Info
Forgetful, previously known as clumsy, is an ability A selection of minions, each with its own ability. From left to right: Divine Shield, Deathrattle, a triggered effect, and Spell Damage. Abilities are special effects, powers, or behaviors found on cards. For spell cards, 
which grants a minion or weapon Garrosh Hellscream ready to attack using an equipped Fiery War Axe For the equip ability, see Equip Weapons are special cards which can be equipped by heroes. Each weapon has an Attack value and a 
a 50% chance of attacking the wrong enemy. Forgetful is a type of triggered effect The lightning bolt icon, explicitly indicating a triggered effect Triggered effects are effects that activate in response to specific events. Triggered effects may belong to minions, weapons or spells (in the form of Secrets), as 
.
While the term forgetful is not featured in card text or otherwise found in-game, it can be found in the game data for these cards. The precise same text is found on all forgetful cards: 50% chance to attack the wrong enemy.
Introduced with Goblins vs Gnomes "Goblins and gnomes… goblins and gnomes! Both are super-brilliant - but you would never know! Everything they seem to make is faulty or explodes… Perfecting imperfection - goblins and gnomes!" Wild format Goblins vs Gnomes 
, the forgetful effect is currently limited to ogres An ogre in World of Warcraft Ogres are large, brutish humanoids native to Draenor. Generally found to be lacking in intelligence, what ogres lack in smarts they make up for with brute strength and physical 
and related cards.
Strategy
The main significance of the forgetful effect is that with multiple targets available, the player cannot be sure which target will be hit. This makes its use less advisable when there are high-Attack enemy minions on the board (unless they are desirable targets), as hitting them will cause the player a lot of damage. It adds further unpredictability when playing against minions such as Boom Bots Boom Bot Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Subtype: Mech Cost: 1 Attack: 1 Health: 1 Abilities: Deal damage, Deathrattle Tags: Random Deathrattle: Deal 1-4 damage to a random enemy.See this card on Hearthpwn data 
.
Forgetful can be useful for potentially bypassing Taunt minions. For instance, with 1 Taunt minion and 3 non-Taunt minions on the field, attacking the Taunt using a forgetful minion will have a 50% of hitting the Taunt, and a 12.5% chance of hitting any one of the other targets.
This can be useful for removing protected minions, or even for dealing lethal damage to the opponent themselves. For instance, with only 1 Taunt minion on the field, attacking the Taunt using a forgetful minion or weapon will have a 50% chance of bypassing the Taunt and striking the enemy hero. In close games this chance at extra damage can allow players to close the gap.
Because of this possibility, when seeking to prevent an opponent with forgetful cards from hitting your hero while behind a taunt, it is effective to summon as many minions onto the field as possible. Each acts to decrease the likelihood of an attack reaching your hero should the attacker miss its intended target.
For further strategy and specific uses, see individual card pages.
Videos
Notes
- A forgetful minion has a 50% chance to attack an enemy target that is not the intended target, if such an alternate target exists. If this occurs, the new target will be randomly selected from among all other enemy characters Characters are representations of people, creatures, and certain objects and mechanical creations within Hearthstone. A character may be a minion or a hero. Each character has an Attack and a Health attribute, and can attack with even chances, including both heroes A hero is a character in the Warcraft universe representing the player. In Hearthstone, this concept is expressed in three interrelated but distinct ways: Heroes are gameplay characters representing players or bosses within a match.
and minions Bloodfen Raptor, a simple minion card. A Beast-type minion, it has 3 Attack, 2 Health and a mana cost of 2. Minions are persistent creatures on the battlefield that will fight for their hero. Minion .
- The forgetful effect can stack, with no known limit to the number of instances a minion can possess at once. In the case of multiple forgetful effects, each instance of forgetful is checked for separately, after the previous one has completed. For instance, if a Dunemaul Shaman Dunemaul Shaman Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Class: Shaman Rarity: Rare Cost: 4 Attack: 5 Health: 4 Abilities: Forgetful, Overload, Windfury Tags: Random, Triggered effect Windfury, Overload: (1) 50% chance to attack the wrong attacks while Mogor the Ogre Mogor the Ogre Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Rarity: Legendary Cost: 6 Attack: 7 Health: 6 Abilities: Forgetful Tags: Area of effect, Random, Triggered effect All minions have a 50% chance to attack the is in play, he will first check to see if he will attack his intended target, and if not, will select a new target; he will then check a second time to see if he will attack his current target at that point.
