Balance Council: Avoiding “Bad” Votes
After three balance councils, there has been significant chatter about horrible balance changes, and several instances of changes being immediately reversed (presumably because the community considered them horrible and not simply to mix up the meta). After some discussion with other players, I have concluded that trying to influence players to vote for specific cards (and not for others) will be unlikely to impact the prevalence of “bad” changes. There are a huge number of reasonable changes – tastes and preferences and hence, votes, will naturally differ (as they should). What may prevent future balance council issues is to help people recognize what are likely to be “bad” changes; that is the intent of this article.
Game Mechanics and Core Balance Components:
Probably the greatest potential for complete disaster is if players make changes that disrupt essential game mechanics or core components of game balance – these include elements like engine/ control/ point-slam balance, commitment, consistency, carry-over/advantage, tempo (both in terms of reach and of simultaneous threats), and faction/archetype/card playability. Let me explain each in more detail.
First, it is critical that engine value, control (or removal), and point-slam stay within reasonable balance. And the reason for this is two-fold. First, there is some level of rock/paper/scissors between these elements of the game. And while rock/paper/scissors is neither strategic nor terribly exciting, it is far more meaningful than rock/paper with no scissors! But even if decks remain balanced after one of these strategic approaches is nerfed or elevated, play becomes much less interesting. For example. I hate Korathi Heatwave. I do not like that the most ubiquitous removal card is also a banish card; in fact, I don’t really like absolute removal at all. But I recognize cards like Heatwave are absolutely essential to counteract numerous cards with abilities that are far too strong without risk of removal. The difficulty with over-nerfing core removal / engine/ or point-slam elements is that loss of any one of these elements reduces the enjoyability of Gwent in general. If engines are removed, there is no need for control – everything comes down to point-slam. The game plays very much like the seasonal “Barely Balanced” mode – which isn’t horrible, but which does get old / boring. And this is the best case. If control is removed, the game deteriorates to a purely solitaire game of engine development which is utterly devoid of strategic interaction. And if point-slam is removed, there becomes no deterrent to rampant control. And if everything is removed or controlled, there is nothing to interact with, and again, strategy disappears. Cost and return of engines must be balanced with cost and return of removal, and both must be balanced with the potential point-slam or Gwent falls apart.
Second, choosing level of commitment each round, and even each turn, is the heart of Gwent strategy. Rewarding overcommitment (the way Aerondight does) is very dangerous if you value quality of play.
Consistency may seem like a valuable feature of the game, but removal of all elements of RNG will make the game much less enjoyable for most players. Experiencing different matches – even between the same decks – based upon factors like draw and random effects not only keeps the game fresh, it provides unique strategic challenges. When a game is determined solely by RNG, there is no player agency. But when every match simply becomes a choreographed sequence of plays, there is equally litter player agency. Consistency tools like thinning and tutoring in moderation, increase deck variety and enrich deck building strategy. In excess, they destroy the game.
Balanced trade-offs between the likes of carryover, future card value, and potential card advantage makes for a nice strategic interplay in early rounds, but they denigrate the game when out of proportion. Witness the distaste left when a Kolgrim deck deliberately goes down 6 cards in winning round 1, but then easily win round 2 because Kolgrim’s engine value is worth more than playing cards.
Tempo can potentially refer to two different game elements and both must be balanced. The most common usage refers to how rapidly points can be played (which is closely related to reach). If any one deck obtains too much tempo advantage over another, the notion of round-control (and the value of round-control) gets very distorted to the detriment of the game. Too much support for this type of tempo, and all competitive decks will have to be designed around high tempo, and deck variety disappears. The second type of tempo is the speed with which engines or desirable board-state can be established. It is a huge advantage to be able to establish engines or board state faster than opponent can respond. Allow even a little too much of this type of tempo and certain deck-types will dominate play.
