On Twitter this evening, Dean Ayala, Game Designer and Cool Hearthstone Dad, asked the community to send him in questions. One of those questions prompted a great response on dual-class.
Dean was asked about which keyword he'd like to revisit in the future. Although not a keyword, Dean said that there's a good chance Hearthstone will revisit the dual-class card mechanic.
We first saw cards with multiple classes associated with them in the Mean Streets of Gadgetzan set. It was in that set where we had three different crime families, each with their own three classes, lending their hand to shared synergies.
- The Grimy Goons - Hunter, Paladin, and Warrior. Responsible for the Handbuff package.
- The Jade Lotus - Druid, Rogue, and Shaman. Responsible for those pesky Jade Golems.
- The Kabal - Mage, Priest, and Warlock. Unique potion cards and custom spells through Kazakus.
When Scholomance Academy hit in the middle of 2020, Hearthstone went a different approach with multiclass cards instead of opting to go with a simpler dual-class instead of the tri-class of old. Though with Demon Hunter, they couldn't really do tri-class cards. Each class was paired with two different classes and they received some overlapping mechanics.
With the news this evening that Dean thinks Hearthstone will revisit dual-class in the future, provided they revisited some balance, it makes us ask: Do you think the current Scholomance combinations are good? Would you like to see the mechanic come back?
Additionally, Dean also put it out there that he wondered if the game would overall be more fun if it was permanently dual-class. What do you think? Would you like to be able to build decks using cards from a couple of different classes? Or would you rather only see cards being added regularly that incorporated the mechanic? Let us know your answers in the comments below.
Quote From Dean Ayala What’s your favorite keyword that you’d like to potentially revisit in the future?
good chance we'll revisit duel-class, I honestly wonder if Hearthstone would be more fun if it was permanently duel-class. Would have to revisit some balance to do it, but it's a great mechanic. Very unlikely this will happen, just a curiosity I have.
Comments
I absolutely LOVED the dual-class cards. It brought me back to the days of playing MTG with the Invasion cycle where cards like Fire/Ice were VERY prevalent for years and years. I hope they make this a recurring theme.
Honestly Dual-class would be an amazing idea for a mode, and I honestly think that LoR's dual-region mechanic is one of its strongest features. In terms of balance, I think that they could either just ban neutrals in dual-class (that would remove most of the OP combos) or they could have a ban list of cards that can't be played in dual-class. For example, sorceror's apprentice is balanceable in normal HS (even though it's very strong) but in Dual-class it might need to be banned. I think this would be that best solution because it allows them to print cards that don't work in dual-class while keeping the dual-class mode fair.
I'm not clear on what permanently dual class would mean. Would that be every card printed in the future is dual class, or any deck can have cards from two different classes, and are the pairings fixed?
The latter sounds like a nightmare for balance. Maybe possibly it would work as an alternative mode, perhaps with a limited pool of cards.
I see it as one of three things:
My interpretation was that Dean meant #3, which I agree with. Though, a new constructed mode that lets you dual-class like dual-class arena would be amazing.
I think they meant the former, as in the future of Hearthstone would be dual-class cards.
The flavour of "adjacent" classes is excellent, and they really highlighted the common synergies between those classes.
I love dual classes cards in general, especially that feeling when you open a powerful legendary that is potentially usable in two decks!
I wished for and got Ras as my first one: whilst it was never a top meta card, it is very powerful and I had a lot of fun playing with it in both Mage and Shaman!
If they do Dual-class again, I hope they do the opposite. Just for variety's sake. Like, pair every class with ones that share no common themes, and see what you can do.
I wanna see earth elementals with glaives. I wanna see succubus paladins. What does a Warrior/Mage card look like? I would love to see some ridiculous things like that.
Agreed there. I like how they took a moment to try and think how logically each class fit between other classes. Like Demon Hunter shares legendaries with Warlocks (Demons) and Hunters (Hunters) i.e. Demon Hunter. Paladin shares legendaries with Priests (holy) and warriors (uh...warrior). Paladin= Holy Warrior.
I hope dual class cards stay around permanently like Discover has because 1) it will go a long way towards creating interesting deck archetypes and 2) allows people to use fun and powerful cards in 2 classes, instead of 1.
I like the fact that the little icons that show the dual class icons look like dominos
Dual Class mode should def. be a thing. They are wasting so many opportunities!
While Duels fails, Dual Class would get 4x interest from constructed players than Duels do.
Imagine building your own bi-class deck, how many possibilities would you get? How many archtypes could pop on? How much time would you invest testing, and having fun, with the different heroes combinations?
The answer is... Infinity.
I have always been a pessimist when it comes to dual-class constructed. It's fine in Arena or Solo stuff, but as soon as you give players complete freedom with deck construction you open up Pandora's box when it comes to game balance. Sure, there's a huge number of cool things you could do, but a few of those will be so unfair that they they'll quickly establish a meta that is even less forgiving than Wild.
The heart of the problem is that HS has always been designed and balanced on the basis that the classes are distinct, with the only exceptions being:
Breaking this fundamental part of HS's design is huge deal, and would take a lot of effort before it was the paradise of creativity it first sounds like.
Don't get me wrong - I'd love to be in the world where dual-class constructed existed and worked dreamily well - but I just don't see it happening.
The fear is real, DualClass is 100% going to break the meta!
But what if constructed and wild are already doing it?!
Let me explain my POV:
There are cards (especially mana cheats and swing cards as Box, Il'Gynoth, etc.) that shouldn't exist at all in a competitive environment.
Removing those cards will result in much healtier meta and fairer game experience.
Now, Imagine combining Mage stuff & Sorcerer's Apprentice w/ Rogue... OBLIVION!
The real problem has always been Card Design, whatever the mode is...
My idea has always consisted in a separate Dual-Class Standard & Wild Costructed Modes feat. collection's bans and base set-reworks.
You can check my Custom Mode Concept HERE
Your POV on card design being the real problem sounds like it underestimates the importance of the surrounding class. While there's a handful of dangerous cards that would play out pretty much the same in any class (e.g. Puzzle Box), most of them are a product of the class they are in. Put Il'gynoth in warrior and he's useless, for example.
Importantly, that goes both ways and there are a lot of cards that are in the 'wrong' class, and kept fair because of it. Had Moorabi been in mage, Anub'arak been in warrior, or Animated Armor been in rogue they would certainly be remembered as more powerful cards. Perhaps these examples would still be OK, but you can bet a lot of weak cards become busted.
I think that's part of the trouble with the whole concept: it is its own worst enemy because the very things that get people excited by it are the very things that end up ruining it. In a sense that always happens, which brings it back to your point, but at least the weaknesses of individual classes open up design space for exciting cards that dual-classes shut off.
I think this is where I ended up the last time I discussed the idea of a dual-class game mode with someone: that the effective removal of class weaknesses is a fundamental failure of the game mode. It is also something that cannot really be solved by banning cards, because a class' strengths usually manifest over many cards. You are not going to ban all priest healing in the priest/rogue pair, for example.
Can all this be sorted out? Yes, but it is a massive task that would probably benefit from a full reboot to make the whole game like that, so the devs aren't split between the two vastly different design spaces of mono- and dual-class HS.
Very unlikely? Too bad, I got my hopes up for a second there.