This will be a sixth part of card review series for the upcoming expansion Rise of Shadows. In this review we have couple of Shaman card and they all look good. Shaman is getting many good tools for a variety of styles of play. Will that be enough to make him great again?
Part1
Part2
Part3
Part4
Part5

Sludge Slurper:

A 1 mana 2/1 is a standard body for an aggressive card in the past 2 years of Hearthstone, also it has a battlecry that add a Lackey to your hand and it Overloads for 1. Meaning, if this is a turn one play, the next turn you will be ready with a Lackey to play or another 1 mana-cost minion. A Murloc tag is known for being hyper synergistic, probably the strongest synergy in the game and that could mean that we might see a Murloc Shaman deck. Murlocs are the strongest while there is the least amount of board clears in the standard format and with the beginning of this year, there is an opportunity for that to happen. As I said, the game state is currently going into a value town but you can always die before outvaluing your opponent. This Murloc easily fits into the curve and even gives a decent resource after being played. If Shaman gets just a little bit more aggressive tools there could be a time for this card to shine.

Muckmorpher:

Another Shaman card and this one seems to go into a totally different direction. 5 mana 4/4 but it transforms into a 4/4 copy of a minion from your deck. This sound like a combo accelerant tool. Pulling out Malygos or some other high impact minion that usually costs more mana. Even a 5 mana Alakir doesn't sound that bad. Although not as effective this can be used to get out a combo piece minion and then bounce it with Bog Slosher to your hand to use it later when needed. There are many minions that many decks would like to have more copies of. Now that I think of it, probably there is a potential to use this in a midrange deck full of board Aura or tribe Synergy minions, like Flametounge Totem, Murloc Warleader, Zentimo or even Spirit of the Frog. This card seems a very interesting one and I'm not really sure of its power level but this will be definitely a fun one to experiment around with a there is a high chance that it will find its place in a specific kind of deck. Not sure, although I have to say that it will see play in Combo decks.

Walking Fountain:

The third and last Shaman card for this review, and oh boy does it look nice. 8 mana 4/8, it is not the best stated minion but it also has Lifesteal, Rush, and Windfury! This card does so many things and it is so well suited for Control style of Shaman. It immediately impacts the board and can Heal you for 8 if not more, all while clearing some minions on the opponent's side of the board. This card when for some reason is dropped on an empty board feels threatening because of the Windfury. Everyone has at least once experienced what it means to leave a Windfury minion unchecked and how that can minion with just a couple of buffs can instantly finish the game. This card is capable of so many things that I can't see it not being used during the next expansion at least. But looking at its capabilities I think that it has a huge potential to see play across whole 2 years while it's in the standard format.

Fel Lord Betrug:

A Warlock legendary Demon minion, 8 mana 5/7, kinda too bad for a legendary that even has an effect that doesn't guarantee to trigger. Playing this on turn ten followed up with the Hero Power into drawing a minion that successfully trades isn't that impressive. I mean, it's nice to trade a minion essentially for free but is it worth it in this case? Well, I think that it isn't. First, you got to draw a minion for this to happen, next it has to be a big enough minion to trade into the opponents one, and lastly, it will die and if it isn't a Deathrattle minion, this won't be too big of a deal. Yes, your opponent needs to remove this guy ASAP but again he can ignore it and if you don't draw another big enough minion no harm done. Also, in all of this mess, you are telegraphing your opponent what minion you drew but I think that that is the least of a problem in with this whole situation. If this card could be followed up with drawing a couple of cards or even more specifically minions, then we have a totally different situation, meaning that this could be used as a board clear and that feels strong.

For now, I'm not buying into it and I will say that this card is at best mediocre if not total garbage. Guess we will see with more cards released in the future.

Crystal Tag Team:

Now this is what I meant when Keeper Stalladris was revealed, that we gonna see the push for a Choose One type of Druid, I guess we will call it Crystal Druid haha.

Crystal Power, other than being the perfect fit for Crystal Stag is probably the best 1 mana spell in the game right now. Crystal Power could be directly compared to Arcane Shot and Flash Heal packed in one card. Both of these cards aren't that good but have seen play here and there. Having them in one card and being able to choose depending on what you need still doesn't feel too powerfull but on top of that you got synergies that we already see (Stalladris and Crystal Stag) that really push the power level on this one to more than just playable.

