hearthstone Rise of Shadows is the First Expansion of the Year of the Dragon

[Zadina 923]

New features include the Twinspell Keyword, Lackey minions and Scheme cards.

The leaks were correct and the name of the new expansion is Rise of Shadows. It's a good mix of old and new as we see familiar faces and mechanics joined with new stuff like Twinspell, Lackeys and Schemes!

Launching worldwide on April 9, Rise of Shadows is Hearthstone’s newest expansion, featuring 135 new cards and a host of game improvements which were revealed when the Year of the Dragon was announced. Dave Kosak is here to introduce us the new expansion.

He hints about the next expansions of the Year of the Dragon bringing us to the "ancient depths".

Rise of Shadows is about Rafaam gathering an evil gang, his target being the city of Dalaran. What is his purpose, though? It remains to be revealed in the rest of the year, since the Year of the Dragon expansions will all be interlinked.

Hearthstone's nine classes are pitted against each other. On the one side, we have the League of Evil, whose leader is Arch-Villain Rafaam, a new Warlock Legendary minion. Warlocks are obviously part of the bad guys crew with Rogues, Shamans, Priests and Warriors joining them.

The Defenders of Dalaran are the good guys and they are made up of Druids, Mages, Paladins and Hunters.

 

The League of Evil doesn't operate on its own. After all, its masterminds are busy scheming and plotting; they need some muscle for the everyday bad-guy stuff, they need Lackeys! Lackeys are small 1/1 minions with strong Battlecries. Lackeys will not be limited to Rise of Shadows, as we will see them in the next expansions. They are token minions, only generated from other cards - they are not collectible.

We mentioned "scheming" in the previous paragraph. Schemes are cards that grow in power the longer they stay in your hand. It hasn't been determined if there is a limit to how much these cards can grow.

The new Keyword for this expansion is Twinspell. Once you cast a spell with this Keyword, a second copy of the spell is added to your hand. The copy doesn't have Twinspell.

Older mechanics will also return. You might remember Forbidden cards from Whispers of the Old Gods. With The Fortune Teller being present in both WotOG and Rise of Shadows, it's only natural that we see Forbidden again.

Speaking of The Fortune Teller, her actual name is Madame Lazul and she is an alternative Priest hero you can get from one of the pre-purchase options. There are three pre-purchase bundles for Rise of Shadows. The Standard Bundle costs 49.99 $/€ and contains 50 Rise of Shadows card packs, the Jewel of Lazul card back and a random RoS Legendary card. The 79.99 $/€ priced Bundle includes 80 packs, the Jewel of Lazul card back, the Madame Lazul Priest hero and a random Rise of Shadows Golden Legendary card. Lastly, the Shadow Bundle will be available only during the first week of the expansion: for 9.99 $/€ you can get 9 Rise of Shadows card packs and an Arena ticket.

The solo Adventure content will be released a month after Rise of Shadows, so somewhere in May.

*Images for Kalegcos and EVIL Miscreant are a courtesy of Hearthpwn.

[Migol 425]

Wait, wait a goddamn minute.

"Chef Nomi" is being portrayed as a good guy?    For serious?    He should be the hidden boss!

edit: Also isn't Kobold Lackey a bit too stronk?    1 mana for 2 damage is already a decent -spell-, adding a 1/1 body (and since it's a battlecry it gets around "untargetables" for that matter) seems like some real power creep

 

Edited March 14, 2019 by Migol

[Synesthesy 114]

I hate the fact that this time the alternate hero is both a cool one and one of a class where I don't own any alternate hero ? I don't want to spend that much!!!

 

However, the mage's dragon seems very very strong, while for Rafaam I was expecting something stronger... It isn't that good at all...

Edited March 14, 2019 by Synesthesy

[Migol 425]

47 minutes ago, Synesthesy said:

I hate the fact that this time the alternate hero is both a cool one and one of a class where I don't own any alternate hero ? I don't want to spend that much!!!

 

However, the mage's dragon seems very very strong, while for Rafaam I was expecting something stronger... It isn't that good at all...

Hakkar, the Soulflayer + Rafaam is a pretty damn powerful combo.    There's some RNG to it but generally legendaries are a decent thing to bet on.

[Smorod 33]

11 hours ago, Migol said:

Also isn't Kobold Lackey a bit too stronk?    1 mana for 2 damage is already a decent -spell-, adding a 1/1 body (and since it's a battlecry it gets around "untargetables" for that matter) seems like some real power creep

I agree. Same holds for most other Lackeys too. This makes me wonder if maybe Lackeys will be non-collectible cards, so you can't put them straight into your deck, but can only obtain them in-game from other cards (such as EVIL Miscreant)?

[FanOfValeera 253]

Just now, Smorod said:

I agree. Same holds for most other Lackeys too. This makes me wonder if maybe Lackeys will be non-collectible cards, so you can't put them straight into your deck, but can only obtain them in-game from other cards (such as EVIL Miscreant)?

They are incollectibles. As you can see, they have no colored gems on them, meaning, they are just tokens.

[Taan 46]

Looks pretty interesting so far.

