Venendal Elite Completely Ruining Ranked Play

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SHALLAHJUSTICE;n10250512 said:
Leave it as it is, just stop it from targeting golds.

Do it, and you are destroying the card.

the best way to balance it is to cap the number of power it can swap to a reasonable degree, thats it.
 
That's all well and good but i think the discontent is mainly stemming from the fact it can target golds, which will more often or not ruin a ranked match.

Or at the very least but the targeted player at a severe and unfair disadvantage.

Leave it as it is, just stop it from targeting golds.

If it hits a high level gold, that almost a scorch plus it steals the power. That's a better ability then most golds.

You need to consider how strong golds usually are. The strongest golds are Olaf, Hjalmar and Geralt. The latter two rarely see any play at all, with Olaf being the primary target, in which case, don't have it in your hand. The most common golds ( Ge'els, Schiru, Iorverth: Meditation, Ciri: Nova, Ithlinne, Zoltan, Vilgefortz, Menno, Woodland Spirit, Caranthir, Coral, Lugos, Leo Bonhart) all have a strength which makes the Venendal from an ok card to rubbish.

I am aware that not all golds are the same but since ranked play was mentioned, the most common golds had to be referenced. In conclusion, what matters is a gold unit's ability, not its power. That's why golds are well...golds. Even Tibor and Ciri: Nova are only strengthened if they are placed down.
 
Sheva007;n10250602 said:
Do it, and you are destroying the card.

the best way to balance it is to cap the number of power it can swap to a reasonable degree, thats it.

I think your being a tad bit dramatic saying that it will "destroy" the card.

For arguments sake lets say it does "destroy" the card, if destroying it allows the developers to keep things fair in competitive play, so be it. Hardly the biggest sacrifce anyones made for the greater good.

I honestly don't think it will be "destroyed" anyway their are loads of clever little strategies for using VE i'm sure, maybe people haven't even experimented with the card fully yet. (plus it still targets silvers)

It's a cool card even without targeting golds and if could ruin certain bronzes like swordmasters etc.
 
4RM3D;n10250302 said:
You cannot simply add those numbers together without looking at the circumstances. I have explained in my post why your math is wrong.

On your "logic", if alzur thunder dont kill its target, its always 0 point play, because you can play around it with decoy or mushrooms
 
It's clear that those who claim it needs to be nerfed never played reveal.

ALL the “solutions” indicates it
1.Olaf. Do you play it in first round? no? then don't have it in your hand in round 1. Reveal players can't risk having this card with a 9 strength reveal card in later rounds only to hope catch a high strength.
2.Cap. By that standard it's a 12 point max card, with possibilities that opponent can simply mulligen the damaged card, making it 6 str. Why don't I just play spy deck then?? assasin is easy to pull from deck, 9 max point with eliminating unit and spy synergy.

Ppl that want vandal/sweer etc situational cards nerfed never realize it's their own problem for making the situation against themselves
 
ser2440;n10250752 said:
The most common golds ( Ge'els, Schiru, Iorverth: Meditation, Ciri: Nova, Ithlinne, Zoltan, Vilgefortz, Menno, Woodland Spirit, Caranthir, Coral, Lugos, Leo Bonhart) all have a strength which makes the Venendal from an ok card to rubbish.

Using Venendal on Vilgefortz, Bonhart, Menno, etc is 15+ points swing. That's hardly rubbish.

Using them on Olaf, Geralt or Tibor provides 30+ points swing. For a bronze card! Only scorch, Shirru and GIgni can do more.
 
SHALLAHJUSTICE;n10250842 said:
I think your being a tad bit dramatic saying that it will "destroy" the card.

For arguments sake lets say it does "destroy" the card, if destroying it allows the developers to keep things fair in competitive play, so be it. Hardly the biggest sacrifce anyones made for the greater good.

