History YMMV / HearthstoneHeroesOfWarcraft

* DesignatedHero: The subtitle is Heroes of Warcraft. That said, two of the "heroes" are Gul'dan (an evil warlock from Warcraft II) and Garrosh Hellscream (the BigBad of Mists of Pandaria). The game's definition of "heroes" became even more twisted as time went on, with characters like [[DarkChick Madame Lazul]], [[BigBad Mecha-Jaraxxus]], [[EldritchAbomination N'Zoth]] becoming playable.

* AlasPoorScrappy: Even the most Base Breaking or [[TierInducedScrappy overpowered]] classes invokes this reaction from players when the designers nerf them to unplayable and completely screw them over in the next card adventure / expansion. The most prominent ones are Rogue during The Grand Tournament expansion and Priest during the One Night in Karazhan adventure, if the reaction to Purify is anything to go by.

*** Journey to Un'Goro's Vicious Fledgling quickly usurped Tuskarr Totemic's nickname for two reasons: Tuskarr Totemic had been nerfed so it was no longer as annoying as Dr. 6 or 7, and Fledgling is an [[TierInducedScrappy annoying]] 3 mana 3/3, fitting better with the theme.

* TierInducedScrappy: [[TierInducedScrappy/HearthstoneHeroesOfWarcraft has its own page]]

** On the otherside of the movie spectrum, you have [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tc6ptCEMSCg Onyxia's Lair]], which people have compared to a Disney villain's musical number.

** Justicar Truehart, a 6 mana 6/3 Neutral Legendary released for TGT with the Battlecry of updating the player's Hero Power is beloved for bringing more active ways of interacting with the player's Hero Power and being one of the better conceptualized cards from the set.

** ''Zephrys the Great'' is slowly becoming this, primarily due to effor of the devs in making him a ''[[ArtificialBrilliance smart]]'' card who will analyze battlefield conditions and offer you 3 best possible solutions for your situation. He might even see Lethals you might have missed, so pay closer attention when he starts offering direct burn spells.

** On a meta example, the gnomes. In the original game, they're TheScrappy but was much more well-received in this game due to being the focus for the [=GvG=] expansion and is the image of many powerful cards (Recombobulator, Shrinkmeister, Shieldmaiden, Spider Tank, Tinkmaster Overspark, Loot Horder, Knife Juggler, Leper Gnome, Mind Control Tech etc.)

** The "Road to Northend" gave one to Bookmaster Bae Chao (widely considered to be [[ThatOneBoss an annoying overpowered boss]] in the Dalaran Heist Adventure). Not only dialogues reveal that she was forced to move after the invasion, she was given a tongue lashing from the League of Explorers for being overly concerned with her books [[SkewedPriorities when Galakrond is about to be awakened]].

** ''Journey to Un'Goro'' also makes an effort to reuse some of the older / rarely appear mechanic: Poisonous got a whooping 4 new cards and even appear as an option for the Adapt mechanic, minions that increase the mana cost in your hand got a new release in Emerald Hive Queen, Mage and Shaman receive another option to copy their friendly minions with Molten Reflection and Spirit Echo after Duplicate released all the way back to [=GvG=] and the permanent effect of the Portals appeared in ''One Night in Karazan'' and various Tavern Brawl is finally used in meaningful ways with the introduction of the Warlock quest and the Rogue Legendary Sherazin, Corpse Flower.

** Following ''The Grand Tournament'', the fanbase was fairly miffed. The Joust and Inspire mechanics were total failures outside of Murloc Knight and Confessor Paletress, the Grim Patron deck as it was known was almost completely obliterated by the nerf to Warsong Commander, there was too much annoying RNG controlling the game, and Secret Paladin, a notoriously brainless and overpowered deck, was plaguing the ladder along with a plethora of aggro decks. Faith in Blizzard was at it's lowest, when suddenly they ''smashed'' people's expectations with ''The League of Explorers''. It introduced Discover, a fun variant on RNG that lets players decide the outcome, a large amount of unique, strong cards, and finally the introduction of Reno Jackson, the single most powerful anti-aggro card in the game.

** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58KHn4H6F5Q Trial By Felfire]] gave us the song Ashes of Outlands' Trailer didn't, with a heavy rock and laser light show to boot to show us that Mecha-Jaraxxus has come to claim the Outlands for himself.

* AuthorsSavingThrow:
** After rabid community outcry over the reveal of the blatantly terrible Priest card Purify, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ot7nlHXPLqU Ben Brode published a video]] explaining Blizzard's reasoning for creating the card, that they screwed up by releasing a weak card at the wrong time, and that the card would be removed from Arena drafts to give Priest some much needed support.
** The release of more cards with the "class cards stealing" theme in later expansions for Rogue seems to have quieted down the jokes that Priests are better thieves than Rogues.
** At launch, a mistake in the pack coding for ''Mean Streets of Gadgetzan'' caused the tri-class cards to be dropped at triple the rate, causing players to receive a disproportionate amount of duplicates. In response, Blizzard fixed the bug and handed out free ''Gadgetzan'' packs equal to a third of the packs a player had opened up to that point.
** Many ''Hearthstone'' forums were up in a shitstorm at the release of ''Journey to Un'Goro'', due to accusations that packs were bugged to give a disproportionate amount of duplicates. This would later turn out to be false, but regardless Blizzard seemed to recognize that this shouldn't happen, and as such starting with ''Knights of the Frozen Throne'', packs no longer give duplicate Legendaries (unless the player owns every Legendary from that set), and guarantee that one is opened within the first 10 packs.
** With the release of the ''Kobolds and Catacombs'' expansions, Hunter players were dismayed to discover that Deathstalker Rexxar, whose hero power generates "Zombeasts" made up of two low-cost beast cards combined into one new minion, could not use any of the beasts from the new expansion. It was then revealed that this was not a bug, and that the Zombeast pool was not planned to EVER expand and would only get smaller with each standard rotation. Game dev Mike Donais explained to Reddit that the issue was not about the coding as many suspected, but rather that the localization teams need to translate every possible Zombeast combination and then fit the translated wording into highly specific requirements for card text arrangement. After a few days of internet outrage over the unannounced limitation, the same dev returned to Reddit to announce that they would be reworking the pool to add new and future beasts.
*** As of Rastakhan's Rumble, this change to Deathstalker Rexxar has nosedived into NiceJobBreakingItHero territory; the inclusion of new beasts in his Zombeast pool—and the exponential growth of options that resulted from it—has almost certainly led to Hunter's ongoing dominance in this expansion. [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/GameBreaker/HearthstoneHeroesOfWarcraft See the Game Breaker page for more details.]]
** After a patch aimed at solidifying gameplay consistency was flamed for blatantly nerfing Tess Greymane, Lynessa Sunsorrow, and Jungle Giants without offering dust, Blizzard responded with their reasoning for the patch and admitted they made a mistake by not announcing it beforehand. Afterwards, Tess had her change reverted, and players who brought Quest Druid to HCT were allowed to swap their decks before the tournament. [[note]]Lynessa had no recompense, but compared to the other two her change was pretty minor and was meant to be a simple bugfix, so people were more forgiving.[[/note]]
** After about two years of people randomly spawning The Darkness, a minion that starts out Dormant and can only be awakened through a condition tied to its Battlecry and is thus completely useless if summoned in any way except by playing it, the addition of the similar Magtheridon in ''Ashes of Outland'' prompted Blizzard to prevent minion-generating effects from rolling Dormant minions that don't awaken naturally (the Imprisoned minions in the same set are still fair game since they ''can'' awaken by themselves).

* SequelDifficultySpike: To compensate for the lack of a Heroic mode, the base adventure is much more difficult than its predecessors, and the final battle with the Lich King is a strong candidate for the single toughest boss in the game. That said, unlike the previous adventures, Icecrown Citadel does ''not'' lock you out of any content if you can't beat it - the most valuable item (the free Death Knight) is given to you after the first fight, with the rest of the rewards merely being 3 packs and the [[CosmeticAward Arthas hero skin]].

