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I don’t know anything about Mercenaries and neither do you– let’s get to work! By the end of this article, we will have become wiser together.
There’s a beloved quality about card games, RPGs, Rogue-likes: the hidden, lurking, “Possibility of Greatness.” The promise that, buried deep beneath titanic piles of dirt and detail, glittering jewels of discovery glow; gems that coat the inside of the most ordinary-looking rocks, geode-like. What could be in store for us in Hearthstone Mercenaries? If only we had knowledge and wisdom to draw from.
Toobad we’re just a bunch of babies rolling in the dirt and drooling on rocks right now.
I don’t know anything about Hearthstone Mercenaries. Okay, I knowa little bit– only about as much as you do! Let’s face it, we’re basically babies at this point. Oblivious but curious. But by the end of this article we will both have become Smarter Babies together. From one baby to another– we’ve got this. Spit out your rocks and share in my excitement for someextremelyearly Hearthstone Mercenaries theorycrafting!
Remember: all of these numbers aren’t necessarily guaranteed and are subject to change!
Where the heck should we start?
deep breath in
There is literally too much to ask, think about, and predict right now for Hearthstone Mercenaries. But the coolest part is that it looks like there issomuch opportunity to ask these questions every single day.
I went through thelist of currently-revealedMercenaries and currently-known abilities (open and bookmark this Google Sheet, by the way) and did some preliminary Hearthstone Mercenaries theorycraft scouting. Here are three Fighters, Protectors, and Casters that I think have some opportunity to see competitive play and why.
Theorycrafting: Three Possibly Broken Fighters
Tyrande:“Elune’s Grace” – Your party’s next Arcane ability casts twice and is permanently (X) Speed faster.
Valeera: “Fan of Knives” – Deal X damage to all enemies. Your other Mercs are (Y) Speed faster next turn.
Diablo: “Apocalypse” – Deal X damage to an enemy. It takes Critical Damage from all Roles this turn.
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Three Possibly Broken Protectors:
Lich King:“Frost Shield” – Gain Taunt this turn. After an enemy Attacks this Merc, Freeze them until the end of the next turn.
Cairne: “Endurance Aura” – Gain Taunt this turn. Your party is (X) Speed faster this turn.
Cornelius Roame: “Blessing of Sacrifice” – Restore X Health to another friendly Merc. Whenever it takes damage this turn, this Merc takes it instead.
Three Possibly Broken Casters:
Millhouse Manastorm: “Arcane Bolt” – Deal X damage. Gain +Y Arcane Damage.
Bru’Kan: “Muddy Footing” – Deal X damage to a character. Its next ability its (Y) Speed slower.
Tamsin Roame: “Veil of Shadows” – Gain +X Shadow Damage. Enemies can’t heal this turn.
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Hearthstone Mercenaries: A Now-Smarter Baby’s First Comp
This is thelist of “beginning"Mercenaries that are given for free at the end of the Hearthstone Mercenaries tutorial:
Which of these makes the best 3-piece lineup? Well, of the ones we included in our “Maybe Broken” list we’d have Cornelius, Millhouse, Tyrande, and Samuro.
Cornelius + Millhouse + Tyrande is the first “face up” combo I see– double Arcane synergies for DPS, and a tank that prepares to block enemy power turns as well as heal. Are their speeds okay and bullets reasonable?
Tyrande Whisperwind
“Elune’s Grace”, the combos-with-Millhouse spell, is a 6/1 ability. (Can we start a new naming convention? Why not. “6” Speed, Cooldown of “1” turn.) This means her “good” ability starts on Turn 2 and is medium slow. She’ll have to start with “Arcane Shot” to help get one target low before our combo.
In a perfect world we’d rip a Powerful Arcane Spell the action immediately after “Elune’s Grace.” Can Millhouse efficiently come after her on turn 2?”
Millhouse Manastorm
“Greater Arcane Missiles” is what you’dwantto Double and Speed Up– but it’s a 9/2. You’d have to get to Turn 3 to get this one off– that means a lot of gap-filling until then. And on top of that we’d miss out on Tyrande permanently speeding the spell up for another shot, unless the fight goesanotherthree turns. With such low health totals on our Mercs at first, that seems hard to imagine.
This probably means we’re priced into using “Arcane Bolt” to get copied instead, which still probably kills almost anything. Turn 1 Bolt hits for 4, then the Turn 2 double-Bolt hits for 5 and 6. That feels like pretty high DPS! I don’t think I’ve seen a Mercenary do anything like 7 damage on one fast / no Cooldown ability yet, or even anything close.
(Speaking of DPS: I imagine you’ll start to be able to figure out and rank every Merc based on things like DPS and Heals-per-Second soon. This game seems really viable to build simulators for! And with such small and interactive numbers on most things we’ve seen I wouldn’t be surprised if calculating individual Merc DPS is not only possible, but critical to the competitive scene.)
But can Cornelius get us through these turns alive?
Cornelius Roame
We’ve got some slow abilities here, and our hands are almost tied– “Hold the Front” is our fastest, but it’s on a Cooldown at 4/1. That means his opener is always slow: “Martial Mastery” is an 8/0, but we don’t mind. This ability essentially says “Heal for 15% of my health and deal 6 damage” (attack + double damage to Fighters). That seems fine. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a cool breakpoint with this comp where against low level Fighters you always kill with Cornelius punch + Millhouse Bolt + Tyrande Shot.
His second turn is really cool because he seems to have two viable options that counter different things:
Baby’s First Turn Sequence In The Dark
Alright! We’ve got our comp, we’ve figured out our buttons– finally, what does our game look like?
Turn 1:
[At the end of the Turn 1 we’ve now dealt 6 Damage to Fighters, Bolted for 4, and Shot for 4. This could take out almost any Fighter in one rotation, it seems! Is the meta going to revolve around one-shotting things? Once we get higher levels, health and gear, probably not.]
Turn 2:
[If everything goes as planned, Turn 2 adds up to 11 damage.]
One might notice that this is lower DPS than our “basic” rotation in Turn 1– but when we start taking into consideration things like Mercenaries dying before their second ability or, again, any different numbers for Health, this still might be optimal.
Also note that, if things work the way they seem, this turn is strictly faster and more DPS than “Arcane Bolt” into “Arcane Shot” on 7. You’re always going to double the 5 damage spell instead of waiting to use a 4 damage one.
In particular the thing that this sequence seems to do well against is specifically 4 and 5 Speed attacks that would kill Millhouse or Tyrande before they fire on 6. Especially if we tried to burn down the only enemy Fighter on Turn 1, Cornelius healing could let Millhouse live at 1 to enable an 11 damage burst instead of Corny Boy just hitting for 3.
This is likely the end of combat, having seen 25 damage spread across your enemies and left with both sides in shambles. Supposedly dead Mercenaries will get filled in with ones from your bench, but we can only go so deep in one article.
And with that:
deep breath out
I wish the announcement video wasn’t so weirdly received by The People because I think everyone is going to be wildly surprised by how sick this mode is. If you can’t tell, I’m ready to go.
I hope you’ll feed off of my excitement and join me in crossing my fingers that Hearthstone Mercenaries theorycrafting is even half as funky and complex as it looks. If it is, this one could be a game changer.
Good luck, and let’s have some fun!
Hearthstone Mercenaries showcase reveals gameplay, launch date and more
Blizzard just revealed details about Hearthstone Mercenaries. The showcase featured the Mercenaries Village, gameplay, minion types and more.
