Let's talk Skellige - what's wrong with this faction?

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@SpudCakes, that wall of text is in need of paragraphs and punctuation marks, to make it more readable for users because not many are going to read it now. Just as an FYI.

Yeah, I tried. I got the the point about Olaf and remember his statement about Svalblod being trash, at 17 provisions. Well, I disagree. If Olaf is so bad and Champion (guarantee), then why did/do all Svalblod decks always bring renew and that Skellige renew as well? And even bronze renew (for priest).

I don't know the state of Svalblod now, but at the time of this thread it was absurd, and everyone was saying it. I don't see much having changed inside Skellige (except get new better cards), so Svalblod should still be a good deck. But it's relative ofcourse, to the current meta situation. I'm not exactly sure about that, being locked on PS4 still and moving over at some point.
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Wtf, that temporal jump : Jul 17 2019 - Jan 13 2020

Yeah, I was tired of facing overpowered Skellige, so I stopped playing. The balance at the time made it unfun to play.

I think Iron (parts of it) and Scenario seem like the worst thing that has happened to this game since launch. I like that they brought back armor, but some of the cards are outrageous.
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Well the guy who said Skellige is OP also said he's playing on console version, so he really has no idea what the game is really like. There are no scenarios/poison/bombardment in that game version, so it's no wonder he's saying weird things about balance.

Shame of CDPR for shutting down console. Now I have to move to PC or something, it's a bit geeky for me, but I guess I have to. There is poison in the frozen version, but I guess it got much worse, and I've seen how scenarios and bombardment plays out, which is exactly why I said it looks terrible.

Perhaps I'm lucky to stay with the console frozen version for now, not having to experience that nonsense.

Anyways, it's only been fronzen for about a month, so I haven't missed that much!
 
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The time where SK, in particular Svalblod and self damage, dominated the meta was around May and June 2019. By July it was still really strong but SY had just come out and was even stronger.

Nowadays SK is at the bottom of the meta (maybe got a little bit better after last patch, with Wild Boar of the Sea buff and a Dagur/GS resurgence), but it has been probably since Iron Judgment, maybe even before.

Even though the crow archetype was well received, it was not strong enough to outshine the other archetypes of SK; like NG Poison and NR Siege did.
 
Well, in the frozen version, Skellige is still strong, so alot must have changed in a short time then.

There are a few 4-6 provision cards in the game that are really overpowered, I'm not saying that Skellige have more of those than other factions, in the newest version. But at least 2-3 of those belong to Skellige.

I think we all have a general idea what kind of bronze cards we are talking about, across the factions. I'm not saying to only fix the Skellige ones.
 
Just rounding up some PS4 activity, and I thought I would give a couple of trophies a go. Win a match with no gold cards in your deck, and revive 5 allies during a match.

So I made a Skellige (who else) deck with only bronze cards and I managed to win a match relatively easy. How did that happen? Svalblod Priest and Armored Dakkar is how it happened. I stayed alive in the first two rounds (in one I used Svalblod priest and maybe Dakkar too)..

In any case, it was impossible for the enemy with a normal deck to beat my last round Svalblod Priest, Armored Dakkar, Svalblod Priest and eventually Tuirseach Veteran. He was literally outplayed by 4x5p Skellige bronze cards. My other cards were some weather cards, and some special cards (damage). Svalblod Priest on Armored Dakkar, and Svalblod Priest on Svalblod Priest, then Veteran in between.

So, I made my revive deck basically only around Armored Dakkar and Svalblod Priest, this was my whole move. I had some supporting cards like Tuirseach Veteran and Hjalmar and a couple more gold units too. But sure as going to the toilet, I won with this deck as well. Easy peasy. Just play Svalblod Priest and Armored Dakkar. R2 same thing, revive them. R3 same thing.

I used Crach An Craite and spammed "hahahahaha" after every move, just to show the discontent with my own ridiculous deck and how overpowered all the cards I played was.
 
The combo is quite strong but the priest is one of the very few engines SK has so it shouldn't get nerfed imo.


Right.. So having now played Skellige a fair bit after moving to PC, it is very clear that Svalblod Priest is OP. I always use Svalblod Priest and even Freya's Blessing to revive, it's just how good it is.

I think at some point they changed Tuirseach Veteran as well? Before it was just 4 body, 5 provisions. Now it is 5 body, 5 provisions and berserk 2 heal self. It's a pretty bad change. It's a very good card, on it's own to absorb random damage, but also as a Svalblod Priest companion.

If you discount what Svalblod Priest actually does and any synergies, it is actually, boost self by 1 turn by turn, no condition. I don't know any self contained boost engine that is so good as that. In actuality it is even worse, because of synergies and 2 boost per turn. Best boost engine in the game, with plenty of support.

I'm steadfast in my thinking that Svalblod Priest should be 5 provisions and 1 boost per damage. I think it would still be a good card with synergies, just not OP like now.

I think due to all the cards added to support greatsword/dagur, SK has now been turned into the greatsword faction. I think the easy way to solve that issue is to make greatsword a 6p gold card. Removes the Freya's Blessing and spam greatswords options and makes play more tactical.

Sad thing is that Svalblod Priest and whatever card support it, is the driving force behind all my Skellige victories, despite my decks not being built around them (but Crowmother, Dandelion, Vigo's Muzzle, Alchemy). The Svalblod Priest engine is simply too good, even more so now with the supporting cast (Drakkar, NEW Veteran+++).
 
Sad thing is that Svalblod Priest and whatever card support it, is the driving force behind all my Skellige victories, despite my decks not being built around them (but Crowmother, Dandelion, Vigo's Muzzle, Alchemy). The Svalblod Priest engine is simply too good, even more so now with the supporting cast (Drakkar, NEW Veteran+++).

