Hello everybody. Today, we will be talking about the Charge and Rush mechanics as they're a fairly hot topic right now.
Historically, Charge has always been a dangerous mechanic. Having an effect which ignores "summoning sickness" is common in CCGs like this; Haste in MTG is a perfect example. Or in the case of games like Legends of Runeterra, summoning sickness simply doesn’t exist at all. Those games seem to make it work just fine, so what’s wrong with Charge? Well… unlike MTG, Hearthstone doesn’t use a blocking system or have Instant-speed cards that can be used as counterplay. The closest things we have to those in Hearthstone are Taunts and Secrets respectively, both of which do the job preemptively instead of proactively. In MTG, if your opponent plays a Haste creature, you can use a creature to block it, an Instant spell to kill it, etc. But in Hearthstone, if your opponent plays a Charge minion, it’s just going to attack your face unless you happen to have a Taunt minion or a Secret up.
Some of the most historically powerful and notable cards in the game are Charge cards. Leeroy Jenkins is a classic (literally) staple finisher for Aggro decks, and continues to be as such even after it was nerfed from 4 mana to 5 mana. Doomguard has seen play in most forms of Warlock decks over the course of the game and was sent to the Hall of Fame last year for just being too darn good. Warsong Commander has also had an extensive history being nerfed and changed multiple times before being given its current design (which incidentally, was the first one which had nothing to do with giving minions Charge).
Notice how all 3 of these examples come from the Basic or Classic set? To work as a typical Haste mechanic, Charge appears fairly frequently in these two sets. In TGT, Charge appeared on 6 cards (by far the most out of any set). After that though, Team 5 had admitted how much of a problematic mechanic Charge is and this came at the same time that Warsong Commander was nerfed to its present day form. As such, Charge became used very sparingly. The last Charge card that was made was Chillblade Champion in Knights of the Frozen Throne, about 2 and a half years ago!
This is where we enter the world of Rush.
A modern day warrior mean mean stride, today’s Tom Sawyer mean mean…
Err no, not that Rush (RIP Neil Peart).
Rush was introduced in The Witchwood as a way to still print Charge effects but on a less dangerous mechanic because it doesn’t allow early face damage. Rush can be considered to have 3 Beta versions: Icehowl in The Grand Tournament, Charged Devilsaur in Journey to Un’Goro, and the nerfed Charge card.
While they aren’t proper Rush effects, they would eventually lead to Rush as a keyword. When Rush was introduced, it was exactly what the Hearthstone community had been asking for. It proved to be very strong and very popular, as it is currently the third post-launch mechanic to appear outside its debut set. Because it wasn’t nearly as dangerous as Charge as it allowed for immediate action without face damage, it was printed much more frequently. There are currently 74 cards in the game with Rush on it, whether it be a minion that has Rush (naturally or conditionally), summons a token with Rush, grant Rush to something else, or interact with Rush minions in a specific way. This is more than double the amount of Charge cards in the game printed in about half the time the mechanic has been around. Rush is absolutely everywhere, but that may not be a good thing after all.
Last month, a member by the name of Scarth asked the question “Does anyone else feel like Rush has ruined the game?” Whether you agree or disagree that Rush has ruined the game, one thing everyone agreed on in that thread is that there’s too much Rush. The Witchwood in particular has quite a lot of Rush cards, which is perfectly natural for a set attempting to introduce the keyword to the game. Even outside of The Witchwood though, it has appeared fairly abundantly in every succeeding set. Saviors of Uldum being the lowest with 8, and The Boomsday Project being the highest with 13 (about one-tenth of the set). It’s clear that Team 5 really likes Rush as a mechanic. I like it as a mechanic too, but I will agree that too much Rush may end up shifting the game in a negative way and we may be approaching that point. If you dislike Rush as a mechanic, you may be relieved knowing that 41 of those cards (55%) will be rotating out when the first expansion of the new year releases in roughly a month and a half to two months from now.
There’s one more aspect of Rush that I want to talk about though, which is the fact that it has essentially replaced Charge. While this is overall a change for the better in my opinion, it does raise a few interesting implications. Will there ever be another Charge minion printed again? The closest we’ve had is Dinotamer Brann who summons the ever-notable King Krush. While Brann summons a Charge minion, it still isn’t a natural Charge on a card and is the only time the mechanic has been used since 2017.