Finally, players must maintain balance between all factions, a reasonable variety of archetypes, and a broad selection of cards. Everyone has a right to enjoy the game. Destroying something just because you dislike it both reduces variety and destroys some player’s joy. It is certainly OK to suggest a given archetype is too powerful and needs to be toned down – this is not the same as destroying it. And it is even OK to suggest that the game might be better off if certain cards did not exist (were nerfed into oblivion) provided there is sound justification for that action. But this is also not equivalent to destroying a card where there are alternatives, or simply based upon its over-use or personal distaste. Incidentally, cards can be destroyed in ways other than by rendering them unplayable. For example, Xavier Lemmens were buffed to 4 provisions, Squirrel would become obsolete (it would always be replaced by Xavier – even if Squirrel remained a decent tech card in isolation).
Consideration of Deeper Consequences:
Cards are never played in a vacuum; what happens to one card inevitably influences what happens to cards around it. Avoiding bad votes requires considering indirect influences of a change. Some indirect impacts can include: unintended balance consequences, rendering cards irrelevant, impact on replay/duplication/summoning, buffing deck-defining archetype-independent cards, and impact on other power/provision based effects. Again, I will address each factor separately.
Often cards are critical to (or possible in) multiple decks. For example, I hate Simlas. Actually upon reflection, it is not really Simlas I hate – it is the whole Vanadain/Heist/Waylay/Alissa/Simlas mess that I hate. But I will never vote to nerf Simlas – he seems essential to at least a half-dozen different, interesting decks. To better reduce the impact of that awful exploitive combo, I would look to nerf Vanadain or Alissa – both of which are more problematic on their own. Also one card can impact the usefulness of another. For example, nerfing Curse of Corruption would prove a huge buff to either Erland or Sove whose boost becomes much safer without final say.
The most obvious way a card is rendered irrelevant is by buffing a similar card to a point of being uncategorically better. If Ice Giant were buffed to 9-power, there would be no real reason to play Griffin. But cards can also be rendered irrelevant by killing essential companion cards. I doubt Radeyah would see use if Shupe were dead. Otkell would be unusable if Freya’s Blessing cost 10 provisions. Cards can also be killed by making effective counters too attractive: if Xavier Lemmens were power 12, Witches Sabbath would disappear.
Easha has already mentioned this, but it bears repeating. When certain cards are duplicated/summoned(/sometimes replayed) by other cards, buffing/nerfing power effectively affects all the cards that duplicate it The December 2023 Balance Council buff to Cleaver’s Muscle also buffed Novigradian Justice and hugely buffed Cleaver!
There is extra risk to over-buffing any cards that are archetype independent – especially cards that contribute a strong flavor to decks. Cards that are over-powered will tend to appear in every deck that can play them. Dominant cards that can appear is many decks – especially if they shape the feel of the deck – will make all decks seem the same. We saw this when Renfri and Golden Nekker were first released – almost every deck was a Renfri or a Nekker deck. It felt like the meta had two decks. This effect is strongest when Neutral cards are OP, but faction cards can have similar effects on a more limited scale. There may be exceptions to this principle in the case of neutral cards that support different factions in unique ways. For example, cards like Wagon or Peasant militia are not going to make ST and NR decks feel the same because they work through distinctive feeling cards.
Probably the most common indirect effect from changing provisions/power is the impact of change on provision or power-based effects. I think the impact of provision changes and of power changes are significant enough to merit their own sections.
Impacts from Provision Changes:
Aside from directly affecting the price of cards in the deck building process, provision levels of certain cards can affect the level of deck polarization. They can also affect game play through powers that either target only cards of certain provision level, or through cards whose effect depends upon another card’s provisions.
Cards with effects whose intensity changes depending on the provision level of other cards include: Mysterious Puzzle Box, Viper Witcher Mentor, Sorceress of Dol Blathana, Endrega Queen, Prism Pendant, Pitfall Trap, Damnation, Palmerin de Launfal, Cosimo Malaspina, Mercenary Contract, Deadman’s Tongue, Bride of the Sea, Vivienne de Tabris, Summoning Circle, Triangle Within a Triangle, Vivienne: Oriole, Gimpy Gerwin, Mutagenerator, Abduction, Ihuarraquax, Jan Calveit, Land of a Thousand Fables, Filavandrel aen Fidhail, Alzur, Gerhart of Aelle, Yaga, Melitele,Amphibious Assault, Torres var Emreis: Founder, Fucusya, and. Renfri (Blessing of Charity).
