Scoia'tael Deck Strategies

[lakired]

I can see if you play him in the end of a round to draw a card, but wouldn't it be more viable just to leave it out in such cases?
Furthermore if you opponent doesn't pass when you use it as an opened you would not only have to beat the score he can muster but beat the 12 you added as well,
which based on ST low average score a card, is not that easy. Though I must admit some of the new revealed cards does help with getting the points.

You should almost never use a spy at the end of a won/lost round for its draw effect. Like I said, you use the spy for CA. I gave some examples, but if you need more concrete ones:

You lose the coin flip (i.e. you go first). After a few turns, you've played up-tempo and are 13+ points over your opponent. Now you play your spy, draw a card, and you are on equal cards against your opponent with the lead. So they either have to play into it further or give you the round on even cards. If you can continue to out-tempo them you'll win this round on even, or lose it up two. Having a silver spy also prevents your opponent from doing this to you, so when they play it you play yours back. Additionally, if you go first and fear your opponent has enough high tempo cards to overcome you, you can play your spy (assuming you can beat the score difference in a single play) to make it so that they effectively lost the coin flip and you're no longer at risk. And as I mentioned before, it stops your opponent from gaining CA if you won R1 and they have carry-over in R2 (or alternatively, protecting YOUR carry-over in R2 from THEIR silver spy).

 

[DragonMind]

You should almost never use a spy at the end of a won/lost round for its draw effect. Like I said, you use the spy for CA. I gave some examples, but if you need more concrete ones:

You lose the coin flip (i.e. you go first). After a few turns, you've played up-tempo and are 13+ points over your opponent. Now you play your spy, draw a card, and you are on equal cards against your opponent with the lead. So they either have to play into it further or give you the round on even cards. If you can continue to out-tempo them you'll win this round on even, or lose it up two. Having a silver spy also prevents your opponent from doing this to you, so when they play it you play yours back. Additionally, if you go first and fear your opponent has enough high tempo cards to overcome you, you can play your spy (assuming you can beat the score difference in a single play) to make it so that they effectively lost the coin flip and you're no longer at risk. And as I mentioned before, it stops your opponent from gaining CA if you won R1 and they have carry-over in R2 (or alternatively, protecting YOUR carry-over in R2 from THEIR silver spy).

I am not sure if it's the way you explain it, but the explanation as I understand it just make it sound affirmative to my thoughts on how useless Yaevinn are, as opposed to using another silver card..

 

[lakired]

Maybe it's my explanation then, or maybe you don't understand how critical card advantage is. Suffice to say, it is one of the universally best cards currently in the game.

 

[Rawls]

EDITED FOR POST MID WINTER PATCH My current deck:

Eithne

Iorveth; Iorveth: Meditation; Ithlinne; Schirru
Bekker's Twisted Mirror; The White Frost; Ida Emean; Nature's Gift; Artifact Compression; Yaevinn
Azur's Thunder x 3; DB Protector x 3; DB Swordmaster x 1; Hawker Support x 2; Elven Merc x 2; Sage x 1; Lacerate; First Light; Roar

Nothing special ... but it's fun. Kinda sad Quen is gone. Iorveth: Mediation is awesome and Schirru is now essentially Gigni without the 25 pt cap and with a slight self-harm risk. Not 100% on Ida. I like her because she's another built in spell + 3. Iris might be better in some circumstances. Giving it some thought.

 

[orian34]

So I recently started playing 3 days ago and I found myself loving the ST strategies(I always sided with the ST usually).
I'm but a low rank 9 for now, but I've been having great fun with this deck strategy. And winning quite consistently.

It's based around swapping, swapping and more swapping, oh and having an insane board too.
Name :
Scoia'Tael Special Unit

Cards : (keep in mind that I haven't got most of the good cards and that means fillers)

Leader :
- Francesca. I just love how you can casually get the best card you need. Oh, and you get value too, cause swapping.

Gold :
- Saskia. Because more double swapping is ridiculous. Oh, and double bronze tutor too? This is getting pretty nice.
- Triss. Because filler...
- Regis : Higher Vampire. Because filler that is occasionnaly very good.
- Geralt : Igni. Because filler that is quite the blowout when you get it right. Oh and you can swap it out if the worse comes to get.