Rafaam might definitly be interesting for newer players, who want to try out all those whacky legendaries. For me personally he doesn't look very good. I still think that from all random cards you can get, legendaries are the worst ones, since they are often very dependent on the rest of your deck (and cost a lot of mana).

From all the flavour going on I'm really looking forward to the singleplayer-content.

Edited March 15, 2019 by Taan

[Guest]

Rafaam may be fun for new players.

In constructed decks he is horribly bad.

Why? Because if there would be great decks consisting of only legendaries those decks would be played.

Even if you can choose the "perfect" legendaries for a deck, there is no way you can make a great deck.

How can a deck consisting of RANDOM legendaries be decent then? -> It can't be.

The dragon seems strong. Or can be strong, especially if there are several possibilities to get him as a 1/1 minion or something like that. (Without battlecry then of course), like you had the chance with Barnes. (But if you need to cast a spell to get a copy of him into the field he looses the potential.)

 

[NoahMcGrath 4]

33 minutes ago, WedgeAntilles said:

Rafaam may be fun for new players.

In constructed decks he is horribly bad.

Why? Because if there would be great decks consisting of only legendaries those decks would be played.

Even if you can choose the "perfect" legendaries for a deck, there is no way you can make a great deck.

How can a deck consisting of RANDOM legendaries be decent then? -> It can't be.

The dragon seems strong. Or can be strong, especially if there are several possibilities to get him as a 1/1 minion or something like that. (Without battlecry then of course), like you had the chance with Barnes. (But if you need to cast a spell to get a copy of him into the field he looses the potential.)

 

Well Elise Starseeker was played in warrior in the past, and she creates the Golden Monkey token. This Rafaam does that immediately, without the whole map thing, so maybe it'll be played too, who knows?

[Guest]

1 minute ago, NoahMcGrath said:

Well Elise Starseeker was played in warrior in the past, and she creates the Golden Monkey token. This Rafaam does that immediately, without the whole map thing, so maybe it'll be played too, who knows?

I am not sure I understood you correctly. Maybe my bad english or we are referring to different cards.

But Elise has nothing to do with Rafaam?

Elise adds a (very useful) card to your deck.

Rafaam replaces every card in your deck with a random one, lots of them useless.

[NoahMcGrath 4]

22 minutes ago, WedgeAntilles said:

I am not sure I understood you correctly. Maybe my bad english or we are referring to different cards.

But Elise has nothing to do with Rafaam?

Elise adds a (very useful) card to your deck.

Rafaam replaces every card in your deck with a random one, lots of them useless.

There are 2 Elises in hearthstone. Elise Starseeker and Elise the Trailblazer. 

Elise the Trailblazer is from Un'Goro.

Elise Starseeker is from the League of Explorers (where Rafaam first appeared) and she shuffles a Map to the Golden Monkey into your deck, and the map shuffles the Golden Monkey into your deck. The Golden Monkey has the same effect as Arch-Villain Rafaam. Elise Starseeker was played in control warrior because of the Golden Monkey battlecry, which replaced all the useless cards you had left late game with (generally) useful ones.

Since the effect of replacing your hand and deck with random legendaries was considered good in the past, i believe Arch-Villain Rafaam has a chance of being played in constructed.

[Guest]

Thx, my bad!

(Pop-ups of the cards don't work here and I only remembered Elise from Unguro. That's why I was confused^^)

Edited March 15, 2019 by Guest

[Hanz39 53]

Chef Nomi is the legendary noone will hope to open in their packs for this expansion. Battlecry: if you're dead summon a board full of 6/6 with no ability.

the lackeys seems very powerful so all the cards related to them will be pretty much good.

For the schemes i suspect they have some like Greater Emerald Spellstone so whatever class get that will be the new 'Hunter'

[Rhondis 148]

1 hour ago, Hanz39 said:

Chef Nomi is the legendary noone will hope to open in their packs for this expansion. Battlecry: if you're dead summon a board full of 6/6 with no ability.

Yea, I really don't understand how useful Chef Nomi would be in this expansion, nor in future expansions. Just seems to be a very meme-y card.

I haven't played Hearthstone in a good while but I will definitely keep an eye out. But right now I am too busy with MTG Arena, especially with War of The Spark on the horizon!

[FanOfValeera 253]

2 hours ago, WedgeAntilles said:

The dragon seems strong. Or can be strong, especially if there are several possibilities to get him as a 1/1 minion or something like that. (Without battlecry then of course), like you had the chance with Barnes. (But if you need to cast a spell to get a copy of him into the field he looses the potential.)

 

You can jusy play him (her?) and play a big spell with it. Normally big value minions which doesn't have taunt are bad tempo cards, because if your opponent is already ahead on board, they do nothing (Ysera is the bext example, and how The Lich King was chosen over her ). With this guy though, you can play a free Blizzard or Flamestrike to make sure you don't lose all that tempo, and you just don't lose the game on spot. And if your opponent does not have an immediate answer to Kalecgos, value and tempo gain is just insane. I believe it can be a core part of a new control mage archetype with Hex Lord Malacrass and Jan'alai, the Dragonhawk as late game value tools. A pure attrition deck. Only thing missing right now is a good neutral heal and maybe some mid game value cards (Antique Healbot and Sludge Belcher, anyone?)

