Wolves Seem Kind of Trash?

[GooseOnTheLoose]

I haven't taken the time to break things out in excel and really examine wolves, the cards, etc. but dual wolves is the only starting lineup that I ever struggle with. Any other dual-racial lineup I can handily beat the warden and often beat the Prince. Try as I might with wolves in dual lineup, I confess I rarely make it past the first boss.

Wolves are the only race where I consistently level them up, am presented with their talents/perks and think "Jeez... I don't want ANY of these!"

The problem, frankly, is they just get pulled in two many different possible directions and none of those directions are particularly GOOD.

Weasels are straightforward, right? Lean hard into bleed and/or poison, card generation, and debuffing.

Hares are FANTASTIC at arguably the two strongest mechanics in the game: Moving the opponents and card draw. It's a similar story for the others (though I admit I don't care for the Beaver racial ability, their awesome perks and talents more than make up for it).

Meanwhile the wolves have arguably the worst racial ability (It's just... really really bad) and have too many different ways that their build can pull you:

-Banish cards

-Ruin = good

-Discard cards

-Bleed/Exhaustion = good

And the issue is if you try to do any of these things and don't pull it off, you have placed your bet on a mechanic that is sub-optimal to have in your deck if you can't get the combo going. Like banishing, ruining, discarding cards, and self inflected bleed/exhaustion are all REALLY REALLY BAD for you if you don't pull off the combos that make them positive. And there are too many possible combos to really have a good chance of leaning into one and pulling it off, as far as I can see.

I love the game, and I think the other races are all roughly equivalent (perhaps with the exception of Hares, which I do think are stupidly good) but I just don't see how wolves are not much, much worse than the rest of the pack (lol).

[Syrris]

The wolf's racial ability lets them play any ally's weapon or talent card (also, any weapon card from the stash). That's actually a very strong ability, especially if they wind up with a talent that grants benefits for it, but it does depend on your allies having good talents or weapons, which might be an issue in the early game.

The two power cards in the wolf's repertoire are Oathkeeper and Strength of Will. The latter gives you fantastic deck control - get cards you want, get rid of ones you don't want (like the negative ones that enemies hand out), and allies get a buff into the bargain. This is the best of the bunch, but their focus on discards lets you cycle your deck more quickly when there are one or two power cards that you want to play a lot. Which brings us to...

Oathkeeper, their game-maker. You need to get it early(ish) and work at powering it up as much as possible during each fight; by the end of the game it can turn into a one-shot against anything other than the Warden (due to his defense mechanic). Dual-wolf runs are pretty much focused on this card.

Outside of those two, Never Surrender is one of the few ways of regaining Will mid-fight. Spirited, one of their unlockable perks, also lets them give Will back to others by playing the ally's card using their racial. With these two they can become a mana(Will) battery for the rest of the team.


Outside of dual-Oathkeeper, though, they generally perform better as part of a mixed team, since their racial is at its best there - fittingly, they play into a "my strength in others" theme.

[kome360]

You can also turn them into pseudo-healers with the Sacrifice and Babtism of Fire talents. Really turns the tide during an attrition match.

[xNeariax]

Originally posted by Syrris:

Outside of dual-Oathkeeper, though, they generally perform better as part of a mixed team, since their racial is at its best there - fittingly, they play into a "my strength in others" theme.

Pretty much this. I love playing all-Wolves for fun though. The combination of multiple early on Oathkeeper + Strenght of Will(s) + Sever + the odd Never Surrender to let everyone play any Oathkeeper they want: 100% brokenly OP. ^^

Throw in a couple of (what is it?) Double Team?! The one that gives shield + charge to everyone of the same race, some heavy armour if you can get it... auto win, no matter the Oaths or Challenge.