There are certain provision level changes that strongly affect the ability to target a card. Below are the levels at which card targeting changes.
Between 4 and 5 provisions: Crow Clan Druid, Eventide Plunder, Epidemic, Musicians of Blaviken, Shady Vender, Sorceress of Dol Blathana, War of Clans, Damnation, Bride of the Sea, Artis, Gerhart of Aelle, Portal
Between 5 and 6 provisions: Shady Vendor, Filavandrel Aen Fidhail
Between 6 and 7 provisions: Penitent
Between 7 and 8 provisions: Penitent, Blood Eagle
Between 9 and 10 provisions: Ciri: Nova, Abduction, Golden Nekker, Hanmarvin’s Blue Dream, Renew, Telianyn aep Collen
Between 10 and 11 provisions: Oxenfurt Scholar, Caranthir Ar-Feniel, Amphibious Assault, Torres, Fucusya
As can be clearly observed from this list, changing provision cost between 4 and 5, between 9 and 10, and between 10 and 11 is often impactful; other changes are usually not very significant.
Impact of Changes in Power:
Because power is a gameplay statistic, while provision is a deck-building statistic, it is not surprising that the implications of change in power are far more numerous and subtle. But crossing various power thresholds can impact any of the following: survivability, tempo/reach, highest or lowest power triggers, seizability, base power effects, ability to trigger deathblow, ability to align power (for the likes of Schirru), tall punish triggers.
Here are a few power level thresholds that I find particularly important:
1 to 2: vulnerability to on deploy pings (Artis, Naval Supremacy, An Craite Longship), division/duplication (Self Eater, Reaver Hunter), one-point ping removal becomes impossible.
2 to 3: Two-point ping removal (weather, lacerate, etc.) no longer suffices.
3 to 4: Moves unit outside most unit-based damage removal; moves unit out of most seize range.
4 to 5: moves unit out of bomb and similar kill-range.
5 to 6: moves unit out of faction-based damage kill-range.
6 to 7: moves unit outside most damage kill-range, moves unit out of Enslave 6 and Vigo’s Muzzle range.
8 to 9: moves unit out of almost all damage-kill range, but into tall removal (e.g. Geralt of Rivia).
Other Sources of Poor Voting Choices:
There are numerous other reasons that players make poor voting choices. These include uncontrolled bias, inconsistency, lack of vision/future planning, extremism, carelessness/assumptions, and trolling/manipulation. Again, I will discuss them separately.
The most nefarious basis for poor balance council vote is abject bias. Now, let me make this clear – balance is inherently subjective; it is perfectly reasonable that players value different elements of the game differently and have different experiences with various cards. What is not reasonable is to buff cards just because you like them and nerf others because they are bad for some poorly constructed pet deck. Votes that do not consider the well being of the game in general risk being destructive.
In Gwent there are certain parallels between factions: for example, up until the last balance council, top faction removal was 5 points for 5 provisions, self-summoning thinning cards were 4 power and 5 provisions, Defenders were 7 total point value for 9 provisions, etc. These symmetries not only helped factions to remain balanced, they provide a valuable baseline for equity between factions and a worthwhile aesthetic to the game. While changing this is not disastrous for the game, it feels like it would be a loss. But consistency applies not just to benchmark cards; it applies to reasoning about cards. To argue that Nilfgaard is a control faction so it shouldn’t have engines, while Northern Realms, as an engine faction, also needs significant control to be viable is inconsistent. Changes or standards that are not applied consistently tend to be harmful.
One of my biggest complaints about Balance Council so far has been a lack of significant movement toward what I would consider a better game. To me, there are two features of Gwent that significantly decrease my enjoyment of the game: the first is the lack of player agency in deciding the outcome of a match. Barring huge blunders, 90% of the time a match result is determined exclusively by either the match-up or the card draw; game-play simply doesn’t matter. The second major flaw is the very limited potential for different viable decks. Unless one chooses from a very narrow pool of “meta decks”, there is virtually no chance of winning a match. I believe that much of the problem is the huge difference in strength between a handful of top cards and everything else. I consistently vote to nerf the luck driven and highly powered cards and to buff the strategically interesting cards as well as the dross in general. While I don’t expect that all players will share my impression or vision for the game, I would like to see more votes supporting some meaningful, long-term plan.
