A new Hearthstone patch hit during the madness of yesterday's expansion reveal - Saviors of Uldum. Here's everything you need to know about the patch with the official notes being available here.
Uldum Pre-Order Available In Client
The patch brings us the pre-order for Saviors of Uldum in-game.
- For $49.99 USD you get 50 Saviors of Uldum packs, the Elise's Journal card back, and one random Golden Legendary from the set.
- For $79.99 USD you get 80 Saviors of Uldum packs, the card back, Golden Legendary, and the new Druid Hero - Elise Starseeker!
Fire Festival
The Fire Festival is going to return this year and with it we're getting some quests and a special tavern brawl / adventure hybrid called Blackrock Crash.
- There is a chain of 7 quests that rewards 7 Card Packs and 400 Gold.
- Rakanishu appears to be involved with this year's festivities.
- The cosmetic fireworks are returning!
Here are all the datamined Fire Festival quests as they are given to you. Keep in mind datamined information can sometimes not be entirely accurate.
Quote From Out of Cards
- Welcome to the Fire Festival! - Play 3 Games.
- Rewards: 200 Gold
- Happy Fire Festival! - Play 30 Cards.
- Rewards: 1 Witchwood Pack
- Happy Fire Festival! - Play the Tavern Brawl 3 Times.
- Rewards: 1 Rise of Shadows Pack
- Happy Fire Festival! - Play 5 Mechs.
- Rewards: 1 Boomsday Pack
- Happy Fire Festival! - Draw 50 cards.
- Rewards: 1 Rise of Shadows Pack + 1 Rastakhan's Rumble Pack
- Happy Fire Festival! - Take 25 turns.
- Rewards: 1 Rise of Shadows Pack + 1 Boomsday Pack
- Happy Fire Festival! - Play 3 games.
- Rewards: 200 Gold
Card Art Censorship
UPDATE: Hearthstone's Dave Kosak talked about the art change with PC Gamer.
Quote From Dave Kosak We went back and really just brought everything up to our standards.
It wasn't because we were looking at ratings, or international [regulations], or anything like that. We really just wanted our artists to feel good about everything in the set.
[We] wouldn't print those same cards today.
Following the Jaina art change earlier this year which changed her outfit to include a camisole, another round of card art changes have come to Hearthstone. This art update further reduces sexuality of some of the art pieces, completely changing the characters in some cases, and removes blood from some cards.
Sexuality Focused Changes
- Succubus renamed to Felstalker, a completely different character.
- Mistress of Pain renamed to Queen of Pain. Less leg showing, no longer looks seductive.
- Windfury Harpy is now more covered up, different pose.
- Secretkeeper now has a frontal post, no more behind.
Blood / Gore Focused Changes
- Eviscerate no longer shows blood, uses old art. (Especially noticeable on golden version)
- Bite new art, higher detail. No longer biting into anything, just showcasing sharp teeth.
- Deadly Shot is now a ballista shooting an arrow.
- Headcrack showcases a slingshot with a ball on fire instead of a character being smacked in the head.
How do you feel about the changes? Are there any cards you think could be next?
Here they are in a gallery format with the new art on the left and old art on the right.
Quote From Fluxflashor We're no longer being factual, this is an opinion. You've been warned.
I suspect all the changes are due to Chinese regulations being slapped onto gaming. Blizzard is being forced to make changes to the game so they can continue to publish Hearthstone in the East. What I fail to understand though is why they can't pull a The Skeleton Knight and have different artwork depending on where you're playing the game. This is done heavily in World of Warcraft which censors almost all the skeletons in China while everyone outside of the country gets Undead in all their glory.
If China isn't the reason for the changes, it would be nice for some transparency from Blizzard letting us know why they're taking the time to go back and update old art.
Undead in World of Warcraft, World vs China (Source)
The Skeleton Knight in Hearthstone, World vs China (Source)Succubus I understand more than the others that received changes, even if it doesn't sit well with me since they still are everywhere in World of Warcraft, you just can't really localize a seductress. Which actually asks the question, why is this stuff okay in World of Warcraft but not Hearthstone?
On a positive note, the new art does look quite good on Secretkeeper, Windfury Harpy, and Queen of Pain. They look like cards that will kick some serious ass and they're much more detailed.
Card Changes - Consistency Update
Quote From Blizzard Pilfer: We’ve updated the card text and functionality for Pilfer to match the recent changes to other “Burgle” cards currently available in Standard.
- Old Text: Add a random card to your hand (from your opponent's class).
- Updated Text: Add a random card from another class to your hand.