Do you consider this as basically Team 5 admitting this is what Charge should’ve been the whole time? If you take a look at all the Charge cards in the game (mostly the evergreen sets, although this could apply to expansions as well), imagine if all of them were changed to have Rush (and stat balance change to compensate)? I’ve seen this idea popped up a few times, with many people stating that Leeroy Jenkins is the only card in the card in the game that needs Charge, and some people include Stonetusk Boar as well. In your opinion, would this be a positive change or a negative change?
Would the previous design of Warsong Commander be printable with Rush instead of Charge? Team 5 (mainly Ben Brode) has stated in the past about the reluctance to add a new keyword to the base sets as part of why Rush doesn't appear there. Despite this however, we did get Plaguebringer as a replacement Basic card for Rogue. Whilst Poisonous has existed since launch, it did not exist in its keyworded form until Journey to Un’Goro. Plaguebringer would also not have been possible to print without the keyword as the textbox would be very clumsy otherwise. Could Rush be added to the permanent evergreen set? One effect of this would be that because Rush is always available no matter what, less cards with it would need to be printed in expansions. There is precedent for significant retroactive changes to the evergreen sets besides card nerfs, so while I would consider it unlikely to happen, I wouldn’t consider it completely impossible. What do you believe?
Comments
Shameless self-promotion here.
When I planned my core set revamp, I also wondered whether I should get rid of Charge entirely. I opted for keeping it only for the Classic legendaries that have it. There are 4 of them: King Krush; Al'Akir the Windlord; Grommash Hellscream; Leeroy Jenkins.
Those cards are used as finishers. Without Charge, they would be very bad and not feel like legendaries at all. I *will* nerf Leeroy though, but he's gonna keep Charge.
Keep charge but also make them exclusive like 1-2 per expansion and cost them 5+ mana so there are no early game charge shenanigans. If they also did something for the opponent that be even better.
+1 for the Tom Sawyer reference.
That was my favorite part of the article.
I often thought cards like Charged Devilsaur is the more elegant way of creating 'rush' minions, since it can also act as a combo OTK piece rather than a pure finisher the way Leeroy Jenkins is now.
I think if team5 were to print more charge cards it should come with conditions, like 'can't attack heroes this turn', or 'if your opponent has more than 6 cards...' etc. If there's a way for the opposing side to manipulate so the charge minion is either inactive or severely weakened, I think that's the best way forward, assuming charge as a mechanic is ever going to come back.
First thought: I think a limited number of charge cards like Leeroy Jenkins are good for the game. Leeroy does 6 damage from hand for 5 mana and can be blocked by taunt and secret cards; Fireball does 6 damage for 4 mana and can only be blocked by secret cards. Mage class identity is built around large burst damage from hand, but pulling off OTK's like Exodia Mage is tricky. Leeroy Jenkins is a powerful card and can be abused by some decks (historically mostly rogue whose class identity is built around pulling off tricky combo mechanics), but I believe it adds value. Players have to make a choice when they are under 15 health, can i risk getting hit by Leeroy Jenkins shenanigans and play greedy or do I need to be cautious just in case my opponent can pull off big face damage. I wouldn't want this to change.
Second thought: Rush is a good mechanic. Even aggro decks benefit from carrying some rush. I don't think we are over-saturated with rush yet, but I am glad to see some cards rotating out to give room to a new mechanic. Having a variety of mechanics in play in a single meta is nice. I would love to see enrage and inspire on some new cards as well. I guess that is why I like wild.
Leeroy is a very interesting card. I wouldn't mind it being HoF'd, cause it does end a ridiculous number of games, but lately I've been using it to dilute priest res pools with whelps. I like cards that have multiple uses like that. Enabling Dragonmaw Poacher is cool. Comboing it with Unleash the Hounds and the quest is cool, but kinda problematic since it does so much damage. Losing charge may be good for the game, but classes do need good ways to end games. Maybe it shouldn't be Leeroy so much, but it's nice having cards like Leeroy :)
I have a sort of on topic question on this matter.
When you have a minion on board that can go face and then you "Give it Rush". How come it can still go face? Rush as a mechanic means cannot go face this turn so giving something rush should remove its ability to go face that turn on top of whatever else happens like extra stats or DS or whatever.
