Season of the Elves is ending soon!

[rrc]

Ay, those vipers were an annoyance, but they had plenty of company in that regard. Personally, I found the Greatsword decks to be the most frustrating, however. I fought plenty of those chaps, and frequently lost.

Yes, VW, GS defeats are the most frustrating.
VW, you can't do anything to stop since it is based on their starting deck and they use VW at least 4 times for 15 points. I lose 99% of matchups against NG alchemy VW pathetic deck. I am not a noob. I know the mechanisms and I am at level 20 and had won an Arena. Why I am saying this is, I am not simply screaming because I lost a couple of games. They are unbalanced as hell. And every single bronze they play is played for at least 12+ points. Novice pulling of Makaham Ale (14 points), and resurrected once or twice, Slave Driver pulling your best cards, and to avoid their poisoned ale if you play in two rows, they do Vesemir and Black Blood and Blood Moon. It is like you have to lose painfully knowing that you can't win.

Greatsword I hate it, because you can't stop them unless you specifically build a deck to only counter them. Two times Azul's Thunder, Ioverth, or whatever you do, they are always brought back and in R3, they are at 20+ points easily. A single card winning an entire game. Nowadays I mainly play Arena because I am tired of this VW s**t. I sincerely hope CDPR fixes this horrible card. I even sent them three suggestions I don't know if they will fix it.

 

[Pruny]

Really just depends on your preferred deck, which opposing ones you find imbalanced.
i'm running a triple scorch double thunder deck (with a Muzzle to boot), and the Greatswords and VW decks both are my favorite matchups. The first turn that they let their hugely buffed cards match in points and bam scorched for an easy win. And literally nothing tops watching a greatsword deck buff their way up to 16+, followed by Thunder + muzzle + hello 18 point card on my side.

Right now, the one that gives me the most trouble with my preferred scorch deck are Henselt machine decks.... i can never seem to kill off enough machines - they always seem to pull off the graveyard->deck + henselt 4 machines on my face combo, and the machines all have such low points that it's hard to scorch them all. I've played that deck and never can get a machine create card to create a machine i actually have in my deck to do it.

Wow , i never used thunder to steal big greatswords because i use muzle first. Good move man
:cheers:

I use crushingtrap to kill all machines.

 

[Khreygond]

Yes, VW, GS defeats are the most frustrating.
VW, you can't do anything to stop since it is based on their starting deck and they use VW at least 4 times for 15 points. I lose 99% of matchups against NG alchemy VW pathetic deck. I am not a noob. I know the mechanisms and I am at level 20 and had won an Arena. Why I am saying this is, I am not simply screaming because I lost a couple of games. They are unbalanced as hell. And every single bronze they play is played for at least 12+ points. Novice pulling of Makaham Ale (14 points), and resurrected once or twice, Slave Driver pulling your best cards, and to avoid their poisoned ale if you play in two rows, they do Vesemir and Black Blood and Blood Moon. It is like you have to lose painfully knowing that you can't win.

Greatsword I hate it, because you can't stop them unless you specifically build a deck to only counter them. Two times Azul's Thunder, Ioverth, or whatever you do, they are always brought back and in R3, they are at 20+ points easily. A single card winning an entire game. Nowadays I mainly play Arena because I am tired of this VW s**t. I sincerely hope CDPR fixes this horrible card. I even sent them three suggestions I don't know if they will fix it.

Personally, in the higher tier, Brouver was found much more frequently.
It's only because you haven't faced Axemen that you say that mate You have NO idea what frustrating means if you aren't up against these guys xD Unless you run a dedicated counter axemen deck like Pruny does, it's insane how oppressive they can be. And currently no one has teched against them because very few people play them.

Also Axemen leave the Vipers to the ground usually. It's so hard for me to play decently against them, though I am good at playing with them

 

[Sariel_]

Personally, in the higher tier, Brouver was found much more frequently.
It's only because you haven't faced Axemen that you say that mate You have NO idea what frustrating means if you aren't up against these guys xD Unless you run a dedicated counter axemen deck like Pruny does, it's insane how oppressive they can be. And currently no one has teched against them because very few people play them.

Also Axemen leave the Vipers to the ground usually. It's so hard for me to play decently against them, though I am good at playing with them

Axemen are pretty easy to counter. Just force them to short round 3.

 

[Esmer]

Greatsword I hate it, because you can't stop them unless you specifically build a deck to only counter them. Two times Azul's Thunder, Ioverth, or whatever you do, they are always brought back and in R3, they are at 20+ points easily. A single card winning an entire game. Nowadays I mainly play Arena because I am tired of this VW s**t. I sincerely hope CDPR fixes this horrible card. I even sent them three suggestions I don't know if they will fix it.

