QoL & Balance | IWC 0.92.2 Beta Patch Notes

[h2]Quality of life changes[/h2]

• The deckbuilder can now be used while queuing for a game, entering a game will use the last saved version of your selected deck, when returning to the deckbuilder, you will be prompted if you wish to continue.
  
• Ending a game will now return to the main menu screen you where last on.
  
• Added Automatic game hang reporting after 10 seconds of waiting for an opponent, upon reporting, the game will abort, in the next few days we will be releasing a follow-up hotfix, to ensure that for ranked games there will no MMR changes if this occurs, please be patient as we prepare this patch.
  
• The Mutator menu now displays effect description instead of card image.
  

[h2]Fixes[/h2]

• Made a variety of updates and fixes to tutorial mission text.
  
• Fixed Overcharged Bolt not overcharging cards from hand if the primary target becomes invalid.
  
• Fixed Verore Kidnapper returning all cards to their previous zone, not just commanders.
  
• Fixed Misery Stone leaving its effect in place when removed from play.
  
• Fixed Purification Stone not self-sacrificing if its targets become invalid.
  
• Fixed Rescue Angel only becomes 0 cost at 48 or less health, instead of 50.
  
• Fixed issue where you could create invalid accounts.
  

[h2]Balance Changes[/h2]

[h3]Mutating Dead rework:[/h3]
Pay 2: Remove target Character from a Graveyard. Mutating Dead gains +2/+2, and gets the Removed Character’s keywords until the end of turn.

Giving Mutating Dead Flying and Untouchable is too uninteractive for how quick and reliable it is (usually followed by other keywords for more resilience and a quicker kill). This effect is really cool but would be more fun if there’s more counterplay, so we’re changing it to temporary buffs. In exchange, you can activate it many times per turn now.
Stealing types at all, and stealing keywords from combat kills were removed, in both cases because they very rarely matter, and would matter even less if they were until end of turn only.
Another change: Previously, Mutating Dead would only be able to copy a conditional keyword such as “Indestructible in the Assault Zone” if the target was at that time in the Assault Zone (rather challenging in this case as the target should be in the Graveyard). Now, Mutating Dead will be able to copy “Indestructible in the Assault Zone” at any time – but will still only have Indestructible when Mutating Dead itself is in the Assault Zone.

Agent Coyle, Singularity Add Pay 1 to activation cost

Multicolor cards are very strong, so getting to draft them for free was making it just a bit too competitively viable to win by simply pulling out your secret second deck to fix your late game (especially against control decks). This is a small nudge that will hopefully preserve what’s cool about Singularity but leave a little more tempo burden on your own deck.

Tempus, Champion of Patience rework:
1 cost 8 morale
Flying
At the start of combat, if Tempus is on the Battlefield and you control 5 other Deployed Angels, Tempus Ascends to gain +8/+8.
2/2

Tempus is easily the most powerful aggressive threat in the game and sets the entire pace of the competitive scene. Normally, Flying-based aggro threatens more consistent damage in exchange for efficiency - not so with Tempus. But her worst crime is forcing the rest of the Overseers faction to be balanced around her, especially token-making ones. In order to safely buff other Overseers cards, especially aggressive ones, Tempus needs to go down a notch. We do still want Tempus to be a useful card, and from certain points of view this can be seen as a sidegrade or even open up new applications for her, but the primary intention is as a nerf.

Unstable Demon 6/14 → 9/16, but loses unconditional Haste. Instead, has Haste when in the Graveyard (e.g. when played for its Exile cost).
6 cost
Exile 5
Deadly
Unstable Demon has Haste while in the Graveyard.
9/16

Unstable Demon was too close to an auto-include in any deck with Exiles, and was often preferable to play from hand instead of with Exile anyways. We prefer losing Haste from hand to raising the base cost of the card, and raising its stats seems like fair compensation. We considered lowering the base cost to 5 instead, but there are a lot of 5 cost Demons already and too few 6’s.

Twins in Gray Gain Unique.

You could probably consider this a bugfix as the Twins in Gray have always been unique characters in the game’s universe.

Lead By Example +2/+1 → +1/+2

It was too easy to win on turn 5 with Lead By Example giving +10/+5 to all your attackers. That is not within the bounds of acceptable match pacing and many decks have very little counterplay.

