Hearthstone Reveals New "Tavern Brawl" Gamemode - Update

Steven Bogos

The Taco Man
Jan 17, 2013
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Hearthstone Reveals New "Tavern Brawl" Gamemode - Update


Hearthstone's new "Tavern Brawl" mode features special rules that change every week.

Update: Blizzard has cleared up a little bit of the confusion surrounding the cost and rewards of Tavern Brawl, caused by some poor wording on the initial blog post. First up, Tavern Brawl will always be free to play. However, the free card packs awarded for players' "first win of the week" in Tavern Brawl will only be available for the "first few weeks".

Original Story: Blizzard perplexed its playerbase this week by teasing a new addition to Hearthstone [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/tag/view/hearthstone]'s gamemodes, adding a mysterious "fourth button" to the game menu. Today, it has finally revealed the button's purpose: an entirely new gamemode called "Tavern Brawl", coming later this month.

The best way to describe Tavern Brawl is to go all the way back to Left 4 Dead's "Mutation" [http://left4dead.wikia.com/wiki/Mutations] game mode, which essentially provided a twist on the classic co-op and versus modes by adding crazy custom rules that changed every week. Tavern Brawl works much in the same way - one week might feature preset decks, while another week could have you crafting a brand new Tavern Brawl deck following specific guidelines, while others might offer buffs to specific minion types.

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The best part of this new game mode is that unlike The Arena, which costs you a couple of bucks or 150 gold to play, Tavern Brawls are completely free to play, and will even reward you with a free classic pack of cards for your first-win-of-the-week (at least, for the first few weeks following the mode's launch).

In addition to simply queuing against random players of your skill level, you can also challenge your friends to a Tavern Brawl. The first Tavern Brawl should start in mid-June, though Blizzard neglected to give a specific date.

Blizzard also revealed that some new customization options will be coming in the next patch, including the ability to assign specific card backs to specific decks.

It also teased two of the new paid alternate heroes [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/141042-Hearthstone-Alternate-Hero-Skins-10-Each] that will be joining Magni - The Hunter and the Mage. Fan speculation puts the Mage alternate as Medivh, and the Hunter alternate as one of the Windrunner clan.

Source: Blizzard [http://us.battle.net/hearthstone/en/blog/19508176/brace-yourself-for-tavern-brawl-6-10-2015]

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Daymo

And how much is this Pub Club?
May 18, 2008
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And I just convinced myself to stop playing because saving 700 gold for each wing was getting super tedious. Sounds like fun, will probably get me back for a while, depending on what they come up with.
 

Bindal

New member
May 14, 2012
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Well, sounds interesting: Not having to rely on your own deck to play and getting new cardpacks easier is exactly what new players actually need to finally get even with players that play for quite a while (as right now, if you don't have most cards to build good decks, you just get stomped by someone who even has just twenty hours of playtime - let alone someone who finished both Solo Adventures!)
Arena could've been the same thing if it wouldn't be for the paywall it has for every entry.
This seems to solve just that: You don't need your own deck most of the time (meaning playtime matters a lot less) and you get more cardpacks (meaning you get more cards to actually use in the proper Play Mode), which helps new players and old players get a new challenge in similar style as the Arena, except free.
 

Best of the 3

10001110101
Oct 9, 2010
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Free for now. Unless they state it will remain free i can see them making you spend money on it after the initial launch.
 

Newage

New member
Aug 21, 2014
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Best of the 3 said:
Free for now. Unless they state it will remain free i can see them making you spend money on it after the initial launch.
Several members of the Hearthstone team said on Twitter it would always be free.
 
Sep 14, 2009
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about damn time blizzard, implementing stuff like this at a snails pace. Should be even easier to apply your own filters between friends for matches for things, but I suppose this is an okay first step.
 

Steven Bogos

The Taco Man
Jan 17, 2013
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Newage said:
Best of the 3 said:
Free for now. Unless they state it will remain free i can see them making you spend money on it after the initial launch.
Several members of the Hearthstone team said on Twitter it would always be free.
Can confirm that Blizzard has told me directly that Tavern Brawls will always be free, however, the card packs awarded for your "first win of the week" will only be for the first few weeks.
 

Best of the 3

10001110101
Oct 9, 2010
7,083
0
41
Newage said:
Best of the 3 said:
Free for now. Unless they state it will remain free i can see them making you spend money on it after the initial launch.
Several members of the Hearthstone team said on Twitter it would always be free.
Turns out you were right, which makes me happy. The base game is good but very bland and repetitive. If this was behind a paywall I'd enjoy it but not enough to actually go out of my way to play it. Really glad to hear this news.
 

Battenberg

Browncoat
Aug 16, 2012
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For those wondering the first tavern brawl is up. You randomly play as either Ragnaros or Nefarian with an uncustomisable pre-set deck (lists here: http://www.hearthpwn.com/news/925-tavern-brawl-launches-today-deck-spotlight-reynads) with both characters having totally different decks. Unfortunately it's not well balanced and one character is kind off dull to play as after the first few games imo but fingers crossed for better tavern brawls in the future.