View list of cards released so far in this dedicated post.
Introduction
This is the series where our contributors – high ranked ladder and Arena players – and players from Team HSP review the new revealed The Grand Tournament cards. We rate every card both in Constructed and Arena, then give you our thoughts about them. This post will be updated every time we’ll get a new review!
When it comes to the rating, we rate the cards from 1 to 5:
1 – Very Bad – The card will see no play in any kind of deck. It won’t be drafted in Arena unless you’re present with other terrible options. E.g. Magma Rager, Dalaran Mage.
2 – Bad – The card might see some occasional play in low tier or budget decks, but isn’t good enough to be played in top tier decks. It will rarely be drafted in Arena – either it needs to synergize with the deck or you need to be present with other bad options. E.g. Boulderfist Ogre, Frostwolf Warlord (Constructed), Ironforge Rifleman, Ancient Mage (Arena)
3 – Average – The card might fill some niche and see play in couple of decks. Not an especially strong card, but can be used to fill gaps in the deck after putting staple cards. In Arena, it’s the card you’re gonna draft pretty often – the card is good enough to not ruin the quality of your deck, but nothing impressive. E.g. Gnomish Inventor, Sen’jin Shieldmasta (Constructed), Bloodfen Raptor, Archmage (Arena)
4 – Good – You’re gonna see this card in a lot of decks. Either it fits into a certain archetype or is overall a good card. Your Constructed deck are mostly filled with cards of those quality. They’re strong and definitely serve their purpose. In Arena, those are the cards you actually want to see and draft – every great deck will have at least couple of those. E.g. Azure Drake, Defender of Argus, Haunted Creeper (Constructed), Harvest Golem, Mechanical Yeti, Stormwind Champion (Arena)
5 – Very Good – This is THE card that will be auto-include or at least a very strong contender. The card that is gonna be really strong and see a lot of play in many decks. Card that is often best in its role, the one that you can’t really pass. In Arena, this is the card you want to see most in the draft, the base of 12 wins Arena decks, one that you instantly pick when you see it. E.g. Dr. Boom, Mad Scientist, Piloted Shredder (Constructed), Flamestrike, Truesilver Champion, Fire Elemental (Arena)
This time we review all the latest reveals. We’ve bundled most of the cards revealed after Gamescom, up to the 2 newest Legendaries.
Icehowl
Nuba
Constructed: Very Bad (1)
Arena: Average (3)
In constructed: A worse King Krush? Nop, nothing to see here.
In arena: There might be worse options than this, like Lorewalker Cho and Baron Rivendare, in which case getting a 10/10 board clearer isn’t the worst of the deals.
Stonekeep
Constructed: Bad (2)
Arena: Average/Good (3.5)
Pretty cool idea – a big minion with Charge that can’t attack face. Will it work, though? I don’t think so. The biggest problem with this guy is that he costs 9 mana – that’s really much. You spend your whole turn on removing one guy. Most of the slow decks already have better ways to deal with big minions – Hex, Execute, Siphon Soul and even Big Game Hunter (if the minion is over 7 attack). The only slow deck that doesn’t really have any big removals is Ramp Druid – that’s why Druids always run BGH and often even Mind Control Tech. This MIGHT work as a Druid removal, especially if Aviana deck becomes a thing.
Another problem with this guy is that it’s a minion. Annoy-o-Tron can tank 2 hits from this guy. Sludge Belcher too. Even the 1/2 Slime from Sludge Belcher can easily stop him. And the problem is that when you’re spending 9 mana on this guy – you can’t Silence or play something else on top of that.
Another problem is that against decks that have couple of small threats instead of one big – once again, you’re spending your whole turn to remove something small. I don’t know, if you run it into a Spider Tank or a minion like that – you’re using 9 mana to get rid of enemy 3-drop. That’s bad in terms of tempo. Yes, you get more value in couple of turns, but sometimes you won’t have time if enemy rushed you down.
In Arena, it’s not that bad. It can often get 3 for 1 or something. The problem is that it doesn’t threaten face damage unless you Silence him – and you can’t reliably draw Silence in the Arena. It’s definitely not Ragnaros level, but better than a lot of Legendaries.
