Provision wise I'm not sure why some leaders like Foltest got nerfed while Woodland Spirit and Crach decks will have 1+ and 2+ provision, respectively. Who decides these things and based on what statistics?
Hey Look, provision system giving us unlimited potential to tweak the competitive balance. Who woulda thunk it? And CDPR hasn't even scratched the surface of what they can do with it yet.
Nope, it's pretty mediocre.
Look at Foltest, 3 zeal to powercards like Gaunter, Seltkirk and co.
Arachas can easily spam 15+ points over the course of the game, and so on.
Woodland is an average boost that can get destroyed if your opponent have the last say.
I pray the Draw & Thinning is improved by March.
Lets see how this anti punitive mulligan change works out,if Card Advantage Meta comes back with this patch as it looks like. I'll be a happy man.
Edit: I'm not a happy man.
Until Draw & CA are addressed. This is going to continue being a children's game of Gwent.
I understand the philosophy of trying to lower the barrier of entry to plebs so you get more people playing the game. But I'm falling asleep waiting until the last round.
Lack of strategic passing is DULL. The Mulligan Overdraw System still doesn't address Card Advantage in any serious way.
It is still better to force my opponent to play cards in the opening round rather than go on the defensive and aim to overcorrect with additional mulligans as it allows my opponent to do the exact same thing, except they have the advantage of being able to dictate when I can pass in R2.
Without the threat of Card Advantage through strategic passing, this game is dull. 'Overcorrection Passing' is a BAD strategy to salvage a horrible draw. It's another layer, sure. But it's a last ditch layer of decision making and should only be used as a last resort due to how much of an advantage you give your opponent.
It's still 100% preferable to push until 6th card. But +6 on draw makes that far too easy a decision to make.
Reduce Draw, bring back thinning & Card Advantage. Suddenly the overcorrection has more weight as I NEED to draw cards to set up thinning to have a greater chance for a better hand in R2/3.
Look. Roadmap was great, addressing the Mulligans & showing how you can balance with provisions. Great!
I suspect you can't implement draw changes without additional cards added to the game to balance thinning (probably due to the manpower required to get back on top of your dev schedule) so I'm hopeful (naively so) that the March Expansion with new leaders & new cards will restore Gwent to the complexity it had before.
Thanks for your continued work, hopefully things continue to turn around.
Lets see how this anti punitive mulligan change works out,
Edit: I'm not a happy man.
Until Draw & CA are addressed. This is going to continue being a children's game of Gwent.
I understand the philosophy of trying to lower the barrier of entry to plebs so you get more people playing the game. But I'm falling asleep waiting until the last round.
Lack of strategic passing is DULL. The Mulligan Overdraw System still doesn't address Card Advantage in any serious way.
It is still better to force my opponent to play cards in the opening round rather than go on the defensive and aim to overcorrect with additional mulligans as it allows my opponent to do the exact same thing, except they have the advantage of being able to dictate when I can pass in R2.
Without the threat of Card Advantage through strategic passing, this game is dull. 'Overcorrection Passing' is a BAD strategy to salvage a horrible draw. It's another layer, sure. But it's a last ditch layer of decision making and should only be used as a last resort due to how much of an advantage you give your opponent.
It's still 100% preferable to push until 6th card. But +6 on draw makes that far too easy a decision to make.
Reduce Draw, bring back thinning & Card Advantage. Suddenly the overcorrection has more weight as I NEED to draw cards to set up thinning to have a greater chance for a better hand in R2/3.
Look. Roadmap was great, addressing the Mulligans & showing how you can balance with provisions. Great!
I suspect you can't implement draw changes without additional cards added to the game to balance thinning (probably due to the manpower required to get back on top of your dev schedule) so I'm hopeful (naively so) that the March Expansion with new leaders & new cards will restore Gwent to the complexity it had before.
Thanks for your continued work, hopefully things continue to turn around.
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I have lost hope that CDPR design team sees this game objectively and balances it as a game. I think it is all about personal preferences of people with influence in the team. I can't understand why WLS even needed a buff. +2 for Crach? Seriously? Like they were weak and Tier 3 before? Eithnè and Voorhis makes sense. They needed a higher provision so that can build a Tier 2 deck and play around Rank 8-15. The leaders who can counter the WLS are nerfed when it got buffed.
I think the design team goes into a room to allocate power/provision/balancing and every one can just throw a number and argue that. May be there are a lot of influential supporters for MO and SK against whom people can't discuss. I can't think of any logical explanation why Tier 1 leaders even get buffed at the same time their main counters getting nerfed. It is like double boost. +2 for Crach? Seriously? +1 for WLS? Seriously?
