http://us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/blog/20097355/

All good changes in my opinion, other than maybe Blade Flurry. Arcane Golem is nerfed into no-longer-playable.

On further reflection, AoL should have had it's mana cost dropped by one to make it still epic. Oh well, more dust. Thank goodness I saved all those golden commons.

jesus christ why

Dust 'em all and let Standard sort it out!

Arcane nerf was a bad call as it's less burst than evis or skillcommand, master of disguise nerf is kinda stupid because it hoses certain casual strategies and basically no real deck. Leper gnome and knife juggler are now almost unplayable which is really sad. Blade flurry can still be used alright by oil rogue late game but losing an early catch up method sucks. Everything else seems fine.

I actually think that BGH is still playable

The only change I don't understand at all is hunter's mark, when was that ever a problem at 0?

They must be really spooked about stealth if they nerfed the already completely unplayable master of disguise :v

I am sad to see no buffs, cards like Warsong Commander really could use a boost even just for arena.

"What it should have been":

• Savage Roar
Now costs (2) and only buffs your Beasts and your hero. Force of Nature untouched (un-nerfed to (5) even?)

• Ancient of Lore
Now a 4/4, but heals for 7 instead. Alternatively, make it draw one card and cost (6).

• Keeper of the Grove
Nerfed to 2/3, druid has other very competitive 4-drops

• Master of Disguise
Change effect, 4/3 for (3) or 5/4 for (4).

• Blade Flurry
Now only hits minions, possibly increased to (3) if new cards justify it

• Big Game Hunter
Now deals 4 damage instead of destroying the creature.

• Knife Juggler
Now only hits the enemy hero

Hunter's Mark, Arcane Golem and Leper Gnome remains unchanged.
Kind of wary about Sea Giant with BGH nerfed.

I think this nerf makes perfect sense. The design team shouldn't have to worry that any neutral minion with a static ability might be some sort of broken combo with Master of Disguise.

Like, Stoneforge Mystic would be far from broken in MTG standard right now, but if it was in every standard, they could never print powerful equipment.

I don't think Knife Juggler's nerf kills it. It just makes it less of an automatic best choice. It is more of a synergy piece. To make a comparison to MTG, it's like when they make a card weaker so that it goes to the right deck in draft which can still use it very well but it isn't snapped up by everyone else just because it's that much value.

I understand the nerf to Blade Flurry was to open up Rogue weapons in the future, but it should've either only hit minions or increased its mana cost, not both, imo.

It already forced their hand once with Animated Armor, which was originally a neutral card.

Master of Disguise was a necessary nerf for the sake of future design space.

Force of Nature nerf probably kills it. I don't think it becomes bad, but I also don't think anyone will spawn three 2/2s just for the chance of them surviving to combo the next turn.

Arcane Golem nerf was awful. It is unplayable now. Same for Blade Flurry -- increase to 4 or remove face damage, but not both.

Giant and BGH nerf are okay. So is Owl. Knife Juggler is still playable but not the best 2-drop for an aggressive deck anymore. It remains great in anything with Muster for Battle, but something like Face Hunter has to think twice about it now. It is the good sort of nerf. Not so sure about Leper Gnome; it doesn't look automatically unplayable but doesn't look like an autoinclude either. This is probably a good thing.

I gained like 4000 dust from this, so I'm not terribly unhappy. Crafting legendaries here I go.

well, goodbye Burst Rogue.

Malyrogue barely lost any burst though.

I don't like Gnome and Owl nerfs. they were both strong, sure, but they don't seem like things that shouldn't be strong. Owl I've always thought of as a Chapel-type card. sure, it's very strong for its cost, but the game benefits from having something that powerful. in this case, it's a critical safety valve, and that valve being playable is healthy. Gnome just feels mean to aggro decks. maybe they want each class's aggro to look more different, but there's still enough neutral 1-drops that are better than most classes' 1-drops that I don't see the nerf making much difference.

they also say that Gnome required no further deckbuilding decisions to be effective, but it requires commitment to aggro. Control Warrior isn't playing Leper Gnomes, for instance.

yeah I wasn't talking about the sort of deck that runs 9-drops

Yeah I understand why they changed master of disguise, it's just been a long time since I have seen an unplayable card nerfed.

Also poor Mekgineer Thermaplugg gets nerfed by this I assume? That's kind of dumb :v

Ancient of Lore is now a really bad Azure Drake.

Hunter's Mark is now Execute. Still playable.

Arcane Golem should have been given Taunt, so that it would be neutral Misha instead of neutral Huffer. As it is, it goes from "high risk, high reward" into "never use it as an actual card, but it's still great to get out of 'summon random 3-mana minion' effect" category.

Blade Flurry is now Shadowflame, which also costs 4, doesn't hit face and requires sacrifice of a card. However, since Rogues don't have Molten Mace or Mountain Dagger, it will likely be a 1-off in some Reno lists, much like Shadowflame is outside Handlock.



I wouldn't write it off yet. With Owl and BGH both getting a nerf, I can easily see ol' Van Cleef becoming a really nasty threat.

yeah, but the nice thing about Burst Rogue was that most of its core cards were commons and rares. I've been playing actively for like 6 months now and I haven't yet gotten enough dust to craft a single legendary, so builds that require those are pretty irrelevant to me.

Reading threads about Divine Favor makes me think people just have a weird hard-on for control and think aggro is morally inferior.

I like all tyes of decks as long as they are weird. Combo is superior to all though.

thinking more on this... a lot of guides for budget Burst Rogue and Face Hunter recommend replacing Arcane Golem with Leeroy if you have the dust, meaning that for those sorts of decks (the only sort of deck that wants Golem at all) Leeroy is stronger than Golem. and yet Leeroy remains unnerfed. people with the budget for it can still play the stronger version of this deck, even though they've removed the option to play the weaker version. in fact, they nerfed 0 legendaries. no Alex, no Tirion, no Antman. all of those are cards they decided were fair and should be left alone. Tirion's especially bizarre because its only real weakness is silence, and they nerfed two of the best sources of silence, meaning that post-change Tirion gets even better.

I also think they were over-conservative with silence in these nerfs. I honestly don't think hoot hoot is really problematic, except that people are mad that their finishers get countered by a silence, but also, why are you as control playing out your finishers before the opponent has used up their obvious counters. I would've just made hoot hoot into a 1/1, and Keeper of the Grove could have gone just down to 2/3.

That said, looking at the new cards, I think they wanted to have less sticky minions, weaker taunts, and removing a counter to stickies and taunts like hoot hoot allows that.

Edit: They did already nerf Leeroy once and he really doesn't seem to have a great role in burst decks anymore. He used to be required for face/burst decks, but Arcane Golem really did supplant him.

Also, Leroy requires more time or money investment, therefore $.