Sea Reaver
Stonekeep
Constructed: Bad (2)
Arena: Average (3)
A new Flame Leviathan! I really dislike effects like that. You have zero control over when it occurs. And just like Flame Leviathan, I don’t see it being used. Control Warrior wouldn’t like to use it – really no need to do so. Patron Warrior? I also don’t think so – Patron wants to control the Whirlwind effects. Obviously it can be beneficial – you might have Acolyte of Pain, Grim Patron etc. on the board. But you might also have 1 health minion that you’ve wanted to use this turn. Or the effect might be completely neutral – you might have an empty board. Since the Patron Warrior doesn’t really need a vanilla 6/7 minion (it’s like running Boulderfist Ogre) and the effect might work in your favor but also against you – Patron Warrior won’t use it. Maybe some sort of Enrage Warrior? I also doubt – since you damage your own minions, they often stay at 1 health. Enrage Warrior is also pretty aggressive deck, so it probably runs some small minions that you don’t want to hit.
So, I don’t see it being good in Constructed. In Arena, it’s also worse than Bouldefist Ogre. The effect is almost never positive – you much more often have minions you don’t want to damage on the board. In Arena you trade to take efficient trades – especially with the Warrior, who has no ping. You often leave your minions at low health. It can kill your 1 health minions and put your 2+ health minions into ping / AoE range. Really bad. The stats are obviously good – and that’s the only reason why I’ve given it 3/5. But Boulderfist is 1 point higher because of no effect.
Healing Wave
Stonekeep
Constructed: Good (4)
Arena: Bad (2)
Finally, Shaman has got some heal! It seemed really strange to me that Shaman was only class that couldn’t heal, even though it has Restoration spec in WoW and actually a lot of the Shamans were healers. But I see that they’re fixing it. And in quite spectacular way.
So, once again, I’ve compared Priest’s new Flash Heal to Paladin’s Holy Light. One less mana, one less heal, much better deal in TGT.
This one you can compare with another vanilla spell – Druid’s Healing Touch. It costs the same amount of mana, heals for 1 less, but has a potential to heal for 6 more. I think it’s clearly better than Healing Touch – when you play Control Shaman, even against other slow decks, this heals you for around 9.5 on average (obviously depending on exact list you run and your enemy runs). Against fast decks, it’s around 12.5 healing on average. So no matter against which deck you play, on average it’s better than Healing Touch – with being MUCH better against Aggro. And that’s the spell’s main purpose – to counter Aggro. If you roll 14 healing, that often means sealing the game against fast deck. Even 7 is often good enough.
But comparing it to Healing Touch makes no sense, because it’s not used. Yes? No. First of all, it’s better. Second, some Ramp Druids were using Healing Touch. Third, Druid and Shaman are completely different classes. Druid is proactive – he wants to play something every turn, put minions on the board and let enemy take care of them. He wants to dictate how the game goes. Slow Shaman, on the other hand, is really reactive – he responds to enemy threats, has a lot of answers and not that many threats. It’s a more grindy deck that intends to win the value game – because a lot of Shaman cards have high value. That’s why I think that while Druid doesn’t necessarily need heal (especially Midrange one), it might work out much better in Shaman.
I think the Control Shaman might work out after the TGT. We’ll yet have to see that, but it should be fine.
In Arena, it’s meh. When you play a really slow deck and you’re sure that you’re gonna win in the late game – you might pick it, but generally a spell that does nothing in terms of board control or card advantage is pretty bad. Health total is not important in Arena – you can stall the game for one turn with healing, but if you have no way to clear enemy board, he’s just gonna hit you again with all the minions and you’re back to the previous state, just one turn later. Also, Joust is much less reliable in Arena – every deck needs small drops, no matter how slow you want to play, you need some early game to survive. So if you run small minions, enemy runs small minions and you need to actually WIN the Joust (so if you both roll 2-drop you don’t win), it’s not gonna heal for 17 that often. It means it’s around Healing Touch level – bad.
Light’s Champion
Smashthings
Constructed: Very Bad (1)
Arena: Bad/Average (2.5)
There is not too much to say about this card; Blizzard is really careful about adding Silence effects to the game due to the power of the effect (that and silence makes the game ‘less fun’).
