hearthstone Twig of the World Tree Reveal: Kobolds & Catacombs

[Zadina 923]

The Druid legendary weapon has been revealed!

After yesterday's stream, the card reveal season is now in full swing. And the best way to to start is with a legendary weapon! Twig of the World Tree was unveiled today by NGA.CN.

Image provided by Hearthpwn.

This is a very curious case of a card, at first sight. It can either be terrible or it can be overpowered. Before presenting arguments for both sides, it should be clarified that this card doesn't exactly work like Kun the Forgotten King (since a lot of people are comparing them). Whereas Kun refills your Mana Crystals, effectively becoming a 0 mana 7/7 at turn 10, Twig of the World Tree gives you full Mana Crystals.

This means, on the one hand, that you can use it to either ramp up or to have a ferocious amount of 20 Mana crystals on Turn 10 (double Ultimate Infestation anyone?)! Moreover, this weapon can't be countered by the Oozes or Harrison Jones, since you will be giving your opponent free Mana crystals. It's only worth using these cards when this weapon has 1 Durability. Lastly, a good combo would be destroying Twig of the World Tree by using Medivh, the Guardian. Therefore, you can create a very nasty OTK deck with the new legendary weapon, Medivh, Malygos, various spells and maybe even a Kun to piss your opponent off a bit more!

On the other hand, while OTK Malygos Druid is powerful in the correct hands, it has always been a gimmicky, mid-tier deck at best. The combos that can be pulled off with Twig of the World Tree sound amazing and we will probably see them a couple of times in funny videos, but they are not combos that can happen in most games. The Deathrattle is also very slow to activate, if you get really unlucky with card draw and you want to use the weapon to ramp up. Getting a single Mana Crystal on turn 9 isn't exactly worth it.

What is your take on the card? There are four more card reveals planned for today (check the schedule), while you can see all the Kobolds & Catacombs cards that have been revealed in our expansion hub.

[PaasHaaS 81]

This sounds like it allows for a lot of bullshit to take place in a single turn. Being able to drop a Malygos and having 1 + 10 mana left to use is ridiculous.

Playing against this, it's definitely worth removing this weapon at higher mana levels though. If your opponent is at 10 already, you're denying 10 extra mana from being used. That's if the weapon works the way I imagine it would.

Is it finally time to put that golden Malygos to good use? I think so!

[Tri 138]

my thoughts

[Caldyrvan 377]

All are looking at the insane OTK combos (which are boring as hell) but if you play this early like on turn 2, combined with your hero power you have a decent 2 damage to the face or board clear. But I guess its potential is indeed for some one turn bs. Doing nothing for most of the time in the game then winning in one turn. Interesting we never had such kind of deck and I'm sure players will love to play against it.

P.S. Another card from the new set (even if it turns out to be powerful) that is not impressive. (pre-purchase becoming more and more unlikely)

Edited November 21, 2017 by Caldyrvan

[Shine 144]

6 minutes ago, Caldyrvan said:

All are looking at the insane OTK combos (which are boring as hell) but if you play this early like on turn 2, combined with your hero power you have a decent 2 damage to the face or board clear. But I guess its potential is indeed for some one turn bs. Doing nothing for most of the time in the game then winning in one turn. Interesting we never had such kind of deck and I'm sure players will love to play against it.

 

I was gonna say the same thing. I see a lot of early game potential. the 5 extra damage (albeit spread over 5 turns) is really gonna be good in terms of board control and favorable trades.

[SMOrcMan 76]

It's a cool concept but I personally feel it'll end up being slightly underwhelming. With Innervate only giving 1 mana, it probably won't see too much play in ramp druid as they will be at 10 mana before it breaks in most games.

Although it is 4 mana for a 1/5 weapon, chances are that the extra mana it gives when it breaks will make it worthwhile in decks that play ultimate infestation. Although there is bound to be a combo deck based on this, I feel it's most likely going to be behind other druid decks.

[Caldyrvan 377]

As I said, nothing impressive :D

[Hanz39 53]

The point of this card isn't ramping crystals but using 20 crystals in a single turn like somehow Kun but Kun only has option to summon a 10 mana 7/7 with them this make you do whatever you want with those 20 crystals. 

Isn't a bad card enabling druid to hit for 2 damage for 5 turns and is somewhat immune to weapon removal before 9 mana.

The bad thing is the tempo loss for playing a 1 damage weapon for 4 mana so if you're behind you can't afford to lose the turn to play this against a board with threats

For now seems suited for the Medivh UI deck that runs a ton of 10 mana cards or for the Malygos combo that i don't see played from long time

[VaraTreledees 138]

This card has a lot of pros and cons, and the OTK type use of this card is pretty heavily limited by weapon removal, and in general, I don't think that removing this weapon is that bad of a strategy (assuming you do it when it has 1 charge left or the turn before they play mediv or what ever the flavor of the month is to combo with it), but I have a general problem with the design of this card.  I don't like cards where it is unclear on what you want to do with them.  It is very frustrating to play against something like this.  Do you destroy the card going into their mediv turn if they have say, 2 or 3 charges left on it?  If they don't have mediv you might have just given them UI 2 turns earlier, if they have mediv and you didn't, then you might have just lost the game, then when you factor in innervate, the decision is even worse.   Overall, I hate this card.  I don't know if it will be good, it is really hard to evaluate without seeing it in play, but the design of this card is abysmal.

[Shine 144]

14 hours ago, VaraTreledees said:

This card has a lot of pros and cons, and the OTK type use of this card is pretty heavily limited by weapon removal, and in general, I don't think that removing this weapon is that bad of a strategy (assuming you do it when it has 1 charge left or the turn before they play mediv or what ever the flavor of the month is to combo with it), but I have a general problem with the design of this card.  I don't like cards where it is unclear on what you want to do with them.  It is very frustrating to play against something like this.  Do you destroy the card going into their mediv turn if they have say, 2 or 3 charges left on it?  If they don't have mediv you might have just given them UI 2 turns earlier, if they have mediv and you didn't, then you might have just lost the game, then when you factor in innervate, the decision is even worse.   Overall, I hate this card.  I don't know if it will be good, it is really hard to evaluate without seeing it in play, but the design of this card is abysmal.

 

I think this is actually a good thing. I hate nothing more than cards that are always played against the same exact way. I like it when a card is somewhat versatile in how you're supposed to deal with it. (hence my eternal love for evolve and devolve)  I guess this just comes down to personal preference. I'm pretty sure we will see OTK druid deck pop up again (and I always loved any OTK strategies.).

Edited November 22, 2017 by Shine

[Caldyrvan 377]

Sounds strange because the OTK decks always follow the same way of play and mostly leading to a lengthy boring game (at least for the opponent). They just work on their plan to get to the OTK and meanwhile barely interacting with their opponent besides denying them everything. There are rarely any surprising or interesting plays with those decks.

[VaraTreledees 138]

11 hours ago, Shine said:

 

I think this is actually a good thing. I hate nothing more than cards that are always played against the same exact way. I like it when a card is somewhat versatile in how you're supposed to deal with it. (hence my eternal love for evolve and devolve)  I guess this just comes down to personal preference. I'm pretty sure we will see OTK druid deck pop up again (and I always loved any OTK strategies.).

It isn't that there are multiple ways of playing against it that I have a problem with, it's that the card creates a situation in which it is completely unclear how to play against it.  Granted this only really applies currently with mediv, but if they print other similar cards, it can become problematic.  I think that lack of clarity is just terrible card design.