Hearthstones next patch will add Battle Ready decks to buy and the Quilboar tribe to Battlegrounds

In February, Blizzard revealed that Quilboars were headed to Hearthstone Battlegrounds as the next minion type. Today it announced that they'll arrive in the next major update, which is due to drop next week. That patch will include a trio of new heroes, 17 new minions, and a new spell type called Blood Gems that give +1/+1 to friendly minions. From the look of things, some Quilboars will also have special interactions with Blood Gems.

Battlegrounds games will still be limited to five minion types after Quilboars are added, meaning that three minion types will be excluded from each match. Quilboars won't be one of them, however: Quilboars will show up in every match until the next major content patch, and if it's anything like previous updates you can expect players to 'force' Quilboar-based comps for at least the first few weeks. Full details on the Quilboar update will be revealed in the 20.2 patch notes, which will be published tomorrow.

But that's not all! Blizzard is also launching 'Battle-Ready Decks', with the aim of helping players get a leg-up in Hearthstone's Standard constructed mode. Limited to one purchase per account, players will be able to choose from 10 possible pre-built decks (one from each class), with the emphasis very much on competitive viability.

"When these Battle-Ready Decks become available, you’ll be able to add a complete deck from the class of your choice to your permanent Collection," Blizzard said. "Each Battle-Ready Deck is handcrafted using data captured across hundreds of thousands of play sessions to ensure you’re taking home a combat-worthy list!"

Battle-Ready Decks will go for $20 each for a period of three weeks after they're listed in the shop. The reason they won't be going live as soon as a new expansion launches is because: "We want to make sure we preserve the exploration phase of each expansion when everyone is trying out new and interesting things. 

"We won’t be offering Battle-Ready Decks right after an expansion launches because the meta always needs time to settle at first, and we need time to analyze the resulting data to determine which decks we should offer."

Looking at the decks on offer, Blizzard isn't joking about them being data driven. These are very much the powerhouse decks currently being played on ladder, and as such most contain multiple legendaries and epics. Given the price point, even players with a full collection may wish to pick one up and dust the spare cards. Do note though that you won't receive dust for any Core cards. No doubt someone will do the math soon on which is the best deck to buy if you already have a full collection and just want the crafting currency.

That also probably explains why players are restricted to buying one per account. It's possible that limit will be expanded in the future, as Blizzard said it's trying the limited run now "to gauge community interest before we decide how expansive this should be". 
That also probably explains why players are restricted to buying one per account. It's possible that limit will be expanded in the future, as Blizzard said it's trying the limited run now "to gauge community interest before we decide how expansive this should be".