Embiggen
Embiggen is a 0 Mana Cost Epic Druid Spell card from the Descent of Dragons set!
Card Text
Give all minions in your deck +2/+2. They cost (1) more (up to 10).
Flavor Text
Did you set it to "wumbo?"- Mana Cost: 0
- Crafting Cost: 400 / 1600 (Golden)
- Arcane Dust Gained: 100 / 400 (Golden)
- Rarity: Epic
- Class: Druid
- Card Type: Spell
- School: Nature
- Set: Descent of Dragons
- Mechanics: Buff Minion, Change Cost
I can see a lot of arguing about this card, and I honestly just don’t understand it. People tend to compare it with Surrender to Madness, but it’s two entirely different cards that share very little in common.
Surrender to Madness not only costs 3 mana, but it also takes away two of your mana crystals, with their loss most of the time being devastating to you. If you were to play it on turn three, it would take you 9 turns to reach 10 mana, with having 2 crystals less then your opponent on 8 of them, which would mean that you’ve paid 3+(9×2)-1, or 20 mana in total for this effect in total, with rarely being able to fully unleash the effect itself. Most of the time you will find yourself dead long before 10 mana after that. To sum up, Surrender to Madness requires you to pay horrific price without gaining anything out of that right away, and that is true about ALL of cards that break your mana crystals or give more to your opponent.
Embiggen, on the other hand, doesn’t require you to sacrifice anything, besides one card – but if it was drawing card in place of itself, it would be just way to OP, so the price is fair. You may pay even more mana in total for the buff you get, but you won’t be paying it right away – only slowly and only for the cards that you actually get to play. With the delayed powerful effect, the price for it is also delayed, and this is what makes this card incomparably better.
Some assume that it would be good in aggro archetypes, some think more of control, but know what? I would be brave to say that it will be equally good in any kind of druid based around minions, just because relation between bigger price and more stats is shifted way to much on the side of stats. It would be more arguable if it were +1/+2 buff and totally worthless in case of +1/+1, but +2/+2 makes it absolutely busted.
You know, giants could be pretty op with this, they won’t cost more… Sea giant, mountain giant, and mulchmuncher, would get insane “free” buffs. Giant-Druid perhaps?
Yeah I mean it’s literally surrender to madness but a Druid and a slightly different drawback. Yawn.
Go to sleep, Jed. Have embiggened dreams.
When I first look at this card it reminds me of surrender to madness, similar kind of mechanic but it seems this one’s drawback is less hindering overall, so I thought of all the decks of small minions I could use this to maximum effect on.
However the more I think about it, the drawback for this one is actually significantly worse, say you have 20 minions in your deck, standard for token Druid, if you get it on the first turn, which you’d want to as it sets up the game, that’s 20 extra mana that’s gonna slow you down that game. 0 cost yeah but the chances you’ll get it that early on aren’t too good.
That being said its +2/+2 not +1/+1, that 2 gives you enough to survive off removal and attack helps with trades. A LOT of cheap stuff with this could be bonkers, Oasis Surger, Crystal Stag and more. Heck, this could be good in a big minion deck, Druid is good at ramp and the cost can’t go over ten so it wont change costs of 10 cost stuff, though at that part of the game a +2/+2 buff doesn’t do a lot.
And then again you’re gonna likely run two of this in your deck to maximize your chances of getting it, but the problem is say you have relatively few things to do and draw this. Are you gonna wanna increase it to 2 mana?
So I have really mixed thoughts about this card and to me this card will heavily be influenced by the meta. Whether or not the meta has room for Druid to play this I don’t know, but that’s gonna make all the difference. As far as rating I’ll say if Druid is able to run this, I think it could be 10/10, if not 1/10, its one of the cards I’m most excited about for that reason.
If used a quest druid could make use of nourish being basically 4 Mana draw 3 of course to get best use your choose one cards would be limited more to the draw and removal rest of deck being minions even the draw a card minions would be more valuable. Add in the new ysera and you just might have an interesting deck with a heavy draw mechanic to keep dropping buffed up minions.
Its amazing how you keep on suggesting mixing cards into archetypes they don’t belong in.
