imgur album for ease of viewing
The Spiritwalker
(Hero power can be used without a minion on the board)
According to Wowpedia:
Spiritwalkers have a powerful connection to their ancestral heritage. Capable of channeling ancestral spirits through their body, spirit walkers are revered in tauren and orc societies for the history and wisdom they carry within them. The eyes of a spirit walker are ancient and shine with the light of a thousand souls. Their bodies are vessels, conduits from the realm of the dead to the world of the living. Spirit walkers are often looked upon with awe and fear by their brethren. A spirit walker strong enough to bear the weight of so many souls achieves a mystical transcendence, embodying the collective will and experience of the generations that are reaching out to him.
Class Identity:Strengths
- Single target/lone minions. The Spiritwalker doesn't do handbuffs or board buffs, but focuses on building up single minions and making sure it has a persistent board presence that can stand against even the widest enemy boards.
- Health Restore/Addition. While there are some similarities to Priest, healing is a means to an end rather than an archetype for the spiritwalker.
- Slow-burn weapons. A weapon that is better suited to attacking minions than going face is just a taste of the kind of unorthodox board control that Spiritwalker will introduce.
- Death-based effects. There will be a lot more minion demise related cards (not necessarily deathrattles) in initiate/core sets.
- Card draw/generation. To keep up with your opponent, Spiritwalkers need every opportunity they can get to level the playing field, and that means card draw/generation.
- Taunt, and other keywords that significantly obstruct your opponent.
Limitations
- Low AOE potential. Board clears will usually be conditional and expensive, but they create swing turns to build up big minions.
Weaknesses
- Low burst damage. Spiritwalker isn't inherently a class that rushes to the finish line (even though there is potential for early game snowball), so don't expect much in the way of smorc.
More Lore:
Tauren and orcs hold spirit walkers in near reverence, yet they also fear them. A spirit walker lives only partially in the mortal world. His mind roams freely, and countless personalities enter his memories and his thoughts. When speaking to a spirit walker one can never be entirely certain that only the spirit walker responds, for they speak with the voices of the ancient ancestors. Elderly spirit walkers sometimes lose all memories of their original selves, slipping from one spirit to the next without warning or control. The stress of handling so many souls turns a spirit walker's pelt or hair snow-white over the years. Some tribes consider a tauren born with a white pelt to be destined to become a spirit walker. Such children sometimes refuse their destiny, but almost all give in eventually. Elder tauren have been known to develop spirit walker powers sometimes only days before their deaths.
The loyalty a spirit walker feels for his community is zealous. The spirits of countless ancestors fill his mind, impressing a powerful need upon their host to guide and safeguard the tribe. Despite this devotion, a spirit walker is often set apart from his others. He knows his friend not only as his friend, but as the child of a slain warrior spirit, as the grandchild of an elderly spirit, as the parent or sibling of a mournful child spirit. This makes any personal relationships complicated and very difficult. A spirit walker is a loner who sits apart from his others but defends them fanatically in times of peril. The rest of the tribe senses this conflict within a spirit walker, and while they treat their spirit walker with great respect and deference, they will resist forming close relationships with him to avoid further complicating his life. Spirit walkers rarely establish families. They live apart from the tribe they devote themselves to forever.
The only culture in Azeroth's history known to have brought forth the spirit walkers are the formerly nomadic tauren tribes. However, the orcish people have steadily been returning to the shamanistic practices of their Draenor ancestors, and the far seers of the Horde have taken a growing interest in the mystic phenomenon of spirit walking. Whether orc spirit walkers may have existed in Draenor's ancient past or not is lost to history, but when tauren and orcish shamans established contact with one another the tauren discerned that their orcish peers showed the potential for this level of spiritual awakening. To many of the orc shamans, the path of the spirit walker represents the only means left to them by which to recover the lost wisdom of their forebears.
Spirit walkers can use tauren halberds and tauren totems.
Showcase Cards
Have you ever been hit over the head with a tree? This guy hasn't been, but he might know a thing or two about it anyway...
I'm a lot better at my rites of solitude than my lefts of solitude.
Anduin has a patent on 'resurrect' effects.
• Unyielding Chieftain is a mid to late-game defensive option that packs a punch against token decks, especially when paired with buffs like Rite of Solitude or Anima Infusion. It can also be pulled from Rematerialize.
• Rite of Solitude can be used to establish an early advantage that can stop your opponent developing a wide board (used on Truesight Saber for example) and even put pressure on them.
• Rematerialize can pull that legendary minion your opponent killed, or the taunt that's been keeping you alive. An excellent combo piece/defensive tool.
