Hearthstone: One Night in Karazhan

Yay, a new adventure is announced! Quite surprisingly, I'm still not entirely bored with the newest set yet -- by the time that Grand Tournament, League of Explorers and Whispers of the Old Gods showed up the meta has became quite stale, but I honestly am not having that feeling with this batch. Maybe it's the result of having two different metas, or so many deck archetypes that's playable... I dunno. But the next adventure, 'One Night in Karazhan', is set for release in two weeks. For news and details check out Hearthpwn.com and other news sites that'll undoubtedly be more concise. Also I don't wanna just retype everything.

Karazhan is a cool part of the lore, first introduced as a pretty generic mage tower belonging to Medivh that's common in a lot of fantasy fiction, it became extra-prominent when it is released as a dungeon in World of Warcraft, with the ghosts and magical beings that remained within the tower running wild. This version, of course, is a Hearthstone-ified version of the insane yet dark tower, and the within the story of the game apparently we turn back the clock to when Medivh was sane and hip and smashing, and throws a party... yet he disappears for some reason, and we have to go through the Karazhan bosses who run wild (of course) plus, um, a Silverware Golem. Aesthetically Karazhan is awesome and the bits we saw with the new bosses and whatnot all look really cool, and the trailer is pretty bombing too, but while the adventure experience is undoubtedly going to be amazing and awesome, especially with wacky shit like the Chess and Opera Events... let's talk about the cards.

(Young Medivh looks pimp as fuck, by the way)

We're getting 45 new cards, and like League of Explorers two of them will be free upon unlocking the first wing. At this point we're only getting to see seven of them, which is a bit of a shame, but hey.

