Dwar Unleashed

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Frodo
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Hmm, I can't see a better way than to say it like this:

"Any non-Ringwraith character with a Wolf ally may be in his
company and each Wolf ally in his company gains the Ranger skill."

Question: Is there some useful magic that Dwar is lacking, or something else, that we can also add to these wolves?

Frodo
marcos
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replace:
You may discard this card to add a bonus to
prowess (maximum +7) to all Wolf allies in his company
until the end of the turn. This bonus is equal to the number
of regions Dwar is moving. Cannot be duplicated.
for:
You may discard this card to give the ranger ability and +1 bonus to prowess to all Wolf allies in his company
until the end of the turn. (Can be duplicated)
can be duplicated so the bonus to prowess can be higher and you don't clog the hand with much DU for possible rivers in his company
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Bandobras Took
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Our Own Wolves may be played on Dwar's company and never creates an attack when so played. Tap a Wolf Faction to bring Our Own Wolves from the discard pile to your hand.
marcos
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that sounds nice indeed ben
Jambo
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Dwar Unleashed wrote wrote:Playable on Dwar during the organization phase (if Dwar is your Ringwraith). Even without a mode card, Dwar’s company may use region movement equal to 1 region plus an additional region for every Wolf faction or two Wolf allies in play (no maximum). Any non-Ringwraith character with a Wolf ally may be in his company. You may discard this card to give the ranger skill and a +2 to prowess to all Wolf allies in his company until the end of the turn.
Ok, based on Marcos' idea above, what do you think? Dwar Unleashed now won't clog your hand since it is now able to be duplicated. This means that with 3 in the deck you now have the potential for 3 separate discard opportunities, or the potential to discard two or three at a time for a large prowess boost! Maybe there now needs to be a limiting factor on the region movement allowance to compensate being able to duplicate the card?

I'd like to have added Ben's Our Own Wolves part and add Hounds of Sauron, but Dwar can't use either Sorcery or Shadow Magic alas... and space might be an issue... :(
marcos
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actually, dwar CAN use sorcery ;)

agree with the region movement limiter, maybe add: "this movement booster isn't cumulative"

or something like that
Frodo
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Wow, Ben's card is indeed cool--I like how if you have multiple Wolf factions in play, it means you can play Our Own Wolves more than once per turn and really pump those wolves up!

The only thing I don't like about it is that I wish we still had some benefit for Dwar MOVING so many regions. Kind of like They Ride Together, it would be nice to encourage the Dwar player to actually *move* the many regions he is entitled to, but other than picking a strategic site, there's no reason to at all if we remove the wolf prowess line.

My creative brain is stalling, however, in trying to decide what else this bonus can possibly be. Here's some random ideas:
1) Dwar himself gets +1 prowess for each region (could be cool, but perhaps takes away from the "big scary wolf" prowess thing we're going for)
2) Dwar can draw an extra card for each region (not to overplay my only joke on this forum, but he would kinda be like, um, "Evil Radagast"... But seriously, think about it! Radagast is all about Nature. DWAR is also all about Nature, but he is the evil or destructive side of Nature. Perhaps there's a way to play off this idea more with the card.)
3) Dwar gets to take X animals/wolves from discard pile into hand, where X is number of regions, and his hand size is increased by that amount until the end of next turn
**4) Okay, this is a really, really insane idea, but maybe we can tweak it... Dwar gets his own "bomb" card... if enough wolves in play and regions moving, he turns **all regions he is moving through into dark-domains**, not just for HIS movement/hazard phase, but until the END OF OPPONENT'S NEXT TURN. (!!!!!) This would mean that the strategic Dwar player would be cutting large "swathes" of dark-domains all around a hero opponent's projected next movement, in hopes of "trapping" the hero into moving through one of these dark-domains next turn.

The only thing a bit uncool about this is that animals, wolves etc. are not keyable to darkdomains, so this doesn't exactly show off his "nature" side, only his "evil" side. Although now that I think about it, that's not exactly true... he is "corrupting" Nature with his influence!

If we didn't like the fact that he affects his own site path, we can have him only affect regions for opponent next turn. At the very least, creatures keyable to his regions would always attack as non-detainment.

Is this really just too nutty?

Other ideas?

Frodo
Jambo
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Oops Sorcery should have been Spirit Magic. Hounds of Sauron and Our Own Wolves use Shadow and Spirit magic respectively. Dwar can only use Sorcery.
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Bandobras Took
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That's why my original wording said "Our Own Wolves may be played on Dwar's company."

@ Frodo:

For that last ability, I would prefer "Any region Dwar moves through changes to a Dark-Domain or Wilderness until your next organization phase." Just turning everything into Dark-Domains is less interesting because your hazard strategy will pretty much be stuck to dark-domains (not that I object to making Wraith-Lord the hazard to end all hazards. :) A Dwar that changes Free-Domains and Border-Lands into Wildernesses can do some surprising things, especially with Fever of Unrest.

