It seems to me that Blizzard moves on too fast from keywords. They just introduced Corrupt last expansion, released a slate of Corrupt cards, gave Priest a reduce Corrupt cards Legendary and now there are no new Corrupt cards in the new set. Same w/ Reborn...nothing new. Same w/ Spellburst...nothing new. And they keep introducing new keywords that will go strong for an expansion and then fizzle out most likely. I don't know...seems like they should start to scale back the whole "introduction of a new keyword" strategy and start releasing better support for keywords that already exist. Frenzy for example seems pretty weak and like it was a bit of stretch to me when Enrage already existed. I get that Enrage was permanent where Frenzy is one time but still...seems like they're running out of ideas rather than building upon the pretty good ones they had in the past.
Interested in the community thoughts and if anyone else has picked up on this.
Yep, that's the standard. Blizz does one keyword per expansion, and those keywords are specific to those expansions, with VERY few outliers. They'll even actively avoid reusing old expansion-based keywords on new cards that have nearly identical functions, completely based on this arbitrary rule they made.
Yep, that's the standard. Blizz does one keyword per expansion, and those keywords are specific to those expansions, with VERY few outliers. They'll even actively avoid reusing old expansion-based keywords on new cards that have nearly identical functions, completely based on this arbitrary rule they made.
its really dumb that they dont reuse keywords when they print cards with equivalent effects way later, they already have the tooltips made and they can save so much card real estate.
I don't mind them hard dropping keywords after an expansion, but id like it if they would pepper in a few from time to time with the keyword included.
I think Frenzy is a cool idea and very fitting for the next expansion, but I agree with the general point that they should probably keep building on existing keywords for at least the standard year they are introduced in. Having support for an expansion keyword appear over multiple years has the danger of becoming Gorillabot A-3 where the card is still in standard but all of its support was sent to Wild. Frenzy as a mechanic has the potential to be very strong, but with just the cards we see in Barrens it seems under-utilized.
Corrupt specifically is so fitting(Thematically and gameplay-wise) for the Old God theme that I'm fine with that being a one expansion keyword, especially since the cards we already have are very strong and don't really need additional support, but more general keywords like Inspire, Frenzy, Spellburst, Magnetic, Invoke and Recruit are something I'd find interesting as recurring mechanics. Invoke is somewhat similar to Corrupt in how tied it is to an expansion but they could make either a new set with different heroes to Invoke or make it work with basic hero powers. They could of course go back to Corrupt too if they decide to go back to Old Gods or some other nefarious themes later, but for now I think we have a good Corrupt package already in standard.
My thoughts exactly - don't mind the new stuff to keep the game fresh...that's always healthy. But it doesn't make sense to totally abandon stuff only to re-brand it later w/ a new little wrinkle.
Yes! Would love to see Adapt back in some new cards. Since Hunter is relatively weak this expansion in terms of new cards introduced, just imagine if they would've tossed in 1 or 2 new Beast Adapt cards...even as a dual class w/ Druid. Again, something they've already abandoned it seems is dual class.
I will say, I don't think it's as offensive to print Legendaries that interact with Expansion specific keywords - those cards will always be in standard together, so while the legendary is plateaued in its power level off the batt, sometimes that's okay as long as the design itself is solid. Dark Inquisitor Xanesh has a cool and powerful ability in conjunction with a Corrupt deck, and while it'd be nice to see Corrupt cards enter the game later on to develop the strategy a bit further, that's hampered by the way the expansion cycles work.
I will say though: I agree that they don't spend as much time as they could with certain mechanics. We only got 16 cards with Frenzy in Forged in the Barrens, and while I'm sure the mini set - and each mini set going forward this year - will add a few to the mix, that does make the mechanic feel hollow presently. Although, that said, with the new way the cycle works with mini sets being a thing, we'll see new cards with older expansion Keywords get made occasionally, just in those I guess.
Not every Keyword is a winner. I love Un'Goro for example, it's my favorite expansion to date. But Adapt isn't a very interesting Keyword, and its design space is so narrow I couldn't see them coming back to it in ways that feel like it was worth it. I think some of the best non-evergreen Keywords are Twinspell, Spellburst, and Overkill (it could have been cool I swear). Dual-Class is also an extremely cool mechanic with so much open design space, it's no wonder they came back to it in Darkmoon Races. Scholomance had such good mechanics, Iksar said in a twitter Q&A that he wouldn't be surprised if those mechanics made returns in the future.
