, so the card should now be much more useful in control decks.
Blizzard overnerfed this card. Now it can be used in a few Hunter decks, while not making it too strong to prevent Hunter from getting too much card draw.
This card most likely still won’t see any play, but now isn’t completely overshadowed by Maelstrom Portal, since Mage is supposed to have the best spells (See: Fireball, Frostbolt).
Paladin:
So paladin’s base set is really f***ed up with terrible cheap spells and secrets alongside a terrible weapon. Let’s fix this.
Humility: 2 mana. Change a minion's Attack to 1. Draw a card.
Being able to cycle the card makes it much stronger, maybe even too much. Might change the cost to 3. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Ancestral Healing has a very similar effect for 0 mana and is never used, so I don’t think we have to worry about the card becoming overpowered. Divine Shield is valuable though, especially in combination with Taunt, and I would say this would definitely find a place in Quest decks with this change. (CheeseEtc had the same idea on this one 😉)
Light's Justice: This card is very weak, but I couldn't come up with any suitable buffs for it. I think it can become strong if Pally gets early weapon buffs.
Holy Light: 2 mana. Give a friendly minion +2 health. Restore 6 Health to your Hero.
The card art really seems like the paladin is blessing the wounded soldier, all the while being blessed by the Light itself. Buffing and healing at once is a new effect and I think it would fit well with Pally’s quest.
With the 4-mana slot having two auto-include cards in Consecration and Truesilver Champion, Hammer of Wrath has a hard time finding a place in decks. In addition to that, 4 mana is pretty expensive for cycling. Lowering the cost and damage by one makes the card more useful for cycling while not being overshadowed by two other OP cards of the same cost.
Guardian of Kings: 7 mana, 5/6. Battlecry: Restore 6 Health to your Hero. Taunt
I think all this card needs is Taunt to make it the ultimate anti-aggro card. (Thanks to Boethion for the idea)
Priest:
Mind Vision: Not a good card, but not really terrible.
Holy Nova: 5 mana. Deal 2 damage to all enemies. Restore the same amount of damage to all friendly characters.
The healing now increases with spell damage, which makes sense.
Polymorph and Hex are actually better since they ignore deathrattles and counter Anyfin and N’Zoth well. Don’t think it’s fair that this card is so damn expensive when the effect isn’t even all that good.
Assassin's Blade: I really don’t know what to do about this one… it’s bad, but kind of tough to not make it too strong…
Shaman: (Thanks to iandakar for helping balance these.)
4/3 stats are too easy to remove, which is why playing this card was too big of a risk.
Drain Life: 3 mana. Deal 3 damage. Restore 3 Health to your Hero.
I never understood why this was so bad, it’s kind of a 3-mana version of Claw which was already bad.
[Edit 4.7.2018]: Not giving the card lifesteal, since Blizzard said in an interview that they don't want to use that keyword in the basic set. With the release of Drain Soul and Gnash, it's even easier to see why I think this card should be buffed.
Dread Infernal: 6 mana 4/4 Demon. Battlecry: Deal 2 damage to all other characters.
Nice AoE with a body, much stronger than a 1 damage AoE. Toned it down a notch from CheeseEtc’s suggestion, when compared to Corrupted Seer the effect is quite strong.
I 100% agree with CheeseEtc on this one, one card that gives charge is fine when it’s this expensive.
Cleave: No changes to the text, but can be cast when the opponent only has 1 minions.
Warsong Commander: 4 mana 3/3. Your minions with 2 or less attack have charge.
I don’t even know where to start with this. The banhammer struck so hard. This card right now is like a Raid Leader, which is not even a good card, with +1 health but only works for charge minions. It’s disgusting. What they should’ve done is make her effect disappear if the minion gains more than that 2 attack, so you can’t abuse Frothing Berserker. Also doesn’t work with Grim Patron. I don’t really know how this card could be used like this, but it most certainly isn’t broken like before. Might have to change the cost to 4 so it can’t be used with aggro.
Neutral:
Basic neutrals aren’t supposed to be great and mostly act as baselines for later cards. There are still a few I want to change, though.
Frostwolf Grunt: Terrible card, but I can’t come up with anything for this one. 2/3 is an option, but that seems kind of weird considering that Pompous Thespian is a 3/2 and thus would be worse…
The stats are too low on this one. With this change it gains +1 Attack (aka 1/2 mana worth of stats) for costing one more (compared to Fire Plume Phoenix). The phoenix is still stronger, because 2 damage is more relevant on turn 4 than 5 and it has the elemental tag.
Nightblade: 5 mana 5/4, Battlecry: Deal 4 damage to the enemy hero.
Now she feels like a proper assassin. 1 mana for that effect is fine at 5 mana.
Now has the same amount of stats as War Golem (7+8=9+6=15)
Classic:
Druid:
Savagery: 4 mana. Deal damage equal to your hero’s attack to all enemy minions.
Savagery is basically a Shield Slam for druids, but unlike armor, attack stays for only 1 turn. That’s why this card is never played, it’s far more unreliable than Shield Slam and has to be combed with other cards on the same turn. Changing it to an AoE makes it a lot more useful, but I wouldn’t say it’s too overpowered: Hero power gives you a 6 mana 1-damage AoE, Claw a 5 mana 3-damage AoE and Feral Rage a 7 mana 4-damage AoE. This might seem strong to some, but compare it to Paladin’s Wild Pyromancer + Equality, which is a 4 mana 2-card combo that clears the whole board (except for divine shields). I’m not sure if 4 mana is too steep of a cost to run this in any decks (compare to Blade Flurry, which sucks) but unlike blade flurry or Pyro equality, druid has lots and lots of cards to use with this card so it’s more versatile. This would give control druids a board clearing option, albeit as a combo which would prevent it from becoming too strong.
Lowering the cost by 1 makes this card a bit more useful. My new change to Blessing of Might makes the card a 1 mana give +4 attack, so I think this is a fine cost since choose one cards USUALLY cost more mana in exchange for variety (I’m looking at you, Wrath) and it might now even find a place in some decks.
The last nerf on this card was way too severe. I know they wanted to nerf silence but as a 2/2 both Spellbreaker and Fire Plume Phoenix (which are pretty average cards) outstat this minion by too much, especially since this is a class card. Buffing his stats will make him a good card again.
A really cool card, but 4 mana is too much to justify putting this win-more card in any deck, even a Token deck.
Starfall: 6 mana. Choose One – Deal 8 damage to a minion or 3 damage to all enemy minions.
5 mana is too much for just a 2-damage AoE. Holy Nova at least heals and hits the enemy hero, but Starfall’s AoE has no extra effects. Please don’t kill me because of this one since it’s really hard to evaluate a 3-damage AoE since we don't have a lot of them in the game.
Force of Nature: 5 mana. Summon three 2/2 Treants with Taunt.
Another druid card that was nerfed into oblivion. Doppelgangster is actually a better version of this because of synergies with hand buffs and evolve, and even then it’s only used in those decks where it can get insane value. The original charge treants were in my opinion a dumb idea, so instead I’m going to make this a more expensive Feral Spirit.
