Hearthstone’s Patch 21.4.4 is a small, but pleasant surprise for Battlegrounds players. The main focus of today’s changes is to target Mech strategies that use Omega Buster and Holy Mecherel.
Omega Buster was a vital card to players aiming to spike six drops, since it could provide immense bonuses to wide boards of Mechs. These strengths were boosted when combined with cards like Baron Rivendare or Monstrous Macaw (if Beasts were in the minion pool for that lobby). Now that it has 1/1 less worth of stats and spawns one less Microbot, both its initial body and Deathrattle are less efficient.
Despite this nerf, Mechs will still appreciate finding an Omega Buster, but the need for tools that amplify is exasperated now since this tribe will be brought more in-line to others. The nerf to Holy Mecherel nerfs general Divine Shield strategies; having less attack early means you need to invest more effort into making Mecherel’s stats matter.
Blizzard is also making changes to Recycling Wraith, but only to specifically nerf one hero that can use it, Millhouse Manastorm. Recycling Wraith allowed for turns with ridiculously potent economy swings, because making a reroll free could improve consistency. When combined with Millhouse, who has cheaper minions and more expensive rerolls, this could make most Elementals effectively return gold to you when played.
Now that Recycling Wraith can only reduce the cost of rerolls by one, this brings Millhouse down to par with every other hero in the game. But if you do manage to control two Recycling Wraiths, their effects will stack as confirmed by a Hearthstone Battlegrounds designer.
If you do manage to make a golden version of Recycling Wraith, it won’t be as economically beneficial as two regular ones since the golden effect reads “Your next 2 Refreshes cost (1) less,” which was also confirmed by the same designer.
Here are all of the changes coming with Hearthstone Patch 21.4.4.
Battlegrounds minion updates
- Omega Buster
- Old: Six Attack, six Health. Deathrattle: Summon six 1/1 Microbots. For each that doesn’t fit, give your Mechs +1/+1. → New: Five Attack, five Health. Deathrattle: Summon five 1/1 Microbots. For each that doesn’t fit, give your Mechs +1/+1.
- Holy Mecherel
- Old: Eight Attack, four Health. → New: Six Attack, four Health.
- Recycling Wraith
- Old: After you play an Elemental, your next Refresh costs (0). → New: After you play an Elemental, your next Refresh costs (1) less.
Bug fixes and game improvements
- Added missing lightning bolt symbol to signify some Avenge triggers.
- General performance updates to Mercenaries mode.
- Fixed Diablo’s Apocalypse Ability to show the correct damage numbers while Magma Horn is equipped.
- Fixed a text error where Jaina’s Task Two stated the wrong Ability name.
- Fixed a bug preventing privacy settings from being saved for new players.
Hearthstone: United in Stormwind’s Patch 20.4.4 is live now with the updated Battlegrounds balance update.
