It's been one day, so: What's your favourite "Once upon a pyre" card?

+
It can be the card art, new strategies, anything. Just interested.
I like "She who knows", as art and as an idea. Trying to get it to work in a deck, not very successful yet :ROFLMAO:
 
For the artwork it would propably be Rience (if I can completely exclude the actual card).
If the patchnotes count it would be Shani.
If we talk about the ability and only the carddrop itself it would be Dead Man's Tongue.
 
After opening probably 150 kegs, I don’t have enough of the new cards to fairly comment on any. Guess I will save my opinion until November when expansion kegs become available.
 
Depends what you mean by 'favorite card'.

As in cool ability, that would be a tie between The Witchfinder and Blightmaker.
As in card art, that would be Francesca Findabair and Bride of the Sea. Scoia'tael nailed it with the art though as the 2 bronzes together with Francesca and Vanadáin are just gorgeous.
 
After opening probably 150 kegs, I don’t have enough of the new cards to fairly comment on any. Guess I will save my opinion until November when expansion kegs become available.
Don't you have enough scraps after opening the kegs to make them yourself now?
 
The ST bronzes have been playing well for me. The Whisperers play like symbiosis treants, but spawn after EVERY special if not dealt with while the Sorceresses play a bit like an order version of the Forest Protector with a less choice in cards if you don't boost them. Mixing Nature spells with a Whisperer lets you spawn two units per spell, so you can almost treat ST Spells as a swarm deck. I've tried out a ST spell deck that incorporates a lot of neutral spells. Not a very competitive deck so far, but it's fun to play and does well in Dual Casting.

Sadly, Francesca just doesn't appear worth the effort. The risk of her double playing some high-value spell makes her an immediate target. Outside of a few Dual Casting games, she hasn't stayed on the board long enough to see her ability trigger. I put her solidly in the high-risk, high reward category.
 
Don't you have enough scraps after opening the kegs to make them yourself now?
In a year and a half, I have accumulated enough scraps to craft about 140 legendary cards, so I could certainly craft this expansion if I wished.

However I am still missing about 250 legendary cards. Every card I craft will delay the time until I get a complete collection because it increases the odds that legendaries drawn in kegs I later purchase will be duplicates of cards I own. I have tried to be disciplined in crafting only cards I really want to play. Thus, I have crafted cards like Artis and Malena that I really wanted to try, but I still own neither oneiromancy nor heatwave.
 
The ST bronzes have been playing well for me. The Whisperers play like symbiosis treants, but spawn after EVERY special if not dealt with while the Sorceresses play a bit like an order version of the Forest Protector with a less choice in cards if you don't boost them. Mixing Nature spells with a Whisperer lets you spawn two units per spell, so you can almost treat ST Spells as a swarm deck. I've tried out a ST spell deck that incorporates a lot of neutral spells. Not a very competitive deck so far, but it's fun to play and does well in Dual Casting.

Sadly, Francesca just doesn't appear worth the effort. The risk of her double playing some high-value spell makes her an immediate target. Outside of a few Dual Casting games, she hasn't stayed on the board long enough to see her ability trigger. I put her solidly in the high-risk, high reward category.
Francesca gets the Meve treatment. She is a worse Meve in fact as Francesca's counter starts 1 turn later if you are not playing Mahakam Forge or if you don't have a Sorceress.

How often did we see Meve being played? Extremely rare. Why? Because the card has such a high ceiling that not being able to remove/control it means instant loss. Meve would theoretically wreak havoc now that NR is swarmy. Francesca too would wreak havoc if not removed. Imagine playing her in Nature's Gift and using Shaping Nature to lower the last counter. It plays for an incredible amount of points.

Francesca is too fucking strong, but for it to pay off, you need to wait a couple of turns. Considering that the current meta is removal heavy, chances for it to stick, or for the Sorceresses/Whisperers to stick are small. That's why I wasn't too thrilled when I saw the ST reveals. They are not practical, not reliable. Order abilities without Zeal now are almost always useless and a liability. Even more so a card that has a counter. How many cards with counters have been regularly used in Gwent? Eist, because of his bloodthirst not being a hard condition to meet, because BoG and now because of the discard package. Other than that no one. Alzur? Except some rare meme decks, no. Too RNG. I already talked about Meve. The Elven Scribe might get play, because as Bushy said in his analysis, you can afford to play a shit, disposable 4 for 4. If it sticks (99% it won't), then that's great, if not, that is not as much a loss for you as it is for your opponent because you bait removal. But you can't afford to play a shit 5p or 6p bronze. That has to stick and provide value.
 
