A new expansion is coming soon and the people at Blizzard have released an announcement trailer with a Bill Nye the Science guy theme. It looks like Mechas are making a come back in force since the first big expansion, Goblins and Gnomes. Dr. Boom makes an appearance in the trailer with a new mech suit; so we will be expecting him to have a new card in the expansion.

• The expansion launches on August 7!
• New Keyword: Magnetic - Played by themselves or can attach to a Mech minion to add on their health, attack, and ability.
• Projects are new spell cards with extremely powerful effects, but they help both players.
• Omega Project - These cards are normal, but have a Battlecry that works when you have 10 Mana Crystals.
• There will be legendary spells, such as one that draws your entire deck!
• Warriors are getting a new Dr. Boom as a Legendary playable hero (at least that's what it appears to be in the video).
• Logging in after the expansion launches gives you 3 card packs and a random legendary minion from the set.
• In addition to a pre-order bundle, Blizzard is adding a mega bundle option. The difference from the pre-order bundle is that it will include 30 more packs and a Mecha Jaraxxus Warlock Hero. The new hero skin looks like this. And of course, it will cost more than $50. I'm guessing it will be around $80-$90. Edit: It's $80. It includes a cardback, 80 packs and 1 golden legendary and the hero skin. The pre-order is $50 for 50 packs. You can pre-order both right now.

New Cards!

Well, I guess it's neat that they're finally going to do something with the Mech card text, after they completely forgot to do anything with it post-GvG. They've tried to be somewhat consistent with Beast/Murloc/Demon synergy from the start (to varying degrees of success), and Dragons and Elementals got some ongoing attention once they did an expansion focused on them, but Mechs have been completely abandoned since GvG rotated out. The closest thing I can think of is how Totem synergy has been garbage/largely forgotten at basically all points in Hearthstone history except when Thunderbluff Valiant was a card in Standard. I still think Shaman class identity is all over the place and often wildly redefined by one or two power cards (Evolve/Thrall Death Knight previously, Shudderwock/Hagatha now).

As flashy as the effect sounds, I really don't think "draw the rest of your deck" is very helpful when you're still limited to a ten-card hand and fatigue damage still exists, but I guess you could compare it to Aluneth. Draw cards way too rapidly, but hopefully win the game before the fatigue kills you. Maybe a Zoo Warlock deck could run the card, and when their hand is nearly empty (at 10 mana) and their deck is down to 5-10 cards, they could draw the rest of their deck and play their final copy of Doomguard/Soulfire/Fungalmancer to hopefully win the game that turn. I still think it's highly questionable/situational, and I think Zoo does just fine without the card.

We'll have to wait and see, but my immediate reaction is that I don't expect the "affect both players" Projects to be any good. Historically, all of the symmetrical effects that Druid has had like Grove Tender have seen exactly zero play, or if they draw cards for both players they've only been used in decks that seek to mill opponents (which I guess Blizzard thinks are against the spirit of the game, RIP Coldlight Oracle, Long Live Mill Druid). Obviously certain styles of decks can rig things in their favour, like how control decks could play Mistress of Mixtures/Refreshment Vendor, because the symmetrical life gain helped them out while doing very little for their aggro opponents who were probably at full life. Nonetheless, after seeing the Hearthstone designers completely fumble stuff like Freeze Shaman and Big Hand Druid, I have little faith that they'll do this mechanic right, and at best maybe one of the Projects will be in any way good.

I'm pretty sure I'm really negative every time one of these threads comes around for a new expansion, but in my defence I think the Standard meta has been bad for something like 6-9 months.

Can't wait to see which 8-10 cards will be playable in Wild.

Biology Project is one of them, that card is busted and will see play for sure.

Is there a card that gets stronger when you draw a card? I thought there was something out there with that ability.

Would be crazy if there is.

@bisonhero: Pretty sure the spell is a rogue card, which is exactly what a lot of rogue decks want. You put on a lot of pressure, the opponent turns the tide and then you prep Unstable Element and then do a final nuke (instead of withering slowly drawing a single card per turn).

