Wild Hunt Casual

[Void_Singer]

Wild Hunt Casual

Had a go at making a Wild Hunt theme deck that relies on player psychology more than anything, thoughts welcome

Leader:

• Eredin

Golds:

• Royal Decree
• Ge'els
• Ciri: Nova

Silvers:

• Operator
• Decoy
• Alzhur's Double-Cross
• Abaya
• Nithral
• *Nekurat / Jotun

Bronzes:

• 2x Wild Hunt Navigator
• 2x Wild Hunt Drakkar
• 2x Nekker Warrior
• 2x Reconnaissance
• 2x Barbegazi
• 2x *Siren / Wild Hunt Hounds
• 2x *Moonlight / Frost
• 2x *Werecat / [Ice Giant | Ice Troll]

Deck theory:
Straight up relies on surprise and misdIrection, including the shorted gold to prevent tipping that it's a Ciri deck. * = Distraction package
R3 you should get 5-6 Drakkars, 7 are possible (with one left in deck). You could probably swap the *package silver for a gold but it lowers the guarantee on Ciri. you could probably use a consume package for the distraction, but it'd need harpies and maybe nekkers, and they might tip off your opponent when only 2 pop out and you pass. Fog / Foglet might be possible, but there isn't much synergy to fill out with < 7 strength and still retain thinning

Round 1 theory:
burn up whatever you can of the starred Moonlight/Frost package, your goal here is to thin your deck and bleed your opponent for cards, finish with a Barbegazi and pass, only keep part of this package if it'll cost your opponent a card to win the round. you should finish this round +/-1 cards from your opponent. Save recon. If they attempt to bleed round 2 play it as round 3

Round 3 theory:
if you have any leftover Moonlight/Frost package that you mulliganed into, lead with them to draw fire, then ideal play order:
Drakkar > Navigator (Drakkar) > Operator (Navigator) > Warrior (Drakkar) > Warrior (Drakkar) > Recon (Drakkar) > Navigator (Drakkar) > Navigator (Drakkar) > Eredin [Navigator (Drakkar)] finish up with Decree > Ge'els > Ciri.
(Operator first if only one Navigator in hand)

Mulligans:
R1: Alist= 1-2x Navigators, 2x of [Warrior | Alzhur's], 1x Drakar, Operator, 1 Gold, 1x recon, Decoy. Blist= 1 Barbegazi, + min 1 of remaining distractions (thinners better)
R2/3: everything from the Alist

Notes:

• Alzhur's: Fetch Warrior #2, or Drakkar #2( if you have the warriors)
• Decoy: Warrior / Navigator to fix holes
• Recon: As above (if desperate)
• Eredin: Drakkar (if desperate when shorted / destroyed)
• Operator: duplcate Drakkar if no Navigators, (last resort)
• Nithral: 7pt Engine Killler, use before 3rd Navigator (can use in R1 if it'll give you card advantage)
• Abaya : Weather Control / Free damage
• Ge'els: Fetch silver if you have either other gold.

Obviously not the strongest deck and playing it is not very reactive... more about patching any holes that occur. Still great fun when you catch the moment the opponent realizes that the Drakkars (that no one uses) are the point, and has their WTF moment at the end when you pop off Ciri after playing out 6 Drakkars

 

[Pruny]

Dont know why most eredin players use moonlight and nova, i dont think its great. you may encounter dagon or axemen and you are doomed.
Nithral is so bad.

 

[Void_Singer]

You may have noticed it's not intended to be a T1 deck.
I prefer moonlight in this theme simply because it can be either defensive, or offensive, unlike the frost package which is pure offense. It also gives the appearance of a bricked moonlight deck, which is common enough, so kinda the point = D

In general, I agree moonlight's weak otherwise, because you can really only push 5 max out of deck, and it's a really weak offensive option early and mostly horrible if you try to do both. It can be competitive backed by other options, at least as much as any boon deck can... they're all destroyed by weather decks though.

ETA:
as for Ciri, she's an awesome card for new/casual players since she cuts deck building costs allowing them to experiment with multiple factions and still have a decent pocket ace. Highly recommend crafting early just because of that

 

[Ic3Purple]

In my opinion, until they nerf "Clear Skies", weather decks like Wild Hunt can't be as competitive as other archetypes.

They should just make Clear Skies clean the single row where it is played.

Considering boons, Thunderbolts, and all the bronzes and silver self-clear skies plus decoy, there is enough to counter weather already in every faction and neutrals.

Such a change wouldn't only bring back a dead archetype like WH, but also bring back to life dead cards like Geralt AARD, Bridge Troll etc. Moreover, this could also stop the retarded spam points decks that don't run anymore a first light or anything to clear wheater.

Guess why?

 

[4RM3D]

In my opinion, until they nerf "Clear Skies", weather decks like Wild Hunt can't be as competitive as other archetypes.

They Should make Clear Skies clean the single row where it is played.

