This is our second round of card reviews for the upcoming adventure, One Night in Karazhan. Stonekeep is back and ready to explain how he sees these cards fitting in the future, be sure to check out the first round of reviews right here: One Night in Karazhan Card Review (First Reveals).
One Night in Karazhan Information
Malchezaar’s Imp
Blizzard was very reluctant to release any new 1-drops for Warlock, for a good reason. If you get 1-drop that is too strong, Zoo Warlock can abuse them. And as we all know, Zoo Warlock remains to be one of the most consistent decks of all time. As it seems, that rule has been broken and we have a new Warlock 1-drop. And a strong one, that is. I’d say that the strongest 1-drops are the ones that can be played on t1 and work then, but they also have some sort of scaling into the late game. So for example, Mana Wyrm is a great 1-drop, because on turn 10 you can follow it by a bunch of spells and you get something like a 4/3 or 5/3 for 1 mana. Tunnel Trogg? Same thing. Argent Squire? Well, you might immediately turn it into a 2/2 Divine Shield with Defender of Argus (great value) and it survives AoE.
Malchezaar's Imp is weaker on turn 1 than most of the other popular 1-drops. It’s just a 1/3 with no self-buff effect or anything like that. You know, Voidwalker without Taunt. But then, it has INSANE late game scaling. There are a lot of times when you have Doomguard in your hand, but you can’t really play him, because you’re going to drop other cards. This minion allows you to do that much more freely. On turn 6, this + Doomguard – you discard 2 and you draw 2. So basically, for a deck like Zoo that cycles so much anyway, the Doomguard was played without any downside. Same goes for Soulfire – while people have already played it a bit, it will definitely be more common with Malchezaar’s Imp.
What’s really cool, though, is that we might see some cards that we haven’t seen played before. One card that I’m most hyped about, with Malchezaar’s Imp on the board, is Darkshire Librarian. You pretty much negate the negative Battlecry and you still have 3/2 that draws you a card on death. I definitely see this card being viable in standard Zoo lists. The question is – is it enough to make so-called Discard Warlock work? People have tried this concept before pretty much since Fist of Jaraxxus was released. It was never great, but I’d say that in WoG it was already close to being viable deck. And it sometimes takes only one card top push the deck into viable zone.
Babbling Book
I see people are getting hyped about this card, but I’m not exactly sure why. Is a ”free” 1 mana 1/1 really worth the fact that it gives you a RANDOM spell, not exactly the one you want to play or even can play? What you’re gaining is a 1/1 minion (that you still have to pay 1 mana for). What you’re losing is the ability to choose a spell that’s good and not rely on the RNG. It’s not Discover mechanic, where you can pick one of the 3. And it’s not Cabalist's Tome, which creates random spells, but also creates a card advantage – this one gives you really no card advantage.
Why wouldn’t you prefer to play a meaningful spell over this guy? While it might give you perfect board clear when you need one, burn spell when enemy is low etc. – it’s all RNG. And the chance that you will get exactly what you need are really really low. What it struggles with is consistency. The deck of choice for this guy would most likely be Tempo Mage. So it creates another question – what would you drop to play it, assuming you want to? The idea of Babbling Book would be to increase early game consistency without losing a value. After all, you get another (after Mana Wyrm) turn 1 play and you don’t get completely screwed because it’s 1/1, because you still get a spell back. But then again, if you want to play Babbling Book instead of one of your early game spells (like Arcane Blast or Arcane Missiles), don’t you actually REDUCE the consistency of the deck? I’m sure that I’d much prefer to have one of those than a 1/1 minion in the early game. Then, you can’t really throw him in instead of more expensive spells like Fireball or Flamestrike, because you aren’t guaranteed to get back what you want. Maybe, in the list that plays Cabalist’s Tome, you’d play it instead? (I TOTALLY can’t see playing both of those in the same deck) But it’s much worse in the late game, because it gives you no card advantage over the enemy and only cycles itself (with a 1/1 body). Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t like the card at all. I will be really surprised if it will pass through the initial testing phase.