Ancient of Lore: 7 mana ¾. Choose One - Draw 2 cards or restore 8 health.
I really liked the fact that this card could draw multiple cards at once, since most cards in the game only draw one. With the nerfs this card got, it became a more expensive Azure Drake with no spell power, which is absolutely terrible. I don’t think Arcane Intellect + a 3 mana minion is too good for 7 mana, so I hope I don’t need to change this more. Open to suggestions, though.
The biggest problem with Cenarius is his cost. By lowering it you can use him on an earlier turn or play a Wrath or small minion alongside it, making him not as awkward of a play.
Hunter:
Bestial Wrath: 1 mana. Give a friendly beast +3 attack and immune this turn.
Allows you to get a good trade, but is still very situational. It has a requirement, so I made it give the same amount of attack as the Blessing of Might in addition to immunity.
Misdirection: Secret: When an enemy attacks your hero, instead it attacks another random enemy.
Now this card will always have a negative effect on your opponent. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Explosive Shot: 5 mana. Deal 7 damage to a minion and 2 damage to adjacent ones.
It’s still far from Meteor’s power level, but at least makes Control Hunter just a tiny bit more viable. Good players will play around this as soon as they realize you’re control (which they will before turn 5), so you can’t call it too strong.
Gladiator's Longbow: 7 mana 6/2 weapon. Your hero is Immune while attacking.
In the last year of playing this game, I have seen this card played once, counting both Ranked and casual. Deserves a buff for sure, especially when comparing it to Gorehowl (which isn't seeing that much play either).
Mage:
Mana Wyrm: 1 mana ½. Whenever you cast a spell, gain +1 Attack.
1-drops with such high health and potential to grow really big are very unhealthy for the game, resulting with games with the starting hand deciding the result of the match completely.
Vaporize: 3 mana Secret: When a minion with 2 or more attack attacks your hero, destroy it.
This change makes the card more consistent by making sure you get some value out of it even if the opponent has 1/1s.
Ethereal Arcanist: I think this card is fine, but if a lot of people think it sucks, I’ll make it a 4/3.
Paladin:
Eye for an Eye: If this is changed, it’ll be too complicated so I’m not really a big fan of changing it :P
Argent Protector: 2 mana 2/2. Taunt. Battlecry: Give a friendly minion Divine Shield.
Now seems more like a protector. Also, the “Not on my watch” sounds enough of a taunt to me.
It’s difficult to fit 8 mana cards into your deck in this day and age, especially ones that don't do anything to the board.
Priest:
Lightwell: 2 mana 0/5. At the start of your turn, give another friendly minion +2 Health. Restore it to full Health.
I thought about giving this guy 1 Attack, but it wouldn’t make sense, since wells can hardly fight. Instead, I made it buff your other minions, which makes a lot of sense and makes it a lot more useful as well.
I’ve never seen this card being played. EEVER. Since this is a class card, it makes sense its stats are better than giant wasp’s (Which is not even all that good, btw.)
A 1-turn stealth is not worth much, since it can’t be combed nearly as well as conceal.
Kidnapper: 4 mana 2/3 Combo: Return a minion to its owners hand.
6 mana is too steep of a price. This is another card I’m still thinking about.
Shaman:
Shaman’s base set is one of the worst ones. I’ll need to make some drastic changes here.
Dust Devil: 3 mana 3/3 Elemental, Windfury. Overload (2)
1 health on an Overload (2) minion is a crazy risk, especially now that Patches exists. I saw this change on some thread, but haven’t found it since.
Forked Lightning: 1 mana. Deal 2 damage to a random enemy minion, then deal 2 damage to a random enemy minion. Overload (2). (Can be cast even if there is only one minion on the opposing side.)
A small buff will make enrage decks slightly more viable.
Frothing Berserker: 3 mana 2/4. Whenever a friendly minion takes damage, gain +1 attack.
This card can grow insanely quickly, and it’s difficult to kill, having 4 HP. With this change it won't trigger off of opposing minions, meaning it cannot grow too rapidly.
The nerf on him was too harsh, I think. With 0 attack he's easy to kill and his ability might not even trigger at all. Now he can at least do some damage to attackers.
Most 2 mana cards have prime stats for the cost, so I think this one should too, considering how difficult it is to make use of her effect. First she needs to survive a whole turn, and even then you need to somehow play tons of spells to do some significant damage.
Lorewalker Cho: Couldn't come up with anything for this one without ruining the card's nature.
This is one of those notorious examples of Blizz giving windfury minions shitty stats. Even in an ideal scenario, you would kill two 1/1s with this guy and then he would be a 2/1 that would easily be pinged. 4 health lets the farseer at least have a chance of surviving an attack from another 3-drop.
Tauren Warrior: This minion has the same problem as Thrallmar Farseer; gets killed before its effect can be utilised. I can't come up with a good buff for him without powercreeping Squirming Tentacle, though.
In theory, this card sounds good. Having to be destroyed because of taunt and then destroying the enemy board sounds like a great defensive tool for control decks, right? Somehow, it just never really works out that way. Usually the AoE just isn't enough and ends up hurting you as much, if not more. I don't remember this guy even being good in the arena.
Not a big buff, but at least gives him a bit more survivability when up against minions ans soft removals.
Priestess of Elune: 6 mana 5/5 with battlecry: Restore 5 Health to your hero.
One of the weakest cards in the game. At some point you could maybe have said that Blizzard doesn't want neutral heals so we don't get a new Antique Healbot, but even that argument has been made obsolete with K&C adding Shroom Brewer, which by stats and effect is pretty much as good as priestess (healing can target minions as well), except that it costs 2 less mana. And Shroom Brewer hasn't even seen any play. I rest my case.
I've never seen anyone play this card either, and the reason is obvious: Tomb Pillager is leagues better. Having a drawback for a deathrattle means you should get proper compensation for it.
Neutral:
Nerub'ar Weblord: Same stats and cost. Effect now reads: Minions with Battlecry cost (3) more.
A weak card and hardly usable as tech. Now you can actually tech this into you deck to prevent your opponent from playing Shudderwock, which is a card many people hate.
I know the effect can be beneficial with Can't attack cards, but he's still too expensive to be used in decks like that. Having vanilla stats might make him worth running.
It's easy to compare this card to Entomb, which has a much stronger effect. Usually you would want to use these cards on a powerful enemy minion, potentially a win condition, so you would almost always rather have the minion for yourself instead of your opponent finding it later again. At 5 mana, this card is similar to Assassinate, but can negate deathrattles with the drawback of your opponent being able to possibly play it again later.
Dark Wispers: This was probably meant to be used in some kind of token deck, but is too expensive for what it does. On turn 6 1/1s are very weak and can easily be removed. The buff is all right, but bone mare does that better, too. I don't really know how to buff this, since I might accidentally power creep Wisps of the Old Gods.
Hunter:
Steamwheedle Sniper and Feign Death: Haven't been used in a whole lot of decks but might become useful if Control Hunter becomes a thing. Can't think of any good buffs for them, either.
Call Pet: I think this card could actually be pretty good in Recruit Hunter decks in Wild. Maybe it's already used there, haven't really seen those decks in WIld a whole lot.
