In a dedicated deck, this card may be the most dangerous card in the deck. You play this on 2, it survives, you play Pounce + hero power and suddenly this is a 5/4 for 2. If it survives, it'll just snowball hard.
But that's the problem isn't it. It'll never realistically survive more than 1 turn, and without double Pounce, you're essentially skipping your turn just to make a 4 health monster, which isn't bad but its not game winning neither.
Its probably bad. RNG aside, there's no way token druid can ever plan ahead with their plays with this card in consideration. Properly speaking, this card can only truly function in a midrange, no ramp, no gibberling bs, druid. In other words, its a decent card in a class that does broken things. Just no.
Its likely to be something you'd want in a discover because if your hand is trash then this one only adds to it. Its only true hope is to somehow have more than 2 minions on board and you have 2 mana extra to spare. With the death of gibberling, that's just really never going to happen.
But if you get it to work, it really works. Reloading is no joke, but like Cybertech Chip or Revenge of the Wild, its likely never to be as good as some may think it is.
Probably bad. A card that needs another card to work needs to be very, very good. And this card isn't that. At best you'd coin fel spell into this, a 3/4 taunt at 1. But whenever you can't do that this card feels just too weak even in an aggro deck.
I was thinking this was shit, but then I realised that this can hit face. So instantly this is a good card. Exactly what Jace Darkweaver needs in order to work.
Of course, there's the issue that this will whiff most of the time because there's almost always going to be something else on board to block it, but for the fact that it can act as removal in the early game and finisher in the late game, this is most certainly a card for consideration.
If it didn't have taunt it'll be hot trash. But then team5 had to muck it up by making it a demon as well. So again, the only reason you're playing this is because you're playing hard for the quest to work. But even a good card in a bad deck is shit, so what's there to say about this card?
Well, on the bright side, it'll always cost 0 if you get outcasted skull on this thing.
Its mostly bad. You'd have to pay 1 mana to draw one for the following turn, which means essentially you're paying 1 mana to do nothing. Just put a tradeable card in your deck would be a better card than this one.
The only reason, and a bad reason at that, you'd play this card is because you're going hard to finish the quest. But as has been established, the quest kinda sucks, so this card which is pretty bad to begin is now only a consideration in a bad deck.
Its not entirely trash, mostly because it costs only 3. But the fact is that most of the time this will do nothing on 3, and will likely only have 4 attack at the best of times.
Unless there's major cycle like Plot Twist for warlock, this will only ever reach the lofty heights of 5-6 attack, and that's if you're willing to wait all the way to the end game with this stuck in your hand.
My take: Bad, but can certainly be better with support.
There are some fel spells you'd want with this card, like Fury (Rank 1) or the new Chaos Leech, which is fairly good.
The problem? Well, the body is bad, and the dhunters dont need the draw. The only possibility this sees play is in a really, really stacked fel deck, or the chance there be an OP fel spell in the future.
Its useless in tournaments because you get to see what classes your opponent's bringing. I doubt they'd limit the disguise to only the 4 classes, so its literally a 50-50, which isn't worth it.
- Stormwind Piper looks good because its nearly impossible to remove on 3 without your opponent throwing everything into it. Curves well into something like Sin'dorei Scentfinder. If you have Trueaim Crescent you may get away just buffing your board by 2/2 on 4.
- Ignite and First Flame easily makes into spell mage. Forget the quest, ignite alone will do it.
- Alliance Bannerman is broken as hell. Just came from the theorycraft stream and this one's a winner.
- Maestra of the Masquerade is funny, but the misdirection will only occasionally work. Too bad we'll never see this in tournaments.
- Rogue got scammed because there's simply not a single good deathrattle below 4 this time round. Maybe the midset?
- Canal Slogger will be one of the most infuriating card you'd ever have to face against shaman. Its almost always a 2 for 1 trade in your favor, and it heals you as well.