Extremism in balance council would be actions like killing a card when other options are available. A classic example was the decision of many people in the first balance council to reduce the power of Reaver Hunter’s to the point where their order ability could never be used. It would have been perfectly sufficient to raise the provision cost of Reaver Hunters – or even better to raise the provision cost of the cards that allow a million copies of bronze soldiers. The results of extremism are: 1. reducing the variety of viable decks., 2. wasting future votes reverting destructive changes, 3. offending segments of the player base.
Carelessness and faulty assumptions result in votes that even the voter might agree were bad ideas. I think many players naturally assume that a power decrease is always a nerf and a provision decrease is always a buff and may think no deeper than that. Decreasing power on a unit with a berserk condition may just make the condition easier to trigger. Or they may vote to change the power of some card like Viper Witcher Mentor (that will reset on deploy anyway). An assumption that is easy to make is to assume that other player’s votes will not mess up your plans. If you think a vote to buff one card in a certain deck is well balanced by a second vote to nerf a different card, you should definitely consider what would happen to Gwent if just one of your two votes actually went through.
Finally, although it is unfortunate, there will always be “voters” whose primary aim is simply to disrupt the process. And there are others who may sincerely believe a certain, say buff, is appropriate, but who try to mislead other voters into supporting that buff by posing it as a nerf. For example, some players believe that Nilfgaard has been over-nerfed and needs some buffs. I have also seen calls to “nerf” the highly binary Puppet Master to 3-power. If players actually think it through, this would not be a nerf; it would be a huge buff – it makes a used Puppet Master easier to destroy, or even to seize! The best counter to the small number of players who attempt this type of manipulation is simply to think about the merits of suggestions before voting.
Conclusion:
Despite the possibility (and even the inevitable occurrences) of bad voting, Balance Council holds enormous potential. It is my hope that this and similar articles can help players to avoid many of these “bad” votes.
After three balance councils, there has been significant chatter about horrible balance changes, and several instances of changes being immediately reversed (presumably because the community considered them horrible and not simply to mix up the meta). After some discussion with other players, I have concluded that trying to influence players to vote for specific cards (and not for others) will be unlikely to impact the prevalence of “bad” changes. There are a huge number of reasonable changes – tastes and preferences and hence, votes, will naturally differ (as they should). What may prevent future balance council issues is to help people recognize what are likely to be “bad” changes; that is the intent of this article.
Game Mechanics and Core Balance Components:
Probably the greatest potential for complete disaster is if players make changes that disrupt essential game mechanics or core components of game balance – these include elements like engine/ control/ point-slam balance, commitment, consistency, carry-over/advantage, tempo (both in terms of reach and of simultaneous threats), and faction/archetype/card playability. Let me explain each in more detail.
First, it is critical that engine value, control (or removal), and point-slam stay within reasonable balance. And the reason for this is two-fold. First, there is some level of rock/paper/scissors between these elements of the game. And while rock/paper/scissors is neither strategic nor terribly exciting, it is far more meaningful than rock/paper with no scissors! But even if decks remain balanced after one of these strategic approaches is nerfed or elevated, play becomes much less interesting. For example. I hate Korathi Heatwave. I do not like that the most ubiquitous removal card is also a banish card; in fact, I don’t really like absolute removal at all. But I recognize cards like Heatwave are absolutely essential to counteract numerous cards with abilities that are far too strong without risk of removal. The difficulty with over-nerfing core removal / engine/ or point-slam elements is that loss of any one of these elements reduces the enjoyability of Gwent in general. If engines are removed, there is no need for control – everything comes down to point-slam. The game plays very much like the seasonal “Barely Balanced” mode – which isn’t horrible, but which does get old / boring. And this is the best case. If control is removed, the game deteriorates to a purely solitaire game of engine development which is utterly devoid of strategic interaction. And if point-slam is removed, there becomes no deterrent to rampant control. And if everything is removed or controlled, there is nothing to interact with, and again, strategy disappears. Cost and return of engines must be balanced with cost and return of removal, and both must be balanced with the potential point-slam or Gwent falls apart.