This card might be the most broken card in DoD, but it clearly doesn’t go into Quest Druid. It doesn’t make Starfall better. Or Nourish. Or Hidden Oasis. The card only affects MINIONS. And Quest Druid doesn’t play very many of them.
You really didn’t get what planned out for it. The current quest druid just runs a lot of choose ones and that’s the whole point. Suggestion of using quest here is making a deck that doesn’t use much in the way of choose one cards it’s more to get better value out of other cards. Most games played against druid outside of the first few turns they rarely used hero power.
Nourish gives ramp and draw and Starfall gives removal and clear. It’s more for running cheaper minions then buffing them up so they have more value later. It’s more a plan for an aggro druid with the choose ones being a situational boost. You’d probably only run 6-8 choose one cards 4-6 being spells. Still planning out the deck for this method but downside that comes with current quest druid is it’s more focussed on the late game embiggen is used to give cheap minions mid to late game stats.
Here is a better idea. Don’t play any of the choose one cards. And get rid of the quest.
The Quest isn’t worth it without enough Choose Ones. And you can’t be playing an “aggro” deck when you start with one less card in hand, and are floating mana on the early turns.
Commit your yourself to one strategy or another. Hearthstone 101. This isn’t rocket science.
You worry about the early game, but this card does not influence the minions you already drawn, which stay one mana less. So in the early game you can use that and after that swap to the op minions with +4/+4
I said lets assume we get it on the first draw.
Yaeh anyway since this card has no impact on your hand the minions you already drawn don’t increase in cost
I know…I just said that
At first glance, this card and Quest druid seem like a match made in card game heaven. Oasis Surger (6 mana 2x 7/7’s with Rush), Anubisath Defender (0 mana 5/7 with Taunt), ; hell, even cards like Crystal Merchant (3 mana 3/6) could benefit from this card in terms of just shear value and mid-late game tempo. But when you step back and realize that those minions I just listed are kinda of the only valid minions Quest runs well outside of their wincon / occasional Zephrys, well… the idea starts to fall apart a little.
That’s not to say that Embiggen ISN’T going to work, the opposite in fact. What it means is that Embiggen alone might end up warping quest AWAY from the more controlly late-game OTK / Nomi builds we’ve been seeing and more towards a “Big Buff Stuff – Value/Tempo” type of play style. This ESPECIALLY seems the case when you consider all of the new dragons coming out along side “Wilder Growth: Dragon Edition” and Frizz, whose Battlecry alone can “undo” Embiggens entire downside in one fell swoop.
One final stray thought that crosses my mind with Embiggen is just how it works with the oft forgotten “Juicy Psychemelon”. We’ve seen from Barnabus in the past that cost alterations to the deck in Druid do seem to be considered when referenced for other effects (namely recruiting). This means that you can almost shift your targeted draws with Psychemelon by chaining it before or after you play it. Not a major consideration mind you, but an interesting one that could make the second Psychemelon actually a useful draw card in the late game.
Quest for druid isn’t to bad with this just build more of a tempo deck nourish with the quest HP is basically a 4 Mana draw 3 cards and if not at max Mana it’ll get you there. Been experimenting with idea some and cheap minions do help ysera adds a nice bonus when get to late game since could restock the field by drawing overall if ran the quest with utility choose one cards it wouldn’t do to badly. Just like could run quest and build around new treat card.
It all comes down to if think losing a 1 attack 1 armor 2 Mana power is worth the utility cards. Losing HP really only affects the side quest it looks like.
Do I have issues if the first thing I thought was, I can probably use this in my Big Quest Druid deck xD
And considering we have a dragon card that cuts the cost of dragons in deck down by 2 you could play this twice for +4/4 and the dragons would break out even.
This would be a horrifying card for the token zoo druid. The down side of zoo decks is tends to be low power in late game this card boosts up the power and could even be dropped in begining which could shift early game to mid game to late game in stat value. The only thing is just need to keep drawing will possibly see card not used often make appearances if they can come out stronger.
Good point
Meanwhile in wild :
Embiggen, Embiggen, southsea deck hand
WHO’S IN CHARGE NOW
Another card added to list of thing their rogue wants to pull combo this with say Tess and scheme and you basically get a late game Pogo hopper style deck with who knows what else Tess triggers.