- Can't wait to build decks with Mo'arg Forgefiend because this thing is just insane as an 8 drop. At least I would be, if Royal Librarian didn't exist. Like why'd get rid of spellbreaker only to print another one except this one is infinitely better because it has tradeable. This card alone guarantees the death of priest midgame stabilization. Wouldn't be surprised if this is in every deck at some point.
- In case anyone's interested, my views on the quests are in the theorycraft article. Basically druid and mage quest are good, contrary to expectation.
Alright, after looking at the new cards and watching a few streamers, here's a short view on the quests and new cards in general;
Show Spoiler
- Quest decks seem bad. A lot of them complete around turn 7 in general, and as expected many of the rewards aren't exactly worth their weight. The only quests that have impressed me is druid, rogue, mage, warrior, and hunter.
- Mage fire spells are strong enough for you to just continue playing spell mage, with or without the quest. My initial concerns of mage not being able to complete this because fire spells are pretty bad is extinguished by nearly all spells in this expansion being fire spells, and all of them are good. The quest allows you to nearly always win against control decks because Ignite is broken as hell. But in most scenarios you'd just easily do without it.
- Druid quest will thrive if your opponent is burn or aggro. Basically you play as ramp druid with Cenarion Ward at the top end, and you curve into this along with the quest. The quest and reward aren't the real deal, they just allow you to live past the early game. I personally think any midrange or control deck will beat this handily
- Rogue does rogue things. The quest is fine but rogue again suffers from the lack of health and useful taunts. Could be that the SI decks are just too slow, but refinement can easily change things. If you do get the reward, its fairly scary for your opponent because nog-gen fog generator and fizzflash distractor can easily turn the game around.
- Warrior is the real aggro class next turn around. But I suspect it fits into midrange better, because skipping turn 1 for an aggro deck is pretty much a no-no.
- Hunter quest allows you to somewhat play raza priest in standard. But because hunters cant heal, this one gets dumped on by aggro and burn, like really badly. Unless you can find some way to stabilize or play big taunts, there's just no way you'd win those matches because the quest really forces you to play cards that don't really protect your face.
- The other quests? Priest can easily win without the quest funnily enough. Shaman has a lot of strong cards, but nothing beats just playing Doomhammer and winning. By the time you get the reward you'd likely have no cards so its really not doing anything. Quest paladin needs refinement, Im not giving up on this yet, but you wouldn't be be playing quest pally because midrange handbuff would be the real deal. Dhunter quest is laughable. Nuff said.
- Best deck in my opinion would be midrange handbuff paladin. Seen Kibler's stream with this deck. Its basically the same sermon midrange deck with plenty of taunts except you snowball really fast because Alliance Bannerman is broken. The only way you lose is through burn, and even then I'm not 100% sure.
- Didn't get to see much of shadow priest, or Bolner Hammerbeak. Sad.
- My take is that top of the mountain will likely be shaman, druid, paladin.
Arbitration clauses in contracts. Man. Glad I don't live in wherever something like this can even be legal, or accepted. Of all the demands, this shouldn't even be there, such bs clauses should never even exist to begin with.
No wonder the dudes on top keep pestering those at the bottom. I was already wondering that day why their employees dont just sue their arses off the minute it happens.
Just want to add that you dont have to do this in ranked. Just go casual duels where its guaranteed that your opponent will want to sear your arse quick instead of wasting your time.
You dont have to win, just play, reach 15 hp and concede. Its literally that simple.
It makes sense that Blizz says as little as possible. They did the same with Blitzchung controversy. As long as they don't bring it up, the consumers will forget eventually.
The blitzchung issue was addressed after like a week. J Brack went with the usual 'acknowledged the issue etc.' speech and then reduced blitzchung's punishment, which is largely why he's still in GM last season. To be honest, even blitzchung himself acknowledged that he knew what he did was wrong and was ready to face punishment. The only real innocent casualty were the casters who were banned (not sure if they were unbanned after that speech).
Its certainly not a case where the community simply forgotten because it was not mentioned. They've been fired up all week before J Brack's speech retuned some semblance of normalcy. Far as Im concerned, that issue is closed.
