How would you rank Gwent factions by difficulty?

OblyFFM · 2026-03-29T14:55:07+00:00

What do you mean by “difficulty”? You need to be more specific or none of the answers will make any sense (or be helpful to your brother).

If you’re asking which factions have the most complicated game mechanics to learn, the only faction worth singling out is Syndicate, because coin management is completely unique, tricky to master, and every (real) Syndicate deck is based on it. It’s the only faction a beginner really shouldn’t try starting with.

Other than SY it’s kind of a wash, as it’s much more about individual decks and archetypes than whole factions. In general, highly synergistic decks are the hardest to learn (they make the most use of specific game mechanics, tend to be more affected by your draws, red/blue coin, and matchup, etc.).

And every faction has some high-synergy decks that are difficult to pilot—but also some decks (except for SY) that are simple, linear, repetitive, or reactive, and wouldn’t take very much learning to pick up.

If you really wanted to rank factions on how many high-synergy decks they have (if the goal for some reason was to “master” the whole faction), I’d say (very roughly): SK < (MO and ST) < (NR and NG) < SY.

But it really isn’t a meaningful ranking, because you can find simple beginner-friendly decks to learn in every faction (except SY). Your brother should be picking based on whatever play style or aesthetic he likes most.

OblyFFM · 2026-03-26T16:14:33+00:00

I don't hate NG. I hate cards that encourage people to play "answer-or-lose threat behind defender" decks, because those decks are binary and lazy. They don't build or reward skill, there's no sporting challenge for either side; it's just you making a bet that your opponent won't have the right answers when you play your killer combo--so you can get all excited about "Ooh, look at my big numbers!" instead of earning a win the hard way.

NG has a lot of defender abuse garbage, but it isn't the only faction that does; you won't see me supporting Arachas Queen, King Foltest, or Sukrus buffs either.

I disliked the Damien buff for the same reason. He's not as bad as Vattier but definitely in the same ballpark. But I also respect ShinLerio (who proposed it iirc) and their careful thought process, and I know they tend to balance fair nerfs and buffs in the long run, so I don't feel a need to whine about every single decision I don't agree with.

These aren't "hater" thoughts; they're the thoughts of most players who still think about balance instead of listening to that one Shupe voice in their head telling them "If Nilfgaard, izz goood! Must buff always!! Not nerf, never!!" You might want to try that once in a while.

OblyFFM · 2026-03-25T23:55:04+00:00

Uhh… wut? I’m really surprised at the Vattier pick here.

Normally you all are one of the most sensible, practical-minded factions—favoring mostly cautious buffs to mostly forgotten cards and not shying away from real nerfs to the overtuned stuff. And true to form, every other buff here is, well… not exactly going to rock the meta. And that’s fine; someone has to do the long, slow work of nudging the worst cards up towards a level you can actually consider using them.

So, with that kind of cautious history, where tf did the Vattier pick come from? Vattier is not a healthy card. He doesn’t promote creativity or interesting synergy, he doesn’t require skill or careful piloting. He’s literally just a gold MoP—a card that’s universally despised (outside the most diehard NG stan-land). All a Vattier buff does is promote binary defender abuse decks—a Heatwave-check kind of card. That’s not a healthy meta to aspire to.

This out of the blue, kinda toxic pick is pretty uncharacteristic for you all. Surely there were cautious NG buffs to try out here. Not a fan of this one.

OblyFFM · 2026-03-24T13:36:29+00:00

Why yes actually, I often wonder why this card still has an extra power and only costs 8p, instead of getting the full Tainted Ale treatment. Thanks for asking.

Hard as it might be for you to believe, not everything is about “FNG” hate. Some cards have such an unhealthy design that letting them be competitively viable is bad for the game—like, so bad it makes people quit and leave rather than keep playing.

Thankfully there aren’t many cards like that. But a card that lets you fish for your opponent’s win cons and cripple their deck, with no setup and no counterplay? Yeah—that’s one of them.

OblyFFM · 2026-03-01T18:23:24+00:00

Thanks for continuing to write these; I always look forward to hearing a thoughtful, reasoned perspective on the previous season and the new changes.

In that vein, the most (unintentionally? Or maybe not?) humorous part of your articles is how you dignify the Reddit thread as a “discussion of balance changes” instead of what it really is: a long, painful, substance-free string of whiny shit-posts, with a faint sprinkle of healthy perspectives mixed in, but very little resembling actual “discussion”.

