Blizzard has created a card in Hearthstone that should be particularly annoying. But players found ways to make the “Pen Flinger” even worse than planned. Now it has finally been toned down in a new patch.
What kind of card is this? The Pen Flinger was intended in Hearthstone as a super-annoying guy in a classroom who annoys everyone but never gets caught. Someone who constantly throws pens at others, but as soon as you turn to him, shrugs and acts as if he doesn’t know what you want from him:
- The Pen Flinger came to Hearthstone with the “Scholomance Academy” expansion in July 2020.
- It is a neutral 1-mana minion with stats 1/1 and abilities Battlecry: Deal 1 damage / Spellburst: Return this minion to your hand
- When played, the card calls out “Hey Loser”. When it returns to hand after casting a spell, it says “Wasn’t me” – both in a super-annoying tone
The Reign of the Class Tyrant
This was the tyranny of the Pen Flinger: For a “1 mana” card, the Pen Flinger had far too much influence on the match flow in Hearthstone. Players used the card to construct particularly annoying decks.
Often, players held 2 Pen Flingers in hand, which they combined with spells that became particularly cheap through other effects. With each spell, the Pen Flingers returned to the player’s hand. This allowed the annoying cards to be played multiple times per turn.
The Pen Flinger had strong synergy effects in spell-heavy decks when you could keep dealing 2 damage to the opponent, even past defensive minions.
A Mage deck used the Pen Flinger in a combo for one of the feared “One Turn Kills”: a sequence of cards that deals 30 damage to the opponent in one go and kills him:
Additionally, the Pen Flingers would constantly call out “Hey Loser” and “Wasn’t me!” in a squeaky voice, making it all even more annoying. Because the card practically always returned to the player’s hand, the victims of the tyrant could hardly do anything against the Pen Flinger. They just couldn’t get a hold of him. This frustrated them even more.
Since the minion is neutral, it can be used in various decks: It was found in both resilient Warrior decks and gimmick decks from Mages, Rogues, or Paladins.
Nerf Hits “Hey Loser” in Hearthstone
This is now the nerf: The card was simply too dominant in its form and could be played in too many situations. Blizzard has now changed the Pen Flinger in the latest patch for Hearthstone so that it can no longer deal damage to the player, only to minions. This makes it still playable and certainly useful in some decks, but not as annoying anymore.
And hopefully the “Hey Loser” spam is at an end.
For those who want to get started with the new expansion in Hearthstone, we have prepared three decks:
Hearthstone: 3 strong decks for starting in Forged in the Barrens
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