GWENT - Patch 9.2.2018

As announced by the developers, the current GWENT patch is particularly focused on the game balance and takes care of the problems since the midwinter update. There are also a lot of bug fixes and tooltip improvements. On top of that there is a discount on the transmutation to premium cards this weekend.

A long requested feature also comes with the patch, it is now possible to reroll one of the daily quests. So if you are stuck on a quest that requires victories or games with a faction that you rarely or never play, you can now get rid of them in the hope of better quests.

Statement by the GWENT developers on the patch

With this update we have focused on balance changes as well as adding numerous game fixes and tooltip improvements. In addition, we have introduced a weekend discount on the transmutation of premium cards - you can upgrade cards to the premium version for half the transmutation costs until Monday, February 12th, 12:00 noon.

We've also created a detailed map detailing all of the map changes made in this update and the reasons for them. If you are interested in the full patch notes, you can find them below.

GWENT - cards hit by the Nerf hammer

Commanders horn

Old ability: Boost 5 neighboring units by 4.
Updated ability: Boost 5 adjacent units by 3.

Kommandantenhorn has been a popular map since the beginning of GWENT development and has been changed several times. Before the update, it was too strong (much stronger than other silver cards) which made it too popular for a neutral silver card. We decided to tone it down a bit. We believe this change is vital, especially considering the card can be played twice via Eithne's ability.

Bone talisman

Ancient Ability: Choose: Resurrect a Bronze Beast or Svalblod and buff it by 2, or heal an allied unit and buff it by 3.
Updated Ability: Choose: Resurrect a Bronze Beast or Bronze Cultist, or heal an allied unit and empower it by 3

As an item, Bone Talisman can easily be used by clan protectors, and as such it can generate a lot of strength for a bronze card. Before the update, this card generated a solid 15 points with the following combination: Clan Protector (2) -> Talisman (+2) -> Bear (11) = 15 bronze points. Because of this, the strength effect has been removed from Bone Talisman's ability.

Aglaïs

Power changed from 9 to 8.
Ancient ability: Resurrect a bronze or silver special card from your opponent's graveyard.
Updated ability: Resurrect a bronze or silver special card from your opponent's graveyard and then banish it.

Because Aglaïs almost always has a target in the form of runestones and commanders horn, Aglaïs is a popular addition to most Scoia'tael decks. When the number of possible targets was smaller, it made sense that it was a 9 strength card. Anyway - we have now restructured Aglaïs. Her power is reduced to 8 and the card she revived is banished so that it cannot be used with Eithné.

Iorveth: meditation

Ancient ability: Force 2 units to duel.
Updated Ability: Force up to 2 enemy units in the same row to duel.

Right now, Iorveth: Meditation is a very powerful card that is considered a must have in every Scoia'tael deck. We didn't want to change the card's ability because it was so unique, we decided that it should be restricted to units in the same row. In this way, interactions involving this card can be provided with more counter-possibilities.

Slimy

Power changed from 3 to 2.

Schleimling is one of the top 4 cards that are played not only in Consume, but in all Monster Archetype decks. That prompted us to take a closer look at it to finally make the decision to decrease the strength of the card by 1 point.

Monster nest

Ancient Ability: Generate a Bronze Necrophargen or Bronze Insectoid and upgrade it by 3.
Updated Ability: Generate a Bronze Necrophargen or Bronze Insectoid and upgrade it by 1

Monster Nest is a powerful card across all monster deck archetypes and is considered strong even without the boost mechanic. To prevent it from becoming too strong, we decided to reduce the boost effect to 1.

Slave driver

Power changed from 2 to 1.
Change: The card's ability no longer guarantees a choice between 3 unique cards.

Slavers were one of the strongest bronze cards in the game. The reason for this was the way this card's ability worked. Even if an opponent had multiple copies of the same card, when playing Slave Driver, a choice of 3 unique cards from the opponent's starting deck is guaranteed. After the update, this is no longer the case - if an opponent has 3 copies of a particular bronze card, the slave driver can potentially be offered the choice of multiple copies of the same card.

Summoning Circle

Ancient Ability: Generates a simple copy of the last unit of bronze or silver placed on the battlefield.
Updated Ability: Generates a simple copy of the last bronze or silver unit placed on the battlefield that is not an agent.

