Hearthstone’s next expansion sees players enter The Witchwood

Today, Blizzard announced the newest expansion for Hearthstone: The Witchwood. Themed around the haunted city of Gilneas, players will be able to acquire 135 brand new cards in order to fight off the spirits of the Witchwood.

“Dark magic has twisted the creatures of the forest and set them loose upon the Gilnean capital in Azeroth, but King Genn Greymane and his lycanthropic subjects won’t make for easy prey,” Blizzard said in an announcement. “The citizens of this proud kingdom, who can shapeshift into ferocious wolf-beasts known as worgen, are bringing the fight to The Witchwood with tooth and claw—and soon, Hearthstone players will join the pack and help them face down the horrors within.”

The expansion brings a few new gameplay systems to Hearthstone. The first is Echo, which causes some cards to create replicas in your hand once played. For the rest of your turn, you can play these echoes as long as you have the mana. Rush cards are also new and are similar to Charge cards. However, Rush cards can only attack minions on the turn they’re dropped, not the enemy hero.

Here’s a preview of seven new cards coming to the expansion.

Grid View

• Blizzard Entertainment
• Blizzard Entertainment
• Blizzard Entertainment
• Blizzard Entertainment
• Blizzard Entertainment
• Blizzard Entertainment
• Blizzard Entertainment

The Witchwood will also offer players a new single-player mode called Monster Hunt. Here, players will choose one of four unique heroes and venture into the mysterious Witchwood. They’ll have to survive eight increasingly difficult brawls in order to face the boss fight that waits for them in the heart of the wood. To make things more fair, players will be able to pick up upgrades to their deck after each battle.

The Witchwood is currently available for pre-purchase on Blizzard’s store for $49.99 and comes with 70 decks filled with new cards. The expansion is set to release sometime between now and the end of April, so players won’t have to wait long to get their hands on these new cards.

Curious players can keep up with the currently announced cards here.

An announcement video, which features a musical number and a preview of Witchwood cards from the development team, can be viewed below.