Second, choosing level of commitment each round, and even each turn, is the heart of Gwent strategy. Rewarding overcommitment (the way Aerondight does) is very dangerous if you value quality of play.
Consistency may seem like a valuable feature of the game, but removal of all elements of RNG will make the game much less enjoyable for most players. Experiencing different matches – even between the same decks – based upon factors like draw and random effects not only keeps the game fresh, it provides unique strategic challenges. When a game is determined solely by RNG, there is no player agency. But when every match simply becomes a choreographed sequence of plays, there is equally litter player agency. Consistency tools like thinning and tutoring in moderation, increase deck variety and enrich deck building strategy. In excess, they destroy the game.
Balanced trade-offs between the likes of carryover, future card value, and potential card advantage makes for a nice strategic interplay in early rounds, but they denigrate the game when out of proportion. Witness the distaste left when a Kolgrim deck deliberately goes down 6 cards in winning round 1, but then easily win round 2 because Kolgrim’s engine value is worth more than playing cards.
Tempo can potentially refer to two different game elements and both must be balanced. The most common usage refers to how rapidly points can be played (which is closely related to reach). If any one deck obtains too much tempo advantage over another, the notion of round-control (and the value of round-control) gets very distorted to the detriment of the game. Too much support for this type of tempo, and all competitive decks will have to be designed around high tempo, and deck variety disappears. The second type of tempo is the speed with which engines or desirable board-state can be established. It is a huge advantage to be able to establish engines or board state faster than opponent can respond. Allow even a little too much of this type of tempo and certain deck-types will dominate play.
Finally, players must maintain balance between all factions, a reasonable variety of archetypes, and a broad selection of cards. Everyone has a right to enjoy the game. Destroying something just because you dislike it both reduces variety and destroys some player’s joy. It is certainly OK to suggest a given archetype is too powerful and needs to be toned down – this is not the same as destroying it. And it is even OK to suggest that the game might be better off if certain cards did not exist (were nerfed into oblivion) provided there is sound justification for that action. But this is also not equivalent to destroying a card where there are alternatives, or simply based upon its over-use or personal distaste. Incidentally, cards can be destroyed in ways other than by rendering them unplayable. For example, Xavier Lemmens were buffed to 4 provisions, Squirrel would become obsolete (it would always be replaced by Xavier – even if Squirrel remained a decent tech card in isolation).
Consideration of Deeper Consequences:
Cards are never played in a vacuum; what happens to one card inevitably influences what happens to cards around it. Avoiding bad votes requires considering indirect influences of a change. Some indirect impacts can include: unintended balance consequences, rendering cards irrelevant, impact on replay/duplication/summoning, buffing deck-defining archetype-independent cards, and impact on other power/provision based effects. Again, I will address each factor separately.
Often cards are critical to (or possible in) multiple decks. For example, I hate Simlas. Actually upon reflection, it is not really Simlas I hate – it is the whole Vanadain/Heist/Waylay/Alissa/Simlas mess that I hate. But I will never vote to nerf Simlas – he seems essential to at least a half-dozen different, interesting decks. To better reduce the impact of that awful exploitive combo, I would look to nerf Vanadain or Alissa – both of which are more problematic on their own. Also one card can impact the usefulness of another. For example, nerfing Curse of Corruption would prove a huge buff to either Erland or Sove whose boost becomes much safer without final say.
The most obvious way a card is rendered irrelevant is by buffing a similar card to a point of being uncategorically better. If Ice Giant were buffed to 9-power, there would be no real reason to play Griffin. But cards can also be rendered irrelevant by killing essential companion cards. I doubt Radeyah would see use if Shupe were dead. Otkell would be unusable if Freya’s Blessing cost 10 provisions. Cards can also be killed by making effective counters too attractive: if Xavier Lemmens were power 12, Witches Sabbath would disappear.
