The nerfs in Hearthstone had unforeseen consequences. One of the best cards in the game no longer serves its purpose.
Basically, I consider balance changes in Hearthstone to be important and correct. To keep the game exciting and to introduce variety into somewhat established decks, they are essential. That’s why I thought the nerfs to the old cards were good as well. But unfortunately, Blizzard did not consider all the consequences of these nerfs.
For the nerfs to the cards also had consequences for entire decks and thus also for the “deck formulas” that Hearthstone suggests when creating new decks.
Old deck formulas are now nonsensical: One of these decks is “Nekrium-Cocktail” from the rogue and is based on a lot of death rattles effects. Among other things, this deck also includes the card “Prince Keleseth”. This card buffs all minions in the deck by +1/+1 as a battle cry, but only if the deck contains no other cards that cost 2 mana.
Exactly here lies the problem: Since the patch, the rogue spell “Cold Blood” no longer costs only 1 mana, but now 2 mana. This means that Keleseth’s battle cry will no longer be triggered unless you have both “Cold Blood” cards in hand or played beforehand.
Of course, one might say, “If you know that, you just change the deck formula, no problem!” – and that’s true. But only to a certain extent.
Wurbelfitz suffers from the nerfs: The second consequence is that the card Wurbelfitz the Wonderful is also affected by the change. Those who play this card receive a random deck at the start of the match, selected from the existing deck formulas.
With a bit of bad luck, one now starts with a rogue deck that cannot access one of its core components, namely buffing all minions in the deck. This makes Wurbelfitz the Wonderful much less attractive, and I internally roll my eyes every time I now have to face the rogue deck.
Wurbelfitz is my current favorite card. I no longer have to think about deck construction when I just want to play a few matches “on the side”. Wurbelfitz makes a lot of things so easy and is perfect for a more “casual” play of Hearthstone.
This is what Blizzard should do in the future: The developers should ensure that all deck formulas of all classes are reviewed and adjusted with every balance patch when there are conflicts. If certain cards no longer fulfill their purpose due to an adjustment, then the deck formulas and thus Wurbelfitz the Wonderful must also be adjusted.
Because in this way, the actually brilliant card loses much of its charm. And especially for a few matches “in between” without having to think too much about a new deck, Wurbelfitz has been wonderful so far.
Currently, there is a cool event in Hearthstone – you can be infected by Hakkar!