The ability to generate multiple copies of Silver Card Perk spies is something that crept into the game with the Midwinter update. With this change, we want to offset the card advantage that comes with the fact that a silver spy unit can give a player a single copy.

Shani

Power changed from 5 to 4.

Shani was the number one gold unit in the Northern Kingdoms. Indeed, in some cases their ability was too strong and for this reason we decided to decrease their strength by 1 point. Perhaps this doesn't look like a huge change, but we feel that this is the right way to properly balance the map in the long run.

Him

Power changed from 4 to 3.

In general, we want to weaken the “create” skills. One of the most popular Skellige cards with this particular ability, Him, is one of those cards we looked at. As in the case of Shani, while 1 point may not seem like a huge change in strength at first, we believe that the current strength-to-ability ratio will prove beneficial to the game's meta overall.

Dwarf skirmishers

Ancient ability: Damage an enemy unit by 3. If the unit was not destroyed, strengthen that unit by 3.
Updated ability: Deal 3 damage to an enemy unit. If the unit was not destroyed, boost that unit by 2.

The dwarf skirmishers are bread and butter of every Zwegdeck. They were previously able to be revived by Paulie Dahlberg for a huge power blow in round 3. After the update, the dwarf skirmishers use the ability to improve instead of strengthen and thus remain a useful addition to all dwarf decks, while at the same time forming a more balanced unit within the meta.

Stammelford's tremor

Ancient ability: Inflict 1 damage to all enemies. If any have been destroyed, generate a Lesser Guardian.
Updated Ability: Inflict 1 damage to all enemy units.

Double tremors, part of Ithlinne's ability, can do really great damage in and of yourself. Generating Lower Guardians made the map even more powerful. When we looked at Quake, we thought of a possible revision of Ithlinne. Given how much time it would take to plan and test their skills, we decided to shift the focus to Quake themselves. The end result is a change in the card's ability to focus solely on dealing damage. A simple example would be having 12 units on the opponent's side. The way quake was, an Ithlinne move would be worth 38 points (2 + 12 + 12 + 12 + 12 + 6 + 6 + 6). After the update, this move is worth 26 (2 + 12 + 12 + 12). We are aware that there are still more than some gold cards, but we want to test this change out before we move on to a possible makeover for Ithlinne.

Dwarf incitator

Power changed from 2 to 1.

Dwarven Rioter was able to bring a lot of speed into the game when he was brought together with dwarf skirmishers and Mahakam guards. We decided to reduce some of this speed of the dwarves by reducing the power of the dwarf agitator by 1 point.

Mahakam guard

The power has been reduced from 9 to 4.
Old Ability: Boost an allied unit by 3.
Updated Ability: Boost an allied unit by 4.

These guys are very powerful and indispensable in a lot of dwarf builds. There was a possibility that after switching to dwarf skirmishers, the Mahakam guards would become too powerful. We compensate for this by shifting our own strength into the ability to improve.

Elf scout

Power reduced from 2 to 1.

One of the most popular Scoia'tael bronze cards. As with the Dwarven Skirmishers, we decided to adjust the strength of this card to match the pace certain Scoia'tael decks could generate.

Doppler

Change: Organic as an attribute has been removed.

Doppler was mainly used to create additional units. Removing Organic from the map's attributes reduces the number of ways that Doppler can be accessed. There were simply too many than expected, with some - such as Herbal Woman (3 strength plus an additional unit of Doppler) - being too powerful.

Ciri: Nova

Old Ability: If you have exactly 2 copies of each bronze card in your starting deck, set that card's base strength to 25.
Updated Ability: If you have exactly 2 copies of each Bronze card in your starting deck, upgrade to 22.

Ciri: Nova has been played a lot since it was first introduced to the game. She was a powerful finisher. One that could be easily countered with Geralt: Igni, which, based on statistics, isn't one of the most used cards. By reducing the strength of the card to 22 points, we are making it a little weaker when it comes to the raw numbers, yet very prone to burn.

Berserker giant

Change: The ability does not trigger twice when a unit is both cursed and wounded.

We felt that this card's ability to trigger twice made it a little too powerful, hence adapting it to how it worked. This change does not affect all decks (e.g. bears that do not self-wound).

Slave infantry

Change: The created copies are now "Damned".

Originally, all unit copies were meant to be doomed by design. When the slave infantry spawning mechanics work on this principle, it prevents cards like ointment from reviving the slave infantry copies and from overfilling the cemetery with copies.

