Freezing is one of Hearthstone’s oldest and most under utilized mechanics. Turning a minion into a popsicle that can’t attack for a turn is an amazingly powerful ability, one that the developers at Team 5 have always been afraid to use to its fullest potential. Cards like Demented Frostcaller and Frost Nova attempted to use “ice ice baby” to its fullest potential, but are designated to Arena when there’s no better card to pick. With Knights Of The Frozen Throne taking players to the coldest part of Azeroth, it seems like a fitting time for the coldest card game status to become more than just a gimmick.
Blizzard seems to be pushing two different frost-wielders into the deck-building spotlight. Along with Shaman, Jaina is turning into Elsa from Frozen . With about a week’s worth of card reveals, it’s obvious that Blizzard is trying to make Frost Mage a viable deck archetype. There had been a ton of speculation around what Death Knight abilities the sorceress supreme would be getting after an Italian leak revealed what she could do. She’s a frosty mistress who summons Frost Elementals to do her bidding. If she kills an enemy minion with her Hero Power, she summons another 3/6 snowman to do her bidding.
Combine that spectral ice queen with the other frozen cards in the set and you actually start to see a deck archetype forming before your very eyes. Control Mage has fallen off in recent metas for a number of reasons, including how fast the game has gotten. It’s hard to stack combo pieces in your hand while Pirate Warrior deals lethal damage on the board. Without Emperor Thaurissan , who left us after the Standard rotation of Year Of The Mammoth, Jaina just couldn’t use all her spells before getting chopped in the face. If Mages had the tools to stop powerful minions in their tracks, it would give them time to stage a proper comeback and maybe even beat Aggro.
Icewalker might not seem like much of a powerhouse on paper, but if you take a step back and look at the bigger picture, you can really see how powerful it can be. Icewalker’s stats are abysmal, making playing it on curve seem like a terrible idea. But, if you held it in your hand until the mid to late game, you could afford to Freeze a minion, possibly following it up with a Cryomancer or one of the other new cards, Coldwraith . Getting a draw off a three-mana minion with Spider Tank stats is pretty good – all you have to do is “chill out” first.
Like a drop of water transforming into a snowflake in the clouds, these cards turned Freeze Mage from an icey gimmick into a (potentially) full blown archetype. We still need to see what other Frozen cards could be coming in Knights Of The Frozen Throne , but this is a great start. I miss the skill required to play Control Mage well. I feel like my brain cells are dying every time I queue up with Murloc Paladin. If Blizzard can thaw out the archetype, the game will be much healthier with control blood pumping through it’s veins.
Do you think Control Freeze Mage will be coming back or is the Lich King’s magic not strong enough to bring back something that broken back from the dead? Tell us in the comments.