Apparently in reddit there's some video of trump confirming that the theorycraft stream will still continue and obviously they've been given the full list of new cards to work with. Also apparently this will take place tomorrow.
Usually all the cards would be dumped into the website right after the full reveal livestream is complete so if that stream has been canceled I don't see what repercussions there would be simply dumping it all to the website, even if unceremoniously.
The gag order is to be expected. But that has nothing to do with the full card reveals. As it stands, we're actually likely to get a look at all the new cards from the theorycraft stream, which would be what I would call disastrous.
Edit: Just want to add that this is not saying team5 is incompetent, in light of the scandal. People have the right to be upset about this, but as long as no one is calling for anyone's head to roll that's fine in my opinion.
Let's hope that the cards are dumped before the theorycraft stream. Otherwise, the usual dislike for such things are going to be amped a little higher than usual. I have nothing against the streamers getting to play early. I would usually watch them myself. But it does grate more than a little that Im literally tuning in just to see what are the new cards we're going to get.
Its never realistically going to do anything anyway. Especially since the lawsuit is currently on the way and will likely take up to a year before acitivision blizz gets anywhere near court.
We can trust that there would be some internal shake ups to address this issue even if the lawsuit comes to naught. Unlike more pertinent and persistent issues that tends to divine opinion, like how CEOs get paid exorbitant amounts of cash over their staff, or the very unequal nature of work vs pay in general, any form of harassment, much less sexual harassment, is nearly universally frown upon by all walks of life regardless of their stature. So much like the women suffrage movement, or the civil rights movement, I have no doubt that change will happen autonomously without any need to appeal for militancy or full blown boycotts.
Its entirely reasonable to withhold from blizz products until this stink ends. But it'll be entirely on our own conscience to do so.
In a dedicated deck, this card may be the most dangerous card in the deck. You play this on 2, it survives, you play Pounce + hero power and suddenly this is a 5/4 for 2. If it survives, it'll just snowball hard.
But that's the problem isn't it. It'll never realistically survive more than 1 turn, and without double Pounce, you're essentially skipping your turn just to make a 4 health monster, which isn't bad but its not game winning neither.
Its probably bad. RNG aside, there's no way token druid can ever plan ahead with their plays with this card in consideration. Properly speaking, this card can only truly function in a midrange, no ramp, no gibberling bs, druid. In other words, its a decent card in a class that does broken things. Just no.
Its likely to be something you'd want in a discover because if your hand is trash then this one only adds to it. Its only true hope is to somehow have more than 2 minions on board and you have 2 mana extra to spare. With the death of gibberling, that's just really never going to happen.
But if you get it to work, it really works. Reloading is no joke, but like Cybertech Chip or Revenge of the Wild, its likely never to be as good as some may think it is.
Probably bad. A card that needs another card to work needs to be very, very good. And this card isn't that. At best you'd coin fel spell into this, a 3/4 taunt at 1. But whenever you can't do that this card feels just too weak even in an aggro deck.
I was thinking this was shit, but then I realised that this can hit face. So instantly this is a good card. Exactly what Jace Darkweaver needs in order to work.
Of course, there's the issue that this will whiff most of the time because there's almost always going to be something else on board to block it, but for the fact that it can act as removal in the early game and finisher in the late game, this is most certainly a card for consideration.
If it didn't have taunt it'll be hot trash. But then team5 had to muck it up by making it a demon as well. So again, the only reason you're playing this is because you're playing hard for the quest to work. But even a good card in a bad deck is shit, so what's there to say about this card?
Well, on the bright side, it'll always cost 0 if you get outcasted skull on this thing.
Its mostly bad. You'd have to pay 1 mana to draw one for the following turn, which means essentially you're paying 1 mana to do nothing. Just put a tradeable card in your deck would be a better card than this one.
The only reason, and a bad reason at that, you'd play this card is because you're going hard to finish the quest. But as has been established, the quest kinda sucks, so this card which is pretty bad to begin is now only a consideration in a bad deck.