@oodli: There's a mage minion that does that, so it's not like you're gonna be able to pull off that combo reliably.

Pretty underwhelmed by the cards they've started out with but I'm used to that by now. Pretty powerful, but mostly in super boring ways imo

That being said, bringing back mechs is a fun thing, and Magnetic as an exclusive keyword to them is interesting

Quick note though: I hate the design of the Omega effect personally, one of my least favorite thing in Hearthstone is just "aahhh, dump a bunch of stats on a cheap minion." Like it seems totally fine, 6 health is still totally reasonable to remove at that point in the game, it's just obnoxious, and strong in the most boring way

Excited to see what the new Warrior hero does, Hagatha reminds me a lot of what the Hero cards should be imo, and I'm hoping they've learned their lesson with the insane power levels of a bunch of the KotFT ones

@bisonhero Have you been playing Standard since Witchwood released? Since the Warlock/Paladin nerf a few weeks in, we've had arguably the most diverse meta in the format's history. Every class (besides arguably Priest) has at least one or two strong, competitive decks.

@oodli I hadn't thought of Questing Adventurer when I saw that, but depending on how the card draw works, specifically whether drawing past your hand size triggers its ability, that could be a pretty simple two-turn kill.

Edit: Regarding Questing Adventurer / Myra's...obviously this is a very niche case, but it could potentially be near-lethal on turn 3:

Turn 2 - Coin into Adventurer

Turn 3 - Preparation into Myra's

Yeah standard is actually pretty good for once right now, you genuinely don't know what you're going to fight against when you queue in

kinda bummed about the lack of midrange, it's like 60% control and 40% aggro right now and very little in between, closest to midrange is like... recruit Hunter? I guess?

but otherwise it's a very diverse meta

@nnickers: Questing is when you play a card, not draw. And you only keep 10 cards from Myra's.

@ares42: Oh yeah, it is a Rogue card. For some reason a quick glance at the card's art and border read as Warlock to me.

@nnickers: Pre-nerf I would say Standard was nearly unbearable. So much Call to Arms Paladin decks, Spiteful Summoner decks, Cubelock decks. Things have been better post-nerf and there's more variety, so I guess overall the meta is healthier, but personally I've tried several of the deck archetypes right now and just don't enjoy them for whatever reason, so I've only been playing like a couple times a week.

I haven't been following the Wild meta. Does Wild Druid run some kind of combo that just wins the game once they ramp to 10 mana? I get the concept of ramping as fast as humanly possible as Druid, but I worry that giving your opponent the extra mana is just too much of a gamble. I'd think that Wild Growth/Jade Blossom/Nourish is already enough ramp?

I know they have a schedule for release, but man this current meta is pretty great. Every class has a top tier deck and there are still so many other random decks i encounter all the time in even in legend rank. Blizzard approach to printing more average power cards last expansion was great, hopefully none of the stuff released during this one will be too insane too.

More or less. 2 extra mana isn't as much of a drawback as you think it is since your deck is built around ramping into UI as fast as possible and your opponent's isn't most of the time. If they are an aggro deck then it is completely fine to give them extra mana, the worst they can do is dump more minions onto the board which Druid can deal with, especially in Wild because of Poison Seeds. Druid will also be ramping up beyond their opponent anyway, so even if you give them 2 mana, you have other forms of ramp and Ultimate Infestation and they don't. Biology Project has synergy with Druid's other ramp as well since you get the mana crystals immediately like Nourish. For instance you can now do things like Biology Project AND Wild Growth on Turn 1 without the coin, then Turn 2 Nourish for crystals. Or Biology Project and Innervate/Coin Jade Blossom on Turn 1. If you have a really lucky draw then you could be playing Ultimate Infestation ON TURN 3 without the coin. In most situations it simply won't matter that your opponent gets mana crystals because you are going to be farther ahead than them anyway.

This card is so strong that I bet you it will be played in Standard as well and I have no idea what the Standard meta is like.

