Yep Keejchen swarms gain life and gain additional strikes with this combo.  There is a way to get killer bee swarms up to 9 dice critical.  I’m gonna let the forums figure out what other cards can combo to make additional strikes up to 9.  I think they can get up to 10 but need to clarify if that is possible.  10 die critical attacks is possible now!   

Potions Introduction

New equipment being released in academy Druid!!!  Now these offer a lot to arena for little cost.  All costing 1 SBP from the Nature school they could be and should be considered in a variety of books in and outside of the nature school. Especially if you are running a battle forge which allows you to put them on your mage for a free action. 

Lets take a closer look at them. 

Cleansing Potion, 1 mana. 

Has 3 charge tokens and allows this ability:  you may once per round remove one.  If you do remove a poison condition from a friendly creature in this zone by paying its removal cost.  Cleansing Potion cannot be replaced.
If there are no more charge tokens on Cleansing Potion, destroy it.

Things to highlight.  Once potions are on you, your mage may activate the potion when you have priority as a free action.   That is awesome so for three rounds you have an option of getting rid of condition without using an action saving you much needed time.
 Secondly you can remove it from yourself or a friendly creature in your zone.  You can you use this defensively or offensively just know your mage has to be in the same zone to trigger it to help out your other creatures.  You can keep those weaks and rots off keeping your guys alive longer and hitting just as hard to deal out more damage.
Rots and Weaks are the conditions that would appear most.  Each having a removal cost of 2.  Again high value for cost. Taints are 3 and Cripples are 4. 

Corrosive Concoction, 4 mana

Has 3 charge tokens and allows this ability:  you may once per round remove one when you damage an enemy with a non-spell attack.  If you do place a corrode condition on that creature.   Corrosive Concoction cannot be replaced.  If there are no more charge tokens on Corrosive Concoction, destroy it.

Things to highlight.  4 mana for 3 corrodes!  Great cost again comparing it to acidball or rust.  Basically allowing you to get out 1 more corrode for free. 
Secondly, combo this with ranged weapons you could do direct damage to zombies, or prepping your target to take down even easier.  Joktari or any mage who wants to use ranged weapons will want to have this in your book. 

Rage Tonic, 2 mana

Has 3 charge tokens and allows this ability:  you may once per round remove one.  If you do target a friendly living creature in your zone.  It gains +1 Melee until end of the round.  Rage Tonic cannot be replaced. If there are no more charge tokens on Rage Tonic, destroy it.

Things to highlight, Again I stress free actions.  Especially combo it off a battleforge. 
Your mage wants to kill a threat or you want to send out another friendly creature to do your deed.  As long as the friendly creature starts in your mage zone you can send it out to kill things.  Lesser teleport, cast cheetah speed and hit things two zones away.  As a free action you can position things and use it at the right moment.  As a Bloodwave warlord combo this up with strategist helm and commands and get more dice out for free actions!  Maybe allowing your goblins to kill something and become that vet you always knew they would become!

Conclusion:

Potions are great ways of bumping up options of dealing out damage and or removing them pesky poison conditions.  I believe they work great for solo or buddy mages who run the battleforge.  Also support wise for your troops if running smaller less efficient threats, they will be a nice addition.  Nature mages should have them handy at all times but I could see them widely used in out of school more aggressive books as well.  They offer alot of options and could allow players to swing the game.  lastly they do not take up an equipment slot.  Now you cannot replace with the same named potion but a player could have one of each to start to combo them fairly effectively.  +1melee and +1 corrode sounds fun!

Yea I have made my case about swarms  on other channels.  I do believe they are OP.  Some of the wording in the current format contributes to that.  Swarms bave been and always will be immune to all conditions.  It is part of the text inside the  Druid academy rules.   They also cannot be targeted by enchantments or incantations unless it has swarm trait in the target line.   

I believe they should have the rules text: swarms cannot gain innate life. 


I do see the list of ways to counter the killer bees and that is great but when we can start to have the chance to have 9 dice critical,  it just shouts OP.   I’m a nature school lover and I just want to have balance in Mage wars.  This card is far from balanced . 

Ok yea I don’t see them being OP.  Some are maybe more stronger then others.  And most are limited by unique, once per turn ect.   I think if we are to look at them on an individual basis maybe some would be either epic spells or a mana cost to make the action more fair.  Some however are sometimes situational and either don’t make a big enough difference. 


As of right now I think conjurations can be taken oiut if they are a big enough threat.  Not really an issue




I’m up for changes but I do feel we need to be very selective.  And tackle the biggest issues first.  Like goblin builder. 

I feel too and I will post about this more in another post but I do see some concerns of how this we effect the community.  Will it be divisive or will it bring more people in to the community.   I think maybe having tourneys and or unofficial rulings is cool for those things.  For newer players I could see some issues.   

hey Steack.

Yea so the original post I developed a system based on strength of ability and used life almost as a cost for abilities.  So the original arena abilities and life totals were key to get a feel for how much life the abilities cost for each mage.


I have a couple of reasons I wanted to make changes from the first draft.  The first and foremost is I think the Graduated academy mages should feel different from the original arena counterparts. 

Secondly IMO and the feedback from others the first iterations with the arena ability, they had too much synergy with the acadmey abilities.

From here on out i will try and get these play tested and let you know what I find out.  I also agree if we could get these on OCTGN for playtesting it would be sweet.  With some coordination with Shark and some of the other Arcane Duels peeps I think we can make it happen. 

If you have playtested these please come back and give feedback.  Also I’m sure there maybe need to reword some abilities or tweak them if they appear too strong or weak.  I think for the most part they are fairly balanced.  But again who knows someone may break one or two of these mages.  So let’s get some games in!!!!

Academy mages converted to Arena Mages with new abilities 1.2


Bael Warlock 36 life, channel 9.

Hell Fire Curse:  you may pay 1 mana and place a burn on a creature if they have a curse and no other burns.  Also enemy creatures with curses have a +2 to effect die when rolling for burn conditions.

Sacrifice of Blood

Kelsar Grove Beastmaster 34, 9

Fury of the Beast: nature enchantments targeting Animals cost 1 less, once per round if a friendly animal has a nature enchantment you may pay one mana to give it +1 melee for the round. 

Stir the Beast

Sistarra Wizard 32,10

Extend Magic
Lightning Charge during upkeep you may pay 1 mana your mage has +1 armor until you cast a lightning spell.  your next attack gains +1 melee and +1 range to lightning attack
Weather Influence
once per round cloud, wind and frost spells cost 1 mana less
any freeze conditions on enemy creatures also gain +2 to effect rolls when attacked


Dsjer-Tet Forcemaster 34,10

Power Transfer
Force Barrier you may pay 1 mana in upkeep to get +1 armor for the round and the first time your mage is damaged by a melee attack you may place a stagger on the attacking creature. 

Ivarium Warlord 32, 9 

Battle Orders
Battle Horn  once per round when you summon a lvl 1 soldier you may summon another soldier by paying mana equal to Level +1. 


Asyra Priestess 33, 10

Blessing of Champions

Asrya Blessing:  During upkeep, you may pay 3 mana to heal 2 damage to a friendly creature in arena.  If you do that creature  gains +1 melee for the round. 

Retribution:  non-mage friendly light attacks gain +1 melee and +1 Range

Congrats Zot!!!