Silver :
- Ele'Yas. Because this is one of the funniest card to swap during the games, then tutor it at the end for easily 20+ power.
- Sheldon Skaggs. It's kindof a filler, it works pretty well with the low power elves of the deck to move and get around 15 to 20+ power with the good set up.
- Myrktabrakke. It's a "good filler", cause it's a consistent way to get rid of troublesome enemies with flexibility.
- Ida Emean. I recently swapped the aeromancer for her, pretty much a powerfull toolbox, and hey, now it's an elf. You also get a way to clear weather.
- Commander's Horn. Because not having 5 creatures in a row almost never happens with this deck.
- Summoning Circle. Filler, filler and filler. Waiting for a good opportunity can make it shine, but it's meh, too situational.

Bronze :
- 1*Vrihedd Neophyte. Because it's consistently a 10 power+2 bonus guy. The bonus is almost never lost.
- 2*Vrihedd Dragoon. Because you always want to have the best card to turn 1 with. You can always swap it later if you get it late. The bonus easily gets around 5+
- 3*Vrihedd Vanguard. Because this card is broken. It. Is. Broken. You can just swap it or play it and you anthem your whole team for a quite huge bonus. But you'll mostly be swapping it, that's where the gravy is.
- 3*Vrihedd Officer. Because you'll swap Vrihedd Vanguard or Ele'Yas more often than you can even hope to. This is a pretty insane card. Pretty consistently having a 11+ power guy that boosts your elves is crazy for a 3 of.(Or a 15 guy that boosts your ele'yas? Yeah lol, Geralt is 15 power too, and it's gold)
- 3*Wardancer. The free elves you'll swap time and again and be soooo happy to have when you swap Vrihedd Vanguards it's almost obscene.
- 3*Elven Saboteurs. They're sweet because they remove 2 cards of your deck to improve consistency, they're 3 elves to boost with swapped Vanguards, and you can get a small combo with Sheldon for great value. Efficiently making you play a deck of 20 cards(wardancers don't even count with the absurd swapping you have).



So, I might be new and don't know the meta, havent even looked at the other factions(I even tried monsters for a quest, but UGH it is painful. Just Scoia'Tael. A little bit of Scoia'Tael is all I need.), but I love this deck.
It's a quite consistent deck, with a lot of swapping and tutoring that makes not drawing an essential card almost never happening.

Oh, and there's a lot of fun things to do too.
For example, turn 1 have 1 or 2 wardancers, cast your 3 elven saboteurs, turn 2 Vrihedd Officer swapping Ele'yas or a Vrihedd Vanguard, efficiently getting around 30+ points in 2 bronze plays. and the rare but overly overkill play to do Saskia swapping 2 Vrihedd Vanguards. At this point, if you haven't won the round, I'm sorry for you.

So yeah, it's pretty hilarious to play.

But what do you guys think? Maybe higher up, the strategy becomes underpowered, and I'd like to know that!

 

[tauric]

i made this guide for the froth deck i got GM with:

 

[Noela]

i made this guide for the froth deck i got GM with:

I had a lot of fun with a drunken dwarves deck before Midwinter patch arrived. I'll give it a try, thanks!

 

[kruelist]

I started playing the game three days ago and I wanted to share my first deck that I have had some success with finally. I played all the challenges and reached level ten and was excited to get into some ladder climbing in the ranked matches. Not to my surprise, I ended my second day of playing with a record of 8-20-1......20 losses with my monsters consume deck. It was the only marginally viable build I had after opening approximately 16 kegs that I had gotten from the progress I had made during challenges and casual matches. I started looking into the Nilfgaard and Scoia'tael cards I had accumulated so far in my collection to see if there was anything even remotely close to some synergy between the cards I owned. I really enjoyed their styles of play while I was doing the adventure challenges but sadly I did not even have a skeleton of a viable deck.

So I made a tough choice and decided on one faction to play for now until I can rebuild my collection. Yes, I milled every card I owned.....nearly. I built up the following deck and counted the cost to create it and ended up having to mill every card I owned in each faction besides Scoia'tael. The only cards that got a pass on my milling massacre was Leaders and one Gold card. Every other card I had went to scraps. So, I built this deck......Thankfully I have had a much better streak since I started playing it.

So here is my first deck that I built from scratch.....literally


Deck List - 30 Cards Total

Leader:
7 Francesca

Gold:
10 Saskia: Destroyer
10 Xavier Moran
8 Zoltan
1 Ciri: Nova

Silver:
10 Nivellen
9 Ciaran
9 Sheldon Skaggs
* Decoy
* Alzur's Double-Cross
* Rockslide

Bronze:
11 Vrihedd Sappers x2
10 Vrihedd Neophyte x2
9 Mahakam Guard x2
8 Farseer x2
7 Dwarven Mercenary x2
7 Elven Marksman x2
6 Half-Elf Hunter x2
5 Hawker Healer x2
5 Vrihedd Officer x2
* Petri's Philter x2


I hope that maybe some other people will be able to get some inspiration from this deck and have some fun with it or make it their own. Feel free to post any suggestions that you see as potential improvements or any of your experiences while playing it yourself if you choose to run it as is.


