Hearthstone Nerfing Overpowered Cards: Dr. Boom, Luna's Pocket Galaxy, And More

Hearthstone recently introduced its Saviors of Uldum expansion, and now that it's been out in the wild and the meta has started to form, Blizzard is getting ready to rebalance some cards. This time the nerf stick is hitting some cards that have been recognized as problematic in the community for quite some time, including rolling back two of the cards it buffed in a June update. The balance update will go live next week.

The two biggest changes are coming to prominent Warrior and Mage cards. The Warrior Hero card Dr. Boom, Mad Genius and the Mage card Luna's Pocket Galaxy have both been hot topics in the Hearthstone community since Uldum launched, and both are having their Mana cost increased. Dr. Boom will increase from 7 Mana to 9, which Blizzard says should make it more difficult to find a good time to play, and give opponents more time to make their own power-plays. Luna's Pocket Galaxy, which was reduced to 5 Mana in June, is being reverted back to its 7 Mana state.

That isn't the only Mage card to get a nerf, though. Conjurer's Calling is having its Mana cost raised from 3 to 4, which Blizzard says will make it more difficult to play both of its Twinspell instances back-to-back. Similar to Luna's, the Priest card Extra Arms will have its cost reverted to 3 Mana, reversing the buff it received. Finally, the years-old card Barnes is having his cost raised to 5 Mana to better balance Wild, where he's still in play.

Notably, none of these balance updates are coming to cards that were actually introduced in the Saviors of Uldum expansion. These are all older cards that have proven to be consistently too powerful through more than one expansion, or alternatively, have now become problematic in conjunction with new cards from the Uldum set.

Saviors of Uldum is the second chapter in a planned year-long story event. Like the first chapter, Rise of Shadows, a single-player element is planned to launch roughly a month after the expansion itself.