Ultimately I don't really agree with the reuse of old mechanics with omission of their Keywords. Things that Recruit, for example, should just say Recruit. People who didn't play back in K&K might not know what it means off the batt, but they can just look at the Keyword and it gets explained to them. Keywords help simplify card text, they shouldn't be abandoned when the effects are reused to avoid confusing people who wouldn't be that confused about it to begin with.
It's not only about keywords, but pretty much everything in HS. They sometimes print like 4-5 cards in the first expansion of the year to start entirely new archetype (which looks promising, but it's not quite there yet to be playable) and that's it, no more cards to support it in following expansions, until next rotation arrives...
For example, why introduce new, rather weak archetype for Warlock (destroy your own deck) instead of reinforcing Soul Shard Lock from the last year or adding some support for his useless legendaries like Archwitch Willow or Deck of Chaos?
Maybe this will change with the new system... when they add specific wild cards to the core set they might add new cards in the expansions of these years which contain new cards with these keywords or synergies with them
I mean if by they "fizzle out" you mean they were designed for that one expansion and were not to be reused multiple times through out the game. The only reason keywords resurfaced in Galakrond's Awakening and Darkmoon Races was because it was kind of a "victory lap" set. Recapping the year. Which I think worked really well.
Frenzy will be back in the Wailing Caverns set, and likely the last bonus set of the year as well.
I get why they don't reuse keywords, even when they apply (like Inspire and Recruit). If you only have like... one recruit card, I think it's weirder to use the keyword than it is to just have that one set card (one standard card even) use that keyword. Not only is it confusing for new players it just feels kinda... pointless?
If they were going to reuse a key word like Inspire. I'd rather they do like... I dunno, return to the Grand Tournament or something. or "Stormwind Faire Grounds" or something. Bring back the mechanic in earnest and have a lot of cards use the keyword.
The main mechanics I'd like to see back are magnetic (just a good flavour for mechs), I wouldn't mind them taking another shot at the Worgen flipping mechanic, I wouldn't mind them bringing back twinspell, just because I think that was a really good mechanic.
But inspire, recruit, adapt, overkill... meh. I don't think those mechanics were that worth it, I wouldn't be that keen on seeing them return.
I'd say that since Mechs don't really have a "Mechanic" in the way that Dragons have "if you're holding a dragon" and Elementals have "If you played an elemental last turn", Magnetic seems like a totally reasonable way to give Mechs something like that.
Most Keywords have a lot of potential in terms of design space. Recruit, for instance, can be on the text of any card that summons a minion from the deck, but also can be placed on a minion that could potentially Recruit itself - like Patches does. Maybe a minion that Recruits all copies of itself out of your deck as a Battlecry. Inspire did see a return in a few Hunter cards in Descent of Dragons. Phase Stalker and Dragonbane are both essentially Inspire cards, and they're the strongest ones ever printed - evidence that the mechanic could work if the effort gets put in.
Overwhelm is an example of a mechanic that completely flopped because it was underutilized. Most Overkill cards didn't have Rush or Stealth, or any way to help guarantee the Overkill activation. They didn't even really get high health stats, they were given higher attack so the Overkill would happen more consistently. We just got Piercing Shot, which is functionally an Overkill card - if it deals excess damage (the Overkill prerequisite) that damage is then dealt face. Trampling Rhino does the same thing. If we had more Overkill spells, or Overkill cards that incorporated the number of excess damage dealt, Overkill would have been at the very least more interesting.
I don't think any one Keyword is so closely tied with the flavor of its expansion that they can't be taken other places. I see it moreso as something flavored to each card with a Keyword on it. Some massive Beast in the Barrens could have Overkill and it would make sense from a flavor perspective. Recruit would make perfect sense for the Horde/Alliance themed expansions, as both of them have armies that need new Recruits, and with the flavor here being a story centered around 10 Mercenaries, the idea of Recruiting a Mercenary also makes sense.
I see the idea of a single card in an expansion having a Keyword on it being confusing for new players. But since every card when looked at in game explains what each Keyword on it means, the confusion won't last. Not only that, but being confused isn't an overtly bad or totally unavoidable thing. Not only that, but it would make card text less cluttered, which is a minor but notable plus to reusing old keywords.