*(I updated my changes to the deck after another 28 matches. I made a few card swaps after 15 matches and I decided that after winning seven games in a row with this current build, it would be best to update the deck to show it's most functional and versatile form for competing on the ranked ladder. Hope everyone enjoys this deck as much as I have. It will be continually tested and updated as time goes on but this is the current state of the deck.)

 

[Noela]

kruelist

Milling whole factions it is not a good idea, usually. I've done it and I have no regrets, but I had enough experience with different factions in closed beta and decide to be squirrel forever. At least you have not milled Leaders, but you even so. If the reason for milling was to climb the ladder faster, it is not a good idea. Meta changes, and you can find yourself in a more advanced rank, stuck with a faction who is not powerful in a particular meta. And it'll be very hard for you to rebuild your collection. On top on that, limiting yourself to one faction will make you miss a lot of quests. So, my first advice would be to start again with a new account, and search for affordable budget decks, and, more importantly, learn to use them right and not be a Emhyr about this and have a bit of patience.

As for the deck in question, it is better if you write what golds and silvers you have, as I understand that some of those cards in your list must be fillers (like Morenn), then we can help you tweak the deck a bit.

 

[kruelist]

Noela

Thank you for your wisdom and input into my process of milling and building my first deck. I understand that I have put myself into a predicament where I am not getting the full scope of all that is available through learning the various factions. I was not necessarily under the pursuit of climbing the ladder faster as much as I was trying to play something that I actually enjoy. Obviously I do not really consider losing to be all that much of a punishment in patience. I did lose 3/4ths of my games before I took the plunge into milling my collection of cards. I have another account that I play on as well (Necrosive - Maybe we will be in a match and you will see that name, you will know it is me if you see it). That account has every card I have earned from kegs and progression. I do not plan on milling anything on that account unless it is necessary, as in when they have a balancing patch and we can get the full value out of milling extra cards because they got a buff or a nerf. I plan to build the entire collection over time on that account. This account is kind of my test bed for a particular faction and deck archetype each season.

My primary account is the one in which I am playing the scoia'tael deck that I am working on right now. I plan on testing and correcting this one deck during the rest of this season and then I will move onto Nilfgaard next season. Keep in mind that my other account as Necrosive is where I do the majority of my playing and this account as Kruelist is my more serious and competitive free to play account. I have no problem switching between accounts and I appreciate that you have the same concerns that I had about learning to play each faction holistically. I look forward to any advice you have on the deck that I deem to be competitive and fun to play because it actually works in a variety of situations (The one I have posted). Again, thank you for your insights and perspectives into my playing habits. It is much appreciated to know that this community has people that care about other people and their success in the game.


- I posted all my golds and silvers and bronzes that are in the deck. I have no other cards on the account except for other leaders from other factions and about 2,300 left over scraps.

 

[Noela]

kruelist

How do you play this deck? I think 30 cards are too many for consistency if you don't go with more thinning options, and I see too many targets for ADC.

 

[Rawls]

Bronze: 11 Vrihedd Sappers x2 10 Vrihedd Neophyte x2 9 Mahakam Guard x2 8 Farseer x2 7 Dwarven Mercenary x2 7 Elven Marksman x2 6 Half-Elf Hunter x2 5 Hawker Healer x2 5 Vrihedd Officer x2 * Petri's Philter x2

I would drop the Sappers and Philter probably. It's better to be close to 26 since you have Ciri to maximize the likelihood of drawing golds.

 

[Piotrek1007]

Hi there guys,

I've played Gwent for a week now and came up with a pretty basic dwarves deck that is based on the starting ST deck. Didn't really craft any specific cards, just put inside anything nice that i got from card packs. It works on rank 17, but I get the feeling that it won't be viable from rank 18 and above. I've got some card fragments (around 2500) and I wonder how to make his deck better by adding one or two cards. I'll try to save some fragments to build a nice Skellige deck ultimately, but as of now I want to climb with this (but a bit boosted) deck.

You're suggestions are more than welcome

And here's the deck::
https://www.gwentdb.com/decks/42180-easy-budget-scoiatael-rank-17-currently

Cheers!

 

[gards]

Nobody is building anything individual. they are ALL netecking, sickening..Even ST players are pissing me off now with the return of the elves and farewell to dwarves archetype.

