I don't feel the game anymore

[Lyphian92]

I don't feel the game anymore

I created this topic to seek your words of wisdom, because I'm about to quit Gwent...(who cares?) For all those who care, I talk to you, and the developers.

I feel like nothing left of true Gwent after the update. It feels as if the cards have no weight anymore, and strategy has ceased to exist. It feels like we are just placing cards on the board, hoping that we randomly have more points by round's end. I don't think about my next moves anymore, because I don't have to. I can't feel the weight of failure/success of my next card. With these 100+ new cards released, it has become way too fast-paced, everyone is just doing their thing on the board and that's it.

I play a lot of monsters, and I just can't care if my Vran Warrior is locked down, because now I have a BUTTLOAD of other Consume cards that can do his job. Do you see now what I mean by "cards have no weight"? There are now so many possibilities, so many options to win the game, that matches have become a big nothingness. There's no such thing as good/bad deck anymore, because now everyone just builds their little favorite deck, play it, and HOPE their deck can beat the opponent's deck. The closest thing I can do to feel like I'm controlling the game's outcome, or to feel like I'm actually doing something to gain advantage over my opponent, is to read my card's damned tooltip and (for example) deal 5 damage with it. WOW!!! Sense of pride and accomplishment right there. Needless to say, Gwent was never like this. Gwent was about filling 3 buckets with your sweat before you executed your next move.

"Not much left of that world." - Vesemir

So please tell me, is there anything I can try to do to feel like getting back to it?

 

[Esmer]

There's no such thing as good/bad deck anymore, because now everyone just builds their little favorite deck, play it, and HOPE their deck can beat the opponent's deck.

Isn't that a good thing?

Wasn't everybody tired that each faction had only 1-2 competitive archetypes?

 

[Rawls]

1.) I think a greater number of competitive decks and options for how to build decks is a good thing.
2.) Whenever the game transitions to a new meta ... the first week or two is a bit of chaos while everyone tries to figure out exactly what works. So give it a week or so.
3.) I get what you're saying about that feeling where the weight of your next decision is important ... but I haven't lost that feel as you have. If things with Monster Consume are not to your liking, try a different faction or archetype - but take that with a grain of salt coming from the guy who always plays as ST.

 

[Babatino]

I'm a fairly new player (started when Saovine was winding down), and I'm not "feeling" it anymore either. It just seems... dumbed down? If this is an attempt to get new people into the game, it's doing the opposite for me.

 

[Theodrik]

So please tell me, is there anything I can try to do to feel like getting back to it?

At what MMR are you playing at? Because at the top end of the ladder I still find myself concerned about every move, and many matches I won/lost because of a single decision. There are some weird matches with people trying new decks and cards in which I don't "care" about what they're playing, mainly because I don't know what to expect yet, and I also don't know all the new mechanics and effects. Against those I just don't know what to counter, so I just go my own way expecting to win.

Like Rawls just said at:

2.) Whenever the game transitions to a new meta ... the first week or two is a bit of chaos while everyone tries to figure out exactly what works. So give it a week or so.

So if after a week or two, when the meta starts to settle, I notice I'm facing too many of this new cards, I'll have to tweek my decks to counter it. However when I'm matched against a familiar competitive deck archetype, it's still challenging and interactive.

 

[Lyphian92]

At what MMR are you playing at? Because at the top end of the ladder I still find myself concerned about every move, and many matches I won/lost because of a single decision. There are some weird matches with people trying new decks and cards in which I don't "care" about what they're playing, mainly because I don't know what to expect yet, and I also don't know all the new mechanics and effects. Against those I just don't know what to counter, so I just go my own way expecting to win.

Like Rawls just said at:


So if after a week or two, when the meta starts to settle, I notice I'm facing too many of this new cards, I'll have to tweek my decks to counter it. However when I'm matched against a familiar competitive deck archetype, it's still challenging and interactive.

I reached R17 last season, but nowadays I don't play ranked.

 

[TheShift]

Up to this point they have only added 20 cards per update
adding over a 100 this time is going to make the game feel wierd.. until it settles
which may be longer than a couple weeks this time around
but who knows

I hear this same thing everytime a new update is added.
last time it was gold immunity that had pantys all bunched up..

the game survived and thrived from that
this update will be no different

 

[Raunbjorn]

Up to this point they have only added 20 cards per update
adding over a 100 this time is going to make the game feel wierd.. until it settles
which may be longer than a couple weeks this time around
but who knows

I hear this same thing everytime a new update is added.
last time it was gold immunity that had pantys all bunched up..

the game survived and thrived from that
this update will be no different

It's a bit different with this patch though. They kinda killed off the flavor this time around which is a really surprising move and one I don't understand at all. The shortening of names was a huge mistake imo. Putting "Bran" or "Mushrooms" onto the board is just not the same. I know they're gonna get the game ready for mobile but instead of making a mobile version for mobile(!) it feels like they made a one size fits all version for all platforms that has ended up looking really cheap visually. It's like chopping of toes to fit in the right shoes.
Also they've removed/simplified cards that made the game unique such as the Old Speartip.
Btw, where is the draft mode? The new RNG cards were meant for that, right?

This is obviously a personal opinion but one that is shared among many others. I'm sure the game will survive and I do hope so but I'm gonna take a break and will watch it from the sideline for a while.

 

[bboczula]

I totally agree, it's like you're reading my mind.

It feels like we are just placing cards on the board, hoping that we randomly have more points by round's end.

This statement is so true, I only basically play quests and sometimes with the oponent. There is one strategy though, it is called "in the round one if you go second, play whatever gives you advantage and pass as soon as the oponent can't match your score" - this basically gives you huge advantage, just pass second round and there's 90% chance that you win the match in round three.

