kambi/helmar/ciridash the new ambush

[Ruthless95]

kambi/helmar/ciridash the new ambush

skellige was a pretty disgusting faction in my eyes and with this new trend of kambi/helmar & ciri dash it has reached new lvls.
the only thing you can do about it is to lock the giant, or kambi but this combo is played when there is 2 or 3 cards left in your deck and chances are you are not holding a D-shackles 90% of the time. you can D shackle or D-bomb their helmar too but not ciri dash. basically have D-shackle in your last 3 cards or rip.
mind you you still can get spanked if the guy is having his own locks to unlock the giant or kambi.
so while you see the annoyance of ambush with dragoons from the start of the game and you can't do anything about it, this newly exploited combo tells you "you fcking lost loser GTFO" while you still have 3 cards in your hand.
is the solution to drain every skellige opponent i face to 2 cards by round 2 so he can't pull out this combo in round 3? that's not how a non-broken game works
FIX IT M8.

 

[Tamacountry13]

This combo has been going on for ages now and honestly doesn't work often.
Even if the Skillege player gets all three necessary Golds, you need to hope your opponent doesn't have their own Golds/Shackles/Spies. It works absolutely horribly against NR against Nekkers.

 

[4RM3D]

Yup, like Tamacountry13 pointed out, the combo is too unreliable in too many cases.

 

[IAxiiYourMother]

lmao, how many times have you seen this recently? Also, why are these noobers not using Skjall for that extra 6 point curb stomp.

 

[panerola]

Ruthless95 And I see you had Kayran in your deck and the D-Bomb, but were unfortunate not to get it. You really could have save the round with Kayran and make a lot of damage with the D-Bomb. Really, it is difficult for the combo to work.

 

[NlelithZ44]

It's really easy to avoid this combo... Always go for the win in first round against SK. If you didn't see any enemy golds, push second round so they have to use Kambi in it to win: with a 3 turn timer, they can't save it for the last, and you'll have your key cards for the 3rd round in hand.

 

[DEERCG]

NlelithZ44 Yep, you're right. I run Kambi deck for a month, easy to win this deck at round 1 (Skellige always weak at round 1), and push Kambi in round 2 then you will have 90% chance to win. I think I was first person run this deck after this patch.

 

[Nimraphel]

Yet another "omfg I just lost a game vs. a once-in-a-blue-moon combo that only works if you grossly misread the opponent, NEEEEERF PLX FIX IT WAAAAGH"-thread from Ruthless95... Sorry, but it's getting really old. Kambi/Hjalmar/Ciri: Dash is hardly a gamebreaking, meta-defining, problematic combo from a balance perspective. Stop making pointless nerf threads whenever something just so happens to gib you without you drawing - or having - the necessary counter-play options (of which there are numerous...)

On a sidenote, it baffles me why on earth you would shackle the Longship in round 3. Surely one would think that it could - at most - generate 4-6 value in that round, making it a neglegible target considering you, as Monsters, can easily outpower any King Bran deck, especially one that relies on Morkvarg in lieu of raw power...

Edit: Furthermore, the guy is playing all four of his gold cards in that round - Kambi, Ermion, Madman Lugos and Hjalmar (why is Ciri: Dash mentioned in the thread even...?). On top of Donar an Hindar. How on earth did he push you to third round without spending a single gold card? How on did you manage not to pressure him more? You won round 1 and got greedy with your keep, instantly passing round 2? ... This thread is utterly pointless and worthless. The issue here is not certain cards, it's the player in question.

 

[RickMelethron]

get wrecked

 

[Codexhel]

"is the solution to drain every skellige opponent i face to 2 cards by round 2 so he can't pull out this combo in round 3?"

Considering that you can easily beat SK in Round 1 with monsters' power, yes, that's exactly what you're meant to do. You have a superior keep to SK, you are more able to generate more power from fewer cards than SK, yes you absolutely try to burn the SK out of their resources. That's part of what this game is: if I'm a combo deck, I have every incentive to try to manipulate there to be two long rounds that I can win. If I'm monsters, I absolutely try to break up the opponents' combo and exploit the huge keep for CA or just massive value in R3.

