All Hearthstone Expansions, Ranked from Worst to Best

by JR Cook - 8 years ago     show comments

With the announcement of the new Hearthstone Standard Format, we now know that old expansions will eventually be rotated out. With that said, I’ve decided to take a look our beloved cards sets and see how good they actually were. Join me as I rank the expansions and see which ones will I miss, and which ones I’m glad to see gone.

Lets start at the bottom of the barrel…

Rank 5 – The Grand Tournament

The Grand Tournament was Hearthstone’s version of Warcraft’s Argent Tournament, and those riders sure left a lot of dust on their path. The Grand Tournament featured really uninspiring mechanics and a whole lot of barely unusable cards. Both Joust and Inspire seemed pretty cool and fun when they were announced, but they didn’t really pan out. TGT was an expansion that looked very interesting on paper, but besides a few interesting cards making it to the already established decks, this set is probably the biggest failure in Hearthstone’s short life. TGT is going to remain in Standard for a while and that’s a shame, because a lot of weak cards will use valuable format space, yet see no competitive use.  Oh well, on to number 4!

Rank 4 – Goblins vs. Gnomes

Goblins vs Gnomes was the first full set introduced to Hearthstone, and in hindsight, I believe it was more a miss than a hit. GvG introduced a lot of WILD high-variance RNG effects (Shredder, Unstable Portal, Boom Bot, Imp-losion, et al.), which I’m very glad will stay in the wild format. Not only that, but the power creep was real in TGT. Cards like the aforementioned Shredder and Dr.Boom are still dominating to this very day, and have prevented a lot of cards on their mana slots from seeing competitive play. Then there’s the mech decks, those uglies still pop up from time to time, and still steal games just by getting those lucky and drawing those insane Mechwarper openers. Man, the more I write about it, the more glad I am that this awful set is finally going to be gone.

Rank 3 – Blackrock Mountain

Everyone, get in here! Blackrock Mountain was Hearthstone second PvE adventure, and it’s mostly known for its addition of Grim Patron, Flamewaker, Quick Shot, and Emperor Thaurissan to the metagame. Blackrock also brought a Dragon theme to the game that ended up being quite underwhelming, although things got a bit better for Dragon Decks when the Twilight Guardian was released on the next set. Blackrock was a very nice and harmless PvE adventure that could’ve been one of the best expansions out there if it had brought stronger Dragon archetypes and more usable cards, but alas it was not to be. I still think Blackrock was a positive set overall, but I just wish that it had exploited its full potential.

Rank 2 – Curse of Naxxramas

Naxx out! Back in 2014, Naxxramas was the first wave of new cards to hit Hearthstone. Naxxramas brought on a lot of very solid cards that have become staples of the metagame. Sludge Belcher, Loatheb, Haunted Creeper, Death’s Bite, Zombie Chow, Dark Cultist, and Void Caller are all fine cards that see a lot of play, and you might even argue that they are a slight too strong. Naxxramas also brought interesting cards like Nerubian Egg, Shade of Naxxramas, Echoing Ooze, Duplicate, Kel’thuzad, and Spectral Knight that are all usable in the right circunstances. But Naxx wasn’t without flaw, it introduced the super broken Undertaker and Mad Scientist, the first of which had to be nerfed because of its insanity, and the second one keeps adding insane value to Mages and Hunters everywhere. Naxxramas greatly improved the game and was a great start for Hearthstone as a game, yet I feel like its run its course and for all its greatness, I’m happy to see it phase out.

Rank 1 – The League of Explorers

Adventure we seek, ‘cross land and sea, won’t you come and join us? The League of Explorers is not only the latest Hearthstone expansion, but also the best one overall. Hearthstone introduced the wonderful Discover Mechanic. Discover takes all the fun parts of the wild RNG that makes Hearthstone a very fluid and dynamic game, and mixes it with the kind of decision making that makes Hearthstone a wonderful competitive discipline. Hearthstone has a lot of cards that could be really good in certain situations or matchups, but are not strong enough overall to justify the deck slot. Discover rewards the players that can find those situations and make those correct choices.

But its not just one mechanic, the League of Explorer is full of fun, interesting, and playable cards. Nearly every card in the sets has a place in some sort of viable deck, and even the ones that are not can find decent value in the arena, or as cool techs for certain Tavern Brawls and PvE encounters. The League of Explorers was the first adventure to have all of their legendary cards to be highly usable, and cards such as Reno Jackson and Anyfin Can Happen opened a lot of interesting decks options. The League of Explorer was basically the perfect Hearthstone expansion and it is the easy choice for number one on this list.

What is your ranking for all of the Hearthstone expansions? Let me know using the comment section below! You can also follow me on Twitter @DannieRay23.