What bothers me most about this is that we will never see new combinations of keywords, like Magnetic + Reborn, Overkill + Frenzy, Sidequest + Twinspell, Inspire + Spellburst...
It's always new variations of rush, taunt, battlecry and deathrattle that are associated with the new keyword, sometimes stealth or divine shield, always "vanilla" keywords that we've known since the beginning, and they are most of every set.
Like every set has maybe 15 or 20 cards with the new keyword, another 20 cards with new unique text, and 80 cards with vanilla keywords, it's really lame.
Sometimes we see old keywords returning with new text and no actual keyword for the sake of confusing everyone, but they can't have a card with two old keywords in the form of huge text, like say you want a card that has the activation methods of Phase Stalker and Trampling Rhino, of course they could spell it " Inspire and Overkill : do something" but they won't, so such card will never exist.
Have they ever addressed specifically why they won't reuse keywords? Like, is it because it would be complicated for people just getting into the game?
It was really neat when they brought more corrupt, dormant and spellburst cards in with the DMR mini set, but really, why not dip back into old keywords? What is the worst thing to happen?
One area where they kind of blew this in my opinion is printing a pure Paladin legendary that is not on the same year as the other pure Paladin cards. So now the only current payoff for pure Paladin decks after rotation is the 7/5 legendary. It shows how printing a theme or keyword (sort of) can really weaken some cards because they rotate from standard at different times.
now it’s basically a guarantee no one will run pure Paladin for that single card unless they print more pure Paladin cards this year.. which again will rotate after the legendary will..
One area where they kind of blew this in my opinion is printing a pure Paladin legendary that is not on the same year as the other pure Paladin cards. So now the only current payoff for pure Paladin decks after rotation is the 7/5 legendary. It shows how printing a theme or keyword (sort of) can really weaken some cards because they rotate from standard at different times.
now it’s basically a guarantee no one will run pure Paladin for that single card unless they print more pure Paladin cards this year.. which again will rotate after the legendary will..
I also think they should reuse old keywords where they fit. The words are explained on each card, the new players need to learn somewere and this is the best way. They will run into such cards in Brawls and elsewhere inevitably.
However they also need to stop printing overly specific keywords, I think the prime example here is Adapt which is just so heavily tied to the Un'goro aesthetic but even so I can see it being reused sometimes for some beasts without too much dissonance.
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It seems to me that Blizzard moves on too fast from keywords. They just introduced Corrupt last expansion, released a slate of Corrupt cards, gave Priest a reduce Corrupt cards Legendary and now there are no new Corrupt cards in the new set. Same w/ Reborn...nothing new. Same w/ Spellburst...nothing new. And they keep introducing new keywords that will go strong for an expansion and then fizzle out most likely. I don't know...seems like they should start to scale back the whole "introduction of a new keyword" strategy and start releasing better support for keywords that already exist. Frenzy for example seems pretty weak and like it was a bit of stretch to me when Enrage already existed. I get that Enrage was permanent where Frenzy is one time but still...seems like they're running out of ideas rather than building upon the pretty good ones they had in the past.
Interested in the community thoughts and if anyone else has picked up on this.
Yep, that's the standard. Blizz does one keyword per expansion, and those keywords are specific to those expansions, with VERY few outliers. They'll even actively avoid reusing old expansion-based keywords on new cards that have nearly identical functions, completely based on this arbitrary rule they made.
its really dumb that they dont reuse keywords when they print cards with equivalent effects way later, they already have the tooltips made and they can save so much card real estate.
I don't mind them hard dropping keywords after an expansion, but id like it if they would pepper in a few from time to time with the keyword included.
I think Frenzy is a cool idea and very fitting for the next expansion, but I agree with the general point that they should probably keep building on existing keywords for at least the standard year they are introduced in. Having support for an expansion keyword appear over multiple years has the danger of becoming Gorillabot A-3 where the card is still in standard but all of its support was sent to Wild. Frenzy as a mechanic has the potential to be very strong, but with just the cards we see in Barrens it seems under-utilized.
Corrupt specifically is so fitting(Thematically and gameplay-wise) for the Old God theme that I'm fine with that being a one expansion keyword, especially since the cards we already have are very strong and don't really need additional support, but more general keywords like Inspire, Frenzy, Spellburst, Magnetic, Invoke and Recruit are something I'd find interesting as recurring mechanics. Invoke is somewhat similar to Corrupt in how tied it is to an expansion but they could make either a new set with different heroes to Invoke or make it work with basic hero powers. They could of course go back to Corrupt too if they decide to go back to Old Gods or some other nefarious themes later, but for now I think we have a good Corrupt package already in standard.