Half Elf hunter

Change: The created copy is now "Damn".

As with the slave infantry, we chose to 'condemn' all copies made by the half-elf hunters, as was originally intended in the unit copy draft. This prevents extensive copy chains from arising and cemeteries from being overfilled with copies.

Restore

Change: The unit resurrected via Restore is now "Doomed".

Restore and Sigrdrifa are currently played on every Skellige deck. Not only is this unhealthy for game and deck diversity, but it also suggests that those cards were actually too strong.

ointment

Old Ability: Choose: Heals an ally and randomly boosts allied units by 5; or resurrect a bronze unit with a strength of 5 or less
Updated Ability: Resurrect a Bronze unit with a strength of 5 or less

When we customized this map, we thought of the Nilfgaard alchemy. Making the ability a single option makes the card a little weaker, while the decision used to be a nobrainer because of its boost. Another thing is versatility; Giving two powerful options to a bronze card is too much in this case.

Tuirseach veteran

Change: The change of the category from soldier back to support has been reversed.

The initial change should be a buff for decks with Clan Veterans and Eist. On the PTR, however, we saw that if the soldier category remained with the veterans, that archetype would become too strong. We could have done the whole thing a little differently - but we want to come back to that in a later update.

Avallac'h

Change: Card is now "Damned".

We decided to add “Damn” to this card so that it can only be used once and cannot be revived with renew.

Impera Enforcer

Ancient Ability: Inflict 2 damage per spy on an enemy. Deal 2 damage when an enemy spy shows up.
Updated Ability: Deal 2 damage to an enemy unit. At the end of the turn, inflict 2 damage to an enemy unit if an enemy unit appears on your turn on espionage.

Retrospective damage was something that made Impera Enforcers too powerful. Previously, any espionage unit that was already on the board was counted towards the damage. Now enforcers must be used in front of spies.

Card Buffs: Cards that were rarely played received 1 point strength buffs.

Joana

Old Ability: Heals a Bronze or Silver unit and then improves it for the amount healed.
Updated Ability: Heal an allied unit, then upgrade it with the healed strength.

With no wounded targets on their own side of the board, Joana forced players to heal enemies in what we consider to be accidental. In addition, due to the restriction to Bronze and / or Silver units, Joana's healing could not interact with Olaf. Adjusting Joana's ability to include gold cards made sense as the game already has many similar combinations in it.

Master of Masters

Ancient ability: Duel a higher enemy.
Updated ability: Challenge an enemy unit to a duel.

We believe that Master of Masters' earlier ability limited the card's full potential and did not give him many options in terms of potential targets. The custom ability gives players a more varied choice of targets when playing Master of Masters, which ultimately makes the card more versatile and makes it a solid deck addition.

Treason

Ancient Ability: Enchant a Bronze Spy enemy with 10 or less power.
Updated ability: two up to 2 adjacent enemy units to duel.

This card's old ability doesn't make it really playable. With the majority of players celebrating the Dueling Mechanic, we thought changing the ability from Betrayal would bring more versatility to the game.

Pavko Gale

Old Ability: Play a random bronze or silver item from your deck.
Updated Ability: Play a Bronze or Silver Item from your Deck.

Pavko's ability had limited usability and was generally not as good as some of its counterparts in other factions - for example, Clan Protectors in Skellige. To make Pavko stronger, we've changed the way his ability works by giving players the option to choose which Bronze or Silver item from their deck they want to play.

Nithral

Ancient Ability: Deal 5 damage to an enemy. If you're holding a Wild Hunt unit, deal 7 damage instead.
Updated Ability: Deal 6 damage to an enemy unit. +1 damage for each Wild Hunt unit in your hand

We really wanted to rework Nithral, not just because he's a cool (pun) and really underrated character, but because his old ability made him an unpopular choice. We want to test this ability for him and see how it affects his game speed.

Kaedweni Revenant

Change: The Damned category has been removed from the base unit. Only copies made are “damned”.

Similar to the slave infantry and the half-elf hunter, our original design was that all copies made should be automatically "damned". This change introduces the original design of the Kaedweni Revenant. At the same time, the base card Kaedweni Revenant is no longer “Damned” and opens up many possible interactions for the card (resurrection by Sabrina's ghost or shuffling in the deck with Nenneke).