Remaining Cards
Challenge
If it wasn't evident, the class is directly WoW-related. However, since spirit walkers are unplayable, there are not really any compelling associated spells in the game.
2
Hey! Filipuntik/Flippz/spin#8192 here with the final competition entry. After many years, I've finally been able to catch the custom class competition around these places, and could put my ideas for a custom class to use. In a bit of backstory, I've had the concept of a "Gunner" class bouncing around on paper at least since 2018, with most of the themes that are present in this finalist entry already down. In this post where I present what the class would look like after the release of Forged in the Barrens, with the Basic and "Initiate" set filtered into a Core set for the class as well as said expansion's cards. I'd also like finally like to go more into detail regarding my design intentions with some of these cards and themes, as opposed to the flavorful descriptions I've been writing in the previous rounds of this competition.
If you'd like to see how the class has been evolving over the summer, check out the following forum posts or imgur albums:
Basic (imgur) | | Initiate, pt. 1 | | Initiate, pt. 2 (imgur) | | The Boomsday Project (imgur)
Apologies for the Boomsday Project post looking so drab, but my full write-up got flagged as spam, and I had to squeeze out a barebones version to qualify. Anyway, without much further ado, let's dive right in!
Bomber, relentless, inventive and reckless. They dive into the fight head-first and quickly move onto unloading all of their firepower as quickly as possible. However, they can also perform as decent tacticians, using their firepower to take control over the battlefield in their own manner. They're rarely in for the long haul, though, and pack reactive action in favor of longevity. Such is the deadly mix of a class that features plenty of damage to itself, but, at this moment, absolutely no healing.
Core Set
Design Notes
It is probably worth mentioning that the origin of this class comes from a top-down design. Originally, the class was supposed to revolve around a League of Legends character, no less, but I was mildly aware of having to scrap that for the actual competition. It changes nothing about the class's identity as a fast and reckless class.
What helps sell that is the Hero Power. It has gone through many iterations over those three years, only arriving at its current form now, partially thanks to Demon Hunter introducing a 1-Cost Hero Power. At first, the Hero Power interacted with a keyword I'd refer to as Reload, which effectively just refreshed the Hero Power, which dealt damage. From this stemmed the idea of having a Hero Power that would deal considerable damage but only every other cast, or a Hero Power that would store 2-damage charges, and could be charged by itself or via certain class cards. This idea generally came to a halt when it came to considering under what circumstances Hero Powers refresh themselves, though. An alternative path for this Hero Power began with "Deal 1 damage to a target and both heroes", so effectively Mage's Hero Power with extra burn. This is the one that eventually led to Bombs Away! as it is today.
Originally, there was a keyword in development, called Fuse (X). A card's Fuse would count down every turn, and if it reaches zero, the card explodes in your hand and, in its most basic form, you draw a new one. The biggest trouble with this keyword was that there was a very narrow space between numbers low enough that players would only run those cards and hold onto them for the free cycle, and numbers too high to evoke the sense of urgency that the Bomber exudes with its burn through deck and hero Health. Spare a moment of Silence for the two cards in the original Initiate/Boot Camp set which featured this keyword spelled out. Thus, the class itself features no keywords, but it sports a pair of mechanics (well, one is only a token) mostly unique to itself, as far as Core sets are concerned.
Rockets
Rockets are the very simple token that Bombers utilize throughout combat. Weak on their own, they mostly work add extra damage to other, bigger sources. They can also be combined with Spell Damage to provide strong bursts of damage to whittle down your opponent. Originally, the Initiate/Boot Camp set featured various ways to power up Rockets beyond that, but I believe that with the necessity to keep the Core set rather simple, empowering Rockets should be the job of various expansions.
The wording of cards that generate Rockets has been changed. So far, it was the norm for them to spell out that Rockets deal 1 damage. With Core, however, the text changes to parentheses for Core cards: (that deal 1 damage), meaning that expansion cards can do away without this explanation.
Temporary Armor
Easily the biggest head-tilter from the whole class. Gameplay-wise, of course, the numbers are bloated, but Armor in Bomber serves double duty as a defense against your opponent's damage, but your own, too -- and if you choose to break your own Armor with self-damage effects, at least you know it's not going to waste! Of course, the real issue that may come to mind is floatiness and interaction with regular Armor. It's a valid question, but often I feel like people approach it with the worst possible execution in mind.