If you're complaining about the actual strategy of the game and calling it broken, you really need to take a step back and figure out what you want from games.

 

[a_page06]

Considering its a legendary craft, it seems unlikely to see this cheese combo in the low levels, and at higher levels it seems like Fake Ciri or other things that people will usually have seen and have a good counter for in their deck by this time. Gotta know what its possible for your enemy to have and if you're a new player, I'd suggest heading to youtube and watching others play your faction. For me it opened my eyes to seeing the possibilities and weighing the likelihood of what the enemy might have, as well as doing more research on other factions' cards than I was previously doing. Once you have a handle on your deck and its synergies, the real game begins in beginning to read your opponent and how to tweak/utilize your deck in order to counter, shutdown, avoid, or overpower what they may have. Also at your level you could probably just USE one or two of these cheese strats. I run Face Ciri knowing fully that probably 30-40% of the time she'll be shut-down, but the 60% of the time I face somebody who hasn't seen this card, its a pretty easy way to get ahead. I fully expect to phase her out as I see more and more counters.

Edit: Btw at a very basic level (low mmr but climbing!) here's the super basic scoop on each deck:
Monsters-tons of power, gotta have some kind of counter or shutdown or their numbers will just end up higher than yours. Also they have a gimme in round 2 or 3 of a previous card; knowing its the last non-gold, non-fleeting unit can be played to your advantage. E.G.: They play Eredin to slightly best you, so play a small card to force them to play a low-power monster which will be retained instead of Eredin.
Nilfgaard-either spies or reveal. Usually card deficit is my concern playing this deck, so cause your opponent to use cards in an unfavorable trade. The longer you play them, the more mulligans and deck-grooming cards they will have used, or the more about your hand they will understand.
Skellige-Later rounds are not your friend, so overpower them early. Carry a D bomb for Crach, a lacerate for King Bran, and some method to combat the constant weakening of your side against Harald.
Northern Realms-Gold gold gold or just trebuchets weakening you while resurrecting/duplicating power. Typically new NR players will easily setup for scorch or igni, so if you don't have igni then don't play a bunch of high-power early unless its gold, so you can utilize a well-setup scorch target. If three 6-8 power trebuchets are the highest power non-gold on the board, you can still scorch them for 18 points. D-bomb also can come in handy!
Scoiatel-Expect ambushes or counters, and probably the first thing you want to learn about them are the cards they can play face-down so you have an idea of the 2-3 cards it could be (based on the side its on.) If you know the few options for a face down card and an idea of the hand they're trying to setup, you can make a more informed decision.

As a general thing might wanna check out how the mulligan works-it might not be what you expected. Also learning about deck setup (25 cards or bust!), deck-thinning, and general strategies for how to get more with less is a good way to play. I watched a video of Merchant playing a 40 card deck, and he was just laughing at his draws knowing that with a more appropriate, 25 card deck he would probably have what he'd been fishing for by now...

TL;DR-study and practice more if you wanna get better and beat cheese strats.

 

[Ruthless95]

Ruthless95 And I see you had Kayran in your deck and the D-Bomb, but were unfortunate not to get it. You really could have save the round with Kayran and make a lot of damage with the D-Bomb. Really, it is difficult for the combo to work.

his last card was a D-bomb so kayran was a dead card too. but yea i have high rate of "unfortunate" incidents

 

[Ruthless95]

(why is Ciri: Dash mentioned in the thread even...?)

i have seen this shitshow with ciridash combo as well. helmar kambi ciri dash bi*chman lugas all can contribute to this combo since we are talking about a combo not specific gold cards.

