The first batch of info for the Hearthstone expansion "Curse of Naxxramas" has just been released. Following the reveal of five new cards, we reached out to some Hearthstone pros to collect their thoughts and feedback.
The cards:
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Savjz: I think the expansion is cool. I hope they will balance out the matchups in the class specific cards, i.e. give Shaman a card which is good particularly against Hunter. To be honest, I would've preferred a completely new mechanic and they could've easily done so for sure, but I think they want to keep the amount of different mechanics low intentionally so new players don't get confused. |
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Gnimsh:
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StrifeCro: I think many of the new adventure cards are usable in different decks and it will be cool to see if people can make some new decks around some of them. Nerubian Eggs seems very close to Ancient Watcher with different pros and cons  and Shade of Naxxramas is very close to a 3/3 stealther for 3 that grows over time as well. |
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Lothar: Undertaker - a better Secretkeeper - that's for sure. Even without the rest of the new set of cards he's really good. Imagine a follow-up turn with two Leper Gnomes. We got Loot Hoarder, Thalnos, Harvest Golems, Cairne, Highmane and the new ones also (I think of you, Nerubian Egg). This one drop will be a staple in the new Deathrattle Decks. Dancing Swords - To be honest I don't like this one. There is always some drawback when a minion has superior stats to it's cost but I don't think giving your opponent a random card is good. I think King Mukla is way better than the Dancing Swords. Maybe I will reevaulate this card when I will see the whole set. Baron Rinvendare - It's has so much potential. Double harvest Golems, 4 damage Lepers, double Loot draws, double Nerubians. And double Dancing Swords draws ;) From what I see now I can tell that Deathratlle decks will become a thing, maybe even top tier. And this card will push it there. Shade of Naxxramas - Got lot of mixed feelings about it. It's very similar to the Questing Adventurer with less buffing potential but with survival tech via Stealth. Coining out this beastie may be quite good. But still, it's a great target for Silence. And Flares are kinda heavily played right now. Nerubian Egg - THIS IS BONKERS. This card will make the DR decks happen. You just need some ways to buff it to attack like Abusive Sergeant, Cruel Taskmaster et cetera to kill opps minion and grant yourself a brand new shiny spider. A 4/4 spider which is kinda insane. Particularly Warlock will be fond of this card. Think of Power Overwhelming, Hellfires or even Void Terror (will it see some play now?) |
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Ostkaka: Undertaker:  Has similar stats to those of Secretkeeper, but with typical cards like Loot Hoarder, Bloodmage Thalnos, Leper Gnome and Harvest Golem it is more easily buffed and could certainly be powerful considering its mana-cost. Shade of Naxxramas: This card looks really strong, usually it will be a 3/3 for 3 that only dies to non-target removal. When it enters the board on the next turn it will be a high-priority target because it will grow even larger if it isn’t dealt with. It’s like a mini-Gruul but with stealth, against certain classes you could maybe even leave it stealthed to grow into a huge minion. Nerubian Egg: At first I thought this card could just be ignored until it gets silenced and killed. But the power this has is enormous in a deck like Zoo because it offers AoE-protection. A shaman could Earth Shock it before playing Lightning Storm but not all classes will be able to do this and the 4/4 coming into play next turn might be too much to handle, interesting card for sure. Dancing Swords: Underwhelming stats for the Deathrattle it has, if your plan is to play it combined with a silence, Ancient Watcher is a much better choice. King Mukla is also a better tempo play for a 3-drop. Possibility in a mill-deck with Baron Rivendare? Not sure, haha. Baron Rivendare: Currently I see two huge synergies with Sylvanas Windrunner and Cairne Bloodhoof. The stats are very poor, but because it looks like the new cards will revolve around Deathrattle this may have some really cool interactions which we have yet to see. |
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Blackout: The patch seems OK in terms of new content. 30 cards in 10 months-ish is super slow development though, so Blizzard need to step up their game if they want to keep the "casual" scene interested - which seems to be their objective judging from the dungeon game type. I'm not sure how many of the new cards will see play from the ones that we've seen so far, but I think Rivendare is pretty poor and generally won't see any play just due to his abysmal stats. Overall, it's a good patch but not enough - Blizzard needs to be doing this on a regular basis and a larger scale if they want to keep true to their aims of keeping the non-competitive players interested. |
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Ignite: So, Blizzard just teased us with 5 new cards and the information that each adventure mode wing will award a legendary - we've seen Baron Rivendare, so we can expect 4 more legendaries. These 5 cards also give us some sort of insight on what playstyle to expect, a very combolicious one where deathrattles are king. Personally my favorite card there is the Undertaker, it's another theme card to join the likes of Secretkeeper, Lightwarden, Unbound Elemental, Mana Wyrm and Mana Addict which reinforces each theme such as the use of secrets, deathrattles, healing, overloading... All in all, I love most of these creatures for the basis they provide to each of their own themes, they have the potential of becoming staples to their own archetype as Unbound Elemental is in the Shaman builds. Conversing about the Deathrattle theme however, which is the theme we were teased with by Blizzard, these cards seem to have their place in the meta, namely Undertaker + Baron Rivendare in a deathrattle heavy deck (Dancing Swords is questionable - but Harvests/Hoarders/Cairne/Sylvanas/even Abomination look like great candidates for the archetype - might we see a new card that will help counter this abundance of deathrattles, or might Priest rise to the occasion and take advantage of cards like Mass Dispel and even the 0 cost Silence with Watchers and Pyromancers in the deck? As for Nerubian Egg, seems like a bad Pagle in a meta that will most likely shift into more silences and more outs for deathrattles, feels as if this card wil rarely get value unless you can introduce it with a buff combo so you can actually attack with it in hopes of trading it before it gets silenced, otherwise your opponent can choose to ignore it while you have a useless 0/2 that feeds your board presence to their Unleash the Hounds for example. All in all, everyone knows these cards will drastically shift the meta, and we've only seen 5 of them! I hope they introduce a legendary that such as Baron Rivendare, has a passive effect while on board that just nulls the activation of deathrattles, that'd be a pretty sick tempo card for the upcoming meta! Looking forward to it |
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ThijsNL: I’m happy Blizzard add new cards to Hearthstone. The new cards look very interesting, and will change the meta. It is still difficult to say how big the impact will be, but with all the death rattle’s silence cards will getting more popular. For me, the new legendary card ‘Baron Rivendare’ looks really strong and is a unique card. If you can combine it with Cairne, and get a double Baine, it can win you games. If you want to play Baron Rivendare, you need to play a Deathrattle deck. I don’t think the card will be OP, you can only use the strength of the card with some death rattle’s on the board, but it will get a place in some decks. I’m really excited to see the other 25 cards and what their impact will be. Hopefully the cards can make a balanced game, and I hope they add some anti aggro cards. |
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Semijew: I have just eyed over the cards quickly, no deep thinking gone into it yet cause I think you need to see ALL the new cards before you can start thinking about theory crafting. But I think Baron Rivendare can be combo'ed good with for example Cairne, and Nerubian Egg might be useful in some sort of aggro deck. The other three cards look pretty bad to me, but as I said before, it's hard to determine how strong and weak the cards will be before you see all of them |
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GosuGamers have reached out to even more players to hear their thoughts. This list will be updated as said players get back to us.
To catch up with the entirity of Curse of Naxxramas' timeline and see all the revealed cards and all related news and information, visit our spoiler page.