For 1 less mana than Spellbreaker we get a incredibly situational tech card that only helps against one class. AND EVEN THEN, most demons are not worth silencing (Mal’ganis, Voidcaller are about it).
So basically you have a tech card that doesn’t even do that well against the deck(s) you tech’d it in to beat!
Worse still, Warlock cannot make much use of the card either: if Demons had effects like Fel Reaver or The Beast then you could at least consider running this card in a Demon deck and use it like you would use Wailing Soul.
But at the moment almost all Demons have the negative Battlecries, not negative Deathrattles. Ergo Silencing ones own demons is not really a viable idea right now.
In Arena (just like constructed) you are almost never going to be able to trigger the silence, which means you are simply adding a 4/3 to your deck.
A 4/3 is not too terrible, but the stats are the wrong way round: Spider Tank is a lot better (plus it has mech synergy).
In short, I see no real use for the card. Its basically just a 3 mana 4/3 vanilla minion.
I can’t help but feel that this could have been an into a somewhat interesting card if blizzard gave it a tribe: e.g. Make this a Murloc and its sort of playable.
Or what if it was a demon? At least then Warlock could think about playing it in a demon deck (9/10 times its just a 4/3 but 1/10 times you get to silence a power-overwhelming or an Aldor Peacekeeper‘s effect or something).
But no. As it is the card is boring and unplayable. A very disappointing reveal.
Can we petition Blizzard to buff this card? A nice buff would be giving me 100 dust (instead of 20) when I disenchant the thing.
Nuba
Constructed: Very Bad (1)
Arena: Average (3)
In constructed: Nop nop nop. I don’t see why Blizzard keeps making straight up sideboard cards on a game without sideboard. And Silencing a Demon, really?
In arena: It’s another story here though. This card is cost-efficient, a 4/3 for 3 can sometimes be bad because it can end up trading with 2 drops, but overall this can 2-for-1 most 2/3 1-drops as well as bring the beats early in the game. This card should be seen in the draft as a vanilla 3 mana 4/3.
Stonekeep
Constructed: Very Bad/Bad (1.5)
Arena: Bad/Average (2.5)
I still think the minion should be named Holy Knight for the pun. But sadly it’s not. And that would be the only good thing about him, actually.
4/3 is a poor statline for 3-drop. 3/4 is much better, because it doesn’t die to smaller drops that easily.
The effect is really, really situational. I mean, in Constructed it works only against Warlock. The only non-Warlock Demon is Illidan Stormrage and no one is using him. Even if someone was, it’s just better to kill it – he has just 5 health and is in Big Game Hunter range – you don’t really need to Silence it. So, if you play against Zoo Warlock or Demon Handlock, this guys is not bad. If the game had sideboard or you would be sure that you’ll be facing Demon Warlock decks – yeah, he’d be pretty nice, but even then I’m not sure if I’d include him. But as it turns out, the minion that’s decent (because not even great) against only one class is pretty bad in general. No reason to run it over general Silence – comparing it to Ironbeak Owl, sure, you pay 1 more mana for +2/+2 stats, but you lose the ability to Silence ANYTHING. Even against Zoo you often want to Silence let’s say Nerubian Egg and you wouldn’t be able to do that.
The only reason I see for using this guy in future is either introduction of sideboards (which would actually be pretty nice feature in tournaments) or introduction of a strong Demons with a negative effects for the owner. In this case, Warlock could be the one running this guy to Silence his own Demons (while having normal Silence for enemy minions). But right now, neither is the case, so it’s bad.
In Arena, you can treat it as a vanilla 4/3. You’ll almost never get value – not only the Warlock is not the most popular class, but also he doesn’t always get the Demons you want to Silence. I see it working maybe like once in couple of Arena runs you draft it, because Voidcaller is really popular pick in Arena. And as it turns out, vanilla 4/3 is not that strong – 3/4 is much better. The 4/3 is only good if enemy drops 2/3 on turn 2. 3/4 is good always – it kills both 2/3’s and 3/2’s while still surviving. Not the worst card ever in Arena, though. Just slightly below average.
