Whizbang's Workshop's Nods to the Past: Druid, Hunter, and Mage Cards

We continue our trip down Hearthstone's memory lane that Whizbang's Workshop affords us. Today, we're looking at all the call backs in the Druid, Hunter, and Mage set, and they're quite a bit more substantial than our first article (which you should totally check out after this one), at least when it comes to the individual classes. Let's get into it!

Druid

Druid's callback Legedary is Sky Mother Aviana, a WoW character that fought in the War of the Ancients, a massive battle taking place thousand of years before even the first Warcraft game. She made her debut in Catacalysm, where the players were tasked with ressurecting her. Aviana, taking the form of a harpie, is a Wild God and an Anchient, a manifestation of life and nature on Azeroth. Specifically, he represents birds and other winged creatures, and is worshipped by the Druid of the Talon.

In Hearthstone, Aviana appeared early in the game's lifecycle, debuting in 2015's The Grand Tournament, the game's second ever expansion. Like many cards of the time, it uses art from the now-defunct WoW TCG. Unlike many cards from that specific expansion, it was a very good card, but it didn't see that much play until the release of Kun the Forgotten King a year later in Mean Streets of Gagetzan, increasing her power massively, to the point she was nerfed to 10 mana for a while. Another version of the character was released in 2018's The Witchwood with Duskfallen Aviana, a card that many consider to be the worst in the entire game.

In terms of non-Legendary callbacks, we have two. First is Jade Display, a reference to Gagetzan's Jade Idol, with Jade Druid being one of the most powerful decks in the history of the game at the time. Another one is Ensmallen, a callback to Embiggen, released in 2019's Descent of dragon. While not as powerful as the Jades, Embiggen Druid was still a force to be reckoned with.

Hunter

Hunter actually get two call-back Legendaries. The first one is King Plush, a toy-fied version of Kind Krush. Krush is a famous Devilsaur (WoW's theropd) that was added in Wrath of the Lich King that a lot of hunters, erm... hunt. Introduced as part of Hearthstone's Classic set, King Krush is one of the cards to use art from the WoW TCG... from a completely unrelated character. The art depicts Lar'korwi, who is A) blue instead of green, and B) a ravasaur, which are raptors, not theropods. Maybe he should get new art? The Plush version of the character trades a few stats for the ability to partially clear the board so he can go face.

The other Legendary Hunter got is Hemet, Foam Marksman. Hemet Nesingwary is a dwarven game hunter in WoW and considered the best hunter in Azertoth (Rexxar would like a word). In Hearthstone, he can't decide what he wants to be! The original from 2014's Goblins vs Gnomes was a single-target removal that only worked on Beasts... in a MECH expansion! Jungle Hunter is deck thinner introduced in 2017's Journey to Un'Goro that was mainly used in Mecha'thun decks the following year. And the latest version is a greedy value engine that adds Legendaries to your hand. Also, the first two cards are Neutral, while the latest one is Hunter. Pick a lane, man!

No other references in Hunter's package, it seems. There's Mystery Egg and Patchwork Pals, but those are more returning mechanics than call backs to older stuff. Closest would be Jungle Gym as a reference to Un'Goro, but Hunter had no ping mechanics there.

Mage

Remember last time how we said Magtheridon was the oldest character on that list in terms of when he first appeared? Well, this goes doubly for Khadgar, who first appered all the way back in Warcraft II: The Tides of War. He's a character that did a A LOT in the lore of WoW, having strong ties to Mediv and Sergeras. We're not gonna go over him here, but needless to say he's one of the most important characters in WoW.

In Hearthstone, he first appeared in 2019's Rise of Shadows, where he was a measly 2/2 that would double the output of cards that summoned other minions. Puzzlemaster Khadgar, the version from Whizbang's Workshop, doesn't call back to that. Instead it references Wondrous Wisdomball, a passive that appeared in Dalaran Heist (the single player content from Rise of Shadows, when those were a thing), with the Magic Wisdomball that it equips to you. The art on the Wisdomball even alludes to "Chadgar", a nickname the community has given the mage with white hair.

Mage has a couple non-Legendary references to old cards. The first is Yogg in the Box, which features Yogg-Saron, Hope's End, a character that showed up in quite a few cards over the years. Yogg-Saron is an old god, very powerful parasites that were sent to Azeroth by the Void Lords to corrupt because... actually, let's not get into that, the cosmology of WoW is weird. What you need to know is that they're big, powerful, and can influence people's minds, to the point of driving you mad. If you've played Chrono Trigger, they're similar to Lavos, but with a Lovecraftian coat of paint.

Yogg and the other old gods initially appeared in 2016's Whispers of the Old Gods, the expansion that introduced rotation to Hearthstone, once more in 2020's Madness at the Darkmoon Faire, and finally by himself as part of last year's TITANS miniset. There's also Puzzle Box of Yogg-Saron from 2019's Saviours of Uldum, which might be what the Yogg in the Box specifically calls back to. 

Finally, there's the spell Frost Lich Cross-Stitch, a call back to 2017's Knights of the Frozen Throne, specifically Frost Lich Jaina. Frozen Throne was a big expansion, as it was the first time the game introduced a whole new type of cards: Hero cards. This expansion featured Death-Knighed version of all the (a the time) 9 base hero. The backstory of how that happened is that, at the tavern, Pompous Thespian starts retelling the story of how how Arthas acquired Frostmourne... except now every one of the heroes is going after the sword. It's obviously not canon, but it's a fun read that you can still get on Blizzard's website.