Blizzard has posted all the details for tomorrow's 19.0 game patch.
- The patch should arrive at the usual time, around 1 PM Eastern.
- Mobile users, your patch will, as usual, take some extra time to arrive.
- Duels will be receiving 1 new Hero Power and 2 Signature Treasures for each class.
- This patch activates new dailies, weekly quests, achievements, and more for progression.
- A battle pass, The Tavern Pass, will be available for $19.99 USD.
- Battlegrounds Perks will be available for $14.99 USD. It is also included in the mega bundle for Darkmoon Faire.
Read on for all the details. You don't want to miss out! Madness at the Darkmoon Faire launches on November 17.
Quote From Blizzard Tomorrow’s 19.0 patch includes an all-new progression system, several game improvements, and some updates to Battlegrounds. Its arrival means Hearthstone’s newest expansion, Madness at the Darkmoon Faire, is almost here! All Madness at the Darkmoon Faire cards have officially been revealed, and while you can’t use the new cards until they’ve unlocked on November 17, you can get a head start on building your launch day decks with our online deck builder!
Duels: Season One also begins on November 17, but tomorrow’s patch grants Duels: Early Access to everyone, introduces Whispers of the Old Gods to the pool of eligible sets, and adds Madness at the Darkmoon Faire cards to loot buckets! Once Duels: Season One begins, you’ll be able to add Madness at the Darkmoon Faire cards to your starter deck as well! You can learn more about Duels in our announcement blog here.
Tomorrow’s patch will also add a new unlockable Hero Power and two Signature Treasures for each class in Duels, which you can obtain by owning Scholomance Academy and Madness at the Darkmoon Faire cards. Check out our Pre-Release blog to learn how you can open Madness at the Darkmoon Faire packs early!
New Battlegrounds Hero
Silas Darkmoon
- Come One, Come All! [Passive]
- Darkmoon Tickets are in the Tavern! Get 3 to Discover a minion from your Tavern Tier.
- Random minions in Bob’s Tavern will have Darkmoon Tickets. Buy three of these minions to Discover a minion from your current Tavern Tier.
Players with Battlegrounds Perks will have early access to Silas Darkmoon before the hero is formally released on December 1.
Progression & Rewards Revamp
The 19.0 patch adds an entirely new progression system to the Tavern! In what is Hearthstone’s biggest systems update ever, the progression revamp includes four major parts:
- The addition of an Achievements System that tracks your in-game accomplishments.
- A central Rewards Track for all earnable rewards outside of Ranked play.
- A Quest Revamp that supports daily and weekly quests.
- An updated Profile Page with player info, ranks, and stats.
You’ll be able to access each of these pages by clicking on a new Journal icon that will replace the Quest Log on the main menu. You can read the full breakdown for each part of the progression revamp here. We’ve got a few additional details to share on the progression update today:
- Quests – Quests can be completed in Casual, Ranked, Arena, and Duels. Certain quests may also point you to Battlegrounds or Tavern Brawls. Quests can also be completed in the Friendly Challenge variants of any of these modes.
- Achievements – Achievements are broken up into categories and subcategories. As you’d expect, the Game Modes and Adventures categories can only be completed within their specified modes. The more general Progression and Gameplay categories can be completed in Ranked, Arena, and Duels modes.
- Dev comment: There is a known issue that sometimes causes Collection Achievements to appear to have incorrect progress—this will be fixed in an upcoming patch. When that happens, Collection Achievements will update to the correct progress, but no Achievements will be taken away.
- Reward XP – You can earn XP just for playing the game in most game modes. This includes Casual, Ranked, Arena, Duels, Battlegrounds, Tavern Brawls, and Adventures. Friendly Challenge variants of these modes do not give XP.
We’re investigating an issue which may impact minimum spec mobile devices (those with fewer than 2GB of memory) on this patch which may result in degraded performance. This behavior may be triggered by accessing the new in-game Journal. We’re advising players to exit and relaunch Hearthstone if they encounter these issues.
Tavern Pass
The Rewards Track includes a free track for all players, and a paid track that can be unlocked with the Tavern Pass, which will be available for purchase for $19.99. Purchasing the Tavern Pass at any point during the expansion will immediately grant the Golden Silas Darkmoon Legendary minion, a 10% XP Boost that lasts for the duration of the expansion, and all items up to your current level on the paid track. You’ll earn an additional XP Boost as you progress with the Tavern Pass during the Madness at the Darkmoon Faire expansion, in addition to the Annhylde Alternate Warrior Hero and Card Back, three Jaina Hero Skins, three Thrall Hero Skins, and one of Hearthstone’s first-ever collectible Cosmetic Coins!
Battlegrounds Perks
Battlegrounds Perks will be available as a standalone purchase on November 17, separate from the Tavern Pass, for $14.99 or 2000 gold. Battlegrounds Perks will allow you to pick from 4 Heroes at the start of a Battlegrounds match and grants advanced stats, visual emotes, and early access to new Heroes! Battlegrounds Perks are also included in the Madness at the Darkmoon Faire Mega Bundle.
Game Improvements & Miscellaneous Updates
- Hovering over the opponent’s Mana tooltip will now display a count of their Overloaded Mana Crystals. The friendly Mana tooltip has also been updated to display a count.
- Drustvar Horror will now randomly pick one option for Runic Carvings instead of casting both.
- Fixed a Duels bug where Golden cards would appear as normal cards.
- Fixed a Duels bug where the Best Runs counter was being unintentionally reset.
- Fixed a Duels bug where Heroes were not playing their voice line when selected for a run.
- Fixed a Duels bug where Book of the Dead was not counting enemy minions that had died.
- Fixed a bug where Dormant minions would not consume discounts provided from Studies.
- Fixed a bug where the arrow for targeted Hero Powers in Battlegrounds would begin offscreen.
- Fixed a bug where emotes would overlap with the post-game victory or defeat screen.
- Fixed a bug where portraits shown in history tiles were inconsistently sized between devices.
- Free decks for new and returning players have been updated (recipes can be found here).*
- Card text for Corrupting Mist and Chaos Gazer have been reworded to avoid confusion with the new Corrupt keyword. Functionality of both cards remain the same.
* Limit one per account. A returning player is defined as one who has not logged into Hearthstone for 120 consecutive days
November 17 - Arena Rotation
When Madness at the Darkmoon Faire launches on November 17, the Arena will include cards from the following sets:
![All The Great Dark Beyond Card Reveals for October 12 - Day 2 [Finished]](dark-beyond-reveals-day-2-thumb.webp)
Comments
Do we have to finish all the quests we currently have to not lose them?
yes
Yes.
Will three wins in Ranked still be rewarded by 10 gold? I've been playing 80% Duels the last few weeks, and it bothers me that I don't get that 3-win bump from that game mode. I understand not having it for Heroic/Arena because of the rewards structure, but it would give more people an incentive to play casual if it gave you something. And maybe it does? I really have no idea how this new experience-based quest system works. Any insight on the details of these new quest mechanics is appreciated.
To my knowledge, the 10 gold for 3 wins is going away. Instead you just earn xp for every game played, win or lose, and it goes towards gold progression.
So that's $20 per expansion for the tavern pass that lasts 4 months.
Plus $80 for the mega bundles. and $40 for the smaller bundle.
You're looking at $140 dollars for this game, and we're not even talking about purchasing the cards in the mini expansion
that's a big EEEESH from me
The way I'm doing this is buying only the mega bundle and grind enough gold between expansions to buy enough packs to get whatever cards I would like. This way I don't have to buy the small bundle.
Will probably buy the tavern pass as well, so I'm looking at $100 (not counting the mini expansion, which I'll also buy/craft with gold/dust) per expansion. Still rough.
What I'm really curious about is whether finishing Achievements gives some rewards.
Before I transferred to Hearthstone, I played another CCG which had Achievements that gave generous amounts of rewards. I'm really interested if HS does the same or if the Achievement points are just for bragging rights.
I thought finishing achievements could rewards some xp for the rewards track, buuut... I’m probably wrong sbout that.
none of the other blizz games achievements give any rewards, they are just points for bragging rights
I would assume, especially that they havent specifically announced anything, that it will be the same case for HS
:(
Seems like something they would have announced very clearly if it were the case.
Well, we know that there's at least one Collections achievement that rewards us with a cosmetic coin. I'm just wondering if the others will too, considering that some achievements are difficult to pull off.
My entire opinion of the Tavern Pass revolves around whether it is purchasable with gold, or at least whether subsequent ones are. I am more than happy to pay $20 once, and earn enough gold each expansion to always buy the next one. If I have to pay $20 each time, then it makes absolutely no sense and I will never take part.
I'm pretty sure that because it's just cosmetics it's only cash. Similar to you, I'll never pay for it. I'm comfortable with that. A lot of other people like cosmetics and this feels like the first time they're being serious about releasing regular cosmetic content on a regular basis. If that helps fund the game and keep new game modes like Duels being produced, I'm happy. I'm most curious about unlocking additional hero powers and treasures in duels and if that will be paywalled in any way.
They hinted in one interview that they "like the idea of a hero power being tied to owning a specific card", so it might potentially, if it ends up being a legendary, more so if it ends up being a meme legendary :)
The way they have worded it in this announcement, it looks like you will have to pay $20 each expansion.
Since the Tavern Pass rewards are mostly cosmetic, I see nothing wrong with this. Historically, most cosmetic rewards in Hearthstone have not been purchasable with gold.
And because you can technically get more gold with the accelerated XP, it would make absolutely no sense if they let you buy it with gold. That would literally be the same as just handing out free gold.
You say that, but that is how Fortnite does it with their Battle Pass (which also only grants aesthetic rewards), and it's one of the most successful games in the world.
In Fortnite, you pay for a Battle Pass, and then over the course of the season you earn more than enough in-game currency to buy the next one. It just means you have to play regularly to keep up your streak. The more often you play, the more invested you feel, and the more likely you are to pay for other things that do cost money (like pack bundles, etc. in HS's case) I don't see why HS can't use the same model.
Judging by the wording you'd have to pay $20 for each expansion
The big question for me is: will there be new weekly/daily quest(s) available when the patch goes live? I hope so.