Cobra Shot: 5 mana: Deal 4 damage to a minion and the enemy hero.
I think this card might be one of the weakest cards in existence. The devs probably thought it could be used to kill a taunt while pressuring the opponent's face, but 3 damage is just too weak for that on turn 5. Some people might be scared about the burst potential this card would have with this change, but Hunters already have double Kill Command so I don't think it's a problem.
During the last year, due to some new cards being released and old ones rotating, some of these cards have actually seen minor play so I decided they're all right in their current condition.
Awesome! I made a thread about this a while ago, but I just determined that there were so many cards with broken effects that could never be balanced. :/
Shadow Word Death? Deal INFINITE DAMAGE!
Meh.
In any case I am gonna suggest that you add more spoiler tags to format your stuff more, it's kinda hard to tell where one class begins and another ends.
The thing is, that a big part of the player base wants the game to be unbalanced.
This gives a puzzle to solve in terms of deck building, finding out what works etc.
It's actually easier to adjust cards to their intrinsic value than people think, but if every card is on face value, then the game purely revolves around who can spend the most mana.
However, there are always cards like Sword of Justice which are simply too far off the margin to be worth inany deck.
The thing is, that a big part of the player base wants the game to be unbalanced.
This gives a puzzle to solve in terms of deck building, finding out what works etc.
It's actually easier to adjust cards to their intrinsic value than people think, but if every card is on face value, then the game purely revolves around who can spend the most mana.
However, there are always cards like Sword of Justice which are simply too far off the margin to be worth inany deck.
It's enough if a card is playable in a single viable deck because it has great synergy in that deck, or because the meta favors the card. then it's balanced. Balance doesn't have to mean that every card of the same cost is equally powerful in every situation.
I would say that it's balance that creates puzzles. When you are building a Dragon Priest and have a card that is clearly overpowered like Drakonid Operative in front of you, including that card is a no-brainer. Similarly you would clearly never include a card like Midnight Drake because it's just bad. Poor balance just finished the puzzle for you.
I did a similar (unfinished) balancing pass recently of every card below 3 mana, never got further because the expansion was released so I became too busy playing :3 I think some general feedback on the changes you propose is that they are skewed towards constructed balance, without considering the impact on arena. Be very careful when buffing common cards, especially for classes with an already powerful classic set. I would also shy away from heavy card reworks that completely remove their identity, such as what you suggest for Light's Justice, unless the whole concept behind the card is unhealthy or incredibly hard to balance.
I also have many comments on several of the individual proposed changes, especially regarding cards that heavily limit design space, but overall I think the direction is good. Maybe one day I'll finish my rebalance pass and we can compare suggestions ;)
This is a casual game for entertainment , dont think about it that much.
As I said at the start of the thread, this is purely speculation and because I enjoy doing this kind of stuff. It's not like this will ever affect the game, I'm doing this of my own will.
The thing is, that a big part of the player base wants the game to be unbalanced.
This gives a puzzle to solve in terms of deck building, finding out what works etc.
It's actually easier to adjust cards to their intrinsic value than people think, but if every card is on face value, then the game purely revolves around who can spend the most mana.
However, there are always cards like Sword of Justice which are simply too far off the margin to be worth inany deck.
It's enough if a card is playable in a single viable deck because it has great synergy in that deck, or because the meta favors the card. then it's balanced. Balance doesn't have to mean that every card of the same cost is equally powerful in every situation.
I would say that it's balance that creates puzzles. When you are building a Dragon Priest and have a card that is clearly overpowered like Drakonid Operative in front of you, including that card is a no-brainer. Similarly you would clearly never include a card like Midnight Drake because it's just bad. Poor balance just finished the puzzle for you.
I did a similar (unfinished) balancing pass recently of every card below 3 mana, never got further because the expansion was released so I became too busy playing :3 I think some general feedback on the changes you propose is that they are skewed towards constructed balance, without considering the impact on arena. Be very careful when buffing common cards, especially for classes with an already powerful classic set. I would also shy away from heavy card reworks that completely remove their identity, such as what you suggest for Light's Justice, unless the whole concept behind the card is unhealthy or incredibly hard to balance.
I also have many comments on several of the individual proposed changes, especially regarding cards that heavily limit design space, but overall I think the direction is good. Maybe one day I'll finish my rebalance pass and we can compare suggestions ;)
My reasoning behind these changes are exactly this: if all cards are balanced, deck building won't be as easy since there will be more viable options. This will also make netdecking perhaps more difficult, since there will be more good options. I think the change for Light's Justice is needed, because it's very difficult trying to make a balanced 1-mana weapon. Thank you for the constructive criticism!
For the Assassin's Blade, it could have this ability: "killing a minion does not use a durability point" or it could be 2 attack with poisonous.
Windspeaker just can't be a 4/4, it would have to be a 4/3 or 3/4.
Corruption could also silence the target, but then it may need to cost 2 mana.
And, rather than making Charge actually give charge, i would put the text: Can't be reduced below 1 Health this turn. and keep the 1 mana cost.
keep up the good wok man!
Those are interesting ideas. I'll think about them. I'm not so sure about Charge, though, since with that change it would make the card a much worse Commanding Shout. If you meant giving that effect in addition to charge, that could be a cool idea.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
Razorfen Hunter is fine as it is (though you might change the stats to 3/2 as well). Ironbark Protectordoesn't need to be stupidly broken and overstated. 8/9? Oasis Snapjawdoesn't need to be overstated as well. 2/7 is premium stats for a 4-drop, no need to change something.
Razorfen Hunter is fine as it is (though you might change the stats to 3/2 as well). Ironbark Protectordoesn't need to be stupidly broken and overstated. 8/9? Oasis Snapjawdoesn't need to be overstated as well. 2/7 is premium stats for a 4-drop, no need to change something.
I guess 3/2 is enough for the Rifleman.
Razorfen would be better as a 3/2, I guess it has all right stats at that cost so it's all right...
Ironbark Protector is definitely not overstatted or broken. Compare it to Ancient of War: 3 more attack for 1 more mana, and ancient isn't even used anymore because it's so expensive. On a taunt minion the attack doesn't really matter and it'll always get removal'd anyway, far from OP.
Oasis Snapjaw sucks. Even if it has the same amount of stats as Chillwind Yeti, the stats are not distributed as well, so it deserves more stats for that reason.
As already mentioned, Shiv = Hammer of Wrath except it costs 1 less. (Also Holy Smite is simply better than Arcane Shot for no particular reason, one could even argue that Hunter needs a better version because it has only a few control tools) Furthermore, you should take Arena into consideration, a 3 mana 3/3 Light's Justice would be ridicolously good (the regular version is actually a good pick these days), same goes for 8/10 Iron Bark Protector.
As already mentioned, Shiv = Hammer of Wrath except it costs 1 less. (Also Holy Smite is simply better than Arcane Shot for no particular reason, one could even argue that Hunter needs a better version because it has only a few control tools) Furthermore, you should take Arena into consideration, a 3 mana 3/3 Light's Justice would be ridicolously good (the regular version is actually a good pick these days), same goes for 8/10 Iron Bark Protector.
