Patch 20.4.2 - Stealer of Souls Removal - Battlegrounds Balance Changes
The patchnotes for the patch for June 16th, with the official removal of Stealer of Souls and some interesting Balance changes for Battlegrounds, as well as the usual bugfixes. Read all the details below! This patch is now LIVE!
Quote from BlizzardThe 20.4.2 patch, which will release on June 16, includes one update for Wild and two balance changes for Battlegrounds.
Wild Update
- Stealer of Souls has been banned in Wild.
Dev Comment: We've decided to ban Stealer of Souls in Wild, where it caused many games to stray too far away from the type of gameplay we’re aiming for. After deliberating on the appropriate action, we’ve decided to ban the card in order to maintain its current, and healthier, function in standard—as well as eliminate the problems caused in Wild. We do not have plans to ban many cards in the future. Bans will be reserved for cards creating extreme gameplay issues where there is no great solution for all formats. Since this is the first decision of its kind in Hearthstone, we'd love to hear your feedback. We’ll continue to monitor the card in all Modes and formats to determine if further action is needed elsewhere. When Stealer of Souls rotates into Wild, we’ll reposition it for the Wild environment and remove the ban. If there are any balance changes to Stealer of Souls before then, we’ll re-evaluate the ban.
Stealer of Souls will be eligible for a full dust refund for 2 weeks after the 20.4.2 patch goes live.
Battlegrounds Updates
Captain Flat Tusk
- Old: After you spend 3 Gold, gain a Blood Gem. → New: After you spend 4 Gold, gain a Blood Gem.
Kangor’s Apprentice
- Old: [Tavern Tier 6] 4 Attack, 8 Health → New: [Tavern Tier 5] 3 Attack, 6 Health
Bug Fixes & Game Improvements
- Fixed a bug that caused a copied Archdruid Naralex to give Dream cards to the wrong player.
- Fixed a bug where Lady Anacondra would not reduce the cost of Nature spells if she was already on the board when a Celestial Alignment was played.
- Fixed a bug with the reconnect feature on mobile.
- Fixed a bug that caused the Battlegrounds Rating to show as “0” when first opening the Player Profile.
- Fixed a bug that caused the Player Profile to show number of Battlegrounds first place finishes instead of Battlegrounds Top 4 finishes, as intended.
Quite bizzare "balance" changes in BGs. Charlga gives you 6 blood gems per round, but this guy will only give you 3-4 now...
The 6 aren't targeted on one minion. Flat Tusk is often the only blood gem generation engine you needed for Aggem though i do feel Charlga is underrated.
I think the nerf is a bit much I would have left it at 3 gold, but not count gold used for hero powers.
Gold spent on rerolls*
I kind of missing stealer of souls,now my aggro deck is losing to Reno again and stealer was keeping Reno away lol
Mobile has more issues than a "disconnect bug". Performance has degraded significantly over the past three or four patches. My devices aren't slouches either. It's particularly noticable when trying to pull off higher apm plays. Animation times are more drawn out on mobile as well. I play on PC too, but when I'm out and about using mobile, I expect to have at least a MODERATELY similar experience.
Wild is not so wild anymore
And that is a good thing
I think the biggest complain is that wild is supposed to be a place where you can play with all cards, banning cards instead of nerfing contradicts the main purpose of this mode
In other hand, in this particular case, banning is easier and faster than rebalancing with a risk of killing the card or even a whole archetype, or resulting in being ineffective, so there is no reason to complain, they killed a stupid deck with low to none counterplay and we all get dust refund, everybody wins!
I mean, in Russian, Wild mode is called as Free / Freedom mode. That's ironic
I thought the purpose was to play with cards that rotated out as to not feel forced to purchase new content,
Not be plagued by whatever is introduced in standard.
No mention of the Lich King bug, so I assume this is not a major enough patch to include that particular fix.