Hearthstone announced during BlizzCon 2019 that it is introducing a new expansion with Descent of Dragons. The expansion is scheduled to be released on December 10. A lot of people are excited, since dragons are finally coming in Year of the Dragon. It's not just the usual dragons as none other than the most powerful draconic force in Azeroth is arriving: Galakrond.
Unlike other hero cards, Galakrond manifest itself as five unique Hero Cards for the League of E.V.I.L. classes which are Rogue, Warrior, Warlock, Shaman, and Priest. Like existing Hero Cards, Galakrond replaces your current Hero and Hero Power, grants some Armor, and even triggers the card's Battlecry. However Galakrond offers a lot more.
Arriving with Galakrond is the new "Invoke" keyword. Using this keyword results in Galakrond being upgraded into more powerful versions of himself. From his base form, invoking him twice results in a stronger form. Invoking two more times brings him to a more powerful form.To understand this better, let's take the Priest manifestation of this progenitor of dragonkind. We have:
- Base Form: Galakrond, The Unspeakable
- Battlecry: Destroy 1 random enemy minion.
- First Upgrade: Galakrond, The Apocalypse
- Battlecry: Destroy 2 random enemy minions.
- Second Upgrade: Galakrond, Azeroth's End
- Battlecry: Destroy 4 random enemy minions.
- Equip a 5/2 Claw.
As you can see, as he upgrades to a new form, the power of his Battecry effect doubles. In addition, the final form gives him a 5/2 Claw weapon. There is a balance, in that when Galakrond is played and his Battlecry is unleashed, he can no longer be upgraded using Invoke cards. However, they can still trigger the Invoke effect.
But wait, there's more. Whenever you play an Invoke card, you not only help Galakrond to his next transformation. You also grant an activation of this dragon's Hero Power. The card Seal Fate, for example, lets you deal three damage to an undamaged character. However, it also gives you a random Lackey to your hand since that's the Hero Power that was gained when you play Galakrond, The Nightmare, the Rogue manifestation.
Here are some other details that can help you when playing with the new Galakrond cards:
- Main Galakrond
- The first Galakrond that you take control of, whether in your deck or hand, becomes your "main" Galakrond. In general, this should be the one that is included in your deck. However it can also be the one that you steal from an opponent or from some other crazy way. Thus, any Invoke cards are going to upgrade this Galakrond as well as trigger its Hero Power effect. Remember that the five Galakrond cards, along with cards that have the Invoke keyword, can't be generated by random effect.
- Multiple Galakrond
- There are cases when you are going to have multiple versions of Galakrond in your deck. A good example is in Tavern Brawls, where cards from multiple classes are allowed. When this happens, your main Galakrond is the one that matches your class. Otherwise it's going to be the first Galakrond that is detected by the game. Once this happens, your main Galakrond is the same for the rest of the game unless its transformed, destroyed, or when you replace your hero with a dfferent version of this dragon. What this means is that once you play Galakrond, this is your main Galakrond until you make the decision to replace it.
- Invoke
- When you Invoke, it is none other than Galakrond himself that is rewarding you. So when you don't have Galakrond as a Hero, or even in your deck or hand, then the Invoke does nothing. Even if you steal one from your opponent, nothing happens as long as you have no Galakrond.
There you have it. There’s no question that Descent of Dragons is sure to change Hearthstone. Pre-purchase of the expansion is already available here.
