Blizzard Details Hearthstone Curse of Naxxramas Pricing and Release Schedule
While the release date for Hearthstone's single player expansion Curse of Naxxramas continues to be M.I.A., we at least now know how much it will cost our coin purses to unlock each of the expansions five boss filled 'wings'. To start with, let's take a look at how each of these wings will be unlocked.
Blizzard intends to fully release Curse of Naxxramas over the course of five weeks, with each week representing the opening of a new wing. The first of these wings, the Arachnid Quarter, will be available for free to all players during the launch event window which according to Blizzard will last "roughly a month or so". After Arachnid, the Plague Quarter, Military Quarter, Construct Quarter, and Frostwyrm Lair will all open up in that order.
In terms of pricing, each wing can be purchased for 700 gold or $6.99 USD. Unlike Arena, once a player unlocks a wing it will become available to them permanently. Blizzard will also offer bundle pricing giving players the opportunity to purchase all five wings for $24.99. If players opt to purchase a few of the wings with gold they can still take advantage of the bundled pricing by purchasing the remaining wings for a reduced bundle price. Each wing a player already owns will reduce the price of the bundle by $5.00 USD.
Blizzard also revealed that once players had defeated all bosses within each wing they'd unlock the heroic version of that wing which will prove to be significantly more challenging. While you only need to complete each wing of Naxxramas on normal mode to unlock the expansion's new set of cards and legendaries, defeating the entire encounter on Heroic will net you a special card back.
As someone whose never had 700 gold at once in Hearsthstone (currently sitting on 180 after paying gold for an arena), I'm unsure how I feel about the entry point for strictly Free-to-Play players, especially those who aren't naturally good at card games. On the flip side, bundled prices combined with the initial free wing (provided you snag it) seem quite reasonable.
With this in mind, I'd be interested to know whether you feel many players will opt to pay the 700 or go for the cash option instead.
More details, including pricing for EU and Aus players can be found on the official blog post here.
About the Author
Michael Dunaway has been part of the MMOBomb team for years and has covered practically every major Free-to-Play MMO title since 2009.
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1) fix the losing exp. Should not get EXP for LOSING! This pits bad decks vs good ones (this is how they make money though).
2) Get rid of the class system. The spells are stupid. Keep the idea of spells and weapons to equip etc. But give the player freedom to chose a "character class (male or female)" as a character image. Then open up equipment cards that cater to each class (as you unlock cards, you can get warrior gear, rogue, etc...trash the ones not of your class, keep the ones you need). This system should replace the current "spell button" that "defines a class". So stupid.
3) Get rid of the blocking system. This is the only card game I ever played where a character that has block, BLOCKS ALL CARDS no matter what. That exists, but as a seperate card with "character blocks all damage this turn". MOst card games divide damage: "I have 2 2/2 creatures, there is a 2/4 with block. MEaning as I attack, he has the choice to block either one of my 2/2 but NOT ALL OF THEM!" that is normal! This is like having a snail stop a train. The ultimate troll deck system by default.
4) Open up chat. This "play it safe with emotes only" is annoying. I need to tell the opponent how much I love him or her.
OTher things but once the list goes on it just gets depressing and I get sad for humanity.
Malice 700 week really? that not very casual...
quest come 60-40 gold so 50 gold(about) per quest 50x7 350g from quest u need to play another 100+ game to get the other 350 gold.....
zagy11 ..maybe ...but u need to play a lot and get lucky
-150 gold start arena run 12win (2-3hr) get 400gold-150(start) 250 u need to run another arena ....2-3hr+ 250)end gold form last round)-150(arena fee) =100 +400(12win) = 500gold 4-6hr
and that 12win back to back
and 700 gold?! thats a month of finishing up quests.
And this curse of naxramas is really overrated,its just a update for single player campaign which every other card game has so they didnt add anything extra,they are just filling up the holes.