Yeah, I was pretty doubtful about the Shiv... I think I'll revert it back to what it was. It IS used in some decks. Holy Smite's effect is just a small bonus so it's not that much better (Look at Fireball vs Mortal Strike), and I don't really have ideas for Arcane Shot. The Light's Justice is kind of on the fence as well, still thinking about it. Might change Ironbark to 8/9, but then it would suck... we'll see.
If Hearthstone was balanced it would be the most boring game in the history of mankind.
Well, Chess is balanced. And it's bigger than hearthstone ever will be, and not boring at all.
Note quite, actually. In fact, Chess and its lack of balance has been a well known thing, with a documented effect on winrate so high the average gamer these days would call it wildly imbalanced: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-move_advantage_in_chess
So, the point of this thread is to balance all the cards in the game to be viable, while perhaps toning down some of the stronger ones. It’ll take some time for me to finish all the sets, so I’m posting this already so people can comment if they think I messed up. I know that it's bad to make changes to too many cards, this is a waste of time blah blah… I’m only doing this because I love balancing things in video games, so it’s a lot of fun trying to make bad cards viable while seeing other people’s comments and ideas. I haven’t played during the Naxx or GvG eras, so I really am not as well informed of the viability of all the cards from those sets.
Another argument against these kinds of threads that I've seen is cards that give you cards in the middle of a match, like Babbling Book or discover effects. Now, this isn't actually a problem at all. The value of cards that give you random stuff will become a bit better, but now be less RNG-reliant, since it won't be as likely that you get trash. When talking about discover, these buffs are only good news. When you discover a card, it's often clear what you'll choose, since two of the options can be terrible. With cards becoming better, it will be more difficult to choose which one you want to pick, which forces you to study the situation more closely and decide based on that and not make the decision based on which one of the cards sucks the least. Feel free to comment if you think I missed a card or made a bad change.
Now, with the explanations out of the way, let’s get started!
Basic:
Druid:
Claw: 1 mana. Give your hero +3 attack this turn.
With this change, Claw can remove 2-drops and even 4-drops. The downside is that you’ll take more damage, since the armor effect has been removed. Basically a bit of a worse pre-nerf Rockbiter Weapon.
Healing Touch: 3 mana. Restore 6 health. Draw a card.
Now, hold your horses, I know what you’re saying: “B-but Ice Barrier is 3 mana restore 8 health and it’s good!” Well, there are a lot of differences between these two cards. First of all, Ice Barrier is a secret. Normally secrets are cheaper than a card of similar effect (i.e. Consecration and Explosive Trap), but in that example the cards are AoEs. With AoEs, you usually want to cast them immediately and play a couple of minions on the same turn for a huge tempo swing. With Explosive Trap that is not possible, because a skilled opponent can first trade the minions that would die to the secret into your minions and then trigger it. That’s why Consecration is more expensive. With Healing Touch vs. Ice Barrier however, the situation is the opposite. When you have to heal, it’s usually because your opponent has lots of minions on the board and is threatening your life total. In that kind of situation Healing Touch would take a large amount of mana out of clearing their minions, and also being a dead card in control matchups, it’s not worth running. Ice Barrier is an excellent card for healing, since it can be used on an earlier turn on which you weren’t going to do anything anyway, to later activate when your opponent attacks. It’s actually even faster healing than other methods, since it happens as soon as you need it on your opponent’s turn instead of on the turn after, giving you more mana to use for clearing. In addition to this, it gives armor, so the effect won’t be wasted even at full HP. Also, being a secret, it synergizes with solid cards like Arcanologist and Medivh's Valet, making them more useful even in a non-secret deck. It even forces the opponent to play around possible secrets like Duplicate, Mirror Entity, Counterspell and in some situations Ice Block. By adding the card draw effect to Healing Touch, it becomes a weaker Shield Block that is now useful in control matchups as well as aggressive ones.
Starfire: 6 mana. Deal 6 damage. Draw a card.
This card just seems a bit weak for a 6-mana card. It hasn’t been part of a meta deck for a long time, if ever.
Ironbark Protector: 8 mana, 8/8 Taunt. Battlecry: Gain 5 armor.
Ironbark Protector is just very weak for an 8-mana minion, which was made even more obvious with the release of The Lich King. This change not only makes it more powerful against aggro, but also works with Druid's theme of gaining armor.
Hunter:
Arcane Shot: 1 mana. Deal 2 damage. If you control a Beast, deal 3 damage instead.
Thanks to Likafoss for the idea. Now it's a smaller Kill Command.
Multi-Shot: 5 mana. Deal 4 damage to two random enemy minions. (Can also be cast with only one enemy minion in play.
This card, along withCleave and Forked Lightning, are not only bad, but also for some reason only castable only when the opponent has multiple minions. With this change, you can use it one on minion if you want to. Also, 4 damage is way better than 3, so the card should now be much more useful in control decks.
Starving Buzzard: 4 mana 2/2 beast with the same effect.
Blizzard overnerfed this card. Now it can be used in a few Hunter decks, while not making it too strong to prevent Hunter from getting too much card draw.
Mage:
Arcane Explosion: 2 mana. Deal 1 damage to all enemies.
This card most likely still won’t see any play, but now isn’t completely overshadowed by Maelstrom Portal, since Mage is supposed to have the best spells (See: Fireball, Frostbolt).
Paladin:
So paladin’s base set is really f***ed up with terrible cheap spells and secrets alongside a terrible weapon. Let’s fix this.
Humility: 2 mana. Change a minion's Attack to 1. Draw a card.
Being able to cycle the card makes it much stronger, maybe even too much. Might change the cost to 3. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Hand of Protection: 1 mana. Give a minion Taunt and Divine Shield.
Ancestral Healing has a very similar effect for 0 mana and is never used, so I don’t think we have to worry about the card becoming overpowered. Divine Shield is valuable though, especially in combination with Taunt, and I would say this would definitely find a place in Quest decks with this change. (CheeseEtc had the same idea on this one 😉)
Light's Justice: This card is very weak, but I couldn't come up with any suitable buffs for it. I think it can become strong if Pally gets early weapon buffs.
Holy Light: 2 mana. Give a friendly minion +2 health. Restore 6 Health to your Hero.
The card art really seems like the paladin is blessing the wounded soldier, all the while being blessed by the Light itself. Buffing and healing at once is a new effect and I think it would fit well with Pally’s quest.
Hammer of Wrath: 3 mana. Deal 2 damage. Draw a card.
With the 4-mana slot having two auto-include cards in Consecration and Truesilver Champion, Hammer of Wrath has a hard time finding a place in decks. In addition to that, 4 mana is pretty expensive for cycling. Lowering the cost and damage by one makes the card more useful for cycling while not being overshadowed by two other OP cards of the same cost.
Guardian of Kings: 7 mana, 5/6. Battlecry: Restore 6 Health to your Hero. Taunt
I think all this card needs is Taunt to make it the ultimate anti-aggro card. (Thanks to Boethion for the idea)
Priest:
Mind Vision: Not a good card, but not really terrible.