So basically put, ALL of your minions in your deck will have Enchanted Raven’s Body (a 1 Mana 2/2), but will also cost at Enchanted Raven’s body too, with just 1 more mana. I’d say it’s pretty worth it. Especially for something like your Oasis or your Stags. Maybe you want to have 1 copy of this, however, since you can go like priest tried to buff everything but instead backfired with his Surrender to Madness. Comparing it with Embiggen, It’s deferentially a whole lot healthier for Druid to play, and Especially for when Druid still has their Corridor Creeper; their Anubisath Defender, to still costing 0 Mana if you cast a spell that’s 5 or more mana. I would honestly say that if you don’t really wanna play a Malygod OTK Druid deck, I think a lot of druids will not like the idea of spending more mana at first, but for the price of how big their minions are will be worth it to them, especially for when your facing against Control yourself, and you know that they have some big minions. So for my eyes, I’m going to rate this 5 stars.
Thats not really how it works, tempo loss is a bigger problem than “getting enchanted ravens on your minions”. There is a big difference between playing 2 3-3 rush minions on turn 5 vs 2 5-5 rush minions on turn 6, especially against aggro. You can just play quest and you will be a lot safer against aggro/midrange and you will have a more reliable (and arguably better) late game. As for the “against control decks” argument, if you are playing a big deck against a control deck, then you should be able to win without this card anyway. I think a better comparison for this card is into the fray rather than surrender to madness, into the fray has the better tempo while this card has more value, and in hearthstone tempo generally weighs more, so I would say into the fray is better than this card, and yet, we all know how much that card sees play.
This reminds me of Surrender to Madnes for priest, except it costs 3 less and essentially only punishes you for 1 mana. This is obviously much better, especially in some kind of tempo or zoo decks. Heck, even some kind of dragon druid would be happy to use it.
Everyone is mentioning tokens. Am I missing something? Unless the tokens are in your deck, they don’t get buffed. A couple “shuffle into your deck” cards, but most tokens are insta or death rattle.
Zoo deck? I can see that.
No I think they mean more like really small minions to flood boards, token doesn’t just refer to decks based around token generators themselves
Yeah, I was wondering about that.
One of the best cards of the expansion. The downside only hurts in the first turns but there u still have the minions from your start hand. Better keleseth for 2 mana less without restriction 2 times playable. Insane
Hm. Nobody complaining about how this is like Prince Keleseth?
Might be super busted.
Remember Tall Tales from Bob’s tavern in The Dalaran Heist? Well two of these wil basically cast that on ALL minions in your deck… Even though one is already enough to win you the game… This is a really allround-card, it can go from token, to midrange, and it could also maybe even fit into dome kind of big Druid? I don’t Know, but this is definitely one of those broken cards that DoD is all about. You could also combo it with Vargoth, for an insane deck buff in a dragon deck and then bring their cost back to normal the next turn with that one legendary. I’m kind of also hoping it creates some deck buff druid. That would be pretty fun, and even if it doesn’t reach the meta, it’ll still be an amazing meme deck. 🙂
Token dr00d is back.
Yay.
Literally no one missed you.
A noble heart embiggens even the smallest man
Yep. Saw the name and was wondering if anyone else got the reference.
I was browsing the comment section looking for you
Good
Anyone who rates this lower than 5 is out of their mind. This is insane.
Oh my goodness do I love this! Now I really wanna play some kind of big druid deck with lots of dragons, these spells and frizz to lessen the costs this increases. I really hope Druid gets a few control tools too so this deck can genuinely work.
I mean c’mon this is Keleseth x2 with a small drawback, playing even one of these in any minion heavy deck will be very powerful.
I’d also like to mention that Druid just got a powerful ramp card as well which makes using this alot easier. 5 stars, no doubt
seems crazy
What….
This seems absolutely busted. Costing 1 more in exchange for +2/+2 (particularly when this costs 0) seems outrageous. If token/zoo strategies are even slightly viable for druid in this expansion, this is going to be crazy to deal with.