Let's start with the most current news: The Azerite Snake has been temporarily nerfed to 6 mana. You can read more details here. Read on for my thoughts on why this card needs a nerf, what that nerf should actually be, and how all of this will affect Excavate Warlock.
Snakes. Why Did it Have to be Snakes?
The Azerite Snake is a Legendary minion that can only be obtained by Warlocks after using 4 Excavate abilities. Warlocks can Excavate using these cards:
Decent Removal Solid Card Amazing Card Even this one sees play?
With Warlock's innate ability to draw cards quickly, it's not difficult to get that 4th Excavation, all while removing enemy minions and healing yourself. Once you have The Azerite Snake, you simply play it over and over until your opponent dies. Fun, right? Not for your opponent. Here are the issues with this, listed in order of most to least important:
- The Azerite Snake doesn't just deal damage to the enemy hero and heal your hero, it literally steals health, changing both players' max health in the process. Once you've played it, your opponent's max health is now 20, and they cannot restore any health above that mark. Play it again, they're down to 10. Once more, and you guessed it, they're dead. Armor will not stop this. Even if your opponent is running Prince Renathal, you just need to play it one extra time. And of course, in the process, you are boosting your own max health, allowing you to then heal up to 40, 50 or 60 health.
- You can play The Azerite Snake 7 times in one game, overcoming even the lofty health totals Triple Blood Rune Death Knight can achieve through Vampiric Blood and The Primus. This repetition is thanks to Youthful Brewmaster, Saloon Brewmaster, Zola the Gorgon, and the fact that you can just Excavate 4 more times to get another Snake. These bounce options are so cheap that you can often play The Azerite Snake twice in one turn to set up or clinch the kill.
- The cost. For only 4 mana, you deal 10 (permanently) and heal 10 ("permanently"). This, plus the low cost of your brewmasters, enables many Snakes in short order.
- It's too easy to get. Really powerful game-ending cards exist in Hearthstone, but you really have to fight to get there. Think about Purified Shard. It takes many turns and often sub-optimal plays to get that win condition. Warlock's Excavate cards are abundant enough to get the Snake quickly, and good enough to keep you in the game while you dig.
Nerf the Snek
Blizzard's temporary solution was to increase the mana cost to 6. This partly addresses my 2nd and 3rd bullets above, but doesn't touch my 1st bullet, which I consider to be the biggest issue with the card. Plus (and remember that this is an opinion piece), I like the fact that all 5 Legendary Azerite Beasts are 4 mana 5/5s. Changing one of them to 6 mana breaks the consistency. I know, not super important.
Blizzard has already stated that they are going to revert this nerf in the next balance patch, while enacting a better solution to the issue, but they haven't said what it will be. Therefore it is my honor to humbly suggest the following:
This keeps its basic effect intact, while giving your opponent the opportunity to heal back the lost health and preventing you from stacking up health totals Warlock should never have. Additionally, giving the card Lifesteal softens the nerf a little, since leaving it on the board can potentially net you more healing. Currently, leaving it on the board is not something anybody is doing.
Is This the End of Excavate Warlock?
Personally, I think not. As many of us predicted during the reveal season, Excavate is a powerful ability that can swing or win games even without reaching the Legendary treasures. Sometimes you're playing a non-Excavate class and you get one of their cards through copy or steal effects: it's still good. The treasures you get by Excavating are almost always playable, and sometimes totally game-changing. Warlock in particular has so many powerful tools, like Sargeras, the Destroyer, Symphony of Sins and Dar'Khan Drathir, they will still be a top-tier class using Excavate cards alongside their other staples. Plus, you can also run Tram Conductor Gerry for an additional reward for Excavating. And who knows, maybe if The Azerite Snake takes a hit in popularity, it will make room for SludgeLock to come out and play.
What are your predictions for the eventual nerf to The Azerite Snake? How do you think it will effect the archetype's viability? Let us know in the comments below.
Comments
Meanwhile Blindeye Sharpshooter goes untouched
You're not wrong! I've been playing tempo naga DH a bit with a very high winrate. This card allows you to pull through your whole deck while dealing repetitive damage. It's like they learned nothing from Spitelash Siren.
I would still want it to give you max health, since that is not the problematic part of the card, but yeah, it should just deal 10 damage, that's fine (maybe even still too much)
My guess for the nerf is this:
"Deal 10 damage to your opponent, give your hero health equal to the damage dealth"
This removes the frustration of losing health permanently, while still allowing warlocks to gain max health. And this change makes it so the damage doesn't bypass armor anymore, and the "give your hero health equal to the damage dealth." makes it so cards like Solid Alibi can counter the effect by making it so the warlock has to wait a turn, or else they only gain 1 health instead of 10. Also it of course also enables a lot more counterplay.
Also this change would make it so the excavate package will remain a good package for control warlock decks, instead of it being a frustrating OTK/Combo package.
This is something I was also thinking about
I don't think they designed this card as a OTK/finisher/combo card, it kinda feels like, yeah, ok, it should give you and advantage for the rest of the game after playing it but not instantly kill your opponent in most situations
because in situations where your opponent dies right away the part of the card that says that you gain max health is completely irrelevant and the flavour of the card is completely lost
That's a nice change, as bypassing armor and permanently reducing max health are both very problematic.
The best part of whatever the nerf will end up being is we're getting a lot of free dust as they will most likely offer full refunds on all warlock/neutral excavate cards :)
I think the problem is the bouncing. It's interesting to have a card that addresses health while ignoring armor.
A possible fix: instead of a battlecry, the text becomes "At the end of your turn, steal 10 health from your opponent."
That would be a neat fix too! The effect is still strong, but you'd realistically only get it once, then maybe a second time if you Excavate 4 more times and get a second snake. And in the very unlikely scenario that your opponent can't kill a 5/5, you're pretty much just winning at that point.
Leaving the snake on the board also opens up the possibility that your opponent will steal it, via Sylvanas or similar.
And from Blizzard's perspective, yes, it's a change, but less of a nerf than some of the other suggestions mentioned here.
This is definitely relevant! I actually just played SnakeLock this afternoon against a Rogue, and I specifically chose to wait a few turns to play the combo because all I had to bounce it was Zola the Gorgon and I was waiting for a brewmaster. The Rogue might have been able to steal it, then bounce it with Shadowstep or Breakdance, and I couldn't take that chance.
The most intricate nerf would simply to turn this into a spell, making it impossible to bounce.
Unfortunately, if you cant reliably turn this into a win con theres simply no reason to actually want to play excavate warlock. I find hearthstone nowadays has gone to the point where you need to be threatening lethal by turn 7-8 or the deck would automatically suck. Not to mention preventing the opponent from killing you by turn 7-8. The excavate cards have not really turned up the way I thought they would, mostly because the excavate cards themselves are often overcosted. Think about how easy druid can pile up dragon golems and how you playing a bunch of subpar cards for a good reward can outrace that?
The snake was an anomaly. It does both prevent and exact as a wincon. Take away the wincon and you can see warlock simply never excavates again. They really dont need to. Sargeras alone can wipe most games, as can Symphony of Sins.
And then you will transform it in OTK combo in wild - Snake spell + Archmage Vargoth + Drakkari Enchanter. 11 mana combo, but some mana discount or Audio Amplifier and *poof*.
I think its sufficiently convoluted and slow enough in wild that it'll never realistically be a problem.
I think leave the effect same but change it to like 5 health steal
the "Prince Renathal" nerf
Yes, that would tone it down quite a bit. Then there would be games against midrange or aggro decks where it simply isn't even enough damage/healing to matter, and others against control where it still wins you the game, it just takes longer.