Holy Nova: 5 mana. Deal 2 damage to all enemies. Restore the same amount of damage to all friendly characters.
The healing now increases with spell damage, which makes sense.
Rogue:
Assassinate: 4 mana, same effect.
Polymorph and Hex are actually better since they ignore deathrattles and counter Anyfin and N’Zoth well. Don’t think it’s fair that this card is so damn expensive when the effect isn’t even all that good.
Assassin's Blade: I really don’t know what to do about this one… it’s bad, but kind of tough to not make it too strong…
Shaman: (Thanks to iandakar for helping balance these.)
Totemic Might: 1 mana. Give your Totems +1/+1.
0 mana cards are rarely worth putting into a constructed deck, so maybe now people could consider using this. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Ancestral Healing: 2 mana. Restore a minion to full Health and give it Taunt. Draw a card.
The effect is too weak to justify putting it in a deck. Drawing a card makes it way better. (Again, thanks to CheeseEtc for the idea.)
Frost Shock: 1 mana. Deal 2 damage to an enemy minion and Freeze it.
Pretty strong, but when you think about it oftentimes it will be like Frostbolt and only remove a small minion.
Flametongue Totem: 2 mana 0/2 Totem. Same effect.
This card is just pissing so many people off, it’s a super strong card. Kind of on the fence, not sure if it needs a nerf… need some help here again.
Windfury: 2 mana. Give a minion Windfury and +1 Attack.
A small Attack buff to go along with the windfury.
Rockbiter Weapon: 1 mana, 3/1 weapon.
Now can’t be used with Doomhammer but still efficient removal. The first 1 durability weapon. (Thanks to CheeseEtc, really cool idea!)
Windspeaker: 4 mana 3/4. Same effect.
The stats are way too low for the effect. (Edit 6.6: -1 atk)
Warlock:
Sacrificial Pact: 0 mana. Destroy a Demon. Restore 7 Health to your Hero.
5 health is not enough for sacrificing your minion, even if it happens to have a cool interaction with Lord Jaraxxus. (Thanks CheeseEtc!)
Corruption: Again, not really buffable.
Succubus: 2 mana 3/4 Demon. Same effect.
4/3 stats are too easy to remove, which is why playing this card was too big of a risk.
Drain Life: 3 mana. Deal 3 damage. Restore 3 Health to your Hero.
I never understood why this was so bad, it’s kind of a 3-mana version of Claw which was already bad.
[Edit 4.7.2018]: Not giving the card lifesteal, since Blizzard said in an interview that they don't want to use that keyword in the basic set. With the release of Drain Soul and Gnash, it's even easier to see why I think this card should be buffed.
Dread Infernal: 6 mana 4/4 Demon. Battlecry: Deal 2 damage to all other characters.
Nice AoE with a body, much stronger than a 1 damage AoE. Toned it down a notch from CheeseEtc’s suggestion, when compared to Corrupted Seer the effect is quite strong.
Warrior:
Charge: 3 mana. Give a minion charge.
I 100% agree with CheeseEtc on this one, one card that gives charge is fine when it’s this expensive.
Cleave: No changes to the text, but can be cast when the opponent only has 1 minions.
Warsong Commander: 4 mana 3/3. Your minions with 2 or less attack have charge.
I don’t even know where to start with this. The banhammer struck so hard. This card right now is like a Raid Leader, which is not even a good card, with +1 health but only works for charge minions. It’s disgusting. What they should’ve done is make her effect disappear if the minion gains more than that 2 attack, so you can’t abuse Frothing Berserker. Also doesn’t work with Grim Patron. I don’t really know how this card could be used like this, but it most certainly isn’t broken like before.
Might have to change the cost to 4 so it can’t be used with aggro.Neutral:
Basic neutrals aren’t supposed to be great and mostly act as baselines for later cards. There are still a few I want to change, though.
Frostwolf Grunt: Terrible card, but I can’t come up with anything for this one. 2/3 is an option, but that seems kind of weird considering that Pompous Thespian is a 3/2 and thus would be worse…
Silverback Patriarch: 2 mana ¼ Taunt, Beast
I would say this card is even worse than Magma Rager. Now it can at least take a few hits for its cost.
Razorfen Hunter: 3 mana 3/2. Same effect.
Swapped the stats so it can be a bit more useful on offense.
Magma Rager: 3 mana 6/1 Elemental
Why not give it more Attack? Now it has 7 stats total like other 3 cost cards (3+4=6+1=7).
Ironforge Rifleman: 3 mana 3/2. Battlecry: Deal 1 damage.
A bit more attack is fine, there's no reason to pay more than 1 mana for a ping.
Dalaran Mage: 3 mana 2/4. Spell Damage +1.
Stats are once again too low.
Stormpike Commando: 5 mana 4/3. Battlecry: Deal 2 Damage.
The stats are too low on this one. With this change it gains +1 Attack (aka 1/2 mana worth of stats) for costing one more (compared to Fire Plume Phoenix). The phoenix is still stronger, because 2 damage is more relevant on turn 4 than 5 and it has the elemental tag.
Nightblade: 5 mana 5/4, Battlecry: Deal 4 damage to the enemy hero.
Now she feels like a proper assassin. 1 mana for that effect is fine at 5 mana.
Gurubashi Berserker: 5 mana 3/7, same effect.
Now he can do a bit of damage even before he’s enraged.
Frostwolf Warlord: 5 mana 5/4, same effect.
Maybe can now be used as a budget Sea Giant.
Darkscale Healer: 5 mana 5/5. Battlecry: Restore 2 Health to all friendly characters.
2 Health doesn’t do much on turn 5, so she shouldn't pay too much in stats for her effect.
Booty Bay Bodyguard: 5 mana 5/5 Taunt.
Such bad stats… considering buffing him all the way to a 6/5.
Lord of the Arena: 6 mana 6/6 taunt.
See above.
Archmage: 6 mana 4/6. Spell Damage +2.
At 6 mana +1 Spell Damage does nothing. The stats are fine, because it’s too expensive to use in crazy comboes so it needs to stay alive.
War Golem: 7 mana 7/8.
I never understood why 7-drops' base statline was 7/7, when Boulderfist Ogre is a 6 mana 6/7.
Core Hound: 7 mana 9/6 Beast.
Now has the same amount of stats as War Golem (7+8=9+6=15)
Classic:
Druid:
Savagery: 4 mana. Deal damage equal to your hero’s attack to all enemy minions.
Savagery is basically a Shield Slam for druids, but unlike armor, attack stays for only 1 turn. That’s why this card is never played, it’s far more unreliable than Shield Slam and has to be combed with other cards on the same turn. Changing it to an AoE makes it a lot more useful, but I wouldn’t say it’s too overpowered: Hero power gives you a 6 mana 1-damage AoE, Claw a 5 mana 3-damage AoE and Feral Rage a 7 mana 4-damage AoE. This might seem strong to some, but compare it to Paladin’s Wild Pyromancer + Equality, which is a 4 mana 2-card combo that clears the whole board (except for divine shields). I’m not sure if 4 mana is too steep of a cost to run this in any decks (compare to Blade Flurry, which sucks) but unlike blade flurry or Pyro equality, druid has lots and lots of cards to use with this card so it’s more versatile. This would give control druids a board clearing option, albeit as a combo which would prevent it from becoming too strong.
