Reviews
Cards
More cards have been revealed for the upcoming Hearthstone adventure, Blackrock Mountain, and they have their own share of shake-ups for the game. All three new cards are class-exclusive for Warlock, Hunter, and Mage respectively. If these particular cards fail to excite you, keep in mind that each class will receive two exclusive cards.
Warlock is fearsome at flooding the board and Imp Gang Boss is all about that. However, it’s debatable whether this will be better or worse than the existing Imp Master card. Boss has a better stat line and demon synergy, but it has to run itself against an enemy to spawn an imp and a tough taunt is all it takes to whittle him down. Honestly, the Imp-losion spell will probably prove better than either minion, but Boss is still an interesting option.
Hunter-exclusive minion Core Rager is similar to the Druid’s Druid of the Fang card, but it’s either more or less situational depending on the deck it’s placed in. As a 4/4 beast for 4 mana, its stat line is fair enough, but playing it simply as a 4 drop should only be done as a last resort. The idea is that this will be strongest when you’re topdecking in the late game, but calling out a 7/7 without a hand is only going to be useful if you already have a strong hold on the board or if its enough to land a lethal hit on the enemy hero. Otherwise, it’s not going to get much work done and your opponent can afford to ignore it. Core Rager is definitely the least exciting of this crop.
Flamewaker is easily the most competitive card in this set and it already has plenty of people outraged at it. Mech Mage is currently one of the strongest decks in the game and, while Flamewaker isn’t a mech, it does have a great deal of synergy with the Spare Parts series of token spells. Mage is also heavily based around good spells in general, so this is likely to become a mainstay in most Mage decks. I don’t think it’s nearly as overpowered as a lot of people are assuming given the randomness of its effect, the fact that you have to spend a spell to trigger it, and the fact that its stat line is only okay, but it is certainly a force to be reckoned with. Definitely keep an eye out for this one.
There are still 19 cards left to be seen with Blackrock Mountain, 4 of which will be legendary, and we likely won’t have to wait too long for them to be revealed. It may not be that long before we even start to play with them as the adventure is set to begin sometime next month.
