Ozzie Mejia of Shacknews had a chance to sit down with Mike Donais to discuss the Hall of Fame and why certain cards weren't included.
- The two primary factors for cards being sent to the Hall of Fame are card power level and class identity.
- Really powerful cards that consistently show up and have a large impact on the meta are good candidates.
- Doomguard was replaced because of its powerful impact and they can re place with with another card in the future.
- Druids are more about mana creation, not removal. That's why Naturalize was sent to pasture.
- They talk about Malygos moving every year but decided against it again because of the decks he creates.
- Mind Blast's One Turn Kill (OTK) potentially is reduced thanks to the rotation of Shadow Visions. The card remains on the short list.
Want to learn more about the Year of the Dragon and the cards that are rotating to the Hall of Fame? Check out the Year of the Dragon announcement.
Mike Donais on Malygos and Mind Blast
Quote from Mike DonaisDonais: There's lots of other candidates. We talked about cards like Malygos, which we talk about every year. We decided not to go with Malygos again, because of all the new decks that he creates. An important thing in card games is to have different types of decks. Not every type of deck should be medium-sized minions fighting. There needs to be small minions, big minions, and there needs to be some Malygos decks and other tricky decks that have different game plans. That's what makes card games interesting.
Donais: I think the Mind Blast problem will be temporarily improved because of Shadow Visions leaving, but I don't think that's a hard solve. Mind Blast is also on our list, both because it doesn't match Priest class identity. They're not supposed to be the face damage class. And it's also pretty powerful in the right decks. It has had a big design impact on us with the resurrection decks especially. You're seeing people resurrect and do Mind Blast.
At least I had chicken.
and all this shit stay in wild
In other words: "Mindblast is a basic set card. That doesn't give dust, so we have it in focus. Maybe we find a substitution like 6 mana 2/2 battlecry: you won't run that f2p bs in your deck"
You realize before Reaper Anduin and Vision existed MB was a garbage pack filler card? Both those cards rotating mean the end of SB combo face dmg decks in standard.
They just hall of famed 2 trash epics because of odd and even mechanics. But surely their focus is only on basic set cards..
Inner Fire or Divine Spirit should rank higher on priest nerf list than Mind Blast, IMO.
/make Shadowform worth a damn
"Damage from hand" is considered at odds with warlock's class identity, but not priest's. Riiiiight. . .
Had to post as a WoW veteran back in the day
Language NSFW, but this one is the best
Haha i havent seen that Onyxia Wipe Animation before, but hearing it brings out so many memories :D
It is not a problem, until it becomes a problem, then we will move it, simple.
[unpopular opinion deleted]
What's interesting is that the very same argument he stated for leaving Malygos in standard can be used verbatim for Baku the Mooneater. Blizzard seems to be contradicting their own logic.
Yeah, mind blast is fine. Shadow vision is literally the key to that card being a problem since you can hold up to 4 copies of the card. 2 mana to cheat the 2 card limit.
What we really need to talk about are Inner Fire and Preparation.
Since RR was released, we got the 'blessing' that is Mosh'Ogg Enforcer. How many times do we see this thing become 28/28? Too many times. At least the rez spell stone is disappearing after rotation.
Preparation has also lead to rogues getting stale cards. They either get boring cards, or high mana cards that are only high mana because preparation exists. That needed to go for the health of the game.
F class identify. HoF cards, and release NEW cards to replace the basic and classic ones getting retired to better identify the classes. Like I've said before, every rotation, Blizz should go through some of the rotating cards and see which ones were healthy to the game, then add them into classic or basic.
If you have a problem with the Enforcer, do what I do: Reckless Fury your 30 Armor away :p
But, yeah, that card's going to be a pain.
Anyone else find it ironic that last year Blizzard decided milling should only be part of Druid's class identity and HoFed Coldlight Oracle, and this year they decided that it shouldn't be part of Druid's class identity either and HoFed Naturalize?
Is this also the reason they didn't HOF Leeroy? Because he summons two 1/1 whelps (dragons)? :D
Leeroooooyyyyy Jenkiiiinsss aiaia
Well Leeroy is just a 1 of and Cold Blood was nerfed
He's lying. The real reason they didn't hall of fame Malygos was because it's going to be The Year of the Dragon. Think about how bad that would look.
Also, since the Welcome bundle update (which now delivers one of the classic legendary dragons) it was highly unlikely that they'll move e.g. Alexstrasza or Maly anyway. Otherwise those players would be really pissed off - for a reason.