Multi-Target Cards
We’ve updated the following multi-target cards to function even if there is only one viable target on the board. These cards will now also properly trigger when played by random effects such as [Hearthstone Card (Yogg'Saron, Hope's End) Not Found].
Tavern Brawls Now Active All Week
Quote From Blizzard Downtime for Tavern Brawls has been reduced to 1 hour per week. Tavern Brawls will now begin every week on Wednesday at 9:00 AM PDT and end the following Wednesday at 8:00 AM PDT (times and dates will vary by region).
Comments
Human skeletons are not allowed in China
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/arcana/chinese-skeletons-2002-03-13
What's wrong with sex and violence?
Strange they straight up replaced Succubus with a Felstalker - thought they'd reserve the Felstalker for something that can silence or steal a spell since that's what they do in WoW.
Also, the new queen of pains artwork is a tad garish.
WAIFUUUUU NOOOO
And I just opened Sonya Shadowdancer.....don't they DARE touch her beautiful art!!
The art change to Harpy makes me think back to WC3 and polygonal harpy breasts in their animated unit portraits, haha.
Felstalker is a waste of a future card that could have discarded a spell from your opponent's hand, or so.
The others? not so bad.
These card art changes will have absolutely zero impact on my life but they reek of censorship and that really annoys me.
I even like the replacements but it still reeks of censorship and that really annoys me.
I even agree with toning down the sexuality of cards especially in the #metoo age but it's still censorship and guess what? That really annoys me.
I guess I'll register my discontent with Blizzard by pre-ordering both bundles - that will show them!
The succubus was way too far. The new secret keeper is hotter in my opinion. The new deadly shot and headcrack look like crap. I don't mind the rest of the changes. But 100% this is for China. Hearthstone is not making as much money anymore in the East and this is their full support of moving their market to China.
Never really noticed that Secretkeeper had a back post... So, RIOT OFC
I totally understand why they changed oversexualised cards. Both Harpy Secretkeeper had ridiculous pose that was suxualised. Its not about being in bikini or revealing outfit. But both those arts were done to hit to horny 15 year olds. Both have pose that is unnatural and only made that way to show off to and bottom. On new art they are still not covered from head to toe (I would say that SC have more revealing outfit now). They just now in normal pose standing / flying like normal life being not pinup girl bending in teenage dream fantasy style.
About removing blood. I do not care at all. I am only surprised that they didn't changed some warrior cards that have quite a lot blood on illustration.
Succubus looks so much more natural as a demonpuppy, right?
Alright, so I guess we can forgive the Chinese, apparently BLizzard is just run by spineless cucks.
I hope they don't do anything to Frost Lich Jaina! :(
Helen Lovejoy approves this post.
Someone on reddit linked a tweet of one of the game designers quoting that they didnt change the art for china. Apperently they did it to keep hs in a fresh state and because they want the artists to feel good about their art, which they werent with these cards anymore. Dont ask me for the source i just saw the post on reddit yesterday while browsing through the Hearthstone sub on my phone.
Discolock still is one of my favorite Wild decks and the Succubus artwork probably was one of my top 5 in the game. Really sad to see this one gone. Hurts even more that Felstalker looks really bad imo.
If it really was about bringing stuff up to standard, why completely change cards and card arts. They could easily have remade headcrack and all the other cards in the newer art style. Even though I prefer many of the new arts (deadly shot looks so much less impactful now, especially for a card that destroys a minion), this is a bs explanation
Is it just me or does Queen of Pain look like Dreadlord Jaina skin from Heores of the Storm? xd
Judging just from the trailer, I say that Elise will be this expansion's best girl.
Not even Reno flexing on two camels will change my mind
"It wasn't because we were looking at ratings, or international [regulations]"
Proceeds to ruin the art of one of the most iconic card arts in the game aka eviscerate "because our artists weren't feeling well with some cards art".
Yeah i can see them rolling in their beds at night with nightmares about secretkeeper's art...
Mistakes were made?
It's almost like Blizzard has a track record of lying to our faces and expecting we don't notice
They should have just come out and said "it's because of ratings/the Chinese/general office cuckery and I would have accepted it, maybe even respected it.
But just lying and saying "this is what the artists wanted, no ulterior motives" is just such a blatan lie it's kind of embarassing
I'M sure the artist for Succubus went like "oh yeah, back when I drew her originally I always intended her to be a retarded demondog, it just turned outj wrong, lol"
They could have just done a more toned down version of a Succubus and it would have been fine, but no, gotta lure in those kids because they spend the most money.
At this point some court decides that selling lootboxes to children should be illegal and all this shitshow comes crashing down.