For the following cards, the value for grinding will be increased during the time of the 50% transmutation promo (more on this below):

Commanders horn
Bone talisman
Aglaïs
Iorveth: meditation
Slimy
Monster nest
Slave driver
Summoning Circle
Shani
Him
Dwarf skirmishers
Stammelford's tremor
Dwarf incitator
Mahakam guard
Elf scout
Doppler
Ciri: Nova
Berserker giant
Slave infantry
Half Elf hunter
Restore
ointment
Impera Enforcer
Avallac'h

If the cards on this list are ground, they discard the yield of scraps and meteorite dust that corresponds to the amount required to produce a card of the same value during the half-transmute cost campaign.

CHANGES

Cards that previously used the phrase “regardless of their position” now use “in your hand, in your deck, or on the battlefield”.
Cards now use the term "enable / disable" to indicate that block, espionage, and toughness can be added and removed.

NEW FEATURES

Players can now reroll one of their daily quests!
Celebrate the Chinese New Year with the Lunar New Year Bundle!
NEUTRAL
Yennefer: Sorceress Power changed from 9 to 10.
Avallac'h: Sage's power changed from 2 to 3.
Ancestral Ale strength changed from 9 to 10.
Commander's Horn enhancement value changed from 4 to 3.
Summoning circle no longer generates copies of agents.
Stammelford's Quake no longer generates a Lesser Guardian.
Doppler is no longer organic.
Ciri: Nova now sets the base strength of a unit to 22 instead of 25.
Avallac'h is now damned.

MONSTER

Nithral now deals 6 damage to an enemy unit plus 1 damage for each Wild Hunt unit in the player's hand.
Ifrit Power changed from 7 to 8.
Caranthir Ar-Feiniel Power changed from 8 to 9.
Whispering Hill power changed from 5 to 6.
Bridge Troll Power changed from 9 to 10.
Morvudd Power changed from 5 to 6.
Invisible Power changed from 4 to 5.
Striga Power changed from 5 to 6.
Kayran Power changed from 6 to 5.
Kayran now consumes a unit with a maximum strength of 7 and improves by its strength.
Slimy Power changed from 3 to 2.
Monster Nest now improves by 1 instead of 3.

SKELLY

Joana now only heals friendly units.
Joana now also heals gold units.
Master of Master can now duel with any opponent.
An-Craite Two-Handed Power changed from 7 to 8.
Eist Tuirseach Power changed from 4 to 5.
Ulfhedinn Power changed from 5 to 6.
Heymaey Flaminica's power changed from 9 to 10.
Heymaey Skald's power increased from 8 to 9.
Bone Talisman no longer enhances resurrected beasts or cultists.
Him's Power changed from 4 to 3.
Berserker Giant's ability no longer triggers twice when an allied unit is both cursed and damaged.
Restoring now adds the Damned trait to the unit that was put back into hand.

NORTHERN KINGDOMS

Kaedweni Revenant no longer has the Damned Trait. Only copies of the Kaedweni Revenant receive this property.
Vincent Meis Power changed from 8 to 9.
Warrior Hunter Power changed from 5 to 6.
Ves' power changed from 11 to 12.
Field Medic's Power changed from 6 to 8.
Seltkirk of Guleta Power changed from 7 to 8.
Shani Power changed from 5 to 4.

SCOIA'TAEL

Pavko Gale now allows players to choose which bronze or silver item to play from the deck.
Dwarven Mercenary Power changed from 7 to 8.
Dwarven Mercenaries now buffs 3 instead of 4.
Yarpen Zigrin Power changed from 7 to 8.
Morenn's power changed from 9 to 8.
Morenn's damage changed from 5 to 7.
Filavandrel Power changed from 3 to 4.
Iorveth Power changed from 7 to 6.
Iorveth damage changed from 7 to 8.
Aglaïs Power changed from 9 to 8.
Aglaïs now banishes the risen card.
Iorveth: Meditation can now only force two enemy units in the same row to duel.
Dwarven Skirmishers now buff instead of buff.
Dwarven Rioter's power changed from 2 to 1.
Mahakam Guard power changed from 9 to 4.
Mahakam Guard now improves by 7 instead of 3.
Elven Scout damage changed from 2 to 1.
The generated copy of Halbelfischer Hunter now has the "Damned" trait.

