Patch 23.0.1 Patch Notes - Balance Changes BG & Duels - Pandaren Importer Change & Bug Fixes
Blizzard put some Patch Notes live on forums tonight, to adress some Battlegrounds balance concerns and a particularly problematic OTK with the new Core Set.
Some creative streamers found a new OTK with extremely high APM requirement. The idea was to use Brann Bronzebeard plus Pandaren Importer and Fogsail Freebooter and perpetually cycle the latter 2 with Shadowstep (created by Pandaren Importer by having every other spell in the deck, meaning it showed up guaranteed), for a very slow 4 damage a pop OTK.
There was bound to be a reaction by Blizzard, and there was: Pandaren Importer is now a 3 Mana minion, meaning she can't be perpetually cycled back and forth with Shadowstep. Crisis averted!
Quote from BlizzardPatch 23.0.1 is a server-side hotfix, deploying right now. The patch includes balance changes to Battlegrounds and Duels, a pre-emptive balance change for Standard, and bug fixes.
Balance Changes:
- In order to prevent an unintended interaction after Standard rotation, Pandaren Importer is changing from a 2-mana 1/3 to a 3-mana 2/4. Because this is a server-side patch, Pandaren Importer will appear as though its stats have been affected by an in-game effect. This will be updated in an upcoming patch. Because of this change, regular copies of Pandaren Importer will be able to be disenchanted for their full dust value until April 20 at 10 a.m. Pacific. (Golden copies of Pandaren Importer are not craftable because they were on the United in Stormwind rewards track).
- Sub Scrubber (Ini Stormcoil’s Buddy) has been moved from Tavern Tier 2, to Tavern Tier 4. Because this is a server-side hotfix, the Tavern Tier will not appear correctly at hero selection or when hovering over the Buddy Meter. This will be updated in a later full patch.
- Varden Dawngrasp and Ini Stormcoil have been moved from Armor Tier 2 (2-5 Armor) to Armor Tier 1 (0 Armor).
- Wildfire and Malygos are banned from deck creation in Duels.
- The Legendary Loot and Unstable Magic Passive Treasures were moved to the Ultra Rare Pool 2.
Bug Fixes and Game Improvements:
- Fixed the visual bug that caused the Ranked Season Rewards celebration to appear blank.
- Fixed a bug where Kurtrus, Demon Render counted times your hero was attacked as well as times you attacked with your hero.
- Fixed a bug where secrets played after Freezing Trap would not trigger after Freezing Trap activated to remove the trigger condition. For example, after this bug fix, if a player plays Freezing Trap and then Explosive Trap, and the enemy attacks the player with a minion, the Freezing Trap will activate to return the attacking minion and then the Explosive Trap will trigger.
- Fixed a bug where Emergency Maneuvers could cause an enemy minion to go Dormant.
- Fixed a bug where Pathmaker would create extra history tiles throughout games.
- Improved Battlegrounds performance related to when minions buffed “for the rest of the game” appear in Bob’s Tavern during the Recruit Phase.
- Temporarily removed the “The Good Stuff” Darkmoon Prize from Tickatus’s Prize pool in order to avoid a bug. The Prize is expected to be returned to Tickatus’s Prize pool in a later patch, when the bug is resolved.
- Fixed a bug where the game would crash if you got a Mysterious Stranger encounter after already completing all Tasks for all Mercenaries you own. Now, if there are not enough visitors with available Tasks to fill the three options, it will select random Mercenaries to fill those slots. You will then be able to select a Mercenary as normal and, if that Mercenary does not have any Tasks to offer, you will get Coins for that Mercenary.
- Fixed a bug where the Reshape Deathblow would copy the target’s Equipment twice.
- Fixed a bug where the “Mecha Magic!” Duels card bucket was inaccurately labeled as “Big Spell.”
- Fixed a bug where players who already had a complete Curse of Naxxramas collection when Patch 23.0 went live could not claim the Diamond Loatheb reward that was added in the patch.
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Yea, it would be perfectly reasonable to nerf my 20 different rogue decks to protect your neutral card that will stop seeing play the moment it rotates. God forbid you need to spend 1 more mana for 1/1 stats.
Oh, I don't think they should nerf Shadowstep at all. I just think they should have rotated it out of 2022 core set or just removed it from pandaren's discover pool. The former option would allow for rogue to not revolve so heavily around one card that's defined its identity forever, and the latter option would solve the issue outright with almost no issues.
If they did rotate Shadowstep, though, I would like for them to totally redo rogue's core set to not have quite as many bad cards, too.
Funny. That's very much the same argument all those people made about Preparation before it went from discount 3 to discount 2.
Shadowstep has been a design space problem since the games creation - it keeps cropping up in degenerate combos, in OTKs, infinite hand loops, etc etc etc. And a bunch of cards in Rogue are absolutely hamstrung during the design because Shadowstep *exists*.
shadowstep being removed from standard is WAY over due.
I still cant get diamond Loatheb as I disenchanted curse of naxx cards. I'm unsure if this is by design or if this is still a bug?
You need to recraft the missing Naxxramas cards. After you get diamond loatheb, you can disenchant normal loatheb.
I also disenchanted some of the naxx cards some months ago but as I did own the complete set before that I still got diamond loatheb. So I guess a bug, or you never owned the complete naxx collection
lol the sad Quest Priest became a side victim again for indirect nerf.... Pandaren Importer is their favorite card.
I'm surprised at such a quick nerf response from their team, hope they can keep up with this pace when the expansion actually launched...
Yeah, kind of a dick move to shoot down Quest Priest like that. Nothing comparable coming up with the rotation in the 2 mana slot. Could've made her discover spells that cost at least 1 mana or something.
they should have waited till rotation to nerf
Well, thanks for the extra 160 dust and diamond Loatheb.