Mark of Nature: 2 mana, same effect.
Lowering the cost by 1 makes this card a bit more useful. My new change to Blessing of Might makes the card a 1 mana give +4 attack, so I think this is a fine cost since choose one cards USUALLY cost more mana in exchange for variety (I’m looking at you, Wrath) and it might now even find a place in some decks.
Keeper of the Grove: 4 mana 2/3, same effect.
The last nerf on this card was way too severe. I know they wanted to nerf silence but as a 2/2 both Spellbreaker and Fire Plume Phoenix (which are pretty average cards) outstat this minion by too much, especially since this is a class card. Buffing his stats will make him a good card again.
Soul of the Forest: 3 mana, same effect.
A really cool card, but 4 mana is too much to justify putting this win-more card in any deck, even a Token deck.
Starfall: 6 mana. Choose One – Deal 8 damage to a minion or 3 damage to all enemy minions.
5 mana is too much for just a 2-damage AoE. Holy Nova at least heals and hits the enemy hero, but Starfall’s AoE has no extra effects. Please don’t kill me because of this one since it’s really hard to evaluate a 3-damage AoE since we don't have a lot of them in the game.
Force of Nature: 5 mana. Summon three 2/2 Treants with Taunt.
Another druid card that was nerfed into oblivion. Doppelgangster is actually a better version of this because of synergies with hand buffs and evolve, and even then it’s only used in those decks where it can get insane value. The original charge treants were in my opinion a dumb idea, so instead I’m going to make this a more expensive Feral Spirit.
Ancient of Lore: 7 mana ¾. Choose One - Draw 2 cards or restore 8 health.
I really liked the fact that this card could draw multiple cards at once, since most cards in the game only draw one. With the nerfs this card got, it became a more expensive Azure Drake with no spell power, which is absolutely terrible. I don’t think Arcane Intellect + a 3 mana minion is too good for 7 mana, so I hope I don’t need to change this more. Open to suggestions, though.
Cenarius: 8 mana, same effect & stats.
The biggest problem with Cenarius is his cost. By lowering it you can use him on an earlier turn or play a Wrath or small minion alongside it, making him not as awkward of a play.
Hunter:
Bestial Wrath: 1 mana. Give a friendly beast +3 attack and immune this turn.
Allows you to get a good trade, but is still very situational. It has a requirement, so I made it give the same amount of attack as the Blessing of Might in addition to immunity.
Misdirection: Secret: When an enemy attacks your hero, instead it attacks another random enemy.
Now this card will always have a negative effect on your opponent. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Explosive Shot: 5 mana. Deal 7 damage to a minion and 2 damage to adjacent ones.
It’s still far from Meteor’s power level, but at least makes Control Hunter just a tiny bit more viable. Good players will play around this as soon as they realize you’re control (which they will before turn 5), so you can’t call it too strong.
Gladiator's Longbow: 7 mana 6/2 weapon. Your hero is Immune while attacking.
In the last year of playing this game, I have seen this card played once, counting both Ranked and casual. Deserves a buff for sure, especially when comparing it to Gorehowl (which isn't seeing that much play either).
Mage:
Mana Wyrm: 1 mana ½. Whenever you cast a spell, gain +1 Attack.
1-drops with such high health and potential to grow really big are very unhealthy for the game, resulting with games with the starting hand deciding the result of the match completely.
Vaporize: 3 mana Secret: When a minion with 2 or more attack attacks your hero, destroy it.
This change makes the card more consistent by making sure you get some value out of it even if the opponent has 1/1s.
Ethereal Arcanist: I think this card is fine, but if a lot of people think it sucks, I’ll make it a 4/3.
Paladin:
Eye for an Eye: If this is changed, it’ll be too complicated so I’m not really a big fan of changing it :P
Argent Protector: 2 mana 2/2. Taunt. Battlecry: Give a friendly minion Divine Shield.
Now seems more like a protector. Also, the “Not on my watch” sounds enough of a taunt to me.
Sword of Justice: 2 mana ¼ weapon with same effect.
If it’s cheaper, it’ll be easier to get more value out of it.
Holy Wrath: 4 mana, same effect.
Encouraging the memes :^)
Blessed Champion: 4 mana. Double a minion’s attack.
It says something about the card if it's too expensive to even be used in buff decks…
Avenging Wrath: 5 mana. Deal 7 damage randomly split among all enemy minions. (Ty to CheeseEtc for the idea)
Kind of like a Volcano without Overload that only hits enemy minions. What do you think?
Lay on Hands: 8 mana. Restore 10 health. Draw 3 cards.
It’s difficult to fit 8 mana cards into your deck in this day and age, especially ones that don't do anything to the board.
Priest:
Lightwell: 2 mana 0/5. At the start of your turn, give another friendly minion +2 Health. Restore it to full Health.
I thought about giving this guy 1 Attack, but it wouldn’t make sense, since wells can hardly fight. Instead, I made it buff your other minions, which makes a lot of sense and makes it a lot more useful as well.
Shadowform: 2 mana, same effect.
I’m not a huge fan of Shadowform myself, but I know lots of people like it so I’m gonna make it a bit better. <3
Mindgames: 3 mana, same effect.
This card is so unpredictable it’s not worth it to run in your deck. Now playing it won’t be as big of a gamble. Will be closer to Unstable Portal.
Temple Enforcer: 6 mana 6/6. Battlecry: Give a friendly minion +4 Health.
On turn 6 you really need something more impactful than a 3-mana minion’s battlecry.
Rogue:
Rogue has a lot of nerfed and bad cards in its base set. I’ll try to fix some of these so they’re not as bad anymore.
Patient Assassin: 2 mana ½. Stealth, Poisonous
I’ve never seen this card being played. EEVER. Since this is a class card, it makes sense its stats are better than giant wasp’s (Which is not even all that good, btw.)
Defias Ringleader: 2 mana 3/2 Combo: Summon a 2/1 Defias Bandit.
I think it should now be good enough to be played, but not too strong like it used to be like, since its survivability won't be as good.
Betrayal: Weak, but would be too good in Miracle if it was 1 mana.
Headcrack: 2 mana, same effect.
Just too expensive for any competitive deck.
Perdition's Blade: 3 mana 2/3 weapon. Battlecry: Deal 1 damage. Combo: Deal 2 instead.
Giving it more durability since a 2/3 weapon is usually not great, and I don’t want to make it too good. Still thinking about this one, though.
Master of Disguise: 4 mana 5/4, same effect.
A 1-turn stealth is not worth much, since it can’t be combed nearly as well as conceal.
Kidnapper: 4 mana 2/3 Combo: Return a minion to its owners hand.
6 mana is too steep of a price. This is another card I’m still thinking about.
Shaman:
Shaman’s base set is one of the worst ones. I’ll need to make some drastic changes here.
