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Commons of the North

We take our final excursion to Northrend to dig up which beasts from Warcraft lore may one day become Hearthstone cards.

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We’ve come to the final stage of me yammering on about Northrend. Legendaries-Done, Epics- Done, Rares- Done and now we come to the commons. Creatures from the lands of Northrend that should be in Hearthstone if not with the coming Naxxramas expansion, then sometime in the future.

Gargoyle

Artist: Samwise Didier
Artist: Samwise Didier

These nimble flyers, first introduced in Warcraft III, were found by the scourge in Northrend and brought into their war effort. More likely dominated and forced into their war effort. The creatures have a thick rigid hide, protecting them from a range of different attacks. They are well armoured, ferocious and savage but the gargoyle has a key weakness. In order to maintain the energy required for flight, the gargoyle needs to rest, which it does by condensing the thickness of its hide and turning to stone. While the Gargoyle is able to resist a great amount of attack in this form and recuperate its energies, it is unable to defend itself. In moments of desperation the gargoyle takes this form on the off chance that they can defend their lives long enough to be saved by an ally. This stone form could be implemented in several ways in hearthstone. The gargoyle could have a similar mechanic to the alarm-o-bot, being useless for a turn in stone form and then the next turn transforming into a powerful beast. It could have some sort of ‘boomerang’ effect, having a cheap minion that when killed turns to stone and back into its owner’s hand.

Shade

No Caption Provided

Pretty sure these are being introduced with the Naxxramas expansion but let’s go over why the shade should be in Hearthstone and why I think it should be a common. Again the Shade was first introduced in Warcraft III. Acolytes, the scourge's unit used to gather resources, would sacrifice themselves. Their restless spirits would rise as shades, ghostly skeletal aberrations surrounded by a thick black mist and invisible to the naked eye. Due to their invisibility, these ghostly creatures were put to use as scouts for the scourge and were only detectable with the aid of magic. The shade itself also has the ability to see others who are invisible. Shades are capable of communicating telepathically with each other, which is yet another quality that makes them one of the most effective spy forces in all of Azeroth. Shades become irrational and violent when faced with their own reflection, which is difficult to produce, or when reminded of their previous lives. Shades consider themselves reborn and look to forget their past, constant reminders can cause the shade to become enraged. While an essential cog in the Litch King’s army, there have been no strong shade figure heads and as a result, they should be a common card. In Hearthstone the shade would obviously be up for consideration as a stealthed unit, because of its ability to see other invisible units it could also be used to reveal an opponent’s stealthed unit too.

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