Hearthstone Dev Tracker

Hey all,

As you know, last week we launched Patch 27.2, a massive patch that included Battlegrounds Season 5, over 100 balance changes, and the Caverns of Time expansion (launching soon!). Unfortunately, with a patch that large, a few things slipped through the cracks.

Some of you have noticed that there were a few Hearthstone balance changes that weren’t announced before the patch went live. These changes were things we tested for the patch, but had decided not to ship—or, at least, we didn’t mean to ship.

We’ve seen your excitement about these surprise changes and we’ve decided that some of them would be fine to keep in the game. Of the six cards that slipped through the cracks, we’ll be letting three of them keep their newfound buffs: Timber Wolf, Jinyu Waterspeaker, and Firelands Portal.

On the other hand, we don’t think it’s the right time to make the changes to Dragon’s Breath, Swipe, or Glaivezooka, so we’ll be pulling those changes back out in Pat...

Patch 27.2.1 is a server-side hotfix patch, launching today, with the following updates and bug fixes.

Battlegrounds Updates

Armor Updates
The following heroes now have less Armor:

• Shudderwock has 5 Armor at higher ranks, still has 10 Armor at lower ranks.
• Infinite Toki has 7 Armor.
• Forest Warden Omu and Kurtrus Ashfallen have 8 Armor.
• Inge, the Iron Hymn has 8 Armor at higher ranks, still has 6 Armor at lower ranks.
• Dinotamer Brann has 12 Armor.

The following heroes now have more Armor:

• Bru’kan and Ozumat have 15 Armor.
• Sneed has 17 Armor.
• Guff Runetotem, Jandice Barov, Sindragosa, and Skycap’n Kragg have 18 Armor.

Anomaly Updates

• The Fortitude of Khaz’goroth, Denathrius’s Anima Reserves, A Faire Reward, and Oops, All ____! Anomalies will all appear less frequently.
  o Sir...

Passing that one along, thanks.

Patch 27.2 is now live, bringing with it Battlegrounds Season 5, preparations for Caverns of Time and the launch of Twist, and more!

The following are some of the known issues we’re tracking this patch:

• [Hearthstone] Reprint cards that are included in Caverns of Time are defaulting to the Caverns of Time version in the in-game crafting menu (which isn’t yet available for crafting). If you want these returning cards before Caverns of Time goes live next week, you can still craft them by going to the crafting menu, searching for the card, and then switching the collection manager to that card’s original set.
• [Resolved 8/25] [Battlegrounds] The Echoes of Argus Anomaly (all Battlecries and Deathrattles trigger an extra time) has been temporarily removed from the Anomalies pool for being a bit too anomalous and causing crashes.
• [Resolved 8/25] [Battlegrounds] Y’Shaarj has been temporarily removed from the hero pool due to a bug with ...

We’ve seen some frustration recently with increased bots in some aspects of Hearthstone. We take botting very seriously; we hear you and we’re acting on it.

We’ve seen a marked increase in third-party botting over the past several months. We already do regular, massive ban waves for bots, and we’re working to scale up our response to match the influx of new bot accounts. So far this year we’ve banned hundreds of thousands of accounts for botting—and we’re ramping up our efforts. We also have people working on solving this problem on a systematic level.

We can’t share more at this time. We have a general policy against explaining our cheating investigations or actions, because we have found that every time we share information about the process, that just helps the cheaters get more sophisticated, making the problem worse in the long run.

You can continue to help by using the in-game reporting function to report suspected bots. It helps us track down and eliminat...

Patch 27.0.2 is a server-side hotfix patch, rolling out now, with the following updates and bug fixes.

Battlegrounds Updates

Quest Changes
The following Quests are more difficult to complete:

• Find the Murder Weapon
• Dust for Prints

The following Quests are easier to complete:

• Burn the Evidence
• Pressure the Authorities
• Track the Footprints
• Reenact the Murder

Quest Reward Changes
The following Quest Rewards are harder to earn (the requirements on the Quest they’re paired with are harder):

• Turbulent Tombs
• Cooked Book

The following Quest Rewards are easier to earn (the requirements on the Quest they’re paired with are easier):

• Bloodsoaked Tome
• Snicker Snacks
• The Golden Hammer
• Scepter of Guidance
• Timeline Accelerati...

Hello everyone, the following is being posted on behalf of Aleco Pors, Lead Designer on the Final Design team:

TITANS is about to go live and you’ve now seen some of the new design space that we’re exploring for Paladin in this expansion and beyond. This is the second class we’ve given a tune-up to this year, after Priest. We wanted to take this time to talk about why those changes were made and what we consider (or don’t consider) when adjusting a class like this.