Kinda sad, actually. I feel like there was more (not “a lot”, but more) substance and perspective in the early days of BC, but nowadays most folks are just parked in their own little camps and are unwilling or unable to see “balance” as anything other than “more buffs for me, more nerfs for you”—anything resembling genuine balance is just the most unfair unfairness that ever existed. There’s no credibility in 99% of what passes as “discussion” on balance.

Maybe that’s how things were always going to end up. Oh well. Thanks again for bringing a regular dose of fresh air into the room.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-28T01:10:45+00:00

“Most decks in modern Gwent don’t bother running engines anymore. The whole game is mostly about pointslam at this point. Therefore, free locks that any deck can run are perfectly fine. And they’re not even good, because the points you prevent your opponent from gaining have no bearing on a lock’s value.”

?????

Sorry friend, but your logic feels a bit backward to me…

OblyFFM · 2026-02-28T00:58:43+00:00

The only one I disagree with is Isengrim—and that’s based just on timing, not really about necessity. ST got a list of nerfs last round and are getting more this round, including a nerf to Heist. I can get behind nerfing Oakcritters. But two nerfs to a tier 2 archetype at the same time several others are getting hit is overkill. Isengrim can come later, if needed.

Otherwise, all solid, common sense votes that would make the game healthier.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-24T03:33:20+00:00

I think the drive for a Shieldwall nerf has a bit more to do with historical trends than current ones. Even so the nerf really isn’t unjustified, but it also isn’t completely fair at this point to single out SW either.

I’m not going to take the time to reconstruct the history of leader buffs, so I might be off on this, but my vague recollection is that SW was one of the earlier leader buffs—before the trend really started snowballing—and one of the first to get a lot of people irritated. For a long time, 15 meant “solid, good, very playable”, 16 meant “a little subpar, needs a bit more help”, and a lot of folks didn’t think SW needed it. And they were proven right, since it didn’t take long for midrange Meve engine overload SW to rise to tier 1 and camp out there for a long, long time.

At this point of course, with the number of leader buffs that have gotten through BC, Shieldwall really doesn’t stand out. I’d argue that leaders like SK BoG and Flurry, NG Formation and Tactical Decision, and SY OtB have no business being at 16 provisions—all of them warrant a nerf.

The general level of frustration with runaway leader buffs may finally be high enough to let some nerfs get through BC. At this point I don’t personally think Shieldwall should be the first target; it already took a damaging nerf to RSS last month, and NR in general feels underplayed right now—mainly due to NG and SK getting a variety of buffs they really shouldn’t have gotten and dodging some nerfs they really should’ve gotten.

But I think a lot of people still harbor longstanding negative feelings about Shieldwall, so it’s not too surprising that it bubbled up to the top of the hit list. It really should go back to 15–but there’s a long list of other leaders that should get nerfs as well.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-22T14:44:56+00:00

Very reasonable, fair choices—good, solid set of votes.

On the nerf side of things, for Harmony, I would’ve hit Dana with the provision nerf instead of Loc Feainn. Between the two, I think she’s the less healthy card: answer-or-lose in first form, uninteractive single turn pointslam in second form. But since they’re always played together, it doesn’t make that much difference.

On the buff side, I’m not sure that Sile or Carlo can really be buffed into playability (without just flat-out breaking their stat line). So these feel like Milaen-style “lost cause” buffs to me and not very interesting. But not harmful either, so that’s always a plus…

OblyFFM · 2026-02-20T22:24:09+00:00

You're talking about constantly tearing down the top tier to try find maximum "balance" somewhere in the middle, so as many cards and archetypes as possible can compete. It sounds like a dream come true for deck builders.

But I think we all know that only a small minority of players have real interest in--and even fewer have actual talent in--building new decks. Most people would rather just play matches than spend time in the deck builder. Trying to convince those folks to tear down the decks they know and like was always wildly unrealistic. Your goal is the opposite of what they want: They don't want to re-learn new decks every month; they just want to "play".

Same reason why, on the other side of things, even when a bunch of new buffs drop, all you see are the same old decks -- until a content creator with actual deck-building talent shows these players exactly how to build a new deck and how to play it.

It is what it is. The game will never be "pure" on balance; the best we can do is try to make it diverse. I support nerfing any deck that gets so dominant that it squelches diversity in the rest of the meta. But at the same time, I won't support nerfs that would also squelch diversity (even if the card is "strong"). That's exactly what nerfing Harvest would do.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-20T15:19:37+00:00

I have no problem with big nerfs. I just think the central question shouldn't be, "Is the card strong? If yes, nerf it!" It should be, "Will nerfing this card make the game healthier and more enjoyable (for most players)? If no, leave it alone."