Dust Devil: 3 mana 3/3 Elemental, Windfury. Overload (2)
1 health on an Overload (2) minion is a crazy risk,
especially now that Patches exists. I saw this change on some thread, but haven’t found it since.Forked Lightning: 1 mana. Deal 2 damage to a random enemy minion, then deal 2 damage to a random enemy minion. Overload (2). (Can be cast even if there is only one minion on the opposing side.)
Suggested by Likafoss, now it can be used as a Flamecannon to clear totem golems and tomb pillagers, for example.
Al'Akir the Windlord: 8 mana 3/6 Elemental, same effects.
Over time Al'Akir has become less and less relevant as stronger cards have come up. A small buff should make him a decent option for some decks.
Warlock:
Blood Imp: 1 mana 1/1 Demon, same effect.
Now you can trade this guy into an opposing minion if needed.
Felguard: 3 mana 4/5 Demon, Taunt. Battlecry: Destroy one of your Mana Crystals.
Destroying a mana crystal is a huge deal and you should get enough compensation for it.
Summoning Portal: 3 mana, same stats & effect.
Easy to kill, so making it less expensive won’t make it as punishing if your opponent destroys your portal.
Pit Lord: 4 mana 5/6. Battlecry: Deal 4 damage to your hero.
4 damage isn’t as much as 5, so Pit Lord will now be much less of a risk to your life total.
Warrior:
Upgrade!: 1 mana. If you have a weapon, give it +1/+1. Otherwise equip a ½ weapon.
The upgrading effect is already very strong, so I don’t want pirate warriors also being able to make a new weapon so easily.
Rampage: Give a damaged minion +3/+4.
A small buff will make enrage decks slightly more viable.
Frothing Berserker: 3 mana 2/4. Whenever a friendly minion takes damage, gain +1 attack.
This card can grow insanely quickly, and it’s difficult to kill, having 4 HP. With this change it won't trigger off of opposing minions, meaning it cannot grow too rapidly.
Arathi Weaponsmith: 4 mana 4/3. Battlecry: Equip a 2/2 weapon.
The weapon’s impact on turn 4 is small, so I increased the weaponsmith’s attack by 1.
Neutral:
Leper Gnome: 1 mana 2/1 with the same effect (so reversing the nerf)
After leper gnome was nerfed, we've gotten plenty of more powerful 1-drops, so I don't think he would be a problem anymore.
Nat Pagle: 2 mana 1/4 with the same effect.
The nerf on him was too harsh, I think. With 0 attack he's easy to kill and his ability might not even trigger at all. Now he can at least do some damage to attackers.
Millhouse Manastorm: 2 mana 5/4 with the same effect.
I like him being a meme and often a suicidal play, but his stats should be at least a bit higher to compensate for his effect.
Master Swordsmith: 2 mana 1/3. At the end of your turn, give another random friendly minion +2 Attack.
This card is extremely underpowered when compared to Cobalt Scalebane.
Mana Addict: 2 mana 2/3 with the same effect.
Most 2 mana cards have prime stats for the cost, so I think this one should too, considering how difficult it is to make use of her effect. First she needs to survive a whole turn, and even then you need to somehow play tons of spells to do some significant damage.
Lorewalker Cho: Couldn't come up with anything for this one without ruining the card's nature.
Thrallmar Farseer: 3 mana 2/4 with windfury.
This is one of those notorious examples of Blizz giving windfury minions shitty stats. Even in an ideal scenario, you would kill two 1/1s with this guy and then he would be a 2/1 that would easily be pinged. 4 health lets the farseer at least have a chance of surviving an attack from another 3-drop.
Tauren Warrior: This minion has the same problem as Thrallmar Farseer; gets killed before its effect can be utilised. I can't come up with a good buff for him without powercreeping Squirming Tentacle, though.
King Mukla: 3 mana 6/5 with the same effect.
You would think this card could at least work in mill decks, but nope. A buff is most certainly deserved here.
Demolisher: At the start of your turn, deal 3 damage to a random enemy. (same stats and cost)
Now it can actually live up to its name.
Arcane Golem: 3 mana 5/5 with the same effect.
Another example of an overnerfed card. +1 attack to vanilla stats is not enough compensation for giving the opponent free ramp.
Alarm-o-Bot: Gains +1 health
Can now more reliably pull off its effect.
Ancient Mage: Gains +1 attack
The battlecry on this card is too weak and unreliable to cost this much in stats.
Abomination: Gains +1 attack
In theory, this card sounds good. Having to be destroyed because of taunt and then destroying the enemy board sounds like a great defensive tool for control decks, right? Somehow, it just never really works out that way. Usually the AoE just isn't enough and ends up hurting you as much, if not more. I don't remember this guy even being good in the arena.
Windfury Harpy: Gains +1 attack
Again, stats are too low because it has windfury.
The Beast: Gains +1 health
Not a big buff, but at least gives him a bit more survivability when up against minions ans soft removals.
Priestess of Elune: 6 mana 5/5 with battlecry: Restore 5 Health to your hero.
One of the weakest cards in the game. At some point you could maybe have said that Blizzard doesn't want neutral heals so we don't get a new Antique Healbot, but even that argument has been made obsolete with K&C adding Shroom Brewer, which by stats and effect is pretty much as good as priestess (healing can target minions as well), except that it costs 2 less mana. And Shroom Brewer hasn't even seen any play. I rest my case.
Illidan Stormrage: Swapped attack and health.
Now he'll be more difficult to remove so you can more reliably get to use his effect. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Hogger: Stats changed to 3/6.
Same as Illidan.
Ravenholdt Assassin: Gains +1 attack
Stealth isn't worth that much.
Gruul: Would have to be reworked completely. Right now he's useless in constructed and a bit too good in arena and some brawls.
Nozdormu: Might also need a rework, he's supposed to be a meme card but most people hate playing against him despite him being really bad.
Curse of Naxxramas:
Rogue:
Anub'ar Ambusher: Gains +1 attack
I've never seen anyone play this card either, and the reason is obvious: Tomb Pillager is leagues better. Having a drawback for a deathrattle means you should get proper compensation for it.
Neutral:
Nerub'ar Weblord: Same stats and cost. Effect now reads: Minions with Battlecry cost (3) more.
A weak card and hardly usable as tech. Now you can actually tech this into you deck to prevent your opponent from playing Shudderwock, which is a card many people hate.
Stoneskin Gargoyle: Gains +1 attack
1 attack is too weak on turn 3. (Thanks to SamTheHam for the idea)
Wailing Soul: Gains +1 attack
I know the effect can be beneficial with Can't attack cards, but he's still too expensive to be used in decks like that. Having vanilla stats might make him worth running.
Maexxna: Gains +1 attack
I think this card should just be reworked. It's stupid that a legendary exists that has the same effect as a rare card from the classic set.
Goblins vs Gnomes
A truly troublesome expansion notorious for having a lot of power creep along with many very underpowered cards.
Druid:
Recycle: Cost lowered to 5
It's easy to compare this card to Entomb, which has a much stronger effect. Usually you would want to use these cards on a powerful enemy minion, potentially a win condition, so you would almost always rather have the minion for yourself instead of your opponent finding it later again. At 5 mana, this card is similar to Assassinate, but can negate deathrattles with the drawback of your opponent being able to possibly play it again later.