For starters, every instance of Temporary Armor says "for 1 turn". This wording is deliberate not because the number can be treated as a tweakable variable, but instead to mimic the wording of Rastakhan Rumble's Spirit minions' "Stealth for 1 turn". With this precedent, this Armor then breaks at the start of your turn. Then, due to the lack of regular Armor in Bomber, in 99 % of cases, if enemy Bomber has Armor up, it'll go away at the start of their next turn.
In the odd case of a stack of regular and temporary Armor, temporary Armor would break first before the regular one, similarly to how regular Armor covers Health. It's up to debate whether these niche cases would require visual indication. Something as minor as recoloring the digits of the indicator would probably do the job.
Enough of that. Time to get back to the Core set.
New Cards
These are the three brand new cards introduced into the Core set. Fully Loaded is a general purpose card meant to support various Bomber decks by providing extra cards from relevant categories or doubling as a Rocket generator. Foundry Giant is an Armor-related Epic mech that replaces Gigantabot, which required too much Armor gain cards to function. Its synergy wasn't very welcome in a Core set. Similarly, Shanna Sparkfizz replaces Siegecrafter Blackfuse, whose presence warranted too much of a Rocket generation. Somewhat fitting for his assistant to replace him (actual boss encounter nonwithstanding), and she instead provides a real handful of Rockets on demand, instead of relying on several cards over the course of the game.
Redone Card
Reload is the one card undergoing a major change, similar to Hunter's Tracking. The incentive behind this change is to put the spell down to 1 Mana as oppoosed to the original price tag of (2). However, to theoretically maintain the amount of Mana saved by fulfilling the condition, the reduction has moved onto the drawn spell. This spell is included to fuel general spell and Fire spell decks. In the Bomber class, Fire synergy is boosted by the Rocket tokens.
Touched-up Cards
Powder Monkey now follows other (1) 3/1 minions in the game with its +1 Attack buff, adding some damage to aggressive decks that wish to utilize Rockets as a source of face damage. Handheld Zapper's Armor gain has been bumped up from 3 to 5 to better reflect the game's new power levels and find its place in weapon decks as more than just a weapon to trigger synergies. It goes similarly for Hand Cannon, but its +1 Attack buff also increases the class's mid- to late-game threat, packing a higher potential damage output than a Doomhammer.
Both Iron Star and Special Delivery have had their Costs cut down by (1) to ensure they can come out earlier in more aggressive metas, following the buffs done to cards such as Flamestirke and Assassinate.
Unchanged Cards
To support Bomber's fast-paced gameplay, Burning Up is printed, virtually without a downside if you're willing to take that damage, or block it with your Armor. Speaking of which, Evasive Maneuvers fulfills a similar niche if you find yourself in a pinch for Armor. Finally, Zapcrafter is brought back. Originally, this minion was considered for a small buff, perhaps an extra point of Spell Damage. However, she is kept as she was to support the countless Rockets and other damaging spells.
As an all-around card, Goblin Shredder comes in to support Mechs, self-damage and aggresive archetypes at once. Control decks get, in turn, Landmine, unchanged, now comparing a little closer to Assassinate, but still cheaper at dealing with a majority of targets.
Finally, a pair of cards to help out weapon-centric decks, both hailing from The Boomsday Poject set. Recuperator fulfills a role similar to Reload! pictured above, offering cycling useful for such decks. Then, Ion Ray, a solid midrange weapon with effectively Armor on demand.
With Core having laid down most of the building blocks for archetypes, it was time to flesh out two of those in this expansion: Fire spells and Mechs. As far as Fire spells are concerned, it's something I've been looking forward to for a while (having even accidentally posted a Fire synergy card in a pre-spell school set). Of course, not only do Bombers boast an exciting array of collectable Fire spells, but their Rocket tokens also bear the Fire school, meaning that those can enable further synergies. It's almost a shame there's not more school synergy card in the set just yet, perhaps Stormwind could fix that, which would also break in that hero attack synergy. Mechs serve double duty in the Barrens, as they come cheap (including the Neutral Core mechs), but many of them also provide means of defense. The Mech synergy part of this set focuses on Ratchet, a small goblin colony set up by Gazlowe and actively trading with various goblin-run cities and settlements across from the Barrens.
Forged in the Barrens Set
Design Notes
Fire spells
Mechs
Looking back...