- It is therefore possible for targets to switch to an unintended target with the first forgetful trigger, then switch back to the original target with the second.
- By engaging in combat with a randomly targeted enemy, forgetful can allow the character to hit minions with Stealth A minion in Stealth Stealth is a minion ability which prevents that minion from being the target of enemy attacks, spells and effects until they attack or deal damage. They can, be that as it may, be the target , or even Immune The immune effect from Bestial Wrath Immune is an ability that prevents a character from receiving damage from any source, and prevents the opponent from targeting it. Be that as it may, Immune does not prevent destroy, healing or targets. In the case of Stealthed minions with more than 0 Attack, this will cause the enemy minion to lose Stealth, since it will deal its combat damage in exchange. Stealthed minions with 0 Attack will not deal any damage in exchange, and so will not lose Stealth, but can still be struck by forgetful targets.
Forgetful and Secrets
The forgetful effect triggers during the same step of the attack This page describes the act of attacking. For the Attack attribute, see Attribute. Attacking or combat is what occurs when a player commands one character to attack another, causing them to simultaneously deal damage to sequence as most Secrets A Secret is a spell card that is cast normally but has a delayed, hidden effect, which only takes place when a specific event occurs. When a Secret is played, a Secret icon appears on 
. When a forgetful minion attack triggers a Secret, the effect that triggers first is determined by which was played first. This can make order of play extremely important.
- Example 1: An Ogre Brute Ogre Brute Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Rarity: Common Cost: 3 Attack: 4 Health: 4 Abilities: Forgetful Tags: Random, Triggered effect 50% chance to attack the wrong enemy.Ogres have really terrible short-term chocolate.See this , which was played before an enemy Noble Sacrifice Noble Sacrifice Set: Classic Type: Spell Class: Paladin Rarity: Common Cost: 1 Abilities: Secret, Summon Tags: Combat-related, Triggered effect Secret: When an enemy attacks, summon a 2/1 Defender as the new target.We will always remember , attacks an enemy. The forgetful effect triggers first; Noble Sacrifice will then activate, and whichever target the Ogre Brute had selected, he will instead hit the Defender.
- Example 2: An Ogre Brute, which was played after an enemy Noble Sacrifice, attacks an enemy. Noble Sacrifice activates first, summoning a Defender Defender Set: Classic Type: Minion Class: Paladin Rarity: Common Cost: 1 Attack: 2 Health: 1 See this card on Hearthpwn data page] Defender is an uncollectible minion summoned by the Classic paladin Secret Noble Sacrifice. ; the Ogre Brute`s forgetful effect will then activate, giving him a chance to instead strike another target, including his original target, thus overriding the secret`s Taunt-like effect.
Secrets A Secret is a spell card that is cast normally but has a delayed, hidden effect, which only takes place when a specific event occurs. When a Secret is played, a Secret icon appears on that activate from an attack will still activate even if the forgetful effect interrupts the attack. Attack-based Secrets will also check for activation each time a different attack is set in motion by the forgetful effect, if they were not already activated by an earlier planned attack.
- Example 1: An Ogre Brute, which was played before an enemy Explosive Trap Explosive Trap Set: Classic Type: Spell Class: Hunter Rarity: Common Cost: 2 Abilities: Deal damage, Secret Tags: Area of effect, Combat-related, Triggered effect Secret: When your hero is attacked, deal 2 damage to all enemies.It , attacks the enemy hero but forgetful triggers, causing it to instead attack a minion. The Explosive Trap will activate even though the Brute is no longer attacking the player, prior to the Ogre Brute attacking its new target. If this destroys the Brute, the new attack will be aborted.
- Example 2: An Ogre Brute, which was played after an enemy Explosive Trap, attacks a minion but forgetful triggers, causing it to instead attack the enemy hero. The Explosive Trap goes off even though the Brute did not originally attack the player.