Crystal Stag a 5 mana 4/4 with Rush, already not the worst combination for the mana but when played to satisfy the battlecry requirement it is so damn strong. Only thing that doesn't let me say that this card is overpowered is the lack of good healing options for Druid. Apart from this new Crystal Power, Druid has Healing Touch that is unplayable and Ancient of Lore that is also barely an option to look at. Probably the best way that Druid will use healing is trough Lifesteal minions like, Zilliax but still it will need a little bit of work to meet the Crystal Stags requirement. It is nonetheless a solid card and will see play since it seems that Blizzard will really push this new style of Druid even more.

Ray of Frost:

A 1 mana Twinspell for Mage, this one looks pretty interesting, its flexibility gives this card so many options: Freeze two minions, Freeze a minion a deal it 2 damage or deal for 4 damage to already frozen minions or you can even go face with it. Being a 1 mana Twinspell it makes it work great with Sorcerer's Apprentice and other cards that trigger on spells being played like, Gadgetzan Auctioneer, Archmage Antonidas, etc. It looks like a bit more fair Ice Lance but it also has a potential to become like Ice Lance, which is just to remind you now in Hall of Fame because it gave trouble to the developer's team to balance it out. Because of past experiences, I will say that this is maybe a broken card but since then a lot of things have changed in Hearthstone, maybe it will be manageable. I'm certain of one thing, and that is that this card will be enough for us to see a new Tempo Mage in Rise of Shadows.

Mana Cyclone:

A 2 mana 2/2, not the best body but it seems average in comparison to other 2 mana minions revealed in this expansion. It has a battlecry to add a random Mage spell to your hand for every spell that you cast this turn. This is another Tempo Mage card for sure and it works well with Ray of Frost as well. Being an Elemental does mean it will have some synergies, first that comes to mind is the Arcanosaur but that doesn't feel like the way to go. Elemental Invocation might see play because of this card. It is a 0 mana spell that gives 2 mana tempo for the Elemental (this one) and then recycles for a random Mage spell. This is a significant improvement for both of these cards and might just be enough to see them played together. All in all an okay card that will be used in Tempo Mage for sure and if it gets more Elemental synergy it might just be overpowered.

Commander Rhyssa:

Here we have a Paladin Secret support legendary, 3 mana 4/3 body is basically a premium stat-line for an aggressive card like this, also it has an Aura effect that triggers your Secret twice. Because of her effect and the current Paladin secret pool, Commander Rhyssa feels like a strong card that is hard to remove from the board. It can be protected well with Never Surrender from spell removal, Noble Sacrifice and Autodefence Matrix from minion attacks and with Redemption in general. Although I'm not sure if Killing Commander Rhyssa will proc Redemption once or twice, in any case you are left with her alive on board. Never Surrender makes her and the rest of your board safe from almost any AOE removal such a Flamestrike, because when it triggers your whole board will get +4 health and that is massive value for 1 mana.

Paladin doesn't have any other support for secrets, yet but if some kind of aggressive Paladin deck forms it will most likely have this card in it.

Hecklebot:

Deathlord? Anyone? This effect was on a 3 mana, 2/8 Taunt, Deathrattle minion that was introduced way back in the Naxxramas expansion, the first year of Hearthstone and it was an awesome card. Used in Fatigue/Control decks to break opponents potential combos or just denying them battlecries and thining out their deck. Now, this one is a 4 mana 3/8 taunt, also Mech but it summons the minion with a battlecry. This is slightly worse because if you don't clear it an opponent will be able to attack with that minion the following turn. One advantage it has it is the Mech tribe tag and with high health total, it is a good target for Magnetic effects. Combining it with Zilliax can give a lot of healing while also posibly removing the minion that was summoned this way. This card is a high risk, high reward concept that will usually break opponents combo if you are playing versus control decks, but if your opponent has some big minions and doesn't really care what you summon from their deck it is basically just a minus in tempo for the player using Hecklebot.

This card is a must at "existing" because if any combo deck is getting out of control this is going to serve as a tech option to help in those match-ups.

Mass Ressurection:

Lastly we got this big Priest spell and honestly, I didn't even want to mention this card. It is just a boring one for me. Doesn't do anything new, feels like a replacement for Priests Spellstone, has some minor differences but... I don't know what to say about it other then it sucks. Will only see play if Priest is able to make some Big Minion deck or as specific as Cloning Gallery Priest was with the choice of minions. It just feels high rolly to me and unimpressive.

That's it, I don't like this card, don't really think it will see much play.

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Let's wrap this up. Shaman is getting some really strong cards in every direction. Druid new archetype is seeing a real push and will most certainly be a thing. Tempo Mage is forming and Paladin is on the way to have some chances for an aggressive style of deck.

Thank you for reading!

, z3ll