Hearthstone update 24.2 patch notes: Battlegrounds Season 2 arrives

Lawrence Scotti
hearthstone battelgrounds

Hearthstone Battlegrounds Season 2 arrives with the 24.2 patch notes, including massive changes to the game mode including the addition of a new gameplay mechanic in Quests.

With Murder At Castle Nathria, Heartstone took players back to the Shadowlands with a game of whodunit played in with the Venthyr covenant.

Now that the expansion has been out for almost a month now, Battlegrounds is ready to make the move and join standard play with tons of Shadowlands-based content coming to the game mode. Here are the patch notes for Hearthstone’s 24.2 update.

Hearthstone Battlegrounds update 24.2 patch notes

official Hearthstone Murderat Castle Nnathria cover art
Murder at Castle Nathria dropped on August 2.

On August 30, Season 2 of Battlegrounds will commence, and with it, an all-new gameplay mechanic with Quests.

Blizzard explained how Quests work and said, “Quests have their own unique twist. Instead of starting the game with your Quest, your Quest options will appear on turn 4 (the 6 Gold turn). And instead of getting the same Quest and Quest Reward every game, you pick them from three options at that time. You are choosing both your Quest and the Reward for completing it as a pair, so choose carefully! Once you complete your quest, you automatically receive your Reward.”

There are over a done Quests at launch, all of which can be read at Blizzard’s website.

General Updates

  • Turn 4 (the 6 Gold turn) will have its turn time slightly extended to account for the new Quest mechanic.
  • Players can now exceed 10 Gold when selling minions or otherwise gaining Gold during the shop phase. The start-of-turn maximum is still 10 Gold.
  • Battlegrounds-exclusive Weekly Quests (like “Finish Top 4 in Battlegrounds”) have been removed from the general Weekly Quests rotation and converted into Battlegrounds Missions. Other Daily and Weekly Quests that can be completed across Modes can still be completed in Battlegrounds or other Modes.
  • Celebrate Season 2 with a chain of three Legendary Quests that award new Battlegrounds cosmetics. 

New Heroes

Murloc Holmes (Armor Tier 2)

  • Detective For Hire
    • [0 Gold] Look at 2 minions. Guess which one your next opponent had last combat for a Coin.

Sire Denathrius (Armor Tier 1)

  • Whodunnit
    • Passive. At the start of the game, choose one of two Quests.

Hero Updates

Rakinishu (Tavern Lightning)

  • Old: [2 Gold] Give a friendly minion stats equal to your Tavern Tier. → New: [1 Gold] Give a minion stats equal to its Tavern Tier.
  • Moved to Armor Tier 3.

Patchwerk (All Patched Up)

  • Old: Passive. Start with 55 Health instead of 40. → New: Passive. Start with 60 Health instead of 40.
  • Moved to Armor Tier 2.

Vanndarr Stormpike (Lead the Stormpikes)

  • Redesigned: Passive. Avenge (2): Give your minions +1 Health permanently.
  • Moved to Armor Tier 1.

Drek’Thar (Lead the Frostwolves)

  • Redesigned: Passive. Avenge (3): Give your minions +1 Attack permanently.
  • Moved to Armor Tier 2.

Aranna Starseeker (Spectral Sight)

  • Bob’s Tavern will now always replenish to 7 minions, such as after buying a minion.

Fungalmancer Flurgl (Gone Fishing)

  • Redesigned: Passive. After you sell 4 minions, get a random Murloc.
  • Moved to Armor Tier 2.

Skycap’n Kragg (Piggy Bank)

  • No text change, but the piggy bank can now store over 10 Gold.

Galewing

  • (Westfall) Old: Passive. In 1 turn, give your left-most minion +2 Attack. → New: Passive. In 1 turn, give your left-most minion +2/+1.
  • (Eastern Plaguelands) Old: Passive. In 5 turns, your next Tavern Tier upgrade costs (5) less. → New: Passive. In 5 turns, your next Tavern Tier upgrade costs (6) less.

New Minions

Picky Eater [Tavern Tier 1, Demon]

  • 1 Attack, 1 Health. Battlecry: Consume a random minion in Bob’s Tavern to gain its stats.

