So I saw a discussion on Twitch & Reddit and on Twitch the competitive players were pretty much unanimously for open decklists in pro ladder whereas on Reddit the reaction was mostly negative from as far as I could tell. The first time I heard about this idea my first impulse was to be against it. But listening to how the pro players rationalized it I have changed my mind about it and think it would be a good idea.
As people that watch them will be sure to know Gwent tournaments use open decklists. You know what deck your opponent will be playing during the match and he knows yours. Decisions in the game can be made with this knowledge in mind. Because it works this way the game doesn't just evolve into a guessing game as to what the other player could be running but instead it's a strategic game where you can actively play around what you know the opponent has.
Since pro rank is the route to tournaments and tournaments use this format, wouldn't it make sense if pro rank itself would also be played under these rules? I'm sure this idea will be met with plenty of resistance. A lot of players love the fact their deck has an element of surprise and a few tricks up their sleeves and in fact their deck is only remotely viable because of this. Though I definitely see the fun in just that and I'm always in favour of using niche ideas for your deck, it doesn't really make the game any more skill rewarding in fact it makes it less so.
You can also ask yourself if such 'meme decks' should have a place in pro rank. They obviously fit casual much better and ironically we've got a situation now were in ranked there's often the surprise unitless deck of some sort and in casual people are often playing netdecks. If I had to guess this is because for a lot of players after they've reached pro rank there's not really much for them left to do if they're not actively grinding MMR towards top 500/200. Making casual the logical format for more experimenting style of gameplay just makes a lot of sense to me. How do you guys feel about this?
As people that watch them will be sure to know Gwent tournaments use open decklists. You know what deck your opponent will be playing during the match and he knows yours. Decisions in the game can be made with this knowledge in mind. Because it works this way the game doesn't just evolve into a guessing game as to what the other player could be running but instead it's a strategic game where you can actively play around what you know the opponent has.
Since pro rank is the route to tournaments and tournaments use this format, wouldn't it make sense if pro rank itself would also be played under these rules? I'm sure this idea will be met with plenty of resistance. A lot of players love the fact their deck has an element of surprise and a few tricks up their sleeves and in fact their deck is only remotely viable because of this. Though I definitely see the fun in just that and I'm always in favour of using niche ideas for your deck, it doesn't really make the game any more skill rewarding in fact it makes it less so.
You can also ask yourself if such 'meme decks' should have a place in pro rank. They obviously fit casual much better and ironically we've got a situation now were in ranked there's often the surprise unitless deck of some sort and in casual people are often playing netdecks. If I had to guess this is because for a lot of players after they've reached pro rank there's not really much for them left to do if they're not actively grinding MMR towards top 500/200. Making casual the logical format for more experimenting style of gameplay just makes a lot of sense to me. How do you guys feel about this?