Heaststone update 23.6

Update 23.6, releasing today, sets the stage for Murder at Castle Nathria, the next Hearthstone expansion! The patch also includes updates to battlegrounds, mercenaries, the arena, and more.

The next Hearthstone expansion , Castle Nathria Murder, is out August 2! This puzzle is set in the Shadowlands, where murder is considered the most heinous. You and the great detective Murloc Holmes will have to explore new location maps in search of clues to which of the 10 suspects killed the great Ser Denatrius! Murder at Castle Nathria includes 135 new cards related to the murder mystery and 10 guests at its center. You can read more on the Murder at Castle Nathria Announcement blog. Two pre-purchase options are now available to start your inquiry after the extension has launched.

Sign in and get Prince Renatal for free

Log into Hearthstone now for a first taste of the Natria Castle Assassination experience with the free legendary minion Prince Renathal! This powerful noble allows you to start the game with 40 lives and build a deck of 40 cards! Add it to your collection and see what you can do when you have more space to work with.

Battlefield Updates

General updates

New Moon Prizes are back! From now until the next season of Battlegrounds, Darkmoon trophies will appear in 25% of games. Several Darkmoon Prizes have been changed since their last appearance.

The number of copies of each level 1 minion has been reduced from 16 to 15. The following Battlegrounds bonuses are extended until the next season of Battlegrounds (instead of the next standard expansion): Discover 4 Heroes; Early access to heroes (if any heroes eligible for early access are released during this time); and Advanced statistics. The visual emotes will remain until the next standard expansion, at which point all Battlegrounds players will receive the base visual emotes. Stay tuned for more updates on Battlegrounds bonuses and rewards for the next season of Battlegrounds!

New hero

Lady Vashj (Armor Level 1) Relics of the Deep[1 Gold]. Reveal a sorcery spell of your level or lower. Passive: Your first turn is permanent.

Players with Battlegrounds bonuses will have early access to Lady Vashj ahead of her official release on July 11th.

Hero Updates

Bigglesworth

Bigglesworth's Hero Power will now grant a Consolation Coin every time the player dies without minions.

Kariel Rome

Persuasion now targets more minions at each rank: two random friendly ones at rank 1; four random friendly minions at rank 2; and all friendly minions at rank 3.

Drek'Thar

Old: Choose a friendly minion. It copies your minion's attack with the highest attack until the next turn. → New: select a minion. It copies the minion's Attack with the highest Attack until the next turn.

Developer Comment: Drek'Thar and Vandar can now target and copy from any minion, including the minions in Bob's Tavern.

Gaff Runetotem

Old: armor level 7 → New: armor level 4

Old:[1 Gold]Give a friendly minion of each tavern level +1/+1. → New:[2 Gold]Give a friendly minion of each tavern level +3/+2.

Overlord Saurfang

Old: Give +2 Attack to the next minion you buy this turn. (Improves every turn!) → New: Give +2 Attack to the next minion you buy. (Update every turn!)

Developer Comment: The effect now persists between turns.

Sindragosa

Old: Freeze a minion in Bob's tavern. Frozen minions get +2/+1 each turn. → New: Freeze a minion in Bob's Tavern. Passive: At the end of your turn, frozen minions get +2/+1.

Developer Comment: This is not a functional change. This is just to more clearly distinguish the active part of the hero power from the passive part.

snead

Old: armor level 7 → New: armor level 1

Old:[2gp]Give a friendly minion: "Deathrattle: Summon a random minion of the same tavern level." → New:[1 Gold]Give a friendly minion: "Deathrattle: Summon a random lower tavern minion."

Vanndar

Old: Choose a friendly minion. It copies the health of your highest health minion until the next turn. → New: select a minion. It copies the health of the minion with the highest health until the next turn.

Y'Shaarj

Old: Start of Combat: Summons a minion of your tavern level. Add a copy of it to your hand. → New: Combat Start: Add a minion from your tavern level to your hand. Summon a copy of it.

Developer Comment: This means the minion will be added to your hand even if there is no space on the board to summon it.

New minions

Tavern Tipper[Tavern Level 1]2 attack, 2 health. If you have unspent gold left at the end of your turn, gain +1/+2.Silverback Patriarch[Tavern Tier 1, Beast]1 attack, 4 health. Provocation.

Sparring Partner[Tavern Level 2]3 attacks, 2 taunts. Battlecry: Gives a taunt to a minion.