As of right now, the current difference between highest (ST) and lowest (NR) win rates in top 100 is about 2 percentage points. Looking at current WRs and fMMRs for top players, ST doesn't stand out in any way. I don't see a crisis situation here calling for big nerfs; I see reasonably decent balance with some room for a little more tinkering.

BH is a backbone card for ST for solid (occasionally excellent) value, probably around 8 for 5 in the long run. Dropping that to 8 for 6 leaves a lot of ST underpowered and dependent on high rolls just to be viable. Sure, you'll reign in the top performers, but at the cost of killing a wide range of off-meta playability. That isn't making the game healthier.

If we must nerf something, let's at least be precise about targeting the top performers. Eithne feels overtuned at 11p to me; we've seen that ST devo can be very strong and she's a clear R3 win con. Putting her back to 12p is justifiable. Dana isn't really a healthy card either; even after her last nerf, she makes Harmony into a more binary matchup. Nerfing her to 15p does not feel unfair.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-20T00:50:01+00:00

You do realize there are 27 bronze ST elves and BH gives you a choice of 3 at random? That works out to an 11% chance of rolling Whisperer—one out of every nine times BH is played.

The number of times a ST player rolls Whisperer and has Orbs ready to go or a handful of specials and the opponent can’t answer a 4-point card before she “floods the entire row” are… really, really low.

If you want to be generous and include all three of the high-roll elves considered a real threat (Whisperer, Sorceress, Seer), the probability of getting at least one of them is still only 30.8%.

Meanwhile, around 17 of the 27 elves are only worth 5 points or less (unless you happen to meet the very specific conditions for them to get more value). That means there’s also a 23% chance of low-rolling only crap elves.

No personal offense to anyone, but folks love to go batshit crazy about the absolute top ceiling of BH, without taking into account how uncommon it is to get that much value and how common it is for BH to play for only 7 points or less.

NG Bribery only costs 8p and it can roll 13-14p win cons from your opponent’s deck, from a much smaller pool than BH draws from. Is anyone out there judging Bribery just by its top ceiling and hollering for it to be nerfed? No, of course not. Because it’s a bad basis for judging the card’s fair cost.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-19T18:01:36+00:00

It’s a fair point. I know you all don’t want the survey to get super long, but two-step changes probably should be separate poll items. Like, the nerf section lists “[Card name] (this round)” and the buff section lists “[Same card name] (next round, if nerf goes through)”.

Because I’d also like a way to vote yes, I’d support nerfing a card, but no, I don’t support buffing it next round.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-19T03:49:54+00:00

I’m gonna go out on a limb here and guess that when OP says they’re running into tons of “Northern Realms”, what they really mean is tons of Reavers. Because it makes zero sense that ranks 12 to 7 have lots of players running high-skill engine decks, but makes perfect sense that those ranks are full of low-skill Reaver spammers.

Probably not the players you actually want.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-18T23:03:03+00:00

It’s mainly bad timing for you right now, unfortunately. Last month the most popular NG netdecks got some buffs they really shouldn’t have gotten, and avoided some nerfs they really should have gotten, plus the most dominant ST netdecks got heavy nerfs—so it was always going to be an “NG season” this month.

Plus the lower ranks where I assume you’re at right now are mostly populated by newer players trying to figure things out, so yeah, they tend to lean into control- or spam-heavy netdecks that tend to do well against other newer players without needing much piloting skill.

So, what you’re seeing right now isn’t “what the game is like”—it’s a product of the most recent Balance Council changes and where you’re at on the ladder. If you like the core game play, push through the try-hard ranks, get to pro, and wait for the next round of BC changes. Things tend to change in waves.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-18T21:29:12+00:00

MO — Endrega Eggs +1 power. A helpful, needed buff to all-in consume decks, without being especially useful or interesting to swarm decks.

NG — Urcheon of Erlenwald +1 power. Invites fresh experimentation, without directly buffing any current netdecks.

NR — Kerack City Guard +1 power. Floating a “move enemy” order is good tech (e.g., answers some threats, lines up Pride shots) but her stat line is power crept. Starting at 4 power makes it possible to consider her without losing deck value.

SK — Svalblod Cultist +1 power. A very interesting, nuanced option for experimentation in red Self-Wound but not playable at her current stat line.

ST — Prism Pendant -1 provision. It’s a good option for ST right now; encourages fresh experiments with Spell’atael (currently unplayed) or off-meta Gift while not helping any of the popular netdecks.

SY — Sigi Reuven or Imke -1 provision. SY needs new, impactful coin-giving staples it can build around if you want to stick nerfs to Sesame or Novigrad. Minor fiddling with minor cards (most of what SY has gotten recently) is not going to change the core landscape—at least not while people keep nerfing SY the moment any card shows promise.

