ROGUES ARE GETTING NERFED! 4 Card Changes Coming May 22
In a blog post from Blizzard this afternoon, they have announced changes to Rogue cards and Archivist Elysiana. The patch comes out May 22.
- EVIL Miscreant - Now has 4 Health (Down from 5)
- Raiding Party - Now costs 4 Mana (Up from 3)
- Preparation - Next spell cast cost is now reduced by 2 (Down from 3)
- Archivist Elysiana - Now costs 9 Mana (Up from 8)
Quote from BlizzardAfter evaluating game data and working through internal and external feedback on the most popular decks currently in the meta, we’re looking to address the power level and overall pervasiveness of Rogue decks, alongside a specific interaction with Archivist Elysiana. Look for these changes in an update slated for May 22.
We chose to focus primarily on Rogue in this update due to seeing the meta stabilize around the class’s most popular decks. Currently, if you want to build a deck that is strong against Rogue, you have just one reasonable option: Warrior. If you compare Rogue to Warrior, however, you’ll find that the latter class has a wide variety of good and bad matchups, which makes it unlikely that it’ll overtake Rogue in popularity in the current meta.
While we recognize that there are other powerful and popular decks (like Token Druid, Conjurer Mage, and Mech Hunter), we decided to not address them in this update because they all have varied matchups. If any of these decks were to emerge as the new prominent strategy, there are plenty of decks available to combat them, which would allow the meta to continue shifting.
As always, we’ll be evaluating the results of these changes over the coming weeks and look forward to your feedback. Read on for details on these changes, our thought process around them, and our goals for each of the cards we adjusted.
- EVIL Miscreant - Now has 4 Health. (Down from 5)
- EVIL Miscreant is meant to be a value-generating card that creates future swing turns, but having 5 Health on this minion means Rogue players sacrifice very little to set up those turns. We expect that EVIL Miscreant will continue to be a great option for Rogue decks, just at a power level that is more in line with other available cards.
- Raiding Party – Now costs 4 mana. (Up from 3)
- Rogue already excels at drawing cards, so having another powerful option that offers consistent results has resulted in Rogue games that play out a little too similarly than we think is fun. We’re making this change to better represent the power level of drawing from a very specific subset of cards.
- Preparation – Now reads: The next spell you cast this turn costs (2) less.
- All changes we make to the Basic and Classic sets are aimed at ensuring Hearthstone’s long-term health. Preparation is currently seen as such a powerful card that it appears in nearly all Rogue deck archetypes. That said, the change we’ve landed on is a small one. While we do want the card’s power to decrease, we also think it’s important for Preparation to remain a reasonable option, since it fits the Rogue class fantasy so well.
- Preparation is regularly used to reduce the cost of cards like Sap or Eviscerate, and those interactions will remain unchanged. Reducing the cost of your next spell by 2 as opposed to 3 opens our design options up a little more to create higher cost Rogue spells without having to balance so closely around the assumption that they’ll be cast alongside Preparation.
- Archivist Elysiana – Now costs 9 mana. (Up from 8)
- Our goal here was to preserve the feeling and power level of Archivist Elysiana when it comes to general use, while making much more difficult to play her multiple times in the same game. Shaman will still be able to replay Elysiana through Shudderwock, but this is not as common or problematic as what we’ve seen in control Warrior decks. Now, playing Elysiana alongside cards like Baleful Banker or Youthful Brewmaster should be a less consistent strategy.
Because Warrior is 'dominant' only because such a large portion of the meta is Rogues and Warriors are its biggest counter. Did you read the article?
I'm so glad they didn't nerf Barnes precipitously...
Yeah, 3 years is a very short period of time in order to evaluate a card's potential
Ah well. Back to hunters everywhere.
Also no changes to Leeroy, really? Wonder how they still have not HoF'd him or nerfed again
Leeroy has been already nerfed (used to cost 4 mana and used to kill you from 30 health if you're interested): he's not the problem, as well as Edwin VanCleef or Zilliax. It's just that there are broken cards that make him shine outrageously.
Leeroy was a massive problem at 4 mana, it's still crazy at 5 mana, so I think yeah it will go to Hall of fame next year.
STOP KILLING ROGUE FFS
The more I think about it the more I dislike the Prep nerf...it just kind of ruins all the previously printed high cost spells and just kind of exclusively pairs it with spells like Evisceerate and Sap whichh were already powerful enough.
Idk I wish they'd done a more out-of-the-box approach
What if we made it "your first spell next turn costs 4 less"....y#know....actual preparation
or just give it an actual mana cost to prevent it from cheesing with Edwin.
Either way, rip Sprint, Cannon Barrage, Wanted!, Necrium Vial, Fan of Knives, eetc...
Yeah I totally agree with you: I would have loved a separate announce on the lines of "since we nerfed Preparation, we'd like to reduce Cannon Barrage to 5 mana" for example.
But I guess we will see the results of this balance change in the future expansions.
There was someone who made a "custom expansion" and the preparation effect you mentioned was basically the keyword he designed the set around---it was basically a delay of card effects called resonance. Could check it out, was interesting to look at the cards.
https://www.hearthpwn.com/forums/hearthstone-general/fan-creations/212868-the-shifting-sands-a-custom-expansion
So is it save to craft Archivist Elysiana for full dust refund?
yes, but you get full dust refund only for two weeks after nerfs come to life
Yes it is safe, with the exception that it doesn't really make sense, because you'll need to disenchant it to get back your dust. So your net dust gain is 0.
I am not sure if it works the way you say. I think you will get the full dust without DE the card itself. Dust gain is 0, but you keep the card. Otherwise, it would not make any sense as you wrote.
You're thinking of HoF, where you get the dust given automatically. With Nerfs, you can disenchant for the full cost of crafting the card for a limited time, as opposed to the reduced dust value.
You won't get given any dust when the nerf occurs, you'll need to disenchant yourself, hence why crafting before will net you nothing.
Thanks Exlutonian for making it clear!
I was hoping they would nerf mage since Giant + Conjurers is a bit too strong IMO...
they'll probably do it in the second round of nerfs.
I doubt the meta will be fine now that the main reason said decks were held back is gone.
I still suspect Bomb Warrior, Conjurer Mage and maybe even Mech HUnter to get some sort of nerf
Looking at the statistics, Mage isn't too powerful at the moment. Yes, there are few plays as powerful as turn 3 Giant into turn 4 Khadgar, Coin, Conjurer's Calling, but that happens only rarely.
Mage can be be overwhelmingly powerful, but it's not very consistent.