Freaky Chemist[Tavern Level 2]4 attack, 4 health. Battlecry: Swap a minion's attack and health.

Yrel[Tavern Level 2]1 attack, 5 health. After this attack, a friendly minion of each type gets +1/+2.

Atramedes[Tavern Level 4, Dragon]3 attack, 6 health. Whenever it attacks, deal 3 damage to the target and its neighbors.

Combat Equipment[Level 4 Tavern, Mech]5 Attack, 5 Health. Magnetism.

Tunnel Blaster[Tavern Level 4]3 attack, 7 health. mockery. Deathrattle: Deal 3 damage to all minions.

Uther, the Lightbringer[Tavern Level 6]5 Attack, 6 Health. Battlecry: Set the minion's attack and health to 15.

Minion Pool Updates

Werewolf Zerus and Iron Sensei were returned to the minion pool.

Acolyte of C'Thun, Menagerie Mug, Volatile Ghoul, Promising Greeneye, Screwdriver, Prestor's Fire Spawn, Argus' Defender, and Mecha Egg have been removed from the minion pool.

Minion Updates

bannerbor

Old: 1 attack, 4 health. At the end of your turn, play a blood gem on an adjacent quilboar. → New: 1 attack, 3 health. At the end of your turn, play bloodstone on nearby minions.

Annihilan Warlord

Old: 3 attacks → New: 5 attacks

soul Eater

Old: Battlecry: Choose a friendly demon. Remove him to get his stats and 3 gold. → New: Battlecry: Consume a friendly demon to gain its stats and 3 gold

.Developer Comment: This is not a functional change. This change is only made to make the text better match the existing effects.

Grease bot

Old:[Tavern Level 4]3 Attack, 6 Health. After a friendly minion loses Divine Shield, give it +1/+1 permanently. → New:[Tavern level 6]4 attack, 7 health. Divine shield. After a friendly minion loses Divine Shield, give it +3/+2 permanently.

New and Updated New Moon Prizes

Several Darkmoon trophies have been updated since they last appeared on the battlefield:

Good things

Old: Give minions in Bob's Tavern +2 Health for the rest of the game. → New: Give minions in Bob's tavern +1 attack for the rest of the game. I'm still just a caged ratOld: Minion double attack. → New: Give a minion +2 attack and then double its attack.

Great deal

Old: Until end of game, reduce Bob's Tavern Upgrade Cost by (3) at the end of your turn. → New: Bob's tavern upgrade cost reduced by (6).BouncerOld: Give a friendly minion +5/+5 and Taunt. → New: Give a friendly minion +6/+6 and Taunt.

B.A.N.A.N.A.S.

Bananas now have a 50% chance to become a Big Banana (no change to the card text box). In addition, the Big Banana has been removed from the Darkmoon Faire prize pool and two new prizes have been added:

banana bunch

(Bonus Move 1): Add 2 bananas to your hand.

Developer Comment: These Bananas have a 50% chance to be Big Bananas as well.

Mind Flayer Goggles

(Bonus Move 3): Steal all the minions in Bob's tavern. Then update it.

Finally, players who are in the bottom half of the leaderboard no longer have a chance to win the best prizes.

Mercenary Updates

Sign in now to get three free portraits!

Any player who completes the Mercenaries tutorial will receive special portraits for Tyrande Whisperwind, Millhouse Manastorm, and Xirella! These portraits are a thank you to everyone who has tried Mercenaries since its launch. We know you've all been looking forward to seeing what big changes we've been working on this year, including what you'll be able to do with your extra coins.

Later this year, we'll be adding a system that will allow you to trade in some of your extra coins for random Mercenary Coins you own but haven't upgraded yet. We're also still working on the final content hinted at in the Year of the Hydra announcement, including a way to use extra coins to increase the power and personalize traits of your Boosted Mercenaries, all of which we're still looking forward to a bit further down the line.

Implementing these systems has taken us a little longer than we expected, but we wanted to let you know that we have a clear plan in place for our goals for these projects, we are actively working on them and they are getting closer. We consider this our highest priority in the development of mercenaries; we just need some more time to make sure everything is done right. This is a one-time reward for accounts that have already completed the Mercenary training at the release of Update 23.6. These players will automatically add these portraits to their collection. These portraits may become available to other players at a later date.