@zombie2011: Think of it this way, by giving both players two mana you're sorta skipping two turns of the game. An aggro deck will usually spend those turns building a board and getting chip damage in, while you just sit there hero powering and twiddling your thumbs. Sure, they get to play their "good stuff" quicker, but they don't have that already established board, and you're not already at 20 hp. And you can still answer the same way you would when they played those cards.

I've been playing a bunch of taunt druid recently and a very common scenario against paladin is that they play more stuff than I can deal with (or I'm busy ramping), and by turn four they have like four minions on board, possibly even 8-10 damage coming next turn. If I could skip both of us straight to turn four they would get to play half their hand and I could instantly answer with Swipe or Oaken Summons. And options like Raid Leader or Dire Wolf Alpha suddenly become really bard cards for them, since they don't have anything on the board yet.

Right most card is the draw of course, so presumably a Tempo Mage card. Dunno if they actually want a three mana 2/4, especially in Wild where they already have a better one of that mana cost/statline :L

I've learned never to underestimate card draw though, so as someone who doesn't play Tempo Mage I probably shouldn't judge it

Sure, I guess. I had to think if this was a card already but it makes sense

Menacing Nimbus may be playable but it's certainly not a card that I would get out of my chair for. As usual, we're going to have to wait until the reveal stream to get the interesting cards.

A couple more cards before the big reveal

It's interesting that they said that Paladin, Hunter, and Warrior are going to get the mech/magnetic focus this expansion. Where have I heard those 3 classes together before...

I wonder if maybe Dr. Boom has some less than legitimate, grimier sources of funding, perhaps coming from... Gadgetzan?

Anyways, Magnetic continues to be my most anticipated part of this expansion. I hope this mechanic isn't too swingy, or else we get Bonemare meta all over again. So far it seems fine though

Framebot seems pretty good. Probably a good thing they didn't give that the Magnetic keyword because a 1/5 can be quite difficult to remove early on.

That's the thing they explained in the video, most of the mechs in this set have high health/low attack so that they're hard to remove and have less burst potential when you stick the magnetic mechs on them

Framebot exists pretty much just to be magnetized to

Here's the actual video these were revealed in, pretty good explanation of the history of the Magnetic mechanic

There are a lot of Arena classes that wouldn't mind a Neutral +5/+5 for 5 mana, assuming you can draft enough Mechs. Really hard to say, though, until we see how many Mechs the set has to offer.

https://www.hearthpwn.com/news/5665-the-boomsday-project-complete-card-reveal-schedule

The complete card reveal schedule leading up to the expansion

Normally I wouldn't post this since there's nothing tangible here, but I just thought it was interesting to point out that there appears to be a Mecha C'Thun and a Mecha Jade Spirit in these teaser arts

Also a new Paladin Magnetic mech!

Whizbang replaces your deck with a random deck recipe, and I believe he said he replaces your hero as well. Very much a new player card but sorta fun I guess?

Looks like Whizbang will be an auto-craft for me on day one. I'm always nervous about what to craft first in the first of month expansions but you can't deny the value of 18 decks in one card!

tbh, I feel like every time someone logs into Hearthstone for the first time ever and is a completely new player, they should just automatically receive Whizbang the Wonderful from now on. It would do wonders for the new player experience, compared to grinding out hours and hours of matches with only Basic cards. The reason I'd say to give it a C'Thun-like status of "just give it out for free" is that long-time players of the game with a big collection have little reason to craft the card, and I'm not sure new players actually have the presence of mind to realize it's meant for them since if new players are going to craft anything, it's probably going to be whatever Legendary they perceive as really strong.

If Blizzard really supports the treant synergy, I can see Mulchmunch being a real problem. Blizzard has learned from the corridor creeper mess, right? Right?

Mulchmuncher looks fine to me, 10 is a lot

Keep in mind there's a Hunter Deck that summons chargers of equivalent size easier

and the treants you're playing to get there suck, it's not just any minion like Creepy

Also man, we've had so many Druid reveals before the official card reveal stream even, 1 on the announcement, 1 earlier in a video, and three here

https://playhearthstone.com/en-us/blog/21965466?linkId=100000003062344

Nooooo, that sick Ziliax/Shadowboxer interaction that never will be!

