Celebrating Winter Veil - Our Favourite Moments From Journey to Un'Goro
We're in the last stretch of the Year of the Raven which means next year, in April, we're going to see some expansions rotate out. Today we're talking about our favourite moments from Un'Goro.
- Un'Goro brought forth the first collectible Legendary spells in the game which gave in to some of our biggest dreams for the game.
- Elementals finally became a real tribe and got some serious must-play additions through Tar Creeper, Fire Fly, and Glacial Shard.
- Hunters were thought to have some of the best new cards in the game, oops.
Thanks for the holiday sweater, Blizzard!
What were your favourite decks? What cards are you truly going to miss in the rotation? Were there any exciting next-level matches you had? Share your favourite moments from the expansion in the comments below. Here's some of our favourite moments and the two launch videos for Journey to Un'Goro.
Flux - Opening That Waygate
Journey to Un'Goro was without a doubt one of my favourite expansions this game has created. Going on down to southern Kalimdor to play with dinosaurs and elementals sounded like a ton of fun and even more so when you include legendary spells.
I loved Two Turn Kill Mage. Open the Waygate was such a mind-blowing card and experience that I don't think we'll see again in Hearthstone due the issues of having two similar cards in Wild. Also, fellow Mage players, there were so many fun times with Primordial Glyph, like when you'd glyph into glyph into glyph and have your waygate sitting at a healthy level of completion.
Quests overall were amazing though and just being able to theme decks so well, let's ignore how insane the power level of some of them were, was such a cool way to approach deck building. I hope we'll see something similar in the future, maybe Elise the Trailblazer can make a comeback with a different pack and adventure.
ShadowsOfSense - Tortollans
Ever since I was a young boy, the humble turtle spoke to me. Their hard outer shell but soft underbelly; their powerful jaws used most often for munching on a good piece of lettuce; their ability to only do things slightly faster than the typical Blizzard balance patch. It really resonated with me.
So when Blizzard decided to grace our screens with the Tortollans, I was overjoyed. We'd already had everybody's favourite golden card Oasis Snapjaw since the game began, and had been given the gift of Tuskarr Jouster's happy steed in TGT, but now we were inundated with tens of testudines at once. A late birthday present all for me.
Not only did we get some fansnapstic representation, we also got some great cards out of it too. Rising and falling in the meta, Spiritsinger Umbra is the friend of Deathrattle decks across the board, while Stonehill Defender has been a consistent presence for many a deck - Taunt Warrior, Control Warlock, various Mage and Paladin decks. Tortollan Shellraiser made her presence known in Quest Priest, and who could forget Spikeridged Steed?
But if you're talking the true all-star stand-outs from Un'Goro, none can compare to the one and only Tortollan Primalist. He was never particularly meta defining, but by Yogg was he fun when he worked. I mean, who can say no to a turtle that brings a free Flamestrike?
Zence - Voracious Voraxx
Un’Goro was one of the most fun expansions I ever got to play through. The larger than ever dinosaurs and other crater creatures felt absolutely amazing to own and play, and the deck warping Quests brought some of the most fun and unique decks anyone could imagine. The expansion also introduced one of my favorite legendaries of all time, The Voraxx.
(Yes that’s a card)
What drew me to this carnivorous plant was the fact that Pally had gotten many new and unique spells to play on their minions for their quest. The fact that you could play Adaptation on Voraxx and adapt the mini plants separately opened up a lot of different ways to try to take a board, and a turn 10 combo of playing the plant with Spikeridged Steed and getting double the value was extremely satisfying.
Its a shame that it never became a viable card, but it was definitely one of the most fun to use. In fact I still use it, since support for buffing Paladin minions seemingly never stops.
Other fun for me cards included Awaken the Makers with their larger than life effect created by Amara, and The Marsh Queen with its mighty Queen Carnassa charging in with her seemingly endless brood.
But what would Un’Goro be without its greatest hits? Cards like the infamous The Caverns Below, former arena menace Vicious Fledgling, crazily valuable Primordial Glyph that always seemed to find the right answer, Rogue champ Vilespine Slayer, and so many other awesome and impactful cards that we still see now.
It’ll be a shame when it rotates, its been a wild ride with Elise and co. down in Un’Goro crater.
Chimera - Control Of The Meta
Taunt warrior was an archetype i wanted to be a thing, and tried to make work often since The Grand Tournament and the release of Bolster. A couple sets later we saw what I considered the heaviest in terms of taunt.
