Blizzard Entertainment revealed a major content roadmap for Hearthstone during the BlizzCon opening ceremony. The announcements center on a rebuilt in game journal, the upcoming Reign of the Black Empire card set featuring a card fusion mechanic, and corrupted Aberrations entering Battlegrounds. The studio also confirmed the Monk will join the roster as the first new playable class in 6 years.
The card game is overhauling its progression interface with a unified journal system. This hub pulls every quest, achievement, and seasonal event into 1 central screen that tracks player progress alongside the story of each card set. It provides a clearer record of account milestones as players complete matches.
The next major expansion is Reign of the Black Empire, scheduled for release in October. The set travels back to ancient Azeroth long before the imprisonment of the Old Gods. Its core gameplay addition is the Assemble keyword, a mechanic that lets players merge 2 separate cards into 1 stronger minion during a match to create unexpected combinations.
Battlegrounds will receive its own update ahead of the main card set in late September. The auto battler mode is adding Aberrations, a brand new minion type created from void corruption and Old God experiments.
The development team also outlined long term plans for the competitive roster. The Monk will arrive in March of next year, bringing a fluid and adaptable playstyle to the tavern as the first new character class added to the game since the Death Knight.