It wouldn't have been that broken, it wasn't an infinite combo or anything, it just would have been... a lot of damage and a Reno effect with two cards :L

I decided to give Standard a try for the first time ever this month, having played Wild exclusively since the format was introduced. I figured it was a good time since the new set is coming out, this way I can start at R4 in both formats and experience the fresh meta and have some fun with it. In short...Standard was extremely boring to me and it was a struggle to finish this, especially since I started at Rank 25. I faced almost exclusively Tier 1 and Tier 2 netdecks with little to no variation, only encountering 2-3 homebrew decks or decks with significant changes during my entire climb above R18 or so. Decks felt quite a bit more fair, but also much easier to predict opponents' plays and of course there are a lot fewer cards to play around. Skill level of opponents in general seemed lower than Wild for whatever reason. I might check out some Standard once Boomsday comes out, but probably only for a little bit. Wild is just way more fun to me, despite the existence of broken combos and cards like Barnes.

The big card reveal is happening in 30 minutes! Tune in to the HS twitch to see the cards.

https://www.twitch.tv/playhearthstone

Dr 7 is back! And he has a few special abilities. The developers say your hero power rotates every turn but you won't get the same one twice in a row. The effect changes on your opponent's turn so they can play ahead. Blizzard also says this card won't appear in arena.

Reckless Experimenter is super cool. I dunno that I'll ever want to play the kind of decks that use it, but it has a lot of potential

How is Omega Agent a Warlock card? Like I guess zoo but it has so little Warlock class identity to it, am I missing something?

The new Boom is super cool, I was really excited to try Tempo Warrior again in Witchwood with the new rush minions and it just wasn't really there. It was a little better in wild where the dragon cards old-style Tempo Warrior played still live but even then it wasn't quite right. I'm hoping Boom and some new mechs can give a new spin on the archetype, making your mechs rush is huge and a lot of those hero powers are great

All the legendaries shown so far look potentially usable. Electra is good in shudderwock (bleh), I could see stargazer luna working if you put some cheap taunts in your deck (wax elemental, mirror image). 3 mana is a lot though, card is either going to be mediocre or carry the tempo archetype. Myra unstable element....ehhh, maybe not this one, seems too situational. Hmmm, maybe this would be good in odd rogue? I was thinking miracle or something, but you could use it to finish games with leeroy or cold bloods. Maybe, I could see it. Zilliax just seems like a solid 5 drop that will work well with other mechs.

Floop.....really blizzard? Unless they have a card that damage/kills the next minion played why would you print this card. On the other hand, whizbang is a great card and I hope they give it to new players for free or something. Dr. Boom.....seems too unreliable. The hero powers are good, but are you going to get them when you need them?

I don't see many good non legendary cards here. Biology project is obviously busted. Lab recruiter might be good in kingsbane rogue. Demonic project, now there's an interesting card. Good if it hits cubes, recruit cards, shudderwock and friends. Run 2 of those, 2 dirty rats and some gnomeferatus in wild to really annoy combo decks (although I have no idea what the wild meta is).

@mike nice job on standard legend :). I played a homebrew elemental mage to rank 1 before I fell down, but between the broken recruit mechanic and odd aggro decks it's really damn hard to make your own deck in this meta without being crushed. Oh and shudderwock makes it impossible to play the long game, but hey its becoming more oppressive by the day, maybe you'll get your golden dust.

@noobsmog: the thing about Boom is the mechs having rush adds a lot of consistency to him imo

3 of his hero powers do generally the same thing, I think that's enough to go along with rushing in mechs for the rest of the game

The only duds I think are the armor gain hero power and the discover one, but even those are fine, he's not meant to be a control value generator (or at least he doesn't seem to be), more a tool to take the board like Malfurion

(granted I do think Malfurion is better since it also scales well into the late game and is more consistent but Druid right now it kind of busted in general, I don't like comparing other cards to theirs :L)

@cesakich: Oh wow, somehow I completely skipped over the part about your mechs having rush, haha. That certainly makes it a lot better. Warriors still need a way to deal with shudderwock though, because that matchup is close to a 100% loss.

