Are you an auto-battler fan? Do you wonder if Hearthstone: Battlegrounds is made for you? Whether you come from Teamfight Tactics, Dota Underlords, Auto Chess, or even Chess Rush, this guide was written to answer all your questions!
The fact that Hearthstone is a card game, and not a MOBA initially, changes the situation on several aspects and it is important to take into consideration these differences to understand the game more easily and become better quickly. Indeed, if some elements like recruitment and automatic battles remain very close to the other auto-battlers, the other fundamentals of this type of game are very different!
Game Basics
In Battlegrounds, you will play against each of the other 7 players one by one. As in other auto-battlers, the players are gradually eliminated, and the last one alive eventually wins!
If you want to know a little more, just about Battlegrounds, you will find a guide just below.
Battlegrounds , the new Hearthstone game mode, will be available in closed beta as of November 05, then open beta on November 12. To get started, here is our guide explaining all the mechanics of the game!
Pros & Cons
Tavern & Economy
At this level, you should not be too out of touch. New minions are present each time randomly, collected in a common pool, which you can buy and use in your army. You can renew the store for one gold and improve it in order to have a chance to get higher level minions.
Tavern level and number of minions
The first difference is that the level of the tavern is related to the number of minions present. At each renewal, it will find the number of initial minions linked to its level.
- Level 1 → 3 minions
- Level 2 & 3 → 4 minions
- Level 4 & 5 → 5 minions
- Level 6 → 6 minions
However, the level of the tavern is not related to the number of minions you can place on your board. If you manage to have 7 minions (the maximum) by keeping your tavern level 1, you can! However, it is strongly discouraged if your goal is to win the game.
Cost of minions
Unlike other auto-battlers where the cost of minions varies according to their tier, in Battlegrounds, all the minions have the same price! For 3 gold coins, you can buy any minion, whatever the level of the tavern or the minion. They can be resold for one gold coin, whatever their level, even if they are improved.
Gold coins and economy
Regarding the economy, the differences are very significant.
- It is impossible to keep gold coins between two passages in the tavern.
- The maximum number of gold available is 10, no matter what happens.
- There are no mechanisms to earn interest.
Since there is a gold cap, long-term savings strategies cannot exist in this game. You will use renewal much more often than in other games to find better minions or create triples.
However, two minions make it possible to make some savings at the beginning of the game. Indeed, when they arrive on the battlefield, they summon another servant whom you can sell a little later, allowing you to have a small reserve that will be unlocked by selling them.
Moreover, it is common on turn 3 (where you have 5 pieces) to sell a minion to be able to buy two.
Battles and positioning
Because of the card game genre, the battles will not be in real-time. In battle, each creature attacks in turn, from left to right. The attacks are totally random, with one restriction: minions with the Taunt keyword are attacked first.
Scout your opponents
For the moment, this is not possible in the game. Future updates will slightly change this fact, allowing us to know the type of minions of each player, but at the time of writing this article, this is totally impossible. It is therefore very difficult to adapt to the opponent's strategy if you have not already faced him recently.
Positioning
If it is very complex in other auto-battlers, it is quite simple in Battlegrounds. A few basic rules can improve your placement, but the RNG, very present, will often decide the tightest fights.
Ideally, you want to position your minions with Taunt on each side of the board, while placing weaker minions or minions with many health points next to them, in order to avoid taking too much damage from cleave effects (minions who also attack minions that are adjacents to their target). The most important minions are placed on the right to hope to keep them alive as long as possible, especially those with interesting effects during the game (see below)
Heroes and minions
Heroes
At the start of each Battlegrounds game, you choose a boss/hero who will give you a bonus in the game thanks to his hero power. Some are passive (and therefore free), others cost a few coins and offer you more or less significant bonuses. The choice of the hero is random, each player being offered 2 or 3 different choices among the 24 existing ones. Only Dota Underlords has a system of heroes, offering 2 which are however very different from those of Battlegrounds.
Minions
If you are used to seeing many synergies related to the types of creature/champions in the other auto-battlers, you will be surprised! At the moment, only four types of creatures are available: Mechs, Demons, Murlocs, and Beasts. Nor are there any passive bonuses linked to the possession of several servants of the same tribe. However, servants can often interact with other creatures of the same type as you own, for example, boosting them or giving them bonuses.
In most parts, the strategy will focus more on specific minions than on specific tribes. If some cards are essential in a given archetype, the games will not look alike, and you can win two games with the Beast archetype without having the same creatures on the board.
Some minions, such as the Nightmare Amalgam, also allow you to play on several levels since he has all types.
Upgrade
Same principle here as elsewhere: to improve a minion, you must combine 3 copies of it, which will then transform it into its improved version. However, an additional bonus is offered in Battlegrounds. Indeed, by putting the improved version onto your board, you will get the opportunity to Discover (understand "choose between three") a minion from the upper tavern level! Improving your tavern before using your discover effect is thus an excellent idea.
Buff
Buffs are the main way to improve your board. Even more than the improved versions, they are the lifeblood of this game. All the buffs you make during your turn will be kept permanently. If you improve your minions, the buffs will be kept and added to the improved version. It is not uncommon to see some of your minions stay in play for a very long time and end up with huge stats, sometimes exceeding 100/100 if you are very lucky with the RNG.
Blizzard keeps the same strategy on Hearthstone: Battlegrounds as on their main game. If he does not have the complexity of other games of this kind, his simplicity and good use of the RNG allow it to position itself effectively and attract many players.
The battlefield will change with the addition of four new heroes! To make room, King Mukla, Giantfin, Millificent Manastorm and Lich Baz'hial were removed and replaced by Brann Bronzebeard, Sir Finley Mrrgglton, Elise Starseeker and Sindragosa!
