Theotar & Ice Revenant Nerf Leaks Confirmed - Coming With Expansion Patch 25.0
Blizzard just confirmed some leaks of changed cards on the PlayHearthstone card library, the rest of the leaked changes were apparently bugs.
Quote from BlizzardHello everyone,
Alongside our major announcements this Tuesday we updated our website’s Card Library to include new cards from the Death Knight Class and March of the Lich King expansion. Additionally, Death Knight deck building has been enabled there to allow for early theory crafting!
We’re aware of an unexpected issue with the implementation of this feature that has caused some cards to show up with different stats than their in-game counterparts. The inaccuracies do not reflect planned changes to these cards, with the exception of Theotar, the Mad Duke, and Ice Revenant; those 2 changes will arrive with our 25.0 update.
Dev Comment: Two cards not in the March of the Lich King set will be receiving nerfs in the 25.0 patch: Theotar, the Mad Duke and Ice Revenant.
The release of a new class is an incredibly exciting moment for Hearthstone players everywhere, and a moment that we want to be as enjoyable and accessible as possible. Knowing the importance of this new class release, our plan with Theotar was to test out a smaller nerf to the card (from 4 mana to 5 mana) before potentially moving to a larger nerf (6 mana 4/4) if necessary. Theotar’s play rate did not drop as far as we would have liked it to with the smaller nerf and is still much higher than we would like it to be leading into the March of the Lich King. Our aim with this second nerf is to lower the card’s play rate to ensure that the release of Death Knight is as fun as possible for players with a wide variety of interests and experience levels.
The nerf to Ice Revenant might appear out of place, but it feels like a necessary one in a world where Death Knight has access to multiple cheap Frost spells (Horn of Winter in particular). In testing we were frequently seeing Ice Revenant’s game-ending size on turn 4, and the card was simply overshadowing many of the new and exciting things going on in the set.
In addition to stat differences, there are some minion type tag adjustments visible. Minion type tags are indeed changing on many old cards, which we’ll be communicating the specifics on in the near future.
Our own visuals (click to enlarge)
Comment made by a developer
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hunter is fine after the weapon and wild seeds nerfs. it's not dominant anymore which was the point of the nerfs.
Noooo, I actualy play a homebrew, not viable, Frost Mage deck, and Ice Revenant was pretty much the best win condition in that deck.
"Insanity is No Excuse for Bad Mana"
"Insanity is no excuse for bad card design"
The thing is that this nerf does not arrive for another month in patch 25.0 for the expansion launch... We have no idea how the new meta with 11 classes will play out yet, it is a big question along with nerfed 6 mana 4/4 Theotar, I don't want to conclude this change is not enough even though I think it will need to be nerfed again..
Our aim ... to ensure that the release of Death Knight is as fun as possible for players with a wide variety of interests and experience levels.
Mission failed.
Mindrender Illucia all over again. Next time we'll finally see a full effect change.
Dunno why blizz doesn't realize that in a meta with game ending cards like Kel'Thuzad, Mutanas, Denathrius, Raffam, Artificer, that stupid 9 mana eat 3 minions card, etc, a card like this would see play at even 6 mana.
Funny how they are going to pre-emptively nerf ice revenant, a card that has never seen any play, due to playtested "game-ending sizes." But they allow rogues to put out 15/15 stealths as early as turn 5, is pretty funny.
Ice Revenant ?
Where does that card saw played?
"The nerf to Ice Revenant might appear out of place, but it feels like a necessary one in a world where Death Knight has access to multiple cheap Frost spells (Horn of Winter in particular). In testing we were frequently seeing Ice Revenant’s game-ending size on turn 4, and the card was simply overshadowing many of the new and exciting things going on in the set."
In the few DK card revealed, I already can see how busted Ice Revenant could be. Cards like Horn of Winter, Icy Touch, Glacial Advance and Frost Strike paint a clear image of this Miracle Ice Revenant deck. I mean, it could rather easily make a 10/11 or bigger Revenant if you cast "just" 3 Frost Spells on turn 4, which could very well be game-ending in combination with the amount of face damage Frost DK has.
Yeah my bad I didn't think of that
Upping the mana twice instead of just dealing with the elephant in the room: you're going to have to change the verbiage on Theotar eventually.
Stay lazy, Team 5.
Calling it now. Theotar is going to be up for either a THIRD nerf or a ban after this lameduck nerf they are pulling. Even at six mana, he'll still see a good deal of play. Effect is strong enough still to warrant a spot. That's why Theotar is played in the first place. This is all just my opinion of course but I imagine his play rate won't change. For a lot of people's sanity, let's hope it does. Cheers!
i think even at 8 mana he would see play
Doubt it.
Even at 5 mana a lot of decks dropped him.
At 6 mana, only very specific decks relying on stealing cards would take him.
A lot of decks may have dropped him but I still see him in 5 out of 7 games against varying deck types
Is your deck a control deck? You include it. It could cost 10, you still include it because it is needed to beat combo and other control decks.