Into the Emerald Dream Hearthstone Expansion: All Info, Dates & More

Images courtesy of Blizzard Entertainment

Blizzard just announced the first Hearthstone set of The Year of The Raptor, and oh boy, it’s looking good. The Into the Emerald Dream expansion will bring 145 brand-new cards and take you straight into… well, the Emerald Dream, which is a mythical version of Azeroth kept in eternal spring by the green dragonflight and wild nature magic.

At its core, the Emerald Dream is meant to be a pure, untouched paradise; except the Old Gods want to turn it into their twisted playground. That’s right, the Old Gods might have a little comeback in this expansion; at least that’s what Warcraft lore suggests. If not in the main set, then perhaps in the mini-set, huh?

Anyway, let’s see what the next Hearthstone expansion has in store for us; as a TL;DR, I can already tell you that we’re going to get:

• A free Legendary card available now (Ysera, Emerald Aspect)
• Extremely powerful Wild God Legendary cards
• Two new card keywords (one similar to Galakrond)
• A release date set for March 25th

Into the Emerald Dream Expansion: Ysera, Emerald Aspect

Blizzard is giving players an early taste of the Into the Emerald Dream Hearthstone expansion with a free Legendary card; Ysera, Emerald Aspect is now available as a free login reward. First things first, it’s clear that this card might be an absolute game changer for two classes, Druid and Warrior. And mirror matchups with this card will just be crazy; that’s basically going to be starting the game with a Guff-like effect.

Cards like this are super difficult to rate; it’s either super broken or completely unplayable. Nevertheless, considering the potential impact of the Hearthstone 2025 rotation, this card will surely see some play – even now, without any other cards from the Into the Emerald Dream expansion.

So yeah, I guess it’s time to abuse some Dungar Druid before the rotation hits!

Into the Emerald Dream Expansion: New Card Keywords

Imbue

Imbue is a new keyword designed for classes fighting to protect the World Tree for the following classes:

• Druid
• Hunter
• Mage
• Paladin
• Priest
• Shaman

The way it works is, when you play your first Imbue card, you receive a brand new Imbued Hero Power that’s unique to your class. And every time you play a card with the Imbue keyword, your Hero Power improves by essentially getting a “+1” bonus to its usual effect. It’s a stacking mechanic similar in spirit to Galakrond Invocations.

For example, let’s take the Shaman hero power. Normally, this hero power might transform a friendly minion into a random minion that costs one more. With Imbue, playing your first Imbue card grants you the base effect: transform a minion so that its cost increases by one.

However, each subsequent Imbue card you play upgrades this effect further; after playing a second Imbue card, the transformation now increases the cost by two, after a third, by three, and so on. And just like Galakrond Invocations, when you play an Imbue card outside the supported classes, it simply won’t trigger the effect at all.

As of Day 1 of the reveal season, we only got a sneak peek of two unique Imbue hero powers, Shaman & Hunter. And well, if you want to stay in the loop with all the latest reveals and card game news in general, be sure to follow CardGamer on Bluesky.

Dark Gift

While Imbue channels the pure magic of the Emerald Dream, Dark Gift is all about embracing the darker side of things – courtesy of the Old Gods. It appears that this keyword will be available for all classes, but some will have class-specific cards that emphasize it, including:

• Death Knight
• Rogue
• Warlock
• Warrior

In its conception, when you play a card with Dark Gift, you always Discover three minions. But this isn’t your everyday Discover — each of the three minions comes with an extra special effect that’s chosen at random from a pool of 10 possible effects; including:

• +3 Attack and Lifesteal
• +2/+2 and Elusive
• +4 Health and Taunt
• +4/+5 boost and placement of that minion on the top of your deck
• Cost reduction by two with 2 Attack subtraction (only available for minions where this won’t drop their Attack below 1)
• Clone effect; when you play the minion, summon a 2/2 copy of it
• Reborn
• Charge
• Divine Shield
• Windfury

Expanding Choose One Keyword on Other Classes

Remember how Choose One used to be the exclusive domain of Druids (aside from those quirky Dual-Class cards)? Well, in the Into the Emerald Dream Hearthstone Expansion, Blizzard decided to spread that druidic goodness to every class. Now, every single class will get at least one Choose One card.

Yes, it’s official. All 12 classes are now basically Druid. At least for the time of Into the Emerald Dream.

Into the Emerald Dream Expansion: Wild Gods

Moreover, each class will receive a Wild God Legendary, most of which will likely be powerful, high-cost minions, super similar to what we saw in the TITANS expansion. I wouldn’t be surprised if every class gets two Legendaries (one Wild God and one regular), but that has yet to be confirmed.

Into the Emerald Dream Expansion: Release Date & Preorder

Into the Emerald Dream  is set to launch on March 25th. Keep in mind that this will also be the first day of the Year of the Raptor, a fresh Standard rotation where many important cards take a backseat, giving way to a new meta – so yeah, be ready to rethink your strategies. 

Pre-purchase bundles are available until the expansion’s launch on March 25th and can be used in the Pre-Release Tavern Brawl starting March 18th.

That’s all about the new Into the Emerald Dream Hearthstone expansion! If you feel like you still need to prepare yourself economically for the expansion, be sure to check out my article on how to farm gold in Hearthstone, as well as Hearthstone economy guide. That should have you covered!