If you've been playing Gwent the past few weeks you've probably noticed a bit of a Skellige infestation, as well as an overabundance of weather. If you're as sick and tired of them as I am you'll be glad to hear that the developers have just announced some rather massive balance changes.
All forms of weather have been heavily nerfed and now only affect one unit a time, Skellige's Morkvarg, Hjalmar, Axeman, and Shieldmaiden have been slightly nerfed, while the vast majority of the previously unusable cards have been given some much needed buffs. If you're interested in the full list of changes revealed so far I would recommend heading over to SdF1998's thread on Reddit, but for now allow me to list out some of the most important changes:
• Biting Frost - Has the ability of current Torrential Rain, except it will only affect one of the Lowest Units
• Impenetrable Fog - Current ability, but only one of the Highest Units
• Torrential Rain - Damage 5 of the Lowest Units by 1
• Aeromancy - Now plays chosen Bronze / Silver Weather from the Deck
• Skellige Storm - Will deal 2 - 2 - 1 Damage now
• Stammelford's Tremors - Damage 6 enemies by 2 (instead of 8)
• Overdose - Reworked; Boost 6 random allies by 2
• Renew - Now restricted to the owner's Graveyard
• Priscilla - 4 Power from 5. Won't Boost self anymore. The ability will discontinue after 4 turns. Won't go back into the Deck anymore
• Redanian Knight - Now Agile (was Melee)
• Wild Hunt Hound - Power changed from 5 to 4
• Caranthir - Power changed from 5 to 7. Moves 3 Enemies (instead of 5). Biting Frost changes apply to him
• Succubus - Power changed from 6 to 5. Its ability will trigger at the end of its owner's turn
• Emhyr var Emreis - Power changed from 4 to 6
• John Calveit - Won't be able to play Gold cards. Imperial Golems will be played before John's ability is triggered
• Clan Drummond Shieldmaiden - Removed Veteran Ability
• Clan Tuirseach Axeman - Removed Veteran Ability. Power changed from 2 to 3
• Morkvarg - Power changed from 8 to 9. Gets weakened by half (rounding up)
• Savage Bear - Power changed from 6 to 7. No longer hits spawned Units. Fixed the bugs related to Savage Bear
• Kambi - Hemdall Power changed from 11 to 16
While I like the general idea behind all of the changes, I'm not a big fan of the double nerf approach. Wild Hunt Hounds and Caranthir were poised to become much, much worse with the changes to Biting Frost, so why pile on an additional nerfs before we've even had a chance to test them out? That said, CDPR has repeatedly stated that these aren't the final patch notes and that things will change between now and release, so hopefully they will reconsider some of the nerfs and let us first test things out, and then balance again if truly necessary.