A nerf to wandmaker is nothing else.
Decent card, for a decent purpose. Being able to kill something and gain life is a decent outcome, and at 3 mana you'd deal 5 damage most of the time.
Certainly going to see play in lifesteal dhunter, but in most other cases you'd discover this rather than actually having it in the deck.
Its not entirely trash, mostly because it costs only 3. But the fact is that most of the time this will do nothing on 3, and will likely only have 4 attack at the best of times.
Unless there's major cycle like Plot Twist for warlock, this will only ever reach the lofty heights of 5-6 attack, and that's if you're willing to wait all the way to the end game with this stuck in your hand.
My take: Bad, but can certainly be better with support.
There are some fel spells you'd want with this card, like Fury (Rank 1) or the new Chaos Leech, which is fairly good.
The problem? Well, the body is bad, and the dhunters dont need the draw. The only possibility this sees play is in a really, really stacked fel deck, or the chance there be an OP fel spell in the future.
But at the moment. No.
Its useless in tournaments because you get to see what classes your opponent's bringing. I doubt they'd limit the disguise to only the 4 classes, so its literally a 50-50, which isn't worth it.
Some interesting cards:
- Stormwind Piper looks good because its nearly impossible to remove on 3 without your opponent throwing everything into it. Curves well into something like Sin'dorei Scentfinder. If you have Trueaim Crescent you may get away just buffing your board by 2/2 on 4.
- Ignite and First Flame easily makes into spell mage. Forget the quest, ignite alone will do it.
- Alliance Bannerman is broken as hell. Just came from the theorycraft stream and this one's a winner.
- Maestra of the Masquerade is funny, but the misdirection will only occasionally work. Too bad we'll never see this in tournaments.
- Rogue got scammed because there's simply not a single good deathrattle below 4 this time round. Maybe the midset?
- Canal Slogger will be one of the most infuriating card you'd ever have to face against shaman. Its almost always a 2 for 1 trade in your favor, and it heals you as well.
- Can't wait to build decks with Mo'arg Forgefiend because this thing is just insane as an 8 drop. At least I would be, if Royal Librarian didn't exist. Like why'd get rid of spellbreaker only to print another one except this one is infinitely better because it has tradeable. This card alone guarantees the death of priest midgame stabilization. Wouldn't be surprised if this is in every deck at some point.
- In case anyone's interested, my views on the quests are in the theorycraft article. Basically druid and mage quest are good, contrary to expectation.
Alright, after looking at the new cards and watching a few streamers, here's a short view on the quests and new cards in general;
- Quest decks seem bad. A lot of them complete around turn 7 in general, and as expected many of the rewards aren't exactly worth their weight. The only quests that have impressed me is druid, rogue, mage, warrior, and hunter.
- Mage fire spells are strong enough for you to just continue playing spell mage, with or without the quest. My initial concerns of mage not being able to complete this because fire spells are pretty bad is extinguished by nearly all spells in this expansion being fire spells, and all of them are good. The quest allows you to nearly always win against control decks because Ignite is broken as hell. But in most scenarios you'd just easily do without it.
- Druid quest will thrive if your opponent is burn or aggro. Basically you play as ramp druid with Cenarion Ward at the top end, and you curve into this along with the quest. The quest and reward aren't the real deal, they just allow you to live past the early game. I personally think any midrange or control deck will beat this handily
- Rogue does rogue things. The quest is fine but rogue again suffers from the lack of health and useful taunts. Could be that the SI decks are just too slow, but refinement can easily change things. If you do get the reward, its fairly scary for your opponent because nog-gen fog generator and fizzflash distractor can easily turn the game around.
- Warrior is the real aggro class next turn around. But I suspect it fits into midrange better, because skipping turn 1 for an aggro deck is pretty much a no-no.