That's not my experience. What rank are you playing at?
 
That's not my experience. What rank are you playing at?

I was around 5 when I started this thead. I just moved from console to PC, and I've been playing Skellige for the first time, and my impressions are verified. I'm currently around 10.
 

DRK3

Forum veteran
At the moment Skellige has 3 archetypes in the realm of 'viable' (or close to it):

(by order of viability)
Damage - with 2 variations, one with Dagur/GSs, another without them and more bloodthirst units
Self-damage - svalblod priest and drakkar are the key, providing 5pts per 2 turns (better than other bronze engines)
Crows - not on the same level as the others but has some good matchups and some pros most decks dont have

The 4th SK archetype would be discard, but its quite weak atm, even with recent buffs.
 
Something that I always thought was a little weird was the Tuirsech Invader compared to a similar card in the other factions such as the Aen Elle Conqueror: I kind of feel like you should have to play devotion to get the veteran tag. Otherwise you are just playing a 7 for 4 with veil and no downside. I see it in almost every SK warriors deck and while most of them play devotion it still seems like a pretty good example of how strong the SK bronze cards are compared to their counterparts in other factions.
 
Something that I always thought was a little weird was the Tuirsech Invader compared to a similar card in the other factions such as the Aen Elle Conqueror: I kind of feel like you should have to play devotion to get the veteran tag. Otherwise you are just playing a 7 for 4 with veil and no downside. I see it in almost every SK warriors deck and while most of them play devotion it still seems like a pretty good example of how strong the SK bronze cards are compared to their counterparts in other factions.
Yes and no. Devotion for veteran is not an unreasonable nerf to invader, but I don’t think invader is as strong as you make it out. Veil has limited value as Invaders are unlikely to be deliberate targets for anything. And a basic pointslam card is far more useful in round 1 and sometimes round 2 than in round 3. In earlier rounds, the reach of a seven point card can be useful; in round 3 you hope to have better cards than cheap bronzes.

You are right that invader is played in most warrior decks, but how often do you see it being held until round three when it finally attains full value? Given a choice, I would certainly take Conquerers instead.
 
Yes and no. Devotion for veteran is not an unreasonable nerf to invader, but I don’t think invader is as strong as you make it out. Veil has limited value as Invaders are unlikely to be deliberate targets for anything. And a basic pointslam card is far more useful in round 1 and sometimes round 2 than in round 3. In earlier rounds, the reach of a seven point card can be useful; in round 3 you hope to have better cards than cheap bronzes.

You are right that invader is played in most warrior decks, but how often do you see it being held until round three when it finally attains full value? Given a choice, I would certainly take Conquerers instead.
But Veil DOES give you a meaningful advantage. Not in every single possible case but in many cases it does. For example the Poison Treant trap card from Scoiatael, it would waste it's poison on a veiled target. Also if you ever played a Vampire based MO deck (it's not META so ppl don't play it so often cuz ppl want shortcuts to wins, not fun), you'd know how something simple as Veil can block the entire point of your deck. Also there is that one other 4P SK card that has "Give the unit to the right bleeding for 4 turns, then give 4 bleeding to an enemy unit", also NG sometimes benefits from having locked units even if they didn't have some effect, just for the status.
 

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But Veil DOES give you a meaningful advantage. Not in every single possible case but in many cases it does. For example the Poison Treant trap card from Scoiatael, it would waste it's poison on a veiled target. Also if you ever played a Vampire based MO deck (it's not META so ppl don't play it so often cuz ppl want shortcuts to wins, not fun), you'd know how something simple as Veil can block the entire point of your deck. Also there is that one other 4P SK card that has "Give the unit to the right bleeding for 4 turns, then give 4 bleeding to an enemy unit", also NG sometimes benefits from having locked units even if they didn't have some effect, just for the status.
Veil was supposed to be a counter for poison so using Vampire decks as an example is ignoring the misstep the devs made. They unintentionally killed Vampires but actually made NG stronger since a lot of their cards benefit from other statuses (including Veil) or the units they'd normally target anyway remain unaffected. So there's no meaningful advantage in the sense that it didn't achieve the intended objective...The treant trap card isn't played because traps are not strong in comparison to the newly introduced cards and there are hardly enough veil units to even make a difference, how many veiled units are in each faction or actually played. It's a relatively small number.
 
Bloodthirst should work with own units as well, this should open up spots for previously unplayed / unplayable cards like warmonger. This should make an interesting dynamic between berserk and bloodlust. Just a thought.
 
Bloodthirst should work with own units as well, this should open up spots for previously unplayed / unplayable cards like warmonger. This should make an interesting dynamic between berserk and bloodlust. Just a thought.
That would make other cards, like Svanrige Tuirseach, or the Eist Tuirseach almost (but to be fair, with all the SK abilities to make damage, the word "practically" would suit better here) non-conditional. Eist is already ridiculous and it rather needs nerfing, not "accidental" buffing.
 
That would make other cards, like Svanrige Tuirseach, or the Eist Tuirseach almost (but to be fair, with all the SK abilities to make damage, the word "practically" would suit better here) non-conditional. Eist is already ridiculous and it rather needs nerfing, not "accidental" buffing.
I agree with you, maybe on reconsidering the idea it would cause more problems than solving others. I would however like to see unplayed cards get more airtime/action, maybe even expand on svalblod for future cards.
 
That would make other cards, like Svanrige Tuirseach, or the Eist Tuirseach almost (but to be fair, with all the SK abilities to make damage, the word "practically" would suit better here) non-conditional. Eist is already ridiculous and it rather needs nerfing, not "accidental" buffing.

One could try to circumvent the problem by upping the Bloodthirst numbers, like Bloodthrist 5, 6, etc.
Just ideas, I also don't like Eist as a card.
 
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