Hearthstone 20.0.2 Patch notes: Deck of Lunacy, Pen Flinger, Watch Post, and Jandice Barov nerfs

Over the last month, Hearthstone went through some of the biggest changes since the game's release, and both pros and casual players were excited to find out how will that influence the game's meta.

And while the game feels really fresh with many new strategies influenced by the Forged in the Barrens expansion and the introduction of the Core Set, the meta has quickly become overflowed by a few dominating cards.

The rage-inducing Pen Flinger has become even more oppressive since the rotation and he has found his place in many types of decks that can use cheap spells, where he serves both as a removal option and as a finisher which can do huge amounts of damage, particularly in Rogues and Paladins.

As a response, Blizzard is now nerfing him so that he can only deal damage to minions, but not to heroes.

(Picture: Blizzard)

Far Watch Post and Mor’shan Watch Post are interesting cards added with Forged in the Barrens, and their unique design has been praised by players, but their raw stats were simply too strong in combination with their powerful effect, which has proven to be a deadly combo, and these cards became staple parts of many decks.

Blizzard is now bringing their stats down to be more "fair for the cost" and thus easier for the opponent to deal with them.

(Picture: Blizzard)

Jandice Barov is an interesting card to be nerfed. Blizzard explained that with the introduction of the Core Set, a number of weak 5-drops have been removed from the Standard format, and that has significantly improved the quality of 5-cost minions, which makes Jandice Barov's effect stronger and more consistent.

By putting her cost to 6 mana, they think that will better reflect the total stat output she provides.

(Picture: Blizzard)

Paladins' Sword of the Fallen has been nerfed from having 3 Durability to 2 Durability. There's not much to say here, since the rotation, Secret Paladin has been one of the strongest decks in the meta, mostly thanks to this card and its powerful effect which allows Paladins to consistently have Secrets in play and thus activating secret-synergy cards that benefit from them.

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This is a strong nerf, that will definitely put Secret Paladin more in line with other competitive decks.

(Picture: Blizzard)

Finally, Deck of Lunacy now costs 4 mana up from 2 mana. The card which was mostly seen as a meme before the rotation was now by far the biggest culprit of the new meta. The card singlehandedly created many ludicrous situations and it was really infuriating to play against it, as often players simply had no answers to its insane early game RNG.

(Picture: Blizzard)

Developers wanted to keep its crazy effect as they recognize that players like those fun effects, but with doubling its cost they want to move the card's power from the early game more to mid to late game, where the opponent will have more ways to answer the new threats it creates.

Hearthstone 20.0.2 Patch will be live on 13th April at 7 pm CET / 1 pm ET / 9 am PT.