I honestly don't think it will be "destroyed" anyway their are loads of clever little strategies for using VE i'm sure, maybe people haven't even experimented with the card fully yet. (plus it still targets silvers)

It's a cool card even without targeting golds and if could ruin certain bronzes like swordmasters etc.

You say that because you aren't analysing the card properly.

Literally every argument people have made against the Elite here is 'I don't want to have to play around it'. Well tough. I don't want to have to play around tons of things in the game. Should every card I hate playing against be removed? No. I hate playing around Wrath of God in Magic: The Gathering, but the fact I have to isn't a problem with the game. Having to play around things is the literal skill part of card games. Sticking to Gwent, I hate playing around the following cards: Rag Na Roog, Drought, Ciri: Nova, Schirru, Ithlinne, Scorch (the most play-aroundey-card of all cards to play around), Geralt: Igni, Skellige Storm, Axemen, Henselt (the leader himself, he's a royal pain), Radovid (likewise, engine-locking git that he is), Harald and the list goes on and on.

Should all these cards be removed? Harald gives a simple axeman a 20 pt power swing! Heaven help if there's two!

All these arguments amount to 'I want my game to be easier for me'. Or even worse 'I don't want reveal/insert deck here to be an actual threat'. Not 'this is bad for the game'.

The Venendral Elite puts pressure on you. If a card you would rather was safe gets revealed, you suddenly have to take a risk. Do I play it now and pass on a better moment to do so, or do I take the chance on him having Venendral and this really sucking for me? Practice, learn how to play against reveal. The deck is not that good. It simply isn't. It struggles in all but the first round, and even then, in its strongest round, all you need to do is stop them from sticking a mangonel and suddenly they're fighting to win the one round that they can usually guarantee a win on.

Please, just practice against it. I can honestly say I've been inconvenienced by Venendral Elite maybe twice in the last week. On every other occasion I've simply mulliganed the things I wanted to protect and later mulliganed whatever the Elite hit, if anything. On a few occasions I had a hearty belly laugh as they hit my hand and reduced my Tanhamar from 4 points to 1, or once, a slave driver from 2 to 1.

The idea that this card should be silver is ridiculous. Silver cards are always pretty good, often great, sometimes game-breakingly powerful. The Venendral Elite requires set up to even have a chance to be powerful, and you can play around it and prevent it from doing much. It is perfectly fine as a bronze. I'd go so far as to say it's one of CDPR's better ideas, in fact, because it opens up a new avenue of attack for the reveal deck and makes people think about something else other than points on the board.
 
SHALLAHJUSTICE;n10250842 said:
I think your being a tad bit dramatic saying that it will "destroy" the card.

.

Oh, but of course it will.

as mentioned in several post from different people in this very same thread, VE its a fairly unreliable card. When it hits, it hits like a truck, but when it doesnt, its a card that ranges from subpar, to bad, or straighaway useless.

and you know what? If you reduce the pool of cards it can target, you are making it less reliable. And no reliability =/= competitiveness., so, when i say "kill" í mean it wont be competitive, because there will be better options to add to your deck.

Sure it will be part of meme decks or something to have fun, but thats as much as saying Gaunter sees play.

i'll say it again for the last time, since this thread is already getting a bit stale, you want to limit the potential power of the best case scenario? Í agree, give the card the BTM Treatment, so you will limit it, and at the same time give it a bit more flexibility,

But dont give it the spotter treatment, because you are killing the card.

 
SHALLAHJUSTICE;n10250512 said:
Leave it as it is, just stop it from targeting golds.

I could get behind that idea.

ZenaRose;n10250932 said:
On your "logic", if alzur thunder dont kill its target, its always 0 point play, because you can play around it with decoy or mushrooms

The fact that you've made that comparison, indicates you still don't understand the concept of points on the board and points in your hand (or elsewhere, for that matter). In your example, Thunder is still a 9 point play, regardless of how it gets countered. If you use Venendal Elite on a 10 strength unit, you play a 10 strength bronze on the board. That's it. It doesn't affect anything else on the board and as such, its power is average and lacking tempo. The strength of Venendal Elite stems from denying your opponent value later on, either by disabling the unit completely (i.e. any high strength unit without an ability) or by having him play his weakened unit to trigger its ability, which is only necessary if you've hit a crucial unit and it only matters when that unit had high strength to begin with. All this makes Venendal Elite an unreliable card with the possibility of gaining little to no value only being offset by its high potential, if it does happen to hit Olaf once in a blue moon.
 