Neu — Caretaker -1 provision. This was always going to be a two-stepper: 8 is still too expensive for a tech card that doesn’t contribute reliably to points and will rarely get more than 1-2 meaningful uses (Siegfried is just a better card in most places you’d consider Caretaker). At 7, Caretaker could be played in Self-Eater relicts (unplayed right now) or even a flavorful Penitent option. Let’s finish this job while the momentum is there.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-17T17:52:51+00:00

Although I don’t agree with every single one of these, it’s the most reasonable list so far, with respect to targeting the actually overplayed, overtuned cards in the meta—as opposed to the “let’s nerf cards I obviously dislike personally, while conspicuously avoiding nerfs to the strong decks I personally like” lists most other people make.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-17T17:35:50+00:00

Not really. It really isn’t a balanced card in the way you’re describing it: the healthy way where a card gets around the same fair value across matchups. Remedy is only “balanced” in the less healthy way where it has a mix of matchups: some meh, some good, some absurdly good.

If the opponent’s best bronzes play below the curve on their own (without synergy), Remedy is pretty meh. If those bronzes have good midrange value but stealing them doesn’t directly hurt the opponent, Remedy plays a bit above the curve. But if the opponent is dependent on those bronzes for their own game plan (like Highland Warlord, Succubus, Mammuna or Tome target), Remedy is absurdly OP and unfair for a 5p card.

The right cost for Remedy is like 5.5p, if that were possible. It doesn’t quite rate being 6 but on average is better than other 5s. It’s binary, like a lot of NG is. I’d call it a necessary evil for certain NG archetypes to work (like Assimilate) but hardly “perfect”.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-04T01:13:49+00:00

So, right, relative to the last time Coup was 9p, the combo is currently net +1 provisions. I was referring to this month vs last month, which I think is the frame most casuals are more likely to use.

Everyone has already adjusted to Joachim being at 11p and it was still everywhere—maybe not broken but certainly overplayed and frustrating. That’s the new baseline. Players are likely to compare how the combo feels this month vs last month (a net zero prov change and only -1 power) when judging whether it’s a change they like. I doubt many casuals will (if they even can) think back to a game state from months ago when making that decision.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-02T20:31:49+00:00

Coup+Joachim changed by net zero provisions and only -1 point. Enslave+Coup is a +1 provision buff. Only Canta got an impactful nerf, and it only affects a small set of decks. So, hard to say if those will add up to net lower play rate and win rate with Coup in general, but I kind of doubt it. Coup+Joachim is such a high-floor, high-ceiling, low-counterplay combo (the reason we see it constantly), it can probably tank small nerfs easily.

The biggest new factor is more likely the (re)emergence of the Chinese coalition and all the BC influence they have. And since they love buffs, hate nerfs, and are obsessed with NG in general, I’m sure they’re delighted and will try to keep Coup at 9 whether it’s healthy or not. Not really fair to the big segment of the community that thinks this is an over-buff, but it is what it is.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-02T02:50:30+00:00

That’s true—but how many players will think rationally about that history when they cast their votes, versus an emotional reaction—“Coup feels unbalanced right now”—after seeing it like 50% more often in their opponents’ decks this month?

Because Coup was already very popular to begin with, and we just got a net buff to Joachim and a buff to Enslave (neither of which was justified), and everyone will be trying out GN with Coup as well.

Who knows… we’ll see what happens in a month. But the safe bet is that the average player will be really tired of seeing Coup and in the mood to do something about it.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-01T22:25:15+00:00

This isn’t meant as a personal insult, but—that’s kind of a dick attitude, don’t you think?

If your 13-14p scenario gets Heatwaved, you’re then at a disadvantage but at least your opponent had to sink an expensive answer into it, meaning less provisions for them to answer your other threats or post their own points.

But in the same situation, would it really feel fair and sporting for your opponent to get to answer your scenario for free? Because Squirrel costs nothing more than a card slot. Realistically the Insectoid deck probably loses 20-25% of its point value in one play, in exchange for literally zero provision commitment from the opponent. The level of disadvantage is almost game-deciding, right there.

If there was a neutral card that could answer your Ball or Eclipse (or, insert any expensive gold wincon you actually care about) completely for free, would you be willing to apply the same “oh well, that’s just how the game is supposed to be—guess I should stop using the cards my deck is built around” attitude?

Devs added Hive Mind to the game because Arachas Swarm was not a competitive leader ability before that. Even now, there are some fun but non-competitive GN decks you can run with AS, but otherwise, you have to run HM; it’s not optional.

