Hearthstone 20.4 patch notes: First Day of School & Hand of A’dal nerfs, Wailing Caverns mini-set, more

Hearthstone 20.4 patch is almost here and it comes with some much-needed balance changes, as well as an abundance of new content, includes the second Hearthstone mini-set: The Wailing Caverns.

The Wailing Caverns mini-set is slated for release on 3rd June along with update 20.4, and it will include brand new 35 new cards (66 in total), but that's not the only thing we are excited about when it comes to the 20.4 patch.

The update also comes with some long-awaited nerfs for Paladin, by far the most dominant class in the game for quite some time now.

First Day of School will now again provide only two 1-mana minions, but the 1-mana cost will remain the same, and hopefully, this change will finally make the card properly balanced.

The notorious Hand of A’dal is finally getting nerfed as well, one of the most hated Paladin cards, which provides both insane tempo and value trades while drawing a card.

(Picture: Blizzard)

With now giving only 1 HP instead of 2, it will be much harder to make value trades, but it will still remain a strong early game card, especially if Paladin continues to put out minions on turn 1 consistently.

Strangely enough, the patch also comes with a small nerf to Unbound Elemental, which will now have slightly lesser chances to survive cards like Volcano and Elemental Destruction, due to its effect now activating only after the card is being played and resolved.

• Read more: Hearthstone Wailing Caverns Druid cards Fangbound Druid, Deviate Dreadfang, and Rogue's Savory Deviate Delight

Asides from standard changes and the Wailing Caverns mini-set, the update will bring two new Battlegrounds heroes, Guff Runetotem and Mutanus the Devourer, while temporarily removing Maiev Shadowsong from the Battlegrounds Hero Pool.

Finally, the patch introduced new Arena and Duels rotations and Book of Mercenaries Xyrella single-player content.

Check out the full patch notes below.

Hearthstone 20.4 full patch notes

Standard Updates

First Day of School

(Picture: Blizzard)

• Old: Add 3 random 1-Cost minions to your hand. → New: Add 2 random 1-Cost minions to your hand.

Hand of A’dal

(Picture: Blizzard)

• Old: Give a minion +2/+2. Draw a card. → New: Give a minion +2/+1. Draw a card.

Unbound Elemental

(Picture: Blizzard)

• Old: Whenever you play a card with Overload, gain +1/+1. → New: After you play a card with Overload, gain +1/+1.

Battlegrounds Updates

NEW HEROES

Mutanus the Devourer

(Picture: Blizzard)

• Devour [Costs 0]
  • Remove a friendly minion. Spit its stats onto another. Gain 1 Gold.

Guff Runetotem

(Picture: Blizzard)

• Natural Balance [Costs 1]
  • Give a friendly minion of each Tavern Tier +2/+1.

HERO POOL UPDATE

• Maiev Shadowsong has been temporarily removed from the Battlegrounds Hero Pool.

NEW MINION

Hexruin Marauder

• [Tier 4, Demon] 3 Attack, 5 Health. At the end of your turn, if you have 6 or fewer minions, gain +3/+3

MINION POOL UPDATES

• Quilboar are no longer guaranteed to be in every Battlegrounds match.
• Siegebreaker has been removed from Battlegrounds.
• Cap’n Hoggarr’s text has been reworded to say “whenever” instead of “after” (no functional change).

Duels Updates

When the 20.4 patch launches on June 3, the Wailing Caverns Mini-Set will be added to loot buckets and the pool of eligible cards you can use to build your 15-card starter deck. The patch also includes updates to the passive treasures system to make the system less deterministic.

Arena Rotation

When the 20.4 patch launches on June 3, the Arena will include cards from the following sets:

• Wailing Caverns Mini-Set
• Forged in the Barrens
• Darkmoon Races Mini-Set
• Madness at the Darkmoon Faire
• Scholomance Academy
• Ashes of Outland
• Kobolds & Catacombs
• Goblins vs. Gnomes
• Core

Returning Card Backs & Hero Skins

Many previously released Card Backs and Hero Skins will become available for purchase with Gold as of the 20.4 patches!

With this patch, 94 Card Backs and 11 Hero Skins will be available! The following Hero Skins will be available at launch:

• Magni Bronzebeard
• Alleria Windrunner
• Medivh
• Khadgar
• Sylvanas Windrunner
• Lei Shen/Thunder King
• Dame Hazelbark
• Maiev Shadowsong
• Morgl
• Lunara
• Sir Annoy-O

Bug Fixes & Game Improvements

• Updated Friends List messaging to indicate whether friends in Play Mode are playing Ranked or Casual, and which format they are playing.
• Fixed a bug where copying Imprisoned Celestial with Mirror Entity resulted in the copied Imprisoned Celestial being unable to activate its Spellburst effect after awakening.
• Fixed a bug where cost-reduction effects on Dormant minions would persist after the Dormant minion was played and awakened.
• Fixed a bug where effects that trigger after or whenever a spell is cast would not trigger if Oh My Yogg! converted the spell into a new spell with no valid targets.
• Fixed a bug that caused Sparkjoy Cheat to use both Scabbs Cutterbutter discounts if it put a Secret into play with its effect.
• Fixed a bug where Guidance’s Spirit Path option was not being counted as an Overload card when selected.
• Fixed a bug where Bogbeam and Ironbark’s cost reduction effects would not activate after casting Celestial Alignment and going back up to at least 7 Mana Crystals.
• Fixed a bug where Crabrider was not recognized as a Battlecry minion by cards like Field Contact.
• Updated the wording of Shield Slam so that it accurately represents the way that the card interacts with Spell Damage bonuses.
• Added language clarifying that both Classic and non-Classic versions of a card are removed from your collection when either version is disenchanted.
• Fixed a bug where Elite Tauren Chieftan would sometimes generate non-Classic versions of cards when played in Classic.
• “Quilboars” has been corrected to “Quilboar” as the proper plural form of Quilboar when displaying Battlegrounds minion types.
• Fixed a bug where Reckless Apprentice’s effect would cause some minion-only Hero Powers to hit the enemy hero.
• Fixed a bug that would result in duplicate treasures being offered in Duels.
• Prevented cards of the same name from different sets being offered in the same Arena run.
• Updated the Player Profile to display total wins for each game mode.
• Fixed a bug where progress related to progression tracks, such as the “Tavern Regular” achievement, would not properly update.
• Fixed a bug where reward pop-ups would sometimes not properly appear when the reward was earned.
• Fixed a bug that prevented players from switching accounts on iOS devices.
• Updated the New Player Experience to remove certain restrictions and to better indicate locked heroes, modes, and other features.
• Updated MMR calculation for returning players to better account for their time away from the game.
• Fixed a bug where effects that added copies of Diamond cards to a player’s hand or deck would add Golden versions instead of Diamond versions.
• Fixed a bug that would make some Diamond cards not appear in your collection if owned.
• Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause cards in hand to arbitrarily change positions.
• Fixed a bug where the wrong description would sometimes appear for items in the in-game shop.