Five Card Nerfs Coming in the Next Hearthstone Update - Druids, Win Axe, Murlocs, Hex
Five card changes are coming to Hearthstone in an upcoming patch which brings nerfs to several fan favourites, three being basic cards.
- The reason for nerfs to basic cards is due to too many cards from this set being included in those classes' decks.
- They're trying to limit additions to the Hall of Fame, so they're instead nerfing Murloc Warleader.
Discuss the Nerf Discuss the Nerf Discuss the Nerf
Discuss the Nerf Discuss the Nerf
Blog Post
In an upcoming update, we will be making balance changes to the following cards:
Innervate
Now reads: Gain 1 Mana Crystal this turn only. (Down from 2)
Fiery War Axe
Now costs 3 mana. (Up from 2)
Hex
Now costs 4 mana. (Up from 3)
Murloc Warleader
Now reads: Your other Murlocs have +2 Attack. (Down from +2 Attack, +1 Health)
Spreading Plague
Now costs 6 mana. (Up from 5)
Developer’s Note: Basic Cards and Our Stance on Hall of Fame
After careful consideration, we chose to make changes to three Basic class cards: Innervate, Fiery War Axe, and Hex. While they can be regarded as staples in those classes’ card repertoires, too many Basic and Classic cards played in individual decks means less fun when new expansions are released.
Cards in the Basic set serve several purposes in the game, so we would rather make balance adjustments to them instead of moving them to the Hall of Fame, like we have done for cards in the Classic set. We are also trying to limit Hall of Fame changes to the start of each Hearthstone Year, which is why Murloc Warleader—a Classic card—is receiving a balance change instead of moving to the Hall of Fame.
Innervate
Several powerful variations of Druid are currently seeing play, and all of them utilize Innervate. Innervate creates explosive starts to the game that can be difficult for the opposing player to recover from. This change leaves Innervate as a simple Basic card and slows down the explosive start potential, while ensuring that it will be utilized in decks that revolve around playing inexpensive spells.
What other changes did we consider?
We considered a few other options for Innervate:
- Refresh 2 Mana Crystals.
- Gain 2 Mana Crystals this turn only and increase the mana cost to 1.
- Gain 6 Mana Crystals this turn only and increase the mana cost to 4.
Since Innervate is a basic card, we need it to be clear and simple. Along with Wild Growth, these cards inform newer players that Druids create mana as a part of their class identity.
We kept in mind that cards like Counterfeit Coin were strong in combination with other support cards, such as Gadgetzan Auctioneer, Edwin VanCleef, and Combo cards. With the right support cards for Innervate, it may end up still seeing play, but won’t be in every deck—which is ultimately what we’re aiming for with this change.
Fiery War Axe
Fiery War Axe has been a powerful Warrior weapon since the launch of Hearthstone. Already great tempo for its cost, Fiery War Axe is well complimented by Pirates and cards that synergize with weapons. Raising its mana cost by 1 will slow down the Warrior’s tempo and lower the overall power level of the card.
What other changes did we consider?
The other option we considered for Fiery War Axe was to lower its attack to 2, but that change didn’t feel intuitive enough. Generally, changing the mana cost of a card is less disruptive, because you can always see the mana cost of cards in your hand. Despite the increased mana cost of Fiery War Axe, we expect that it will still see play—other 3 mana 3/2 weapons, like Eaglehorn Bow, can be found in decks that may not have synergy with the weapon’s card text.
Hex
We’re not making the change to Hex due to a current power-level problem. Shaman is a class that currently has a lot of flexibility, but is lacking in both class identity and identifiable weaknesses. Changing Hex makes Shaman a bit weaker against big minions and worse at silencing—having both strengths and weaknesses in a class is important.
We are very wary of cards that also incidentally work as a silence. If a player wants to utilize a card with a silence effect, they should be giving up something else. For example, if a player decides to include Spellbreaker in their deck, then they are playing a card that is weak in some situations. Priest is an exception to this rule—silence is a part of their class identity.
