Acornbearer (or "Fluffy Squirrel Whisperer"): Very powerful one-drop, a 2/1 that adds two 1/1 beast tokens to your hand. Not much to say, it's a more fragile and slightly slower Fire Fly that adds more bodies. Great in Token Druid for sure, and honestly, definitely a solid 1-drop all around. The Deathrattle definitely makes this a bit less powerful than initially seems, though.
Dreamway Guardians: "Heal Druid" is trying to be a thing, and this is a 2-mana spell that summons two 1/2's with Lifesteal. The token-generating part of this card is certainly great, since you're basically doing a Firefly-turn-two turn, but with lifesteal. I'm still not convinced that the deck itself will be particularly powerful, sine it might genuinely be hard to get damaged and restore that health, but between the Stag, Lifeweaver and Lucentbark, there definitely are the roots for a deck. It's certainly far, far more promising than poor old Gonk.Lifeweaver: Crystal Stag is a card I deemed to be pretty powerful, but sometimes might just be too impractical to get its effects off. Lifeweaver is the other way around, though -- a 3-mana 2/5 is probably just powerful to be run on its own (Druid of the Flame surely did) but the additional effect of generating specifically druid spells whenever you restore health? It's not just face-health either, it could be any health. Can definitely see this just being a simple turn 3 drop that sometimes snowballs and generates resources, and in Wild I can definitely see this deck working out with the likes of Fungal Enchanter,
Lucentbark: The legendary that is supposed to define the heal archetype, Lucentbark is... not very impressive on purpose. 8-mana 4/8, even with Taunt, is very overpriced. Lucentbark's effect is similar to that of Sherazin from Un'Goro, which is going dormant, and restoring 5 health is definitely a relatively simpler thing to do than playing 4 cards in a turn. Lucentbark being a big-ass body with taunt is also a huge incentive to bring him back as compared to Sherazin's 5/3 body. The real problem, I think, is whether there are enough cards at all to pull this off reliably. I'm just guessing that we need a couple more solid healing cards, although maybe Druids will just really look into the lifesteal pool and go from there? Honestly, while it's probably not going to be a tier-1 deck, I can definitely see this archetype working out. If not in this expansion, maybe in the future.Crystalsong Portal: Druid spell, costing 2 mana. You discover a druid minion, and if your hand has no minions, you get to keep all 3. Some druid minions are good, some are okay, some are crap... comparable to Omega Assembly, except Omega Assembly's ask -- reaching turn ten -- is far, far easier than running a Spell Druid deck. Never say never, since Spell Hunter did end up eventually working, but unless we get some powerful support, definitely not going to be a particularly powerful card.
Nine Lives: A 3-mana spell that... hoo boy, what an interesting effect! You discover a friendly deathrattle minion that has specifically died this game, add it to your hand, but also trigger the deathrattle immediately. A very powerful late-game card, particularly if you play it with some of the more powerful Deathrattles -- Spider Bomb, Sylvanas, Cairne... hell, the fact that this is a Discover effect means you can straight-up choose! People are pointing at Oblivitron and while it certainly supports that deck, I still don't think the currently revealed cards are enough for Oblivitron to actually be a proper deck. Nine Lives itself will definitely see play in some degree, though. I guarantee it.
Shimmerfly: Simple card that combines Webspinner and Babbling Book, except for Hunters, a 1-mana 1/1 that deathrattles into a hunter spell into your hand. Sounds neat, but probably a bit too weak for its own good. Deathrattle decks will want genuinely powerful deathrattles to not dilute their Nine Lives, whereas spell-centric decks will want actual spells. Not a bad card, though.Conjurer's Calling: A card I actually like a lot -- a 3 mana Twinspell card that destroys a minion, and then summons 2 minions of the same cost to replace it. Obviously you want to do this with large minions, preferably those of the 6-10 mana range. 3 mana isn't too expensive to run in, say, a Cabal Crystalrunner into a trade, and then swap out your damaged minion for two fresh 6-drops. Obvious synergy with Khadgar and whatnot... it's comparable to Evolve, I guess, where you have to set up a board so that you want to get the maximum value from the spell, but instead of getting value through upgrading cost, you just go with quantity. Particularly powerful in Arena, I would believe.
Desperate Measures: A Twinspell 1-mana spell that casts a random paladin secret? I'm seeing a lot of Paladin secret synergy, but this one just looks cute but impractical. It's fun, maybe, to baffle your opponent with "ooh, what secret do I have, I don't even know what I get", but I don't think it's worth it to run this instead of actual Secrets you want.
