[DEATHWISH] The archetype, the deck, its specificities...
You maybe don't know it (because it wasn't a really played deck) but CDPR replaced "kinda" the Breedable archetype with the Deathwish one. I was a huge fan of Breedable even tho it has never been a meta deck or even a really viable deck (really risky and some of the meta decks just hard countered it). BUT it was really fun to play and really refreshing. The Deathwish archetype is almost the same in a way that no one knows the potential of that deck so people usually don't know how to play against it.
Deathwish is not an extremely strong archetype but it's really cool if you're not looking for a Meta deck but a really fun deck to play or something new to discover, a different way to play Gwent.
But enough talking, in this thread I'll explain :
- The Deathwish archetype ;
- The deck and its specificities ;
- Its core cards and other cards that can really help ;
- Its strengths and weaknesses ;
- What could be done to improve the viability of the deck ;
- Decks of the community.
The deathwish archetype is based on the death of your units to trigger (basically like the Closed Beta Golems/Earth Elemental/Prize-Winning Cow) but what does that mean?
That means the unit's ability triggers when it's removed from the battlefield and goes to your graveyard, the removed units spawning other units (each Harpy Egg spawns a 3str Harpy, each Earth Elemental spawns 2 Lesser Earth Elementals and the PW Cow spawns a 6str Chort).
The two most important units of this deck are the Harpy and the Shadow. Indeed, they both trigger the Deathwish ability, harpy (played from hand OR spawn from egg !) triggering its adjacent units and the shadow targeting 3 units to the right. But that doesn't mean the ability is disable for the rest of the game so you can spam the board with units and still get a decent amount of value to the next round.
Good to know : The ability doesn't trigger when replayed with Decoy (like before in the Closed Beta with the golems). The unit needs to go to the graveyard to trigger, so decoying the Earth Elemental or the PW Cow won't do anything. But you can still decoy the Celeano Harpy to spawn more eggs.
Unfortunately there's not enough cards at the moment to have a lot of varation in the deck, and I'll explain each card utility further below, but here's the deck I built :
http://imgur.com/a/0nSQU
As you can see, it lacks of units and there's a lot a special cards but like I said each bronze unit is worth 3 : Celeano spawns 2 eggs, Earth Elemental spawns 2 babies and regular harpy can spawn up to 4 units if you're lucky. (more details below)
Here's a list of almost every cards from this deck (except for the basic ones like Locks, First Light and stuff), their utility in this deck and how to use them.
P.S.1 : In this deck, I use Dagon as Leader essentially because it's the only leader that can have some sort of utility (Eredin is Wild Hunt only and the Unseen Elder would only be useful to eat the eggs but you need those eggs). Since it's a deck which don't have a lot of ways of control, Dagon can do that and he can remove Iris (check Iris for more informations)
P.S.2 : As you'll probably see, I didn't add the Prize-Winning Cow because I don't think it fits the deck even tho it's a Deathwish unit. And I didn't add Ragh Nar Roog or Draugr or any other card since they don't synergize with the deck except to take down Iris.
Its strengths
- The fact that even if you lose a round, you can instantly get a good amount of strength for the next round, like a free resilency ;
- Your amount of units can really snowball your buffs ;
- The fact that no one knows this deck and how it works ;
- Its fun value.
Its weaknesses
- Its lack of interaction with the opposing side of the board ;
- Its lack of units ;
- It takes some time to set up ;
- The fact that some combo are RNG based ( Harpy spawning next to Earth Elemental) ;
- You can be a good target for Scorch at the start of a round if you have enough Harpies buffed with Iris, which could easily remove 24-36str (4 or 6 6str harpies).
- Round 3 can be really hard to win, especially against Queen's Guard, Reveal and any deck which is stronger round 3 ;
- Too much control can let you defenseless for the last rounds. It can be a risky stategy.