We got so many good cards to support taunt warrior and Fire Plume's Heart was the key build-around. We now had Ornery Direhorn, Stonehill Defender, Tar Creeper, and Primordial Drake from this set alone which i would argue were the best taunt minions you could play in the deck, as much as I loved Alley Armorsmith. Honorable mention to Cornered Sentry, Nesting Roc, and Tar Lord as additional taunt options.
With support from The Curator and Bloodhoof Brave we had a meta-defining deck archetype right off the bat. Sulfuras is one hell of a quest reward and the journey to acquire it was a often quite slow and frustrating for many. You can fit so many lethals in this bad boy. The hero power, DIE, INSECT!, is the beginning of the end for the match if you don't have many minions on the board to obscure the RNG.
I haven't played with or against this quest in a long time since although it is still in standard for a few more months. It actually makes me want to go and build a deck for this quest with some new cards from Rastakhan's Rumble just for fun. Do you think this would be something that has any viability in the current meta? I certainly don't know as I haven't played much outside of arena recently, but it could be a thing I want to do. Sad to see these cards moving to wild next year, but perhaps that just means I may play more wild? Should be an interesting rotation, no doubt.
Hey there don't be scared
ungoro was the best expansion , no it was the best period in my gaming life ever , the game was so amazing back there and thanks to it i discovered the love of my life called Elemental shaman , been playing the deck since ungoro and trying to make it work , before ungoro i had 50 shaman wins , now i have 1200 wins , not to mention the meta was extremly fun and i also played midrange paladin back there that was very very fun to play , easily the best expansion & meta in the game
My memories of JTU are still somewhat plagued by every other game starting with "I'M IN CHARGE NOW!"...
I remember how some of the first revealed cards were Tar Creeper, Golakka Crawler and Gluttonous Ooze. People thought it would be the end of Pirate Warrior, but it was only good enough to fight them. And while I was kind of happy that there were at least some tools to beat Pirates with, I was actually somewhat frustrated by the fact that almost every single deck was required to include two Crawlers by default.
Then again, it was so damn satisfying to beat Pirate Warrior with Taunt Warrior. There was a relatively short time where Quest Warrior was really good, and I was pretty happy about getting Fire Plume's Heart in my opening.
Regardless, the reveal was one of the most exciting ones for me. Nowadays, I am not too excited about expansions anymore, but back then, I was really happy about Elementals, a tribe I wanted to see coming to the game for a while already. Playing with Elementals was not too hot in the end, but there were some fun decks, and many of the cheap neutral cards were pretty solid, like Tar Creeper, Fire Plume Phoenix, Servant of Kalimos, to name a few. At the time, just playing Elementals was good enough to have some success on the lower ranks, and I had a good time with them.
Also, for the first time ever, it was reasonable to use Hungry Crab because of all the Murloc decks that came up with Gentle Megasaur and Rockpool Hunter. I remember how upset I was a long time ago that one of my first epics ever was the infamously bad crab, and all of a sudden, it paid off having it in the collection.
I also remember having fun with Beast Druid, thanks to Bittertide Hydra and Shellshifter, back then when Innervate was still a card and the good beast synergies like Mark of Y'Shaarj and Menagerie Warden were still around.
It was also the time Secret Mage became a thing for the first time, thanks to Arcanologist. There were some good cards for it in Karazhan and MSG, but Ungoro was where the deck would finally be listed as one of the strongest in the game. I actually thought that was pretty cool, at the time. Cards like Kirin Tor Mage and Counterspell were ignored for so long before this, that it felt like old cards came out as new.
And my favorite deck at the time was definitely Silence Priest. The idea everyone was laughing at, the worst card ever in the game, Purify, showed up in a good, competitive deck. The supposed joke card Humongous Razorleaf turned out to be a big threat. And Lyra the Sunshard was such a cool legendary, so much fun to play with... I was so happy to have her on my other account.
Over time, I came to resent some of the cards from that expansion though, primarily Stonehill Defender, Primordial Glyph and Vilespine Slayer. The "random" discoveries that could decide games are frustrating me to this day, even though Glyph is not as present anymore these days. At the time, Casino Mage was one of the best decks with cards like Babbling Book, Medivh, the Guardian, Firelands Portal and Cabalist's Tome and of course Glyph, and a dack that I absolutely hated playing against. Glyph would also haunt me far into Kobolds until Tempo Mage finally started disappearing.
