Blizzard announced a new Hearthstone expansion today, The Great Dark Beyond, a spacefaring set of 145 new cards set to go live on November 5. Unfortunately, in a break from the normal drip-feed reveal schedule, every single card was revealed to the community at the same time thanks to what must be the biggest leak in the game's decade-long life. It's one way to celebrate, I suppose.
It's not clear what caused the leak—the game's devs have been quiet about it on social media so far—but according to a post on Resetera, it tracks back to a free card, Avatar of Hearthstone, that Blizzard gave away as part of today's 30.6 patch.
That card is part of the game's 10th anniversary celebration giveaways, and is earned by playing at least one game on the new patch. However, after claiming the card (which is very cool and flavourful, not that that will comfort Blizzard much right now) it seems that the entire Great Dark Beyond expansion set became viewable as uncraftable cards in the collection.
This one really sucks for the Hearthstone team. New set reveals are typically tightly-managed affairs that roll out over the course of weeks, with sites and influencers typically showing off a few cards at a time and opining on how they might impact the game.
Take, for example, our own reveal of three cards from the Whizbang's Workshop reveal earlier this year: You got not only a look at the cards themselves, but also insightful thoughts on which of them might be, as resident Hearthstoner Tim Clark put it, "the real juicer."
That analysis has value, as well as building hype, and Blizzard will likely still go ahead with the planned reveal schedule, but for some the excitement of seeing the new cards for the first time is gone. That may be a particularly harsh gut punch with this expansion, which will add the dranei as a new minion type and let players build and launch starships. From the announcement:
Throughout The Great Dark Beyond, you’ll find Starship Piece minions. When they die, their stats and effects get added to your in-progress Starship construction. When you’re ready, press the button and Launch your Starship directly onto the board for 5 Mana. You can stack as many pieces as you want before you launch—the sky’s the limit!
Anybody can build a Starship, but six classes in The Great Dark Beyond have dedicated Starship cards: Death Knight, Demon Hunter, Druid, Hunter, Rogue, and Warlock. Each of those classes has a unique name and art for their Starship, representing their role in The Great Dark Beyond.
It's a little weird for Hearthstone, thematically at least, but that's what makes it interesting—and why today's leak has to be such an air-out-of-the-tires moment for Blizzard.
One bright spot amidst all this is that some Hearthstone players on social media are urging others not to share the leaked cards (and for the record, we will not be). Zeddy, a well-known Hearthstone content creator, said he's simply going to pretend none of this ever happened. Which might be the best way forward for all involved: Head down, power through it. After all, while a lot of Hearthstone players are going to see these cards early, there will be many more who won't.
I'm just going to pretend Hearthstone didn't leak every single card and review them as normal on schedule. Hope you guys will still tune in 😂October 10, 2024
If you want to see the leaked cards yourself, well, it's not hard to find them; if you don't, on the other hand, you might want to avoid Reddit and your favorite Hearthstone leaks account on X for a while.
Apart from all the leak kerfuffle, Hearthstone players can look forward to a pre-release Tavern Brawl that will begin on October 29 and run until The Great Dark Beyond launches on November 5. The Great Dark Beyond Mega Bundle is available for pre-purchase now.