** Elise Starseeker, who apparently is [[WhatAnIdiot reckless enough]] to lead a bunch of kids into such a dangerous place like Un'Goro crater. While the Un'Goro cinematic trailer portrays her as a competent leader, it isn't uncommon to see comments like "Those kids are doom!" whenever it plays.

** The ArtificialStupidity displayed by many of the bosses in the Adventures. Bosses regularly fail to use abilities that boost their attack ''before'' attacking, play cards that synergize together in the incorrect order, fail to clear the board when they should, and regularly [[WhatAnIdiot kill themselves]] by attacking a high-damage minion when they're at low health. This may be to balance out their [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard overpowered cards and abilities, especially in Heroic Mode,]] but the lack of smart play is still noticeable.

The Kobolds' catchphrase of YouNoTakeCandle is such a memetic line, and it's practically a running gag that Kobold-related card has some reference to candles. But come ''Kobolds and Catacombs'', we find out exactly ''[[EldritchAbomination why]]'' they're insistent you don't take any candle. Hell, when the related card is in play, ''you'' will hope you don't take any candles.[[note]]Because once you draw 3 of those, the enemy's ''Darkness'' will activate... and it's a [[OhCrap 20/20]] [[/note]]
** This is actual canon from the [[Videogame/WorldOfWarcraft parent game]] proper: The Kobolds use candles because they're a race of tunnelers. Azeroth is a planet infested in the crust and mantle by the [[EldritchAbomination Old Gods]] and digging into the crust thus brings with it the risk of having DugTooDeep and allowing void energy from the imprisoned Old Gods to seep from the cracks and coalesce in the dark tunnels as manifestations of the Void. Since Light and Void are anathemas to each other, bringing candlelight into the tunnel prevents these void energies from coalescing. Once they have coalesced into something like the ''Darkness'', however, you're going to need a ''lot'' more than mere candlelight to defeat it - which is also represented in the dungeon-run Darkness boss; the candles will buy you time, but you're going to need some seriously heavy hitters to bring it down.

* FunnyAneurysmMoment: The Kobolds' catchphrase of YouNoTakeCandle is such a memetic line, and it's practically a running gag that Kobold-related card has some reference to candles. But come ''Kobolds and Catacombs'', we find out exactly ''[[EldritchAbomination why]]'' they're insistent you don't take any candle. Hell, when the related card is in play, ''you'' will hope you don't take any candles.[[note]]Because once you draw 3 of those, the enemy's ''Darkness'' will activate... and it's a [[OhCrap 20/20]] [[/note]]
** This is actual canon from the [[Videogame/WorldOfWarcraft parent game]] proper: The Kobolds use candles because they're a race of tunnelers. Azeroth is a planet infested in the crust and mantle by the [[EldritchAbomination Old Gods]] and digging into the crust thus brings with it the risk of having DugTooDeep and allowing void energy from the imprisoned Old Gods to seep from the cracks and coalesce in the dark tunnels as manifestations of the Void. Since Light and Void are anathemas to each other, bringing candlelight into the tunnel prevents these void energies from coalescing. Once they have coalesced into something like the ''Darkness'', however, you're going to need a ''lot'' more than mere candlelight to defeat it - which is also represented in the dungeon-run Darkness boss; the candles will buy you time, but you're going to need some seriously heavy hitters to bring it down.

* MagnificentBitch: See [[MagnificentBastard/{{Warcraft}} here]].

* MagnificentBitch (''Book of Mercenaries''): Onyxia, the Broodmother of the black dragons, is once again portrayed as a devilishly theatrical schemer. Integrating herself into the Stormwind aristocracy disguised as a human, Onyxia works with her brother Kazakusan to claim the shards of the broken naaru Mi'da to gain absolute power, using her wealth and connections to have mercenaries collect the shards for her. Orchestrating Tamsin's attack on Stormwind, Onyxia uses the chaos to smuggle the shards to Kazakusan in Alterac Valley, completing their "dark naaru" and giving them all the power they could want. While ultimately cornered in her lair and abandoned by her brother, the determined Onyxia fights to the bitter end, and [[{{Dracolich}} even a little after that]].