This deck really lacks of units so also lacks of variety. It only has 3 dedicated Bronze, 1 Silver and 0 Gold units so I imagined 3 units that could really help the efficiency of this deck. If you have other ideas of units or Special cards based on the Deathwish archetype, feel free to share them. I'd be glad to take an eye on it. (cards created with Custom-gwent.com)
Scurver : 3str Bronze Siege row unit with damage a random enemy by 1 whenever a Deathwish ability is triggered.
Ths is basically a Monster variant of the ST Commando Neophyte, the SK War Longship or the NG Mangonel.
I only gave it 3str and 1 damage since you'll almost always trigger 2 Deathwish ability and sometime 3 per card (Harpy/Shadow/Plague Maiden) and you also get str from the triggered ability.
http://imgur.com/a/Cv9rx
Wraith : 1str Bronze Agile unit which boost itself whenever a Deathwish ability is triggered, wherever it is.
This is basically the Monster/Deathwish variant of the Spotter/Dol Blathana Protector. I only gave it 1str since in this deck, almost every DW ability will be triggered twice.
This card could really help the archetype round 3.
http://imgur.com/a/lOWvG
Rotfiend : 7str Silver Agile unit with "Deathwish : Damage a random unit by 5 (ignoring Armor)"
I don't know if this card should be a bronze (with less str/less damage) or a Silver so I gave a basic Silver value. And I gave it 7str to allow people to play this card in other decks than Deathwish to control resilient units like Mahakam Defenders, Ekkimara, Impera Brigade...
Its agile characteristic can be removed if necessary, maybe Melee row only.
http://imgur.com/a/pT237
Plague Maiden : 2str Gold unit which triggers the Deathwish ability of any unit appearing on its side of the board.
I only gave it 2str because you should be able to get a lot of strengths and units out of this card.
http://imgur.com/a/w2vJ9
I also thought about modifying 2 existing cards to give them value or a role in the Deathwish and I'm still thinking about 2 unplayed cards, the Manticore and the Chort.
Harpy : Like I said previously, our main problem is to not indirectly buff the Consume archetype and I think I managed to do it with the harpy.
I thought about boosting the unit by 1 for each Deathwish ability triggered. (It could maybe be buffed by 2 instead of 1, I don't know)
Since it can only trigger 2 units, the unit wouldn't exceed 13 strengths between 2 Earth Elementals (3str harpy + 2str buff + 4x2str Lesser Earth Elemental) and 11 strengths between 2 eggs (3str Harpy + 2str buff + 2x3str spawned harpies).
http://imgur.com/a/wFXD4
Wyvern : I also thought about giving the Wyvern a role in the DeathWish archetype and I immediately thought about the NG Fire Scorpion and its role in the Reveal one.
So basically the card works almost the same as the Fire Scorpion : it deals 3 damages to a targeted unit when played and deals 3 extra damage to a random unit whenever you trigger its Deathwish ability. (it can be triggered multiple times so it's stronger than the Fire Scorpion so we could maybe reduce the Deathwish damages to 2 but since the Deathwish archetype doesn't have as many strenghts as the reveal one, I thought it would be fine at 3str each time it's triggered)
http://imgur.com/a/oaGsA
I'd love to rework the Chort and the Manticore too so they can fit in the Deathwish archetype but I lack of ideas (any suggestion?) and the fact that the Chort is linked to the Prize Winning Cow really cramps our possibilities.
Esclive's first deck (Open Beta original deck - 21/05/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/0nSQU
Esclive's second deck (Fogglet/Deathwish hybrid - 22/06/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/AwtVz
Esclive's third deck (New patch version - 05/07/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/ZrCbZ
TriforceDragon's deck (29/05/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/n4L3q
Do you have a Deathwish deck? If so, feel free to share it with us in the comments below with a screenshot or by mentioning every card in it.
That's it for me. I really enjoyed doing this presentation of the deck and the archetype and I'd be glad to get your opinion or suggestions about what I could add to it, your feedback about the deck and your ideas to improve the archetype (new cards ideas, modifications of the existing cards or the cards I proposed...). If you want to know something in particular about any specificity of the deck or the archetype, feel free to ask.