I play a stupid deck with Yoana, since nobody is playing. But when you play against NG, Venendal (a bronze card) can reset gold cards to 1 but Yoana (a silver) cannot buff them again. Maybe the problem is not Venendal is too strong, but other cards are too weak. Nevertheless, I agree that is ridiculous that Venendal can hit gold cards.
 
Honestly, the card is more annoying than really strong. Overall it's a massively overestimated card that's fairly easy to play around and deny advantage from.
Remember that your opponent obviously has to reveal your card in order to hit it, that gives you a clue of what they have in hand and can do and you can adjust your play accordingly (meaning if you have a pure body unit you can consider playing it immediately so you deny its value or simply let the whole thing happen with the intention to mulligan it later).
Also, remember that all units aren't bodies, when your units get revealed think about the power they will give you and consider their body. Most of the time you can just let your opponent absorb their power and still have an advantageous play.

The unit is also fairly easy to deal with since it's a 1 str bronze with a boost and healing/reseting/replaying your unit will bring them to full health if you have those kind of tools at your disposal.

So, of course, there is some situations when you can't do much to prevent it but that's the point of a card right, if it couldn't generate value nobody would play it. It's supposed to be a spoiler that lower the value of your opponent's play kinda similar to the Guardian or Sweers in a way. Again, it's annoying but frankly it's not that strong if you know how to deal with it or play around it.

I do play them in my reveal deck and I think they're stronger because of the mindgame they infuse than the actual value they produce. When your opponent know you run them, they will tend to dish their high value cards which can be very useful when you're bleeding your opponent even when you don't actually hold them. In a way that increases the value of your Alchemist which are pretty terrible otherwise, so I think it's a pretty important tool for reveal. If you nerf them I doubt this archetype would be very playable to be honest so I sure hope that they don't.
 
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Using Venendal on Vilgefortz, Bonhart, Menno, etc is 15+ points swing. That's hardly rubbish.

No that's being an ok card. Anything less than 13 and it doesn't get the value any other bronze does though.


Using them on Olaf, Geralt or Tibor provides 30+ points swing. For a bronze card! Only scorch, Shirru and GIgni can do more.

You selectively copied my post, in a way that I genuinely wonder if you've only read the part you copied. Go read the rest of it please. Tibor is 10 points in hand and not really used in ranked play. Nor is vanilla Geralt and I was talking about ranked. Olaf is the only gold this card can outperform. And no one plays that on the first round anyway, because it will get damage (not enough bears have been played). It's no problem keeping it out of your hand for the first rounds.
 
I ran it for a while in a deck, pretty hilarious against the 20point gold bear from Skellige.

Though I must say it has a lot of problems.

1 sometimes you just dont get any revealed cards when you play this and you get a 1 power bronze instead.

2 It doesn't work against non-power cards like spells (it used to become an 11 strength if used on a non-power), which if the enemy deck is full of them consider it gg.

3 Or if the enemy has low powered cards like bear skellige or priests, again consider it gg.



Yes it can be very powerful but it can also be extremely weak. For reveal though, this is fine because most reveals on enemy cards actually nets barely anything for them. It is this card that is needed to sway the power numbers back in.

eg.

Let's play two cards.

Alchemist revealing two fire scoprions, making the play 9 + 5 + 5. Then playing a fire scorpion for another 5 + 5, total of 29 points.

vs

Alchemist revealing two enemy units making the play a 9. Playing an elite on an enemy of 11 points would put the play at 20 points, and 30 points IF the enemy plays that unit.

