As expected, Blizzard announced its next expansion for Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft at this past weekend's BlizzCon. The Mean Streets of Gadgetzan, Hearthstone's fourth full-scale expansion, is set to be released in early December and will consist of 132 cards.
The biggest change shown thus far is a series of "tri-class" cards, a departure from the past in which cards have all either been playable by one specific class or by all classes. This addition goes along with the general theme of the expansion set of three warring factions in the city of Gadgetzan, a neutral desert trading outpost found in World of Warcraft. The expansion draws heavily on the gangster film segment of film noir, with a generally lighter tone than the previous full expansion, Whispers of the Old Gods, that had tentacled monsters consuming souls rather than brightly covered gangsters in fedoras and pinstriped suits. MSG will also be the last set of new cards until next year's rotation that will shuffle Blackrock Mountain, The Grand Tournament, and League of Explorers out of the Standard format.
We'll be discussing the card set and how the cards are likely to affect competitive play in the coming weeks, but today, we're focusing on ESPN's card reveal, the Grimestreet Pawnbroker.
How does this card fit in competitive play and how likely will it have a key part in the upcoming meta? While there are many cards still to be released, the Grimestreet Pawnbroker does use variants of mechanics with a long history in Hearthstone.
Let's start with the basics. It's at three mana, 3/3 card at its core, a common stat configuration in Hearthstone. 3/3s match up poorly with the three mana 3/4 cards, of which there are many, so the playability of a 3/3 depends on it having a valuable effect.
Looking at class cards, there have been ten 3/3 cards, of which about half have seen significant play at some point: Aldor Peacekeeper and Steward of Darkshire in Paladin, SI:7 Agent in Rogue, Silverware Golem and Void Terror in Warlock, and Ravaging Ghoul in Warrior. All of these cards have a significant effect to go along with them, one with the potential to be abused, whether it's SI:7's ability to do damage and affect the board immediately, Silverware Golem's ability to be played for free, or the Whirlwind which attaches to Ravaging Ghoul, which triggers other Warrior effects.
The Pawnbroker's effect is a Battlecry, giving a random weapon in your hand +1/+1, these days, most likely a Fiery War Axe, Fool's Bane, or Gorehowl. Weapon effects are common in Warrior, but we haven't seen an effect quite like this, with the usual effect being to either give the player a weapon (N'Zoth's First Mate, Arathi Weaponsmith, Malkorok) or enhancing a weapon already in play. This card instead applies its effect to the weapon cards themselves, making a Fiery War Axe a 4/3 weapon, Fool's Bane into a 4/5, and Gorehowl into an 8/2 (which allows a face damage turn without destroying the weapon).
But is this card good enough to see play in the likely Warrior builds? That's a bit trickier. Affecting the card itself is a bit slow - a Warrior wants to be playing the Fiery War Axe on Turn 2 or Turn 1 with coin against decks with an aggressive early game, not waiting until Turn 4 to play a 4/3 weapon instead. A 4/5 Fool's Bane can remove more cleanly cards like Azure Drake and Tomb Pillager (more often than not, the Warrior will have already had to deal with one or both Totem Golems).
The best way to think of a card is a Shattered Sun Cleric (three-mana 3/2 that gives +1/+1 to a minion) for weapons instead of an on-board minion. The Cleric is a playable card, but it's just not good enough to find a spot in highly-refined decks. It's certainly better than Ogrimmar Aspirant, a three-mana 3/3 that gives +1 attack to an equipped weapon with Inspire -- not enough of an effect considering you need to use five mana for it not to be vanilla -- but Aspirant wasn't even close to making any tournament decks. The effect is also less useful to an aggressive Pirate build as the Pawnbroker cannot buff the Rusty Hook equipped from N'Zoth's first mate, while Bloodsail Cultist, a 3/4 for the same mana cost, can.
Warrior has a lot of competition for the three mana slot and it's hard to see this card fitting right now in most decks. Among class cards, Bash, Fierce Monkey, Frothing Berserker, Ravaging Ghoul, and Shield Block all vie for spots in decks and a Warrior can run only so many three-drops. And I'm not sure that Pawnbroker fits Warrior's goals better than any of these cards. If Pawnbroker makes it into competitive Warrior decks, I think it would have to be after the rotation, when Bash and Fierce Monkey leave.
In Arena, this card is more likely to see play simply because a three-mana 3/3 is more playable. Death's Bite remains in Arena and getting from four attack to five attack for turn four on-curve is the best scenario for Pawnbroker, allowing Warrior to more easily deal with a wide array of five-health four drops (the Yetis, Sen'jin Shieldmasta, Violet Teacher, etc.) without the fear of Harrison Jones, a card that is less available in Arena.
In summary, it's a neat card with a new spin on weapon enhancement. It might not fit in existing Warrior decks, but if there's a midrange or an aggressive Warrior deck out that can still get enough armor to make use of an enhanced Fool's Bane and maybe an Arcanite Reaper, this could be a powerful card.
But really, what's the fun of a card unveiling if it's just accompanied by one person's opinion? To get a wider view of where this card fits into the world of Hearthstone, I requested input from other members of the community.
The first place I turned to for a second opinion was Brian Kibler, a veteran card pro -- he's in the Magic: The Gathering Hall of Fame -- and also a designer involved in a number of trading card games, such as the original World of Warcraft Trading Card Game.
"It seems like a potentially powerful effect that helps hit certain health flashpoints with mid-game weapons (could be great with a Death's Bite-type weapon to follow it up, for instance) or to let heavy-hitting late-game weapons do more damage. It pairs very well with Gorehowl, for instance, which can hit for 15 total across two attacks if you can butt if with the Pawnbroker."
Kacem "Noxious" Khilaji, an analyst, streamer, and broadcaster noted for his deck experimentation shared a more optimistic view of the Pawnbroker than I did. "This card is awesome. It will either make Bloodsail Cultist better because of the redundancy or given how straight forward it is, make it obsolete," said Noxious in a short interview. "You play Fiery War Axe on Turn 2 and this on Turn 3 and you can probably get a good Arcanite Reaper on Turn 5. This might be the basis for an alternate win condition in some Warrior builds."
Chris "ChanmanV" Chan, the host and developer of Value Town also believes that the Pawnbroker could lead to a different type of deck, one that could be a Face Warrior's dream.
"It's different than Upgrade since you can't upgrade the weapon activated. That's the kicker with this card, but even one 6/3 Arcanite Reaper is well worth it. When you do hit, it's ridiculous in a deck like Face Warrior. 3/3 isn't that bad of a body and even if you whiff, it's not terrible. If this card became prevalent, you can guarantee that Acidic Swamp Ooze and Harrison Jones will be played even more than they already are.
For the Arena side of Hearthstone, I consulted with Mike "SimCopter1" Bender, who specializes in this part of Hearthstone.
"This is a decent minion that provides potential upside while sacrificing few stats (one stat point in this case, since true three-drops have a baseline of seven stat point). This card fits multiple playstyles: It can help midrange decks get the extra weapon value they need to keep the board, it can help face-oriented decks generate enough burn to win a match they might otherwise have lost. With that being said, I think Grimestreet Pawnbroker is best used as a midrange value generator that lets your weapons clear pressure from enemy minions.
On the downside, if the Battlecry doesn't hit or isn't relevant, it's going to be lackluster. A three mana 3/3 is below-average in an arena meta where high state minion on-curve in games. Luckily Warrior has quite a few weapons these days, but it would be a lot better if it interacted with Arathi Weaponsmith, Upgrade!, N'Zoth's First Mate, or Malkorok."