My thoughts exactly - don't mind the new stuff to keep the game fresh...that's always healthy. But it doesn't make sense to totally abandon stuff only to re-brand it later w/ a new little wrinkle.
Adapt is an interesting key word too, but too bad, it never sees the day to return since Jounrey to Un'Goro expansion.
Yes! Would love to see Adapt back in some new cards. Since Hunter is relatively weak this expansion in terms of new cards introduced, just imagine if they would've tossed in 1 or 2 new Beast Adapt cards...even as a dual class w/ Druid. Again, something they've already abandoned it seems is dual class.
I will say, I don't think it's as offensive to print Legendaries that interact with Expansion specific keywords - those cards will always be in standard together, so while the legendary is plateaued in its power level off the batt, sometimes that's okay as long as the design itself is solid. Dark Inquisitor Xanesh has a cool and powerful ability in conjunction with a Corrupt deck, and while it'd be nice to see Corrupt cards enter the game later on to develop the strategy a bit further, that's hampered by the way the expansion cycles work.
I will say though: I agree that they don't spend as much time as they could with certain mechanics. We only got 16 cards with Frenzy in Forged in the Barrens, and while I'm sure the mini set - and each mini set going forward this year - will add a few to the mix, that does make the mechanic feel hollow presently. Although, that said, with the new way the cycle works with mini sets being a thing, we'll see new cards with older expansion Keywords get made occasionally, just in those I guess.
Not every Keyword is a winner. I love Un'Goro for example, it's my favorite expansion to date. But Adapt isn't a very interesting Keyword, and its design space is so narrow I couldn't see them coming back to it in ways that feel like it was worth it. I think some of the best non-evergreen Keywords are Twinspell, Spellburst, and Overkill (it could have been cool I swear). Dual-Class is also an extremely cool mechanic with so much open design space, it's no wonder they came back to it in Darkmoon Races. Scholomance had such good mechanics, Iksar said in a twitter Q&A that he wouldn't be surprised if those mechanics made returns in the future.
Ultimately I don't really agree with the reuse of old mechanics with omission of their Keywords. Things that Recruit, for example, should just say Recruit. People who didn't play back in K&K might not know what it means off the batt, but they can just look at the Keyword and it gets explained to them. Keywords help simplify card text, they shouldn't be abandoned when the effects are reused to avoid confusing people who wouldn't be that confused about it to begin with.
please don't bully my son
So far the best key word is Discover xD
It's not only about keywords, but pretty much everything in HS. They sometimes print like 4-5 cards in the first expansion of the year to start entirely new archetype (which looks promising, but it's not quite there yet to be playable) and that's it, no more cards to support it in following expansions, until next rotation arrives...
For example, why introduce new, rather weak archetype for Warlock (destroy your own deck) instead of reinforcing Soul Shard Lock from the last year or adding some support for his useless legendaries like Archwitch Willow or Deck of Chaos?
Blizzard in the nutshell...
Discoverstone :(
Maybe this will change with the new system... when they add specific wild cards to the core set they might add new cards in the expansions of these years which contain new cards with these keywords or synergies with them
I mean if by they "fizzle out" you mean they were designed for that one expansion and were not to be reused multiple times through out the game. The only reason keywords resurfaced in Galakrond's Awakening and Darkmoon Races was because it was kind of a "victory lap" set. Recapping the year. Which I think worked really well.
Frenzy will be back in the Wailing Caverns set, and likely the last bonus set of the year as well.
I get why they don't reuse keywords, even when they apply (like Inspire and Recruit). If you only have like... one recruit card, I think it's weirder to use the keyword than it is to just have that one set card (one standard card even) use that keyword. Not only is it confusing for new players it just feels kinda... pointless?
If they were going to reuse a key word like Inspire. I'd rather they do like... I dunno, return to the Grand Tournament or something. or "Stormwind Faire Grounds" or something. Bring back the mechanic in earnest and have a lot of cards use the keyword.
The main mechanics I'd like to see back are magnetic (just a good flavour for mechs), I wouldn't mind them taking another shot at the Worgen flipping mechanic, I wouldn't mind them bringing back twinspell, just because I think that was a really good mechanic.
