Whizbang the Wonderful, the most noob-friendly card in Hearthstone, is taking a backseat next month and rotating to the Wild format for the Year of the Phoenix, according to game designer Celestalon.
The crazy little Gnome is perfect for players who don’t want to break the bank in Hearthstone, available through The Boomsday Project. Instead of creating a new deck every other week and having to keep up with the meta, spending money, or buying packs left, right, and center, Whizbang offers a way out.
When a player starts a game with Whizbang, their deck is replaced with one of 18 pre-made decks chosen at random. This means players don’t have to fork out the cash for packs or waste precious time theorycrafting. The decks might not be the best in Hearthstone, but they do provide a good representation of the metagame.
When the Year of the Phoenix and the Ashes of Outland expansion release to the live servers on April 7, Whizbang will no longer be an available option on the ladder. To replace him and to cater to new and returning players, Blizzard is instead offering free competitive decks, the new Demon Hunter class, and 30 free cards.
Blizzard is also changing the way card packs work in the Year of the Phoenix, adding duplicate protection to epic, rare, and common cards. The system was previously only applied to legendary cards, making building decks a painful and expensive experience. The new system should make up for the loss of Whizbang, helping significantly reduce the cost of the game.
