Upcoming Hearthstone Balance Changes - Wild Growth, Nourish, Level Up!, Saronite Chain Gang, Leeching Poison CHANGES ARE NOW LIVE
Five card changes are coming to Hearthstone on December 19th, which is... today!
- [Discuss this Change] Wild Growth now costs 3, up from 2.
- [Discuss this Change] Nourish now costs 6, up from 5.
- [Discuss this Change] Level Up! now costs 6, up from 5.
- [Discuss this Change] Saronite Chain Gang now summons another Saronite Chain Gang, instead of a copy of the minion.
- [Discuss this Change] Leeching Poison now costs 1, down from 2, and only gives Lifesteal for 1 turn.
Check out Blizzard's post below for more information on each of the changes.
Quote from BlizzardIn an update scheduled to arrive December 19 PST, the following cards will be changed.
Developer’s Note: This balance update is focused on improving the long-term health of both Standard and Wild. We've opted to make these changes earlier in the expansion cycle than we normally consider; we'd like to hear your feedback on the timing of this update, in addition to what you think of all the individual card changes.
Wild Growth – Will cost 3 mana. (Up from 2)
Nourish – Will cost 6 mana. (Up from 5)
Wild Growth and Nourish have been present in every mid-range, combo, and control Druid deck since their introduction in the Basic and Classic set. When cards from the Basic and Classic set are too powerful, they can have negative long-term effects on the game. Continuously playing against these cards can start to feel repetitive, and they can feel so mandatory that they stifle creative deckbuilding decisions. By increasing the mana cost of both cards by one, we expect them to be considerations in late-game control Druid decks, but more difficult to fit in strategies that don’t directly take advantage of ramping mana.
Level Up! – Will cost 6 mana. (Up from 5)
Odd Paladin has consistently been one of the most powerful and most played decks since its introduction in The Witchwood. By removing Level Up from Odd Paladin, we still expect it to be a competitive board control deck, just with more consistent damage output that should be easier to play around.
Saronite Chain Gang – Now reads: Taunt. Battlecry: Summon another Saronite Chain Gang.
Shudderwock brings an interesting combo to the table, but playing Shudderwock multiple times in a single game can be frustrating. Changing Saronite Chain Gang makes playing multiple Shudderwocks in a game much more difficult. Shudderwock should now exist as a powerful one-turn effect rather than constantly copying itself with Saronite Chain Gang’s Battlecry.
Leeching Poison – Will cost 1 mana. (Down from 2). Now reads: Give your weapon Lifesteal this turn.
We love the fantasy of building a powerful weapon over the course of a game with Kingsbane, but granting it a permanent Lifesteal effect with Leeching Poison resulted in an endgame with few weaknesses, as well as conflicting with our philosophy that Rogues should not have persistent self-healing effects. Making the Lifesteal effect only active for one turn should address some of the power level issues with Kingsbane Rogue’s late game.
Kiwii's Thoughts
Resident deck architect Kiwiinbacon had some thoughts on the nerfs.
Really surprised how fast blizzard reacted this time, hopefully this trend continues.
Druid nerfs were long overdue, druid has never been bad since the start of hearthstone and it almost always ran the same shell of 10-20 druid cards with different win condition (aggro druid and spiteful being exceptions). Even when the class had lower popularity, it always had a tier 2+deck.
Kingsbane rogue and Shudderwock shaman helped further push out any control and slow midrange decks out of the meta and turned meta into combo vs aggro, with 0 control decks being above tier 3. This meta in general had a top tier combo deck for nearly every class (apart from warrior and hunter) so I hope this helps control decks recover.
Odd paladin nerfs are a reaction to that deck having highest winrate in the game without a single new card. This is a good nerf, but I think control decks being valuable would nerf odd paladin even without this change.
Secret hunters being untouched shouldn't be an issue if control decks rise up, since you can fight that deck with board clears, value and healing. Rexxar remains an issue for fatigue control decks, but other forms of control can work.
That's the most sensible, well thought out and correctly recognizing the problems the nerfs addressed comment I've seen in the last few days. It's nice to know there are those as well.