Easha has already mentioned this, but it bears repeating. When certain cards are duplicated/summoned(/sometimes replayed) by other cards, buffing/nerfing power effectively affects all the cards that duplicate it The December 2023 Balance Council buff to Cleaver’s Muscle also buffed Novigradian Justice and hugely buffed Cleaver!
There is extra risk to over-buffing any cards that are archetype independent – especially cards that contribute a strong flavor to decks. Cards that are over-powered will tend to appear in every deck that can play them. Dominant cards that can appear is many decks – especially if they shape the feel of the deck – will make all decks seem the same. We saw this when Renfri and Golden Nekker were first released – almost every deck was a Renfri or a Nekker deck. It felt like the meta had two decks. This effect is strongest when Neutral cards are OP, but faction cards can have similar effects on a more limited scale. There may be exceptions to this principle in the case of neutral cards that support different factions in unique ways. For example, cards like Wagon or Peasant militia are not going to make ST and NR decks feel the same because they work through distinctive feeling cards.
Probably the most common indirect effect from changing provisions/power is the impact of change on provision or power-based effects. I think the impact of provision changes and of power changes are significant enough to merit their own sections.
Impacts from Provision Changes:
Aside from directly affecting the price of cards in the deck building process, provision levels of certain cards can affect the level of deck polarization. They can also affect game play through powers that either target only cards of certain provision level, or through cards whose effect depends upon another card’s provisions.
Cards with effects whose intensity changes depending on the provision level of other cards include: Mysterious Puzzle Box, Viper Witcher Mentor, Sorceress of Dol Blathana, Endrega Queen, Prism Pendant, Pitfall Trap, Damnation, Palmerin de Launfal, Cosimo Malaspina, Mercenary Contract, Deadman’s Tongue, Bride of the Sea, Vivienne de Tabris, Summoning Circle, Triangle Within a Triangle, Vivienne: Oriole, Gimpy Gerwin, Mutagenerator, Abduction, Ihuarraquax, Jan Calveit, Land of a Thousand Fables, Filavandrel aen Fidhail, Alzur, Gerhart of Aelle, Yaga, Melitele,Amphibious Assault, Torres var Emreis: Founder, Fucusya, and. Renfri (Blessing of Charity).
There are certain provision level changes that strongly affect the ability to target a card. Below are the levels at which card targeting changes.
Between 4 and 5 provisions: Crow Clan Druid, Eventide Plunder, Epidemic, Musicians of Blaviken, Shady Vender, Sorceress of Dol Blathana, War of Clans, Damnation, Bride of the Sea, Artis, Gerhart of Aelle, Portal
Between 5 and 6 provisions: Shady Vendor, Filavandrel Aen Fidhail
Between 6 and 7 provisions: Penitent
Between 7 and 8 provisions: Penitent, Blood Eagle
Between 9 and 10 provisions: Ciri: Nova, Abduction, Golden Nekker, Hanmarvin’s Blue Dream, Renew, Telianyn aep Collen
Between 10 and 11 provisions: Oxenfurt Scholar, Caranthir Ar-Feniel, Amphibious Assault, Torres, Fucusya
As can be clearly observed from this list, changing provision cost between 4 and 5, between 9 and 10, and between 10 and 11 is often impactful; other changes are usually not very significant.
Impact of Changes in Power:
Because power is a gameplay statistic, while provision is a deck-building statistic, it is not surprising that the implications of change in power are far more numerous and subtle. But crossing various power thresholds can impact any of the following: survivability, tempo/reach, highest or lowest power triggers, seizability, base power effects, ability to trigger deathblow, ability to align power (for the likes of Schirru), tall punish triggers.
Here are a few power level thresholds that I find particularly important:
1 to 2: vulnerability to on deploy pings (Artis, Naval Supremacy, An Craite Longship), division/duplication (Self Eater, Reaver Hunter), one-point ping removal becomes impossible.
2 to 3: Two-point ping removal (weather, lacerate, etc.) no longer suffices.
3 to 4: Moves unit outside most unit-based damage removal; moves unit out of most seize range.
4 to 5: moves unit out of bomb and similar kill-range.
5 to 6: moves unit out of faction-based damage kill-range.
6 to 7: moves unit outside most damage kill-range, moves unit out of Enslave 6 and Vigo’s Muzzle range.
