Hearthstone doesn’t get nerfs very often, but when it does, the changes can be quite drastic. Here are arguably the 5 biggest nerfs in the history of the game:
5) Undertaker
Undertaker used to be part of a deathrattle-focused build that played an aggressive early game to quickly win the game. After the release of Naxxramas, players discovered this deck and started to dominate the ladder until Blizzard released a nerf, practically destroying the deck’s viability on ladder.
4) Gadgetzan Auctioneer
In the early days of Hearthstone, Rouge had many low costs spells that could be comboed to draw out the entire deck in one turn. Since interactivity is a main part of Hearthstone, combo decks that won in one turn were not fun to play against. Gadgetzan Auctioneer’s mana cost was increased along with Leeroy Jenkins’ to prevent Rouges from comboing out for more than 30 damage in one turn.
3) Leeroy Jenkins
In addition to being the reason Rouge decks could deal over 30 damage in one turn, Leeroy was also part of almost every other deck due to his cheap cost and ability to set up huge damage dealing turns without any other cards on the board. The nerf made him much harder to play and he fell from popularity due to being overshadowed by better, on curve minions.
2) Starving Buzzard
Starving Buzzard used to be part of a combo that allowed Hunters to punish aggressive decks that dropped too many minions by allowing the Hunter to use Unleash the Hounds and refill their Hand. However, since the extreme change to Buzzard’s mana cost, the deck and its style of play have been replaced by large numbers of Face Hunter decks.
1) Warsong Commander
Nerfed not once but twice, Warsong Commander used to enable an OTK Warrior deck using cards such as Raging Worgen and Molten Giant. However, that was quickly nerfed due to being unfair to the opponent. With the release of the Blackrock Mountain expansion, Grim Patron joined the party and began the reign of the Grim Patron Warrior. However, 6 months later, Blizzard had had enough and nerfed Warsong Commander into forever being a useless card.