This is what that will happen. People will just play much more Crach and WLS (or any leaders who got boosted) and it becomes the meta and there will be a streamer who builds a deck with a nerfed leader and will show a video with a very favorable matchup and say 'you see, this is all good and balanced' while all the commners will face Crach and WLS much more than what used to face.
[All said and done, there was one light-hearted moment. When I saw -2 for Francesca, I laughed out loud. It is so funny.]
I think the design team goes into a room to allocate power/provision/balancing and every one can just throw a number and argue that. May be there are a lot of influential supporters for MO and SK against whom people can't discuss. I can't think of any logical explanation why Tier 1 leaders even get buffed at the same time their main counters getting nerfed. It is like double boost. +2 for Crach? Seriously? +1 for WLS? Seriously?
This is what that will happen. People will just play much more Crach and WLS (or any leaders who got boosted) and it becomes the meta and there will be a streamer who builds a deck with a nerfed leader and will show a video with a very favorable matchup and say 'you see, this is all good and balanced' while all the commners will face Crach and WLS much more than what used to face.
[All said and done, there was one light-hearted moment. When I saw -2 for Francesca, I laughed out loud. It is so funny.]
I completly disagree and hope they keep the game this way. Your "strategic pass" simply translate to hyper tempo bs and CA abusing. I'm happy you don't have to push for tempo r1 and even engine heavy decks have a shot while going first.
The game is much more strategic now, before you either had an hyper tempo deck or were forced to drypass r1. I don't miss any of that.
Heh, funny. You make it sound like HC isn't dominated by tempo and point swings.
On that we agree. I do believe however that they won't ever get anywhere close to a point that could be called "using the system to its fullest"
More strategic? They removed all strategy with the 3rd row.
Tell me, how would you play around weather now? Play your units in Ragh Nar Roog or Dragons Dream/Nivellen? And this is just one example of how they butchered even the most basic strategic things that we had in beta. How about Scorch/Igni? What feels like 90% of all units have 4 base strength, so they are naturally aligned already, also, for Igni, you don't have a 3rd row to play around it anymore. Handbuff Toruviel, one of the funniest noobkillers got absolutely shafted. Spies disrupting your enemies board without destroying anything is not a thing anymore. I could go on forever, but I'm gonna stop here.
I play Voorhis and I'm rank 7 already, so I'm very happy I'll have even more provisions.
Your concerns about boosted leaders: do not forget that they also can change provision on cards (and +provision on leaders is not the only change) and that just was not announced yet so maybe most crucial cards for Crach's deck will also see some increasing provision changes.
Kili, what deep strategy was before that I may be missing when we had 3 rows. Playing around Gigni and Weather, which is not an issue atm since none of those are relevant atm. The three rows before had no meaning at all rather than splitting your cards. You don't seem to be updated in the current meta, and I can assure you that not Igni nor weather is currently being played. You can see some Ragh Nae Roog from time to time, but that's it, there's nothing that a third row could provide in the current state of the game.
I play Voorhis and I'm rank 7 already, so I'm very happy I'll have even more provisions.
Your concerns about boosted leaders: do not forget that they also can change provision on cards (and +provision on leaders is not the only change) and that just was not announced yet so maybe most crucial cards for Crach's deck will also see some increasing provision changes.
This week's update is not going to have any balancing change other than the discussed cards. RIP Sigil is the only balance in this update. Along with Mulligan charges and Leader Provisions. So, if Crach's cards are going to see some balancing in the end-of-month update, may be then he should have had +2 provisions not now. He was already very strong and Tier 1 worthy and this +2 without any other changes doesn't make any sense. Voorhies was not Tier 1, so an upgrade to him makes sense along with Eithnè and Henselt. But a buff to Crach and WLS when none of their cards have been touched is too much to digest. At the same time, the main counter Leaders for WLS (Forest and Usurper) are nerfed.
What was the need for a buff for an already Tier 1 leaders when their counter leader gets nerfed? So, till the month end the game is left in a broken state.
Foltest may still be able to beat WLS, but he may need perfect hand and a lot of freaking luck and a lot of planning, while WLS just does the exact same thing with a little bit more ease.
It seemed as though they wanted to have every faction to receive a buffed leader, left alone leader, and nerfed leader.
Makes no sense to me.
seriouslly, u "bring bak beta" guys r so funny with such past as one above....
enlight me, what was so deep when it comes to strategic if u had 3 rows and all units could be played on any row which meant something only if u played around igni and versus alchemy
but the best part is with ragh nar roog - 3 rows had such a meaning when u played ragh nar roog in beta...
If anything, she needs a big buff. The reason is that no consume engine survives to even see 8 points worth.
As for Woodland, in a vacuum he is average. But current meta is all about last say and finishers. And here he has a lot of value.
I think she explained on reddit that she had some health problem.