8 to 9: moves unit out of almost all damage-kill range, but into tall removal (e.g. Geralt of Rivia).
Other Sources of Poor Voting Choices:
There are numerous other reasons that players make poor voting choices. These include uncontrolled bias, inconsistency, lack of vision/future planning, extremism, carelessness/assumptions, and trolling/manipulation. Again, I will discuss them separately.
The most nefarious basis for poor balance council vote is abject bias. Now, let me make this clear – balance is inherently subjective; it is perfectly reasonable that players value different elements of the game differently and have different experiences with various cards. What is not reasonable is to buff cards just because you like them and nerf others because they are bad for some poorly constructed pet deck. Votes that do not consider the well being of the game in general risk being destructive.
In Gwent there are certain parallels between factions: for example, up until the last balance council, top faction removal was 5 points for 5 provisions, self-summoning thinning cards were 4 power and 5 provisions, Defenders were 7 total point value for 9 provisions, etc. These symmetries not only helped factions to remain balanced, they provide a valuable baseline for equity between factions and a worthwhile aesthetic to the game. While changing this is not disastrous for the game, it feels like it would be a loss. But consistency applies not just to benchmark cards; it applies to reasoning about cards. To argue that Nilfgaard is a control faction so it shouldn’t have engines, while Northern Realms, as an engine faction, also needs significant control to be viable is inconsistent. Changes or standards that are not applied consistently tend to be harmful.
One of my biggest complaints about Balance Council so far has been a lack of significant movement toward what I would consider a better game. To me, there are two features of Gwent that significantly decrease my enjoyment of the game: the first is the lack of player agency in deciding the outcome of a match. Barring huge blunders, 90% of the time a match result is determined exclusively by either the match-up or the card draw; game-play simply doesn’t matter. The second major flaw is the very limited potential for different viable decks. Unless one chooses from a very narrow pool of “meta decks”, there is virtually no chance of winning a match. I believe that much of the problem is the huge difference in strength between a handful of top cards and everything else. I consistently vote to nerf the luck driven and highly powered cards and to buff the strategically interesting cards as well as the dross in general. While I don’t expect that all players will share my impression or vision for the game, I would like to see more votes supporting some meaningful, long-term plan.
Extremism in balance council would be actions like killing a card when other options are available. A classic example was the decision of many people in the first balance council to reduce the power of Reaver Hunter’s to the point where their order ability could never be used. It would have been perfectly sufficient to raise the provision cost of Reaver Hunters – or even better to raise the provision cost of the cards that allow a million copies of bronze soldiers. The results of extremism are: 1. reducing the variety of viable decks., 2. wasting future votes reverting destructive changes, 3. offending segments of the player base.
Carelessness and faulty assumptions result in votes that even the voter might agree were bad ideas. I think many players naturally assume that a power decrease is always a nerf and a provision decrease is always a buff and may think no deeper than that. Decreasing power on a unit with a berserk condition may just make the condition easier to trigger. Or they may vote to change the power of some card like Viper Witcher Mentor (that will reset on deploy anyway). An assumption that is easy to make is to assume that other player’s votes will not mess up your plans. If you think a vote to buff one card in a certain deck is well balanced by a second vote to nerf a different card, you should definitely consider what would happen to Gwent if just one of your two votes actually went through.
Finally, although it is unfortunate, there will always be “voters” whose primary aim is simply to disrupt the process. And there are others who may sincerely believe a certain, say buff, is appropriate, but who try to mislead other voters into supporting that buff by posing it as a nerf. For example, some players believe that Nilfgaard has been over-nerfed and needs some buffs. I have also seen calls to “nerf” the highly binary Puppet Master to 3-power. If players actually think it through, this would not be a nerf; it would be a huge buff – it makes a used Puppet Master easier to destroy, or even to seize! The best counter to the small number of players who attempt this type of manipulation is simply to think about the merits of suggestions before voting.
Conclusion:
Despite the possibility (and even the inevitable occurrences) of bad voting, Balance Council holds enormous potential. It is my hope that this and similar articles can help players to avoid many of these “bad” votes.