Mind Muck [Tavern Tier 2, Demon]

  • 3 Attack, 2 Health. Battlecry: Choose a friendly Demon. It consumes a minion in Bob’s Tavern to gain its stats.

Piggyback Imp [Tavern Tier 2, Demon]

  • 4 Attack, 1 Health. Deathrattle: Summon a 4/1 Imp.

Nether Drake [Tavern Tier 2, Dragon]

  • 0 Attack, 5 Health. At the end of your turn, give your Dragons +1 Attack.

Amber Guardian [Tavern Tier 3, Dragon]

  • 3 Attack, 2 Health. Start of Combat: Give another friendly Dragon +3/+3 and Divine Shield.

Legion Overseer [Tavern Tier 3, Demon]

  • 4 Attack, 4 Health. Minions in Bob’s Tavern have +2/+2.

First Mate Pip [Tavern Tier 3, Pirate]

  • 5 Attack, 4 Health. You only need 2 of these to make a Golden copy.

Treasure-Seeker Elise [Tier 4]

  • 5 Attack, 5 Health. After you Refresh 5 times, find the Golden Monkey.
    • Golden Monkey [Tavern Tier 1] 6 Attack, 6 Health. Taunt.

Rendle the Mistermind [Tavern Tier 4]

  • 4 Attack, 5 Health. At the end of your turn, steal the highest Tier minion from Bob’s Tavern.

Tortollan Blue Shell [Tavern Tier 5]

  • 4 Attack, 7 Health. If you lost your last combat, this minion sells for 5 Gold.

Tea Master Theotar [Tavern Tier 6]

  • 6 Attack, 6 Health. After you play a minion with no minion type, give 3 friendly minions of different types +2/+2.

Minions Updates

  • Toxfin is returned to the minion pool.
  • Kooky Chemist, Steward of Time, Bublette, Silverback Patriarch, Icky Imp, Nathrezim Overseer, Soul Devourer, Briny Bootlegger, Shifter Zerus, Cobalt Scalebane, Witchwing Nestmatron, Mythrax the Unraveler, and SI:Sefin have all been removed from the minion pool.
  • Impulsive Trickster
    • Old: [Tavern Tier 1] 2 Attack, 2 Health → New: [Tavern Tier 2] 2 Attack, 3 Health
  • Imprisoner
    • Old: [Tavern Tier 2] 3 Attack, 3 Health → New: [Tavern Tier 1] 2 Attack, 2 Health
  • Drakonid Enforcer
    • Old: [Tavern Tier 3] 2 Attack, 4 Health → New: [Tavern Tier 4] 3 Attack, 7 Health

Mercenaries Updates

Murky and its portraits can now be obtained through all normal methods.

King Krush

  • Apex Predator 5
    • Old: Attack the lowest Health enemy minion. Deathblow: Repeat this. → New: Attack the lowest Health enemy minion. Deathblow: Gain +5 Health and repeat this.
    • In addition to this effect change, the Ability will now be Speed 5 at all levels.

Cariel Roame

  • Crusader’s Blow is now Holy.

Deathwing

  • Claws of Terror 5
    • Old: Attack an enemy. If it was damaged this turn, deal 8 damage to them. → New: Attack an enemy. If it was damaged this turn, deal 8 damage to it and its neighbors.
  • Heart of Unliving 4
    • Old: Claws of Terror deals 5 more damage and affects adjacent enemies. → New: Claws of Terror deals 5 more damage.

Yrel

  • Maxed Health
    • Old: 76 → New: 88
  • Radiant Light
    • Old: Speed 4 → New: Speed 2

Blink Fox

  • Maxed Stats
    • Old: 11/84 → New: 14/92
  • Arcane Fling 5
    • Old: Deal 13 damage to an enemy. If it has not acted yet, deal 18 instead. → New: Deal 17 damage to an enemy. If it has not acted yet, deal 22 instead.