* UnintentionalUncannyValley:
** Unlike the stylized faces of most Ancients and Treants, Dame Hazelbark's face is eerily human. While it's ostensibly meant to make her look more grandmotherly, it instead got her branded as AccidentalNightmareFuel from day one.
** Mr. Smite in the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Zld2eXWcOM Deadmines trailer]] got this reaction, especially the part when he's dancing while snapping his fingers. He's more well-animated than previous trailers, but still has that same rough "animated still image" look that the game uses, resulting in something close to real movement but ''way'' off.

* Unintentiona;UncannyValley:

* UncannyValley:

*** Chief among these is Elise Starseeker. She's probably supposed to be a doting teacher type. You'll be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn't use her as the most brutal DeadpanSnarker in the game. Her ''World of Warcraft'' emote[[labelnote:*]]I feel fortunate to have witnessed this![[/labelnote]] is ''savage'' following an opponent's misplay.

*** Chief among these is Elise Starseeker. She's probably supposed to be a doting teacher type. You'll be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn't use her as the most brutal DeadpanSnarker in the game. Her "Wow" emote[[labelnote:*]]I feel fortunate to have witnessed this![[/labelnote]] is ''savage'' following an opponent's misplay.

** Vessina is one of the more popular of the League of E.V.I.L. playable heroes, due to an already fairly-sized group of players wanting to see playable Sethrak in [=WoW=] proper. She stands as a bit of a beacon of hope for them, due to being a gender-dimorphic female Sethrak, which only Sethraliss, their Loa-god is the other example of.

** The Paladin card Dragon Consort is a 5 mana 5/5 Dragon that allows the player to reduce the cost of the next Dragon played by 2. The card refers to a specific title of a dragon that was picked by the Aspects in [=WoW=] to be their "companions, partners, and lovers" and the art depicts a single bronze dragon of ambiguous gender whose effect can "assist" any dragons on the same side, which include some Legendary ones whose gender is explicitly stated like Deathwing, Ysera, Alexstrasza, Nefarian etc.

** Also inverted with Deathwing, who has the nostalgia factor from both WoW and Hearthstone player and Annhylde for being the first female Warrior hero.

** Ambassador Faelin and Dathril are practically dripping with this during Faelin's chapters in Book of Heroes. Faelin clearly remembers Dathril very fondly, went through great danger to return the latter's locket [[spoiler:and refuse to fight Dathril even when the latter was planning to capture his crew as a Naga]].

** The Lich King starts off the fight against him with a brutal cheat card depending on your class that heavily tips the game in his favor, which forces the player to build their deck around mitigating the effects of the cheat card. That is, all classes except Priest, where he just negates your ability to emote with no gameplay effects. This is probably to make it so that players will always have at least one reasonably easy way to obtain the packs rewarded for beating him. While not outright easy, it comes as a breather if one is attempting to obtain the Arthas hero by beating the Lich King with all classes.

** Ambassador Faelin and Dathril are practically dripping with this during Faelin's chapters in Book of Heroes. Faelin clearly remembers Dathril very fondly, went through great danger to return his lockey [[spoiler:and refuse to fight Dathril even when the latter was planing to capture his crew as a Naga]].

** The Lich King starts off the fight against him with a brutal cheat card depending on your class that heavily tips the game in his favor, which forces the player to build their deck around mitigating the effects of the cheat card. That is, all classes except Priest, where he just negates your ability to emote with no gameplay effects. This is probably to make it so that players will always have at least one reasonably easy way to obtain the packs rewarded for beating him.

** The Lich King starts off the fight against him with a brutal cheat card that heavily tips the game in his favor, which forces the player to build their deck around mitigating the effects of the cheat card. That is, all classes except Priest, where he just negates your ability to emote with no gameplay effects. This is probably so that players will always have at least one reasonably easy way to obtain the packs rewarded for beating him.

* StoicWoobie: While Genn Greymane is generally a stoic person, his concern for Tess at the start of Monster Hunt and tells her to be careful because [[AdultFear she is the only child he has left]] makes him this, especially if she is defeated during the Monster Hunt or the Hagatha fight. More so if you are familiar with his Warcraft's storyline and Liam's death.