Ability


Info

Abilities are special effects, powers, or behaviors found on cards Cards are the basic pieces that make up the game of Hearthstone. Each card represents an action that the player can take by playing that card. There are three main types of cards: spell cards, hearthstone . For spell cards, the ability describes the total effect of playing that card, while for minion 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 hearthstone and 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 hearthstone cards, abilities are special effects or powers additional to the basic functions of the card. Abilities may be described in the card`s text, or granted by enchantments An enchantment, or buff or debuff, is a special effect gained by a minion. Enchantments may be generated by spells, minion texts or abilities such as Battlecries, or other sources, may be temporary or permanent, hearthstone .

Hearthstone The Hearthstone icon Hearthstone (formerly known as Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft 1] 2]) is a free-to-play digital collectible card game from Blizzard Entertainment. It was first announced in a presentation by Rob Pardo at the hearthstone featuresSpecial attraction a large range of abilities. Abilities may trigger in response to certain events, provide ongoing effects The welling of light indicating an ongoing effect Ongoing effects are minion, weapon, and boss Hero Power abilities which grant special effects on an ongoing basis. Ongoing effects are often referred to as auras, particularly hearthstone to certain minions, or grant special powers or characteristics. Certain often-used abilities are written in memorable shorthand form using bold-faced keywords on the card, such as Battlecry or Deathrattle, while other abilities are written out with their full description in the card text.

Minion abilities granted by card text or enchantments An enchantment, or buff or debuff, is a special effect gained by a minion. Enchantments may be generated by spells, minion texts or abilities such as Battlecries, or other sources, may be temporary or permanent, hearthstone can be removed using the Silence For the card of the same name, see Silence (card). Silence is an ability which removes all current card text, enchantments, and abilities from the targeted minion. It does not remove damage or minion type. hearthstone ability. Be that as it may, abilities granted to minions through aura effects generated by other cards can only be removed by neutralizing the aura-generating card.

Notes

Videos

Keywords

This section is about keyword abilities. For keywords used to search the collection, see Keywords (collection manager).

Keywords are specific bold-faced words or terms printed on cards which specify a unique power or behavior without any explicit description. Mousing over a minion card with a keyword ability will generate a text display describing the ability. For a more detailed exploration of each keyword, and a list of related cards, click on the respective section headings.

For a discussion of why keywords do not exist for some often-seen behaviors in cards, see the trivia section.

Adapt

Choose from one of three possible upgrades to the possessing minion.

Battlecry

Triggers an action when the minion is played from your hand.

Charge

Enables the minion to attack on the same turn that it is summoned.

Choose One

Gives the controlling player the ability to choose between two or more effects stated in the card. Found only on druid The  Druid is one of the nine classes in Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, represented by Malfurion Stormrage Heroes edit | edit source] Contents 1 Heroes 2 Background 3 Hero Power 4 Unique mechanics 5 Strategy hearthstone cards.

Combo

Triggers an effect if you already played another card this turn. Found only on rogue Contents 1 Heroes 2 Overview 3 Background 4 Hero Power 4.1 Unique mechanics 5 Strategy 5.1 Countering a rogue 6 Spells 6.1 Uncollectible 7 Minions 7.1 Uncollectible 8 Weapons 8.1 Uncollectible 9 Leveling rewards 9.1 hearthstone cards.

Counter

Prevents the next enemy spell cast from taking effect. Currently the only card to use Counter is the mage Contents 1 Heroes 2 Overview 3 Background 4 Hero Power 5 Strategy and gameplay 5.1 Common deck types 5.2 Counters 6 Spells 6.1 Uncollectible 7 Minions 7.1 Uncollectible 8 Leveling rewards 8.1 Starting cards 8.2 hearthstone spell Counterspell Counterspell Set: Classic Type: Spell Class: Mage Rarity: Rare Cost: 3 Abilities: Counter, Secret Tags: Spell-related, Triggered effect Secret: When your opponent casts a spell, Counter it.What s the difference between a mage playing with Counterspell hearthstone ; see that page for details.

Deathrattle

An ability that is triggered when the minion dies.

Discover

Choose one card from three random class-appropriate cards, then add it to your hand.

Divine Shield

Absorbs the first source of damage taken by the minion, removing the shield.

Enrage

While damaged, this minion gains the stated effect. Healing the minion to full Health will remove the effect.