- Hunter quest allows you to somewhat play raza priest in standard. But because hunters cant heal, this one gets dumped on by aggro and burn, like really badly. Unless you can find some way to stabilize or play big taunts, there's just no way you'd win those matches because the quest really forces you to play cards that don't really protect your face.
- The other quests? Priest can easily win without the quest funnily enough. Shaman has a lot of strong cards, but nothing beats just playing Doomhammer and winning. By the time you get the reward you'd likely have no cards so its really not doing anything. Quest paladin needs refinement, Im not giving up on this yet, but you wouldn't be be playing quest pally because midrange handbuff would be the real deal. Dhunter quest is laughable. Nuff said.
- Best deck in my opinion would be midrange handbuff paladin. Seen Kibler's stream with this deck. Its basically the same sermon midrange deck with plenty of taunts except you snowball really fast because Alliance Bannerman is broken. The only way you lose is through burn, and even then I'm not 100% sure.
- Didn't get to see much of shadow priest, or Bolner Hammerbeak. Sad.
- My take is that top of the mountain will likely be shaman, druid, paladin.
Arbitration clauses in contracts. Man. Glad I don't live in wherever something like this can even be legal, or accepted. Of all the demands, this shouldn't even be there, such bs clauses should never even exist to begin with.
No wonder the dudes on top keep pestering those at the bottom. I was already wondering that day why their employees dont just sue their arses off the minute it happens.
This is nuts on so many levels.
Its fun, its good, it promotes slower hunters
And best of all in no way possible this ever fits in face hunter.
5/5 stars. Just watched the stream and this is good, believe me.
Just want to add that you dont have to do this in ranked. Just go casual duels where its guaranteed that your opponent will want to sear your arse quick instead of wasting your time.
You dont have to win, just play, reach 15 hp and concede. Its literally that simple.
The blitzchung issue was addressed after like a week. J Brack went with the usual 'acknowledged the issue etc.' speech and then reduced blitzchung's punishment, which is largely why he's still in GM last season. To be honest, even blitzchung himself acknowledged that he knew what he did was wrong and was ready to face punishment. The only real innocent casualty were the casters who were banned (not sure if they were unbanned after that speech).
Its certainly not a case where the community simply forgotten because it was not mentioned. They've been fired up all week before J Brack's speech retuned some semblance of normalcy. Far as Im concerned, that issue is closed.
Apparently in reddit there's some video of trump confirming that the theorycraft stream will still continue and obviously they've been given the full list of new cards to work with. Also apparently this will take place tomorrow.
Usually all the cards would be dumped into the website right after the full reveal livestream is complete so if that stream has been canceled I don't see what repercussions there would be simply dumping it all to the website, even if unceremoniously.
The gag order is to be expected. But that has nothing to do with the full card reveals. As it stands, we're actually likely to get a look at all the new cards from the theorycraft stream, which would be what I would call disastrous.
Edit: Just want to add that this is not saying team5 is incompetent, in light of the scandal. People have the right to be upset about this, but as long as no one is calling for anyone's head to roll that's fine in my opinion.
Let's hope that the cards are dumped before the theorycraft stream. Otherwise, the usual dislike for such things are going to be amped a little higher than usual. I have nothing against the streamers getting to play early. I would usually watch them myself. But it does grate more than a little that Im literally tuning in just to see what are the new cards we're going to get.
Its never realistically going to do anything anyway. Especially since the lawsuit is currently on the way and will likely take up to a year before acitivision blizz gets anywhere near court.
We can trust that there would be some internal shake ups to address this issue even if the lawsuit comes to naught. Unlike more pertinent and persistent issues that tends to divine opinion, like how CEOs get paid exorbitant amounts of cash over their staff, or the very unequal nature of work vs pay in general, any form of harassment, much less sexual harassment, is nearly universally frown upon by all walks of life regardless of their stature. So much like the women suffrage movement, or the civil rights movement, I have no doubt that change will happen autonomously without any need to appeal for militancy or full blown boycotts.
Its entirely reasonable to withhold from blizz products until this stink ends. But it'll be entirely on our own conscience to do so.