ST is the most popular faction on the ladder and Brouver has the highest winrate across all ranks, and you complain about alchemy NG (less than 50% winrate above 3900) and GS (I haven't seen a single GS deck recently)?

Btw, thanks to all the Brouvers for an easy rank 21. I lost 1 game and won 6 yesterday against them. And no, I wasn't playing alchemy or GS.

Axemen are pretty easy to counter. Just force them to short round 3.

Smart axemen player will pass when he is far ahead (and he will be unless you have 2-3 weather clears or he is unlucky with his draws). So in a short round 3 he will have CA over you, which means Harald + axeman or derran will beat almost anything.

The biggest enemy of axemen is bad deck thinning, which means you may draw only 1 weather in a match. It's usually a lose, especially if the opponent can kill your axemen.

 

[rrc]

Personally, in the higher tier, Brouver was found much more frequently.
It's only because you haven't faced Axemen that you say that mate You have NO idea what frustrating means if you aren't up against these guys xD Unless you run a dedicated counter axemen deck like Pruny does, it's insane how oppressive they can be. And currently no one has teched against them because very few people play them.

Also Axemen leave the Vipers to the ground usually. It's so hard for me to play decently against them, though I am good at playing with them

I have not played a single game with SK. Axeman at least needs a setup. He gives you at least one round to counter him. He is insane I know. I have lost terribly against double axeman and Skelliga storm on my row and the Cripple. The opponent reached insane score (and after that game I thought of crafting Geralt:Yarden or Dimiridum Bomb). You can probably scorch him. But still it is not as frustrating and hopeless as VW. You probably play VW? You can't freaking stop VW from getting 14+ points at least 4 times and Novice getting 14+ points at least 4 times. They don't give a chance to prepare or defend against and they don't need any freaking setup. The only way people can think it is OK is, if they play this horrible pathetic broken deck.

Veterans keep boosting the Bearmaster multiple times with Priestess and coming up with huge Bearmaster+Bear and defeat you. There are a lot of stupid broken cards. But nothing tops VW.

I had a question with Brouver. How come Barclay always manages to play Cleaver? Every single time he plays Cleaver but his definition says he plays a random dwarf. I don't have that card and don't know how and why this works all the time.

 

[bojerbela]

I had a question with Brouver. How come Barclay always manages to play Cleaver? Every single time he plays Cleaver but his definition says he plays a random dwarf. I don't have that card and don't know how and why this works all the time.

Cleaver is the ONLY dwarf in the deck...no RNG.

 

[SrdjanB]

Any info on new season?

Someone should just say when it starts, at least what day, so I can plan accordingly with dailies.

P.S. CDPR really did spoil me with extra quick and smooth start of previous season, so I expect nothing less

 

[Huckleb3rryF1nn]

It will start today. https://playgwent.com/en/news/19271/season-of-the-elves-is-ending-soon

 

[rrc]

Cleaver is the ONLY dwarf in the deck...no RNG.

Ooh man.. A dwarf leader who has all elfs and only two dwarfs to pull of a 26 points single card play. That is smart, brilliant and obscene. No wonder they always played this and always got Cleaver.

 

[Khreygond]

Axemen are pretty easy to counter. Just force them to short round 3.

To do so, you'll need to suffer at least 1 long round. and in that round, they can very easily gain card advantage. Plus, their short round tools are very powerful. Restore into Pirate Captain into Corsair into Warship is a ciri nova spread into 3 cards. Sigrdrifa into Pirate Captain into corsair into warship is 18 points. The leader is 16 points and all these also empower your engines should you manage to get one on the board in the third round.

Like Esmer said, the true weakness of axemen is the deck thinning. If you drypass on Round 1 and your opponent plays the spy while you don't draw it or the Hym, you are in a tight spot.

I have not played a single game with SK. Axeman at least needs a setup. He gives you at least one round to counter him. He is insane I know. I have lost terribly against double axeman and Skelliga storm on my row and the Cripple. The opponent reached insane score (and after that game I thought of crafting Geralt:Yarden or Dimiridum Bomb). You can probably scorch him. But still it is not as frustrating and hopeless as VW. You probably play VW? You can't freaking stop VW from getting 14+ points at least 4 times and Novice getting 14+ points at least 4 times. They don't give a chance to prepare or defend against and they don't need any freaking setup. The only way people can think it is OK is, if they play this horrible pathetic broken deck.

Veterans keep boosting the Bearmaster multiple times with Priestess and coming up with huge Bearmaster+Bear and defeat you. There are a lot of stupid broken cards. But nothing tops VW.