As I said, it's not a strong deck but the fun is there (at least for me) and it's really refreshing from all the Meta decks so please, feel free to try it.
You maybe don't know it (because it wasn't a really played deck) but CDPR replaced "kinda" the Breedable archetype with the Deathwish one. I was a huge fan of Breedable even tho it has never been a meta deck or even a really viable deck (really risky and some of the meta decks just hard countered it). BUT it was really fun to play and really refreshing. The Deathwish archetype is almost the same in a way that no one knows the potential of that deck so people usually don't know how to play against it.
Deathwish is not an extremely strong archetype but it's really cool if you're not looking for a Meta deck but a really fun deck to play or something new to discover, a different way to play Gwent.
But enough talking, in this thread I'll explain :
- The Deathwish archetype ;
- The deck and its specificities ;
- Its core cards and other cards that can really help ;
- Its strengths and weaknesses ;
- What could be done to improve the viability of the deck ;
- Decks of the community.
_______________________________________________
THE DEATHWISH ARCHETYPE
The deathwish archetype is based on the death of your units to trigger (basically like the Closed Beta Golems/Earth Elemental/Prize-Winning Cow) but what does that mean?
That means the unit's ability triggers when it's removed from the battlefield and goes to your graveyard, the removed units spawning other units (each Harpy Egg spawns a 3str Harpy, each Earth Elemental spawns 2 Lesser Earth Elementals and the PW Cow spawns a 6str Chort).
The two most important units of this deck are the Harpy and the Shadow. Indeed, they both trigger the Deathwish ability, harpy (played from hand OR spawn from egg !) triggering its adjacent units and the shadow targeting 3 units to the right. But that doesn't mean the ability is disable for the rest of the game so you can spam the board with units and still get a decent amount of value to the next round.
Good to know : The ability doesn't trigger when replayed with Decoy (like before in the Closed Beta with the golems). The unit needs to go to the graveyard to trigger, so decoying the Earth Elemental or the PW Cow won't do anything. But you can still decoy the Celeano Harpy to spawn more eggs.
_______________________________________________
THE DECK AND ITS SPECIFICITIES
Unfortunately there's not enough cards at the moment to have a lot of varation in the deck, and I'll explain each card utility further below, but here's the deck I built :
http://imgur.com/a/0nSQU
As you can see, it lacks of units and there's a lot a special cards but like I said each bronze unit is worth 3 : Celeano spawns 2 eggs, Earth Elemental spawns 2 babies and regular harpy can spawn up to 4 units if you're lucky. (more details below)
_______________________________________________
ITS CORE CARDS AND OTHER CARDS THAT CAN HELP
Here's a list of almost every cards from this deck (except for the basic ones like Locks, First Light and stuff), their utility in this deck and how to use them.
THE CORE CARD | ITS UTILITY/HOW TO PLAY IT |
Celeano Harpy | It's a Monster Bronze Agile 3str unit which spawns 2 1str eggs.
|
Harpy Egg | It's a Monster Bronze 1str unit which spawns 1 3str Harpy when removed from the battlefield or when its Deathwish is triggered with Harpy/Shadow.
|
Earth Elemental | It's a Monster Bronze Melee 6str unit with a shield which spawns 2 2str Lesser Earth Elementals when removed from the battlefield or when its Deathwish ability is triggered.
|
Lesser Earth Elemental | It's a Monster Bronze Melee 2str unit.
|
Harpy | It's a Monster Bronze Agile 3str unit which triggers the Deathwish ability of its adjacent units.
|
Shadow | It's a Monster Silver Agile 7str unit which triggers the Deathwish ability to 3 units on its right.
|
THE OTHER CARDS | ITS UTILITY/HOW TO PLAY IT |
Dagon | It's the Monster Leader which spawn a bronze weather (Bitting Frost/Imprenetrable Fog/Torrential Rain.
