Hearthstone: Rise of Shadows

So, it's a new year, and a new expansion... but I am really excited for this one, for all the wrong reasons. The actual new cards being introduced honestly all feel like a big shrug for me.

But what I am excited for, though, is the heavy implications that this year's three expansions will all set up a full story in the Hearthstone/Warcraft universe. Single-player content has either been tongue-in-cheek interpretations of WoW raids or handwaved "fight a huge amount of monsters to get to the final boss" for the Dungeon Run/Monster Hunt minigames. And while I appreciate the accessibility that this brings, it also makes me really sad that Hearthstone doesn't engage in more interesting storylines, often just half-assing their way with short prose stories and whatnot. The sequence of shorts leading up to the actual trailer was pretty fun, I think.

So "Rise of Shadows" is the first part of this trilogy, featuring a Suicide Squad made up of Hearthstone's original villains -- Rafaam, Dr. Boom, Hagatha, Toggwaggle and Madame Lazul (that one lady troll that narrated the Old Gods expansion trailer) -- going to Dalaran to unleash some nefarious schemes. It's pretty neat, and I'm actually happy to see that we're going to potentially get a coherent story and single-player experience out of this. The trailer's also pretty fun. Not a huge fan of the music, but the artwork (particularly the expressions) and voice acting is genuinely hilarious.

The actual expansion seems to be splitting up the classes to either be part of the League of EVIL, with each of the five primary baddies getting a class (Rafaam is Warlock, Boom is Warrior, Hagatha is Shaman, Lazul is Priest and Togwaggle is Rogue), while the other four will represent the Defenders of Dalaran. So far, we've got eight new cards and a bunch of new mechanics, and... and it's neat? None of these scream out "oh my god, awesome" other than Kalecgos, although I am kind of a fan of the new mechanics, if not necessarily on these particular cards. Going through them as quickly as I can:


Arch-Villain Rafaam is... he's a fun card. A 7-mana 7/8 with Taunt is not bad, and that Taunt is particularly important. His effect is basically the same battlecry as Elise Starseeker's monkey from League of Explorers, only without all the hassle of having to draw the map and the monkey. It's also interesting that the chose to give Rafaam to Warlock, which I don't think have ever played Elise when she was in rotation. It could be interesting, though, to use Rafaam as a more-consistently-good version of Renounce Darkness, and one that comes with a decent body at that. My gut feeling says that Rafaam isn't going to be great, but I'm definitely going to have some fun with him.

Kalecgos is the mage legendary, and he's a 4/12 dragon, which is a statline shared with many other dragon aspects. He's 10 mana, though, a first, and has the insanely powerful effect of "your first spell each turn costs 0". Someone, somewhere, will make a deck where you can cheat Kalecgos and his daddy Malygos into the field very quickly, and it's honestly a pretty damn interesting deck-building exercise, if nothing else. I do like the fact that it's the first spell each turn that costs 0, so if you cheated Kalec out with a spell (or use the coin!), you can't actually benefit from his passive ability. Kalecgos does also have the battlecry of discovering a spell, which is honestly just kind of overkill since you can just play Kalecgos on turn and just bank on him giving you a free board clear or face damage. I wouldn't say "meta-defining", but people are definitely going to build decks out of him. I know I will.

Chef Nomi: A neutral legendary referencing a funny WoW character, but on first glance, I really don't think that there's any way that Chef Nomi is good. He's a far more conditional version of Mage's Dragoncaller legendary from Kobolds, only being able to summon six 6/6 elementals after you have emptied your deck. And at that point, why play Nomi instead of, oh, Mecha'thun or Hakkar or any of the cards that would heavily benefit from an empty deck? Cool, but ultimately probably never going to see any play.

The Forest's Aid: A Druid spell and features "Twinspell", which is... kind of a variation of Echo. Twinspell basically adds a second copy (without twinspell) into your hand after you cast the spell, but unlike echo, it doesn't disappear at the end of the turn. The Forest's Aid is an 8-mana spell that summons five 2/2 Treants. On first glance and with the cards I know about now, it's just more expensive Force of Nature and Treant druid decks suck worse than discard warlock, so I don't see this card working unless we get some really powerful support cards for the archetype. Am definitely far more curious about other Twinspell cards in the future, for sure.


Forbidden Words: Finally, a Priest spell that allows you to remove 4-attack minions! And a very flexible one at that. A return of the 'forbidden' mechanic from way back in Whispers of the Old Gods, Forbidden Words is a very, very scary-looking spell. I definitely see Wild Big Priest quickly fitting this into their decks. And, yes, Forbidden Words has to be the final spell you play in that turn, but being a very flexible single-target removal is definitely something that Priest would love. Standard Priest is also losing a fair bit of their control tools, so this is definitely a welcome addition to the Priest ranks.

Spellward Jeweler: A neutral 3-mana 3/4 that basically casts a poor man's Time Out on your hero, giving it the Fairy Dragon effect for a turn. It stops OTK Mage combos... but doesn't really do anything against things like Mecha'thun or minion damage. I really don't see this card being the anti-OTK tech choice, especially since Mojomaster Zihi is still probably the premier tech choice.


Hagatha's Scheme: A Shaman spell that is another new mechanic, 'schemes' basically has the numbers on the card increase exponentially each turn. Sort of comparable to Gruul or to the Spellstones, although it only activates on your turn. Hagatha's Scheme is a 5-mana that deals 1 damage to all minions in the battlefield, mimicking Hagatha's battlecry... and it's... it's an interesting spell? It doesn't have overload, and can potentially fuck up a board real bad, but it's such a terrible top-deck that I'm not sure if it's worth the sacrifice.

EVIL Miscreant has my favourite mechanic, which is lackeys. The card itself isn't super remarkable, a 3-mana 1/5 that needs you to Combo it to activate its effect. Hopefully other lackey-generating cards won't be as poorly statted as this one. But the Lackeys are comparable to GvG's Spare Parts, except a lot more powerful than the Spare Parts. We get five Lackeys, and they confirm that they will be adding lackeys in future expansions of this year, which is interesting since adding cards to a small pool of pre-determined cards will definitely affect how good or how bad these lackey-generating cards are.

All the lackeys are 1-mana 1/1, and we have five, each representing the five main villains. They're all pretty neat, I guess, and do a fair amount of powerful tricks particularly for their mana cost. Witchy Lackey evolves a friendly minion, which can be insanely powerful if you have a hugely costed minion on the battlefield -- and especially if the enemy doesn't expect it. Faceless Lackey summons a random 2-cost minion, and while Doomsayer memes will probably be funny, it also is just nice, decent board value. Kobold Lackey's deal 2 damage is just a cheaper C'Thun Panda, also pretty nice if not too powerful. Goblin Lackey's effect is giving a friendly minion +1 attack and rush... and that rush can be pretty scary. Ethereal Lackey allows you to discover a spell, which is probably the only one out of the five that's value-based and not tempo-based.

I look at the lackeys and they look funky and powerful, but I look back at EVIL Miscreant and... is it worth it to put in a 3-mana 1/5? That needs a combo activator? It's definitely a fun, interesting mechanic, but I'm not sure if we're going to see that much play out of them if Evil Miscreant is what Blizzard values the lackey mechanic as costing.

Anyway... new cards! I'm mostly more lukewarm about the new cards this time around, although I definitely appreciate the mechanics. Looking the most forward to the Arena and solo adventures updates, though, because moreso than ever, the dang ladder's just became so utterly stale and monotonous.