4Game

CDPR just announced the roadmap for 2023 and also bit sneak peak for 2024 and onwards. Some news caught people off guard, especially the stop of printing new cards.

People are so dramatic about this but I believe this was good choice when taking into account the recent past. New card drops did create some difficult metas, such as Golden Nekkers and Renfris. With such large card pool that Gwent now has, designing more new balanced cards become even harder and harder. When there are too many cards, the possibilities of broken interactions are tough to catch up. Year 2022 was like this: new broken card drops, community outrage, little card balancing because of incoming tournament, new broken card drops, etc. The cycle just repeated and there was not enough time to balance things. Putting a stop for new card additions is decent way to FOCUS on making game more balanced in long term.

In addition, CDPR announced that they are developing method for community doing the card balances. This might sound little in the paper, but it has actually huge potential. It was known in the past that the game didn't have enough playtesters, so having players deciding the new balance changes will solve issue. Many games that have implemented community-driven developer tools have always been succesfull. For example, Skyrim with modding community or Halo series with Forge map creations. Those things are keeping the games playable, even years after the release. I am not sure how this will be implemented in Gwent, but I think it will be somehow democracy-like voting system where players get to vote problematic cards that need nerfs or weak cards that need boosts/rework. This will make Gwent sustainable in long term.

I am excited and looking forward to "Gwentfinity". See you all around with round of Gwent!