Rexxar

  • Animal Companion (All Ranks)
    • Old: Cooldown 1 → New: Cooldown 0
  • Explosive Shot 5
    • Old: Deal 16 Damage to an enemy and 8 to adjacent ones. → New: Deal 20 Damage to an enemy and 12 to adjacent ones.
  • Huntsman’s Rifle 4
    • Old: Explosive Shot deals 4 more damage. → New: Passive: At the start of each turn, deal 10 damage to all enemies if you’ve summoned all 3 Animal Companions this game.

Fathom-Lord Karathress

  • Cataclysmic Bolt 5
    • Old: Deal 20 damage to the lowest health enemy. → New: Deal 22 damage to the lowest health enemy.

Cornelius Roame

  • Martial Mastery is now Holy

Introducing Runestones

Runestones are Hearthstone’s new virtual currency. You can purchase Runestones with money and then use them just like you would use money for almost all Hearthstone products, across all modes. The costs of products aren’t changing, their prices are just being converted to Runestones. One benefit of this changes is that it allows us to offer smaller-scale items in the shop, like individual Skins or Battlegrounds Emotes, that would previously have had to have been bundled together with other items.

Updated Leaderboards

Hearthstone leaderboards are getting an update! The leaderboards for Standard, Wild, Classic, Battlegrounds, and Mercenaries will now have live updates (currently, they refresh in intervals of 5-10 minutes). All leaderboards will also now select from Season number (like Battlegrounds currently does), instead of a month and year. Finally, there’s no longer a limit to how many people can be shown on those leaderboards. For Standard, Wild, and Classic, this means that all Legend-rank players will be listed. You’re all leaderboard finishers in our book!

Feature Update: In-Game Reporting

In-game player reporting is now live for all players. You can now report friends, current opponents, and past opponents from the friends list menu. Grounds for reporting include inappropriate names, inappropriate chats, and inappropriate gameplay. Now we can all work together to make sure the tavern is a safe and inviting place for everybody to play!

Bug Fixes

  • Improved in-game messaging capabilities. 
  • Fixed a bug where Relic of Dimensions did not draw from the top of your deck. 
  • Fixed a bug where Demolition Renovator did not function on mobile. 
  • Fixed a bug where Front Lines did not trigger if either player’s board was already full. 
  • Fixed a bug where Party Crasher would “use up” the attack of a Rush minion that survived the crash. 
  • Fixed a bug where Sinful Brand would not trigger if the minion died from the damage. 
  • Fixed a bug where Sunken Scavenger was incorrectly counted as an “Imp.” 
  • Fixed a bug where Imprisoned Scrap Imp was not counted as an “Imp.” 
  • Fixed a bug where Suspicious Usher would retain any damage done to minions copied. 
  • Fixed a bug where Dispose of the Evidence showed the shuffled card in the history tile. You can now dispose the evidence without exposing the evidence. 
  • Fixed a bug where Sinstone Graveyard summoned its minions to the far left side of your board, instead of directly to its right. 
  • Fixed a bug where the Infuse sound effect did not play when an Infuse counter was incremented. 
  • Fixed a bug where Locations did not play their entry sounds when played. 
  • Fixed a bug where Location activation visual effects were not seen by opponents. 
  • Updated the text on Cloak of Shadows to more accurately describe how it works. 
  • Spammy Arcanist’s effect will now count Bubbler dying from 1 damage in order to continue spamming. 
  • The Relics of the Deep Battlegrounds Hero Power can no longer be used when you already have a full hand. 
  • Updated Trigore’s Task 9 criteria. 
  • Fixed a bug preventing the Efficient Octo Sought achievement from being able to be completed. 
  • Fixed a bug where Herald of Shadow did not count for the Harold Who? achievement. 
  • Updated the wording on the One of the Classic Blunders achievement to match its function. 
  • Fixed visual bugs with the Reveler Kael’thas and Venthyr Liadrin Hero Skin animations.  
  • Misc. other bug fixes and game improvements. 

About The Author

Lawrence is a former Dexerto writer, based in New York City, who covered entertainment and games for Dexerto focusing on Hearthstone, World of Warcraft, NBA 2K, and any indie game he can review.

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