CD Projekt Red is one of the companies that has regarded its customers with great respect and sets out to create great games that satisfies many around the world. Thus, it is not a surprise that they have announced the Homecoming on their website which puts most of Gwent on hold for the next 6 months. Unaffected modes include their Challenger, Seasonal Events, Rank Rewards and Faction Wars which will still continue along the 6 months. You can go and read their full announcement at their website.
With this announcement, and no changes abound to the Gwent scene, I will still talk about decks and strategies to help you out but may also explore other avenue of card games and/or board games that we can experience together. For today though, I will be showing you a deck from the Northern Realms Faction which is Henselt Reaver Hunters.
Deck List:
Leader: King Henselt
| Gold:
1x Sigismund Dijkstra 1x Shani 1x John Natalis 1x Royal Decree |
Silver:
1x Operator 1x Roach 1x Marching Orders 1x Reinforcement 1x Summoning Circle 1x Alzur’s Double-Cross |
Bronze
1x Reconnaissance 2x Reaver Scout 3x Reaver Hunter 3x Battering Ram 3x Siege Support 3x Kaedwani Knight |
Reaver Hunter is a card that boosts itself and other copies of Reaver Hunter when played on board. This boosts triggers for each copy of Reaver Hunter on board and re-trigger itself when a copy is played on board. Thus, it is a great card that starts out small but ends up huge if not dealt with by your opponent. This combo can lead to a big tempo swing just by playing only Reaver Hunters and it will be our game plan for the last round of the match.
The deck has a very linear game play and a simple combo to pull off. Your Leader, King Henselt is able to pull out copies of either Battering Ram, Siege Support or Kaedwani Knight where each one is a tremendous tempo swing. In your opening hand, try to mulligan away the Kaedwani Knight, Roach, or other extra copies to fish out your golds and one Siege Support. It is best to keep one Reaver Hunter for Operator in later rounds but the deck has a lot of thinning that you will draw one later regardless.
In the first round, try to land a Siege Support and if it survives, use Henselt to pull the other copies from your deck. Then you can use the Battering Ram to pick off the opponent’s Units while building a huge tempo on your own board with the help of the Siege Supports. If you need to catch up, you can use either John Natalis to use Reinforcement, Alzur’s Double-Cross or Reconnaissance to pull Kaedwani Knight for huge tempo. Be careful though with Reconnaissance, since if you did not thin out the deck enough, it might land on Reaver Scout or Reaver Hunter.
It is best to thin out the deck aside from the Reaver Hunters as they will be your closing strategy. In the third round, start out with your Operator to make a copy of a Reaver Hunter and start playing your own Reaver Hunter. Since Operator makes a copy of the Reaver Hunter for your opponent as well, he will play it in the third round only as a mere 6 Strength unit. When he does play his copy of Reaver Hunter, you can go ahead and play Summoning Circle to play an extra copy of Reaver Hunter on board, thus making a total of 5 Reaver Hunter on Board if you played properly.
The Golds, like Dijkstra is to help pull out whatever left in your deck for a tempo swing while Shani is to help you out in case one of your Reaver Hunters were killed or played in an earlier round. Played right, your whole deck will be thinned and played in the third round.
The weakness of the deck is that it has no interaction at all other than the Battering Rams. Although the Battering Rams do provide tempo swings, the damage it does is too small to remove anything significant on the opponent side of the board, for instance, their own Siege Supports. Still, the swing that the deck can produce is massive enough that you can let your opponent do what they want while you thin out your deck and set-up for the third round.
The flexible slots of the deck that you can change around is the Battering Ram, Roach and Royal Decree. Cards that you might want to try out are Dandelion: Poet, Seltkirl of Gulet, and Dandelion for Golds, while Silver and Bronze is up to your own experience and tinkering of the meta.
And that is it for the deck. I hope you enjoy yourself with this deck while we wait for the Homecoming and Hunt some scum Scoiatael with the Reaver Hunters.
Until next time, Gwentlement, keep on slinging spells!
Like what you see so far? Subscribe to our newsletter by entering your email here!