Even though Hex is not always played in the more aggressive Shaman decks, we will be making this forward-thinking change with the overall identity of the class in mind. This includes avoiding Shaman cards that function as direct and powerful removal. We will continue moving forward with this design philosophy to help reinforce that ideal.
Developer’s Note: Regarding Murloc Warleader and Spreading Plague
Murloc Warleader
Murlocs are good at taking an early lead, and if a player can’t clear the board in time, the game can ultimately snowball to victory using cards like Murloc Warleader. Removing the Health buff from Murloc Warleader will make it easier for players to clear the board of murlocs, and still have it remain a Classic build-around card. Simplifying health buff interactions is an additional benefit of this change. For example, in its current state, having a Murloc Warleader in play then using Wild Pyromancer and Equality would not destroy other murlocs on the board, leading to unclear interactions for some players.
What other changes did you consider?
We considered changing both Rockpool Hunter and Murloc Warleader due to the current strength of Murloc Paladin in the early stages of the game. Changing either Rockpool Hunter or Murloc Warleader would accomplish this, but there are extra advantages to changing just Murloc Warleader: The simplification of health-giving buffs and additional room for future Murlocs since Warleader will be around longer than Rockpool Hunter.
Spreading Plague
Spreading Plague is a great defensive tool for Druid to protect themselves against aggressive decks, but it was too efficient at 5 mana. Raising the mana cost to 6 will slow the card down slightly, while still allowing for the defensive minions Spreading Plague creates to be utilized in the later stages of the game.
What other changes did you consider?
We considered changing Spreading Plague to 7 mana rather than 6, since it is currently the top performing card in Jade and Taunt Druid decks. However, since we are also changing Innervate, we decided to only add 1 mana to the cost of Spreading Plague.
Developer’s Note: Regarding Other Community Card Discussions
The community has mentioned other cards in balance-related discussions, such as Ice Block and Ultimate Infestation, and we wanted to talk about those cards as well even though we are not making any changes to them at this time.
Ultimate Infestation
Our team has discussed making a change to Ultimate Infestation since it feels bad to lose to. However, our data shows us how good each individual card performs in a deck relative to other cards in that deck. Spreading Plague ended up being the best performing card in Jade and Taunt Druid, Innervate was in the top three, and Ultimate Infestation was somewhere around the middle—but it felt much more powerful since it has a huge effect when played.
We considered changing all mentions of the number 5 in Ultimate Infestation to 4, or removing one of the effects entirely. With the other changes we are making to Druid, ramping out Ultimate Infestation before turn 10 should happen less often, so we decided to leave it as is.
Ice Block
We’ve seen discussions about moving Ice Block to the Hall of Fame. As previously mentioned, moving cards to the Hall of Fame occurs at the start of the Hearthstone Year, which will occur with the first expansion release in 2018. Our general stance regarding Hall of Fame is that we want to avoid moving cards mid-year.
We are excited for these changes, and we look forward to seeing how they will shake up the game.
Once these card changes are live, players will be able to disenchant the changed non-Basic cards (Murloc Warleader and Spreading Plague) for their full Arcane Dust value for two weeks. Basic cards cannot be disenchanted and will not be available for an Arcane Dust refund.
C'MON! WHERE INFESTATION NERF???&?&?&& *ASS ON FIRE*
So while we are at it just nerf Frostbolt and fireball because all mage decks play that.
Also both power words removal from Priest.
Also remove fire totem.
And so on.
#FlawedLogic
Blizzard are stupid.
They nerf Druid cards that won't make any difference, Jade Druid will still be played, but nerf a key card in a deck that is succesful against Jade Druid, so now it's got one counter deck less. They don't nerf Priest, which is the second broken class only surpassed by Druid, but nerf Hex, the only nearly reliable counter to broken Big Priest. And nerf a Warrior card nobody cares about.
That's brutal for aggro decks!
But the jade problem will still be there unfortunately...