|
Bloodcurdling Roar | It's a Neutral Bronze Special card which destroys a unit and spawns an Agile 11str Bear.
|
Overdose | It's a Neutral Bronze Special card which buffs 6 random units by 2.
|
Thunderbolt Potion | It's a Neutral Bronze Special card which buffs 3 adjacent units by 4.
|
Commander's Horn | It's a Neutral Silver Special card which buffs 5 adjacent units by 4.
|
Decoy | It's a Neutral Silver Special card which allows to replay a unit and give it 3 strength.
|
Bekker's Twisted Mirror | It's a Neutral Silver Special card which swaps the strength of the highest and the lowest units on the board.
|
Alzur's Double-Cross | It's a Neutral Silver Special card which summons the highest unit from your deck and boost it by 2. (Ties are resolved randomly)
|
Marching Orders | It's a Neutral Silver Special card which summons the lowest unit from your deck and boost it by 2. (Ties are resolved randomly)
|
Iris | It's a Neutral Silver Spying 3str unit which boosts all your units by 3str when removed from the battlefield.
|
Operator | It's a Neutral Silver Range 7str unit which targets one of your bronze units in you hand and copies it in your hand and your opponent's hand.
|
Triss Butterfly | It's a Neutral Gold 5str unit which buffs your lowest unit(s) by 1 each turn.
|
Yennefer | It's a Neutral Gold 6str unit which spawns a Unicorn (buffs every units on the board by 2) or a Chironex (damages every units on the board by 2).
|
Grave Hag | It's a Monster Silver agile 2str unit which, after 1 turn, Consume every units in your graveyard and boost itself by 1 for each unit consumed.
|
Fire Elemental | It's a Monster Silver Siege 7str unit which spawns 3 Lesser Fire Elemental.
|
Lesser Fire Elemental | It's a Monster Bronze Melee 1str unit which deals 1 damage to a random enemy. It always spawns in a group of 3 from the Fire Elemental.
|
3 Crones | It's three Monster Silver Siege row units (6str, 6str and 8str) which plays the other 2 crones from your deck when played.
|
Ge'els | It's a Monster Gold 2str unit which allows you to draw a Gold and a Silver card, play one and return the other to the top of your Deck.
|
Caretaker | It's a Monster Gold 4str unit which allows you to resurrect a unit from your opponent's graveyard.
|
P.S.2 : As you'll probably see, I didn't add the Prize-Winning Cow because I don't think it fits the deck even tho it's a Deathwish unit. And I didn't add Ragh Nar Roog or Draugr or any other card since they don't synergize with the deck except to take down Iris.
_______________________________________________
ITS STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES
Its strengths
- The fact that even if you lose a round, you can instantly get a good amount of strength for the next round, like a free resilency ;
- Your amount of units can really snowball your buffs ;
- The fact that no one knows this deck and how it works ;
- Its fun value.
Its weaknesses
- Its lack of interaction with the opposing side of the board ;
- Its lack of units ;
- It takes some time to set up ;
- The fact that some combo are RNG based ( Harpy spawning next to Earth Elemental) ;
- You can be a good target for Scorch at the start of a round if you have enough Harpies buffed with Iris, which could easily remove 24-36str (4 or 6 6str harpies).
- Round 3 can be really hard to win, especially against Queen's Guard, Reveal and any deck which is stronger round 3 ;
- Too much control can let you defenseless for the last rounds. It can be a risky stategy.
_______________________________________________
WHAT COULD BE DONE TO IMPROVE THE VIABILITY OF THE DECK
This deck really lacks of units so also lacks of variety. It only has 3 dedicated Bronze, 1 Silver and 0 Gold units so I imagined 3 units that could really help the efficiency of this deck. If you have other ideas of units or Special cards based on the Deathwish archetype, feel free to share them. I'd be glad to take an eye on it. (cards created with Custom-gwent.com)
Scurver : 3str Bronze Siege row unit with damage a random enemy by 1 whenever a Deathwish ability is triggered.
