Well Met! My name is snower, a Legend player from North America and avid warlock user. Today I would like to discuss and evaluate the fixed version of the epic warlock card, [card]Bane of Doom[/card].
To give a brief overview, it is a 5 mana warlock class spell that deals 2 damage to any character, and if that character dies, a random demon is summoned for you. Before the new alteration, this card was considered to be absolutely awful, due to the fact that the demons summonable by [card]Bane of Doom[/card] were limited to low cost demons like [card]Blood Imp[/card] and [card]Voidwalker[/card]. The card simply did not do enough for its mana cost.
Now, Bane of Doom has been changed to summon any collectible demon, including cards such as [card]Mal'Ganis[/card] and [card]Illidan Stormrage[/card]. These changes have brought the card back into the spotlight, and have created two main schools of thought as to whether or not warlocks should add [card]Bane of Doom[/card] to their demonic arsenal.
Bane of Doom is good
One of the main arguments behind this school of thought is that the card can be compared to [card]Unstable Portal[/card]. While the pool of cards is much more limited than Unstable Portal, the concept is shockingly similar. The argument is basically this: when a 6 or higher mana cost minion is pulled from Unstable Portal, you will more often than not win the game as a result. Similarly, when Bane of Doom pulls a huge demon, you will most likely win. To summarize, many consider both unstable Portal and Bane of Doom to be good cards because they both grant a percentage chance to outright win the game when they are played by pulling big minions.
Bane of Doom is bad
At the same time, there are many different arguments to be made on this side of the coin.
1) The summon effect is conditional
One of the most compelling is the condition that needs to be met to summon a demon - i.e. kill an enemy character with [card]Bane of Doom[/card] is too specific to merit play.
If the card was more like Unstable Portal, in that you summoned a demon 100% of the time, the card would be better, but because the card cannot simply be played to summon a demon, it is too slow and too conditional to deserve a slot. The card can only be played in tandem with another card to deal lethal damage with Bane of Doom, or a minion with a specific amount of stats needs to have survived on board for a turn.
2) The demon summoned will be bad half of the time
Paying 5 mana to deal 2 damage is obviously terrible. The fair mana cost for dealing 2 damage is established at 1 because of cards like [card]Arcane Shot[/card] and [card]Holy smite[/card]. So with Bane of Doom, you are realistically paying 4 mana to summon a random demon. Therefore any demon summoned below 4 mana is bad value, and there are plenty of demons below 4 mana: Blood Imp, Flame Imp, and Voidwalker are just a few. The card has a 50% chance of giving you a bad minion, and as a result, is not a good choice.
Here is a list of all summonable Demons with their good or bad rating (Based on 2 mana deal 2 damage being bad):
1. Voidwalker (Bad)
2. Blood Imp (Bad)
3. Flame Imp (Bad)
4. Mistress of Pain (Bad)
5. Succubus (Bad)
4. Felguard (Good)
5. Imp Gang Boss (Bad)
6. Void terror (Bad)
7. Pit Lord (Good)
8. Voidcaller (Varies on hand/Based on stats Bad)
9. Doomguard (Good)
10. Floating Watcher (Good)
11. Dread Infernal (Good)
12. Lord Jaraxxus (Good)
13. Mal'Ganis (Good)
14. Illidan Stormrage (Good)
3) Warlock is a class that specializes in putting big threats out early and does not need another mechanic for it.
When we look at warlock, we see that the class is naturally designed to be able to play powerful minions faster than other classes, often at a significant cost. Class cards like [card]Doomguard[/card] and [card]Pit Lord[/card] are great examples of this. They offer stats that are far above other cards of their mana cost, but are balanced by costing other resources besides mana. Doomguard costs cards, and Pit Lord costs life. Another example of warlock's acceleration of threats is the infamous [card]Voidcaller[/card], a card which pulls a demon from you hand when it dies.
Furthermore, giants and [card]Twilight Drake[/card]s synergize with the warlock's hero ability to increase hand size and reduce the cost of disgustingly big minions. It is argued that these mechanics already are more than enough for warlock decks, and that the card slot taken up by [card]Bane of Doom[/card] is better reserved for support cards, like removal spells, for example.
To summarize, Bane of Doom is a very interesting card that has a lot of potential, but a lot of drawbacks at the same time. I personally believe that Bane of Doom is best as a single copy in Midrange Demonlocks. The chance of outright winning the game makes the card good enough to see play, but two of them becomes too cumbersome. During many games, Bane of Doom may simply sit in your hand for 5 turns, or summon a blood imp, and those times you will feel quite sad, but there will also be times where Bane of Doom summons [card]Mal'Ganis[/card] and your opponent will simply concede. Bane of Doom is a powerful card and definitely merits checking out!