Hearthstone Balance Update 25.4.3 Coming on Thursday – 3 Standard & 2 Wild Nerfs + 9 Battlegrounds Changes

Just like with the last balance update, instead of posting full patch notes right away, Blizzard has published a teaser on social media. Patch 25.4.2 is releasing on Thursday and it will contain a total of 5 nerfs in Constructed (3 Standard & 2 Wild). It will also contain a total of 9 Battlegrounds changes (3 buffs, 5 nerfs and 1 “sidegrade”). For now, we only know which cards will get changed, not how! I expect full patch notes to be posted on Thursday, shortly before the patch itself.

The current Standard meta is dominated by Frost Death Knight (Construct Quarter) and – to a lesser extent – Evolve Shaman (Goldshire Gnoll), so those are the two most obvious targets. It looks like we’re also getting a preemptive nerf to Big Spell Mage (Grey Sage Parrot), maybe they suspect that it would be too strong after DK and Shaman nerfs? Or maybe it’s also a Wild nerf – after all, Quest Mage plays the card in that format and many players would describe the deck as “toxic”. We’ll have to wait until full patch notes to know for sure. And finally – we got two more Wild nerfs – Spectral Pillager and Cataclysm. Assuming the nerf targets Wild Quest Mage, it looks like they’re nerfing some of the more oppressive Combo decks in that format.

Here’s a full list of nerfed cards:

Image shows a wooden surface with "25.4.3" carved into it along with an upward facing arrow and downward facing arrow going in different directions. Covered by a blue and gold table runner that shows portraits of a group of Standard cards including Construct Quarter, Goldshire Gnoll, and Grey Sage Parrot.

And here are the Battlegrounds balance changes:

Image shows a wooden surface with "25.4.3" carved into it along with an upward facing arrow and downward facing arrow going in different directions. Covered by a purple and gold table runner that shows portraits of a group of Battleground minions including Jelly Belly, Chronormu, Groundshaker, Felstomper, and Magmaloc.

Stonekeep

A Hearthstone player and writer from Poland, Stonekeep has been in a love-hate relationship with Hearthstone since Closed Beta. Over that time, he has achieved many high Legend climbs and infinite Arena runs. He's the current admin of Hearthstone Top Decks.

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Leave a Reply

10 Comments

  1. Barbarossa316
    March 2, 2023 at 8:38 am

    a 6mana pyroblast on a 5/5 is okayage? or even better with brann 9mana deal 20?! …cant wait for brann to get out of standard but this needs a nerv too

  2. MrBoneSAW
    March 1, 2023 at 5:45 pm

    Ugh I really hope frost dk is good still, I was gonna grind to legend with it ????

    • MrBoneSAW
      March 1, 2023 at 5:46 pm

      Seems to happen to every deck I play lmao it’s pretty aggrivating at this point

  3. Strangiii
    March 1, 2023 at 1:41 am

    If I had to guess, Construct Quarter durability down to 2, or cost up to 4.
    Can’t see the token is changed.
    Gnoll to 11 or 12 mana, or stats down to 4/3
    Parrot to only recast 6 and above, so wild quest mage can’t recast the quest reward.
    Other two wild cards no clue :kekw:

    • JoyDivision
      March 2, 2023 at 1:39 am

      Maybe make 3/4s?

    • Zombie69
      March 2, 2023 at 9:01 am

      Durability to 2 barely affects it, because if you play it on 3, the game is likely over before turn 7 anyway and you don’t get to do it 3 times. Either the cost goes up to 4, or it transforms instead of killing along with a change in cost or durability.

      Gnoll to 11 completely kills evolve shaman as a deck, so I don’t think they’ll do that. Still, it’s egregious enough that they might, since it’s hard to find a good way to nerf the card.

  4. PitLord
    March 1, 2023 at 12:19 am

    I think parrot will reply only 6 cost spell and don’t change nothing from big mage (unless discounted spell from balinda count as 5).

    • Wolfcar
      March 2, 2023 at 6:09 am

      Parrot will still work with Balinda discounts. Its the original cost of the spell, that works with Parrots battlecry.

      • PitLord
        March 2, 2023 at 9:05 am

        True but recently they change skulking geist to kill current discounted 1 cost spell (against celestial aligment druid, basically you delete the druid deck).
        I don’t know if they want to keep the same philosophy