The next Hearthstone expansion – Whispers of the Old Gods – is coming soon and will be introducing 134 new cards to the game. ( Read our interview with Team 5 here.

“ Imagine a world where Ragnaros says 'Live Insect' at the end of your turn and heals you instead of dealing 8 damage to your opponent! This is a better world is it not?

A couple of the new corrupted versions of existing minions.

The original.

The Firelord.

High mana minions are usually part of your win condition.

It's an interesting mechanic.

Each class could potentially have a new control-oriented deck archetype thanks to C'Thun.

Today, we’re exclusively revealing one of those cards – “Ragnaros, Lightlord” - a Paladin legendary, and a very surprising twist on an existing icon of the game.As anyone with an even casual interest in Hearthstone The playfulness of Hearthstone very much shines through in this much darker expansion, and Ragnaros, Lightlord is a fantastic example. "Imagine a world where instead of Ragnaros being the most powerful dark being, the old gods are," Senior Game Designer Mike Donais tells me. "Now imagine a world where Ragnaros says 'Live Insect' at the end of your turn and heals you instead of dealing 8 damage to your opponent! This is a better world is it not?"It's a fun twist on WoW and Hearthstone lore, and even better, this twist amounts to a radically different card that will be used in fundamentally different ways to the original Rag.Ragnaros the Firelord is played for his immediate impact, whereas this will be more like an Antique Healbot – used to stabilise and establish board presence.That said, Lightlord has similar drawbacks to Ragnaros the Firelord. Both effects can be powerful, but require some set-up to gain maximum value.In the case of Ragnaros the Firelord, the ideal situation is to play him onto an empty board to guarantee face damage, or onto a board with one big minion, so you have a 50/50 chance to kill it and swing the game back in your favour. For every small minion your opponent has, Ragnaros the Firelord loses potency, and indeed, sometimes it makes more sense to leave an opponent’s Ragnaros alive if you have enough targets for it.Setting up to get value out of Lightlord, on the other hand, should actually be more straightforward, because it’s not as contingent on your opponent. If you’re holding Ragnaros the Firelord in hand, for instance, you can’t control how many minions your opponent plays on his or her turn, and that will directly impact how likely Ragnaros is to be effective.The set-up for Lightlord, on the other hand, is more dependent on your actions. If you need the heal on your hero then you have to ensure you don’t have any damaged minions on the board. If you do, maybe you trade them in. If you want the heal to land on your big minion then, like the OG Rag, you can give yourself a 50/50 shot.A bigger distinction is that Ragnaros the Lightlord is also a body that needs to be dealt with, because it will be able to attack on the following turn, whereas Ragnaros the Firelord can’t – unless silenced it’s inert during your turn, randomly firing off its eight damage fireball at the end of the turn. In that sense Lightlord actually does more than Firelord – it has an ability that repeats every turn AND it functions as an active, imposing minion.The crucial question, however, is - does this card do enough to justify taking up one of the few high drop slots in your deck? The expensive cards that have typically seen play in Hearthstone have an immediate impact. They can either provide additional reach/burst damage to win the game (Ragnaros the Firelord, Grommash Hellscream), help you stabilise (Tirion Fordring, Jaraxxus), help you set up for lethal (Alexstrasza) or just have a really powerful ability (Ysera, Mal’Ganis, Archmage Antonidas).Paladins already have a heap of different ways to heal (and are getting more, such as Forbidden Healing), but the fact that this ability is attached to an intimidating body is pretty relevant. It’s most definitely a control card, however, and designed to fit into the much more control-oriented meta that Team 5 are obviously anticipating once this expansion is out. What does that mean exactly? It means that the game is going to slow down significantly.The main reason for this is that the cards from Curse of Naxxramas and Goblins vs Gnomes will not be playable in the new Standard format, and those were the cards that sped Hearthstone up in the first place, and helped push aggressive decks like Face Hunter over the top. Most notably, those sets introduced stickier/harder-to-kill minions that aggressive decks could take advantage of in a number of ways (such as Haunted Creeper), and with those cards going away, the power level of cards will be recalibrated somewhat.Added to that, the cards we’ve seen so far from Whispers of the Old Gods – such as C’Thun and his followers - are definitely more control-oriented; they’re designed to thrive in a slower-paced game that will actually get to turn ten and beyond.Will Ragnaros, Lightlord see play in the age of Standard format and Whispers of the Old Gods? If Control Paladin returns, it seems likely. Indeed, this card could even be an integral part of a Paladin C’Thun deck, helping Paladin players get to the late game and a whole new victory condition.

Cam Shea is senior editor in IGN's Australian office. Check out his guide to Tempo Mage here and why not say hey on Twitter