Bluetracker
Tracks Blizzard employees across various accounts.
Add a Common Wild Card from Each Class to the Classic Set.
As time went on and the years passed by, the identities of the 9 classic cards grew. And now the Classic set not longer expressed the visage of Druid through Warrior.
In addition to its outdatedness, the Classic set holds back the classes. Because the Classic set was not created at the time of Standard rotation idea (two years after actually), it was not designed with it in mind. The Classic set was not created to be an Evergreen set. The constant nerfs to it and the creation of the Hall of Shame is proof of that. This s one of the many reasons why the meta gets stale so fast. Some classes have too few avenues to explore and next expansions to flush it out. Others are more reliant on the expansions to grant it powerful cards relative to the rest. And as said before, the classic set does not contain many of the class identity that players attribute to the various classes.
One way to help fix this is to add some expansion cards to the Classic Set. New minor injections will pad the classes with just enough cards to solve some of the Classic set's problem without removing freshness.
Here are my suggestions:
DRUID: Wildwalker
Wildwalker didn't make a huge splash but it's incusion to the classic set could be push Druid's missing slight beast synergy.
HUNTER: Cloaked Huntress
Hunter only has one synergy card to anything but beasts. This is one reason why when beast decks aren't strong, Hunter defaults to face. Adding a synergy card to secrets or spells in the Classic gives hunter enough of a jumping point to new decks with a push by Team 5.
MAGE: Dragon's Breath
Outside of replacing cards moved to the Hall of Fame set, Dragon's Breath add a little burn without adding too much power, design limitation, or RNG.
PALADIN: Warhorse Trainer OR Standard Against Darkness
I couldn't choose between the two. A decent dude card in Classic lets Blizzard push or pull back Dude Paladin in standard whenever they want.
PRIEST: Twilight Whelp
Another synergy card (notice a pattern) that can let Team 5 push Dragon Priest in Standard. It can go Midrange or Control or pulled back by adding no powerful dragons for a year.
ROGUE: Shadow Strike
Man, if Burgle wasn't rare and Hallucination didn't have discover. Gang Up limits design too much so Shadow Strike seems as a good sub. If Team 5 is willing to add discover to classic then Hallucination all the way.
SHAMAN:
4manaa7/7Rumbling ElementalShaman's identity is too many identities. Might as well add more to Classic.
WARLOCK: Wrathguard
I'mma be honest. I just like seeing people deal face damage with minion burn spells.
WARRIOR: Bolster OR Fierce Monkey
I'd prefer Drywhisker Armorer but it isn't Wild yet. So I couldn't choose. Favoring Bolster for link to Taunt Warrior forever that is strong enough to buff it but not enough on its own. But not Bloodhoof Brave.
So what is your thoughts? What would you pick? Should it be epic or rare for more complex picks?
Mike Donais
This is a fun thought experiment. I have been thinking about this a bit because Classic actually has 3 classes with less cards than the other 6 (because we moved 4 class cards to the Hall of Fame).
Mage has 2 less cards than other classes. Rogue has 1 less card. Warlock has 1 less card.
One of the things to be careful of is making sure you don't pick a really strong card that will be in decks forever and make people sick of the card. Iceblock was a good example of this.
Getting the exact right designs for these is a challenge, and it isn't obvious if we should use a Wild card to refill them or make entirely new cards. Regardless, this is a fun thread to read people's thoughts on it.