Update 84 - Rise of the Howling Moon

• Nether Bat - 1 mana Common Flying Melee Minion Fast, annoying, and unpredictable - Nether Bats are disposable nuisances you can use to quickly reinforce a push or harass vulnerable melee units. They aren’t used to the sunlight of the arenas, though, and their bad vision means their aggro range is significantly reduced compared to that of normal minions. Fortunately, they have the ability to Netherstep towards a random enemy minion on the map occasionally, though sometimes this could be to their own detriment…
• Wolf Among Sheep - 4 mana Common Melee Minion Summons two Legionnaires, one of whom gains the Lycanthropy buff at random. Lycanthropy is the new mechanic in this Battle Pass that will unleash the inner beast of your minions… quite literally. When a Minion affected by Lycanthropy has 50% or less health (and isn’t dead) it will transform into a Werewolf with full Health and any buffs it had before transformation. Your opponent will not know which of your units has Lycanthropy, but there will be an icon around your Master Tower when a card with the effect is played, indicating a Werewolf is lurking on the field. Here are the Werewolf’s stats:
  • Health: 400
  • Damage: 60 (DPS 60)
  • Attack Speed: 1 Sec.
  • Attack Type: Melee
  • Targets: Ground
  • Speed: 8

• Bats Bats Bats! - 3 mana Rare Spell
  For when just one Nether Bat isn’t enough, Bats Bats Bats is guaranteed to unleash chaos upon the battlefield. For 5 seconds after this spell is cast, any mana spent will cause the same amount of Nether Bats to appear in front of your Master Tower. For instance, if you played Bats Bats Bats and Divine Warrior, 5 Nether Bats will appear at once in front of your tower.

• Once Bitten - 3 mana Rare Spell
  When you want to be more direct with transforming your minions, Once Bitten will give a random unit within its AoE Lycanthropy. As before, your opponent won’t know which unit it is until it happens, so try to set up some tricky mind games to make it harder for them to remove your Minion before it can transform. If you’re playing against it, remember - A dead unit cannot transform into a Werewolf, so try to take them out with one swift strike!

• Grasping Thorns - 2 mana Supreme Building
  Grasping Thorns is a building that slows enemy ground minions that walk over it to a speed of 2, and causes them to take 20 damage per second. It features the new mechanic Untargetable, which in essence means it cannot be directly targeted by the attacks of minions or spells, but will still be damaged by Area of Effects, such as a Daggerfall or a Whirly Scrat attack. It can be a real thorn in your opponent’s side to try and crawl through!

• Lone Wolf - 5 mana Supreme Melee Minion
  This hardy Warrior’s blood rages with the Lycanthropic curse - literally! It’s summoned with the Rage buff, and if there are no other friendly minions on the field it will also gain Lycanthropy, giving you an easy way to create a Raged Werewolf to deal out some serious damage, and its base Warrior can be tough for your opponent to take down before it transforms.

• Howling Moon - 7 mana Legendary Spell
  The titular Howling Moon marks a feeding frenzy for the werewolves. It grants two random friendly ground minions Lycanthropy and reduces every minion’s health to 50%, instantly creating your two Werewolves to clean up your opponent’s weakened board state. Use it to really turn the tides of battle!

• Bahra the Witchwolf - 7 mana Legendary Ranged Minion
  The leader of the pack, Bahra treats the cursed woods as his own domain and controls the twisted forces of nature to do his own bidding. When summoned, Bahra roots all enemy ground Minions for 6 seconds, no matter where they are on the battlefield. He attacks with his signature moonbeams, a powerful arcane AoE attack that will devastate all but the mightiest warriors. He isn’t without his weaknesses, though, as he use his powerful (and slow!) attack on minions regardless of their strength, at which point he’ll be defenseless and open to a counterattack.
  

Balance

• Armored Escort
  • Mana Cost increased from 6 to 7

  --- Developer comments ---
  Armored Escort was always intended to provide value through your ability to bank mana, but also with an immediate gain to getting multiple minions from the card. The banking aspect proved stronger than expected, especially coupled with large pushes.
  

