The Caverns Below is getting nerfed in an upcoming patch!
In an upcoming update, we will be making a balance change to the Rogue card: The Caverns Below.
The Caverns Below now reads: Quest: Play five minions with the same name. Reward: Crystal Core.
Since the release of Journey to Un’Goro, Hearthstone has enjoyed a wider variety of competitively viable classes and decks than ever before. We’ve been monitoring overall gameplay, and we’ve decided that—even though everything is varied and many decks are viable—a change to The Caverns Below is still warranted.
The Caverns Below is uniquely powerful versus several slower, control-oriented decks and played often enough that it’s pushing those decks out of play. This change should help expand the deck options available to players both now and after the release of the next expansion.
Note: The Caverns Below will be eligible to be disenchanted for its full Arcane Dust value for a limited time after the next Hearthstone patch arrives.
[Source]
I think a lot of the heat rogue quest got is because of the card design itself. Having to play a minion multiple times inherently brings about this deck design. If you’re for asking one minions to be played again and again, of course that minion has to be brought back into hand to keep it safe. Otherwise it because a high priority target. And that’s where a lot of the complaint of it being uninteractive comes from. Nerfing this to 5 only does 2 things. The quest rogue deck changes, maybe adding shadowcasters or something. In that case it’s the same uninteractive. Maybe does change the meta, giving control more time to get set. Or (what I think will happen) kill the deck archetype.
I think this nerf didn’t address the issue that was the concern for this deck. I think this is more of blizzard killing the card.
Quests are a fun new mechanic, and I think a few more should be changed. But rogue in particular, I would have liked to instead have seen the quest changed to play 4 (or 5, or how many ever) minions with the same name 2 times. This would have allowed for more traditional deck building which I think still gets to the hearth of what blizzard wanted to do with this quest, utilizing the bounce effect unique to rogue. But it would be more interactive because once you chose a minion you don’t have to keep it protected in your hand. Any minion could be bounced. And you have an actual deck! With SI7 Agents and other big minions. Not just some weird one that desperately needs to complete the quest before dieing.
I don’t know. My 2 cents.
Yeah Rogue is overpowered ….
But take by example the paladin murlock how many time we shall see a murloc paladin killing you with only 8 cards on 30
Yes is it true a murlock paladin just need 8 cards to kill you, seems fair ok ok …
great article by the way
About damn time I say! Basically if you’re an aggro player, you loved playing this deck cause it’s pretty easy to bust down early and has no answers for lots of tokens, but if you prefer the midrange/control game then this matchup IMO is an insta concede (other than burn/freeze mage, which I hate with a passion as well) because there’s just no way you can keep up with all the 5/5’s once the quest is triggered. Now if only they can get rid of ice block everything would be that much better…
Rogue has been my favorite class since I’ve started playing Hearthstone. But Hearthstone really hasn’t been making it easy for Rogue. It has always struggled against aggro, nerf to blade fury killed that card, it seems the legendarys it gets aren’t tops, trying to push the classes identity with stuff like class card steal and stealth which hasn’t worked up to this point, and others. But, thanks to some great players, the class always seems to survive. Mainly with Miracle Rogue. I was happy to see my favorite class have a top level deck especially after bad reviews of this quest when they revealed it. Though I played quest rogue myself, I’m not too saddened to see it leave if it truly was frustrating for opponents. My issue is that if there are other cards that are hurting the game, why are they not addressed, like how Caverns was addressed just 2 months in. I played almost a year against tunnel trogg and totem golem and how that deck would snowball out of control. Jade idol killed control decks since Mean Streets, (just like caverns is doing) that aggro decks like pirate warrior to dominate. There are other past examples too. And what about Vicious Fledgling now?
Now I’m not too angry with the change. But changes like this need to happen a little more often. And stop making it so tough on Rogue. Their decks already need high skill to play. But I know it’ll find a way to stay in the meta! Always does.
You are so ******* right!
The nerf will be the end of quest rogue at ladder. Could they not come up with something to keep it there while not being so op against control? Well, hope the meta only kills one deck and not too many other “side victims”.
Too little too late to be honest. The issue was already well known and the solutions were given to address the problem, and they did nothing about it. Legend ladder was full of rock-paper-scissor matchups and Quest rogue was a huge contributing factor to this. We have only one season left before we should see the next expac, so what is the point in Blizzard finally admitting they were wrong now? Many players quit because you simply did not listen to feedback and the meta has gone to stale crap. Some may say better late than never, but the damage is done. Should have listened to the top players feedback long ago instead of sitting around.
I think you are absolutly right, and I think we are definetly in the right to complain about this issue. But I think it is worth noting,that they at least got the nerf right and didnt change the card completly like other cards, which didn’t see play at all after the nerf (Warsong comander). So we see a progress in which they got better and they adept at least in the right way.
The quest rogue isn’t overpowered but it totally kills the fun. There is so little interaction in those games. If this nerf will make the whole deck go away it will only help the game.
Just a joke. Nerv a low tier2 deck. LoL.Now we will see even more burn/freeze stall iceblock cancer mage. Quest rogue was one of the first deck reliably beating this mage cancer. Never let the smorc/secret mage meta die. Well done…. Not!
Wait, what? Quest Rogue was stomped day in, day out by any current Mage deck! Freeze, Burn or Secret, they just stomp Rogues. It will make no difference for Mages.
Agreed, the comment above makes no sense. Mage is actually more popular because it is counter to quest rogue. If anything we are likely to see less mages post nerf because it takes a good match up away from mage and potentially lets other counter decks to mage back into the meta. e.g. Jade druid is a good counter to freeze mage with all the Armour gain but they are really weak to quest rogue.
Must be a butthurt pirate warrior player! Lol
Brasil !!!!! e nois LLdeA#1747
I’ve never commented on the need to nerf/not nerf a card in Hearthstone, as most peoples’ opinions are garbage (mine included, sometimes!) However, in this case, after the 10th match in a row where my opponent fulfills the quest by turn 4 or 5 and I auto-concede, I realized the only way to fix this card would be to make it need one more trigger, or lower the 5/5s to 4/4s (so they can be Flamestriked away).
At least im getting my dust back 😉
It really isnt a strong deck it just has oppressively good and very bad matchups,
which makes it boring
Was it really in need of a nerf? I never played the deck but played against it, a lot. I never thought it was oppressive like undertaker hunter, even secret paladin at it’s height.
I kind of agree here. Sure, Quest Rogue can be kind of unfun sometimes, but the deck has fallen oiut of Tier 2 and I hardly even see it on ladder anymore. I feel like other cards should be getting nerfed, not thed Rogue Quest
On the legend level, this deck has been seeing a lot of play lately. Just check any tracker website.
Historically blizzard has nerfed decks which have little to no interaction with the board and are still able to win (e.g. patron warrior with charge, stealth, the spell “Charge). The quest rogue deck definitely falls into this category, it is one of the most non-interacting decks in the history of hearthstone.