Introduction
Hello once again, today we got another batch of spoilers and some things caught my attention, so I decided it was time for me to once again do the analysis on the spoiled cards.
Without delays, I believe we should start this analysis right away, so let’s get to it!
Forbidden Healing
So I missed this one on my last review because it wasn’t spoiled when I finished writing it, but here it is: Forbidden Healing!
This card proves that we are very likely to get a full cycle of zero mana epic cards that consume your whole mana and do some effect, for Paladins the effect is Healing.
Forbidden Healing is the most reliable of the Forbidden spells so far, healing for double the spent mana seems quite reasonable and in case good Control Paladin decks start showing up, this card will for sure make part of it.
The most intriguing fact about this card is how are the other Forbidden cards going to look like, this effect is decent but I fear we might end up having overpowered effects within the next couple Forbidden spells.
Infested Tauren
In every single way possible, this is below piloted-shredder’s power level, which I believe is fine given how overpowered Piloted Shredder was, but since this card’s strength is so low, it probably won’t see play.
I might end up being wrong about all this and biting my tongue, but I see no hopes for this one.
This is my trying to be positive about this card:
This card could have a better board impact than let’s say senjin-shieldmasta against decks like Zoo when fighting for board Control because two damage should be enough to kill a minion from their deck. However I don’t think this should be enough to justify this seeing play.
Herald Volazj
This one, at first sight it looks amazing, getting two or more 1/1s on the board and a 5/5 sure seems like a good thing, especially when these 1/1 have powerful Deathrattles, but the truth is that Priests rarely have a good board presence, and whenever they do they are already very close to winning the game anyway (even as Dragon Priests).
Going back to Dragon Priest, the only archetype that might survive the Priest rotation, it runs almost no Deathrattles if any at all, while (at the same time) the majority of good Deathrattles are leaving standard format, meaning new strategies are very unlikely to exist.
This card isn’t bad, but isn’t good either so I believe you shouldn’t be getting your hopes high on this one, as it seems like a very unreliable cards and doesn’t matter what version of Priest you are trying to build, you’ll find much better options in the 6-drop curve.
DOOM!
DDOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!!!
All the time I read the text of this card I instantly recall Dota 2 Hero “Doom” sound when he casts his ultimate. Now, back to the card this is the ultimate form of garbage card. I believe this card to be a bestial-wrath power level of card, but since we have to discuss it let us start:
- This card costs more than a semi-unplayable card: twisting-nether, that until yesterday saw no play because there were better options for board sweepers available to Warlocks. Then it started seeing play in Renolock, that because it could only run one of each couldn’t run dual shadowflame or dual hellfire.
- Then we get to the idea that if you are playing this, you are obviously playing Control Warlock, meaning your hero power itself will be drawing you a lot of cards and you won’t need the extra draws.
- Then we get to the Fatigue problem: Cast this -> Overdraw a bunch -> dies to fatigue.
I see no reason why this card should have ever been created outside of flavor itself, which seems quite nice. I am interested in seeing this card’s animation, but I won’t waste my time playing it just because of it, and I will be instantly disenchanting this if I need the dust.
N’Zoth’s Tentacle
I don’t actually know what to think of this. When I first saw this I was positive it was part of some Dr. Boom like Control-only card, but then I got the confirmation that this was an actual card of the game.
This card is likely to see play, because the possibility for this to make grim-patron warrior viable post-rotation is great, which is nice. I am looking forward to seeing this card being playable, because it will mean another threat to Aggro as well as another prey for Control ( ?° ?? ?°).
Hallazeal the Ascended
And we finally come to the first power creep of the expansion! This card is amazing and should give Control Shaman a huge boost in potential. I don’t know if this will be enough to make Control Shaman viable, but for sure will give it a big boost.
This card has some interactions that are amazingly powerful, keep in mind that this card when combined with lightning-storm or elemental-destruction has some devastating tide-turning effects, especially with the second: clearing your opponent’s whole board, healing yourself back to 30(tons of damage+healing yourself for each point = god) while maintaining your Hallazeal alive is devastating and I for sure will be trying this out.
Not to mention this card’s body is amazingly powerful as well for a 5-drop with the full “Priest-dodging” potential of its 4-attack baseline.
There is literally zero complains about this card.
Closing
And this is it for today’s analysis!
I liked Hallazeal but that doesn’t take the fact that the overall power level of the expansion is below average, which is bad.
Whispers of the Old Gods is an expansion that is proving itself to be lowering the overall power level of the game, up until this very moment a great number of cards that are being shown to us are clearly kilometers below the power level of Naxxramas and Goblins versus Gnomes, the two expansions that are rotating out with the Standard format, at the same time the cards shown to us right now are also below the power level of most cards of the expansions that are still going to be active in the Standard format, so I believe something is telling me that the best part of the spoilers are yet to come, and almost everything that has been shown to us up until now is simply “the bad half” so the hype intensifies the closer we get to launch.
We are still a long way to go before the full set spoil release, so let us keep hoping to get more cards that are “good by itself but not broken” just like our beloved Hallazeal!
Love you guys, very happy with the Shaman card indeed!
See you around,
Nuba <3