• Dragonball
  • Activator Mana cost increased from 4 to 6 Mana
  • Damage increased from 150 to 170

  --- Developer comments ---
  Dragon Ball has been much talked about lately, because it’s been quite popular ever since Season 1. At this point it has replaced a lot of other cards because of the value it can bring, without the activator providing much of a limitation.
  We wanted to maintain Dragon Ball at 5 mana because it allows it to be used unactivated without being terrible, which means the activator needs to play a factor in how you can get the value.
  At the same time, we’ve been looking at the basic Fireball’s popularity lately, and found this opportunity to buff it a bit, also allowing for more value in Dragon Ball with the high limitations.
  

• Fireball
  • Damage increased from 150 to 170

  --- Developer comments ---
  As mentioned, Fireball’s been in our sights because the popularity fell drastically in the last 6 months. We’d like it to be more relevant, and just want to add a little bit of power to it.
  

• Battle Shi-Hou
  • Attack Speed down from 2.0 to 1.8
  • Attack Speed Bonus rescaled
    • Old Attack Speed:
      • No enemies nearby - 2.0 sec
      • 1 enemy - 1.5 sec
      • 2 enemies - 1.0 sec
      • 3 enemies - 0.6 sec
      • 4 enemies - 0.4 sec
      • 5 enemies - 0.2 sec

    • New Attack Speed:
      • No enemies nearby - 1.8 sec
      • 1 enemy - 1.3 sec
      • 2 enemies - 1.0 sec
      • 3 enemies - 0.7 sec
      • 4 enemies - 0.5 sec
      • 5 enemies - 0.4 sec

    
    
  
  --- Developer comments ---
  The Battle Shi-hou’s recent increase in Attack Speed made it quite a lot more powerful with full stacks, leading to quite volatile games where people died before they had a chance to react. We decided to rescale him a bit more so that he is now more relevant at lower stacks and “only” as good as before the buff at full stacks. He still packs quite a punch though, so watch those scrat hordes!
  

• Chain Lightning
  • Cast Delay decreased from 2 seconds to 1.5
  • Stun Duration increased from 0.5 seconds to 1

  --- Developer comments ---
  Chain lightning hasn’t been very popular since the delay was increased, despite other buffs to it. With this change we’re trying to cement the spell with its own identity, returning a bit of speed to it but also further increasing the stun to make it more relevant.
  

• Colossus
  • Damage increased from 250 to 275

  --- Developer comments ---
  We’ve seen quite a lot of buffs to mid-range units recently, in an attempt to provide more power for the mana investment they require. The same approach goes for bigger Minions, which haven’t really managed to become popular in recent times.
  To hit certain thresholds, and to make Colossus worth the investment we’re giving him a slight power increase.
  

• Living Statue
  • Damage increased from 120 to 140

  --- Developer comments ---
  Living statue was quite difficult to bring to your opponents tower despite its large health pool. Making it a great payoff in itself will focus the fight more around it as a bigger Minion.
  

• Stun Lancers
  • Health increased from 120 to 150
  • Damage increased from 20 to 30

  --- Developer comments ---
  A fun and popular card that simply couldn’t provide enough power for the cost, they deserved an increase to make them more useful without backup.
  

• Troubadour
  • Health increased from 1600 to 1700

  --- Developer comments ---
  Again a bigger Minion we’ve been keeping an eye on for a while. We’re treading carefully with the buffs here because we don’t want to go overboard, but a slight increase to health should make him not just more of a threat in himself, but also give you a bit more time to combo him.
  

• Wizard Puff
  • Attack Speed increased from 2 seconds to 1.8
  • Attack Delay improved by 10% to match Attack Speed increase

  --- Developer comments ---
  While the death effect of the Wizard Puff is powerful, the Minion itself was a bit underwhelming when not playing against really big Minions.
  

Card-House Contest Continuation

We’ve decided to refresh the Card-House Contest!
Stormy took the event, rather fittingly, by storm, so it will be added to the game in the future. For this contest the new concept Spawn of Fury will enter the ring - Cast this spell on Minions to bring pain and duplication. The event will last for 3 weeks, from December 17th to January 9th. Here’s the team lineups for this event:

• House Valor - Spawn of Fury: Stormbringer, Voclo, Ratbo
• House Triumph - Taurus: Apep, Settsu, Mordar
• House Glory - Mal’Shar: Milloween, Ravager, King Puff

When you open the chest for your team and card of choice, you will be registering your vote for that card. As always, you can only open the chest once, so choose wisely!

We also included a host of fixes this time, thank you all for the feedback!

Cheers from BetaDwarf!