Hearthstone's Madness At The Darkmoon Faire Expansion Goes Live This November

Madness at the Darkmoon Faire is the next expansion for the digital card game Hearthstone which adds an additional 135 new cards to the current season, and goes live on November 18. But that’s not all that’s new with Blizzard’s free-to-play game as they are revamping the progression system and adding a new game mode before the expansion’s release.

This expansion revolves around the Old Gods once again, specifically C’Thun and Yogg-Saron. The unique cards in this expansion will be Old Gods Artifacts and the new keyword added for this season is Corrupt - cards in your hand with this keyword gets stronger after playing a higher-cost card.

Hearthstone’s new progression system

Blizzard is giving Hearthstone’s progression system a complete overhaul by including a variety of features that makes the game more rewarding for the time spend on the game.

The new system goes live on November 13 and adds an achievement system that gives players challenges to aim for and will be updated as more expansions and other big updates come to Hearthstone.

We are also getting a reward track system, which is pretty much the battle pass system that we all know and is familiar with thanks to other games now implementing the same concept. Each reward track will come with a free track plus a paid track which you can unlock if you purchase the Tavern Pass (adds 10% boost and a Golden Silas Darkmoon legendary card). This system contains a series of rewards from cosmetics, packs, cards and will be the prime method in earning gold, the in-game currency of the game.

Everything you do from completing achievements, playing any of the game modes, and completing quests, result in experience which progress you in the current reward track. The reward track will have 50 levels and completing all of them will give you the option to pick up a unique Hero Skin. Progression continues after 50 as each level scores you 150 gold. You also get a cosmetic coin as well if you max out the rewards track.

Quests in the game will act the same way as it did but added more challenging tasks and now weekly quests, which all now adds experience to your rewards track.

Hearthstone’s new game mode - Duels

Duels is a new game mode coming to Hearthstone for free to all players on November 13. Players are tasked to create a deck with select cards available in their collection and add more cards and unique treasures just for the game mode after each match. You also get to play as unique heroes that comes with unique cards and hero powers. The goal is to reach 12 wins before earning your third loss with the deck you made. It’s another gauntlet game mode similar to previous game modes but will be updated regularly each season by adding in more choices from hero powers, treasures, and other cards each season.

The new game mode can be playable as early as now for players that pre-purchase a Madness at the Darkmoon Faire bundle. The official start of the Duels first season will be on November 18.

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Writer’s take: the revamp of Hearstone’s progression system is probably the most exciting update coming in November simply because Hearthstone feels like the least generous free-to-play card game out today. I doubt I’ll have all that I need with this new system to stay competitive but it’s a big improvement as it gives players a series of goals to aim for instead of just hitting the ‘Legends’ rank in ladder.

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