Upcoming Hearthstone Rule Changes - Copy Cards, Transform, Shadowboxer Nerf and More
Blizzard is introducing some more mechanical changes to the game starting with the Boomsday Project patch.
- Ghostly Charger is losing the Beast tribe.
- Ixlid, Fungal Lord is losing the Elemental tribe.
- Shadowboxer will now only deal damage when a minion is healed, not any character.
- Shifter Zerus, Molten Blade, and Shifting Scroll now all lose enchantments when they transform.
- Voodoo Doll's curse is removed on a minion if it transforms.
- Voodoo Doll's curse is also removed if Voodoo Doll itself is silenced or the minion with the curse is silenced.
- Copied cards will get all enchantments the original card has unless the card is in the graveyard.
Shadowboxer will be disenchantable for full dust for two weeks when the patch hits.
Discuss Card Changes
We've made threads for each of the three main card changes. Click on any of the buttons below to visit their dedicated threads.
Discuss the Nerf
Discuss the Change
Discuss the Change
Blog Post
Here's Blizzard's full post. It's worth the read!
Quote from BlizzardDr. Boom’s bringing more than just mayhem to the Netherstorm. The 12.0 update will also come with several rule changes to Hearthstone’s gameplay. Read on to learn about another minion Type update, the copy a card rule change and the transform rule change.
More Minion Type Changes
There was a ton of feedback following the last minion Type update we posted, and after reviewing all of it, we realized that there were a couple more minions that needed changing. Here are our decisions following the full review of your feedback.
Ghostly Charger
We made a decision that, at least by default, spectral/undead/ghost/spirit versions of animals are not considered Beasts in Hearthstone. There are quite a lot of these sort of cards, most of which are already not Beasts, and changing them would have extensive balance implications.
Ghostly Charger is one of those cards. Clearly a ghost in both its name and art, its Beast tag has also not been relevant in any significantly used interaction. As a result, we’re planning to remove the Beast tag in a future update.
In the much rarer case of spectral/undead/ghost/spirit versions of Dragons, Murlocs, Pirates, and Elementals, they will still remain their Type. There aren’t a whole lot of these cards, but there are a few, and they’re already consistently their type. Examples of these are Ghost Light Angler, Cursed Castaway, Bone Drake.
Ixlid, Fungal Lord
World of Warcraft uses a looser definition of Elemental than what we decided to standardize on for Hearthstone. In Hearthstone, an elemental is something that has been brought to life by being inhabited by an elemental spirit, but is otherwise not alive. These are easy to recognize: a Fire Elemental looks like a living creature made out of fire; A Water Elemental looks like a living creature made out of water.
One of the biggest outliers to this definition are plant creatures. There are a ton of minions in Hearthstone that are some sort of plant. We’ve decided that these do not count as Elementals in Hearthstone. Examples of these include The Voraxx, Fen Creeper, Biteweed, Vilespine Slayer, Rotten Applebaum.
Ixlid, Fungal Lord, is by this definition, a plant creature. Although we’re committed to consistency, there are also other criteria that we consider when changing card Types. One of them is how often a card’s current Type matters when it comes to interacting with other cards. Ixlid’s Elemental tag is not significantly used in current decks, so we’ve decided to remove it in a future update.
We also looked at the following minions but decided against making any changes. We’ve included our thought process as to how we came to our decisions with these cards.
Kindly Grandmother
Kindly Grandmother/Big Bad Wolf looks like a Worgen (which are not considered Beasts) but is actually some other sort of wolf-like creature that is a Beast. The Beast tag is also extremely relevant to its gameplay, and defines most of the card’s intended usage. With this in mind, we will not be changing Kindly Grandmother’s/Big Bad Wolf’s Type. In the future, we’ll be more careful to make the art clear when it comes to Worgen or similar races.
Arcane Giant / Arcane Golem
On top of Elementals and plant creatures, there’s another category of things that have been brought to life via magical animation. These are creatures like War Golem, Arcane Giant, and Avian Watcher—which are not Elementals.
Arcane Giant, Arcane Golem, and The Curator are all examples of another sort of creature collectively referred to as Arcane Golems. These mechanical constructs utilize arcane energy as a power source, with The Curator being a Mech Type as part of his character in the One Night in Karazhan Adventure. This is actually subtly different from something like War Golem, which is carved from stone and then magically animated. While the “golem” definition refers to something that has been magically animated and is therefore neither a Mech nor Elemental, both Arcane Giant and Arcane Golem’s card art don’t clearly show them to be one or the other. Since the correct type for these creatures is so unclear, we will be leaving them unchanged for now, but would love to hear what you think.
