Hex Lord Malacrass


 * ''For the boss of the same name, see Hex Lord Malacrass (boss).

Hex Lord Malacrass is a legendary mage minion card, from the Rastakhan's Rumble set.

Strategy
Hex Lord Malacrass is a very value-oriented card for control decks with peculiar applications. While normally in the mulligan phase you generally opt for cheap cards you can play early on, doing so will weaken the value Malacrass provides. Maximizing his effect will require a balance between low-cost cards to play at the start of the match and mid to high-cost cards that you want another copy of late game.

Malacrass has a consequence of duplicating Quest cards, which means you could possibly complete Open the Waygate twice for two Time Warps, a difficult but not impossible task, or another Raid the Sky Temple if you decide to switch back to it later in the game.

Lore
is a of the  s, a boss in  (both the  and the ), and the one who devised the plan of imbuing the greatest warriors of the Amani with the essences of their  gods.


 * From the original World of Warcraft website
 * ''Furious at the 's latest betrayal, Zul'jin was pleased when the witch doctor Malacrass approached him with a devious plan to crush the elves once and for all. Malacrass had studied the high priests and their ability to call upon the favor of the animal gods. He also knew that the elves had magically bound one of the mighty, using it to channel the power of the Light into their own ranks. Malacrass had devised a similar plan: to seal the power of the animal gods within the bodies of the Amani's strongest warriors. Zul'jin quickly approved the plan and lent his full support. Malacrass experimented tirelessly and succeeded in imbuing four warriors with the essence of mighty animal gods: the lynx, dragonhawk, , and . Some adventurers fear that Malacrass may have bound a fifth, even darker essence within his own soul....


 * From the World of Warcraft Adventure Guide
 * ''Rumored to be the most feared witch doctor of the Amani tribe in decades, Hex Lord Malacrass has done the unthinkable and sealed the essences of several mighty troll animal gods in their strongest champions ... keeping the darkest one for himself.

In Hearthstone lore, Malacrass instead serves as the champion of Jan'alai's Dragonhawks, the fire-obsessed mage team in Rastakhan's Rumble.
 * The fury of Jan’alai the Dragonhawk loa fuels Malacrass’s fire on the Rumble field. Despite a flair for the dramatic, Malacrass is a clever opponent. He’ll give Mages who are willing to plan ahead access to useful resources.


 * Rikkar admired Malacrass’ showmanship. Despite his team’s reputation as hot-heads, they knew how to fire up the crowd before sending the fireballs flying.

Trivia

 * Malacrass was created in the first week of initial design for Rastakhan's Rumble by a new designer who had come in for his first day of work and was tasked with designing the set's mage cards. The card remained mostly unchanged for most of the expansion's development. At one point, Malacrass' Battlecry could generate copies of The Coin and himself if they were part of the player's opening hand. The effect was changed to not create copies of Malacrass himself due to "degenerating gameplay" and the potential ability to endlessly generate new copies of cards like Arcane Missiles or Frost Nova by playing Malacrass over and over again, which could feel really frustrating to play against. One element of Malacrass that was heavily internally discussed was what a player's "opening hand" constitutes, such as if it includes The Coin and/or the first card that a player draws after the mulligan. The team ended up going back and forth a lot on the matter but eventually ended up in a "pretty good space".

Patch changes

 * Added.