Slayer is just a card that made me think "powercreep" and I think it's still busted. It always reminds me of Ben Brode saying about Kidnapper that it was once tested at 5 mana and turned out "hyper frustrating" (check the wiki).
Well... all in all, JTU was a pretty enjoyabe expansion, despite the Pirates. The Standard rotation back then was also not unwelcome, because I was growing a little sick of Reno Jackson. Consdering how insane the game got since then, it actually makes me nostalgic. But with the comparatively low power level of this year's expansions, I hope the first set of 2019 will feel about as good as Journey to Un'goro did back then.
It was no Whispers of the Old Gods, but it was still good.
I gotta say, I had a TON of fun (and actually won a LOT) with Sherazin, Corpse Flower. He eventually faded into obscurity, but he was super powerful before KoFT came. Resurrecting a full board of Sherazins from N'Zoth was always hilarious. Plus it always felt amazing to Vanish the board while he's dormant and resurrect him on the same turn.
Also, who could forget how underrated The Caverns Below was during the reveals? Watching the community laugh at it, then immediately turn around and cry for its destruction. Priceless. Ah, The Caverns Below, the card so nice they nerfed it twice.
Lots of great memories from Un'Goro!
dont forget my boi Crackling Razormaw one of the best design cards in the game and a god dame same staple in ever hunter deck , Radiant Elemental is good to I guess . Great article for a great set
Sorry I missed submitting for the article, but I have a couple of fond memories from the set to share.
I remember the leak that was discovered from Lani Minella, one of the voice artists, which is how everyone discovered the name of the expansion ahead of time. She had updated her resume online and listed her voice credits in the new expansion - whoops! Needless to say, her resume was taken down pretty quickly, but of course, it was too late.
Also, Arena got wrecked with Spikeridged Steed and Vicious Fledgling. This was before buckets were introduced and probably were the cause of creating them because those cards were offered way too much. Now Vicious Fledgling doesn't get offered at all in Arena because it was so broken.
Another fun card was The Caverns Below pre-nerf (only needed 4 minions to complete), which was pretty insane, with Rogue easily squashing everyone in the playing field and making all their minions huge.
Lastly, was Fire Fly. It was such a great and simple card that it's a staple in decks that are currently being played. I'm looking forward to more awesome memories like these down the road!
Seeing the caverns below as the lowest rated quest is hilarious.
If only we'd known...
I'm glad you mentioned The Voraxx, one of my favorite cards.
Hopefully we soon will see a undead tag.
Hey there, don't be scared
no one mentions Lyra Sunshard? ok then
Nice work guys, man i love these hearthpwn articles. Hearthstone wouldn't be what it is without this site.
However...now i remember how much i miss Ben Brode. Why Ben? Why?You left us so early! Your charisma and rapping are irreplaceable.
#rememberBen
Un'Goro was a low point for me -- I loved thief priest decks I'd been playing since returning to Hearthstone, and this expansion pretty much killed the format (it's made a limited comeback so far in Rastakhan, I've noticed). Too much swarm aggro, along with pirate warrior, made it impossible.
Two of the three legendaries I got on opening day were (then) laughable: the Paladin and Warlock quests. But I got Pyros as well.
What kept me from bailing: I credit watching Brian Kibler playing a priest deck that was entirely focused on board clears that kept me in the game against the murloc pallies and evolve garbage shaman.
Let the hate commence, but that deck was the foundation of what would become Big Priest in Knights of the Frozen Throne.
Also had some fun times with Kaliimos elemental shaman decks, purify priest and handbuff paladin here and there; the latter was strangely good against, of all decks, jade druid.
Swarm decks are a thing since beta days.
First as murlocs and agro/tempo rogue, then zoolock, agro mage, buzzard hunter, undertaker hunter, face hunter, bloodlust shaman, pirate warrior, divine favor paladin, token druid... all before un'goro and lets not forget: when most classes lack good AOE removals.
Also, thief priest was dead before ungoro since it had some close to unwinnable matchups against many meta decks like jade idol, patron warrior, miracle rogue... just to name a few.
I mean
it did get the greatest hit nerf-wise
Un'goro was strong but ok.
Real broken stuff came with KFT and KAC.
Wish I had been playing then. Great article, can't imagine what good you can say about KnC though.
Awesome writing. I have missed the year of the mammoth, but I am so glad I could have tried the 3 expansions from it in the year of the raven to the full extent.
lol people thought stampede was the best card of the expansion
Stampede + UtH was gonna be the new draw mechanic for hunter :D yeah, it didnt work as expected :D