by JR Cook - 10 years ago     show comments

Pyroblast has hurt a lot of people and torn apart a number of families. Actually, it hasn’t done either of those things. It has, however, made a lot of people very angry. Pyroblast, in conjunction with standard aggressive creatures has created an inhospitable landscape for most other decks because of its ability to deal ten damage by turn eight. It’s been difficult to race the spell, even for incredibly skilled players. The end result of its supremacy is that in the next Hearthstone balance patch, Pyroblast will see its mana cost bumped up to ten, similar to the Priest spell Mind Control.

Why the change?

Talrakus offered this explanation when the upcoming changes were announced:

• The 8-cost Pyroblast made for an un-interactive experience where the Mage only needed to do 10 damage during the course of a game and then double Pyroblast you for the win. We want Mages to be more interactive with the opponent to achieve victory, rather than delay the game until they can Pyroblast.

The reasoning is sound, and does justice to what the situation was. There were a number of games where, no matter what you did, a Mage was going to kill you on turn nine. The most you could hope for is that, out of a 30 card deck, Pyroblast was the 29th and 30th card. It was simply too good.

Does this change address the issue?

It does. Mage will still be capable of dealing 20 damage between two copies of the spell, but it’ll take a fair bit longer. Moreover, Pyroblast will no longer be able to be comboed with Frostbolt, Fireblast or Arcane Missiles, at least not without the aid of Sorcerer’s Apprentice. I had personally lobbied on Twitter for the card to be bumped up to nine, so that it could remain comboable with Arcane Missiles, but this is what Team Five went with and it’s not a bad change at all. 

What does this mean for Mages?

Mages have been incredibly dominant and, unsurprisingly, have seen a fair few nerfs since closed beta began. I absolutely believe the class is still viable, but expect to see a sharp decline in the number of people playing the class until someone formulates a winning solution again. Burst damage will still be doable, and it might be that we start seeing spell damage become more of a factor again. In the midst of the aggro revolution, most spell damage creatures (aside from Bloodmage Thalnos and Azure Drake) seem to have dropped off the face of the earth. That might change. It’d be awesome to see Malygos trolling around the battlefield again.

Secrets haven’t been played with much but we’ve seen a small bit of success with them in Mana Grind tournaments. Given their slow nature, Pyroblast would likely still be useful in that sort of setup. Again, expect a decline, but it will be because players want sure bets, not because the class can’t be played well. This change, combined with earlier frost spell nerfs feels reminiscent of the Rogue changes a while back. This time, I’m not betting against the nerfed class.

Where will Mages be in the new pecking order?

I’d say Mages will be middle of the pack. Druids, Rogues and Paladins should become the most dominant decks, but Mages will likely have a better time than Warlocks and Warriors in the face of upcoming nerfs. It also remains to be seen what Hunters will do with their new and improved Unleash the Hounds.