4Game

Hello everyone, as a ST main I thought I would share my opinion about the cards the faction got during this expansion. Without further ado…

Once Upon A Pyre
Before the release of this expansion, spell'tael was slowly shifting towards becoming an unhealthy unitless variation. You played cards like saber tooth tiger, sasenthesis, and even Olgierd for uninteractable points while removing all of opponents cards. So, I was very happy to see CDPR push a more engine version of spell'tael.

Unfortunately, the four cards we got simply weren't enough. While the bronzes were great, there wasn't enough existing support for them to push the faction up. Adding woes was an underpowered Francesca and bizzare Vanadain, ST remained in the bottom for two whole months.

Thannedd Coup
I am going to be honest and say that I was one of those who thought orbs of insight and the deer spell thing were weak. We were right to a certain degree. Saov (deer spell) is still over provisioned but orbs on the other hand proved to be competent enough.

I loved elven seer when it was revealed. It completed the trio of bronze engines that formed a pretty strong package to get you through round 1. However, it was Simlas who changed the tide for the faction. Such a simple ability, play all copies of bronze special from your deck, had enough flexibility to make it an auto include in all ST decks

Harvest of Sorrows
I was so glad ST got the brunt of promotions for this release. Dol Blathana is one of my favourite places in the world of witcher, so seeing cards based around it was awesome.

Coming to the cards themselves, I am very mixed about them. I really like Watcher of the valley but it is simply not good enough to be putting into my deck. Perhaps with a provision buff to allgod, he might see play. Then we have bountiful harvest. This card doesn't not support the handbuff well. But in a nature's gift deck, it is simply superb. Filavan, too suffers from being to cluncky. I don't think he is bad, just underwhelming.

However, Torque stands out among the others and I my favourite card this expansion. He makes the handbuff archetype work and not in the way I expected. Plus I really like his character in the books. So, it is win-win for me.

Overall thoughts: ST was yet another victim of the expansion getting split into 3 chuncks. However, compared to NR and SK, it got its act together much faster and now sits comfortably in the "you can play me and win games" zone. I like the overall package and would probably give it 7/10.