@noobsmog: Thanks! Now that I've made Legend in both formats multiple times I'm pretty much done, I'll still play ranked but I doubt I'll try to achieve over Rank 5 again.

Maybe Blizzard will reprint a neutral Dirty Rat for Standard. It's interesting but thanks in part to the existence of that card, Shudderwock basically doesn't exist in Wild. Dirty Rat is very common due to things like Druid combo decks and Reno decks. You might see some weird Mill Shudderwock variants at ranked floors or dumpster legend, but that's about it.

I'm definitely taking that 3200 dust if they ever nerf Shudderwock though.

Either or that or everyone just plays Warlock in standard and plays two of that Demonic Project

I dunno, I think I beat Shudderwock just often enough right now but Electra Stormsurge is a scary addition. Better board clears, better healing, and even if they're fighting a slow deck, just double up on Far Sight. Just a ridiculous card for that deck that was already top tier

And the worst part is we've only seen two Shaman cards so far, they could get even more broken stuff for that deck

A shame too, I think Even Shaman is super cool, hoping that remains the main Shaman deck in wild at least. Need to fill my board with Sea Giants and Things From Below and Flamewreathed Faceless, just hope it gets one or two cards to keep it fresh

I don't think Astromancer is anywhere near as good as Spiteful Summoner but jesus christ Blizzard stop with that effect, it is one of the actual worst things in Hearthstone. Don't even make bad versions!

Omega Medic seems okay actually, fight for board early or heal late, like most of the Omega cards probably more for Arena though

Giggling Inventor actually seems pretty annoying, and if you can't clear both the Annoy-o-trons they're going to get something obnoxious magnetized to them. Hopefully too expensive to see actual play in those decks, coming down the same turn that you want to already have a mech on board for Warbot or Ziliax is a big deal

@cesakich: Do the 1/2 Mechs have the Magnetic keyword? I haven't seen a picture of them yet.

@mike: ? You can attach Magnetic minions to any mech, the base mech doesn't need the key word to get Magnetized to

so like you could curve Ziliax or Warbot onto a Piloted Shredder if it sticks turn 4 for example

Oh ok, I haven't been paying very close attention at all to this set.

I see a Dr.Boom with boombots that go face. Correct play smorc.

I didn't even realize Goblin Bomb was a separate card, I just thought it was one of Flark's tokens but it has a rarity gem. Flark seems sloooooow for what Deathrattle Hunter and any hypothetical Mech Hunter would want to do, but it's a powerful finisher I guess?

Crystology seems pretty good, Paladins need card draw that isn't Divine Favor and that one seems okay

Pogo Hopper seems like a worse Jade, a worse Fal'Dorei Strider, and a worse Biteweed somehow all rolled into one

I'm actually really liking the looks of Deathrattle/Mech Hunter so far? I do wonder though, current Deathrattle Hunter runs Keleseth, but both that two drop existing and a 3-drop magnetic minion existing would mean you're probably putting two-drops in your deck. I wonder if all that's powerful enough to justify cutting the Prince

The other thing we're starting to have to think about is just how many mechs are going in these mech decks. I really don't think these are going to be like Murloc decks where your deck is packed to the gills with them (heh) but I do wonder how many you have to run for it to work? And more importantly, how many good base mechs are going to come out this expansion other than Framebot

I do want to try building this deck in Wild, the existence of Kindly Grandmother, Piloted Shredder, and Mechwarper there seems to have potential

The question is, is an aggressively slanted midrange-y hunter like that even good enough to match the power level of wild where Even Shaman and infinite Ragnaros Priests exist

Oh look a paladin card that isn't for an aggro deck.

This set looks great so far. Looking forward to playing Paladin and Warrior mostly. All 4 of their legendaries look sweet.