Just a thought, probably going to become a more prevalent issue in the future but it has occured to me a few times.
Rush means it can attack the same turn it has been summoned (or played), just not to the opponent's face. If you give Rush to a minion that was summoned (or played) last turn, it can already attack face, so Rush isn't doing anything, since it can also attack minions already because it doesn't have 'summoning sickness'. And that last part is key, Rush lets the minion skip its sickness but only to attack other minions, but if the minion doesn't have the sickness, then Rush doesn't add anything to it and it should not restrict it either. With Charge is the same. Having Charge means you skip the sickness entirely, so giving it Rush doesn't help it but also doesn't restrict it from attacking face.
HS's own tool-tip for rush describes it as "Can attack minions immediately". Translating that into more technical language: "this minion can attack your opponent's minions on the turn it is summoned (or otherwise appears on the board, e.g. transformed into)".
Nowhere does it say anything about not being able to attack heroes. It is a partial bypass of summoning sickness, and does nothing when you wouldn't be in the summoning sickness turn.
This does make me wonder what happens with rush and Sunstruck Henchman. I will do some science and find out whether it affects the turn of summoning or summoning sickness itself...
Edit: Sunstruck Henchman shows it is indeed a bypass of summoning sickness (or sleep as HS seems to call it), and is only indirectly to do with the turn the minion is summoned.
What you describe does happen for the Charge card though.
Right ok thanks. That was a proper ELI5 moment from me but thanks for explaining how it actually works to me.
Instead of thinking of it as 'Can't attack Heroes', think of it as 'Can attack minions'. Giving something Rush that can already attack this turn doesn't do anything because it can already attack minions.
After all, the first interpretation wouldn't mean anything at all - so what if this minion can't attack Heroes, it can't attack anything when it's first played!
Ok thank you for clearing that up, it was me misinterpreting how the coding works on rush minions in general.
I think the best Solution would be to give future Charge-Cards certain Requirements to gain that Effect (like Dinotamer Brann). That Way you give the Players a Chance to better play around Burst without throwing away a whole Mechanic.
Like, maybe something like a Charge-Version of Mind Control Tech? If your Opponent has X Minions, me go Face?
If there are rush minions in every set, it is effectively a core mechanic and they might as well use it in Classic too.
Changing Warsong Commander to grant small minions rush makes sense. We've seen Houndmaster Shaw being good but not broken and the Commander has half as much health, making it a lot easier to remove. Whether the card would be good enough to play after that change, I don't know, but it would certainly bring it closer to playable than it currently is.
It would be an interesting change to have everything that is currently charge be changed to rush (with appropriate stat adjustments), but it would also cut down on the creative possibilities for OTKs. If Blizzard were to make this change, perhaps it would be good to leave just a couple cards (at least Stonetusk Boar) with charge to leave that creative opportunity available.
Though, if they did decide to change most of them, I don't know that they'd be willing to keep just a few with Charge, as a keyword for just a few cards may not be something they want to "clutter" the game with (Ex: Enrage).
I'll still figure out crazy combos and meme decks either way, but I'd definitely miss Charge as a mechanic if it were removed entirely...
And yes, lowering the quantity of charge minions after rotation is probably a smart play for the longevity of the game.
The charge card should just be renamed rush and state give a minion rush. Unless there's some sort of charge mechanic that would still make it relevant the way it is.
I mean, you can use it to voluntarily prevent yourself from going face.
It's something, even if it's a bad something.
I'm a traditionalist in this case: I would like to keep the current charge minions in the game and live with the fact that they get abused from time to time. With Blizzard getting faster distributing nerfs, decks like Necrium Rogue don't stay a problem for too long. Leeroy is my favorite card in the game and I would be sad to see him HoF'ed.
On the behalf of rush, I side with the opinion that we've reached the edge of what's healthy. Rush adds a lot of depth to the game strategy-wise, but just like with everything else in life, too much of the good stuff is a bad thing. So tuning down the number of rush minions would be a good idea in my books.
It might be a bit off topic, but I haven't seen any speculations yet about the merging of two mechanics which was reported to be happening this year after the summit. Do you think rush or charge could be involved? I don't see many more possibilities that 1) are thematically somewhat fitting and 2) don't lead to completely broken results (like fusing taunt and divine shield). Any ideas?