Ths is basically a Monster variant of the ST Commando Neophyte, the SK War Longship or the NG Mangonel.
I only gave it 3str and 1 damage since you'll almost always trigger 2 Deathwish ability and sometime 3 per card (Harpy/Shadow/Plague Maiden) and you also get str from the triggered ability.
http://imgur.com/a/Cv9rx
Wraith : 1str Bronze Agile unit which boost itself whenever a Deathwish ability is triggered, wherever it is.
This is basically the Monster/Deathwish variant of the Spotter/Dol Blathana Protector. I only gave it 1str since in this deck, almost every DW ability will be triggered twice.
This card could really help the archetype round 3.
http://imgur.com/a/lOWvG
Rotfiend : 7str Silver Agile unit with "Deathwish : Damage a random unit by 5 (ignoring Armor)"
I don't know if this card should be a bronze (with less str/less damage) or a Silver so I gave a basic Silver value. And I gave it 7str to allow people to play this card in other decks than Deathwish to control resilient units like Mahakam Defenders, Ekkimara, Impera Brigade...
Its agile characteristic can be removed if necessary, maybe Melee row only.
http://imgur.com/a/pT237
Plague Maiden : 2str Gold unit which triggers the Deathwish ability of any unit appearing on its side of the board.
I only gave it 2str because you should be able to get a lot of strengths and units out of this card.
http://imgur.com/a/w2vJ9
I also thought about modifying 2 existing cards to give them value or a role in the Deathwish and I'm still thinking about 2 unplayed cards, the Manticore and the Chort.
Harpy : Like I said previously, our main problem is to not indirectly buff the Consume archetype and I think I managed to do it with the harpy.
I thought about boosting the unit by 1 for each Deathwish ability triggered. (It could maybe be buffed by 2 instead of 1, I don't know)
Since it can only trigger 2 units, the unit wouldn't exceed 13 strengths between 2 Earth Elementals (3str harpy + 2str buff + 4x2str Lesser Earth Elemental) and 11 strengths between 2 eggs (3str Harpy + 2str buff + 2x3str spawned harpies).
http://imgur.com/a/wFXD4
Wyvern : I also thought about giving the Wyvern a role in the DeathWish archetype and I immediately thought about the NG Fire Scorpion and its role in the Reveal one.
So basically the card works almost the same as the Fire Scorpion : it deals 3 damages to a targeted unit when played and deals 3 extra damage to a random unit whenever you trigger its Deathwish ability. (it can be triggered multiple times so it's stronger than the Fire Scorpion so we could maybe reduce the Deathwish damages to 2 but since the Deathwish archetype doesn't have as many strenghts as the reveal one, I thought it would be fine at 3str each time it's triggered)
http://imgur.com/a/oaGsA
I'd love to rework the Chort and the Manticore too so they can fit in the Deathwish archetype but I lack of ideas (any suggestion?) and the fact that the Chort is linked to the Prize Winning Cow really cramps our possibilities.
_______________________________________________
DECKS OF THE COMMUNITY
Esclive's first deck (Open Beta original deck - 21/05/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/0nSQU
Esclive's second deck (Fogglet/Deathwish hybrid - 22/06/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/AwtVz
Esclive's third deck (New patch version - 05/07/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/ZrCbZ
TriforceDragon's deck (29/05/2017)
http://imgur.com/a/n4L3q
Do you have a Deathwish deck? If so, feel free to share it with us in the comments below with a screenshot or by mentioning every card in it.
That's it for me. I really enjoyed doing this presentation of the deck and the archetype and I'd be glad to get your opinion or suggestions about what I could add to it, your feedback about the deck and your ideas to improve the archetype (new cards ideas, modifications of the existing cards or the cards I proposed...). If you want to know something in particular about any specificity of the deck or the archetype, feel free to ask.
As I said, it's not a strong deck but the fun is there (at least for me) and it's really refreshing from all the Meta decks so please, feel free to try it.
Last edited: