Xero likes Churro - Patch #71
Starting with patch #71 we’re adopting a slightly different cadence with our patching process. Have no fear, xero (0) changes are being made to those bi-weekly balance patches everyone loves 💜… you do love them right? Major features and improvements will now release every other patch.
📺 X-cost cards are allowed to be cast for 0 mana now! Are you dreaming up any big brain 🧠 plays with this change? We certainly are!
Changes ⚙️
- X-cost cards are allowed to be cast for 0 mana.
Bugfixes 🐛
- Fixed a bug where if a card effect attached something to a unit, and the unit you're attaching to was moved from a secret to a public location in the same card effect, if the unit you're attaching to already had an attachment that would be dusted by being replaced by the new attachment, and the old attachment had an effect that would trigger when it was dusted (e.g. Anima), it was not triggering. TLDR; we fixed a bug with attachments.
- Toil & Trouble can no longer target allies.
Looks like it's time for patch #71 already! It's a smaller patch this time, focusing more on nerfing some of the top performing decks rather than making a ton of changes in the effort of stabilizing the meta as we move closer to Soft Launch. However, we've also powered up a few underperformers slightly in an effort to give a few weak cards a chance to shine.
Giza (2069)
Traits: banner ➞ guard,banner
A small buff here, Giza has fallen off a bit, so re-adding Guard to make it a bit more useful.
Twisted Metal (3041)
Text: Give target ally unit +3/+1 or target enemy unit -1/-3. ➞ Give target ally unit +3/+2 or target enemy unit -2/-3.
Wartlock (3076)
Cost: 4 ➞ 5
Power: 3 ➞ 4
Health: 3 ➞ 4
Bumping up to 5c alongside +1atk and +1hp. It’s a high-variance and high-impact card whose winrate had been spiking lately. Moving it to 5c makes it hard to cast before turn 3, similar to Twist and Turn, giving other decks a bit more breathing room before it hits. Making it dump the lowest cost was also an option, but that would have run the risk of making it a cheaper Bill with wither + lifesteal when used with Fun Guy.
Bill (3088)
Text: Summon: Give ally units and units in your hand +1/+1. ➞ Summon: Give other ally units and units in your hand +1/+1.
Power: 3 ➞ 2
Bill soared up the rankings last week, with HRT/INT and HRT/AGY aggro commanding a fearsome presence in the stats, so Bill gets a bit of a big nerf. He loses -1pow, and also no longer buffs himself, meaning he goes from a 4/4 when played to a 2/3, which is a pretty big nerf, but his ability to buff boards and hands to follow up should still make him appealing as a midrange/aggro tool.
Frog King (4045)
Power: 2 ➞ 3
A small buff to the king here, as its winrate was really low. +1 Power should give it a little more presence on board, though I imagine Encapsulate will still come out on top pretty often.
Fish (4066)
Text: Draw your lowest cost unit. Give it -2 cost. ➞ Draw your lowest cost unit. Give it -1 cost.
A Bit of a harsh nerf here in the effort of slowing the roll of combo decks just a bit. -2c on empty mana was also considered, but I fear it would likely not actually affect its effectiveness in combo decks much.
Blood Moon (20011)
Cost: 3 ➞ 4
Text: Give all units guard.
Give ally units +2 power. ➞ Give ally units +2 power.
A nerf to Blood Hunter through her spell, moving up 1c and no longer gives guard, since giving enemies guard was kind of weird in tandem with Hunter’s newly expanded ability to make opposing guards moot. Should be fairer at 4c, making Hunter + Moon a 7c play, more in line with other wide board buffs like Band Together and Orion.
Xero (1094)
Text: Death: Dust the enemy's top two dead cards. ➞ Summon: Dust the enemy's top two dead cards.
A small buff to a card that hasn’t seen a whole lot of love, now dusts on summon, allowing it to be used proactively vs grave-focused strategies, rather than the dust being on death, where its near-impossible to time correctly.
Rodent Problem (49)
Text: Draw and summon a
1 cost unit. Give it +2/+2 and attach Anima. ➞ Draw and summon a
1 cost unit. Give it +2/+2, guard and attach Anima.
Buffing by granting guard to the summoned unit, allowing it to carry a bit more value. Shouldn’t be too impactful but helps an underperformer to improve a bit.
Dual Boot (4017)
Cost: 4 ➞ 5
Text: Draw a unit. Summon a 2/2 copy with guard and attach Dazed to it. ➞ Draw a unit. Summon a 2/2 copy with guard and attach Barrier to it.
Another powerful spell to turbo out earlygame moves up to the 5c slot to reduce earlygame spikes as well as slowing the combo decks utilizing it plus Zam. It's worth noting that while those decks have looked impressive in clips, the play and win rates of Wis/Int decks, as well as the key cards for the Zam combo decks, Magnanimous and Zam, even among high-level players, don’t reflect that the deck is actually a major powerhouse or issue in constructed play at this moment, so I’m making a few more conservative tweaks to a few enablers to slow the deck down without outright gutting it.
Soul Forge (4053)
Text: Attach Lead to your left-most unit in hand. Summon a 2/2 copy
with armor. ➞ Summon a 2/2 copy of your left-most unit in hand. Give it armor and attach Lead to it.
A minor tweak here, mostly to simplify it by making it the same as other copy effects. Now summons a copy and attaches lead, bringing it in line with all the other effects of its type. Should make for fun interactions with anima but also reduces the amount of Lead going around overall.
Jackrabbit (4098)
Text: Sunrise: Dust your top dead metal card to attach Quest. ➞ Sunrise: Attach Quest to another random ally unit.
A bit of a weird and underplayed card with a complex effect, so trying a flavor + effect tweak - now attaches quest to ‘another’ random ally unit on sunrise without the need to dust a metal card, so it fits in more with the theme of the Lapin engineer building things up, rather than just building himself up.
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