 

[The_def_star]

Nope. I crafted Kambi just so I can try it in my Discard deck and he is very unreliable. You have to pull the gold cards needed to make it happen and you have to absolutely win the first round. And even then you might not have enough cards in the third round to even be able to even out the extra 12 points you gave your opponents if he has the card advantage. Don't get me wrong it's pretty hilarious when pulled off but I maybe have pulled it off 2 out of the 10 times I tried it and won once with it.

 

[Nimraphel]

i have seen this shitshow with ciridash combo as well. helmar kambi ciri dash bi*chman lugas all can contribute to this combo since we are talking about a combo not specific gold cards.

Again, echoing other, sensible people in this thread... You misread your opponent grossly. You didn't bleed your opponent at all if it's 1-1 in rounds and he sits with 4 gold cards in hand and haven't had to use Sigrdrifa before round 3. You just got greedy with your keep and wanted a big CA (although you even failed that...).

You really come across as just wanting to auto-pilot your way vs. any deck whatsoever while maintaining a ridiculous winrate. Newsflash! You can't. My ladder deck is at a 65% winrate currently at #72 global rank, and sometimes I get super hardcountered too. Very, very few people (only Garrunah I think?) have maintained a 70+% winrate for an extended period of time.

Now, your deck doesn't seem too bad from the screenshot - at least I've seen way worse even at 4500 mmr - and yet you're still low at 2500-3000~ mmr... Would you at least be open to the idea that maybe - and there's nothing wrong in that! - you're just not a good player? Or even a bad one? And that your mindset of crying whenever you lose a random game, denoting whatever made you lose as a "broken" or "disgusting" mechanic, is simply not conducive to any notable improvement on your part? Note how you're pretty much the only person ever who has complained about Kambi or SK-as-a-ST-player.

Labelling anything that causes you to lose as "disgusting" or "broken" is simply unconstructive and wrong. It is problematic that the forum becomes flooded with such poorly thought threads.

 

[frbfree]

Successful players don't allow opponents to play 3 card combos in Round 3. I know that sounds harsh and insensitive to the OP. But honestly, the entire meta of this patch is to play out your opponent in Rounds 1 and 2. Nimraphel and I don't agree on much, but honestly, there's way too many cards on the board for a third round.

It's a common mistake for Monster players who win Round 1 to pass without playing a card in Round 2, because they want CA for Round 3. It was a good strategy in previous patches, but it just doesn't work anymore. If you win Round 1, your job is to play as deep into Round 2 as you feasibly can, in the hopes of drawing out cards like Kambi, or a buffed Toruviel, or Shani, before they crush you in Round 3. Mostly, because Monsters don't have a Game Swinging Round 3 card, which the exception of Grave Hag, and even she wouldn't help you in this instance, because you lost CA.

This is what people are talking about when they say that Gwent is a tempo game. The more Round 3 opportunities you leave an opponent, the more likely you are to lose.

 

[Nimraphel]

Nimraphel and I don't agree on much, but honestly, there's way too many cards on the board for a third round.

We don't? I wasn't aware Either way, I agree with frbfree ... It pretty much sums up the misplay/misreading of the match-up (and arguably game in general, judging from various other threads by the OP). Against Skellige and NR especially, bleeding them for as many of their resurrection and combo capabilities is essential if you won round 1 - especially when playing Monsters.

 

[drzappleswag]

And today I learned that if you save 3 out of your 4 Golds for a last round play, you probably win.

Who knew

 

[a_page06]

And today I learned that if you save 3 out of your 4 Golds for a last round play, you probably win.

Who knew

I played a game like this last night. Card count was even going into round 2 (round 1 was a draw) and both leaders had been used. I had 3/4 of my gold cards and a spare bronze and he had one gold I think? Either way, it was kinda ugly... He had to play 2 or 3 gold cards just to tie round 1, which obviously is a mistake...

 

[stoner321]

I bought the expensive Kambi card just to use this tactic. Once I used it I found out it was trash. Chances are very high the opponent got more cards in the end / the right cards to block the tactic. I used it like 5 times and then never again. Really not a strong tactic if you are at a higher rank.