Introduction
So this is the last part of the mega review/first impressions article I have been doing the past days. I kinda got super delayed in writing this last part because I had some real life things to attend to and didn’t have time to write all of this.
Figured I’d write a different introduction since this is the final part of the Karazhan review articles I am going to be doing, since the whole expansion appears to have been spoiled already.
Anyway, these last cards are pretty amazing, every single one of them seem to have quite a lot for us to talk about, so get ready for that one big review article!
Today’s Revealed Cards
Deadly Fork
So rogues did get something cool after all. I was quite angry when I saw the first two spoiled rogue cards because of how gimmick they seemed to be. Nobody wants to stop playing a super consistent strategy such as Miracle (even if it isn’t that good) to play something so bad and unreliable as the burglar strategy Blizzard tried to push into rogues.
Anyway, this card is pretty amazing on its own – A relevant Deathrattle minion (not that it says much, since nzoth-the-corruptor based Rogue decks aren’t a thing, and this card won’t make a difference there) that provides you with quite the neat card advantage that doesn’t even draw the card from your deck seems to be quite good for me.
After some time analyzing this card, trying to think about bad situations for this card and probable scenarios where I wouldn’t want to add this card to my deck, I ended up noticing how powerful this card is, regardless of being so simple – You’re likely to want to run deadly-fork is mostly all of your Rogue decks, regardless of what strategy you’re playing.
But what concerns me the most is that I believe Rogues need more than a card like this – They haven’t got much from Whispers of the Old Gods and I have to admit I highly doubt that this card will actually push the class towards being better at anything or even give it new strategies to play with, rather this looks like just a cool card to have.
Onyx Bishop
Popular belief is that this card is super trash. While I have to strongly agree with the fact this doesn’t seem to fix any of Priest’s existing problems, it does is a powerful enough card that we would want to run in some possible resurrect based decks.
Bringing back cards such as injured-blademaster or some other big bodies seems like something amazing to have, and this card quite provides that, however as many have pointed out this won’t change Priest’s current non-existent position in the metagame, as it actually requires an active deck base to be built around.
I liked this card, and I have to admit that if in the next expansion Blizzard actually get it right with Priest cards this might become a major player in some possible Resurrect Priest deck, but as of right now it’ll likely be just another shiny ornament in the shelf.
Menagerie Warden
This was likely the most hyped dude of all the ones spoiled that night. Menagerie Warden seems to deliver quite the punch when you are able to consistently use this card’s battlecry.
I have been hearing from some players that this isn’t as good as it seems, because you actually need to completely build your deck around it. And that this rather looks like a “win-more” card.
While I have to agree with some points, mostly the one about it being a “build around” card, I have to say that building a deck around this card seems quite worthwhile.
Sure, the obvious ideas doesn’t seem very interesting at first: playing stranglethorn-tiger into this seems super value oriented, and while that seems like a terrible idea to have in a deck (you actually have to want to play Stranglethorn Tiger), it might work given how strong this card’s battlecry is.
People always forget that these type of cards can win so many games that you actually want to hurt your 5-drop curve a little to fit it in your deck.
This card also makes Beast Druid something more wantable, since nowadays nobody really wants to play Beast Druid over C’Thun Druid or Token Druid.
Feel free to experiment a lot with this card, as I believe the results should be very fruitful.
Purify
And here we are: The most painful of all the ONK spoilers was this one.
Nothing was worse than watching Blizzard rub it in the Priests face that they weren’t getting any cards to fix the class (since this was the last revealed card), but rather another useless super situational card nobody is going to be using.
Purify could be a nice play around card if there were enough reasons to play Priest, but there simply aren’t. And you’re also spending 2 mana to silence your own minion – That doesn’t even help against opposing minions if you need to let’s say cycle this card looking for an actual response. Not to mention you’re actually spending 2 extra mana for what seems to be a worse silence in so many angles I don’t think I would actually want to play this card, ever, if I wasn’t building a whole deck around it.