Moroes
Let’s start with one thing – a minion that can gather a lot of value over time always has some potential. Sure thing, 1/1 every turn is a slow value gain, but after 3-4 turns it starts getting insane. Stealth makes it much harder to deal with. That said, how good this card is REALLY depends on the new meta. For example – if meta will still be dominated by Warriors, then this card is much worse, as a simple Ravaging Ghoul can completely deal with it. Not even Warriors, A LOT of the popular decks have clear ways to deal with it. But, if the amount of Whirlwind effects and small AoEs would get lower in the meta, this guy would have some potential. As it stands right now, it’s a bad card in most of the matchups. In slow matchups, where it might be great, enemy will have a way to kill it most likely. Then, in fast matchups, where enemy might not have any AoE (like Aggro Shaman or Zoo Warlock), 1/1 per turn might be too slow to make any impact whatsoever. You want immediate answers or big minions, not a 1/1 that needs 3-4 turns to pay back.
There is, however, one pretty interesting case – health buffs. Buffing Moroes’ health means that it’s much more likely to stay on the board. Something as simple as Power Word: Shield might make it much harder to deal with. But then again, you would need to combo those together + even if it doesn’t die it’s still slow + in Priest it would have anti-synergy with Auchenai Soulpriest + Circle of Healing… so after giving it a second thought, I don’t think this one would work too. So in the end, it’s the card with huge theoretical potential, that will very likely be unplayable in practice. UNLESS people really stop running all the small AoEs, which won’t happen.
Book Wyrm
First impression – but hey, it’s a worse Stampeding Kodo… Then I’ve realized that you can actually CHOOSE which target you want to destroy. And I suddenly loved the card. So, first things first – without the Dragon thing, I think this card would become staple in a lot of Control decks. It’s REALLY strong, as there are a lot of minions you can destroy with this effect. And not only small fries like 1-2 drops, but even a lot of 4-drops have 3 attack. We’re talking about things like Twilight Guardian, Water Elemental or Violet Teacher. Heck, even destroying a vanilla 3/5 is amazing. It can destroy the Kodo too. 3/6 stats are also okay for this kind of effect. I mean, this is a best 4-drop statline with a Shadow Word: Pain attached to it. And SW:P is one of the best removals in the game + this card is neutral, which makes it even better. I’d say that power level of this minion is similar to the Fire Elemental. Probably better when it comes to board control, but can’t be used to deal face damage. And we all know that Fire Elemental is a pretty strong card.
But then again, what’s important about this card is that it fits only a small niche of decks. It only fits the slower decks AND then deck needs to be Dragon-themed. Yeah, that is the problem. So it might fit a slower Dragon Warrior, maybe Dragon Priest. And… that’s it? Dragon Paladin isn’t really viable and I don’t think this one will make it viable. Malygos Warlock is also dead in Constructed with Darkbomb gone. So while I really love this card, I think that it’s going to be hard to fit it somewhere. Not because it’s bad, but because there are little to no decks that would want to play such a card.
More cards after the jump!
Protect the King
Warrior’s version of Unleash the Hounds, but instead of Charge, minions get Taunt. Charge is definitely higher valued mechanic than Taunt, so it seems like a worse version of UTH at the first glance… By itself, is not really good, let’s be honest. The best case scenario would be enemy having a full board of 1 health minions and no way to buff them or remove your stuff and having to sacrifice all of them. But then again, wouldn’t a simple Ravaging Ghoul be just much better in this scenario? Another “perfect” scenario is – once again – enemy not having a way to kill all your minions and this card working similarly to Ice Block, as in stalling the game for one more turn where enemy might have killed you without it. Maybe you will draw a Brawl, maybe you will get lethal somehow etc. – sometimes stalling one turn for 3 mana is okay. In theory, in the right situation, this one card might tank 20+ damage. Not probable, but possible. I don’t think the card is great, but it’s okay as a counter to flood decks. So if Zoo or Aggro Paladin were dominating the meta, Protect the King might be a viable tech card in slower Warrior lists.