Call to Adventure: An interesting Paladin spell! A 3-mana card that tutors out the lowest cost minion in your deck, similar to Piper, but also hand-buffs it for +2/+2. Is that powerful enough? Standard Paladin might just run this for the card draw, since they are losing Divine Favor, but I dunno. 3 mana is pretty expensive for bundling together card draw and hand-buff... and that's not quite enough, I think. Sure, Immortal Prelate combo and whatnot, but I dunno. Seems to be a bit too impractical for my liking.Vendetta: We're throwing in a lot of support for Burgle Rogue, huh? Vendetta is a 4-mana deal 4 spell that costs 0 if you're holding a non-Rogue card. It's an effect that has cropped up every now and then in Rogue, but a lot of previous Burgle Rogue synergy cards are "if you play" instead of "if you're holding", which makes Vendetta interesting. Not sure if it'll see that much play -- after all, it could go the way of Wing Blast. Neat design, though.
Underbelly Fence: Another Rogue card that works with the "if you're holding a Burgled card" mechanic, Underbelly Fence seems to be a far more practical card than Vendetta, I think. A 2-mana 2/3 that becomes a 3/4 with Rush when you're holding a card from another class? While we do have Swashburglar to burgle cards on turn 1 in Wild, it remains to be seen if we're going to see a 1-mana burgle card be printed in Standard. Again, I'm not 100% sure that burgle rogue is going to be super-powerful, but if nothing else, giving a inherently fun, wacky deck actually powerful tools is definitely great in my books.
Tak Nozwhisker: Once more, AmazingLP knocks it out of the park with an amazing card reveal. Tak Nozwhisker is a 7-mana 6/6 that adds a copy of whatever cards you shuffle into your deck to your hand. Lab Recruiter is great to play with Tak, since you can suddenly get three copies of whatever great minion you're playing. Togwaggle's Scheme is another obvious one, shuffling a lot of a minion you want into your deck and hand, suddenly doubling things. The reveal video suggests the insanely fun way of comboing Tak with Academic Espionage, and with the addition of Preparation, you can theoretically play Tak, Preperation and Espionage at turn 10 and can both know what cards you shuffled into your deck and cast one of those. Pretty fun card! Probably one that Wild Mill Rogue decks would want -- and that honestly seems pretty scary in conjunction with the likes of Togwaggle's Scheme.
Plot Twist: A 2-mana spell that shuffles your hand and re-draws. It's a powerful effect in many other card games and I've seen this be debated back and forth. We've got a card with effect similar to this back during the Caverns of Time event in Arena, but that was an effect attached to a decently-statted minion. Plot Twist is a 2-mana spell... and while I can definitely see some combos with Augmented Elekk or Soularium, I still think it's honestly a bit too clunky... particularly since Warlock can already draw cards. It's not inherently bad, though, and we'll see if there are enough payoff cards that like being shuffled or drawn multiple times.Aranasi Broodmother: Like Aranasi Broodmother! We've had "cast when drawn" effects seen very sparingly in the past. Flame Leviathan, Sea Reaver, the various 'shuffle into deck' spells... but none that are always beneficial, while the minion stays in your hand. Broodmother is a 6-mana 4/6 Taunt, which is pretty shitty, but heals your hero by 4 when drawn. And... and maybe you just keep her in hand throughout the entire game and only cast her when you really have nothing better to do with your mana. She's also a Demon, so there's that going on for her. Comparable to Rotten Applebaum, but the effect casts faster and she's slightly more expensive. Not very impressive, but kinda solid, I think.
Dimensional Ripper: 10 mana spell that summons 2 copies of a minion in your deck? It's a Warrior spell, thank god, and not one for Priests (Wild Big Priest doesn't really need much more help) and... and it's definitely a better version of the Boomship, I'll tell you that much. Recruit Warrior decks have basically been beaten down by more powerful decks, and 10-mana is... is a lot to ask from a card since it eats up your entire turn. And the deck this would fit in suffers from the same problem that Big Priest suffers from. What if you draw the minions? What minions are good enough? The card is all right, but I'm not sure about the deck this would theoretically go into.The Boom Reaver: The Boom Reaver is another "use a copy of a minion in your deck", and it's really important that these effects are not Recruit. You're not spending a card from your deck. The Boom Reaver is a 10-mana 7/9 mech, but also comes with the battlecry of summoning a copy of a random minion in your deck... with Rush! One thing that's been missing is the lack of actual late-game bombs in a Warrior mech decks, with their game plan basically just outlasting the enemy with the Dr. Boom Mad Genius hero card, but Boom Reaver allows them to generate a whole ton of tempo in the late game. Boom Reaver summoning the likes of Ysera or Lich King or Deathwing from your deck is definitely an amazing power play... particularly with Rush! but at the same time, having Boom Reaver actually miss, and either pull out a weak minion (presumably you just don't run weak minions in a Boom Reaver/Dimensional Ripper deck) or just draw Boom Reaver last, and then he's just an expensive 7/9. Either way, though, definitely a fun-looking card for sure! I like this one.
