Hearthstone is getting a new expansion, and it’s taking the fight to a new school of magic now. Feel the Hogwarts vibes, right? Yes, that’s exactly what seems to have inspired this brilliant new expansion – set in a place known popularly in World of Warcraft as a place for dark magic and necromancy. Scholomance Academy in Hearthstone is a lively place where the citizens of Azeroth blessed with the arcane powers come to perfect their skills. Led by the elite sorcerer Kel’Thuzad, the place is full of the vigor of young students each practicing their own magic in their own dormitories.
The magical academy brings the power of spellcraft in all of its spells. The new mechanic, Spellcraft, is minion-only special effects that are triggered whenever a spell is played. This means the effect can be triggered one after the other, especially if there are multiple cheap spells in hand. One card revealed during the reveal stream was Diligent Notetaker, a Shaman Spellcraft minion that returns the spell that triggered the Spellcraft effect back to the player’s hand.
There’s also a new mechanic, called Study, which are one-cost spells that allow one to discover a card immediately and reduce the cost of all similar cards for later. The Druid Study, Nature Studies, allows the player to discover a spell and reduce the cost of the next spell played by one.
The main feature of this expansion is dual-class cards – cards that can basically be used by both classes to get an advantage during a duel. One revealed card is Shan’do Wildclaw, who can be wielded both by the Hunter and the Druid classes into battle.
The preorder for the update has gone live with the latest update, which includes fundamental changes to a variety of cards to tweak the metagame. The $80 bundle includes the Kel’Thuzad hero, 80 packs, 5 golden packs, 4 arena tickets, as well as special perks for Battlegrounds. The $50 bundle includes 55 packs. Both bundles include a golden legendary from the expansion as well as a special card back. Starting today, anyone logging into the game will receive a free copy of Transfer Student, a special minion that has different effects based on which board he is played on.
The Hearthstone team also promises to listen to feedback and keep tweaking the game to ensure players enjoy it all along. The new game mode which was supposed to be coming was teased briefly in the official announcement post, but no details have been made public about it. Here’s to hoping the tavern welcomes more new players into its mix.