I also approve of any ability that makes region cards useful. :)
Jambo
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ok, so how about:
Dwar Unleashed wrote wrote:Playable on Dwar during the organization phase (if Dwar is your Ringwraith). Dwar may use Hounds of Sauron and Our Own Wolves. Tap a Wolf faction to take Hounds of Sauron or Our Own Wolves from your discard pile to your hand. Even without a mode card, Dwar’s company may use region movement equal to 1 region plus a region for every Wolf faction or two Wolf allies in play (maximum 5). Any non-Ringwraith character with a Wolf ally may be in his company. You may discard to give the ranger skill and a +2 prowess to all Wolf allies in his company until the end of the turn.
As for Joe's other suggestions, I like the idea of drawing a card per region Dwar moves through, and the 'bomb' one. However, I fear something like that would probably require another part to be removed for space reasons...?
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Bandobras Took
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The problem with Our Own Wolves is the potentially of each wolf ally to kill its controller afterwards. No fun at all unless we remove that attack for Dwar's company.
Jambo
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Hmm, I always thought the penalty of the strike hitting home was just the discard of the ally, but you're probably right (and the card stinks with that subsequent attack).
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Thorsten the Traveller
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Yes the frenzy attack is nice thematically, but ruins the use of the card. If it were detainment...maybe we can work on that card as well!

I think recycling Hounds of Sauron is too strong. Reducing strikes to 1 is very very powerful.

I also think the hounds don't need prowess, especially not until end of the turn, against an attack ok. I like ranger ability, but why is that limited, just so we have a use for multiple DU's in the deck? Why not make ranger a perm ability, the doggs are sniffin around all the time, and then discard to retrieve Hounds?

The drawing ability is nice, though minions don't really need the draw I think. The type changer is bit over top.
nb. Dwar is an ICE invention.

I always like the hazard interplay. How about keying any wolves/wargs to regions moved through? Some other dogs are stirred, or maybe they lag behind.
Stone-age did not end because man ran out of rocks.
Frodo
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Lots to consider here. First, I agree with Thorsten that we don’t need to give the wolves more prowess from region-moving if Our Own Wolves can be used. Second, I like his suggestion that we make Wolves keyable to the regions Dwar moved through--this still goes along with the region “trapping” idea I had in mind—but part of me still likes the “dark-domain or wilderness idea” since it is a little more special. Finally, I don’t think we need a region maximum on Dwar’s card any longer.

Here’s two versions, then:

Dwar Unleashed wrote:
Playable on Dwar during the organization phase (if Dwar is your Ringwraith). Dwar may use Hounds of Sauron and Our Own Wolves, which never creates an attack when played by Dwar. Tap a Wolf faction to take Our Own Wolves from your discard pile to your hand. Even without a mode card, Dwar’s company may use region movement equal to 1 region plus a region for every Wolf faction or two Wolf allies in play. All Wolf allies in his company gain the ranger skill and any non-Ringwraith character with a Wolf ally may be in his company. Discard this card during your movement/hazard phase: Any region Dwar moves through changes to a Dark-Domain or Wilderness until your next organization phase.

This is 121 words (the max is about 138). My problems with this card are that there are so many different thoughts it makes it hard to take in when you’re reading it. So I came up with one more version, although to do that efficiently (grammar-wise) I had to allow for something strange: spells playing on wolves! But I still think it’s cool:

Playable on Dwar during the organization phase (if Dwar is your Ringwraith). Even without a mode card, Dwar’s company may use region movement equal to 1 region plus a region for every Wolf faction or two Wolf allies in play. All Wolf allies in his company gain the ranger skill, may play Hounds of Sauron and Our Own Wolves (which never creates an attack this way), and their non-Ringwraith controllers may be in Dwar’s company. Tap a Wolf faction to take Our Own Wolves from your discard pile to your hand. Discard this card during your movement/hazard phase: Any region Dwar moves through changes to a Dark-Domain or Wilderness until your next organization phase.

This is 114 words and, as I think you’ll notice, READS a lot more logically and easily. Thoughts? Also, do people prefer the “Any Wolf creature may be keyed to…” clause, or the dark-domain and wilderness creation clause?

Very cool tactics are now possible by reducing strikes from Hounds and letting an enhanced wolf face it! I like this card.

Frodo
Jambo
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I really like the second version Joe. Dwar has value in just roaming around for the potential effects he can have on one's hazards. Wolf resources, particularly the Wolf factions, can be quite slow and difficult to get, but the powerful hazards that will be possible with this card's discard clause should make up for the typically slower resource side.

I'm not a fan of helping wolf hazards any more! They're good already, and such an effect is one-dimensional. Every Dwar deck will use wolves, ad nauseum. The other effect however, opens up options such as triple www creatures and potential dark domain combos - Lost in Dark Domains, In the Heart of His Realm, Wraith Lord, etc, as well giving himself some much needed protection vs hazards.
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