Bogshaper
Bogshaper seems to be the same type of creature as Ixlid or Fen Creeper, and that would logically lead to removal of its Elemental tag. However, as mentioned above, we look at more than just the fantasy of a card when determining if it needs a Type change. While Bogshaper’s fantasy criteria checkbox is filled, it’s currently heavily utilized in the meta, and features in many decks, including that of the 2018 Summer Champion, Bunnyhoppor.
We are holding off on changing Bogshaper’s Type for now, but would love to hear what the community thinks we should do in this case. We’re also considering making this sort of change when a card rotates to Wild.
Copy A Card Rule Change
Card copies currently only retain enchantments when both the original card and its copy are in play—think Molten Reflection. In Update 12.0, this rule will be updated to match the one regarding enchantments being retained when a card transitions zones.
Zones in Hearthstone are defined as areas where cards are hosted: your deck, your hand, in play, and in the graveyard. In Hearthstone, there is a general forward-moving flow through zones. Whenever a card moves forward in that flow (Deck -> Hand, Hand -> Play, Deck -> Play), it retains enchantments. If a card moves backwards in zones (Play -> Hand, Hand -> Deck, Play -> Deck, Play/Hand/Deck -> Graveyard and Graveyard -> Play/Hand/Deck), it loses enchantments.
With this update, card copies will retain enchantments in the following scenarios.
- Cards that are resurrected currently do not and will continue not to retain any enchantments, unless specifically stated otherwise.
- If you copy a card from a deck to a deck, the copy retains enchantments. (eg. Archbishop Benedictus)
- If you copy a card from a hand to a hand, the copy retains enchantments. (eg. Mind Vision)
- If you copy a card from play to play, the copy retains enchantments. (eg. Molten Reflection)
- If you copy a card from a deck to a hand, the copy retains enchantments. (eg. Thoughtsteal)
- If you copy a card from a deck to play, the copy retains enchantments. (eg. Mindgames)
- If you copy a card from hand to play, the copy retains enchantments. (eg. Kobold Illusionist)
Transform Rule Change
When transformed, a Hearthstone card typically loses all of its enchantment. Most cards in game already obey this rule. However, there are four cards that we are changing to keep in line with the rule, as part of this consistency pass.
Shifter Zerus, Molten Blade, and Shifting Scroll all transform in your hand at the start of every turn. Following the 12.0 update, they will no longer keep any enchantments when they transform. This includes things like hand buffs and Emperor Thaurissan mana-cost discounts.
The impact on Voodoo Doll is a little different with the update. If you transform the minion that’s already been cursed by Voodoo Doll, the curse will be broken, and the transformed (and formerly cursed) minion will not be killed when Voodoo Doll dies. Silencing the cursed minion will also break the curse, in addition to silencing the Voodoo Doll.
Shadowboxer Update
Since the creation of the Lifesteal keyword, Shadowboxer has been a high risk card, in that it can trigger off of itself and deal up to 30 damage in one turn if you ever give it Lifesteal. Because of this, we have changed it to: Whenever a minion is healed, deal 1 damage to a random enemy.
Once Shadowboxer’s card change is live with Update 12.0, players will be able to disenchant it for its full Arcane Dust value for two weeks.
Not at all. People complain that Hearthstone is inconsistent, so to complain when Blizzard makes a fair effort to make the game more consistent = bullshit.
I can get the transforming part of Floop but I really wonder why they changed copy rules.
It can't be about only Shudderwock, I really wonder which copy cards are coming.
And they did not mention copy a card from play to hand (Echo of Medivh, Convert, Sonya Shadowdancer, Shadowcaster, Moorabi, Blood Warriors, Feral Gibberer, Zola the Gorgon, Splintergraft, Holy Water) and play to deck (Gang Up, Baleful Banker, Astral Tiger, Manic Soulcaster, Malorne, Weasel Tunneler, ). Is that mean they keep their current state. If it is like that why?
Also I wonder how Malorne, and Weasel Tunneler works. They work like Astral Tiger or Recycle, Entomb and Psychic Scream since Astral Tiger adds copy and others add the card itself.
I would be tolerant a reasoning like " Because of so much and highly powered buff cards than handbuffs + deckbuffs in Hearthstone we consider that it can be game-breaking to change the copy a card from play to hand and play to deck rules so we have decided to keep their current states."
I think they should have pointed those situations in that article.
