A Hero's Tale Card Design Competition

This is meant to spawn a Fel Warlock archetype, encouraging players to make use of niche cards like Felfire in the Hole!, Demonwrath, Demonfire or even [Hearthstone Card (Council of shadows) Not Found]. You'll have to forgo some staples like Hysteria, Defile or The Soularium, but the payoff is huge: Flame Imp and Vulgar Homunculus without their downside, not to mention that dealing with the usual suspects like Mal'Ganis or Voidlord will be almost impossible for your opponent without constantly healing your hero at the same time.

Balance-wise, I trust the limited card pool to keep the power level in check in Standard. In Wild this would probably annihilate Aggro and claim the top of Control, but still be vulnerable to Combo decks like Pillager Rogue.

Thrall is meant to embody nearly all Shaman archetypes and themes we've had so far, to reflect on the history of the class in game.

• Earth has been associated with battlecries and control (Earth Invocation, Stone Sentinel, Invocation of Earth, Rumbling Elemental)
• Water for a Murloc deck callback to original Neptulon.
• Fire with "at the end of your turn deal random damage", in Ragnaros the Firelord' s image. Mechanically he is similar to totems, not being able to attack but having random end of turn effects.
• Air being tied with Windfury is obvious. Shaman is also a weapon class with multiple weapons and some hero attack synergy.
• By playing a minion, weapon and spell you show your mastery of the basic elements of the game and can now gain a powerful boon!

Support for Treant Druid, of course! Rebirth, growth, all that good stuff: use the life-force of a fallen Treant to support the others and make them stronger. Very good in Wild with mass-summoning effects like The Forest's Aid.

Doomhammer is one of the most iconic weapons in the Warcraft universe, but its card has been missing in action for a very long time. Even if it has 8 Durability and Windfury, paying 5 mana and 2 Overload for a 2-Attack weapon is just hard to justify.

Warchief Thrall alleviates that and puts the hammer back in action. If you play a Highlander Shaman, you can get a 5/4 body on the board with your Doomhammer and also bypass the 2 Overload.

Despite what he might say, Rexxar never hunts alone.

A card for Midrange Hunter, which can help you develop a fairly strong board. He's especially useful against opponents big boards themselves, as you can trade Huffer and bring him back again and again thanks to the fact the card doesn't allow for duplicate Companions.

This card gives your spells in deck the Fire, Frost, and Nature spell schools, enabling a lot of the spell-school specific synergies for shaman that have suffered from a lack of spells in those spell schools. This card is balanced by requiring no duplicates, only affecting the deck (prevents an OTK setup in hand), and being inconsistent due to having to draw Thrall (if you build your deck solely around drawing him and don't, it reduces your winrate). Overall I think it would open up a lot of cool deckbuilding possibilities and make cards like Radiance of Azshara and Wrathspine Enchanter a lot better.

As someone said it best, at the end of the day, Elemental mage is best mage. Jaina is on the warpath, planning on getting revenge for the destruction of Theramore by wiping out a bunch of civilians with a tidal wave of Water Elementals. In this way, Jaina rewards you for summoning elementals for her army throughout the early part of the game by turning them into a massive wave of destructive power for a finisher.

“Beware, beware the Daughter of the Sea. Beware, beware...of me.”

Play: "There is no room for weakness in MY Horde!"

Attack: "For the TRUE Horde!"

By safeguarding those around him, a paladin aids in his own defense.

"While his fellow Aspects watched with pride as the overwhelming energies of the Dragon Soul surged forth into the new Earth-Warder, his body slowly twisting outwards to fill the Malestrom with a gargantuan black form, Nozdormu felt a sickening feeling that averting the End Times had merely condemned them to an even darker future."

Ember Court Illidan's taking pointers from Daddy Denathrius and infuses your next Hero Power whenever a friendly minion dies (meaning it will give your hero additional attack equal to the attack of the dead minion)