...I'm glad I have been able to participate in this competition. It's been fun watching all the other classes grow and evolve as well, and being able to finally jot down the old Gunner idea and flesh it out. This is the first time I've ever created a class, and I do hope it's not the last as well. Chances are I'll be back in a year. Now, one last thing remains to be done with the Bomber: the borders. If you use the {{CCLASS=gunner6201}} tag on HearthCards, you can use the existing border, custom-made for this class. However, if you wish to make a hero card, you'll find a WIP border instead. I've never got around to finishing that one, and might at the tail end of updating the colors and contrast of the existing border. This may or may not have anything to do with the fact that hero cards usually feature permanent Armor, and this class deals in temporary ones. Additionally, I'd like to add different color versions of the target reticle decals for general purpose. But barring that, I suppose it is until next year from now onwards-
1
This is a replacement post for my "flagged as spam" submission to properly enter:
Returning tokens
Showcase cards
Full set
COMMON
RARE
EPIC
LEGENDARY INVENTION
LEGENDARY INVENTOR
Challenge
BANE: No Deathrattles (1)
BOON: 4 cards showcased (1)
Bomber hero border soon? 😳
1
This is what happens when you only find out about the comp two days in advance.
Bombers. Sure is a difficult job! It's a profession shared by gnomes and goblins alike, even if gnomes are more concerned with how, and goblins with how much. That's not to say that others can't get in on the fun, with dwarven artillerymen, human cannoneers, and even the vulpera getting in on some of that firearm fun every once in a while.
A Bomber doesn't waste time and throws themselves into the fray instantly. The fuses are too short to figure out long-term strategies, or to fall back and heal. Get in and blast your opponent and their minions sky high before they can do the same to you.
In combat, Bombers don't heal. They flex their inventions and ingenuity to protect themselves from foes and their own equipment alike, and then, they unload. A rich collection of Fire spells ensures that no board poses a threat to a Bomber, wide or tall. Truly, the greatest threat to themselves... is themselves.
Thanks to the wording of Rastakhan Rumble's Spirits, your Armor for 1 turn consistently breaks at the start of your turn, thus being clear for 99 % of the time. If it happens to get mixed with regular Armor, the interactions can be inferred by the rule that "Armor for 1 turn is to Armor what Armor is to Health", as in, you lose your temporary Armor first.
Class themes:
Armor for 1 turn, Fire spells, Mechs, big spells, damage to own face (recklessness, of course)
Strenghts: Board control, powerful spells, weapons and direct damage
Limitations: Card draw, resource generation
Weaknesses: Healing, wide boards
Basic Set:
Armor:
Bomber's (currently) only own form of damage mitigation is via Armor for 1 turn, which will mostly come in handy to soften the impact of attacking as well as the various effects that damage your hero (including the Hero Power). With the exception of Special Delivery, a Bomber is expected to lose their temporary Armor on the same turn they gain it.
Drawback cards:
Bomber's main drawback, tanking a lot of damage, can be converted back into value via the Goblin Flanker. In terms of damaging your own hero, outside the Hero Power, you may want to play the Goblin Shredder to accelerate the game for yourself, or trade taking a face full of your opponent's swarmed board for just some meager burns coming from handling the Iron Star, a powerful goblin siege explosive. Hey, looks like goblins have really got a grip on this whole recklessness business.
Control cards:
Alongside Special Delivery and Iron Star, Bombers boast two more Fire spells that ensure that the only damage they are taking is from their own cards. Landmine specifically mitigates the damage a minion could dish out by attacking, but will not remove those pesky folk that your opponent will gladly pass up on attacking with if it means they get to keep their Emperor Thaurissan alive. Air Strike serves to knock out medium-sized threats, with the extra ping from your Hero Power serving to clean up the remainders.
Damage output:
Right, so you've been dutifully following safety regulations to mitigate damage to your own hero, now, the question is, how are you going to damage your opponent? Perhaps borrow a perk from the dwarven Mortar Team, their Imbued Gunpowder, ready to put an extra oomph into a minion's swing. Or fit yourself with the powerful Hand Cannon and begin making dents in your opponent's defenses, skull and dreams. And perhaps once you complete the Bomber's Training Camp, you might find more tools to spice up your gunplay with.
Challenges:
- Special Delivery costs (9), hopefully fulfilling the "7 or more" condition.
- In terms of Warcraft lore, the following tidbits have been borrowed: Imbued Gunpowder being a perk from the Warcraft III Mortar Team unit, Goblin Shredder apparently being the title that just so happens to coincide with all the Shredders that spew fire, and, most important of all, Iron Star referencing the powerful goblin siege tool/explosive built by Siegecrafter Blackfuse. Too bad it doesn't boast a good piece of art to go with, so a giant explosion going off has to make up for it.
Border:
The custom border put together for the Bomber class is currently available on HearthCards when using the tag {{CCLASS=gunner6201}}, and composes of a minion, spell and weapon border. Heroes and Hero Powers are usually presented with the Neutral borders, and the border for a hero card may come in the future.