Considering boons, and silver self-clear skies and decoys, there is enough to counter weather. Besides, such changes would bring back to life dead cards like Geralt AARD, Bridge Troll etc...

Very few players actually run boons and even fewer run Clear Skies. So, that's not the biggest issue that's keeping weather decks at bay. A far greater threat is the power creep. Bronze cards have become more powerful, while weather still does the same damage. This means it has become less effective. But even then, there are still competitive weather decks.

 

[Ic3Purple]

Very few players actually run boons and even fewer run Clear Skies. So, that's not the biggest issue that's keeping weather decks at bay. A far greater threat is the power creep. Bronze cards have become more powerful, while weather still does the same damage. This means it has become less effective. But even then, there are still competitive weather decks.

Exactly, very few run clear skies simply because weather decks are quite dead in the current meta.

The only "competitive" wheater deck that I've seen so far performing decently is SK Axeman (Which I consider it much more powerful than WH decks). Why? Because u also generating points while removing from your opponent. And even if the weather gets removed, with the SK deck, you still have plenty of tools to manage. On the other hand, WIld hunt once lost its power from the weather, Clear skies, GG.

The attempt frost/moonlight/nova sucks badly, in fact, I rarely have seen it on the ladder.

I don't see a better solution, if not nerfing clear skies to a single row. If you guys have better ideas, I'll gladly would "hear" it.

About the strong bronzes, can't disagree... Indeed a Viper witcher that 1 shot my rider, or sweers that drop out all my hounds, is surely another of the reasons not to run a WH deck. But shall we start at least from what it is obvious? Clear Skies to me looks the first thing to start with.

 

[4RM3D]

Ic3Purple

A popular streamer is using Frost/Moonlight/Nova with a positive win rate in the higher ranks. So, it's still possible. But that's actually besides the point. Like I have previously said, First Light isn't a threat (in this meta). Even if you would remove First Light, it still won't elevate weather to a higher tier. CDPR tried to find a balance in order to make weather feel less oppressive and to remove the need to auto-include First Light. At the moment, weather decks are so rare (and weaker) that players don't even bother running counters. Trying to tweak weather can lead you down a very dangerous path. Axeman is a good example of a badly design archetype, which goes too much into the all-or-nothing-strategy. If you run Viper Alchemy against Axemen you can kill everything before it has a chance to wreck havoc. If you run double, or even triple, Scorch you can just kill all Axemen at the end. However, if you have neither, then Axemen can get up to 50 points. They are oppressive and need to be dealt with. If you cannot, you'll lose the game. Anyhow, weather needs to be improved and there are a lot of different ways to go about this, but that goes beyond the scope of this thread.

 

[Void_Singer]

Not sure how we got on to weather decks (since this isn't) but hey I'll roll with it...

The thing about Moonlight is that it's crap at being an offensive archetype... it's a better boon n it's face than Golden Froth since it comes with a built in fetch, but worse because of it's limited targets. as an offensive option though it just really sucks because it's a late game play or requires heavy reliance on movement. on rare occasions you can switch gears with it for some special circumstances but overall it's synegeris are too weak and compete with each other for deck space. I really want to like it, because it feels flexible, but realistically it isn't.

 

[Ic3Purple]

Not sure how we got on to weather decks (since this isn't) but hey I'll roll with it...

Ice Trolls, Hounds and Eredin aren't weather cards? The OP says "Wild Hunt" which is known to be a weather/control deck. However, as for meme deck almost everything is legit lol... But I have very personal matter related to the Wild Hunt. It used to be my favourite deck when I started to play, and still would be if it was offering a competitive gameplay. Sadly, beyond R12-14 and above you will struggle to win so bad.

That's why I took the chance to open the case. It is also a deck where I've invested a lot, to learn soon it was a bad choice ( just because it was fun, not competitive as would hope)

 

[Khreygond]

I still play WH casually. It was my deck in the closed beta, where it was quite OP it's worse than Reveal at the moment but it can work under circumstances

Blood Moon usually works better offensively actually. From my experience. I have a better winrate with my BM deck.

Eredin was so much more prevalent the last patch because control was one of the few hard counters of engines like NG spies. Now that the meta is about tempo, it loses its power ultimately.

 

[Void_Singer]

[...] The OP says "Wild Hunt" which is known to be a weather/control deck.[...]

Ah, I see where the confusion was now... I was originally aiming for feedback on the specific deck, but made the title too general. But like I said, it's all good. This forum is too low traffic for me not to be happy to see replies.

ser2440
For you blood moon I'm assuming bridge trolls and drowners? I tried something like that but it seemed weaker than the werewolf boons

 

[Khreygond]

Yup, mine has two bridge trolls and two drowners with the ability to spawn two more via black blood and Monster's Nest

it is weaker than werewolves but it's still stupidly fun to play and it works often I love playing this deck against a consume swarm and it works more often than Eredin at least.