Blizzard has announced that they are ditching the current amour system in Hearthstone Battlegrounds and replacing it with Buddies.
The big update is scheduled to arrive next week, and the development team has provided an in-depth guide on how these new characters will work in-game.
The Battlegrounds Buddies will function like special minions that can’t be bought from the Store.
Instead, each buddy will be unique to the hero you choose and will function through a meter that will fill during combat phases.
The Buddy Meter has two sections:
Fill the first section to get one copy of your Hero’s Buddy added to your hand. Fill the second section to get two more copies.
After both sections have been filled, the Buddy Meter breaks and is no longer available for the rest of the match (regardless of whether you tripled your Buddy or sold any copies off along the way).
“You also get a small bonus each turn for how many minions you have at the start of combat. Buddies are earned at three different rates, with those at lower Tavern Tiers being earned more quickly than those at higher Tavern Tiers. Finally, there’s a limit to how much a Buddy Meter can be filled in a given round, so that no Buddy runs away with the game.”
According to Blizzard, there will be 75 Buddies added to Hearthstone Battlegrounds starting on January 25.
The new Mercenaries mode is also being expanded, with Blizzard confirming the launch of The Training Grounds for next week.
The Training Grounds will be a new space in the Village that allows your Mercenaries to passively gain experience as you do Bounties with your other Mercs, play other game Modes, or even while you sleep.
Mercenaries will need to be added to the Training Grounds to fulfil this passive role, and can be left there for as long as you want.
The Training Grounds costs 100 Gold to create (with one slot for training) and 200 Gold to upgrade (to a total of two training slots).
