Because it was really weak. Right now thanks to this minor buff it can perform very well if left uninterrupted but that's exactly where the deck's struggle begins. The popular factions rn: Skellige, Nilfgaard, Schirru ST all essentially wipe it out because of how removal oriented they are. If you remove the Passiflora you usually shut the whole deck down because it can't snowball engines and they're not strong enough to survive on their own.
SY has access to some great cards though so there's always some traps you have to avoid, but I thought the cache buff was reasonable since the biggest problem with the ability initially was its passive ability in my opinion.
SY has access to some great cards though so there's always some traps you have to avoid, but I thought the cache buff was reasonable since the biggest problem with the ability initially was its passive ability in my opinion.
Was it really any worse than other SY leaders though? Comparing it to overtuned decks seems like a strange approach to balancing. I'd imagine it would be naturally buffed the more hoard units they added.
When they nerfed it last, they nerfed both, the coin gain and the hoard discount, which, although not as blatantly toxic as the recent harmony "fix", seemed a bit too much even at the time. Reverting half of that was kind of expected.
I couldn't disagree more. I think that's one of the best nerfs they ever did. Just because everyone jumped off the bandwagon didn't mean it was garbage. I mained it after the nerf and had good results with it. Hoard is a ridiculously strong keyword to begin with, why should it's leader have the same coin accumulation as Jackpot?
Just buffing SY cards would've been enough, rebuffing Cache was excessive me thinks.
No it wasn't, which is a problem for SY in general, their leaders are all pretty bad. Cache however resonates most with their strongest cards and I'm guessing that's why that ability specifically got the buff. Cause buffing any other SY leader is like putting a band aid over a bullet wound. It's true adding more hoard units would be more of an organic buff, but they only add cards every 6 months now so that doesn't seem like the right approach here.
I don't disagree with you that the balancing is way off, I don't even know if I'd call any of the decks I mentioned 'overtuned' though, I feel like the problem with Gwent right now lies very much in its mechanics and the provision system and is therefor a bit more complex to accurately describe. (I'll probably try my best to in a different thread)
Team Leviathan Gaming agrees with you.
Gwent Meta Report #28
Welcome to our 28th meta report! NG and NR are in a great spot, with Assimilate and Alumni somehow avoiding the nerf hammer and thus dominating the meta. SK isn’t far behind - Reckless Flurry is still a force to be reckoned with and Battle Trance is a decent pointslam alternative. As usual, Nature’s
That meta report is a joke though. The fact SK Warriors is in tier 2 is pretty much evidence of that.Team Leviathan Gaming agrees with you.
Gwent Meta Report #28
Welcome to our 28th meta report! NG and NR are in a great spot, with Assimilate and Alumni somehow avoiding the nerf hammer and thus dominating the meta. SK isn’t far behind - Reckless Flurry is still a force to be reckoned with and Battle Trance is a decent pointslam alternative. As usual, Nature’steamleviathangaming.com
Not to mention uprising was only recently added to the tier 1 and Hidden Cache was the only deck they considered tier 1.
Scrolling through the pro rank leaderboard players got their highest MMR with NR and SK.
I mean, people were playing exact same deck with blood money instead, and/or jackpot, and a nearly identical one with the wild card. That tells you everything you need to know about that nerf. You may have been maining it, but it went from tier zero to not being in top 3 of even SY leader abilities and the best deck SY had to offer was about T3. Rebuffing it now gave SY a borderline T1 deck, but with SK and NR at the top of the meta anyway, it's not nearly as oppressive as it was before.
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I guess those lists are the easiest to use, I've seen people from those teams use more control-oriented decks.
The NR control version is very strong against SY hc
I guess those lists are the easiest to use, I've seen people from those teams use more control-oriented decks.
The NR control version is very strong against SY hc
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How exactly are you supposed to control HCache Passiflora?
They play 4 Seductresses, 3 Peaches (which immediately go to 5) - yes, one of each of those is through Passiflora - you bomb heaver, you denied a peaches and 7 coins, but next turn you got 2 of those h0es on board that need dealing with...
But those are only the 1pt engines... then you also have to deal with Herst - 2pt per turn, and Saul - 3pt per turn, and maybe even Imke - 2coins per turn. Good luck controlling all of that. And lets not forget the boat, there every turn giving an extra 3pts.
I've played against a lot of Cache, in seasonal this month. Even tried Yrden, but sometimes that's not even enough if they're smart enough to spread their boosts. I could go Lockdown and destroy it, but i really dont want to have to go that ability everytime i want to counter a particular deck.
Its just another disgustingly OP deck that can always push and push, no matter the opponent's deck, and get away with a win most times.
They play 4 Seductresses, 3 Peaches (which immediately go to 5) - yes, one of each of those is through Passiflora - you bomb heaver, you denied a peaches and 7 coins, but next turn you got 2 of those h0es on board that need dealing with...
But those are only the 1pt engines... then you also have to deal with Herst - 2pt per turn, and Saul - 3pt per turn, and maybe even Imke - 2coins per turn. Good luck controlling all of that. And lets not forget the boat, there every turn giving an extra 3pts.
I've played against a lot of Cache, in seasonal this month. Even tried Yrden, but sometimes that's not even enough if they're smart enough to spread their boosts. I could go Lockdown and destroy it, but i really dont want to have to go that ability everytime i want to counter a particular deck.
Its just another disgustingly OP deck that can always push and push, no matter the opponent's deck, and get away with a win most times.
I think tlg snapshot is on point save a few inclusions in some decks. Tiers are based on the relative strength of decks in the sum of the most prevalent matchups at a given time. NR was T2 because people still played NG until a while ago. SK is not T1 since the hotfix because 1) it has weak R1 and it's less favorable against decks abusing last say 2) the power and popularity of greed NR is off the charts right now. SY is T1 because it's not truly disfavored against anything.
BTW top players climbed their SK before hotfix.
It's a strong deck for sure. It's also got the benefit of actually being stronger without devotion (so there's heatwave and bomb heaver floating around) In seasonal I lost against the deck pretty much constantly but in ladder I've actually held up very well with Monsters/NG/Skellige. Syndicate has a crazy high point ceiling but also a rather slow build up.
With Monsters I try to exploit that with tempo and with NG/Skellige just through the many control options they have.
What works for me is trying to bleed out the Passiflora with a deck like NR and then pass or if I run a control deck (lockdown especially) I just take the long round and try to prevent the engine snowballing.
I see your point though that you don't wanna run X counter deck just to beat them. Since I'm actually trying to do some ladder climbing this time I pretty much have to anyway.
Engine overload is a key attribute of both SY HC decks and NR Uprising decks, and their engines in comparison to other faction's e.g. Dwarf Defender, WH Hound, are simply better at generating points with less set up and less conditions. Consequently, both are extremely strong (highest tier at least) and the sheer volume of strong engines is only able to be matched by SK's volume of engine removal. Other decks, other archetypes, simply don't have the capability or capacity to match their raw output or remove them all.
the amount of points SY HC generates even after passing is hardly comparable to even the greediest NR deck. how the devs think saul is being fine at 7 provision is one of the most mind baffling things in gwent to me. not only do they have crazy passive engine value but also the best purifier in kalkstein so good luck using locks/poison to stop them.
Saul reminds me a bit of Gord - they both always play well above their provision value. How Gord is 3 for 7 when he regularly plays for 12-15 baffles me. Yes, there is potentially some risk when mulliganing, and removal if you don't have last say, but I can't remember the last time I saw Gord play for less than 10. With a special card heavy deck, why would you ever not include him?