There are two main considerations when we make these types of changes: 1) player enjoyment of the class (the most important consideration); and 2) how much design space the class has for us to work with.

You’ll note that “power” is not a consideration for these types of changes. We’ve seen some questions and comments about why we adjusted Paladin when the class already seems strong. The short answer is just that power isn’t relevant for class tune-ups: this is about...

Yes, it’s on the known issues list, thanks. Updates on the situation will be there once we have them.

Patch 27.0.1 is a server-side hotfix rolling out now with the following updates and bug fixes:

Battlegrounds Updates
General Quest and Quest Reward Updates

• New Quests no longer appear more frequently than normal.
• Victim’s Specter, Burn the Evidence, and Pressure the Authorities have been returned to the Quest/Quest Reward Pools.

Quest Updates
The following Quest has been made easier to complete:

• Burn the Evidence

Quest Reward Updates
The following Quest Rewards have been more difficult to complete (this means that requirements of the Quests paired with these Rewards will be harder to fulfill):

• Endless Blood Moon
• Sturdy Shard
• Doppelganger’s Locket (this Quest Reward is also now rarer)

The following Quest Rewards have been easier to complete (the requirements will be easier to fulfill):

The decks awarded to new and returning players have been updated with Patch 27.0! New players are eligible for their free deck after completing the tutorial, the Starter Quest chain, graduating from the New Player Ranks (Ranks 40-1), and then returning to the main menu. Returning players who have been away for 90 or more days are eligible for a free deck just for logging in. Returning players can claim these returning decks each time they are eligible.

Players borrow all these decks for one week following their eligibility, so they can try them out before making their choice. It’s possible players may not see their chosen deck in their deck lists if they do not have an open deck slot when they choose their free deck. The cards in the deck (aside from the Core Set cards) will still be added to their Collections. They can clear a deck slot and use the deck codes below to construct the decks.

Each deck includes the cards listed, except for the Core Set cards in them. Core...

Patch 27.0 is now live, and TITANS is launching on August 1! The following are some of the issues we’re tracking this patch:

• [Resolved 7/28] [Hearthstone] Always a Bigger Jormungar is not working correctly with cleave effects like Hollow Hound’s. It is expected to be updated in a patch prior to the launch of TITANS.
• [Resolved 7/28] [Hearthstone] Imprisoned Horror’s cost is being reduced by Blood Treant. Due to a recent rules change, paying Health is not intended to count as “damage.” This interaction is expected to be updated in a patch prior to the launch of TITANS.
• [Resolved 7/28] [Hearthstone] Forest Seedlings and Frost Lotus Seedling will decrease their cost on turn 1 if kept in the mulligan. This is unintended and is expected to be updated in a patch prior to the launch of TITANS.
• [Resolved 7/28] [Hearthstone] The team is investigating reports that cards that go into the secret zone (Secrets, Auras, Love Everlasting, etc.) cast by School ...

Patch 26.6.3 is a server-side patch, launching today, that brings Quests back to Battlegrounds along with a few bug fixes.

Battleground Quests
Quests are back in Battlegrounds! Just like last time, three Quest-Reward pairs are offered on turn 4 (the 6 Gold turn) for you to choose from. The Quests require you to take certain specified game actions to earn progress towards your game-changing Reward! You can learn more about how Quests work and all the new and returning Quests and Quest Rewards in our dedicated Battlegrounds Quests blog.

Bug Fixes

• [Hearthstone] Fixed a bug where Choose One spells c...

Patch 26.6.1 is a server-side hotfix rolling out now with the following game updates and bug fixes:

Battlegrounds Armor Updates

The following heroes now have more Armor:

• Heistbaron Togwaggle has 13 Armor.
• Captain Hooktusk has 13 Armor at higher ranks, still has 15 at lower ranks.
• Edwin VanCleef and Tavish Stormpike have 15 Armor.
• Illidan Stormrage has 17 Armor.
• Kurtrus Ashfallen and Tess Greymane have 18 Armor.

The following heroes now have less Armor:

• Cariel Roame, E.T.C. Band Manager, and King Mukla have 5 Armor.
• Inge, the Iron Hymn has 6 Armor.
• Death Speaker Blackthorn and Ini Stormcoil have 7 Armor.
• Dancin’ Deryl and Drek’Thar have 8 Armor.
• Cap’n Hoggarr, The Great Akazamzarak, Queen Azshara, and Varden Dawngrasp have 10 Armor.
• Millificent Manastorm has 10 Armor at higher levels and 5 Armor at lower levels.
• Rakanishu has...

