Mage Wars Mondays #27 - Staywood Forever

[Laddinfance]

It's time for another Mage Wars Mondays! After getting sidetracked for a half hour talking about comics, we finally bring you a podcast focused on the Straywood Beastmaster himself!

You can find it >>HERE<<. As always we love to hear from you. Oh, and if you want to listen to us drone on about comics, you can find that >>HERE<<.

[DaveW]

I've really, really wanted to use the Spider in a Straywood BM book. As you said, it's hard to find a good time to play him... the best bet is to lead with one, if you are going to put it in your book. That way, it has time to set up somewhere before it needs to web a creature or bite something in a tanglevine somewhere... also the mana cost is hard to come by sometimes after the first few turns.

I love what it does, but I think it costs too much to put in the spellbook and costs just one or maybe two mana too much for it. For now I'll just put in a Grizzly instead, and use vines and walls to manipulate the arena. Yes, taint is great... but three more dice of damage all the time is better than a 2/3 max possible taint chance.

[sIKE]

I always thought that the spider would be a good way to gum up a zombie (brute) swarm.

[Sailor Vulcan]

It might be good in team play for a Necromancer/nature mage team of some kind. Other than that I find it difficult to justify using it with the current mages. It's not an animal so you can't pet it. Druid is better off using tanglevines, strangevines and her staff for restraining things. Spider is not a plant and costs too much mana to use both it and a tree in your opening. As for the johktari beastmaster, again, it's not an animal, and you're better off using tanglevines. Sure they cost five mana a piece, but you can't escape from them just by rolling the effect die. And johktari beastmaster's wounded prey ability only works for animals, and if you summon the spider instead of a lair you're going to have a hard time getting the animals you need out without feeling action starved, since johktari doesn't have quick summoning. I  don't know why they didn't just make the spider an animal especially since it was originally advertised as a spell for the johktari beastmaster to use. What we need are lv1 animals that synergize well with the spider. I'm thinking it should be things that take good advantage of the stuck conditions.

[Coshade]

I have a Druid book that uses 2 spiders and the staff. You use the vine tree for popping vine markers to tangle vines then battle fury the spiders to deal double tainted. I have akiros favors in there but that is only if you have time. It's kills most medium creature builds since tainted is so effective. Against necrosis it runs raptor vines. You can get it all out pretty quickly if you sac all usual Druid stuff.

[Boocheck]

I have a similar book - Spider Druid.

All those Tangelvines, Strangelvines and "stuck" staff is really a great way how to handle most of the creatures. Knockdown for flyers.

I never realized that i can use akiros on spiders! That is a tremendous idea!

[sIKE]

BTW, since the topic of the recording was the Straywood Beastmaster that the Spider would particularly useful for this BM especially if the focus of the book was low level swarms and this was brought along as an alternate plan of action for a Necro and possibly a the 3rd in a two creature buddy build.

[iNano78]

BTW, since the topic of the recording was the Straywood Beastmaster that the Spider would particularly useful for this BM especially if the focus of the book was low level swarms and this was brought along as an alternate plan of action for a Necro and possibly a the 3rd in a two creature buddy build.

Maybe a future [mwcard=MW1J02]Animal Kinship[/mwcard]-like totem will give bonuses for having at least one Insect in play, making Giant Wolf Spider a worthy "buddy" for a beastmaster - even though the spider doesn't have the "animal" subtype, and in fact 2 of the 3 "insects" in the game (and 3 of 5 if you count the promos Death's Head Scorpion and Lightning Beetle) aren't insects at all, but rather arachnids...  I know, I know.  "But it's Etheria, and Etheria is a different universe."  Anyway, with at least 5 "insects" in the (hopefully near) future, there should be something that cares about insects; maybe even an "insect lord" (analogous to Makunda or Redclaw or Slaknir) that benefits other insects (?).

*edit* For that next totem, the "animal" (plus insect) subtypes not included in Kinship include:

• Insect (not an "animal")
• Bird
• Bat
• Horse
• Cervine
• Bovid (promo)
• Griffin (promo; not an "animal")

I could imagine more cervine (deer) or bovid (sheep/cattle/antelopes; not sure why it isn't "bovine" to be consistent with the others) that could be sacrificed to "feed" (heal) other animals (analogous to [mwcard=MW1C19]Gray Angel[/mwcard]'s ability), and I've read rumours that horses might be ridden by the Paladin and others.  Level 2 (or higher) Vampire Bats are probably obvious. 

[sdougla2]

I actually like nature training better than arcane training overall. It has great utility, and can support creatures on an individual or group basis.

I like the flexibility that the Straywood Beastmaster offers. Quick Summoning, especially in conjunction with Pet, allow the SW BM to keep playing relevant creatures after engaging the enemy without giving up movement or an attack.

Marked for Death is a great card. I usually run 2 or so in my Beastmaster builds.

Tooth & Nail is good, but Rajan's Fury is better with Cervere/Falcons. Mostly which one you should favor comes down to your creature mix.

I'm not a big fan of the Giant Wolf Spider. For that much mana, you could get 2 Venomous Zombies, which are much better at inflicting Tainted conditions than a single Giant Wolf Spider. I can see it working for a Druid alright, but that seems a little weird.

I am also looking forward to what you can do with a bear build. I'm pretty sure the correct solution to all problems for that build is the application of more bears.

[sdougla2]

For the opening for the Bear Master, I'm thinking:

Turn 1 (19): Ring of Beasts -> Steelclaw Matriarch (7)
Turn 2 (16): Enchanter's Ring -> Steelclaw Matriarch (4)
Turn 3 (13): FD Brace Yourself -> Steelclaw Matriarch (2)
Turn 4 (11): FD Bear Strength -> Steelclaw Matriarch (0)
Turn 5 (9): Bearskin -> Steelclaw Cub (0)

What do you think? Does it get enough bears out fast enough? My thinking is that you play a bear per round through round 10, then you play a Steelclaw Grizzly every other round. That should carry you through round 18, and if you haven't won by then, you've done something wrong. 

[Sailor Vulcan]

For the opening for the Bear Master, I'm thinking:

Turn 1 (19): Ring of Beasts -> Steelclaw Matriarch (7)
Turn 2 (16): Enchanter's Ring -> Steelclaw Matriarch (4)
Turn 3 (13): FD Brace Yourself -> Steelclaw Matriarch (2)
Turn 4 (11): FD Bear Strength -> Steelclaw Matriarch (0)
Turn 5 (9): Bearskin -> Steelclaw Cub (0)

What do you think? Does it get enough bears out fast enough? My thinking is that you play a bear per round through round 10, then you play a Steelclaw Grizzly every other round. That should carry you through round 18, and if you haven't won by then, you've done something wrong. 

By round ten games are often over or almost over. If you want to summon maximum bears possible and still be competitive, play a Straywood/johktari team strategy. Straywood pets a matriarch and quick summons 6 Cubs while punching things. Johktari uses hunting bow and uses a lair to summon more matriarchs and cubs. Opponent will probably never give Straywood 6 rounds to setup in a 1v1. Also, the Cubs have to be in the same zone as matriarch to get the bonus, right?

[sdougla2]

The Cubs need to be in the same zone to give the bonus to the Matriarchs, which is why this works way better in direct engagements than in running battles.