Freeze

Frozen characters cannot attack the following turn.

Immune

Immune is an ability that prevents damage dealt from any source to the target, and prevents all enemy interaction with the target.

Inspire

Inspire 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 hearthstone , which activates each time the controlling hero uses their Hero Power.

Mega-Windfury

Can attack four times each turn. Currently the only card to use Mega-Windfury is the uncollectible Uncollectible cards are cards which although available in-game cannot be collected by players. While these cards are often playable and obtainable by players in the course of a match, they cannot be added to players minion V-07-TR-0N.

Overload

You have {X} less mana next turn. This effect is activated when the card is played from the hand, and typically allows a powerful card to be played for a low mana cost this round, at the price of reduced mana next turn. Found only on shaman The  Shaman is one of the nine classes in Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, represented by Thrall and Morgl the Oracle. Contents 1 Heroes 2 Background 3 Hero Power 4 Strategy and gameplay 4.1 Counters 5 hearthstone cards.

Poisonous

Any minion damaged by a Poisonous minion is destroyed Destroying a minion or weapon removes it from play. Only minions currently on the battlefield and weapons that are currently equipped can be destroyed. Discarding a card removes it directly from the player s hand and hearthstone . 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 hearthstone , Poisonous is additionally identified by a green bubbling flask at the bottom of the minion`s portrait.

Quest

Similar to Secrets, Quests are a special type of spell card that does not take effect until certain requirements are met, triggering its effect. Unlike Secrets Quests can be seen by the opponent, and the conditions must be met by the possessing player rather than the opponent. Each deck can include only one Quest, which will be automatically included in the player`s mulligan The mulligan stage The mulligan or card selection stage occurs at the very start of each match. Each player is shown their randomly selected starting hand, and given the option to redraw as many of hearthstone . All Quests are legendary Rarity is a rough measure of the quality and scarcity of a card. Cards of higher rarity are typically more powerful and more useful, but are harder to find and more expensive to craft. There hearthstone .

Secret

A special type of spell card that remains hidden until its trigger condition occurs, revealing it and triggering its effect. As a rule Secrets can only be activated during the opponent`s turn, but some exceptions activate at the start of the player`s next turn. Only one of any given Secret can be in play for a given player at a time.

Silence

Removes all card text, enchantments An enchantment, or buff or debuff, is a special effect gained by a minion. Enchantments may be generated by spells, minion texts or abilities such as Battlecries, or other sources, may be temporary or permanent, hearthstone , and abilities from the target minion, except for auras The welling of light indicating an ongoing effect Ongoing effects are minion, weapon, and boss Hero Power abilities which grant special effects on an ongoing basis. Ongoing effects are often referred to as auras, particularly hearthstone provided by external cards in play. Silence does not prevent enchantments and abilities from being applied to said minion afterwards, however.

Stealth

Minions with Stealth may not be the target of enemy attacks, spells or abilities until they attack or deal damage. Once they attack or deal damage, Stealth is removed. Minions with Stealth can still be affected by AoE Area of effect (AoE) is the term for an effect which affects all characters of the specified type. Common targets for AoEs include all enemy minions, all minions, and all characters. AoE is defined in hearthstone spells such as Consecration Consecration Set: Basic Type: Spell Class: Paladin Cost: 4 Abilities: Deal damage Tags: Area of effect Deal 2 damage to all enemies.Consecrated ground glows with Holy energy. But it smells a little, too.See this card hearthstone , and randomly targeted spells such as Arcane Missiles Arcane Missiles Set: Basic Type: Spell Class: Mage Cost: 1 Abilities: Deal damage Tags: Random Deal 3 damage randomly split among all enemies.You d think you d be able to control your missiles a little better since hearthstone .

Spell Damage

Increases the output of your damaging spells by X.

Taunt

Enemies must attack minions with Taunt before any non-Taunt characters. This includes minions and hero attacks. Taunt is illustrated by a large shield-like border.

Windfury

Can attack twice each turn.

Card draw effect

Causes the player to draw one or more cards from their deck.

Cast spell

Casts a spell on behalf of the controlling player.

