The new unnerfs have been revealed, and are live now with the latest patch! 24 cards have been unnerfed in all and in this article we're going to discuss how they will impact Wild in general and any specific decks they can fit into.
Apotheosis is probably too weak for Wild, even in buff and Control decks. In Standard there was a powerful combo with Blademaster Samuro but this is too slow for the Wild format which has better things to do.
Zoo Warlock in Wild takes the form of Cute Warlock, which is very fast and dumps their hand early. As such, Imprisoned Scrap Imp may be too slow although a slightly slower Aggro Warlock may eventually find this buff to be powerful enough to run.
None of the current competitive Rogue decks in Wild will want to run this, however this does boost a number of off meta decks that run the Secret Package.
Wild has Starving Buzzard for dedicated beast decks, but this may be good in any decks that want to tutor out a specific beast. Out of competitive meta decks, perhaps Even Hunter may want to try it to draw their Phase Stalkers more consistently.
With this unnerf, it's once again possible to do a turn 1 otk in Druid. This may be an option for any deck with both large and small spells, so many Druid decks may want to try him out as well as potentially other classes like Demon Hunter where he can be used for burst with a free Inner Demon or two.
This card doesn't really see play in Wild as most decks that want to draw weapons use Forge of Souls. The only deck it used to see play in in Wild is Bomb Warrior which is not competitive at all. Therefore, this unnerf will have a minimal impact on Wild.
In terms of sheer meta impact, this one unnerf is probably more impactful than all 23 others. This is very, very powerful for any Handbuff deck, Buff deck, or Murloc deck and will see play in many decks which can include Even Paladin, Handbuff Paladin, Murloc Shaman, Handbuff Warrior, new ones like the upcoming Murlock Warlock which actually has both Murloc and Handbuff synergy, and more. This will boost the power of all these decks and can create a strong threat against decks with low removal - Crabrider becomes a must-remove threat that can snowball into a win with its permanent Windfury.
The main deck that can use this is Il'gynoth otk Demon Hunter, which was very powerful in Standard. However, it's probably not going to make a big impact on the meta as it gets outclassed by other existing combo decks in Wild.
Il'gynoth otk Demon Hunter is back, and the otk can now be done faster and more easily. However, it's very vulnerable to Dirty Rat and won't be better than existing combo decks, many of which are more resistant to having a key card ratted.
This card will clearly break the meta... just kidding. It's going to go into meme RNG Mages and nothing more. Unlike in Standard where a small pool of spells made it consistently powerful, Wild has too many bad or situational spells for this card to be good.
A small boost to Evolve Shamans, not enough to make them meta in Wild but still great for any who enjoy it. A synergy that will now work again is making Dread Corsair cost 0 and then swinging with the weapon to evolve it into a 5 cost minion the turn you play it.
Odd Demon Hunter is a good if underplayed deck in Wild, and this will boost its potential damage output.
Soul Demon Hunter has not gotten more direct support after Outland, so it's far too slow and weak to be good in Wild despite this unnerf.
This is generated by Astromancer Solarian. It may fit into Reno Mages, although since they use Luna's Pocket Galaxy to set the cost to 1 anyway this unnerf doesn't make a big difference.
This may now be an option in Druid decks which have access to ramp, along with a 5 cost beast package. It's still better to use a Oaken Summons package but maybe some decks will want to try both. It also helps make Big Beast Hunter more competitive, but in a class without ramp it is cast too late to impact most Wild games that end early.
Any Warrior deck with the Risky Skipper package will like this change. This can include Dead Man's Hand Warriors and various combo Warriors.
This may now be an option in Odd Demon Hunters. It does mess with Stiltsteppers, but may be good anyway as a top end.
Well, this might help Odd Rogue a bit, other than that it's a bit too slow and low synergy to see much Wild play.
This can be good in an Anyfin Can Happen combo deck to pull out your murlocs with Tip the Scales early.
Many, many slower Wild decks use this to get to their top end and this boosts all of them. One specific thing to note is that it now can go into Even decks.
Open the Waygate Quest Mage, especially the Reno version, will love this for more consistent quest completion.
This is too slow for the current Wild to make as large of an impact as it did when it first came out, but it is a boost to Big Demon Demon Hunters and a potential inclusion in a more Midrange version of Odd Demon Hunter.
This may be good in Aggressive Demon Hunter decks. However, currently aggressive Wild Demon Hunters either run Drek'Thar or are Odd, so it's hard to find a home for him right now.
This has a nice combo with Wave of Apathy to steal any minion, but as a whole this is still too weak to see Wild play. This is especially because Wild currently has few decks that actually summon large minions, many are either aggro decks with many small minions or combo decks with few or no minions at all.
In conclusion, most of these unnerfs help lesser played, off meta decks but won't have an impact on the most competitive part of the ladder. However, the few unnerfs that do, such as Crabrider, can have a very large impact and cause a massive meta shakeup.
What do you think about these cards? Which Wild decks will they see play in? Let us know in the comments below!
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Comments
Shadowform still nerfed? Why?
This list is dumb. Primarily because of Kael'Thas though, I'm still left amazed on why they would unnerf that over Gibberling, Hand of A'dal, Nitroboost Poison, Skull of Gul'dan or many other things really.
I hope it's because they're still waiting for these cards to actually rotate to unnerf them because the fear of being too strong in standard for one week. But then again, they also unnerfed Il'gynoth.
Many are rotated, and are bunch of 100% safe unnerfs, that are wild (and were lalst time time aswell) and they dint revert like faceless corrupter or mogu fleshshaper and what not.
Or others wouldnt be broken in standard even if unnerfed even for just the week , flametonque at 3hp ,or meta at 5dmg wouldnt be broken in standard, and wargliaves is rotating yet dint get unnerfed and no way would be broken (certainly that 1week) in standard
I'm glad I reached legend before this Il'gynoth BS.
I find it worrying how many of these cards are not good enough to see play in standard in their unnerfed forms, eg Kayn Sunfury, Shattershard Mystic, Bloodboil Brute, ...
I think that says a lot about the power level of the previous year.
Scholomance and DoD reallyl started showing the great powercreep and then Stormwind they want overboard with it.
Also no cloak, no faceless corrupter, no altruis, no blade dance, no glaivebound adept, no 5 mana giggling,, no mogu fleshshaper,, no possed lakcey, NO level up, no mana wyrm, no metamorphis, no flametonque(would be 100% fine even in standard), no war axe but is kept in core despite freakign kings defender excisting which is still terrible just a bit less thne Useless war axe.
Is alot missing from unnerfs that wouldve been totally fine and were nerfed for standard, not wild and wouldnt be bosoting already good decks(which kael arguably does)
Also no dreadsteed (but flrugl toxfin can be tutored and equaliy consceration or pyromancer are miles and miles betetr )
I know its only for a week, the Guardian Animals un-nerf has made the ramp Druid w/ actual minions painfully viable in Standard. Love to see my opponent Solar Eclipse + Survival of the Fittest twice before turn 8.
Tax Paladin and OTK Druid, I have missed you two so much 😭
Edit: All hell will break loose when FiTB cards are unnerfed.