Legends of Runeterra

Deck Guide

Gwen: 5 Best Decks to Play with this Champion!

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Shred your enemy’s nexus with the seamstress’ scissors! In this article, I present 5 great options of decks to play with Gwen, who brought with her the keyword Hallowed.

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translated by Joey Sticks

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revised by Tabata Marques

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Introduction

Gwen came to LoR in the most recent expansion, Forces From Beyond, and, besides bringing with her a new keyword (Hallowed), she also came with an exclusive Star Guardian skin.

That being said, this champion is quite popular and is the star of many decks. I selected the strongest options for you guys and I’ll explain how each of them work. Let’s go?!

About Gwen and the Hallowed Mechanic

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Before presenting the decks, it’s worth explaining how Gwen and Hallowed work, as I’ve realized that there are still many players that are quite confused when they’re attacking with this champion.

Hallowed is nothing more than a stackable buff, it will count your Hallowed allies’ deaths and convert these deaths in attack points to the first attacking unit. It is best to be aware of this detail so you can choose wisely which will be your first attacker.

Now, Gwen will ALWAYS get the Hallowed buff, no matter in which position she is attacking. This is a champion effect, so it is permanent, so you don’t need to put her as your first attacker, unless you only have her as your only attacker.

Another important detail is that the Hallowed buffs are given, so they are not permanent. This way, at the end of the attack turn, they come back to their original power, so if you want to finish the game with an Atrocity, it is ideal that you do it in your attack turn, because Gwen and your first attacking unit will be buffed by Hallowed only at this time.

I think now it’s quite clear, right? So, let’s go to the decks!

Gwen/Bard

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Here is a way to get your units to gigantic sizes in a permanent way! With the buffs given by Bard’s chimes and Byrd, The Bellringer, your units get better stats and this deck has quite a powerful combo involving the units Maduli, The Gatekeeper and Eternal Dancers.

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The idea is to summon Maduli, The Gatekeeper in round 6 and double your deck’s chimes, but you mustn’t care about this unit, because it is necessary for it to die so the combo can work. So don’t think twice when giving up Maduli, The Gatekeeper in an unfavorable trade. With Maduli dead, you can use the Eternal Dancers, which when attacking, revives an Ephemeral copy of the strongest unit that died with its power or less. If you put it first when attacking, it will get the Hallowed buffs, so it will always bring back Maduli, The Gatekeeper, which is your deck’s strongest unit, and Maduli, The Gatekeeper will double your chimes again, buffing your units to gigantic sizes!

This is one of those decks that the longer the games take, the strongest it gets. If your opponent can’t finish the game by round 7 or 8, they'll hardly win matches against you.

There are quite a few tools to stall your matches, be it with heavy removals such as Vengeance and The Ruination or with the health sustain that Vile Feast, the unit Ghostly Paramour and Gwen provide. Oh, and one very curious thing about Gwen is that even when she is killed, her skill will drain health from the enemy’s Nexus. This way, the only way to counter it is with spells that can deny skills.

Finally, one thing I haven’t mentioned is that the Hallowed buffs also count for Bard’s level up, so he has a very interesting synergy with Gwen.

Gwen/Ahri

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This deck works like all Ahri decks: it has units that are going to be recalled and recall spells to level up Ahri and finish games with an Elusive Ahri hitting the enemy’s Nexus and switching places with other Elusive units and freely hitting the enemy’s Nexus. Recently I did an article explaining how the Ahri/Bard deck workslink outside website, so by reading it you will get a grasp of how to play this deck.

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The biggest differential of this version is Gwen and the many units with Hallowed. Besides this champion, there are copies of Boisterous Host, Phantom Butler, Ghostly Paramour and also the spell Strike Up The Band that summons 2 Ghastly Bands.

The idea is to get the biggest Hallowed stack possible so you can use it with your Elusive units and deal a lot of damage in the enemy’s Nexus, as there aren’t many answers to Elusives.

By having Ahri in her level 2 form and attacking with her first, she will get all the Hallowed buffs and will finish the game in the brink of an eye!

Gwen/Elise

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The Spiders deck is one of the most consistent decks in the game, being present in the meta since beta and is still the most recommendable deck to beginners. As new cards are being released in new expansions, they are being put in this deck and making it even better, which is the case of this Gwen/Elise.

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It still brings spiders, of course. But there were a few additions: Boisterous Host, which is an excellent 1 drop and already counts for Hallowed buffs early if it’s killed and Phantom Butler, which is a very annoying unit to deal with as it has the keyword Fearsome. If your opponent’s deck doesn’t have removals and no good units to block Fearsomes, you will be able to deal a lot of damage with the Phantom Butler!

Gwen herself is a great addition to the deck, as her ability Snip Snip!, besides already being Burn damage to the enemy Nexus, is a way to sustain your Nexus points and make you more comfortable to not block attacks, as everyone knows AGGRO DOESN’T BLOCK! Jokes aside, if Gwen stays on board for a lot of time, she can wreck great havoc to the enemy Nexus.

Finally, there is the iconic Noxus Burn to finish your matches: Noxian Fervor and Decimate.

Gwen/Nasus

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Is someone missing Nasus? This time this Shuriman Doggy joined forces with the Seamstress Doll and together they created this quite consistent and fun to play deck!

I won’t mention the Hallowed units, because I mentioned them a lot in the other decks, but I will talk about how they work with Nasus. The first observation is that as your units have a lot of power, because of Hallowed, they can slay many units and make your Nasus grow quite a lot, and the second observation, this one a lot more important, is that even if you didn’t slay many units, if your opponent removed many of your Hallowed units with spells, for instance, you just need to put Nasus attacking first in line and his attack will grow and therefore he can easily level up.

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As Nasus is from Shurima, in this list there are 3 essential spells that help out a lot, they are: Ancient Hourglass, Rite of Negation and Quicksand. In a keyword dominated meta, with many units having lots of keywords, having Quicksand is essential to avoid headaches!

On the other side, in Shadow Isles, there is both Vengeance to kill every and any Kai’Sa that you find in your way, and Atrocity to use on your leveled Nasus. As this champion has Spellshield when leveled, it is quite safe to go with this line and easily finish your matches.

Gwen/Aphelios

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This might be the 1747593rd The Winding Light deck that you see today! Jokes aside, this unit is really quite off the curve and with the Hallowed buffs, it can get even bigger and deal thunderous damage with Overwhelm.

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As with the Gwen/Bard deck, here we can combo with Eternal Dancers and The Winding Light, as The Winding Light is the strongest unit in the deck and late game you will for sure get Eternal Dancers to 7 power. With that, just use an Unto Dusk in your The Winding Light and everyone will have Overwhelm and +2+1.

Quite strong, isn’t it? The Winding Light in itself is a very powerful finisher, but in this deck it gets even more dangerous with Eternal Dancers bringing it back many times.

Besides Gwen, who is quite powerful, the deck has Aphelios, which is simply one of the most well-rounded champions in the game. Just choose your weapons correctly and you will have quite an unbeatable deck.

Oh, again, there are copies of Vengeance, which are quite important to deal with Kai’Sa, who in the current meta is the biggest threat.

Conclusion

So, did you like the decks I’ve brought? Is there any other that I haven’t mentioned that you guys are playing and considering strong? Share them with me in the comments!