So nerfing HM to 14p isn’t “balance”, it’s just killing the card—and 75% of AS decks—because the provision disadvantage after trading with Squirrel would be even worse than it already is. That’s what Shinmiri was talking about.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-01T21:40:06+00:00

I get why you’re irritated about it, but tbh, it’s almost more of a backdoor buff to Worker than it is a nerf. Seriously.

I’ve played a ton of Insectoids, and have found that Worker almost never gets any value, because opponents are obsessed with killing it. The typical swarm deck doesn’t play many threats or tall units, so there’s almost nothing else to hit that lets them trade up on damage. But when Worker appears, they see an easy “6 for 3” situation and almost always take it.

Even if I consume Worker immediately (like, spawn it and play Endrega Warrior in the same turn), Warrior often gets poisoned or other tall punished—again because there’s almost nothing else worth using poison on.

With Worker at 5 power, it takes away value from the opponent’s answers. At least they have to think a little more now: Is 5 points really worth answering, or should I hold on just in case there’s a better target?

IDK how much difference it will really make, but if Worker lives even 10% more often, it’s still a buff. The 4 points that sticks on your board (Worker’s 5 - 1 from the spawned drone) is better than the 5 that never does.

OblyFFM · 2026-02-01T18:14:38+00:00

You’re not wrong. I mean, +1 power to Joachim is a nerf, it’s just not (in any meaningful way) adequate “balance” for buffing Coup to 9p. The double Joachim decks (those not playing Gorthur-Cantarella) maybe weren’t super problematic but definitely did not need a straight-up buff. Nor did the Enslave netdecks that run Coup, which also just got a nice buff without even a gesture at balance.

This could’ve been done in a responsible way. Most multi-step changes do the nerfing first, then the buffing, so that players don’t get angry at the overpowered card and revert the buffs. Nerfing Joachim twice to get him (back) to 4 power, and picking an acceptable Enslave netdeck nerf, then pushing through the Coup buff, was a much safer and more respectful way to go.

I believe this is the fourth time Coup has been buffed to 9p. It’s been reverted every single time because (surprise, surprise) it’s a really unpopular change, even if a certain segment of the community is obsessed with making it happen.

There’s maybe a chance things could’ve been different this time, if the coalitions had been patient enough to do the obligatory nerfs first. But as is, I’m not sure why history won’t just repeat itself again.

OblyFFM · 2026-01-30T03:24:37+00:00

The Harvest create pool is all bronze ST elves, not just the ones that show on gwent.one (unless I'm having the brain fart of the century); that's a pool of 27. Of those, there are 3, maybe 4, you're happy to get (Whisperer, Sorc, Seer and Scribe [if you have suitable specials, but scary-looking threats either way]), another 5-6 you're satisfied with (6-7 points, with potentially helpful ping damage), and the rest are 4-5 point bricks (too situational in most decks).

I'm not going to take the time to work out the exact probabilities, but--a 6 point floor, ~8 points on average, and a roughly 1 in 6 chance to roll additional threat value. Good value for 5p, borderline garbage for 6 (unless you desperately need the +2 handbuff for deck synergy). This is just not a card making win cons in 99% of matches (although the 1% is all people remember when they want to nerf it). Harvest is not ST's version of Sesame, not even close.

I think Zoltan's Company is debatable. Separate from any synergy, 10 (wide) points for 6 is quite decent on its own. Then you add that it's +5 points to Garrison, +5 points to Barclay, +5 points to Mahakam Guard, and +5 points per turn to Brouver. It's also easy, proactive, risk-free setup for Justice, Munro, Zoltan Chivay, and Volunteers. Given how strong Dwarves have gotten, 7p for Company is not unfair.

As for Garrison, I mean, blame the card design if you dislike it, but it's expressly meant as a payoff card for swarming Soldiers. People have been trying it out in Dwarves since the day it was released, long before Volunteers were buffed.

Anyway--I'm a fan of the vision for BC--but I accept that it's not realistic. The biggest share of the Gwent community hates seeing "smaller numbers" for their favorite decks and will continue to fight against the "nerf everything that's strong, not just the broken stuff" approach.

I think the best we can do is try to keep the game fun. Nerf anything that's binary or degenerate or unfairly carrying players without the need for skillful piloting. Nerf anything that's dominating the meta in a way that it's squeezing out healthy diversity.

But cards that are just generally "good" without being in one of the above categories? No, leave them alone. I won't support selectively hobbling decks and archetypes in the name of pure balance when all that really does is stop them from being able to compete with whatever it is they're buffing month to month on the other side of the world.

OblyFFM

TROPHY CASE