[Pandabuffel 152]

20 hours ago, Migol said:

edit: Also isn't Kobold Lackey a bit too stronk?    1 mana for 2 damage is already a decent -spell-, adding a 1/1 body (and since it's a battlecry it gets around "untargetables" for that matter) seems like some real power creep

 

So far I think it's ok. You have to play the Miscreant first, which is a 3 mana 1/5 (not really good, a silenced tar creeper). It gives you RANDOM lackey's, so you don't get to pick the lackey that fits your current situation. You still have to play the lackey again for another 1 mana each to gain the (possible useful) effect. So if you played Miscreant on turn 3, you still have to wait a turn (or use coin) to play an useful lackey.

 

So I think right now it's still pretty good and doesn't feel too strong. It depends on all the cards that still have to be revealed. And offcourse it might happen that you get exactly the 2 lackey's you need, but that's RNG for you.

[Migol 425]

5 hours ago, Pandabuffel said:

On 3/14/2019 at 3:54 PM, Migol said:

 

So far I think it's ok. You have to play the Miscreant first, which is a 3 mana 1/5 (not really good, a silenced tar creeper). It gives you RANDOM lackey's, so you don't get to pick the lackey that fits your current situation. You still have to play the lackey again for another 1 mana each to gain the (possible useful) effect. So if you played Miscreant on turn 3, you still have to wait a turn (or use coin) to play an useful lackey.

 

So I think right now it's still pretty good and doesn't feel too strong. It depends on all the cards that still have to be revealed. And offcourse it might happen that you get exactly the 2 lackey's you need, but that's RNG for you.

Yeah I think they edited the post, it wasn't obvious that they were token creatures created by another card at first.     As it stands it's fine since it'll be at least turn 3 (with coin) before you see him

And I think the best Kalecgos play is simply playing him and a free spellbender (or just counterspell tho spellbender is the safer).     That makes it much, much harder for them to deal with him in one turn.    It will be very interesting to see what spells mage gains in this expansion, it's losing quite a bit with the rotation.    Whether Kalec is another worthless legendary or has a deck to build will probably depend on that

Edited March 15, 2019 by Migol

[Synesthesy 114]

On 3/15/2019 at 3:00 PM, NoahMcGrath said:

Well Elise Starseeker was played in warrior in the past, and she creates the Golden Monkey token. This Rafaam does that immediately, without the whole map thing, so maybe it'll be played too, who knows?

Yes and that was one of my favourite decks ever. But back in time the legendary pool was a lot better. There almost wasn't any bad legendaries, and surely not high cost low stat that exists nowaday when we have legendary 1/1.
This is why in Wild Elise isn't played anymore and old Control Warrior is dead (while there exists odd control warrior and fatigue dead hands warrior, both work in a very different way from old time Wallet Warrior and Elise based control or fatigue warrior).

[VaraTreledees 138]

Rafaam is pretty bad, while yes original elise was good, most control warrior decks had strong fatigue plans, control warlocks generally don't (and they especially won't without guldan).  They really want to close out the game with either RIn, or Mr. J.  Plus, locks in general, play less "bad" cards compared to control warrior (IE useless cards in certain match ups).  

 

Evil miscreant seems pretty good value wise, but god awful for tempo.  Plus lackeys lack spell synergy, which is where rogues tend to like there cheap value generation (IE spare parts).  But we all know how well value rogue has worked in the past.  Unless rogues get some serious synergy with lackeys I don't see this seeing play.

 

Nomi is bad.  Like really bad.  Against aggro and control he is just awful, stats are bad and no real effect, and against control he can't be played until fatigue, which means you AND your opponent have drawn your entire deck, and all that was previously dead suddenly has a target.  Also, while it is true that value cards can be good in control mirrors, even ones that summon tons of creatures, Nomi is specifically for control decks with a fatigue plan, which tend to run far less threats like that. He is just a bad card.

 

The jeweler is a great tech card.  Not sure if it will see play (completely meta game dependent), but a relevant and powerful effect on an efficiently stated body is about the best you can ask for in a tech card.

 

Kalec is good, I like Kalec.  BIg body, a powerful effect, and generates a card?  Not to mention said card means his powerful effect is never dead?  IF control mage is a thing, Kalec will be a major part of it.

 

Hagatha's scheme seems pretty good for controls shaman (if such a deck exists).  Probably a tad slow for any shaman deck that isn't hard control or combo though, so I don't think this will see play in some of the more mid rangey style decks.  

Forbidden words seems a tad weak, in terms of mana > killing relevant things ratio, but it offers priests a very strong utility piece, and fills a niche they can have trouble filling (A shadow word pain that isn't dead in some matches, plus a way to deal with early game minions on top of a way to deal with 4 attack minions), so I could definitely see it as a 1 of in some control or combo priest decks.

Forests aide seems bad,  8 mana don't impact the board and get another spell that is 8 mana don't impact the board?  Seems like a great way to throw a game of hearthstone if your ahead and it is probably faster to just concede if your behind.