Ram Wrangler
Smashthings
Constructed: Average/Good (3.5)
Arena: Very Bad/Bad (1.5) + add 0.3 to this score for every beast costing less than 5 mana in your deck + add 0.25 to the score for every beast costing 5+ mana
A nice card for a control hunter, should that ever become a thing. To properly evaluate this card we would need to wait for the whole set, only then could we figure out the exact probabilities of bad/good/okay outcomes. But on the face of it, there only seem to be a small hand full of junk outcomes such as Angry Chicken. Most of the time the outcome will be value positive, just like Bane of Doom. On the face of it you could say anything smaller than a 2/2 is pretty bad when you compare the card to Silver Hand Knight. But then you must consider a lot of the small beasts may make up for the lack of stats with special abilities and/or beast synergy.
For example: If you get Webspinner that’s a 3/3 + 1/1 and draw a card for 5 mana. This outcome is only a bit worse than Azure Drake. If you get Scavenging Hyena then you already have a beast on board so this little guy is immediately threatening to grow into a 4/3 and probably needs to be removed quickly (before Unleash the Hounds wins the game).
So that’s a bunch of bad-ish outcomes evaluated, what about some of the others?
Well you have a bunch of okay outcomes such as Stampeding Kodo or King Mukla (3/3 + 3/5 for 5 mana = decent).
…and then there are the ‘super strong’ win the game outcomes like Savannah Highmane, Gahz’rilla, King Krush, Malorne etc.
In conclusion its a nice high value card that will work more often than it fails (just like Bane of Doom). I rated it 3.5 because we must factor in (a) that we need a beast on board for this to work and (b) hunter doesn’t currently have an Archetype for this card (imo, it doesn’t really fit in mid-range hunter).
In Arena, its certainly worth a pick (if you have a sufficient number of beasts, that is)…there will be games where this card just wins pretty much by itself.
Nuba
Constructed: Good (4)
Arena: ?
In constructed: I like this, I like it a lot. The only reason I don’t straight up give this a 5 is because I believe this card might need a whole different Hunter version if we compare to today’s Midrange Hunter. Generating value out of this is not that hard, and if you do, the chances of getting a game-changing beast is just ridiculous. Do not forget that this can pick up bombs like savannah-highmane or king-krush that will straight up win you the game in turn 5.
In arena: I will leave this to the other experts 🙂
Stonekeep
Constructed: Good (4)
Arena: Depends on how many beast you draft
Back in the Beta, I’ve seen some people playing the Beast Hunter decks. They were actually pretty cool – there are a lot of Beast synergies in Hunter. This makes one more. And a pretty good one.
So, I’ll start with this – I hate this card. I think Blizzard is pushing the RNG too hard. Most of the cards we have are controlled RNG, at least in extent. Ragnaros the Firelord let’s say – you can play him when most of the targets are gonna be good hits. Even though you don’t have control over the fireball itself, you can control on what board you play him. Piloted Shredder? Yes, there is a big difference between getting a 4/4 and getting 1/1 – but Shredder is limited by the fact that he can only drop 2-drops. Blizzard can’t design too strong 2-drops, so there are some boundaries in which Shredder operates. Ram Wrangler, however, is completely random. You can get a 1-drop and cry or you can get a Savannah Highmane, King Krush, Gahz’rilla etc. and just win the game. The variance is WAY too big.
“But hey, you also get a random beast from Webspinner!” – yeah, that’s true. But you have to PLAY it first. Ram Wrangler just summons one onto your board. The 3/3 is worth around 2.5 mana, so the effect is also costed at around 2.5 mana. This means that when you get the 9 mana Beast, you’re getting 6.5 mana ahead in terms of tempo. That’s a HUGE swing. Even getting 5-drops is a big swing, because you literally get your 3/3 for free.
On the other hand, if you get a 3/3 + 1/1 for 5 mana, that’s really, really bad. It can often lose you the game. That’s like 3 mana worth of things for 5 mana. It’s like you’ve played a little better Razorfen Hunter for 5.