Hench-Clan Hag: Very interesting card, Hench-Clan Hag is a 4-mana 3/3 that summons two 1/1 Amalgams that are like Nightmare Amalgams -- they're all types. Nightmare Amalgam's used as a curve rounder in some Murloc and Dragon decks, and I can maybe see Hag be played in swarm-style Murloc decks? Maaaaybe as a tech card in Wild Even Shaman with Totem synergies? It's solid in arena, but I don't think any Mech, Beast or Dragon deck really cares about having two 1/1 tokens all that much.
Archmage Vargoth: The card we'll be getting as the preview card for this expansion, Vargoth, is... a potentially far more dangerous card than Marin from days past. A 4-mana 2/6 isn't the best statline, but far from being fragile either. And at the end of your turn, you cast a spell you've cast earlier in the same turn, meaning you can basically double up on some really powerful spell. Some highlights would be Time Warp, Academic Espionage, Diamond Spellstone, Deadly Shot, Flamestrike, Blizzard, Consecration, Mind Blast... essentially any spell card that targets your opponent's side of the board specifically or just summons things on your side is going to be amazing. It's not going to be practical, of course, but I can definitely see Vargoth being a wacky one-off legendary here and there.Big Bad Archmage: A 10-mana 6/6 that summons a random 6-cost minion at the end of your turn? This is better, bigger Hogger! Except it's 10-mana 6/6, so actually playing this card would be painful. Sure, you get a random 6-cost minion to go with the Big Bad Archmage, which tends to be great (particularly in wild), something I've covered when I talked about Power of Creation... but sometimes you do whiff. Still, at first glance, Big Bad Archmage is definitely a powerful card. A quick consideration might be the hypothetical 'cheat out minions from your deck' Warrior archetype that's been building up, but honestly, I actually do think that Big Bad Archmage might just be a neat little value card. After all, 10 mana to summon a 6/6 that might potentially summon a Cairne Bloodhoof? Or a Sylvanas, or a Thaurissan, or a Hungry Ettin, or a Sunwalker? Not bad if you get it for free, but never a card you'll voluntarily put into your deck.
Archivist Elysiana: Lots of neutral legendaries get revealed in the past day, and they're a whole lot more interesting than poor old Chef Nomi. Elysiana is an 8-mana 7/7 that basically lets you discover cards 5 times, then replace your decks with 2 copies of each. It's... it's an interesting card, one that turns your deck into zero and allows you to reset it with a 10-deck card which you know exactly what's in it. It also allows you to recover from fatigue, albeit for 10 turns. And... I don't think it's good. "Discover 5 cards" is way to vague, but the effect is certainly interesting, if nothing else.
Exotic Mountseller: A 7-mana 5/8 with the very specific effect of summoning a 3-cost beast whenever you cast a spell? What a bizarrely specific reward for casting spells. A 5/8 for 7 mana is a bit too expensive, and on an average, you get maybe a 3/3 Beast every time you cast a spell. Sometimes luck runs out and you get Silverback Patriarch, Pantry Spider or Ironbeak Owl; while sometimes you luck out and get King Mukla, Vicious Fledgling or Stoneskin Basilisk. The current pool of 3-mana beasts in both Standard and Wild are generally decent enough that there aren't a lot of actual straight-up failures, but I dunno what deck really wants this highly specific effect.
Barista Lynchen: A very interesting neutral legendary, this barista doesn't serve you a cappuccino, but rather is a 5-mana 4/5 that adds a copy of each of your other battlecry minions to your hand. A far more efficient -- if more expensive -- version of Zola that only works with battlecry minions, and can do multiples! It's like Grumble, but without bouncing the minions and adding copies instead. I can definitely see her seeing a lot of mileage in wild, particularly Reno decks. Particularly Reno Warlock! It just feels pretty solid all around. Definitely going to see a lot of usage in Shudderwock decks, too. Definitely a pretty powerful effect for sure. I like her!
Overall, a lot more cards with genuinely interesting and refreshing effects this time around. Keep them coming, Blizzard!
No comments:
Post a Comment