Recently, Windows Central accidentally leaked news about an upcoming Hearthstone patch that will bring us greatness, including the long-awaited mini-set for the Madness at the Darkmoon Faire expansion!
Now that we know the release date (January 21st) and a few other details, like a potential bundle purchasable with Gold (!), we also know that we'll receive callbacks to old mechanics of the Year of the Phoenix, exclusive to Ashes of Outland and Scholomance Academy - the leak talked about Spellburst and dual-class cards, but we might receive Dormant and Prime cards as well, who knows!
For now, let's talk about the dual-class cards. The best part is that just a few days ago, Hearthstone Designer Dean "Iksar" Ayala revealed this mechanic would come back in the future. Most of us were happy about this news but didn't really think it would've been this soon.
For those who don't know, dual-class cards are a mechanic first introduced in Scholomance Academy: the same card can be played by two specific classes as if each class had the same card in its arsenal.
The ten class pairings in the Scholomance Academy expansion.
Now that we know we'll get other Dual-class cards, let's try to speculate which pairings will be involved.
Just a few preliminary thoughts:
- The last time we did this kind of prediction, we at least had the pairings and we just had to imagine the card themes, meanwhile this time we don't have any information at all;
- Every pairing below is different from the ones released in Scholomance Academy - although some were very fitting and flavorful (especially Rogue-Warrior, Paladin-Priest and Druid-Shaman), we want to mix things up!
- Do not use anything in this post as factual, we're just having some fun!
Shaman-Warrior - Enhancement and Weapons
Madness at the Darkmoon Faire gave Shaman a wide set of "attack with your face" tools - Cagematch Custodian, Deathmatch Pavilion, Whack-A-Gnoll Hammer, Stormstrike and Inara Stormcrash are all new cards, but let's not forget Thrall has access to Doomhammer, Rockbiter Weapon and Rune Dagger too.
We think that pairing Shaman with Warrior, one of the most proficient classes when it comes to weapon synergy (if not the most proficient together with Rogue - they even got paired in Scholomance and received Steeldancer and Doctor Krastinov) is the best way for the devs to push the Enhancement trait of Thrall's class identity.
We, therefore, expect a dual-class weapon focused on damage output, a card able to buff weapons like Upgrade! or Krastinov or a minion that rewards the player for holding a weapon or swinging with it.
Paladin-Warlock - (Im)purity
While these may be the most distant classes lore and flavour-wise, we think there are some gameplay similarities that are worth speculating about.
First of all, during the last expansion we received Lothraxion the Redeemed, the first Demon ever for the Paladin class (remember: back in Ashes of Outland every class' Dormant minion was a Demon, but Paladin got Imprisoned Sungill). Sure, we are talking about an exceptional character: as a former demon in the ranks of the Burning Legion, he is a unique instance of a nathrezim (humanoid demon) infused with the Holy Light (see here if you want to read more). However, this is not a character you'd expect to see at Darkmoon Faire. Moreover, Lothraxion is not the only thing that binds the two classes.
Another identity trait that we recently noticed is that both classes have their own form of Pure archetype: while Paladin is centered around using just cards from their class, Warlock has the restriction of being able to use only demons in their deck in order to get greatly rewarded by Free Admission and (partially) Man'ari Mosher, not to mention that we started receiving big demons again since Kobolds & Catacombs: Tickatus, Ring Matron, Enhanced Dreadlord, but we can also consider Kanrethad Ebonlocke.
We, therefore, predict the upcoming release of (im)pure synergy cards for both Paladin and Warlock, so that Gul'dan will be able to have more reasons to go demons-only and Uther won't be left with just Yrel after the upcoming set rotation, when Lightforged Zealot and Lightforged Crusader will rotate out of Standard.
Demon Hunter-Druid - Face Damage and Card Draw
While Illidan and Malfurion have their own distinct styles, they have more in common than you might think. First of all, both classes have a Hero Power that can ping (if you think about it Demon Claws is just a more aggressive Shapeshift) and spells that can provide damage through hero attacks; they don't have efficient board clears (RIP Blade Dance) and are very good at drawing cards.
Moreover, Illidan and Malfurion are brothers lore-wise, and as you might have learned by playing the Demon Hunter Prologue released in April 2020, they are not in a very good relationship. So, it would make sense to explore some of the elements they have in common and see what could come out of it. For example, when we were thinking about this pairing we came up with this idea: a Choose One card that, if played in an Outcast spot, grants you both effects - pretty much like a Faire Arborist but with Outcast instead of Corrupt.
