Datamined Balance Changes for 22.2 - Sorcerer's Apprentice - Rapid Fire - Rogue Changes & More!
After some sites jumped the gun, here are the Balance changes as datamined from an upcoming Patch, before Blizzard reveals them in the Patchnotes scheduled for tomorrow. Notable is that The Rapid Fire change for Hunter is not just a cost increase but also a Damage increase and that on top of all the nerfs, there is a buff to Rokara, the hero, going from 5 armor to 10 armor.
Quote from HearthPwn[EX1_608] [Sorcerer's Apprentice] [MODIFIED] COST: 2 => 4
[DAL_373] [Rapid Fire] [MODIFIED] COST: 1 => 2 (note: not just the cost was increased, damage too, from 1 to 2)
[DAL_373ts] [Rapid Fire] [MODIFIED] COST: 1 => 2 (note: not just the cost was increased, damage too, from 1 to 2)
[BT_002] [Incanter's Flow] [MODIFIED] COST: 3 => 4
[DMF_512] [Cloak of Shadows] [MODIFIED] COST: 3 => 4
[SW_028t] [Create a Distraction] [MODIFIED] QUEST_PROGRESS_TOTAL: 2 => 3
[AV_202] [Rokara, the Valorous] [MODIFIED] ARMOR: 5 => 10
[AV_203] [Shadowcrafter Scabbs] [MODIFIED] COST: 7 => 8
[AV_298] [Wildpaw Gnoll] [MODIFIED] COST: 5 => 6
[AV_298] [Wildpaw Gnoll] [MODIFIED] ATK: 4 => 3
Mage Changes
Hunter Changes
Of note, not just the Cost was increased, so was the Damage, from 1 to 2.
I have cards with nerfed, but I can't get full dust.
hate this- so mage is nerfed because of wild sorc mage?
they nerfed it because can't deal with cheaters who jumped animations in wild otk
Priest? modCheck
Mage archetype destroyed. Meanwhile Pirate warrior is at the best 1 turn slowed…
Mage is at the bottom and they nerf mage?
mage in wild is doing so well
no only cheaters are doing well with mages in wild
You're vastly underestimating the impact of the Rapid Fire change.
The huge bulk of Quest Hunter in Wild are Odd decks, and this change literally removes nearly half of their 1-mana DD options (they'll only have 6 with Wound Prey, On the Hunt and Arcane Shot now whereas Rapid Fire would give them 10). You can effectively starve them for a turn or two early on if they don't get a good draw (especially if you refuse to play minions for a bit, not allowing them to use Overwhelm or Powershot).
This probably won't outright kill Quest Hunter in Wild, but you'll probably start seeing a lot fewer Odd ones at least.
I think that Druid, face hunter and Libram will dominate.
Poison rogue got big hit by nerfs and also can be countered with Vipers,
agree, the odd version is now unplayable.
but i think that the non Odd version can be quiet good (not great..) as well
as you can include quick-shot and Dragonbane
Rokara still feels tad weak. Well at least you can play Rokara + 0 mana AOE now.
Not just nerfed, they flat out removed it from the deck. Wild Quest Hunter is only good in the Odd variant, removing Rapid Fire from it removes consistency by a lot.
How in the world has Mr. Smite remained untouched?
It's not the big problem card to be honest. There are loads of things you can do to cockblock charge minions. Mainly because it has to interact with the actual game. The really egregious decks are just killing you from hand atm even when you have a full board of taunts.
So Quest hunter in wild is still broken as hell even with 1 card change. Thanks good knowing wild is still considered the red head step child in this game. Seriously the quest is horrible broken worse than warrior ever could be. Atleast warrior you can tech against pretty easily. Hunters can complete there quest twice as fast as any other one with a ton of utility for easy board clear.
So your basically saying we know it’s broken in wild, have no plan to ban the quest in wild and will continue to watch it wreck havoc. But standard is our priority and anything else is an oh well situation, gotcha.
They nerfed the single best card in the deck
It did? I still see it all the time, as hsreplay has it in a number of high winrate decks.
... yes? A card being powerful and a general purpose buildaround card that is in almost every deck for a class is fine, but it also makes the class stale if it's in every deck for years, so they eventually want to change that fact. That's obviously the right approach, no one wants to see the same few cards and same deck archetypes for another 8 years. They've done it plenty of times before, with cars like Wild Growth for example. Wild Growth got nerfed to the extent that it barely sees any play any longer, but that allowed them to print new types of ramp, often more powerful than Wild Growth, but also more limited in terms of the decks you can include them in. I imagine the same will happen with Sorcerer's Apprentice.
Right. It WAS broken. So why haven't they touched it until now when it has been so clearly busted?
Wild Growth absolutely still sees play in Druids in Standard right now. Sorcerer's Apprentice will no longer ever see play.