Hearthstone: Spellstones guide – Best cards and decks

Spellstone Overview

Spellstone cards are special Hearthstone cards that grow in power if you choose to hold onto them and fulfill certain conditions. You might need to gain a certain amount of Armor to see the card in your hand grow, for example, or incur a certain amount of Overload penalty.

The team is confident that deck archetypes will be built specifically around this new mechanic, although it may well be that existing decks will also find room for these cards where it makes sense to include them, and doing so won’t undermine the deck’s performance.

A few key things to note:

• It’s believed that all nine Hearthstone heroes will be getting their own Spellstone.
• Each Spellstone has a Lesser, Normal and Greater version with distinct artwork for each different form.
• Spellstones do not become more expensive as they increase in power. The Mana cost remains the same regardless of the state of the Spellstone.

Spellstone Cards

Here are a couple of examples that have been provided by Blizzard so far. We’ll continue to add to this guide as new Spellstone cards are released, and once the expansion is out we’ll link to any bespoke Spellstone decks that we think you need to know about.

Druid – Jasper Spellstone

The first example given at the BlizzCon panel was a Druid-specific card called a Lesser Jasper Spellstone which in its base form deals two damage to a minion. If you can gain three Armor though (hello Malfurion the Pestilent), then that increases to four damage. The upper limit if you gain another three points of Armor is six targeted minion damage.

Jasper Spellstone Druid decks

• 1. Aggro Token Druid – Aggro Token Druid deck list guide
• 2. Big Druid – Big Druid deck list guide
• 3. Jade Druid – Jade Druid deck list guide
• 4. Malygos Druid – Malygos Druid deck list guide
• 5. Miracle Druid – Miracle Druid deck list guide

Hunter – Emerald Spellstone

If Secret Hunter is to be a thing in the Kobolds and Catacombs meta, then Emerald Spellstone is certainly looking like a component of that archetype. This 5 Mana spell summons two 3 / 3 Wolves in its vanilla state. Play a Secret and you get three Wolves. Play another Secret and you get four!

Emerald Spellstone Hunter decks

• 2. Big Hunter – Big Hunter deck list guide
• 2. Secret Hunter – Secret Hunter deck list guide
• 3. Spell Hunter – Spell Hunter deck list guide

Mage – Ruby Spellstone

This is the cheapest Spellstone we’ve seen yet and arguably the easiest to trigger pretty early on with an Elemental Mage deck. Each time you play two Elemental-class cards, an extra random Mage spell is added to the Lesser Ruby Spellstone until you cap out at three.

Ruby Spellstone Mage decks

• TBC

Paladin – Pearl Spellstone

Next up is the Paladin, with its Lesser Pearl Spellstone. It costs 2 Mana and in its vanilla form summons a 2 / 2 Taunt minion. If you heal for 3 points the card grows and will provide a 4 / 4 Taunt. Heal for 3 once again and it becomes a 6 / 6 Taunt minion. It’s not the most exciting Spellstone card we’ve seen to be honest, but let’s see how useful it proves in the Kobolds and Catacombs meta.

Pearl Spellstone Paladin decks

• TBC

Priest – Diamond Spellstone

The Priest’s Diamond Spellstone card costs 7 Mana to cast, and in its initial form is resurrects two different friendly minions. Cast four spells and you’ll get three different minions back. Cast another four spells and you’ll get four different minions back!

Diamond Spellstone Priest decks

• 1. Big Priest – Big Priest deck list guide
• 2. Silence Priest – Silence Priest deck list guide

Rogue – Onyx Spellstone

The Rogue gets the Onyx Spellstone, which costs five Mana and destroys one random enemy minion in its basic form. If you play three Deathrattle cards, however, then two enemies are destroyed. Play a further three Deathrattle cards to upgrade the card, and obliterate up to three random enemy minions.

Onyx Spellstone Rogue decks

• TBC

Shaman – Sapphire Spellstone

The second example provided was a Shaman card called Lesser Sapphire Spellstone. This costs seven Mana and summons one copy of a friendly minion you target. If you Overload by three Mana Crystals though, you get to summon two copies. Overload by three again and you’ll gain three copies of your target!

Sapphire Spellstone Shaman decks

• 1. Overload Control Shaman – Overload Control Shaman deck list guide

Warlock – Amethyst Spellstone

This 4 Mana Spellstone card starts off in its Lesser form by dishing out 3 points of damage to an enemy minion. At the same time your Hero’s rewarded with the same amount of Health via the Lifesteal mechanic. The first time you take damage from one of your own cards, the Spellstone grows to 5 points. The second time your cards damage you, the Spellstone grows to 7 points.

Amethyst Spellstone Warlock decks

• 1. Cubelock – Cubelock deck list guide
• 2. Control Warlock – Control Warlock deck list guide
• 3. Demon Warlock – Demon Warlock deck list guide
• 4. Quest Warlock – Quest Warlock deck list guide

Warrior – Mithril Spellstone

Here’s the Warrior’s Jade Druid flavour of Spellstone! Each time you play a weapon the Spellstone improves and summons an extra minion. We believe that even the weapons granted by weak minions such as N’Zoth’s First Mate count towards the growth of Lesser Mithril Spellstone. If you’ve seen a statement from Blizzard stating otherwise, please let us know in the comments.

Mithril Spellstone Warrior decks

• 1. Pirate Warrior – Pirate Warrior deck list guide

That’s all the information we have about Spellstone cards for now. As soon as we get more details, we’ll update this guide. In the longer term, we’ll also include decks that make use of this new mechanic.