But inspire, recruit, adapt, overkill... meh. I don't think those mechanics were that worth it, I wouldn't be that keen on seeing them return.
What annoys me a lot is that they don't keep existing keywords in use. Why the hell doesn't Dragonbane use Inspire?
Take a walk on the wild side...
I'd say that since Mechs don't really have a "Mechanic" in the way that Dragons have "if you're holding a dragon" and Elementals have "If you played an elemental last turn", Magnetic seems like a totally reasonable way to give Mechs something like that.
Most Keywords have a lot of potential in terms of design space. Recruit, for instance, can be on the text of any card that summons a minion from the deck, but also can be placed on a minion that could potentially Recruit itself - like Patches does. Maybe a minion that Recruits all copies of itself out of your deck as a Battlecry. Inspire did see a return in a few Hunter cards in Descent of Dragons. Phase Stalker and Dragonbane are both essentially Inspire cards, and they're the strongest ones ever printed - evidence that the mechanic could work if the effort gets put in.
Overwhelm is an example of a mechanic that completely flopped because it was underutilized. Most Overkill cards didn't have Rush or Stealth, or any way to help guarantee the Overkill activation. They didn't even really get high health stats, they were given higher attack so the Overkill would happen more consistently. We just got Piercing Shot, which is functionally an Overkill card - if it deals excess damage (the Overkill prerequisite) that damage is then dealt face. Trampling Rhino does the same thing. If we had more Overkill spells, or Overkill cards that incorporated the number of excess damage dealt, Overkill would have been at the very least more interesting.
I don't think any one Keyword is so closely tied with the flavor of its expansion that they can't be taken other places. I see it moreso as something flavored to each card with a Keyword on it. Some massive Beast in the Barrens could have Overkill and it would make sense from a flavor perspective. Recruit would make perfect sense for the Horde/Alliance themed expansions, as both of them have armies that need new Recruits, and with the flavor here being a story centered around 10 Mercenaries, the idea of Recruiting a Mercenary also makes sense.
I see the idea of a single card in an expansion having a Keyword on it being confusing for new players. But since every card when looked at in game explains what each Keyword on it means, the confusion won't last. Not only that, but being confused isn't an overtly bad or totally unavoidable thing. Not only that, but it would make card text less cluttered, which is a minor but notable plus to reusing old keywords.
please don't bully my son
What bothers me most about this is that we will never see new combinations of keywords, like Magnetic + Reborn, Overkill + Frenzy, Sidequest + Twinspell, Inspire + Spellburst...
It's always new variations of rush, taunt, battlecry and deathrattle that are associated with the new keyword, sometimes stealth or divine shield, always "vanilla" keywords that we've known since the beginning, and they are most of every set.
Like every set has maybe 15 or 20 cards with the new keyword, another 20 cards with new unique text, and 80 cards with vanilla keywords, it's really lame.
Sometimes we see old keywords returning with new text and no actual keyword for the sake of confusing everyone, but they can't have a card with two old keywords in the form of huge text, like say you want a card that has the activation methods of Phase Stalker and Trampling Rhino, of course they could spell it " Inspire and Overkill : do something" but they won't, so such card will never exist.
Have they ever addressed specifically why they won't reuse keywords? Like, is it because it would be complicated for people just getting into the game?
It was really neat when they brought more corrupt, dormant and spellburst cards in with the DMR mini set, but really, why not dip back into old keywords? What is the worst thing to happen?
One area where they kind of blew this in my opinion is printing a pure Paladin legendary that is not on the same year as the other pure Paladin cards. So now the only current payoff for pure Paladin decks after rotation is the 7/5 legendary. It shows how printing a theme or keyword (sort of) can really weaken some cards because they rotate from standard at different times.
now it’s basically a guarantee no one will run pure Paladin for that single card unless they print more pure Paladin cards this year.. which again will rotate after the legendary will..
It happened before. Oblivitron :(
I also think they should reuse old keywords where they fit. The words are explained on each card, the new players need to learn somewere and this is the best way. They will run into such cards in Brawls and elsewhere inevitably.
However they also need to stop printing overly specific keywords, I think the prime example here is Adapt which is just so heavily tied to the Un'goro aesthetic but even so I can see it being reused sometimes for some beasts without too much dissonance.