The next Hearthstone expansion centers on a daring prison break that will let loose all sorts of Azeroth villains. Escape from Violet Hold will launch on July 7, with in-game events and pre-purchases leading up to the release. GameSpot has an exclusive card reveal for the upcoming expansion, which gives a good sense of the prison breakout flavor–and looks to be a must-include for discard-based decks.
The card is Zuramat’s Prison, a 5-cost Location card with 3-durability. Each time you use it, you choose a card to discard and in its place you’ll get a 5/5 Whisper of the Void with Taunt.
Already, this could be a powerful effect, especially if paired with cards that grant you benefits for discarding them. The ability to control what you discard removes some of the inherent randomness that helps to balance the mechanic, so this could be powerful in itself. But then on top of that, you have the payoff. After using Zuramat’s Prison three times, you’ll free Zuramat the Obliterator itself, an 8/8 minion that will summon one of your chosen discards per turn.
Now obviously there are drawbacks. If your opponent kills or silences your Zuramat the Obliterator immediately after you summon it, you’ll permanently lose two of your three chosen discarded cards. Still, though, at minimum it’s a location that feeds a steady stream of taunted minions, lets you control your discards, and then pays off with an 8/8 body that summons at least one discarded card, and puts constant pressure on the board. That’s a powerful build-around for discard decks.
Escape from Violet Hold will launch on July 7, and introduces another 135 cards. A new Prepare keyword lets you bend the rules of Hearthstone by setting up tricky turns like smuggling minions onto your opponent’s side of the board. And a set of new Legendary Rulebreaker minions go even further, enabling wild effects like running duplicate legendaries or unlocking a second Hero Power.
Leading up to launch Hearthstone will have a series of in-game events to net you rewards. First is the Prison Break from June 2-16, centered on the mastermind Vanessa VanCleef putting the pieces in place to plan her prison break. Then June 16-July 7 will be a series of event missions centering on Warden Maiev initiating a lockdown of the prison. Finally, a legendary quest chain leading up to launch will gain you some loot to use when the expansion launches. Battlegrounds mode is also getting an update, with Anomalies making a return, including seven new Anomalies.