NILFGAARD

Impera Enforcers now deal 2 damage to an enemy unit when they are played and repeat this effect if an enemy unit appears on your turn on espionage.
Treason now forces two adjacent enemy units to duel.
Plague Mangonel power changed from 7 to 8.
Slave driver now also shows copies of the same card in the selection screen.
Slaver Power changed from 2 to 1.
The generated copies of slave infantry are now given the "damned" trait. The original card no longer has this property.
Salbe now only resurrects bronze units with a strength of no more than 5.

TROUBLESHOOTING

Yennefer: Sorceress can now also damage immune units.
Ciri: Sprint is no longer shuffled back into the deck at the end of the round if it has Tenacity.
Cremation Trap no longer triggers Impera Brigade on the other side of the battlefield.
Foltest's pride is now "Temeria".
Vabjorn now only targets enemy units.
Mahakam brigands now also react to those who are strong and weak.
Guardian now has the one-time use ability instead of the stubbornness trait.
Fixed a bug that improved a blocked farseer after she had disabled her block.
Fixed a bug that allowed Doppler to create non-monster faction units when using Crab Spider Queen as leader.
Francesca Findabair's ability now triggers Farseers on the board.
Summoning Circle no longer has the Damned trait.
Fixed a bug that prevented a unit destroyed by Vilgefortz from being resurrected by the ointment drawn by Vilgefortz.
Fixed a bug that caused Vernon Roche to use the wrong effects.
Werewolf now has a counter of 1 and will properly reset when leaving the battlefield.
Lord von Undvik is now played on the opponent's side of the battlefield after he has been replayed with a diversion.
From now on, Mr. von Undvik has the ability to “peek”.
Letho of Guleta can now target raid units.
Smash Trap no longer deals damage to raid units.
Odrin now takes damage from danger as normal.
Fixed a bug that allowed Panthers to target immune units.
Fixed a bug that allowed Milaen to damage raid units.
Fixed a bug that caused the cursor highlight to stay in the graveyard.
Fixed a bug that prevented daily quests from completing correctly.
Fixed a bug that allowed Panthers to target raid units.
Fixed a bug that allowed Nivellen to move raid units.
Fixed a bug where the command to pass one round would remain active and result in an automatic pass on the next round.
Fixed an issue where viewing Dagon's preview would prevent the player from doing anything else.
Fixed a bug that prevented raid units from displaying images in gameplay.
Fixed a bug that prevented enemy taunts from being properly muted.
Fixed an issue where the command to pass was still being given even after the cursor was dragged off the coin.
Fixed a bug that caused Aguara to make the game unplayable after only making one choice.
Fixed a number of bugs that prevented Hjalmar An-Craite's Strength from updating correctly after being upgraded by Lord of Undvik.
Fixed a bug that prevented Wilmar's espionage from working properly.
Fixed a bug that prevented the werewolf from being buffed by a full moon after being resurrected from an opponent's graveyard by a pedell.
Fixed a bug where Discarded Sorceress ability would not trigger after being played as the ninth unit in line.
Fixed an issue where the strength of Ciri: Nova was not displaying correctly.
Fixed an issue where a Nekker's death wish would only trigger after the Queen's Spider Queen ability was fully resolved.
Fixed a bug that prevented Cremation Trap from being removed from the battlefield after being triggered in an empty row.
Fixed a bug that prevented cards from displaying correctly in other players' profiles when they were not in your possession.
Fixed the issue where the cursor would get stuck on the first card in the player's hand after opening the Isengrim: Outlaw selection window.
Fixed a bug that prevented commands from being displayed after accepting an invitation to a friendly game when opening a card keg.
Fixed a bug that prevented Villentretenmerth from burning a unit if it was moved by Miruna at the same time.
Fixed a bug that caused Commander Horn to count the empty space of a unit destroyed by Vilgefortz among the 5 units he could upgrade.
Fixed a bug that prevented abandoned games from counting towards daily quests.
Fixed a bug that caused Emhyr var Emreis ability to be canceled when a target-ability unit was played and right-clicked.
Fixed a bug where Blood Moon would damage units a second time when they rose after being destroyed or discarded.
Fixed a bug that prevented Barbegazi from gaining tenacity.
Fixed a bug that caused game sounds to be triggered by the mouse after exiting the game window with Alt + Tab.
Fixed an issue where the Skellige emblem would always appear in the deck selection when any deck was saved.
Fixed a bug that prevented Impera Enforcer's ability from triggering after taking certain steps.
Various tooltips have been adapted and improved.