Well I am happy with that changes btw. All the changes;
Stitched Tracker
Simulacrum
Archmage Arugal
Mind Vision
Curious Glimmerroot
Crystalline Oracle
Thoughtsteal
Mindgames
Shifting Shade
Devour Mind
Shadow Essence (if we can give keywords to minions in deck)
Archbishop Benedictus
Mimic Pod
Kobold Illusionist
Barnes (If we can give keywords to minions in deck)
They did mention those stayed the same above the examples: Play -> Hand/Deck are examples of 'moving backwards in zones', which remove enchantments. The idea is cards generally move in the direction Deck -> Hand -> Play -> Graveyard. Cards in the graveyard can't have enchantments, and in the first three zones, enchantments are kept if and only if a copy is further forward or in the same zone. In fact, right before the examples, it is stated that those are the scenario's in which enchantments are kept (barring the one about resurrection). So in all other scenario's, like Play -> Hand/Deck, enchantments are lost.
Yeah, The point that I have mentioned here is that they should have shared the reasoning behind why they did not want to change.
Play --> Hand opens up a whole Pandora's Box you do not want to open.
Unlike other scenarios, Play scenario has Temporary Buff ( Abusive Sergeant ) and buffs that don't translate well in card in hand ( specific deathrattles or Windfury so if they interfered with this, it would be possibile to play Leeroy Jenkins ---> double Abusive Sergeant ---> Preparation + Vanish And keep going until you have an unstoppable Charger.
Thankfully they opted to not change the current state of interactions.
You forgot Chromaggus.
Also they did mention play to hand:
Vanish does not copy the card, it returns it to your hand. like Sap Shadowstep, Anub'arak or Youthful Brewmaster.
Yup i forgot that sorry.
I thought I mentioned Chromaggus sorry for that too. But I guess they already copy buffed states of minions with Mimic Pod so nothing changed it seems.
Well, How much time should i quote that?
I am tired of people who doesn't understand what she/he read.
For some reason, people thought that if you play a 0 cost minion with Floop in hand, Floop would remain 0 cost the rest of the game.
Only if that minion got reduced to 0 while being transformed. If Shifter Zerus transformed into Nerubian Prophet and your turn would start or it shifted to Corridor Creeper and minion deaths would reduce its cost, THEN it would stay reduced. But Shifter becoming a Wisp and then Tirion wouldn't make Tirion cost 0.
So many changes in such a short time.
Funny how it took months and months to fix Patches the Pirate and bring Raza Priest in line. Really speaks volumes of how much better Blizzard does when they actually plan their shit out ahead of time.
As a long term WoW player I can ensure you that Arcane Giant and Arcane Golem are constructs, creatures made out of stone that were brought to life using arcane powers. Golems are the same idea, but they were made with some shamanistic powers, not arcane ones. Creepers are the same things but made out of dirt and plants, they aren't some kind of living plant or anything you say there, it's the same idea twisted (probably fel) magic used to animate otherwise inanimate objects and sometimes they wore shown in the lore to represent the sickness of Azeroth (of each individual zone where they apear). The big difference is that they are not spirits as elementals and usually they are servants, or better said tools.
I know mages can summon elementals for help, the same for shamans, but they are naturally found untamed by mortals. Why? Well because, Elementals are elemental spirits who have attained raw physical form.
So maybe also the way there were made: constructs and golems = objects infused with magic => sentient being VS elemental= spirits that took corporal form, existed before taking corporal form.
In my opinion you can put the together or divide them, but keep them as groups shown by me. So you got to the right conclusion that they are different, but in some cases for the wrong reasons, see Ixlid.
Guys, correct me if I am wrong. See you!
This is so intuitive how copy effects should operate, and nevermind the old ruleset ("a copy in hand/deck loses the buffs and discounts"). It sounds like fun times with Valeera the Hollow, Prince Keleseth, and Archbishop Benedictus! I'm liking the direction the game is taking. It seems a bit more timely and taking advantage of the flexibility inherent to digital card games.
How is taking away tags from Ghostly Charger and Ixild not a nerf. I understand they pulled the same bs with Jungle Moonkin but by changing a card in a negative way that counts as a nerf. The Beast and Elemental Tag hold value and by taking that away you're nerfing a card. Blizzard shouldn't be able to get away with this and I'm not complaining because I want free dust but complaining because this lack of consistency on what nerfs are could result in card changes that don't give dust rewards. I just don't think it's right to negativly change a card and not call it a nerf.
Ghostly Charger maybe not so much. Because Paladin didn't ever (as far as I know) put any value in beasts. But for the Moonkin and Ixild, I totally agree. They were nerfed a tiny, tiny bit, but a nerf is a nerf and it should be refunded.
It's also a nerf in the sense that Ghostly Charger no longer works together with Curator. :(
@mshan That's actually true. Gj.
So they killed Zola am I right?
Huh? What makes you say that? I don't see any of the changes affecting her.