The Patch According to Discord: 0.28.0
Introduction
Welcome to the second Patch According to Discord post. Like the Meta According to Discord, this is a crowdsourced endeavour from various players of mostly a fairly high level; thanks to everyone who filled out my survey.
How It Works
I asked respondents to rate changes that weren’t clearly direct buffs on a three point “scale”: “Buffed”, “Nerfed”, or “Situational”, and requested a comment (especially for “situational” responses).
For the buffed or nerfed cards, I asked respondents to rate the changes from “Not Impactful” to “Impactful”, on a scale of 0-3.
The Fun Factor is a rating on a scale from 1-5 whether the change makes the game more or less fun to play overall. I’ve included quartiles to give an idea of how the mean is influenced by outliers who love or hate the change.
For the faction standings, I asked players to rank the factions from best to worst, allowing ties if they felt they were equivalent. I then averaged the rank assigned to each faction and ranked the average. There are other ways of interpreting the data, which might produce different results, but this is close enough.
Faction Standings
- Lyonar
- Songhai
- Magmar
- Vetruvian
- Vanar, Abyssian
Summary Infographics
Courtesy of the excellent ZeroUnderscoreOu, there are some visual representations of the impact and fun factor of all the changes. Many many thanks! Click to enlarge.
Breakdown
Card Limit
All decks 39 cards + General ➝ All decks 39-54 cards + General
The vast majority of respondents view adding only a small number of cards (mostly 1-2, some up to around 5) as potentially useful, with 40 card decks remaining optimal in most’s opinion.
Reworks
Entropic Decay
| 4 Mana ➝ 3 Mana | Destroy a minion nearby an ally. ➝ Destroy all minions on the same row as your General. |
Buffed (24): Vetruvian already plays a game of threatening Star’s Fury against spread minions and Blast against lined-up minions. This doubles down on that effect. It also has potential to remove far more minions, giving Vet some semblance of AoE removal, and has potentially much longer range. The reduction in cost to 3 is the icing on the cake.
Situational (5): It’s remarkably difficult to get value from when your General is Provoked, especially by large Lyonar bodies like Ironcliffe Guardian. The potential for friendly fire can be troubling, particularly for Obelysk decks where you can’t move your minions out of the way.
Overall: Overwhelmingly Buffed
Fun Factor: 3.37 (Median 4, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Void Pulse
Deal 2 damage to the enemy General and heal your General for 3 ➝ Deal 1 damage to a unit and heal your General for 2.
Buffed (7): It’s much more versatile, especially as a Nightsorrow Assassin activator, potentially allowing you to cut Bloodtear Alchemists and free up deck space.
Situational (15): The versatility is offset by reduced sustaining power, and it deals less damage to face now if you choose to send it there. Slower Abyssian decks profit, but aggro Abyssian is unhappy.
Nerfed (7): On a 1 mana spell, losing a point of damage and a point of healing is a huge efficiency cut.
Overall: Situational (Slower)
Fun Factor: 3.96 (Median 4, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 5)
Soulshatter Pact
Give allied minions +2/+0 until your next turn. ➝ Give an enemy minion -2/-0. Give allied minions nearby it +2/+0.
Buffed (8): The card is now stronger outside of Swarm, which is a weak archetype anyway. It also can be used as a tempo tool to enable trades with less health lost, and no longer obviously and directly competes with the much stronger Deathfire Crescendo
Situational (8): It may produce less damage overall, but can be used as a proactive debuff as well as a permanent buff to your own units.
Nerfed (12): You need to position around an enemy minion, which in turns needs to exist on the board. It can also no longer be comboed with Jax, and the persistence of the buff means little when most Abyssian minions have the durability of a wet tissue.
Overall: Mixed (Negative)
Fun Factor: 3.29 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Plasma Storm
Destroy minions with 2 or less Attack. ➝ Destroy minions with 3 or less Attack in a 3×3 area.
Buffed (26): Going back up to 3 attack makes a big difference, and it didn’t come at the literal expense of more mana. Although it’s not global any more, 3x3 is a large area, so you can still hit a lot of things with it. It’s particularly painful against Silverguard Knight and Ironcliffe, which are often clustered near the Lyonar General. The area target allows you to avoid your own minions.
Situational (1): “Dunno.”
Nerfed (1): No longer combos with Metamorphosis for a full clear.
Overall: Overwhelmingly Buffed
Fun Factor: 3.29 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Jax Truesight
| 6 Mana ➝ 7 Mana | 1/1 ➝ 3/2 |
Buffed: crickets
Situational (1): Nothing has actually changed to make it more healthy, it’s just harder to get to.
Nerfed (26): Going from 6 to 7 mana is a massive gap when it’s your primary win condition (as was the case in many Vanar decks), and the value of the card is in the split between five bodies, so giving one of them +2/+1 isn’t very useful. It’s harder to ramp into with mana tiles now as well.
Overall: Overwhelmingly Nerfed
Fun Factor: 3.89 (Median 4, 1st Quartile 4, 3rd Quartile 5)
Nerfs
Sundrop Elixir
Heal a unit for 5. ➝ Heal a unit for 4.
4 health is still enough to restore nearly every minion to full HP, and Lyonar games don’t usually come down to the wire with only 1 or 2 HP left on the General. On the other hand, 5 HP takes 3 General attacks to clear where 4 HP only takes 2, so in some ways it does potentially miss thresholds. Although the card is weaker, it’s only by a little.
