You dont have to read, random toughts.

I have made a post recently about why theming and mechanics in gwent feels a bit off, for example in perfect game, every faction should function as Syndicate, if you dont understand this i will give you some details about it.

When you want to play a deck, you build it arround something, maybe card,mechanic or theme. It is like building your own subway sandwich; you have a bread, toppings and souce. If you want milva(card)? you want move package(mechanic) thus Guerilla Tactics(leader ability is your direct enabler). You want Bleeding(mechanic)? here lots of vampires(theme) and Blood scent(leader ability). There is a pattern for what you do when you do.

Basicly your sandwich looks like: Leader ability+Mechanic(+theme-if there is-) or you skip some steps, put strong individual cards and point slam everything.

But in Syndicate deck building looks like this: Theme. Because in syndicate, themes are hardwired with their corresponding mechanic. Bounty(mechanic) is tied to witch hunters(theme), firesworn(theme) is about swarming(mechanic). Everything makes so much sense, there is a pattern.

Some cards are tribute some cards are hoard but they don't need mechanical synergy between them, in syndicate cards do not work together, they work through coin. Coin is the bridge in syndicate that enables not machanics but faction itself.

As i said in my other topic before, most people uses net-decking(using other people's premade decks). The reason behind it, optimized decks perform much better, to optimize a deck you can do two things; One, use strong individual cards that require no preparation. Two, use many avarage cards which have high synergy to create a snowball. Stronger option is that you mix these two but i personally do belive this third option is the problem in gwent.

We do not hate nor love joker because he is a madlad, we do love or hate him because we can empathise him, having relatively same opinions. Enjoy watching him burning world while you can not. Or opposite, you do not like him because even if you were in the same place as him, you followed or would have follow other path. Same as batman, you have conflict with him. That is why batman is important in the show, we don't want joker to be captured because bad guys must be in prison(rules/external reason). But because we feel the same way as batman, we feel the conflic with joker(personal/internal), so you want batman to do what you would like to do, capture the madlad.

In my opinion, when we play any game; pleasure/fun/joy caused by external and/or internal reasons. External reasons are caused by the game, internal reasons are caused by your fantasies, basicly your gaming-kinks. Games deliver smooth gameplay, amazing animations so you can play more(external). Meanwhile you just wanna see attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion… C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate or just killing vampires in medieval age(your kinks,internal), games also try to pleasure this feeling with putting you in the right environment because internal reasons are much stronger and last longing than external reasons.

Therefore i always try to say the same thing, a card can be strong or weak individually but if that card belongs to no theme, card only gives you external pleasure. While creating a deck of vampires,elves,bounty,witcher or even mixing them for harmony reasons, if there is a pattern there is internal pleasure.

When i play dwarfs i want armor and barricade, not "move". When i play milva it is the opposite. So i look up to patterns in this game and say, as time; cards should change aswell, for thematic reaons. Why ithlinne in handbuff deck while elven mages are a thing now? Why sheldon still waiting to be handbuffed while no dwarfs are handbuff anymore. Those cards can only be used in the opposite of their pattern, no sheldon will be played in dwarf deck, no ithlinne will be played in elven mage deck.

Therefore in summary, every faction needs a bridge that can work like coin, mechanicly different than coin for obvious dumb reasons. In my opinion. Nature's gift, Patricidal Fury,White Frost,Insprired Zeal,Tactical Desicions are good by design. But factions need more dept.

-Random Gamer.