But then, suddenly, a wild Bolster appears. Bolster is a pretty terrible card and the only semi-viable deck built around it was created before WoG and the formats – for example Annoy-o-Tron was a vital part of the deck and it’s no longer available in Standard. Protect the King + Bolster seem like an even better counter to flood decks. Imagine enemy having 5 minions on the board. Quite common against Zoo and such. And then, for 5 mana, you summon 5 3/3 minion with Taunt. The value is insane. But, this strategy is far from perfect. First of all – enemy needs to flood the board for it to work. Not every deck floods the board. Some rarely have more than 1-2 minions on the board at the same time. In that case, it’s much worse. Then, it’s a 2 cards combo. And unless you are going for a full Taunt strategy, then Bolster is completely useless without this card. It makes the whole thing kinda inconsistent and great only in very rare cases. Honestly, I don’t think that the full Taunt deck with Bolster will work, unless the meta will be heavy Zoo-like. Protect the King is okay card, but nothing amazing too. I’m pretty sure PTK + 2x Bolster combos will make it to the reddit or Trolden videos, but it’s not something you will see every day. If Annoy-o-Tron was still in standard, the deck would have a much higher chance to be viable.
Prince Malchezaar
Okay, so I needed to update whole review for this one, because it turned out to do something else. First translation said that it will shuffle the 5 Legendaries at the start of your next turn, this one (the right one) says that it will be at the start of the game. So basically, you now play with 35 cards deck, where 5 of the minions are random Legendaries. Those Legendaries follow the deck building rules, so only the ones from your own class + neutrals. You also can’t get duplicates, so if you already have e.g. Tirion Fordring in your deck, you can’t get a second copy. On the one hand, it’s better in Reno Jackson decks, as you can’t get screwed with a random duplicate, but then again it means that you can’t get the BEST Legendaries, as you most likely play them in your deck already.
To analyze the effect, let’s first see what kind of deck would want to play this. Generally, most of the decks want to do the opposite – THIN the deck, not make it thicker. Aggro, Midrange, Combo decks all want to get through their decks and to the crucial cards as soon as possible. So they don’t want to play this card. So, Control decks that is. And then, in what matchups this card would be good? In the fatigue matchups, obviously. If the matchup won’t go to fatigue, you definitely DON’T want to have 5 random Legends thrown in there. Imagine playing against fast deck, needing to draw that Brawl or Shield Block or something and getting a random high cost Legendary instead. It sucks, right? Not to mention that Malchezaar himself will be just a vanilla 5/6 for 5. And while it’s not terrible, you wouldn’t put Pit Fighter into your deck and be happy with it. So the card is ONLY ever going to be good in Control vs Control game that goes to fatigue (which isn’t given, some Control mirrors don’t even get to fatigue). That’s, I don’t know, 10-20% of the games? So you potentially boost a small fraction of of the matches and you screw the rest. I don’t think that’s a great deal at all. You also have to remember that Legendary card doesn’t equal good card. Remember those times when you’ve played Elise Starseeker and ended up with a bunch of weak Legends? There are quite a lot of Legendary cards that are weak and you DEFINITELY don’t want to draw them in the middle of the match, where every draw might matter.
This card has potential to be auto-include if meta ever becomes control-heavy, as in every second matchup would be slow, control one. Because a Control vs Control favors the one with Malchezaar, meaning that If everyone would play it, you would also be kind of forced to do the same. But given how the Hearthstone ladders work and the fact that a lot of people can’t afford Control decks, I don’t think it’s EVER going to happen. Well, maybe when expansion will still be really fresh – people tend to test the slow, Control stuff then. Right now, Elise is enough to make your Control matchups better, without hurting the rest of the matchups that much.