Jesus christ haha "from pillar to post"

9 games today, 6 against ST. Some very clever people out there, on Youtube...

 

[ColArana]

Looking for some advice on building up my Elf deck. I'm somewhat new to Gwent and don't have a particularly large collection yet. Deck focus is mostly on keeping the opponent's board down and clear with consistent damage cards, and buffing with my hand. ...Mostly though I made the deck because I really liked Iorveth in Witcher 2, and wanted to make a deck including both his versions (saving up for the second version). It's been running into a lot of problems lately though, as NR decks seem to continuously pull out cards I can't consistently bring down (usually I can't get Braenn and Elven Swordmasters to 8+ power until partway through the first round), Skellige and Monsters tend to just bring anything I manage to bring down right back, and Nilfgaard puts out so much stuff with their excessive chains that I don't have enough removal to deal with it all. The only real success I've been finding with this deck is against other Scoia'tael decks, so any advice on cards to either remove, switch in, or start saving up for (in the case of golds and silvers) would be appreciated:

Leader: Francesca Findabair (for digging for Iorveth in round 1, or Braenn/Elven Swordmasters after)
Golds: Geralt of Rivia (placeholder), Triss Merigold, Saesenthessis, Iorveth
Silvers: Roach (placeholder), Myrgtabrakke, Braenn, Vaedermakar, Manticore Venom
Bronze: Vrihedd Neophytex3, Vrihedd Brigade, Vrihedd Dragoonx2, Hawker Supportx2, Dol Blatanna Bomber, Vrihedd Vanguard, Elven Swordmasterx2, Wardancerx3, First Light

Any advice on modifying this deck to achieve its purpose, or even just an alternate deck archetype that both versions of Iorveth would be useful additions to would be welcome.

 

[SHALLAHJUSTICE]

ST players used to be the eccentric minority I miss those
days.
:sleepy:
​​​​​​

The days when fireball traps ignored armor and saskia was summoned with Ethilne.

The faction sold out and went mainstream, the one with the most basic and cheesy strategy of unit boosting, no class, no finesse, no pizzaz.

I played ST when they were the least optimized faction back when everyone laughed at their predictability and lack of competitive archetypes.

I still kicked ass with them though.

:boring:

Mulliganing and boosting are lame themes with no skill in their application or set up and ones that ST are being defined around, it sucks but who cares really.

 

[Noela]

ST players used to be the eccentric minority I miss those
days.
:sleepy:
​​​​​​

The days when fireball traps ignored armor and saskia was summoned with Ethilne.

The faction sold out and went mainstream, the one with the most basic and cheesy strategy of unit boosting, no class, no finesse, no pizzaz.

I played ST when they were the least optimized faction back when everyone laughed at their predictability and lack of competitive archetypes.

I still kicked ass with them though.

:boring:

Mulliganing and boosting are lame themes with no skill in their application or set up and ones that ST are being defined around, it sucks but who cares really.

Yeah, I still miss the neophyte spawn times. But the good ones, not with Isemgrim, but with Fireball Traps, Dragoons, Vanguards, and cads like Myrgtabrakke hurting your own dragoons for more Neos. And Aelirenn was just glorious, now it is just a "meh" card, just good for thinning. For God's sake, that gal was the leader of the last elven uprising, young elves died with her name in their lips (just like her first Gwent iteration), and she is just a bland silver card. Why is she a silver card, and Xavier Moran, an almost anonymous dwarf from Yarpen's crew, is gold?

For me, Scoia archetypes are very good and boring or just funny but very underperforming. Why there is not a good silver synergetic card for handbuff (Braenn isn't)? Why ambush is still unplayable as archetype?

I want a funny, playable deck!

 

[Draconifors]

I made a deck with all possible traps (Crushing, Pit, Bombers), trap tutors (Elven Mercs and of course Pavko Gale), movement (not Bowmen) and Gold weather.

Super fun to play, although by no means a deck that would carry to high ranks.
It's designed to be really annoying to play against.

 

[xDivinity]

Movement is doing ok.Its the deck im using the most for ranked and casual.There is the classic movement cards you can use.Or you can go with a more control oriented style,like using gold weather or ithlinne with 1 alzurs.

Some people complain that we lack a big finisher.How can we have a finisher that has both movement synergy and is a big point play?Im thinking of a gold card kinda like Tibor,with a drawback.You can ignore that last paragraph.

 

[Noela]

Well, I'll try a movement/weather with gold Morenn...I'm thinking that played before a gold weather card could be an interesting card...