If you were one of the many complaining about the current state of the Hearthstone (Free) meta and, specifically, about a number of problematic cards, this announcement should make you quite happy (although you can never please everyone). Blizzard has decided to jump in and make some drastic changes to Basic and Classic cards, which are the core of the Standard set, and these changes are going to change quite a few decks. But first, let’s start with the biggest change of them all, Yogg-Saron’s nerf. While its stats and battlecry remain the same, if while it’s doing its whole spell casting thing the card gets destroyed, silenced, transformed, or returned to its owners hand, the spell casting ends. This is a pretty big change because there are many spells that can have one of the those effects on Yogg-Saron, so hopefully this will make the card less of an auto-include.
Shaman will see Rockbiter Weapon – the culprit of tons of burst damage – go one mana up to two mana, which will make the double Rockbiter + Doomhammer combo much more expensive. Tuskarr Totemic, another often-maligned card, will now only summon basic Totem rather than any Totem, a huge change. Shaman isn’t the only class to see changes; Hunter players will see Call of the Wild go up to 9 mana, Warrior players have to pay 2 to use Execute instead of 1 (I hated how powerful this card was) as well as see Charge go from 3 mana to 1. Also, instead of giving a friendly minion +2 Attack and Charge, it will now give a friendly minion Charge but that minion can’t attack heroes this turn. Finally, Abusive Sergeant has gone from 2\1 to 1\1.
These are big changes, and I’m really glad Blizzard is listening to the players’ complaints about the game. Playing against Shaman after Shaman wasn’t at all fun, and I’m hoping that now we’ll start seeing more variety in the meta and, overall, a more balanced game. The changes, which you can see here in detail, will come into effect before the Last Call events for the Hearthstone Championship Tour. What do you think about all these changes? Are they sufficient, or do you think they should have gone even further?