• Ivory Knight: It's a Paladin minion, a six-mana 4/4, based on the Chess Event, but it allows you to discover a spell (like Ethereal Conjurer) and, most importantly, heal for its cost. Paladin has became the premier healer class with the addition of Forbidden Healing and Ragnaros the Lightlord in Whispers of the Old Gods, and there's still neutral healing options like Cult Apothecary and Earthen Ring Farseer around. With Paladins being quite decent in the value and control games, getting to do two things at once -- heal and discover a potentially devastating spell -- it's definitely far better than I initially thought it is. And a 4/4 body is pretty balanced, yet nothing to sneeze at either. It's a cool and unique design, if nothing else.
• Kindly Grandmother: 2-mana 1/1 with a Deathrattle that summons a 3/2. And it's a beast! Far more mana-efficient than the Infested Wolf, and kind of a weaker but cheaper version of that Twilight Summoner dude. It's super-flavourful with the wolf grandmama becoming a monster upon 'dying' and shedding its disguise, and, wow. Deathrattle Hunter didn't exactly take off because Midrange Hunter was so insanely good, but this will benefit both Deathrattle and Midrange Hunters for sure. Also both the Grandmother and the summoned Big Bad Wolf are both beasts, so that's additional synergy with tings like Houndmaster. I just hope they didn't go too overboard with Deathrattles again, but with N'Zoth around I'm sure the ones they make from here on out will be a lot more balanced. It's like, well, they know what cards are good, but they know releasing them as Neutrals will make them auto-includes in the way that Haunted Creeper and Piloted Shredder were, so I wouldn't be surprised if we see a resurgence of more older Naxx or GvG cards in new forms.
• Ethereal Peddler: 5-mana 5/6 with a battlecry that gives a 2-mana discount for cards from other classes in your hand. So this comboes well with Undercity Huckster, Nefarian and Burgle... and you might think that it's a bit too specific because the cards you get from those cards might not even be good... but a 5-mana 5/6 isn't a bad card, really, and discounts are very useful for a Rogue. Ultimately he might just be too slow and unwieldy, though his stats isn't really bad maybe the other Rogue card from this Adventure might give another steal effect? I definitely will try to make a deck out of the 'steal' mechanic. Oh, by the way, if a Priest Thoughtsteals this card, man... otherwise, though, it's a very gimmicky card. Hell if it doesn't look fun, though.
• Enchanted Raven: 1-mana 2/2 Beast. Yeah, Druids don't want to be outdone by Shaman's 4-mana 7/7. It's a lot less insane than Flamewreathed Faceless, for sure, and possibly less impactful, since Druids like to just skip a lot of the early turns and go straight to turn 4 and 5... and Living Roots already does the same thing, except it splits the 2/2 stats across two bodies (rendering it susceptible to Arcane Explosion or Fan of Knives) with the added flexibility of being able to deal direct damage if needed, doing both effects with Fandral and triggering Yogg-Saron. The Raven looks good initially but I think I still prefer Living Roots? It'll be graet in Beast Druid, which we might reach... eventually. Don't think this is the card that'll do it, though.
• Firelands Portal: 7-mana spell. Deal 5 damage, summon a random 5-mana minion. Holy shit this card is awesome. It's nothing to sneeze at -- you're basically getting a 5-mana minion, and a 2-mana 5-damage which, when you consider how much Fireball and Frostbolt are priced, is insane value. And yes, the 5-mana minion is random... but there are a lot of great 5-mana minions, as my Forbidden Shaping plays have shown me. A quick look through the Standard list shows that the only real losers are the untransformed Druid of the Claw, Faceless Manipulator, Validated Doomsayer, BGH and Ram Wrangler. And yeah, a lot of the other dudes don't have their battlecries activate, but you get generally a 5/5, 5/4 or 6/3 body and that's half-decent considering the additional damage you deal with the spell. And sometimes you get an Earth Elemental or Doomguard and just win the game. It's a spell, too, so it'll be great in Yogg decks, and in arena, man, as if Mages need more OP common cards. At a glance it appears to be great in arena and semi-decent in constructed. It's apparently a series of portal cards a la Forbidden spells? That's cool. I've always loved 'set' cards. 
• Barnes: 4-mana 3/4 that summons a 1/1 copy of a random minion in your deck. It's basically a random, cheaper Shadowcaster, except you can't target the minion. You do get it for free, though, so maybe it'll be useful? I dunno. Pulling out things like Y'Shaarj or Ragnaros or Sylvanas or Tirion or Antonidas would be awesome, but Shadowcaster's great because you can combo it and choose what you want to copy... and if Barnes pulls out a Battlecry minion then it just kinda sucks because you ultimately just get a Yeti's worth of stats with four mana. You don't see a lot of Herald Volazj being played, after all, and I don't think Barnes will be played too much either. I really liked the lore reason, though, where Barnes the opera master summons an 'actor' to play the card in your deck. A Deathrattle N'Zoth deck would be awesome. Unlike Y'Shaarj, he won't waste the battlecry of the N'Zoth he pulls out and he doesn't 'waste' the minion, but if he does pull out a good Deathrattle minion like Sylvanas or Cairne or Xaril or Anub'arak, well, you're in for a treat. I don't know, a lot of people point out how awesome if he pulls out Malygos or Y'Shaarj or Ragnaros on turn 4, but eh. It's something that's kind of a coin toss, I think? He might be really, really good, or be really, really bad. It's one that I kind of dismissed as a weaker, more random Shadowcaster, but after mulling on it a bit, man, it's kind of awesome! It's kind of a build-around deck, isn't it?
• The Curator: Well, this dude's insane. 7-mana, 4/6 Taunt... basically a single Twin Emperor that happens to be a Mech (which is pointless in Standard)... but it draws you a Dragon, a Beast and a Murloc. What insane breed of deck uses all three? I don't know, but the deck-building possibilities is kind of insane. There are a lot of great Dragon and Beast decks out there, and Murloc decks are... doable... but one that uses all three? It'll be hilarious and awesome when a proper triple tribe deck eventually gets made, but until then this is just a cool and initially seemingly-gimmicky card. What it is, though, is a Tutor card with an immediate effect -- anyone who's played a different TCG would know the sheer power of Tutor cards, which are cards that draw specific cards from your deck. Magic, Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon have a crapton of these as the backbone of their meta decks, and the closest that Hearthstone has to a Tutor card is Ancient Harbinger and she kind of is shit. Yes, the Curator doesn't draw your game-ending C'Thun... but the fact that she draws a dragon? You know Malygos decks? Yeah, they have a way to pull the big blue crazy old dragon out of their deck reliably. Alexstrasza in Freeze Mages? They get a Taunt and a guaranteed Alexstrasza in their hands. And even then, any Reno or Control deck will be happy to draw a Ysera, an Azure Drake, a Twilight Guardian, et cetera. The Beast portion might be more specific to Druid and Hunter decks, and I can't think of any super-combo-y Beast that I would want, but on the other hand an extra card in your hand can't really hurt. Murlocs... eh. Murloc Knight's the only real great Murloc I would want late-game, or maybe Corrupted Seer, and that's kinda iffy, but I suppose other Reno decks can fit in Bluegill Warrior? He's the only one I can see throwing into non-Murloc decks.

Overall I liked the feel of the set. It doesn't feel too good from a meta standpoint, not the way that Whispers of the Old Gods had with the dual factor of rotating out two card blocks and introducing a lot of great build-around cards... but I dunno. This just feels fun. Also give Priest a bit of a bone, yeah, and give them some good minions and/or spells? Priest really should be about healing and unkillable minions as opposed to 'remove everything from the enemy's board by stealing or one-shotting them with a spell'.