Probability
- With only the enemy hero as a hostile target, a forgetful character has a 100% chance to hit them, effectively negating its triggered effect.
- With a single minion on the field, a forgetful character has a 50% chance of hitting its intended target, and a 50% chance of hitting the other.
- With a 50% chance of hitting the wrong target, the percentage likelihood of any specific other enemy character being struck is 50 / number of other enemy targets percent, or 1 in 2 * number of other enemy targets.
| Number of other enemy targets | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chance of being hit | 1 / 2 | 1 / 4 | 1 / 6 | 1 / 8 | 1 / 10 | 1 / 12 | 1 / 14 |
| 50% | 25% | 16.7% | 12.5% | 10% | 8.3% | 7.14% |
Cards
Wild format
- This section contains information exclusive to Wild format Wild format or Wild is one of Hearthstone s two game formats, the other being Standard format. Wild format appears in game modes in which players are allowed to play decks without the deck restrictions of .
Terminology and lore
There is no official term for the "50% chance to attack the wrong enemy" ability. The term forgetful is currently preferred by the wiki due to its presence in the game data, where it is used to mark cards with the ability. Be that as it may, this is still an unofficial term, and is not used in-game.
The ability was first previewed in the Goblins vs Gnomes: It`s Not Ogre Till It`s Ogre blog. The pertinent section reads:
- The large, brutish, often clumsy ogres have a knack for “CRUSH BIG THING INTO SMALL THINGS,” making them a force to be reckoned with on the battlefield. Don’t have a trash compactor handy to mash that malfunctioning mech into spare parts? Get ogre it! Ogres aren’t particularly careful in what they hit and don’t take orders kindly—as long as they hit something, they’re satisfied. This makes them both unpredictable and dangerous in combat.
- In Goblins vs Gnomes, many ogres will have the “50% chance to attack the wrong enemy” card text, reflecting their wild and uncontrollable nature. Like previously mentioned, ogres don’t care about what they hit as long as they hit “something,” so their ability can also potentially bypass Taunt and Stealth if one of their wild swings manages to connect. When you see an Ogre on the battlefield, watch out; something is about to get smashed!
- emphasis added
This text provides multiple possible terms - clumsy, wild, uncontrollable, careless - but also several possible lore interpretations for the ability. Forgetful suggests ogres frequently forget which target to attack. This is reinforced by Ogre Brute Ogre Brute Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Rarity: Common Cost: 3 Attack: 4 Health: 4 Abilities: Forgetful Tags: Random, Triggered effect 50% chance to attack the wrong enemy.Ogres have really terrible short-term chocolate.See this `s trigger quote, "Wait... who?". Be that as it may, clumsy suggests ogres attack the wrong target by accident, which fits with Dunemaul Shaman Dunemaul Shaman Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Class: Shaman Rarity: Rare Cost: 4 Attack: 5 Health: 4 Abilities: Forgetful, Overload, Windfury Tags: Random, Triggered effect Windfury, Overload: (1) 50% chance to attack the wrong `s trigger quote, "Oops". Ogre Ninja Ogre Ninja Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Minion Class: Rogue Rarity: Rare Cost: 5 Attack: 6 Health: 6 Abilities: Forgetful, Stealth Tags: Random, Triggered effect Stealth 50% chance to attack the wrong enemy.He didn t have on the other hand appears to mis-target due to disagreements between its two heads - "No! That one." - although this could be interpreted as a kind of forgetfulness, or possibly the second head proving "wild and uncontrollable". None of the quotes appear to confirm the concept that ogres "don`t care about what they hit". The only related non-minion, Ogre Warmaul Ogre Warmaul Set: Goblins vs Gnomes Type: Weapon Class: Warrior Rarity: Common Cost: 3 Attack: 4 Durability: 2 Abilities: Forgetful Tags: Random, Triggered effect 50% chance to attack the wrong enemy.Simple, misguided, and incredibly dangerous. , presumably imbues the user with some characteristic of these ogres, or else has a mind of its own.