I had a question with Brouver. How come Barclay always manages to play Cleaver? Every single time he plays Cleaver but his definition says he plays a random dwarf. I don't have that card and don't know how and why this works all the time.

You can stop with this bias against people who disagree with you. We've talked about this and other matters various times in the forums. I do not play Vipers. Have I played them? yes but the same is true for pretty much every deck that has been meta at some point since Midwinter (except Greatswords). Do I play them? no. Vipers are arguably the strongest bronze removal in the game and I agree, they DO need a rework, but they are nothing compared to so many other cards that need a rework.

I can and actually do think they are not fine, but less troublesome than others. Out of all the top tier decks right now, Vipers are the ones giving me the least trouble .Always have been. Axemen, Henselt, Brouver, Greatswords, Nekkers, even Handbuff are all more frustrating to play against than Vips.

I'd say alchemy's strength is that it's immune to relative deckbuilding. Like, there's no easy way to target alchemy or make your deck effective in alchemy matchups unless said deck has a natural advantage (like Axemen or Swarm decks which do). On the other hand, Alchemy's also the generally weakest top tier deck, so that kinda balances it out.

Nothing is more frustrating than uncountered axemen. Nothing. It's so hopeless to defeat them, you literally stand no chance in the round they develop their combo. Even if you deal with their engines, the weather attrition will just cripple you. Even if you deal with the weather, they have engines and warships to deal a lot of damage (and it's a lot of weather to deal with anyway). You need to really deal with both.

 

[VoidStormer]

Ooh man.. A dwarf leader who has all elfs and only two dwarfs to pull of a 26 points single card play. That is smart, brilliant and obscene.

Yes...and also so true to the Witcher lore!

Hoping some of the changes coming with Thronebreaker make the archetypes somewhat more restrictive based on leader and faction traits. As an example for Brouver, using any card from from the entire Scoiatael deck is just too broad. He should really have a Mahakam based Dwarf army with some Neutrals/allies maybe by restricting the access to allies the same way Gold is restricted.

Some other nods to Witcher reality along the way wouldn't hurt either. My biggest peeve on that front is the Slave driver, a crack of the whip and an entire Skellige longship full of axe wielding Skelliger raiders decide to turn traitor? Bloedhe Arse!

 

[Pruny]

i havent seen much axemen at 4100mmr and they can be countered with clear sky. but the alchemy deck is just disgusting with slavers+beer combo. beer has no place in alchemy tag its not a potion, and ointment its kinda stupid, resurection in NG ??

 

[Esmer]

i havent seen much axemen at 4100mmr and they can be countered with clear sky. but the alchemy deck is just disgusting with slavers+beer combo. beer has no place in alchemy tag its not a potion, and ointment its kinda stupid, resurection in NG ??

Yep, ointments (and resurrection in general) should not be a thing unless it's Skellige. SK deck which got me into top 1000 this season has 5 resurrections, and alchemy has 4. I still managed to beat most alchemy decks. but eventually it came down to who draws more ships/corsairs or witchers/ointments.

 

[rrc]

To do so, you'll need to suffer at least 1 long round. and in that round, they can very easily gain card advantage. Plus, their short round tools are very powerful. Restore into Pirate Captain into Corsair into Warship is a ciri nova spread into 3 cards. Sigrdrifa into Pirate Captain into corsair into warship is 18 points. The leader is 16 points and all these also empower your engines should you manage to get one on the board in the third round.

Like Esmer said, the true weakness of axemen is the deck thinning. If you drypass on Round 1 and your opponent plays the spy while you don't draw it or the Hym, you are in a tight spot.



You can stop with this bias against people who disagree with you. We've talked about this and other matters various times in the forums. I do not play Vipers. Have I played them? yes but the same is true for pretty much every deck that has been meta at some point since Midwinter (except Greatswords). Do I play them? no. Vipers are arguably the strongest bronze removal in the game and I agree, they DO need a rework, but they are nothing compared to so many other cards that need a rework.

...

Nothing is more frustrating than uncountered axemen. Nothing. It's so hopeless to defeat them, you literally stand no chance in the round they develop their combo. Even if you deal with their engines, the weather attrition will just cripple you. Even if you deal with the weather, they have engines and warships to deal a lot of damage (and it's a lot of weather to deal with anyway). You need to really deal with both.

ser2440, I agree that there are lot of broken cards which needs fixing. All I meant was, if people say VW is perfectly fine and don't need any fixing, they should be using that deck. Same goes for anyone who says Greatswords are fine, or Bearmasters+Veterans are fine, etc. All broken ridiculous bronze cards. I have lost against Axeman, and yes it is frustrating if he is not stopped. At least he gives a chance to defend against him, where as VW doesn't. That is all I wanted to say. VW is too ridiculous along with Ointment and for a bronze card. (Yes, I am thinking of creating a separate topic about Cripple. He is insane and no one complains about him I don't understand why).