New Timed Event: Yogg-Saron

The Old Gods continue their offensive, and Yogg-Saron turns his many jaws on the mercenaries. You can take on the MADNESS itself in this limited-time event starting June 30th. The event will consist of 10 special quests centered around the ancient god Yogg-Saron. Two new Event Quests can be unlocked on each of the first five days of the event, but you have until July 15th to complete all 10 Quests. Completing all 10 quests will reward you with a Yogg-Saron Mercenary, a random Golden Yogg-Saron Portrait, a Yogg-Saron Diamond Portrait, and 700 Mercenary Coins! Nagas, Spellcasters and a couple of night elves will be an integral part of this battle.

New mercenary:

Yogg-Saron (Legendary Caster)

Ancient God 10/80 Max stats

Capabilities:

Mad Gaze 5 (Shadow): (Speed 2) Deal 15 damage to an enemy or restore 15 health to a friendly character. Randomly swap your ability speeds. Mind Yoggle 5 (Shadow): (Speed 6) Give a friendly character +5 Attack this turn. They attack a random enemy. The Old Gods' abilities refresh (1) per attack this turn.Oh My Yogg 5 (Shadow): (Speed 15, Cooldown 15) Randomly use 5 other abilities from mercenaries in a game with random targets.

Equipment:

Eye Penetration 4: Mad Eye deals an additional 5 damage. Lash of Hysteria 4: Mind Yoggle grants an additional +5 Attack.

Awakening Roar 4: Battlecry: Old Gods Renewal (4). Yogg-Saron Coins have replaced Garrosh Hellscream's Coins as a reward for Garrosh Hellscream's bounty (in the Sunken City area). Yogg-Saron and his portraits will initially be unobtainable from sets or crafting. Yogg-Saron and his portraits will be obtainable via the normal methods in the post-event patch. Y'Shaarj and his portraits can now be obtained by all normal means.

Arena Updates

When Update 23.6 is released, all current Arena runs will end and a new Arena Season will begin. Eligible card sets will be rotated so that the following sets make up the Arena card pool:

• Basic
• The Boomsday Project
• Onslaught of dragons
• Hardened by the steppes
• United by Stormwind
• Rift in Alterac Valley
• Journey to the sunken city
• Taverns of Time

The fire festival is back

Starting June 30, join a special chain of seven Legendary Fire Festival quests! Complete all seven quests to earn a Standard Set, a Card Set for each of Shattered in Alterac Valley, Journey to the Sunken City, and Murder at Castle Nathria, Mercenary Pack, Battlegrounds Hero Skin, and Warrior Hero Skin ".

New features include an expanded list of recent players and in-game reporting.

The features of recent players have been expanded and improved in the friends list. There will now be a dedicated section at the top of your friends list that includes your latest opponent, former friends, new friends, your current opponent, and more.

In addition, we're excited to announce that a player reporting feature will be added to the in-game friends list menu soon! You will be able to report players from the recent players list (including your current opponent) or from the friends list. Grounds for complaint will be inappropriate names, inappropriate chats, and inappropriate gameplay. We're finalizing this feature, so you'll see hints of it in-game with this patch, and it'll be available soon!

Bug fixes and game improvements

• Fixed an issue where deck changes would not transfer across devices and/or when making changes offline.
• Fixed an issue that caused the Glittering Macaw to copy Gigafin's death rattle with its warcry.
• Fixed an issue where Glowingscale's temporary Divine Shield could remove a minion's permanent Divine Shield.
• Reduced requirements for Y'Shaarj quests 3 and 10.Fixed an issue where the "Complete the bounty at level 30" quests would sometimes not complete as written.Fixed an issue that caused all "kill two enemies in one" quests to not track move."
• Fixed various bugs with Diamond Portrait lines.
• Fixed an issue where Queen Azshara's Heroic Bounty would not unlock after completing the Fish of N'Zoth regular bounty. Fixed an issue that caused Queen Azshara's Bleed and Freeze abilities to not work in the Hunter Boss encounter.
• Fixed various textual, visual, and functional issues with some mercenary abilities, including issues with Maiev's Confinement ability and Queen Azshara's mage primary ability.
• Fixed an issue that caused the Ice Block Talisman to trigger even if the wearer had a Divine Shield to protect it.
• Fixed a bug with removing Stealth if all characters have Stealth.
• Fixed an issue in Duels where Brann's Hero Power "Tracking Dinosaurs" could result in a disconnect.
• Fixed an issue where Zephrys' Lamp would cause a client crash in the Tombs of Terror.
• The ability to copy a deck has been added to Duel. Fixed an issue that caused deck codes to not work with some heroes.
• Other performance improvements, text updates and bug fixes.