Dark Wispers: This was probably meant to be used in some kind of token deck, but is too expensive for what it does. On turn 6 1/1s are very weak and can easily be removed. The buff is all right, but bone mare does that better, too. I don't really know how to buff this, since I might accidentally power creep Wisps of the Old Gods.
Hunter:
Steamwheedle Sniper and Feign Death: Haven't been used in a whole lot of decks but might become useful if Control Hunter becomes a thing. Can't think of any good buffs for them, either.
Call Pet: I think this card could actually be pretty good in Recruit Hunter decks in Wild. Maybe it's already used there, haven't really seen those decks in WIld a whole lot.
King of Beasts: Gains +1 attack
Most Hunter decks are better off running Nesting Roc or Emerald Spellstone, so I think this change is needed in order to make King of Beasts a viable option as well.
Cobra Shot: 5 mana: Deal 4 damage to a minion and the enemy hero.
I think this card might be one of the weakest cards in existence. The devs probably thought it could be used to kill a taunt while pressuring the opponent's face, but 3 damage is just too weak for that on turn 5. Some people might be scared about the burst potential this card would have with this change, but Hunters already have double Kill Command so I don't think it's a problem.
Mage:
Put your spoiler here.
Paladin:
Put your spoiler here.
Priest:
Put your spoiler here.
Rogue:
Put your spoiler here.
Shaman:
Put your spoiler here.
Warlock:
Put your spoiler here.
Warrior:
Put your spoiler here.
Changelog:
Edit 6.6.2017: Added Basic Neutrals, changed Windspeaker.
Edit 7.6.2017: Changed Ironforge Rifleman and Razorfen Hunter. Removed Shiv.
Edit 9.6.2017: Added Classic class cards.
Edit 11.6.2017: Changed Keeper of the Grove.
Edit 12.6.2017: Changed Savannah Highmane, Lightwell, Kidnapper, Forked Lightning, Stormforged Axe and Frothing Berserker.
Edit 14.6.2017: Changed Arcane Shot, Avenging Wrath, Defias Ringleader, Windfury, Frost Shock, Totemic Might,succubus, Warsong Commander, Darkscale Healer and Nightblade.
Edit 9.7.2017: Changed Ironbark Protector and removed Acidic Swamp Ooze.
Edit 4.7.2018:
Changed Ironbark Protector, Starving Buzzard, Arcane Explosion, Holy Light, Avenging Wrath, Bestial Wrath, Temple Enforcer, Dust Devil and Pit Lord.
Removed Blessing of Might, Light's Justice, Holy Smite, Raid Leader, Dragonling Mechanic, Oasis Snapjaw, Bite, Savannah Highmane, King Krush, Spellbender, Blessing of Wisdom, Tirion Fordring, Shadow Madness, Mass Dispel, Betrayal Blade Flurry, Stormforged Axe and Sense Demons.
During the last year, due to some new cards being released and old ones rotating, some of these cards have actually seen minor play so I decided they're all right in their current condition.
Added Vaporize and Classic neutrals.
Edit 5.7.2018: Added Naxxramas, Misdirection, Illidan Stormrage, Hogger and Stoneskin Gargoyle, removed Shattered Sun Cleric and Tirion Fordring and changed Arcane Golem.
Edit 22.7.2018: Added GvG Druid and Hunter.
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
Awesome! I made a thread about this a while ago, but I just determined that there were so many cards with broken effects that could never be balanced. :/
Shadow Word Death? Deal INFINITE DAMAGE!
Meh.
In any case I am gonna suggest that you add more spoiler tags to format your stuff more, it's kinda hard to tell where one class begins and another ends.
I like to make cards and discuss game balance.
I enjoy when "No similar decks were found."
My latest deck: http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/1366184-scholomance-charge-rez-priest-wild
For the Assassin's Blade, it could have this ability: "killing a minion does not use a durability point" or it could be 2 attack with poisonous.
Windspeaker just can't be a 4/4, it would have to be a 4/3 or 3/4.
Corruption could also silence the target, but then it may need to cost 2 mana.
And, rather than making Charge actually give charge, i would put the text: Can't be reduced below 1 Health this turn. and keep the 1 mana cost.
keep up the good woRk man!
This space is intentionally blank.
The thing is, that a big part of the player base wants the game to be unbalanced.
This gives a puzzle to solve in terms of deck building, finding out what works etc.
It's actually easier to adjust cards to their intrinsic value than people think,
but if every card is on face value, then the game purely revolves around who can spend the most mana.
However, there are always cards like Sword of Justice which are simply too far off the margin to be worth in any deck.
If Hearthstone was balanced it would be the most boring game in the history of mankind.
This is a casual game for entertainment , dont think about it that much.
I did a similar (unfinished) balancing pass recently of every card below 3 mana, never got further because the expansion was released so I became too busy playing :3 I think some general feedback on the changes you propose is that they are skewed towards constructed balance, without considering the impact on arena. Be very careful when buffing common cards, especially for classes with an already powerful classic set. I would also shy away from heavy card reworks that completely remove their identity, such as what you suggest for Light's Justice, unless the whole concept behind the card is unhealthy or incredibly hard to balance.
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
Your versions of Shiv and Hammer of Wrath are identical but Shiv costs 1 mana less. Please note that.
You definitely went overboard in some cases.
Ironforge Rifleman would be nice if he was 3/2.
Razorfen Hunter is fine as it is (though you might change the stats to 3/2 as well).
Ironbark Protector doesn't need to be stupidly broken and overstated. 8/9?
Oasis Snapjaw doesn't need to be overstated as well. 2/7 is premium stats for a 4-drop, no need to change something.
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
Basic is now done, will make changes if necessary. Tomorrow 8.6. I will start changing Classic cards.
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
As already mentioned, Shiv = Hammer of Wrath except it costs 1 less. (Also Holy Smite is simply better than Arcane Shot for no particular reason, one could even argue that Hunter needs a better version because it has only a few control tools) Furthermore, you should take Arena into consideration, a 3 mana 3/3 Light's Justice would be ridicolously good (the regular version is actually a good pick these days), same goes for 8/10 Iron Bark Protector.
Dab
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
I like to make cards and discuss game balance.
I enjoy when "No similar decks were found."
My latest deck: http://www.hearthpwn.com/decks/1366184-scholomance-charge-rez-priest-wild
Also a lot of people do find chess boring. (Although I like it)
Didn't have a lot of time/motivation to do changes today, but expect them tomorrow!
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
Classic class cards have now been added!
On the third day before Witchwood, Blizzard gave to me,
three Handlock decks,
two Molten Giants
and a winstreak to Legend Rank #3
Disclaimer: This is a fictional poem and this didn't actually happen to me.
Didn't notice this thread. Will make detailed review later.
The thread that inspired OP for reference : http://www.hearthpwn.com/forums/hearthstone-general/card-discussion/174095-basic-classic-cards-that-deserve-a-buff
Custom cards :
CLASSES : Alchemist (CCC#5 | Phase V) | Chef (CCC#4)
EXPANSIONS : Year of the Scorpion (Year Comp)