This was card just terribly made – Weak, super situational, and built in the worst possible moment for the Priest class – Oh Twitch Chat, i’ll always remember how you cried with me that night.
Ironforge Portal
And here is that one card that we actually need to run the numbers to see if we would want to play it or not, so before we go any further in the discussion of this card, let’s take a look at all the playable 4-drops in the game and separate them:
- We currently have 86 4-drop minions in the game.
- I counted 32 cards we want to get from this. These cards vary from 4/5s, to 5/4s and other super powerful 4-Drops.
- I counted 29 cards that I would deem “ok” (from 4/3s, to 4/4s and some other decent effect minions)
- So this means 25 out of 86 results vary from “terrible” to just “bad”.
I would say this isn’t as good of a card, since we have a 25/86 (which is about 30% chance) of getting totally screwed up, but since randomness can provide some amazing results as well, I can’t quite say if this card will, or will not, see play with absolute certainty.
What I can say, though, is that you should want to playtest a card such as this one in your deck, given that it has the potential to steal games here and there, just don’t forget to pay close attention to the results!
Runic Egg
The obvious comparison that comes to mind when looking at this card is nerubian-egg, you can’t let that comparison go: it is an egg, it is a 0/2, and it has a Deathrattle.
But Nerubian Egg this is not, and the reason being that it generates literally no tempo at all, rather some weak card advantage that you, as Zoo, couldn’t care less about it.
Sure, Deathrattles can make void-terror a cute little viable card, but I don’t think they have to be like this one.
My advice is: stay away from this card, it won’t generate enough value in your Zoo deck, your Aggro Paladin deck doesn’t want it, and I don’t think there would be another deck that you would want to run this on.
Moat Lurker
This seems like a cool card to have in the game, there are two major uses for this:
- Hiding your own Deathrattle minions for future use or
- Temporarily removing something out of the way.
Both uses are pretty good for this card, people haven’t been thinking about it too much because it seems like a bad card, but I have to admit this card can end up being a lot better than what people are giving it credit for.
Another thing I have to admit, though, is that there isn’t an obvious home for a card like this as of right now, but this card could be playtested in a lot of different strategies as the effect seems to be so versatile.
Arcanosmith
Having two bodies seems like a big deal, especially when the card seems to be off the curve. However, we have to remember that much like pantry-spider the stats distribution matters a lot, and a card such as this one is likely going to have the 0/5 traded in for free and the 3/2 part of this card’s body is likely going to just be traded into something for little value.
Unless there are some absurd combos I couldn’t think of right now, this card might not see play at all.
Some neat thing to notice, though, is that this card could (I think it is unlikely though) ultimately be used as a “buy time” type of card, since removal won’t get rid of the full card, and it kind of forces the opponent to trade into the 0/5 rather than simply removing it.
Violet Illusionist
And we finally reached the last card for us to discuss today! Violet Illusionist has some neat uses, with both Weapon classes as well as Warlock Midrange and Control decks, however I have to admit that we likely won’t be seeing this card as a top played card because this kind of effect isn’t needed for anything, and ultimately we just use the slot in our deck for more important cards.
This isn’t a bad card, but I don’t think it will make the ultimate cut in any deck simply because it doesn’t seem to add anything to any deck besides being a “cool card”.
One interesting thing about this card, though, is that it actually makes it so you become immune to Fatigue damage, which could ultimately be the reason behind having this card added to some possible (still non-existent) Fatigue Warrior deck.
Closing
And we are finally finished with the ONK reviews and First impressions articles! I have to admit I am not quite impressed with this expansion, but hopefully there are things we haven’t noticed about it yet that will change things up!
Stay tuned here at Hearthstoneplayers because I am going to start brewing a LOT with this expansion cards, and a lot of new decks might end up showing up for us to play with!
Love you guys, thanks for all the support and every view you have been giving us!
Hugs,
Nuba
