Introduction
Almost a year have passed since the last ‘Nations Of Gwent 4’ Pro Ladder summary (December 2022). With Gwentfinity and Balance Council feature released, the topic of national distribution of Gwent playerbase got revived in the community discussion.
In this article we would update the old graphs with 2023 data up to September Season but also check out new ‘Gwent Player Per Capita’ stat. How popular is Gwent: The Witcher Card Game in different countries relative to the number of residents? Before moving on, if you had some ladder experience in 2023, maybe take a guess of Top3 first.
Then And Now
Top5 Countries
Russia
The share of Russian players visibly dropped exactly at 22/23 year transition by about 4%. Before – each 4th player on ladder was Russian, now – every 5th.
Nik_r is the main Russian Gwent streamer and GwentDetta team manager. Russian and Belarussian players are banned from official Gwent tournaments since February 2022 (invasion on Ukraine). In spite of this, one or two Russian players finishing in Top16 was a common sight in 2023. Nothing comparable to last seasons before ban though.
China
Chinese playerbase is the most dynamic by far and with the start of 2023 we observed a Gwent boom – the number of players in peak grown to 20% in the February season. Since then, the % of CN pro ladder players is systematically decreasing, but remains visibly higher than in M3 and M4.
Cat_Burger, Bukouski and 优柔寡断的司徒空 are Chinese players who would play in the Gwent Masters 5 Finals – Group Phase. You could find Chinese streams on bilibili (liu_m, JohnSally…) or read articles on bilibili/lyingdi.
Poland
Average % of players dropped slightly after 2022, but still around 10% of Gwent Pro Ladder players is Polish.
Pajabol finished Masters 5 with Top1 number of Crown Points and qualified to playoffs of Gwent World Masters 5. Truzky, JaimeOneHand and InNomineSatanas would play in the group phase.
Ukraine
Stats lies – based on September 2023 vs November 2022 comparison we could have assumed slight increase in % of players. In the full picture though it is clear that number of Ukrainian players dropped by about 1% from M4 to M5. The shape of this plunge is very similar to Russian graph.
Sanvanter is the only Ukrainian player who qualified for World Masters 5 Group Phase. He is known for creative decks – looking forward to see his lineup for the tournament!
United States
Masters 4 was the time when the % of US players on Gwent Pro Ladder reached its minimum. In M5 we see slight increase, by about 1%.
No US player managed to qualify for Gwent Masters 5 Finals, while only Redrame made it to Top16 in February Season. Shinmiri2 is the main US Gwent streamer and caster of official events.
Regions
None of three main regions has dominance and the share of EastAsia with respect to Europe/CIS grown.
Amongst other regions the situation is stable. While the main Gwent streamer SpyroZA from RSA snapped out since NoG4, Kareem_Eid from Egypt became the first African player to advance to official tournament.
Gwent Per Capita
…Hong Kong !!!??
The percent of Hong Kong players rapidly increases starting from Masters 3; from 0.7% to around 2% in Masters 5. Is Gwent: The Witcher Card Game really as popular in Hong Kong as in Poland, or maybe it has something to do with Chinese players using Hong Kong VPN? If you happen to know more, I’d be glad to hear your explanation!
2nd-5th place are northern Slav countries; especially Russia is worth attention because big countries tend to underperform in such stats.
Selected Countries
Japan
Japan is more represented on Gwent Pro Ladder than ever; ~1.5% increase with respect to the start of Masters 4.
Mya-mon is the top Japanese player and streamer, who qualified to Gwent Masters 5 Finals Group Phase with trademark original decks.
Italy
The % of Italian players reached the peak of 4% at the beginning of Masters 4… and yet it was a start of rapid fall down to the lowest numbers in history. Again, i’d like to know the roots of such an extreme turn, so if you have any information – please share.
Elquellora is the main Italian player/streamer in Gwent Masters 5, who managed to finish in Top16 for the first time in the last ever competitive season. Italian team ESC Card Gaming are respected administrators of Gwent Qualifier tournaments.
Closure
Hope you enjoyed this overview and learned something interesting about nations of Gwent Pro Ladder!
Raw data and graphs for some other nations not mentioned in the article are available on Google Drive.
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