As you are an active community member (and I believe you have helped me with my other queries too) I respect your opinion. It is like how Axeman is for you, VW are for me. I have never won against VW and probably will never and that is insane. I have won against Axeman and Cripple. If I don't know something, I ask from the community and I respect every single answer (and give REDPoints to every single answer). But I know that VW are too insane for a bronze card (along with ointment) and I simple can't accept if someone says that it is an OK card and doesn't need fixing.

 

[Pruny]

Greatswords are fine, they require setup. and without mandrake in first round i execute them with swordmasters.
I agree that Bearmaster in an abomination

 

[Khreygond]

ser2440, I agree that there are lot of broken cards which needs fixing. All I meant was, if people say VW is perfectly fine and don't need any fixing, they should be using that deck. Same goes for anyone who says Greatswords are fine, or Bearmasters+Veterans are fine, etc. All broken ridiculous bronze cards. I have lost against Axeman, and yes it is frustrating if he is not stopped. At least he gives a chance to defend against him, where as VW doesn't. That is all I wanted to say. VW is too ridiculous along with Ointment and for a bronze card. (Yes, I am thinking of creating a separate topic about Cripple. He is insane and no one complains about him I don't understand why).

As you are an active community member (and I believe you have helped me with my other queries too) I respect your opinion. It is like how Axeman is for you, VW are for me. I have never won against VW and probably will never and that is insane. I have won against Axeman and Cripple. If I don't know something, I ask from the community and I respect every single answer (and give REDPoints to every single answer). But I know that VW are too insane for a bronze card (along with ointment) and I simple can't accept if someone says that it is an OK card and doesn't need fixing.

Ι'd say the difference is that I think it's ok "in context". As in, since we do have a lot more broken cards and decks, they are ok for the game that we have now. They are not exceptionally powerful in comparison to the rest of the tier 1 decks and the cards these decks have.

Their real effect was that they helped kill engine decks and can nuke anything you put on the board. This is played around by no longer relying on units with an active ability but I don't consider that too healthy for the game. I am basically against nerfing them as long as the rest of the decks are how they are because they are the only good deck Nilfgaard has right now. In this time and place, if you nerf the Vipers, you kill Nilfgaard as a faction really, in the top tier. They'll have no competitive Tier 1 deck.

That's the same reason I was against the enforcer change some patches ago. While in general they were unhealthy for the game, and dropped late enough, they could destroy anything the opponent put on the board, they were ok in context, because the Spy deck was still not as powerful as Dwarves, Machines, and Eithne, the 3 most dominant decks. Even with the powerful enforcers, the spy deck only had 48% winrate or so. And that's saying a lot. So in a sense, I do agree that in a better game, Vipers would be non existent and Enforcers would function properly. However in this game, the one we have, doing so without very carefully changing every other card that needs changing, will simply end up killing Nilfgaard as a faction. It's how it happened with Enforcers, everyone cried out for a nerf and as soon as they got nerfed, the spy deck vanished. Off the charts. Nobody plays it anymore. It's the kind of change which is very precarious. While on the one hand, it has to happen if we want a better game, on the other, it must NOT happen before we are ready to have that. If it happens out of context, it will do more harm than good.

 

[rrc]

Ι'd say the difference is that I think it's ok "in context". As in, since we do have a lot more broken cards and decks, they are ok for the game that we have now. They are not exceptionally powerful in comparison to the rest of the tier 1 decks and the cards these decks have.

Their real effect was that they helped kill engine decks and can nuke anything you put on the board. This is played around by no longer relying on units with an active ability but I don't consider that too healthy for the game. I am basically against nerfing them as long as the rest of the decks are how they are because they are the only good deck Nilfgaard has right now. In this time and place, if you nerf the Vipers, you kill Nilfgaard as a faction really, in the top tier. They'll have no competitive Tier 1 deck.

