Force of Nature, Big Game Hunter, Ironbeak Owl and Knife Juggler are among the victims of the nerf bat.
The Hearthstone community has long expected the promised changes to the classic set. With the arrival of standard on April 26th and the exiling of a large piece of the available cards from the new competitive format, said changes were really needed going forward.
There are a few major talking points here. First of all, Druid's [card]Force of Nature[/card] combo is gone, as the card no longer summons Charging threats, but regular ones which don't die at the end of turn. [card]Savage Roar[/card] remains untouched, though, which was largely considered to be the more problematic card of the two.
Other Druid staples like [card]Ancient of Lore[/card] and [card]Keeper of the Grove[/card] have been touched and shouldn't be auto-included in every deck from now on.
Removal and silence effects have also been addressed and two of the most expected targets are [card]Ironbeak Owl[/card] and [card]Big Game Hunter[/card], cheap removal staples in the majority of Hearthstone decks. Class removals in [card]Hunter's Mark[/card] and more importantly, Rogue's vital [card]Blade Flurry[/card] have also had their mana cost increased. Additionally, Blade Flurry has been stripped from the ability to damage the enemy hero.
Third, we have aggro decks suffering a big hit in three of their core cards: [card]Knife Juggler[/card], [card]Leper Gnome[/card] and [card]Arcane Golem[/card]. This should address the worry about whether or not aggro decks will be too strong in standard with the removal of key defensive cards such as [card]Antique Healbot[/card] and [card]Sludge Belcher[/card].
Furthermore, Handlocks and RenoLocks will see their favorite [card]Molten Giant[/card] made significantly more expensive, up to 25 starting mana!
A final, unexpected change is [card]Master of Disguise[/card]. The card has never seen play in Rogue decks, but according to Blizzard, permanent Stealth has been a design obstacle and this change should open up future options.
