New Neutral Minion - Spammy Arcanist

WTF! neutral Defile with a body?

Ok, spell dmg doesn't affect this, but looks like a strong neutral board clear, specially against aggro druid.

Blizz will push tokens decks for sure and prints that card as tech against that archetype.

Good night to have insomnia with these card reveals coming in....

But I can't say I care for this one. Too awkward, too slow. The beauty of defile was its two mana cost. Got no chance. Even an avoid at all costs in Arena cuz it's like a shittier Dragonmaw Scorcher.

Get lucky on 5 and cause a perfect chain reaction?  I'm not buying it!

The most significant part of this card is its cost. At 5, its kinda expensive considering that it can be played around.

Maybe with 3/4 body board swing is enough to overturn the massive cost that comes with this clear option. Still, we've seen how powerful Defile and Lord Godfrey was, there's no reason to doubt that this will fit into some decks somehow someway.

Defile on a body, thats INSANE. Wow and its neutral too! easy 5 star card. it's basicly a neutral mini-Lord Godfrey. Defile and Lord Godfrey still see play to this day because of this amazing effect, so i'm 100% sure Spammy Arcanist will see plenty of play in any control deck in standard. In wild i'm sure plenty of reno decks will include Spammy Arcanist as well!  The only downside is that it costs 5 mana, but i feel like thats acceptable considering Spammy Arcanist just has such a powerful effect. 5 mana destroy the board 90% of the time is very good, and you get a body as well.

Personally i hoped for a Defile reprint or it being added in next years core set, so i'm really happy to see Spammy Arcanist!

I doubt this will see constructed play unless we're really desperate for boardclears. Most classes have cheaper and less conditional boardwips of their own.

It's odd to see a neutral that bundles a 2-mana class card (Defile) with a 3-mana neutral (Spider Tank) and have no cost penalty. I suppose the trick here is that Defile on 2 or 3 is way more impactful than Defile on 5, when the 1 damage breakpoints are harder to line up. So, the bundling is worse than it looks, but this is still a solid board clear for a class that has limited AOE but wants to dabbling in slower, controlling decks.

Quote From meisterz39

I suppose the trick here is that Defile on 2 or 3 is way more impactful than Defile on 5, when the 1 damage breakpoints are harder to line up. 

I don't think I've ever seen a Defile being played on turn 2. The power of the card came from being able to use the rest of your mana to play minions or spells to line up for the Defile clear. If you see the need to play Defile on 2 it's because your opponent blarted his entire hand against a Warlock that played nothing on 1 and therefore, wasn't a zoo-lock.

Spammy Arcanist has a very different role: trying to be the board clear in a class without those. And right now, I don't feel the Control Hunter/ Control Druid dream.

Arena: Man, so many strong Arena cards already this expansion, and the reveal season has just started. Glad this is an epic, otherwise this would have been our new Arena overlord.

Wild: Defile is nuts against Pirate Warrior, so I feel like Spammy Arcanist is almost mandatory as long as Pirate Warrior runs rampant.

Standard: Defile would be nuts against Aggro Taunt Druid as well, so I wouldn't be surprised if this also sees play in Standard.

Defile for everyone! This might single-handedly usher in a control meta as all aggro decks will fear this.

a neutral Defile with legs?!?!  

Defile was amazing, but this card is just too expensive (and doesn't interact with spell power). Part of Defile's strength was that you could combo it with other cheap stuff like Mortal Coil to set up perfect clears, that's a lot harder to do when it costs 3 mana more.

"Mom, can we get Defile?"

"We already have Defile at home."

The Defile at home:

Defile on a (neutral) stick, which sounds great. However, the 5-mana cost means setting up a full board clear might not be as easy compared to the 2-mana spell version. Still, I'm happy to see one of the most creative cards ever printed being reincarnated, and is accessible to all classes at that. 

Defile for everyone. Yippee!

Quote From GoddammitDontShootMe

Defile for everyone. Yippee!

And on a decent stick too

Well this card will be great to push control archetypes since any class can use it to ruin aggro boards. Only thing is it's 5 mana so you have less mana in general to spend on setting up the perfect board clear. 

Also watch out with Shaman, being a battlecry, you can always pair Spammy Arcanist with Brilliant Macaw

Loving Defile before, and I am still loving it

Anyone already tired of mages jumping around and casting Arcane Explosion? :D

Quote From edalyas

Anyone already tired of mages jumping around and casting Arcane Explosion? :D

I assume you are referring to TBC Classic/WoW Classic.  In which case yes, I was always tired of the skill-less mages who ran around spamming arcane explosion then ice block

Neutral Defile on a stick. I think this will be pretty decent to give classes without good board clears at least one viable option.

Just once I want to be able to clear a full board step by step with this. It's so unlikely to happen, because I'm not sure I want to run it in any decks so it'll have to be in Arena, but still... the dream...

As good Defile was, this is much more limited: first and obvious, it's a minion, not a spell, so no boosting it with spell damage. The second is the mana cost, which could limit any combined damage/minions being played to get the chain clear.

Defile on a stick. Will this replace The Lurker Below in Reno Shudderwock Shaman I wonder?

Basically a 3 mana 3/4 plus Defile in one card. Might see play if the meta turns very aggro intensive.