Therefore, we think that if this pairing will ever come to life, it will be about face damage, card draw and possibly some sort of spicy combination between Druid and DH's own keywords, Choose One and Outcast.
Druid-Priest - Mana Manipulation and Menagerie
Druid and Priest have a few traits in common when it comes to class identity: even though Druid is devoid of AoEs and Priest has plenty of them, they both share a proactive nature rather than an aggressive one. Take Elise the Enlightened for example: back in both Tombs of Terror and Trial of Felfire, she was portrayed as a dual Druid-Priest character, with lots of overlapping themes.
While predicting "healing" would be way too obvious and not exciting at all, we think these classes have a lot more to offer. In particular, there are a few Darkmoon Faire cards that jumped to my eye during the reveal season. On one hand, Fizzy Elemental's purpose is supporting the Big/Menagerie game style, and to do that they even broke the "vanilla rule"; on the other hand, Blood of G'huun has the Elemental tag but with no further reason (please note that Blood of The Ancient One is a tribeless 9/9). What I am trying to say is that there seems to be some setup for Menagerie support for these two classes, which is good news since N'Zoth, God of the Deep is the least popular Old God.
Moreover, we also have to consider that Priest, now that Team 5 got rid of any sort of burst for the class, is granted access to remarkable Mana-cheating tools (Nazmani Bloodweaver, Palm Reading and Insight are the latest examples, but let's not forget other niche tools like Fate Weaver) and we know very well that Druid is very good at manipulating Mana Crystals.
Therefore, we predict that if this pairing will ever be present in the next mini-set, it will be about Mana manipulation and Menagerie support.
Priest-Rogue - AoE and Burgle
Okay, this one makes very little sense from every perspective, but hear me out. Everyone on the team knows that I am a complete sucker for the recently leaked Book of Heroes Anduin skin - while we received more information about it and we know that it "will show how Anduin learned to wield both holy magic and a sword as he traveled throughout Azeroth", it still makes very little sense. Why not try to justify it with some playable support?
First of all, both Priest and Rogue take advantage of cards from outside their decks to gain the edge on their opponents - while Anduin uses his opponents' cards against them, Valeera generally uses cards from other classes through effects like Dragon's Hoard and Pilfer.
Moreover, the classes have very different playstyles: Priest is probably the best class in the game when it comes to clearing the board, but it's not very good at playing tempo, even though it has received support over the last expansions; on the other hand, Valeera's only board clear is the good (bad?) old Fan of Knives, but she's probably second only to Illidan tempo-wise.
We think that AoEs and Tempo tools are fields where the two classes could help each other, even if by just a little, but we'd love to see an ambitious crossover between Thief Priest and Burgle Rogue.
What do you think about these predictions? Which dual-class pairing would you like to see in the upcoming mini-set? Let us know in the comments below!
Comments
These theories both made my skin crawl and got me excited to see what will come about.
Really cool ideas, I love the (im)purity take on Paladin and Warlock!
Not so sure about Shaman / Warrior, though. Wouldn't Weapons buff kinda negate the Boggspine Knuckles nerf?
I depends on how you do it: Boggspine Knuckles is good for the effect too, but if your goal is sheer damage then it has nothing to do with Evolve Shaman.
I loved Galakrond's Awakening adding in Shotbot. Kind of a end of the year push to make Making Mummies viable. Wasn't quite enough but seeing Reborn come back and getting that "oh maybe" moment is fun. If this mini-set does push mechanics from the year I'd be very happy. I was already excited for Corrupt to return since I crafted [Hearthstone Card (Y'sharaaj, the Defiler) Not Found].
If they bring back Spellburst I'd be very happy. One of my favorite mechanics. Dormant too was more interesting than I first thought. Another Prime, especially for Demon Hunter, would be welcome too.
Dual-Class being further explored is also a plus. For a smaller set having cards that effect multiple classes is great. If they stick to the same duos I'd be happy. I feel some of them didn't get pushed far enough (Big demons for warlock/dh, or weapons for rogue/warrior). However I love some of your pairings. Attacking for Druid/DH is great. Hero attack druid doesn't get enough love (Gonk, the Raptor). The Impurity Warlock/Paladin made me laugh. That's actually an amazing idea.