 

[Pravicors]

I totally agree, it's like you're reading my mind.
This statement is so true, I only basically play quests and sometimes with the oponent. There is one strategy though, it is called "in the round one if you go second, play whatever gives you advantage and pass as soon as the oponent can't match your score" - this basically gives you huge advantage, just pass second round and there's 90% chance that you win the match in round three.

If this update accomplished anything, it made everyone forget about the coinflip issue.

Not because it fixed it, of course, but just because of.... well, everything about this update.

 

[Pruny]

I reached R17 last season, but nowadays I don't play ranked.

There are still top deck, like Ng spies that got buffed more...
i dont like the speed of the game and loading screen

 

[bboczula]

So this patch being good or not is not really the issue - the issue is generally that Gwent is... not fun anymore, at leas for casual players. To me it really feels like a classic War card game on steroids. War is like super-simple child game, where you shuffle cards, give half to the oponent, you draw card and whoever has bigger card wins. The difference is that in Gwent you add and substract values. And it doesn't even matter how much keywords, strange mechanics and other stuff you add - basically whoever plays the last card has some advantage, and if you also play second and win the first round - you get card advantage, which basically mean you won. That's it. I don't even read card descriptons anymore. And I started playing from the very first build.

Having said that, there is one thing i really like - quests. I cannot wait for Thronebreaker, I honestly thing that this is would be the best that Gwent has to offer, not multiplayer.

 

[Esmer]

There are still top deck, like Ng spies that got buffed more...
i dont like the speed of the game and loading screen

Please stop crying about NG spies.

Did you even play the game after the update?

Skellige bears, cursed NR and new axemen deck are all around. At least above 4k MMR.

 

[slow_cheeetah]

I don't like that game transformed to "Battle of 20 points swings". It's ridicoulus! To be competitive you have to play crazy tempo. In one moment you are tied with your opponent and suddenly he makes 25+ points play.. Out of some common bronze cards!

 

[altaybek]

Do you know what I feel? Rage and salt. Listen:

>I'm playing Eredin weather deck with Ciri: Nova and Succubus. Needs CA and setup to be successful
>No new RNG cards in my deck
>Enemy is disgusting Bear Skellige as usual
>Set up every move and played carefully and made it with one CA in R3
>Have Ciri: Nova, Succubus and Drowner at hand, White Frost on board
>Everything is perfect
>Even if he plays both Olaf and Ciri I will definitely win as I will steal one of them
>Last two cards, I'm behind by a good amount but that's ok because I have my setup complete
>He plays something random but there is a 22 point bronze there so it should be enough
>I play Succubus on opposite row
>Then he pulls a UMA'S CURSE out of nowhere and summons a TOTALLY RANDOM KAYRAN
>Eats Succubus
>Plays another Bear
>Defeat

This is at 4K MMR btw. Not casual.

 

[trencherman]

I do feel like the game changed quite a bit, but my initial reaction is that it is better.

I think it's great that the devs are trying to open up deck building and design space more so it's not just 1/2 archetypes in each faction. I feel like the landscape has changed to add more diversity to the meta, and I think that is great. I personally play mostly Monsters too, but seeing the new and interesting cards in the update in the other factions to build with is pretty enticing.

I totally get that the game feels different now because so many cards function differently now, and there's definitely a bit of a re-learning curve, and that can feel jarring.
But Gwent was fundamentally a points game before the update too, I don't think this changed at all. Actually, the fact that Gwent is fundamentally War is what is so uniquely elegant about it.

If anything, I hope different modes of play are in the pipeline for Gwent, like draft. Until then, I think trying out these new cards should be pretty interesting.

 

[Chickencababs]

I am pretty pissed at what they did to the old cards. I love getting more cards, but it is frustrating that I finally get a reveal Nilfgaard deck working really good in the tier 1 bracket, and they completely changed how cards work so I can't do basic tatics anymore. One of the best examples is cleaver, he used to be a 9 point who locks, now he's a seven who deals damage. They tweaked every single card, some that were already sub-par got needed.Alba pikemen was garbage, but now its unusable.

 

[Esmer]

>Then he pulls a UMA'S CURSE out of nowhere and summons a TOTALLY RANDOM KAYRAN
>Eats Succubus
>Plays another Bear
>Defeat

This is at 4K MMR btw. Not casual.

Actually, there's quite a few gold cards that could deal with Succubus.
Letho, Philippa, Iorveth, Iorveth: Meditation, Vernon, Keira, Lugos, Bonhart (or did he play a bear via a Beastmaster?), Seltkirk, Menno, Lambert, Imlerith, Triss, Vilgefortz, Aguara: True Form (into damage spell), Schirru (into epidemic), Caranthir (moving Succubus so it steals Caranthir instead).

Don't get me wrong, I am not a fan of RNG myself. I stopped playing HS because RNG often basically nullifies your previous turns.

But in this case his play seems pretty legit. He probably knew you'd try to steal his unit (at 4k MMR he should), and Uma's Curse was his only possible way out. If this helps, just think he had a Lugos and discarded a berserker or a marauder to kill Succubus.

 

[Chickencababs]

Forgot to mention all the lag to the animated cards looks ridiculous, game has several new errors and some cards make zero sense to use now. Why would I ever use fringillo vigo now when scorch does the same thing %500 better? I'm going to try and like it, but the fact I'm saying try means I'm probably just going to delete this mess

 

[BlunderMan]

Give it time. I hate what happened to the UI, but it looks like CDPR is listening to feedback from the fans. It'll take quite some time for the meta to adjust to all these new cards. It's still a beta after all.