How does Leapfrogger work in Hearthstone Battlegrounds?

Patch 21.2 has brought many new whacky and wild combos into Hearthstone Battlegrounds. On the whole, they have helped to revitalize the game and give each tribe an even stronger sense of identity. But among the new cards, a so-called “resident sleeper” has made itself apparent, and it just so happens to be the incredibly adorable card know as Leapfrogger.

What does it do?

The card text on Leapfrogger is a new and unique interaction in Battlegrounds. It reads, “Deathrattle: Give a friendly Beast +2/+2 and this Deathrattle.” Essentially, whenever Leapfrogger dies, it gives a friendly Beast minion on your board +2/+2, and the ability to again pass on the +2/+2 when that Beast dies. Due to the nature of such an effect, Leapfrogger can drastically change early fights with some luck, as a board of Beasts might juggle this buff around five or sometimes six times thanks to so many beasts having a Deathrattle that summons more Beasts.

What makes it so strong?

Well, if you have played a game of Battlegrounds on patch 21.2 that included Beasts, you have likely seen at least half of your lobby attempt to build a composition that has been colloquially titled “Frogzodia.” In this composition, A player takes advantage of two other cards in conjunction with Leapfrogger to start an exponential nightmare of stats.

The first card is a Tavern Tier 3 minion called Monstrous Macaw. Monstrous Macaw will trigger a random friendly minion’s Deathrattle whenever it attacks. As such, Macaw allows you to spread more copies of Leapfrogger’s Deathrattle than normally possible, meaning that rather than just passing around a buff of +2/+2, you are passing around two of those buffs. If your Macaw is golden, you pass around three of those buffs, and with a golden Leapfrogger, those three buffs become +4/+ instead.

But it doesn’t end here because the other card that enables Leapfrogger is the Tavern Tier 5 minion, Baron Rivendare. Baron Rivendare will double your minion’s Deathrattles, and it counts Monstrous Macaw’s attacks as Deathrattle activation. One last thing to note is that when a golden Macaw attacks, it will trigger a random friendly minion’s Deathrattle twice, but one at a time, and it doesn’t have to be the same minion. This means that golden Macaw can trigger the Leapfrogger-Deathrattle of a minion that it just granted multiple copies of the buff to, even further spreading the frogs around! Considering all of these things, in conjunction with all three combo pieces being available on Tavern Tier 4 (assuming you triple into Baron), it would seem that “Frogzodia” is currently the best build in Battlegrounds, and it’s thanks to Leapfrogger.