N'Zoth, God of the Deep being least popular makes me a bit sad. I love 'build around me' cards like this. I've had a lot of fun experimenting with this card. Hopefully the mini set pushes him just a bit more in a few other classes. (Fingers crossed for a big neutral Totem! ha).
I hate to be a buzzkill, but I doubt we're getting new multiclasses, for a few reasons.
Although that, it would be really neat if we got some new combos though.
I was basically about to make a similar comment. I had no idea about the Scholomance spoilers, but I figured since these are callbacks to previous Year of the Phoenix mechanics, they would keep the same pairings.
I also think and hope Dean meant dual-class would come back in a future full expansion, where there would be a good chance that there would be different pairings.
I'm going off of memory here, I remember Dean said that there will likely be 5 pairings instead of the 10 in Scholomance next time. So odds are, we aren't getting the same multiclasses, at least not for all classes.
One can dream.
I'm going to be the 'class identity bore' and hope a possible priest-rogue card would not help with either tempo or AoE. Classes always become a problem when they have no serious weaknesses, so it was good that the pairings in Scholomance focused on the overlap between the classes. Priest-rogue definitely works though, either for value or hard removal.
Fun side-thought: a black and white card border would look pretty sweet, and in Scholomance they played with card art colour palettes to match the border, sometimes to beautiful effect with a left-right colour split (e.g. Commencement and Potion of Illusion). If the mini-set is indeed Darkmoon Races, then a chequered flag or finish line banner provides a convenient black and white object to include.
The idea of shaman-warrior on weapon grounds seems solid, though I'm finding it easier to picture a rogue-shaman card since they both add stuff to weapons (poisons and the elements respectively). Something like "Crackling Poison" perhaps.
Your paladin-warlock logic is actually brilliant, and Yrel might be lonely next year if she doesn't get any more pure support. That said, right now I am bored of pure pally and I'd be lying if I said I wanted it to get more support before April. Like highlander, it is also one of those archetypes that might become concerning in Wild if it gets sustained support for Standard. We're some way off that for now, but the back of my mind still tells me it might be best as a temporary archetype.
Unlees evry prue aplyl support is on lvl fo zealot or betetr it has No chance of ever being issue in wild, lcrusader in wild is trash tier, yrel is trash way to slow for both and crusader her efefct is weak and just way more inconsietnt in wild(the main wild deck that does play random generation is questmage and it runs it cause it has to more then anything) and crusader doesnt have imeadte effect on the board.
And juwt wild lvl is way way higehr then standard and in wild have aces to neutrals that are betetr then alot of class cards like loatheb. So even if evry support is is good/better then zealot its sitll evry doubtfull will ever be any issue at all since giving up neutrals is a big price. More in wild then in standard.
Right, but the very principle of cards with high reward for a deck restriction (e.g. highlander, odd/even, pure pally) only makes sense when the reward multiplied by the number of such cards in the deck is comparable to the price paid in the deck restriction. Add enough of them and you easily outweigh the price.
It is insightful to imagine the extreme limit where pally has a full 30 pure pally cards, so literally the entire deck is OP and you aren't worried about missing a few OP neutrals. There will be a break-point somewhere below that, and it may be a long way off, but it will eventually be reached if they keep supporting pure pally in Standard.
They can keep supporting it if all the pure pally cards are expensive so you cannot afford to use them all. But that requires designers making a commitment to do that, and they'll almost certainly break it some point. So I'd prefer it if they accept it is a temporary feature of the class, and choose to not walk down a road which will inevitably end with one more slap in the face to 'honest' decks in Wild (I just want to be able to use my cards, dammit!).
I think that blizz will never design a good AoE for Rogue, they reworked Plague of Madness before they release Tombs of Terror set because lack of AoE is one of rogue's trait.
Great speculations! Hope we get some Illidan/Malfurion cards, that would be excelent.
And that impurity concept is also great, thanks for sharing the lore behind this character. I actually did not know about him.
Edit: I really hope maneagery gets some more love. Really liked playing Nzoth and Ysharj on maneagery, even if it is not that effective.
Also finally, just want to tell the author I found a little typo (I think it is written like that.) When you mention Elise the Enlightened, you wrote Dooms of Terror, when it is Tombs of Terror.
No joke, I definitely meant to write "Tombs", but it appears that my pc must've corrected it. Thanks for pointing it out
Fixed.