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.
Innervate - Yes its coin now, but its coin that is in basic set and will be there all the time (if not moved to hall of fame). And this still gives ramp to Druid but at least not insane one (Flappy Bird turn 1).
Fiery Win Axe - I love that change. FWA is damn basic card and was better than most rare and epic cards. Basic cards should be ...well, basic not OP as hell.
Hex - in line with Polymorph, all fine for me.
Warleader - All those interactions with +health and damage was weird and non intuitive. I like the change. Warleader is still huge tempo and gives Murlocks the Upfhh Big Hit (its Savage Roar on legs). Love the change.
Spreading the plague - still think cards is damn good but at least harder to combo, turn later played. Like the change.
Summary - all you complain Jade, Jade, Jade without seeing how meta will change (and it will change). They nerf cards to oblivion - bad blizzard. They nerf cards much less subtle (all this nerfs up here don't make cards unplayable) - bad blizzard.
I know community will never be satisfied with any changes but you like to complain a lot.
Says the druid and brony player.
Except the fact that the only Gadgetzan Auctioneer stayed alive after all those nerfs
Well I think they nerfed totally wrong cards. Maybe except Hex but even that was not a big problem.
I don't like destroying cards that make core identity of class.
And what the hell did that murloc do? Murlocks were never a substantial problem and now the tribe is dead.
As long as Jade wont be REMOVED ENTURELY FROM THE GAME. This game is OVER. Thet did a nerf, still a buff to jades,they released new cards, still a buff to jade. Its just this scar that wont go away. You can stith it, clean it, but its always there... Goodbye Hearthstone. Thanks for the 3 years...
Good leave we don't need players like you anyway.
Am I the only one around here who is quite happy that Blizzard reacted quite quickly this time around?
Innervate: In my opinion, something HAD to happen with this card. It was a strong card and an auto-include in EVERY Druid deck. Aggro, Jade, Ramp. Making it a Coin is maybe not the best decision, but I agree with Blizzard that it still has an easy introduction into Druid identity for new players. Also it's no longer power creep against Counterfeit Coin (not to mention that expansion cards are supposed to be stronger than basics and classics!)
Fiery War Axe: I like the Warrior Class, but how do you explain that Warrior has a 2 mana 3/2 classic weapon while in Hunter and Paladin there are 3 mana 3/2 weapons played without using the effect? For me, this nerf was necessary. But it's surprising, though.
Hex: I didn't see this being obvious, but I also have nothing against it. The difference between Hex and Polymorph isn't worth one mana in my opinion. As Hex isn't included in all Shaman lists in the meta at the moment, I don't see this being critical for the class.
Murloc Warleader: I understand this nerf, because the Murloc early game of Paladin sometimes snowballs too much due to Warleader. If you can't remove their Vilefin Inquisitor and Rockpool Hunter, it's often gg already when they play Warleader. The card ist still more than playable, but the annoying health buffs are gone. That's fine.
Spreading Plague: I think the card design is fine and fits the Druid identity, but it covers one of the main Druid weaknesses, the lack of AoE. With 6 Mana, I think it won't be longer automatically included in every Druid deck.
Blizzard didn't nerf Jade Idol, though. Playing against Jade Druid is so annoying, because the only win condition you have is to race them down. Maybe Blizzard thinks it's not necessary to nerf Jades as the Jades rotate out at the beginning of 2018 (correct me if I'm wrong). But I think a statement concerning Jade Idol would have been good. Because I think we all know that nerfing Innervate and Spreading Plague will not make Jade Druid significantly worse. But at least, Aggro and Ramp Druid will be a little bit worse I guess.
But druid will definitely still be everywhere. (Shudders thinking about turn 5 UI)
I understand your point of view. But I don't think there has ever been a worse deck to play against than Quest Rogue. Yes, Jade Druid is goddamn annoying, but at least you don't have to play Hyper-Aggro to beat it. Playing aggro was the only way to beat Quest Rogue - which, in my opinion, says everything why it shouldn't be a good deck....
I'm disappointed on the fact that people think this is a good balance change.
Too many people here whining about the wrong thing. It's not Jade that's a problem, it's you for not being strong enough to deal with it and see Jade as just another face in the crowd.
If you're looking for specific nerfs, you're asking for too much. This is not just your game, this is everyone's game. Maybe if you understood that and didn't throw a tantrum when your Christmas list isn't answered at every step of the way, maybe you'd be happier with how things are going. Instead, just throw a tantrum, because that gets you places in life, right? Please, remind me.
Speaking specifically of the nerfs though, Innervate is just so fucking awkward now. I don't understand what justifies using it much anymore.
No Ultimate Infestation?No Jade Idol? NOT ANY JADE CARD, YET IT IS A ``DRUID`` NERF? BOOOO
Ice block is going away next year, it makes me so sad, its the only card that allow mage to play control. The problem never was Ice Block, but the Ice Block random generators.
No, the problem is double Fireball, not Ice Block generators. People don't like Ice Block because of the double Fireball/Alexstrasza+Pyroblast. Generators aren't the "problem", it's burst damage straight out of an Immunity state. It's non-interactive finishers like the above mentioned that have people wanting Alex and IB rotated out.
The issue is that Blizzard is nerfing cards thinking only about the current state of the standard meta, one that has a Druid dominance with many deck archetypes completely under used. The only thing nerfing basic cards accomplishes is making the class overall weaker and making much harder for those unseen archetypes to be played again. Control Warrior lost an important early game board control tool, Shaman got a nerf on a card it barely even plays, Druid still can play Jade/Ramp because a 1 mana difference on Spreading Plague still gives you a boardful of 3/7 taunts with Strongshell Scavenger even with Innervate nerf because you can still ramp shamelessly into the crazy value packed Ultimate Infestation, but after rotations Druid will be left with nothing.
Nerfing Murloc Warleader makes aggro murloc deck worse, and even Quest Shaman, which already is underplayed, will definately not see any play ever, at the same time at least, it doesn't remove murloc OTK decks (namely anyfin Paladin, after all you just care about the +2 attack, the health is pointless if you're going for the win on that turn). This is probably the only reasonable nerf, but it still came around in an awkward moment.
I can't even.
so war axe is now worse than a host of 3/3/2 weapons with effects that are now in print? maybe it slows down pirate warrior a hair, but this feels like it hurts control warriors' ability to combat aggro much more. smh.
hex is probably still playable, but i don't see the need for this nerf at all
murloc warleader, idk. i mean it makes idiot murloc decks slightly less resilient which is a very good thing, but it also hurts the more fun combo-oriented murloc decks, which isn't so good. probably ok though.
spreading plague? ok i guess, but this card has literally never lost me a game, so i don't see the need for this one either. the card was fine. knocking a point off the scarabs health would have been better if they really felt like they needed to be making unnecessary changes. and innervate? i don't know if it sees play anymore. i really dislike touching the core ramp identity of druid. what NEEDED to be changed was Jade Idol and the Jade mechanic as a whole, and those yet again go untouched. so i give this balance patch a 0%