Right now the only place where I could see the card being played is something like Fatigue Warrior. You just play a deck almost full of removals and Malchezaar, this way you don’t have to waste too many slots on minions and you can e.g. add some situational removals into your deck.
Side note: It might be a super fun card to play for relatively new players or people with small collections. If you’re a new player, chances are that the quality of your deck isn’t that high anyway, so a random Legendary here and there could actually boost it. And it allows people who don’t own almost any Legendaries to play around with them. So it’s a really amazing card if you think about it from a new player’s perspective.
Kara Kazham!
A new Warlock spell. Generally, Warlock spells are pretty underwhelming. There are few good ones, but nothing impressive overall. And this fits the theme really well – it’s okay, but nothing impressive. So, that’s a 6/6 total stats for 5 mana, spread across 3 bodies. Seems good, right? But we have to remember that we already have similar things that see zero – and I mean it, ZERO constructed play. First of all, the old, neutral minion – Silver Hand Knight. 4/4 + 2/2 = 6/6. This one is very similar, but instead of 4/4 it has 3/3 and 1/1. I’d say that it makes it slightly stronger for the synergy purposes, but it’s not a big deal. If this was an auto-include, Silver Hand Knight should be at least considered. Then, we have a Druid spell – Force of Nature. After the nerf, it’s 5 mana spell that summons 3x 2/2 minions. The same stats total, spread across 3 bodies, no one plays it. And the Druid (Token version) synergizes greatly with multiple bodies on the board. So what’s the problem? The problem is that cards that are just pile of stats are generally weak, unless that pile of stats is really big for the mana cost (see: Flamewreathed Faceless). 6/6 for 5 seems great, but the fact that it’s spread along 3 bodies and that enemy gets to react to it (since they have no effect like Charge or Taunt), lets him trade however is best for him. For example, a single 3/4 minion might take a 2/2 and 3/3 before dying (in the vacuum, if he trades first). If it was a 6/6 minion, it would be impossible. Multiple bodies are also weaker to AoE clears and play into cards like Brawl. On the other hand, spreading stats is generally better against Aggro decks (where you want to have multiple bodies since you’re usually picking the trades) and against single target removals.
So well, the card itself is… Okay, nothing special, but it’s not bad. I wanted to point out that it might be usable in Zoo (usable =/= great), somehow similarly to the Forbidden Ritual – as the board refill. But, while it’s stronger than Forbidden Ritual on turn 5, it is much less flexible. However, it gets the same synergies as the other Warlock spell – it works very nicely with cards like Knife Juggler or Darkshire Councilman. There is one more interesting synergy – the one with Cho'Gall. Cho’Gall is a very cool card, but one thing was missing – strong Warlock spells. Cho’Gall + Siphon Soul, or maybe + Shadowflame too, were the only really cool combos you could pull off with Cho’gall. Kara Kazham, however, allows for an insanely strong turn 7 tempo move. For 7 mana and 5 life, you summon 7/7, 3/3, 2/2 and 1/1, so basically you flood the board very hard. Not sure how successful this combo will be, but I will definitely try it in RenoLock. I can see RenoLocks trying this card, but that’s probably it – I think that Forbidden Ritual is just better in Zoo because of the flexibility and I don’t think Zoo needs another card like that.
Pompous Thespian
A filler card. Not really much to say about it, every expansion has this kind of cards. It might appeal to the very new players who might buy Karazhan as their first adventure. It’s a direct upgrade over the basic Frostwolf Grunt, although even new players have better options than the Grunt. If someone plays Bloodfen Raptor in a deck with no Beast synergy, I guess Pompous Thespian will be an upgrade. Also, following the theme of Protect the King, I thought about Taunt/Bolster Warrior for a brief moment, but then I’ve realized that they already have a stronger version of this card – Sparring Partner. It’s going to be an okay Arena card, slightly better than average.