Why do people on this site even play the game? You complain for nerfs but nothing on the level of Warsong Commander or Starving Buzzard. The nerfs this time all make sense and still make the cards potential inclusions in decks, not automatic inclusions. And yet, everyone is still complaining. If you hate the game, stop playing. I for one am happy with the changes and if things aren't changed up enough, Team 5 will look into nerfing more.
This honestly just really gets under my skin. We were all hopeful that jade druid would die, but instead they nerf some of the most iconic cards of 3 different classes. Warrior in particular gets under my skin. Firey war axe was arguably always OP, but now Hunter and Paladin both just have stronger Fiery War Axes, with Eaglehorn Bow and Rallying Blade. Warriors should have the strongest weapons just from a thematic standpoint, and nobody was really complaining about the Win axe anyway, despite understanding the strength of it. If they really wanted to nerf Firey Win axe due to the synergy with pirates, they should've made it have the effect "Cannot hit enemy heroes with this weapon equipped." There, problem solved, since he can no longer just keep hitting your face over and over due to cards that increase the weapons attack and durability like Upgrade! and Bloodsail Cultist. I still think this nerf has come one expansion too late either way regardless.
I'm not fond of the innervate changes, the others seem alright, although somewhat unwarranted. Murloc Warleader is one of the win conditions of the classic murloc deck, get a lot of early game minions then play the warleader to trade, and the health let you actually trade considering how little health almost all murlocs have. The reason they gave is silly too, the Equality Wild Pyromancer combo already requires fairly deep knowledge of the game, it's simple logic to understand it won't kill other murlocs when warleader is on the board too. Maybe I've had different experiences from the standard hearthstone player, though I've never thought murloc paladin was a deck deserving of a nerf anyway.
The Spreading plague nerf is good though. Yeah, can't fault Hearthstone there. Really thought they'd be nerfing Jade Idol though, genuinely very confused why they didn't. That card alone has the potential to go infinite in the late game after all, and if that's not reason enough, the Lich King was a breeze to defeat with your standard jade druid deck too!
FWA could have needed an additional effect. Still, at least it opens up the 2 mana slot for warrior weapons, which was not possible before due to how good FWA was. Expect to see more/better weapons for warrior now in expansions. That said, good riddance. No more turn 2 FWA a 100% against every warrior.
Hex is now on-par with other removals, albeit still slightly better in most cases. One hand, that's fair, on the other, it kinda robs shaman of its one shining staple removal card, which is kinda sad. It's a justifiable change, but not one that was needed probably. They could have made the token stronger instead for instance, that would leave the card intact but makes it a bit less of an tempo and stat swing.
Innervate is now RIP. It's still strong on turn 1 into ramp, but that's the only use, so it probably won't see much play now. I would have prefered a nerf to a different card tbh.
Spreading Plague. Good change. It is indeed one of the biggest offenders in Druid's power level, as it simply deals with their biggest weakness.
Warleader. Thank god. That's the perfect change. Emphasizes the aggro nature of Murlocs and leaves the card mainly intact, while leaving the opponent a chance to catch up by allowing for easier board clears. Probably my favorite change.
Thank you for having a level head and seeing the good in these changes unlike most on this site.
I'm happy with these nerfs, especially that Murloc Warleader. I hate the card so much.
Blizzard Devs must have been playing a different game, they dont have a clue about what they are doing...
I agree totally with blizzard: Ultimate Infestation did not need a nerf. The main culprit was Innervate because it make UI playable on turn 6 (even turn 4 if they ramp). Innervate is a huge problem in Aggro Druid too, because of Vicious Fledgling on turn 1, or having 2 pirates and 2 Elementals at 2/3 on turn 1/2.
Finally the day has come,Fiery Win Axe will be nerfed,been waiting for this since beta.
Those nerfs are retarded. Blizzard really want kill this game, fuck them.
Mine as well make Truesilver 5 mana while they're at it. Morons.
LuL
Why Not Fiery War Axe can atack only minions...
I guess this could "confuse the new players" -.- ...