Last edited:
I really like the art of the ST new cards. Francesca and whisperer are such nice ladies to look at :)
 
Considering that the current meta is removal heavy, chances for it to stick, or for the Sorceresses/Whisperers to stick are small. That's why I wasn't too thrilled when I saw the ST reveals. They are not practical, not reliable. Order abilities without Zeal now are almost always useless and a liability. Even more so a card that has a counter. How many cards with counters have been regularly used in Gwent? Eist, because of his bloodthirst not being a hard condition to meet, because BoG and now because of the discard package. Other than that no one. Alzur? Except some rare meme decks, no. Too RNG. I already talked about Meve. The Elven Scribe might get play, because as Bushy said in his analysis, you can afford to play a shit, disposable 4 for 4. If it sticks (99% it won't), then that's great, if not, that is not as much a loss for you as it is for your opponent because you bait removal. But you can't afford to play a shit 5p or 6p bronze. That has to stick and provide value.

Yeah, counters just don't cut it in this meta.

So far a lot of people tend to ignore the Whisperer until it spawns a copy or two. On first playing it, most people are hesitant to use a removal card on a 3 point bronze. It doesn't take long to realize that Whisperer has a theoretical 27 maximum value, though... Worst case, it is good lock/removal bait.

The Sorceresses tend to draw a lot of immediate removal if you don't buff them to 6+. The stratagem, Vrihedd Sabateur, or any of the ST "buff a unit in your hand each turn" units help set them up, though. I even tried a few games using Invigorate as my leader, but a spell heavy deck usually meant I was wasting at least 1 point of buffs per charge... :p
 
More, if you move the ninth one to the other row. Not sure if it'd ever be a good move (pun intended) but it's possible. :D

Well, I had been planning to try a Whisperer - Teleportation combo tonight. Once I've spawned the first copy, teleport the original to the other row and start spawning two copies per spell... :)

EDIT - If my math is correct, you could theoretically get 17 copies on the board if you lead Whisperer, play a spell, play Teleportation, and then 7 more spells. If you happen to be playing Mahakam Forge for the 10th spell card in a round, you could actually fill the entire board with Whisperers. Or if you happen to have a second Teleportation card and set a third copy spawning. I seriously doubt anyone would let you do it though...

EDIT 2 - I guess Oneiromancy into another spell card would also work. I think I've found my new mission - try to populate the entire board with copies from a single Whisperer! :p

EDIT 3 - Idarran / Guerilla Tactics shenanigans.

UPDATE - The best I managed this evening was 8 copies in Unranked, and 16 in Dual Casting. I might have made it in Dual Casting, but my NG opponents kept dropping spies onto my side of the board to occupy slots. Sadly, I faced nothing but NG tonight (Every. Single. Match. Sigh.) and they tend to do nothing but interfere with your side of the board.
 
Last edited:
More, if you move the ninth one to the other row. Not sure if it'd ever be a good move (pun intended) but it's possible. :D
Well yeah, but realistically speaking, how many specials can you use in one round, even for Symbiosis ST? Ideally not that many. You need a couple for Francesca in round 3, assuming you play her.

Yeah, counters just don't cut it in this meta.

So far a lot of people tend to ignore the Whisperer until it spawns a copy or two. On first playing it, most people are hesitant to use a removal card on a 3 point bronze. It doesn't take long to realize that Whisperer has a theoretical 27 maximum value, though... Worst case, it is good lock/removal bait.

The Sorceresses tend to draw a lot of immediate removal if you don't buff them to 6+. The stratagem, Vrihedd Sabateur, or any of the ST "buff a unit in your hand each turn" units help set them up, though. I even tried a few games using Invigorate as my leader, but a spell heavy deck usually meant I was wasting at least 1 point of buffs per charge... :p
The only way Sorceress stick is if you can get hand-buffs with Dunca, Smugglers, Circle of Life or Saboteur and build them up for a third round. Guess we'll have to wait and see, when the meta settles if this is a bargain worth going for. Realistically speaking, it is not, but I hope I am wrong.
 

DRK3

Forum veteran
So far, my favourite new card is megascope, and i doubt that will change soon.

It's one of those cards that opens up so many possibilities it will take quite some time to figure em all out. I intend to make a megascope deck series on my 'Deck of the Day' thread, covering all 6 factions.

Having said that... i do not think this card is balanced, unlike other expansions i think the most overtuned cards this time around are actually the cheapest bronzes, and megascope is one of those 5-7 new cards.
 
Top Bottom