Hearthstone's brand new Core set is finally fully announced! Here are all the buffed and changed cards in Hearthstone's evergreen set which will be launching at the start of the Year of the Gryphon.
- Blizzard has not yet announced the exact release date.
- If you want to see all 29 new cards, check out this article.
- If you want to see all the cards in one place, you can visit our Core 2021 Expansion Guide.
- You can build decks with the new cards by visiting our deckbuilder, choosing your class, and selecting the format "Year of the Gryphon".
- The list of cards below does not include spell school changes to cut down on "spam".
Demon Hunter
- Warglaives of Azzinoth - Cost decreased from 6 to 5 mana (basically an unnerf); durability decreased from 4 to 3.
Druid
- Mark of the Wild - Buff increased from +2/+2 to +2/+3.
- Druid of the Claw - Attack increased from 4 to 5; transforms into a 5/4 with Rush (instead of a 4/4 with Charge) or a 5/6 with Taunt (instead of a 4/6 with Taunt).
- Menagerie Warden - Cost decreased from 6 to 5 mana; stats decreased from 5/5 to 4/4.
- Cenarius - Cost decreased from 9 to 8 mana.
Hunter
- Tracking - Effect changed into "Discover a card from your deck".
- Lock and Load - Cost decreased from 2 to 1 mana.
Mage
- Flamestrike - Damage dealt increased from 4 to 5.
- Cone of Cold - Cost decreased from 4 to 3 mana.
- Ethereal Conjurer - Health increased from 3 to 4.
- Snap Freeze - Cost decreased from 2 to 1 mana.
- Coldarra Drake - Health increased from 6 to 7.
Paladin
- Guardian of Kings - Health increased from 6 to 7; gains Taunt.
- Holy Light - Effect changed into "Restore 8 Health to your hero".
- Argent Protector - Attack increased from 2 to 3.
- Warhorse Trainer - Attack increased from 2 to 3.
- Equality - Cost decreased from 4 to 3 mana.
Priest
- Lightspawn - Cost decreased from 4 to 3 mana; Health decreased from 5 to 4.
- Shadowform - Cost reduced from 3 to 2 mana; effect changed into "Your Hero Power becomes 'Deal 2 damage.'"
Rogue
- Assassin's Blade - Cost decreased from 5 to 4 mana; stats changed from 3/4 to 2/5.
- Assassinate - Cost decreased from 5 to 4 mana.
- Sprint - Cost decreased from 7 to 6 mana.
- Swashburglar - The card generated comes from a random class and not from your opponent's class.
- Patient Assassin - Health increased from 1 to 2.
Shaman
- Fire Elemental - Damage dealt increased from 3 to 4.
- Tidal Surge - The new effect includes the Lifesteal keyword.
- Draenei Totemcarver - Health increased from 4 to 5.
- Feral Spirit - Overloaded Crystals decreased from (2) to (1).
- Lightning Storm - Deals 3 damage (up from 2-3) to all enemy minions.
- Earth Elemental - Overloaded Crystals decreased from (3) to (2).
- Al'Akir the Windlord - Health increased from 5 to 6.
Warlock
- Drain Soul - Damage dealt will be increased from 2 to 3.
- Lakkari Felhound - Effect changed into "Battlecry: Discard your two lowest-cost cards" instead of two random ones.
- Siphon Soul - Cost decreased from 6 to 5 mana.
- Void Terror - Health increased from 3 to 4 mana.
- Lord Jaraxxus - Changed into a Hero card with "Battlecry: equip a 3/8 weapon".
Warrior
- Warsong Commander - Effect changed into "After you summon another minion, give it Rush".
Neutrals
- Bluegill Warrior - Attack increased from 2 to 3; Charge leaves its place to Rush.
- Gurubashi Berserker - Health increased from 7 to 8.
- Raid Leader - Health increased from 2 to 3.
- Stonetusk Boar - Attack increased from 1 to 2; Charge leaves its place to Rush.
- Stormwind Champion - Stats increased from 6/6 to 7/7.
- Flesheating Ghoul - Attack increased from 2 to 3.
- Arcane Devourer - Stats change from 5/5 to 4/8.
- Defender of Argus - Attack increased from 2 to 3.
- Barrens Stablehand - Stats increased from 4/4 to 5/5.
- Big Game Hunter - Cost decreased from 5 to 4 mana.
- Mini-Mage - Cost decreased from 4 to 3 mana; Attack decreased from 4 to 3.
- Baron Geddon - Health increased from 5 to 7.
- Cairne Bloodhoof - Attack increased from 4 to 5; summons a 5/5 Baine Bloodhoof.
- High Inquisitor Whitemane - Cost decreased from 7 to 6 mana; stats decreased from 6/8 to 5/7.
Which changes are you most happy about?
Comments
Just a great job OoC. I looked through all the cards myself and I missed a ton of these changes.
Generally I think these are fantastic changes with the exceptions of Holy Light and Lightspawn. Neither change makes the card more playable, and it seems like both could have been retired for something better. Not that all these cards are great, and they're keeping River Crocolisk for goodness sake, but it seems a miss to have given those cards attention and come up with that. But, to stay positive, they did a great job on the other 49.
When Holy Light Control Paladin and Lightspawn/Lightsteed OTK Priest go meta, please dunk on me.
I have a feeling they're keeping river croc, yeti etc so they have some tutorial cards for brand new players. They help teach what the basic statlines for different mana costs should be
Warsong Commander LIVES and it's decent now! (Well as long as Animated Broomstick is 1 mana, it will still outshine Warsong Commander. But hey it's a step in the right direction!)
Also i love seeing Bluegill Warrior and Stonetusk Boar FINALLY getting "the axe" i'm so happy to see those sometimes game breaking cheap Charge minions finally gone. (I hope these changes are also to the legacy versions, not just the core set versions. It would be horrible to still have the Charge versions of those cards around in wild.)
I HATE that they got them rid of charge for wild.
ANd the murloc not having charge anymore killed anyfin palladin. Wild is susposed to be for your old cards/decks but it seems thats not the case anympre >.>
Well now i think about it yeah RIP Anyfin Palladin, that actually is unfortunate. Personally never played that deck or played against it, but i do know that a lot of people really like that deck. So that's really unfortunate that they killed that deck. The reason i was happy on first glance was because cheap charge minions can become very problematic in the future, but tbh Stonetusk Boar was the biggest offender and deserves this treatment, not Bluegill Warrior. RIP Anyfinn Paladin. :(
The one area where Warsong is better than Broom is if you are making an ETC combo. Not sure how that looks in Standard now with Bloodsworn about to rotate, but in Wild with an Emperor turn for set up... Could be good!
In Standard now your best bet will be to stick ETC a turn, then use Warsong, Faceless to copy, 2x Tinyfins, and some other cheap minions. Maybe even Broom to give Warsong rush too!
Could use Maiev to set it up, protect ETC for a few turns...
Warsong Commander seems about right for the direction the game is going in, same with the changes to the other Charge minions, but I can't help but say I'm pretty disappointed. Hearthstone does need to have some combo options and it needs a variety of combos. The game can't just be a variety of tempo, midrange, and control decks that all kinda look like each other forever. They could have brought back Patron Warrior in Wild, but instead of reincorporating an old pre-Standard deck as a fringe Wild deck for old school players to enjoy and hold on to, they didn't and also killed Anyfin Can Happen Paladin, which was another of my favorite decks for a long time and a deck that had a permanent place in my deck slots. I figured midrange decks with big burst finishers was something Blizzard wanted, but I guess not.
Oh Boy
So much changes, and I LOVE them.
Druid
All changes are nice but change I like most is Druid of the Claw
Hunter
I am not sure if I like that Lock and Load will be in standard as this is quite random card but hard to deny that with 1 mana is much more usable.
But I like change to Tracking, card that gave us Discover mechanic and now have Discover itself (and no longer we lose cards from deck).
Mage
I love all changes and I love that Ethereal Conjurer is returning back.
One of my beloved cards from the past.
Paladin
Guardian of Kings taunt changes a lot and makes this card much more usable.
Rogue
I like almost all changes but don't understand if one health for Patient Assassin will change anything.
Warlock
I assume new Lord Jaraxxus Hero power still will be Summon 6/6?
Warrior and some Neutrals
Love the change that get rid of Charge and leave it as special keyword and that we get Rush instead.
Other
I am not sure if some buffed cards become usable but at least they are now look much less horrible.
Love the change to all legends and that we almost have good old Big Game Hunter back.
In summary, I like all changes. I am not sure if I like some cards we get in core set but I am not complaining. At least now much more of those Core cards look to be usable in some deck instead of always the same small bunch off cards from each class.
I personally refused to use Tracking, because 9 times out of 10, I'd pull two cards I need, and could only keep one. With this change, I can now happily use it.
Most of the time it's actually beneficial to thin your deck by 2 especially in Hunter which lacks card draw.
I 100% totally agree with you, but It still feels inherently "bad" to discard a Kill Command or something. Personally, I don't enjoy playing cards that feel bad when I do play them
Thinning your deck by discarding the cards is only beneficial if you're running something that requires you to go to fatigue. I'm not sure when that's helpful in Hunter. Usually, Tracking was simply deemed acceptable because you're NOT planning on going to fatigue as Hunter, and thus don't care about the lost cards.
Most of the time, you only want to thin your deck in an OTK situation. And for a combo deck, you definitely don't want your thinning mechanism to discard anything. The possibility of being offered two combo pieces and losing one of them is not in any way worth it.
NO the Discard is benefical When youre NOT going to fatigue.
STATISCLY it always was an upside if youre nto going to fatigue.
Thats not hard to get... And downvoting this doesnt make it not true.
yes, when RNGeebus smiles upon you... he shuns me like a plague carrier. I just refused to play it after the 1st year of Hearthstone.
Exactly this. Particularly if you are running a low mana curve, you'll never go through your deck anyways and you'll pitch two cards you can't use any more in most cases. But I guess the "buffed" Tracking is great for... Value hunter???
Charge is now a dhunter only keyword apparently.
Also, the changes to Stonetusk Boar and Bluegill Warrior is like making hand gestures to a man with no hands. What the hell is that 1 attack going to actually do? Might as well treat them with some proper dignity like Southsea Deckhand and remove them from standard entirely.
You say this as if boar hasn't single-handedly been a major design-around issue and a huge part of the torture that was OG Quest Rogue.
Quest rogue was a whole another level by itself. There are other bigger problem cards than mere Stonetusk Boar and Southsea Deckhand, not least the infinite Zola the Gorgon, Vanish and Sonya Shadowdancer
Four classes have Charge minion in Core set, all of those minions are Legendary (Hunter, Demon Hunter, Warrior and Shaman).
I don't see how this is Demon Hunter only keyword now.