That's the same reason I was against the enforcer change some patches ago. While in general they were unhealthy for the game, and dropped late enough, they could destroy anything the opponent put on the board, they were ok in context, because the Spy deck was still not as powerful as Dwarves, Machines, and Eithne, the 3 most dominant decks. Even with the powerful enforcers, the spy deck only had 48% winrate or so. And that's saying a lot. So in a sense, I do agree that in a better game, Vipers would be non existent and Enforcers would function properly. However in this game, the one we have, doing so without very carefully changing every other card that needs changing, will simply end up killing Nilfgaard as a faction. It's how it happened with Enforcers, everyone cried out for a nerf and as soon as they got nerfed, the spy deck vanished. Off the charts. Nobody plays it anymore. It's the kind of change which is very precarious. While on the one hand, it has to happen if we want a better game, on the other, it must NOT happen before we are ready to have that. If it happens out of context, it will do more harm than good.

I agree completely. All broken cards should be balanced (lets not call it nerfed). An average value of a bronze is 11, a silver is 13, and a gold is 15 according to the game. So, if any card should get more value out of it, it should be by the virtue of strategy and tactics. Shupe and Ciri Nova are valuable if you sacrifice your deck building (BTW, I won a NG today because he/she played a Shupe build and it had no synergy and even Shupe couldn't win that game). But alchemy cards are by no way weak or a sacrifice. It is like we are comparing a bronze card with gold cards. Anyhow, I am done ranting and crying about VW. Lets just wait and see what CDPR does in the next balancing.

 

[Pruny]

wrong, diference from silver to bronze its at least 3, same for golds. if you have 11bronzes then silvers should be at least 14, but they are not.
remove braindead 12points bronze halfelf,bearmaster, elven scout, slave driver

 

[Khreygond]

I agree completely. All broken cards should be balanced (lets not call it nerfed). An average value of a bronze is 11, a silver is 13, and a gold is 15 according to the game. So, if any card should get more value out of it, it should be by the virtue of strategy and tactics. Shupe and Ciri Nova are valuable if you sacrifice your deck building (BTW, I won a NG today because he/she played a Shupe build and it had no synergy and even Shupe couldn't win that game). But alchemy cards are by no way weak or a sacrifice. It is like we are comparing a bronze card with gold cards. Anyhow, I am done ranting and crying about VW. Lets just wait and see what CDPR does in the next balancing.

Just want to point out that while bronze nominal value is 11, the rest is not really 13 and 15. Geralt's value is 15 sure, but that's a low gold value. Just like in the Isengrim thread, Geralt's value might be low but it has maximum consistency (it's always 15, so it always attains the highest value it can) with no commitment or cost (unlike Ciri: Nova for example which requires you to have 2 bronze copies of everything). So all cards, including bronzes, become an equilibrium of pretty much 5 things:

Highest Value: This has 2 sub categories

• Point Swing: How many points it gives you when played in the best case scenario
• Indirect Value: Points that are not given to you the moment this card is played. Vesemir is crucial to the NG handbuff deck for example, that's why people use Royal Decree. He doesn't swing for much when played but buffs all your bronzes afterwards, so it has a lot of value even if it doesn't swing for any points

Lowest Value: What's the worst value this card can have

Consistency: How consistently this card gains its highest value, or very nearly

Cost: How much do you need to commit in order to make this card worth it

Flexibility: How many ways it has to gain value

Active ability units have a massive Highest value, especially in a deck that synergizes with them, but they are not very consistent, since they get removed very easily, and the cost is to build your whole deck around them, which is why Engine decks are subpar. Geralt's Highest value is low, at 15, and he is not very flexible, but has 100% consistency and no cost. It will always be 15.

So now you can see why Tutor cards are so crucial. Rainfarn of Attre for example, has, in most decks, 2 ways to gain value. With Joachim or Cantarella. With Joachim it gives you a large point swing, while with Cantarella its value is indirect in tutoring the spy and thinning the deck. It is very consistent if played with the right deck, only rarely bricking, the cost is just to bring 2 silver disloyals and it has at least 2 ways to gain value: these 2 disloyal units. Same goes for Natalis and Whispess: Tribute.

So saying the average silver is 13 and the average gold is 15 doesn't really do it justice in my opinion. That's what the cards that have no cost and max consistency give you. The average good gold value is closer to 19 - 20. "No commitment bronzes" should be 11 but only those that don't really fit any other category. That's why Bearmasters and Half Elf Hunters are bad for the game. They are worth 12, give you 2 bodies and also have synergy with at least one very viable strategy (veterans or elf swarm). In a way, Fiends are also bad due to the Relict synergy. And Dimun Warships because of the added corsair, pirate captain and axemen synergy. If something is going to be worth 11 points, it needs to be so without any other possible added bonus, I think. Just like the old Fiends which were worth 8 (the nominal bronze value then) but had absolutely no synergy with anything.

On the contrary, Machine bronzes are well designed. they need 1 crewman to be worth 11 - 12 points in most situations, worth more with 2, less with none.