Zuza, Angelic Siren Redesign:
3 cost
Pay 3: This turn, when Zuza is blocked by a Character, gain control of that Character until the end of turn, and move it to the back of your Assault Zone.
6/6

Zuza’s original effect was often frustrating to play against due to its low risk, high value, and persistence on the board. It also had a number of technical issues, so a redesign made the most sense. We hope this new version is fun.

Evellee, Mage Guild Recruiter Now uses each card’s base cost and ignores all cost-changing modifiers.

Evellee is too unfair currently with cards like Bek, ever since we changed cost-changing effects to apply to the Deck but not Deployed zones. We considered removing the deck as an eligible cost-changing zones, but think that would be losing something of value.

Aleta, Immortal Searcher Pay 3 → Pay 2 to activate. Exhaust for two turns.

We would like to make this card playable as a card draw engine, but don’t want it to be too easy to fill your hand without other investment.

Aleta, Immortal Survivor Change activation to “Exhaust, Pay 2: Draw a Beast card.”

Her old activation was just too awkward to be worth using.

Brutality Change from “+8/+0 until the end of turn” to “+8/+8 until the end of turn”.

Brutality is never played except in rare combo-kill decks, so we wanted to make it better at fighting on board. It also functions as a heal in a pinch.

Warcry +3/+0 → +5/+0

With Celebration of Heroes moved to 2p, it only seemed fair to make the 1p attack buff card a little more playable, especially for Rift Run.

Resolute Initiative also protect from lethal noncombat damage (will survive at 1 health):
Preemptive

Each Character you control cannot be killed by non-combat damage or by kill effects this turn.
Also fixed a bug where Resolute Initiative wasn’t affecting your Command Zone.
This card is really narrowly targeted at Mass Death, and we wanted to encourage players to give it a second thought. We hesitated to give it complete immunity to noncombat damage, partly because of its power with your own damage-based sweepers, so it will just save your characters at 1 for now. Let us know if you think we should push it further.

Mark1 ’Brimstone’ Battle Tank - make it bigger and costlier, reduce activation cost
OLD:
6 cost 15/14 - Pay 5: Mark 1 'Brimstone' Battle Tank deals 8 damage to target Character on the Battlefield. Activate this only once per turn.
NEW:
8 cost 18/26 - Pay 4: Mark 1 'Brimstone' Battle Tank deals 8 damage to target Character on the Battlefield. Activate this only once per turn.

The old Brimstone Battle Tank was pretty unplayable and flimsy for its cost. In reworking it, we wanted to give 1p Flame Dawn Rift Run decks a new high curve option and improve its potential in command, with a different feeling from Morningstar Wayclearer (their current late-game gold standard).

Avatar of Daode redesign:
OLD:
7 cost 1/25 - Unblockable - When Avatar of Daode is dealt damage, it gains that much attack. - If Avatar of Daode would die, it instead Exhausts for two turns and removes all damage, buffs, and debuffs.
NEW:
8 cost 1/30 - Vigilance - When Avatar of Daode is dealt combat damage, it gains that much attack. If it's attacking, it also attacks again. - If Avatar of Daode would die, it instead Exhausts for two turns and removes all damage, buffs, and debuffs.
Avatar of Yuanshi 7 → 6 cost

Since we nerfed the Avatars’ immortality in the last patch, we wanted to give some compensation gifts to the two lesser-played ones. They have been reworked to be different costs so that they can be run together a little easier, and to fill unique curve slots for their respective archetypes. This should improve the playability of these two avatars, hopefully above their pre-nerf power levels.

Monster Hunt redesign:
OLD:
5 cost Ability - Kill target Character with a cost equal to or higher than 6.
NEW:
2 cost Ability - Kill target Character when it enters combat with a Unique Character this turn.

Hybrid cards are always a bit tricky to design, especially when they fill a staple role and are common in Rift Run. We wanted to keep its role as hard removal while playing into interesting things these two factions can do and enabling it as a Constructed tool that cares about the board. There are enough Uniques running around in Rift Run that this should still be an interesting splash in a deck that isn’t fully focused on them.

Undying Dedication adjust to not just add the triggers to commanders, but also let them grow while in command.
OLD:
Each Character you control in play and in your Graveyard permanently gains "At the end of turn, if this is Deployed or in the Graveyard, this permanently gains +1/+1."
NEW:

Each Character you control in play and in your Graveyard permanently gains "At the end of turn, if this is in play or in the Graveyard, this permanently gains +1/+1."

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