Started playing gwent in november 2016 and had a lot of fun till the infamous midwinter update. I had hoped that HC will bring back gwent's former glory, but the title of the project is totally misleading, because it's a completely new game and most of the things I've loved about old gwent are gone. Changes I don't like: - handlimit + 3 redraws per round makes passing during the first 6 turns pointless - the game is so damn slow - new mulligan system without blacklisting makes good draws more important. Post MW gwent was too consistent, because of all the tutor cards, but they've completely overdone it with lowering consistency (new mulligan system + 2 bronze copies only were uneccesary changes) - they removed a row for better visuals, but I don"t care much about card size. Changes that should make rows meaningful again (they are more meaningful than post MW, but less important than during CB) could have been implemented with 3 rows. The reach concept for example would be much more interesting with 3 rows. Everything feels worse on 2 rows for me. - I'd prefer playing on a wooden board instead of throwing my cards in the dirt, but that's just my personal preference. More problematic: the boards looks to cluttered and information isn't represented well (rows and row score doesn't allign for example). - I've loved the highly synergistic gameplay strongly focused on archetypes. Sadly they've gone away from that concept. - Overall card design isn't very well. Too much boost, damage, destroy. I know things like strengthen can be a problem if not implemented properly, but without such concepts the game becomes boring. - Gwent is out of beta now, but it looks like a game in an early beta stage (poor balancing, bugs...) - RNG bs like reveal (why?) - some really binary cards and concepts ...... Overall, I can't enjoy the game, actually I really hate it. Two stars for good economy and amazing card art.