Copy

Copies an existing card. Usually combined with a Summon For information on summoning minions, see Minion#Summoning. Summon is an ability which summons one or more minions. Distinct from regular summoning, a minion generated by the summon ability does not consume or come from an effect to summon the copy into the battlefield, or a generate effect Generate effects are abilities which create new cards and place them into a player s hand, or more rarely shuffle them into the player s deck. They may generate entirely new cards, or combine with a copy hearthstone to place it into the player`s hand.

Deal damage

Deals damage to a character, attempting to reduce its Health Health, sometimes referred to as life, hit points or HP, is an attribute found on heroes and minions, reflecting the remaining survivability of the character. Health can be reduced, almost always by taking damage. If hearthstone by the stated amount.

Destroy

Destroys a minion, weapon or Secret without dealing damage to it.

Discard

Causes the player to discard one or more cards from their hand A typical hand. The green highlighted cards can be played, while the yellow highlighted card has a special effect enabled by the current state of the game. The hand is where each player keeps the hearthstone .

Enchant

Modifies the statistics or card text of one or more cards. May be temporary, permanent, or ongoing.

Elusive

An unofficial term for minions which cannot be targeted by spells Fireball, a simple mage spell. It costs 4 mana, dealing 6 damage to a chosen target. Spell cards are cards that can be played to trigger a one time effect or ability, described in the hearthstone or Hero Powers Anduin Wrynn with the basic priest Hero Power Lesser Heal A Hero Power is a special ability displayed to the right of each hero s portrait. Usually Hero Powers can be used once per turn and hearthstone , from either player.

Equip

Equips the hero with the stated 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 hearthstone .

Forgetful

A term for a minion which has 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 hearthstone .

Gain Armor

Causes the controlling hero to gain Armor.

Generate

Generates a new card, and places it into the player`s hand.

Joust

Reveals a random minion from each player`s deck. If the player who initiated the Joust produces a minion with a higher mana cost, they win the Joust, activating a secondary effect. Both minions are then shuffled back into their respective decks.

Mind control effect

Transfers ownership of the targeted minion.

Modify cost

Alters the mana cost of another card or Hero Power.

Permanent

Permanent minions lack Mana cost, Attack and Health, are untargetable, are immune to all effects except their own, and take up a more or less permanent residence on the battlefield.

Put into battlefield

Directly places a card from the player`s deck or hand into the battlefield, without triggering any Battlecries.

Put into hand

Draws cards of a specific type directly from the player`s deck and places them into the player`s hand.

Refresh Mana

Refills the player`s empty Mana Crystals.

Remove from deck

Removes cards directly from the player`s deck, without placing them into the hand. Similar to discard effects.

Replace

Replace one card with another, without destroying or discarding the original card.

Restore Health

Heals a character, increasing their Health by the stated amount, up to but not beyond their current maximum Health.

Return

Returns the target minion to its owner`s hand.

Shuffle into deck

Places a card into a player`s unused deck, with its placement randomly determined.

Summon

Summons the specified minion/s. Distinct from simply playing a minion card from the hand, this is an ability found on spell or minion cards, sometimes triggered by a Battlecry or Deathrattle A Loot Hoarder displaying the Deathrattle icon Deathrattle is an ability where the stated effect occurs when the minion or weapon is destroyed. Cards with Deathrattle appear with a skull and crossbones when in play. hearthstone .

Transform

Changes a minion into something else irreversibly, entirely replacing the previous card.

Unlimited attacks

Allows the possessing hero to attack any number of times each turn.

Types of ability

These are rough categories of abilities that describe certain common behaviours.

Area of effect

Affects all characters of the stated type.

In-hand effect

Effects which activate while the card is in the player`s hand.

On-discard effect

Effects which activate upon being discarded from the hand.

On-draw effect

Effects which activate upon being drawn from the deck.

Ongoing effect

An ability which provides a specific effect on an ongoing basis.

Positional effect

Takes effect depending on the specific order and position of minions on the battlefield.

Proportional effect

The output of these effects is proportionate to the amount of mana consumed.

Random effect

Chooses a target or effect at random.

Removal

Used to remove minions from the board. Generally refers to destroy, transform or high-damage effects.

Triggered effect

An effect or behaviour which only activates in response to a certain event. On minions, these are denoted by a lightning bolt icon at the bottom of the portrait.

Boss and Tavern Brawl abilities

The following abilities so far only appear on cards featured in boss encounters and Tavern Brawls.