OR playing an elite on a 20 point card would put the play at 29 points, 49 IF the enemy plays the unit.

OR what happens to be more likely is that the card will be around 7 points, making it a 16 point play with a full potential of 24 points IF the enemy plays that unit.

OR If the target has no power as all, it makes the elite only worth 1 point. 10 point play.

They may also choose to wait and mulligen it out of hand.



So in conclusion, without putting an essay of maths into the different ways you can reveal units, drawing the 3 power golems per enemy reveal or many other ways to play, the card has a HUGE difference in possibility. It could be anything between a 49 point play and a 1 point play. The thing is that when you are affected by such a play, it is usually on the bigger side.

The best counter to this card is to always play your highest unit as soon as it is revealed. However this is another strength of the card: forcing the enemy to play certain cards in order. Not many cards in the game can boast this ability.
 
StrykerxS77x;n10248252 said:
I'm assuming you are talking about ranked so what MMR?

Rank 16 right now, but most of the people are there at the moment. Met a lot of people with good borders/avatars playing NG.
 
And yet Reveal is one of the weakest archetypes. It's barely competitive (that is, barely Tier 2) now, after the buffs it received with Midwinter and hell, even werewolves are more viable. if it was "completely overpowered" and "unbalanced" as people say, then why isn't Reveal at the top?
 
Venendal is to strong for a bronce card, most NG just are to greedy and wait till they found a 10+ unit ( and mostly ending with a 1 point card).

The question is how to nerf it without destroying it.
 

DRK3

Forum veteran
Let me present one last argument on how powerful Venendal Elite is - do you know the card Bekkers Twisted Mirror? It's a Silver Special. When was the last time you saw it played? Exactly.

Its a Silver, and not only is it risky, but it caps the 'switch effect' at 10 points maximum. And Venendal Elite, which is a bronze, and not so risky on a reveal deck, and yet it can be always more effective than Twisted Mirror, as it doesnt have any point cap and can target ALL units!
 
Its a Silver, and not only is it risky, but it caps the 'switch effect' at 10 points maximum. And Venendal Elite, which is a bronze, and not so risky on a reveal deck, and yet it can be always more effective than Twisted Mirror, as it doesnt have any point cap and can target ALL units!

Except Bekker's Twisted Mirror affects the battlefield. Its point swing happens immediately and there is nothing you can do about that. As for the Venendal, it requires setup in the form of revealing cards, specifically enemy, specifically enemy units, and especially high power enemy units and then saps their power sure but you can still make up for that by swapping away said unit, cutting down the Venendal's power by 50% essentially.
 
KasumiGoto;n10253762 said:
Rank 16 right now, but most of the people are there at the moment. Met a lot of people with good borders/avatars playing NG.

All I know is I am at 18 and dwarves are pretty dominant. Reveal isn't very threatening.
 
ser2440;n10254902 said:
Except Bekker's Twisted Mirror affects the battlefield. Its point swing happens immediately and there is nothing you can do about that. As for the Venendal, it requires setup in the form of revealing cards, specifically enemy, specifically enemy units, and especially high power enemy units and then saps their power sure but you can still make up for that by swapping away said unit, cutting down the Venendal's power by 50% essentially.

So what? VE requires "setup" that is tailor-made for NG! C'mon man.. how hard is it to "reveal" a card for NG (happens EVERY time I have played against NG) and then lay down a VE? Compared to BTM, it's more powerful, because it doesn't have the 10 point cap. And no.. VE does't "require" it to affect an enemy card: case in point is the most popular way to use it is with Cantarella. And before you (or anyone else) says that requires a draw.. well.. do the statistical calculation. Two cards to be drawn in the initial hand out of a 25 card deck? Not improbable, especially with the ways NG has methods to "tutor" cards.

edited to add: The fact that a bronze is more powerful than a silver, with setup that requires only one more step, is also indication it's OP.
 
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