Now, I’ve already said it in comments, but I’m gonna repeat myself. I think this guy would have some restrictions. If it, for example, summoned a beast between 3 and 5 mana – that would be much better. The best outcome wouldn’t be THAT crushing for your enemy and the worst outcome wouldn’t be that crushing for you. The RNG would still be here (I don’t know why, but Blizzard loves it, so fine, whatever) and it would be less “LOLESPORTS”.
In Arena, the card is either crap or very good. It’s pretty easily to draw a lot of Beasts as Hunter in Arena – there are many good Neutral ones and a lot of class cards are Beasts. But sometimes you just don’t get any. If you have 0 beasts – this guy is like 1.5/5. 3/3 for 5 without any effect is definitely not something you want to play. And the more beasts you draw – the better and more reliable he becomes. With like 8-10 beasts in your draft, he’s easily 4/5 – the random outcome, on average, is good for you. Even the 2-drop beasts aren’t that bad outcome in Arena – you’re getting two bodies in one drop, which is pretty strong in Arena. So you definitely shouldn’t draft it as your first card – but if you’re late into the draft and you have couple of beasts, he can be pretty good.
Varian Wrynn
Hoarth
Constructed: Very Good (5)
Arena: Good (4)
So this card seems great for Control Warrior, it fits the game plan of controlling the late game quite well. Mathwise, the value is great as well. Drawing 2 cards is worth about 1 card and 3 mana, and then playing a minion off those 3 card will usually be about 7ish mana and 1 card. The 7/7 body is worth about 6ish mana and a card. In total, the card should usually get 16ish mana and 3 cards worth of value… which is amazing for 10 mana and 1 card. Super excited to play this in Control Warrior. Insane value in a deck that excels in late game value.
Keyo
Constructed: Good/Very Good (4.5)
Arena: Average (4)
10 mana is a lot for any card, but this does the job as being viable at 10 mana for Control Warrior. By the late game a Control Warrior has used a decent number of its spells, so the odds of hitting at least 1 and probably 2 are super strong, if you get 3 minions off of it (which is very doable) that’s insane value. I’m so excited for Control Warrior post expansion with Justicar Trueheart and this! One thing to note though is that this card says “Draw 3 Cards” so it’s gonna bring you closer to the fatigue. That doesn’t make this card bad, but just something to remember in those mirrors :p
Smashthings
Constructed: Good/Very Good (4.5)
Arena: Very Good+ (5+)
In the right deck, this card looks really strong;
If you don’t get minions its still a 7/7 that draws 3 cards – which I would say is comparable to the Druid staple Ancient of Lore. This is a good start.
Where things get complicated however it when you draw all minions. When I wrote my opinion for the Druid Legendary (the new 5/5) I said it was rather insane but on further introspection I think I over-rated that card. The problem with developing a huge board is that in slow match-ups people will save critical combo’s for the big turn.
In other words, if you get 1 or 2 big minions alongside this guy it either instantly wins you the game or they counter with board clear (e.g Equality, Lightbomb, Shadowflame, etc ,etc) in which case you lose a bunch of powerful cards without gaining much value from them. You could also lose your tech cards (e.g. Big Game Hunter) in much the same way. But with this said, this only really matters if the game is going to fatigue and/or you lose your win condition (e.g. Alexstrasza / Grommash Hellscream).
The best case scenario is probably getting a non critical minion (eg. Shieldmaiden) onto the board and drawing 2 spells/weapons. Thats a 10 mana draw 2 with a 7/7 + 5/5 on board. This looks really really strong use of 10 mana.
In Arena I think this card is a complete blowout; a big minion that generates a lot of card draw and/or a massive tempo boost is insane. This card is even better than Dr. Boom, I think.
In constructed, I think its decent but to get the most out of it may require some revisions to Control Warrior (e.g. less Battlecries and more Deathrattles/instant value cards – for example, Swapping Nefarian for Ysera). But once you make that change, I think you have a really nice late game card draw/ tempo generator.
In short a really nice card for Control Warrior (too inconsistent for combo decks) that will probably be insanely strong in Arena.