Auto-cast

Causes the Hero Power to be used automatically at the start of each turn, provided the hero has enough mana to spare.

Auto-Attack

Causes the minion to attack automatically at the end of the turn, targeting the minion or minions directly across from it. The minion cannot be commanded to attack, or prevented from attacking.

Trivia

  • According to Ben Brode, the game`s alpha featured 4 or 5 keywords which were removed from the game prior to the beginning of the beta.

Keyword creation

Keywords were specifically designed by the developers to help players to quickly recognise when a large number of minions have exactly the same ability, such as minions with Taunt, saving time spent reading each individual card`s text. Be that as it may, while keywords make it easier in cases where they are frequently encountered, when such examples are rare, keywords can actually serve to make understanding cards harder, requiring players to mouse over cards in understand to examine their abilities. The case of the "Destroy any minion damaged by this minion" effect was cited by Ben Brode in 2014 as an example where the developers could have added a keyword, but chose instead to simply describe the ability in full, since it is was originally only found on 2 cards. Senior Producer Yong Woo explained:

"You know, keywords are double-edged swords. On the one hand, it really condenses information. I tell you Deathrattle and you know what it is right away. I tell somebody off the street Deathrattle and he is going to be like "What are you... selling me a snake?". They will not know what I am talking about, so it is a balance we have to reach between condensing the information and making too hard a set of vocabulary for new players to understand. It is something we continue to work on."

Ben Brode has also stated that when a keyword conveys more than one behaviour rule, it can be hard for players to remember these from just the keyword. For instance, Taunt and Charge immediately convey that the minion possesses a single, specific ability. In contrast, the "elusive" ability is tricky because it has more than one effect, protecting the minion from both spells and hero powers, but not Battlecries or attacks. Ben Brode has stated that the elusive ability was "right on the razor`s edge" regarding whether or not to create a keyword for it.

Yong Woo has stated that it is possible in the future that keywords may be added for currently existing abilities such as the "elusive" ability of the Faerie Dragon, Laughing Sister and Spectral Knight - should there come to be a sufficient number of minions with that behaviour in the game. Other card text for which keywords were considered, and for which keywords may be added in the future, include on-draw effects and Joust.

New keywords

Following its launch, the game did not see the addition of any new keywords until The Grand Tournament, when Inspire was introduced. Inspire was initially represented by the text "Whenever you use your Hero Power do X", but the developers felt that replacing it with a new keyword would both save space on cards and also highlight the new mechanic as a key featureSpecial attraction of the new expansion. They also felt that the game had been around long enough that it was acceptable to introduce a new keyword. Be that as it may, the developers did not choose to make the same expansion`s new Jousting mechanic into a keyword, partly because of a lack of synergy with established keywords, and partly because it is "more in depth" than other keywords. Inspire also featured on a larger number of cards than Joust.

The League of Explorers, the next major addition of cards, saw the debut of Discover. Originally intended to debut in a Tavern Brawl, the second added keyword was postponed due to technical difficulties.

A new keyword would not be added until Journey to Un`Goro, with Adapt. A few months earlier, the long-standing "Poison" ability ("Destroy any minion damaged by this minion") was formalised, with the addition of the Poisonous keyword. The change was purely cosmetic, but appears to have been due to the introduction of a number of new Poisonous cards with Un`Goro, therefore justifying the creation of a keyword for the long-standing effect.

As the game grows, the developers feel increasingly open to adding new keywords. When the game was new, Ben Brode says, the developers "really wanted to keep ourselves in check as far as the number of keywords we added and how quickly we added them", but since The Grand Tournament have begun adding keywords quite regularly.

The one exception to the general rules for keywords is Mega-Windfury, a keyword added with Goblins vs Gnomes for just one minion: the uncollectible V-07-TR-0N, summoned by Mimiron`s Head`s 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 hearthstone . Be that as it may, this keyword is followed on the card by the italicised text, "(Can attack four times a turn.)", essentially negating the use of the Mega-Windfury keyword. The redundancy can be explained by the obvious similarity between Windfury and Mega-Windfury, with the use of the keyword aiding players in immediately understanding the card`s ability. The humorous keyword "Charrrrrge" was similarly added exclusively to the card Skycap`n Kragg with The Grand Tournament, but served only as a cosmetic variant on Charge.