Dear anyone involved in Gwent development who may be reading this,

First of all I would like to establish that I have a huge amount of respect for the Gwent team and everyone involved in the game who is making content and fostering discussion. I love this game and I am so grateful to those that designed it and maintain and update it, as well as those that make awesome art, videos, guides, custom cards, and so on. I once had the Game Director respond to my post on a previous account and it made me so happy because I really look up to those who work on great games like Gwent. In fact Gwent (and other games) have inspired me in my career path, as I have worked on some projects of my own and hope to one day be a game developer.

I also do not endorse anyone who insults Gwent devs by calling them retarded, stupid, etc. We are all human and all humans make mistakes, such remarks only lead to hostility and indeed, a toxic echo chamber like some call Reddit.

That being said I have noticed a rising attitude in certain podcasts, official videos, and so on that are dismissive of this community and the complaints that often fill it. I've seen some state that Streamers/Pros are responsible for this exaggerated negativity regarding the state of Gwent. So I will attempt to explain why I think this is rejection is a problem, as well as discuss some of said problems with the current situation in the game.

First off I would like to acknowledge that there are obviously many "complaints" which are unconstructive, in bad faith, or just plain rude and unwarranted. Perhaps I have even partaken in this in the past when I was angry or burnt out. You get this in any online community, and it is unfortunate that development teams for all games are often bombarded with this. However, I have also seen many posts on reddit and videos/writeups by streamers or pros which are intelligent, logical, and even offer useful analysis or suggestions of how certain cards and playstyles can be made more balanced. So it is a massive generalization to call the online Gwent community a toxic echo chamber that only spreads exaggerated negativity. Is it often exaggerated? Yes, absolutely, but to dismiss it as a whole would be flat out wrong.

The next thing I would like to address is the idea of the Gwent community being a "vocal minority" compared to the vast majority of players. If you look at the numbers, I am sure that this is in some capacity, true. However, this community also represents the people who are likely the most invested in the game. People who are making content, discussing Gwent, making decks, taking the time to go on forums and social media related to the game may be a small number compared to total players, but I think that the community is the lifeblood of the game. Casuals are unlikely to purchase cosmetics, journeys, etc- but people who are very invested in the game will. So I believe it is a poor business decision to dismiss the most dedicated part of your player base. And we have to admit, that even for a chronically negative community, the current situation has very very rarely been this bad.

Finally, I would like to share my personal experience and why I believe the current overwhelming negativity and problems reach beyond the realm of Reddit/streamers/pros and into the overall state of Gwent. I have been playing Gwent for over a year, I have purchased several journeys and cosmetics because I want to support Gwent and Gwent eSports, and have also introduced several friends to this wonderful game.

But recently, playing Gwent and observing discourse related to the game has just made me sad. I don't think I need to say anything about the actual cards and metas themselves, that has been done enough by people more knowledgeable about the game than I (like the recent writeups done by very skillful players). I'd just like to say that for the first time in about a year and a half, I just don't feel like playing Gwent and yes, it is tied to the current meta. I still love the the gameplay loop, the cards, the cosmetics, everything. I just can't take what it has currently devolved to.

Something that also saddens me a lot is that content creators and pros are leaving the game. And worse at least for me personally, my gf and friends have also been getting driven off the by the current situation. And they have never even heard of the Reddit- they've just experienced the situation at high ranks. I really don't know what the attitude of the casual player as a whole is, and I'm sure some are still enjoying the game- but anecdotally, I know several casuals and they are also not happy with what is happening. I don't want the player base of Gwent to collapse, I've seen games with a great foundation be abandoned and it has made me so sad (any TES Legends fans here?).

However I don't want to be all negative, and I want to offer some potential solutions. Prior to the Forgotten Treasures release, I was very happy with the direction of the game and I was playing it all the time. I just hope the Gwent team is learning and balancing as always and we will soon get back to the fun game we all enjoy. But I would really like to see more frequent/faster balance updates, kind of like hotfixes, even if they are very small and only touch a few hot topic cards, perhaps bimonthly or just when required. I also really like the recent Development Journals and I would love to see more of that explaining the process behind Gwent's development, such as the actual stats and methods that go into designing and balancing cards, such as use rates and win rates, how provisions/points are meant to interact, how valued carryover and thinning should be, so on. I am very happy to wait for more expansive reworks and card releases because I would rather wait for good stuff than stress the dev team and get rushed or unbalanced cards.

Finally, I would like to apologize for any hate the dev team has received and strongly state that the players, community and dev team should be in alliance, not against each other.