Average rating: 1.1 “Not Very Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 1)
Fun Factor: 3.38 (Median 4, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Nightsorrow Assassin
3/3 ➝ 4/2
As noted with Sundrop, the difference between an odd and an even number is a General attack. This change makes it much easier to clear Nightsorrow with your general. Although the up-front cost is 1 higher, the overall cost is likely to be 2 lower as at 3/3 it could survive the first attack and then go face as a 3/1. It also now dies to most 2 drops and most AoE damage. On the other hand, it’s a little easier to use with the new Void Pulse.
Average rating: 2.24, “Significantly Impactful”
Fun Factor: 3.2 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Buffs
Mask of Shadows
Your General has +1/+0 and Backstab (2) ➝ Your General has +1/+0 and Backstab (3)
The general opinion is that the card is still not very good because of how heavily Spellhai overshadows anything else you can do with Songhai, but at only 1 mana it presents a real threat of suddenly producing 4 damage for very little. There is likely an awkward breakpoint: as it stands it’s still not very useful, but if it’s buffed again it may surge to being too strong.
Average rating: 1, “Not Very Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 1)
Fun Factor: 3.21 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 3)
Siphon Energy
Dispel an enemy minion. ➝ Dispel a minion.
The prevailing opinion among respondents is that this is unlikely to dramatically change anything, but is still handy. It obviously allows you to dispel debuffs such as Sand Trap, but also offers slightly further out-there plays like dumping it on a friendly minion to free up hand space or trigger Arcanyst effects.
Average rating: 1.34, “A Little Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 1)
Fun Factor: 3.86 (Median 4, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Dark Terminus
Destroy a minion and summon a Wraithling for its owner on that space. ➝ Destroy a minion and summon a Wraithling on that space.
Although this is clearly better, most respondents still felt that 4 mana is a lot to pay for removal and that most Abyssian decks will probably still not want to run it. Also many comparisons to old Entropic Decay.
Average rating: 1.71, “Somewhat Impactful” (Median 2, Mode 2)
Fun Factor: 3.29 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Draugar Lord
Draugar Lord: 6 Mana ➝ 5 Mana | 7/6 ➝ 6/5 Ice Drake: Ice Drake: 2/7 ➝ 2/6
The move to 5 mana makes Draugar Lord a lot easier to play, and also permits a Draugar Lord / Razorback power combo on 9 mana if you (somehow) have a board of walls. At the same time, the 6 health on the Drakes still dodges single card removal spells, and Draugar Lord’s stats (after it transforms back) are still good.
Average rating: 2.08, “Impactful” (Median 2, Mode 2)
Fun Factor: 3.79 (Median 4, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Jaxi
2/1 ➝ 2/2
The overall opinion among respondents was that while this change makes a substantial difference to how you play agains Jaxi (you can now only ping the Mini Jax, not the initial body), that change is probably insufficient to make the card playable over the remainder of the neutral 2 drop suite.
Average rating: 1.2, “A Little Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 1)
Fun Factor: 3.34 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Thorn Needler
When this takes damage, this gains +2/+0 until your next turn ➝ When this takes damage, it gains +2/+0.
The only substantial effect most people noted from this change is if you ramp it out with Flash Reincarnation or Kujata. In other circumstances, respondents generally consider it worse than Emerald Rejuvenator, as a 4 drop, or Araki Headhunter, as a scaling threat.
Average rating: 0.68, “Not Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 0)
Fun Factor: 3.07 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 3)
Unclear
Frosthorn Rhyno
| 5 Mana ➝ 6 Mana | 6/5 ➝ 6/8 |
The dominant feeling is that this is still a feast or famine card: Incredibly destructive if it survives in Infiltrate, mediocre everywhere else. At 6 mana it also can’t be played and immediately activated with Spirit of the Wild, although Arctic Displacer may have been the favourite for that in any case. It’s not as badly understatted outside of Infiltrate, but still not the greatest 6 drop.
Opinion is divided on whether it’s buffed or nerfed.
Average rating: 1.12, “Not Very Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 1)
Fun Factor: 3.2 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 3, 3rd Quartile 4)
Twilight Sorcerer
4/6 ➝ 3/7
The general consensus appears to be that whilst this change makes Twilight Sorcerer better in Songhai, it will still not be played in Songhai. On the other hand, it’s probably weaker in Arcanyst decks where HP buffs are handed out like candy but Attack buffs are nowhere to be seen. At the same time, it’s weaker in Lyonar lists where it now dies to Plasma Storm, like other big bodies in Lyonar, and no longer hits 4HP breakpoints.
In hindsight this should have been a Buffed / Situational / Nerfed item, where I suspect based on general sentiment in comments it would have a few votes for Buffed and roughly equal votes for Situational and Nerfed, probably leaning Nerfed.
Average rating: 1.14, “Not Very Impactful” (Median 1, Mode 1)
Fun Factor: 3.07 (Median 3, 1st Quartile 2.75, 3rd Quartile 3.25)
Acknowledgments
Thanks to all the people who contributed:
| . | . | . | . | . |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sun | Smarty | Krazed | Chocob0 | cloudfrog |
| Zohan | calvin | Jay | Decoy | Fafares |
| Kopiuyt | Kieran | Navy Seagull (who says “Helck Anime next month”) | GoblinWarBuggy | Scuttle |
| Stephanie | ZeroUnderscoreOu | Nangert | Niklaren | coats |
| Elemosin | TOPDECKTIMMY | And 7 anonymous respondents |  |
Harvester Jumpscare
Spirit Harvester was mentioned 0 times in the patch notes and 13 times in the survey responses.
Did you find the Spirit Harvester?