Sixis
Constructed: Good (4)
Arena: Very Good (5)
Varian is of course an incredibly strong card and it has to be because it costs 10. Now if we have to analyse it, I’d say that this card will find his way into some Control Warrior decklist because the ability to draw so much is way too strong in a control that was kinda lacking draw already. The problem Varian has it’s not only being vulnerable to BGH but also that it can summon a lot of big minions and play into Brawl, Lightbomb etc. Still, I’d be surprised if this card didn’t see any play
Nuba
Constructed: Average (3)
Arena: Very Good (5)
In constructed: This card seems great when you look at it, but you have to be careful in these points. Although it looks to be a beast, the RNG can backfire a lot, and overall even the most greedy of the Control Warriors will only run about 6 high-end Legendaries, which might make this card not that good. Obviously, there is the chance that you’ll win the game out of nowhere, but I am still not sold on this card just yet, if you want a protip, here it is: don’t craft this right away, wait to see if good players are actually being successful with it. High level deck builders are pretty fast in testing big legendaries, and in case this is good enough it will see play very quickly – and then you’ll be safe to craft it.
In arena: There is just nothing better that can come to mind than this 8+ in Arena. Ok, drafting Sylvanas Windrunner can be better, but she is also a 5 out of 5. I can only see this card competing in Arena pick with other 5s, seeing how you run a lot more minions in arena than you do in Constructed, and generating even the smallest value out of this can be devastating in arena.
Stonekeep
Constructed: Good/Very Good (4.5)
Arena: Good (4)
My god, that is really, really good! I actually can’t wait to see more 8+ mana legendaries which are very strong. I think that’s how they should look in the first place. But back to the card – it’s incredibly strong. A 7/7 for 10 mana are bad stats, but it draws you 3 cards. You can compare this feature to Ancient of Lore. Ancient of Lore costs 2 less, but draws you 2 cards and is -2/-2 (and you often just Hero Power + pass on the turn you play Lore anyway because you often can’t fit anything into your turn). This one takes your whole turn, but draws you 3 cards. And, which is really important, he puts all the minions you draw this way onto the board. That’s a HUGE turn you can get. Even drawing into one big minion – I don’t know, let’s say Ysera. For 10 mana you play Ysera (which normally costs 9 mana), a 7/7 minion and draw 2 additional spells/weapons. And that’s a pretty common scenario – in best case you can pull like 3 big legendaries onto the board and just win the game, but that’s more like a Trolden video material than the things you’re gonna see in game on daily basis.
This card has few flaws, however. First – it costs 10 mana. It means that you spend your whole turn on doing that – you don’t remove anything enemy has played turn before etc. So it’s sometimes gonna take a lot of time to find a perfect turn to use him (just like any other slow minion – Ysera comes to mind once again). Second – you often play into mass removal. For example, playing this against Warrior, Paladin or Priest might lead to a huge Brawl/Equality/Lightbomb value. Also – it’s really slow, so pretty bad against Aggro, but you can say the same for most of the huge legendaries, so it’s not really a problem. This is the card you put in to boost your slower matchups, not Aggro ones.
I think it’s gonna be auto-include in really slow Warrior. Not sure if it’s just gonna fit Control Warrior like that, but if it won’t – the card is so strong that you can build the deck around it.
In Arena, it’s a little weaker. First of all, the value might not be THAT huge – you play a lot of small minions in Arena. Getting a 2-drop and a 3-drop on the board alongside this is gonna be strong, right, but not game-breaking. You also spend your whole turn 10 – if enemy has some board already, he can just outtempo you, because Warrior has problems with fighting huge boards (no good AoE). Also, it’s a Legendary. A Warrior Legendary. You probably won’t see the card in a loooong time even if you play a lot of Arena. Not only Legendaries are rare, but Warrior is the least represented class. For example, I’ve seen Bouncing Blade maybe twice since the GvG release in Arena – and it’s Epic, not Legendary. Still, if someone manages to pick it in Arena, it’s definitely great.
Rhonin
Smashthings
Constructed: Average/Good (3.5)
Arena: Good (4)
I like cards that add other cards to your hand (Light of Naaru is my favorite GvG card from a design perspective). So yeah, I like the card.
But is it any good? Well, in constructed and 8 mana 7/7 is on the weak side (Dr. Boom is a lot stronger) but the Deathrattle fills our hand with cheap spells.