He meant any Hearthstone cards, not only the ones that are nerfed, so it's not happening :)
Normally I 100% feel the same way, but at least in terms of the Leeching Poison nerf for wild Kingsbane Rogues this was absolutely needed. Just in this past week I've had way too many games as Reno Mage vs wild Kingsbane Rogue where I burned 1-2 of their Deadly Poisons & both Doomerangs on curve with geist, played Jaina on curve for maximum threat/generation of water eles & created water eles for many turns and still lose to Kingsbane Rogue pre-nerf. On paper such a match-up is supposed to be highly in my favor because 'Jaina makes it an instant win', but I still lost every time. The deck's power level was an atrocity to the game that almost no slow deck could naturally oppose with all of the cards available to us now.
This. My experience with Odd Mage in standard was the same - even with Jaina on turn 9 I still lost every single game
This was my favorite nerf list of all time for this game.
@hearthpwn, nourish is played since ancient of lore was nerfed
Players should be able to defeat these opressing old decks by playing with new powerful cards, instead of blizzard defeating them, because the cards they printed are too weak.
I do get the nerf to Paladin .. its one of those ya know ... bring in a new set ... and a few weeks after all you see in the tracking charts is odd paladin from nr1 to nr 10 and not using a SINGLE new card . LMAO. Tey def needed to do it.
Rogue ? I dunno my decks were roughly 50/50 vs Kingsbane , but i do get the frustration playing against that type of deck
The one that baffles me is the druid .... Was it really cancerous ??? and to go in so heavy on it as well seems harsh , i feel for all the druid players (btw , i`m not one )
edit. missed the one on shudderwack .... lol i have not played a single one of em this month , eu 5-L , maybe its for wild tho
Not bad nerfs, although with no buffs that's going to utterly kill Druid for this meta.
If it's just for a turn Leeching Poison should've been 0 mana, but overall this is fine.
I don't think this change needed prior notice, as these all have been overdue, but it's not a good practice to take up on Blizzard's part.
That being said, BYEEEEE TRASHLORD INFINITE VALUE SHUDDERWOCK DECKS, KINGSBANE 14-DAMAGE LIFESTEAL, TURN 6 U.I., LAZY ODD PALLY BOARD FLOOD AGGRO.
Also: this will help balance the number of hunters on deck because real control decks now have room to exist.
I strongly disapprove of having basically zero notice for major balance changes. Not cool.
Blizzard, could you give us more runway for nerf announcements, please? I had a stack of cards saved up and dusted them all the day before the nerf went live. Just sayin’
Run with Reno Mage. I tech 3 different transforms just for Big Priest (and some Control Locks). Save them only for Rag (first priority), Y'Sharjj (2nd priority), & KT (3rd priority). You only lose if they get Barnes on turn 3/4 and get either of the first two choices. Otherwise enjoy your laughable free fatigue game win.
Nerfing Kingsbane deck without actually nerfing Kingsbane, so the cancerous unfuntards don't get full value from dusting Kingsbane?
I approve. Serve you right Kingsbane players.
I agree with all nerfs but something is wrong...
Hunter.
Hunter decks are powerful enough to match all prenerf ones and your biggest nemesis, the odd paladin, was destroyed, ok, maybe not destroyed but is much weaker now and all hunter cards remain untouched, this nerfs should hit the spellstone and the DK too.
What will prevent the complete dominance of hunters with the absolute broken uncheck OP cards now the other broken decks is out of the way?
Reasonable changes. Such a quick nerfs are a major improvement - nerfing op cards in the past should have happened months earlier.
This entire year in hearthstone is a disappointment, because of boring meta and annoying OTKs. Hopefully these changes will help a bit
Shudder is fun and infuriating sure, but what irritates me about the sardonite nerf Is how it affects my handbuff pally, hard not to be a bit salty on that end. Also why would anyone play wild growth over the jade alternative? It’s fiery war axe vs king’s Defender, think about wild Blizz...
They waited this long to make these changes?
perfection takes time