Hi all,

New Titan minions were revealed last week when we announced TITANS, our next expansion! Soon, the rest of the Titans will be revealed and we thought it would be a great time to answer some questions and really get into the nitty-gritty about how Titans work in Hearthstone. So we brought an expert along to give us the scoop—check it out if you want to know all the details of the new Titan keyword, and don’t forget to follow along with our Titan card reveals from July 3 to July 7!

The following is being posted on behalf of Clay Howell, a Senior Software Engineer on the Hearthstone team.

New Keyword: Titan!

Hello! The next expansion, TITANS, has been announced and along with it comes the brand-new Keyword: Titan! I’m here to break down exactly how this new keyword works, so let’s dive deep into the rules and edge cases.

We’ll start with the basics, and then get more nuanced. Titan is a new keyword found only on minion...

Just added his one, thanks. They’ll heal you up when we get an opening to do so.

Patch 26.6 is now live on desktop. This massive patch includes the pre-purchase for Hearthstone’s next expansion, TITANS; the launch of Hearthstone’s latest mode, Twist; and the first part of Battlegrounds’ mid-season update!

Clarification: Twist ladder bonuses are based on your Wild ladder multiplier (aka bonus stars). This is not a bug and was intentionally done as a way to try to efficiently tier the new Mode’s matchmaking. In the future, Twist will have its own multiplier, just like Standard and Wild have their own multipliers.

Here are some issues we’re tracking with this patch:

• [Resolved 6/30] [Hearthstone]: Prison of Yogg-Saron doesn’t show the cards cast to both players while casting them. This will be resolved in a hotfix update soon. In the meantime, both players can see the cards cast by checking the history tile.
• [Resolved 7/6] [Twist/Shop]: The Druid Battle-Ready Deck for Twist is not quite as battle-ready as...

Patch 26.4.2 is a server-side hotfix patch rolling out now with the following game updates and bug fixes:

Battlegrounds Updates
The following heroes now have less armor:

• Cookie the Cook now has 6 Armor
• Inge, the Iron Hymn now has 6 Armor, and 8 Armor at higher levels
• Murloc Holmes now has 8 Armor
• Rock Master Voone now has 10 Armor, and 8 Armor at higher levels
• Tamsin Roame now has 12 Armor

The following heroes now have more armor:

• Cap’n Hoggar now has 15 Armor
• Galakrond now has 16 Armor
• Alexstrasza now has 17 Armor
• Zephrys, the Great now has 18 Armor
• Illidan Stormrage now has 20 Armor

Duels Updates

• Daring Fire-Eater, Amplified Snowflurry, Popular Pixie, Felfire Deadeye, Waterboy, Idol’s Adoration, Sneaky Scout, and Fanottem Lord of the Opera are now banned from deckbuilding and all card pools.

26.4.1 is a small server-side hotfix releasing today with back-end updates and the following player-facing updates and bug fixes:

• [Hearthstone] We’re temporarily disabling the “New Cards” button in the Collection, due to bugs it caused. We’re investigating a permanent solution to bring the button back in a later patch.
• [Hearthstone] Fixed a bug where decks that did not have an assigned card back were treated as having been assigned the “Classic” card back.
• [Hearthstone] Fixed a bug where Magatha, Bane of Music revealed all the cards she drew.
• [Battlegrounds] Fixed a bug where using Upbeat Duo on Putricide’s Creation would only grant the base Undead, not a copy of the creation.
• [Progression] Fixed a bug where the “Sun and Moon to Me” Achievement did not count the Core Set versions of the cards.

Blood Treant not working is intended due to the rules change from a few patches back that “paying health instead of mana” is not counted as damage.

Patch 26.4 is now live, bringing with it the end of all music or your opportunity to save the sound! Find out with the new 38-card Audiopocalypse Mini-Set. Follow this page for updates on list issues we’re tracking with this patch.

The issues we’re tracking this patch include:

• [Resolved 6/2] We’re investigating an issue where decks that do not have a card back assigned are treated as being assigned the Classic card back. You can assign a card back to a particular deck or uncheck “limit to favorites” as workarounds.
• [Resolved 6/15] We’re aware that ongoing Duels runs did not retire with the patch. Instead, the season reset will happen when players finish the run on their own (either by retiring or playing all their games). Players who had an active that would have been retired with the Patch 26.4 reset will be granted one Tavern Ticket in an update soon.
• In Duels, Uber Diablo’s effect is shown as a “Battlecry” effect, but it actually triggers upo...