If the enemy has no minions on board then those 3 spells could easily give a Mage deck a win condition (e.g. Fireball + Hero Power + Arcane Missiles x3 = 16 damage).
Moreover, even if we suppose that there is a big board then multiple copies of Arcane Missiles mitigates one of the biggest drawbacks on the card because it greatly reduces variance (i.e. more missiles = more likely to hit the target(s) you want). In terms of board clear, we have basically added a 3 mana avenging wrath to the deck.
And we haven’t even considered the potential this may have in some of sort of control/combo deck: on turn 10 you can trade is missiles for Fireballs with Archmage Antonidas. With Malygos/Emperor Thaurissan/Sorcerer’s Apprentice/Flamewaker you could potentially pump out a lot of burst damage.
So yeah, I can see a lot of crazy shenanigans with this card, but unfortunately it probably doesn’t fit in Freeze Mage and worse still Rhonin is a small 8 drop that is going to get bullied by a lot of other cards around that cost. This is why I rate is as 3.5 — I think the card needs a new Mage Archetype before it becomes truly exceptional.
In Arena, I think you should add 1-2 points to my score if you have synergy: e.g. Fireball(s) + this guy is a potential win condition. Flamewaker + this = very strong board control opportunities.
Sixis
Constructed: Average (3)
Arena: Good (4)
This card is better than a lot of people give it credit for. I like it because it lets you have amazing Archmage Antonidas without really playing any cheap spells in your deck. Now if we look at the stats the card is pretty underwhelming compared to other drops on his slots, but can still get the job done in a control mage deck. Basically don’t expect this card to be OP at all but i think it can potentially be used in Constructed.
Nuba
Constructed: Bad (2)
Arena: Average (3)
In constructed: Probably trash. Weak body/cost reference, weak Deathrattle. This card could even be a Neutral legendary and I think this wouldn’t be played.
H O W E V E R there is a chance some Archmage Antonidas shenanigans might happen, so don’t come crying out loud to me saying I was wrong, because combos can not be predicted and the only way this ever sees play is if somehow people manage to find combos with it, but I highly doubt that possibility.
In arena: There might be better options when you get to choose between this and other 2 Legendaries, the odds of getting something better are high, but this doesn’t seem like a bad pick at all.
Stonekeep
Constructed: Good (4)
Arena: Good (4)
Really cool card. I don’t think it’s gonna be auto-include into any slower Mage deck, but I definitely see people experimenting with it.
Getting 3 copies of Arcane Missiles might seem underwhelming. And it is by itself – it’s just 9 random damage split around 9 targets. You could just play Ragnaros the Firelord and it would often work out the same, without risking Rhonin being Silenced. What’s cool, however, is the synergies you can make thanks to them.
There are couple of cards to combo Arcane Missiles with. First and most obvious one is Archmage Antonidas. Three copies of Arcane Missiles mean three Fireballs. And that’s pretty huge.
The second one is much less impactful, but still cool. You can combo it with Flamewaker – this way it’s a 15 random damage in total.
And the last combo people have mentioned is Malygos – it turns each Arcane Missiles into Avenging Wrath. Avenging Wrath for 1 mana. Really cool.
But, there are some problems. Once again – he’s in Big Game Hunter range. And he’s gonna often be the only BGH target in such a deck (maybe Dr. Boom/Ragnaros, but it’s hard to fit so much late game).
The second problem is Silence – you get Missiles on Deathrattle, so if it’s Silenced before enemy kills it – well, no Missiles for you. If it was Battlecry, it would be much stronger.
Third problem is how slow those combos are. They require multiple turns to work out. So even though you’re getting a lot of value, you’re losing tempo, and you can’t always afford that.
But overall I think he’s really, really cool!
In Arena, Silence and BGH are not really a big problem. There is another 7/7 minion for 8 mana – Force-Tank Max. So you give up Divine Shield to gain 3 copies of Arcane Missiles. I think it’s a really fair deal – Rhonin is pretty good. Arcane MIssiles aren’t even that terrible in Arena by themselves. The problem here is that you won’t likely have any way to combo them. Maybe you drew some Spell Damage, maybe you have a Flamewaker in the deck – but more often than not it’s just gonna be 3x Missiles without any synergy.
