Arcane Wonders Forum
Mage Wars => Spellbook Design and Construction => Topic started by: GeorgeFalcon on September 09, 2014, 05:14:53 PM
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Equipment
1x Moonglow Amulet
1x Gauntlets of Strength
1x Harshforge Plate
1x General's Signet Ring
1x defense Ring
1x Mage Wand
1x Dispel Wand
1x Reflex Boots
1x Helm of Command
1x Elemental Cloak
Enchantments
1x Armor Ward
1x regrowth
1x Bear Strength
2x Mind Shield
1x Reverse Attack
1x Rhino Hide
1x Standard Bearer
4x Nullify
2x Decoy
1x Cheetah Speed
1x healing Charm
Conjurations
1x Enchanter's Wardstone
Creatures
2x Anvil Throne Crossbowmen
2x Bloodcrage Minotaur
2x Knight of Westlock
2x Orc Butcher
4x Goblin Grunt
Incantations
4x Power Strike
1x Seeking Dispel
2x Knockdown
4x Defed
4x Battle Fury
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You need something to give more actions. A barracks or a Battleforge. Otherwise you will be overwhelmed by your opponents actions. Did you even test this book before posting it? Goblin grunts are not worth the action to summon without a barracks to do it for you.
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You need something to give more actions. A barracks or a Battleforge. Otherwise you will be overwhelmed by your opponents actions. Did you even test this book before posting it? Goblin grunts are not worth the action to summon without a barracks to do it for you.
Agreed, this book needs a battleforge and better equipment selection (Eisenach's hammer, deflection bracers, eagleclaw boots, etc) or a barracks and better creature selection.
I disagree with grunts not being worth your mage's full actions. I used to think the same way, but with the Bloodwave you need creatures ASAP and that means getting meat on the board, even if all you can afford is a grunt. As soon as you get behind creature-wise with barracks strategy you're probably going to lose. Obviously this book may not end up as barracks strategy, but if he's going to go that route and play it like Bloodwave it's important to understand this, imo.
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Have you gotten a warlord swarm book to work? I had a decent one going but it dies to Aviary. Grunts can't handle birds and Slingers are even slightly worse then birds. Basically +1 mana cost for +1 hp which isn't worth it.
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Have you gotten a warlord swarm book to work? I had a decent one going but it dies to Aviary. Grunts can't handle birds and Slingers are even slightly worse then birds. Basically +1 mana cost for +1 hp which isn't worth it.
It depends what you consider swarm. If you consider swarm a mix of level 1's and 2's (grunts, slingers, butchers, alchemists) then yes I believe I've gotten it to work. Goblin Alchemist and acid ball made Warlord Swarm viable, imo (as well as other kinds).
In reference to the particular situation you mention, the way I would go about solving that would be in the following steps:
1). Make Slingers to ranged attack birds
2). Make Grunts to guard them
3). Lay down Fortified position to reduce effectiveness of birds
Not necessarily in that order, but you get the idea. Unless you buff your soldiers with zone/arena wide buffs, you will (should) lose to the beastmaster. Luckily, +2 armor for a whole zone (for 5 mana with discount) effectively increases the health of your slingers and grunts to 6 and 8 or more (66% of the time).
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Harping on him for not testing the book is a bit rough there @BoomFrog. GeorgeFalcon is new to the game so he still has much to learn about book building. That being said I can vouch he is learning at a very rapid rate. He will play this book in a game and learn it's shortcomings and adapt. We all were new and had to learn at some point.
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I've never really used Goblin Grunts and Goblin Slingers, but I've gotten Orc Butchers and Goblin Alchemists to work well.
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I've never really used Goblin Grunts and Goblin Slingers, but I've gotten Orc Butchers and Goblin Alchemists to work well.
I'd say give them both a go; they do pretty well since the release of corrode (like other low level creatures).
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A revision to the previous deck idea.
Equipment
1x Moonglow Amulet
1x Deflection Bracers
1x Harshforge Plate
1x Ring of Command
1x Defense Ring
1x Veteran's Belt
1x Mage Wand
1x Eagleclaw Boots
1x Morning Star
1x Helm of Command
1x Elemental Cloak
1x Horn of Gothos
Enchantments
1x Regrowth
1x Bear Strength
2x Mind Shield
1x Armor Ward
1x Rhino Hide
1x Standard Bearer
4x Nullify
2x Decoy
1x Cheetah Speed
1x Healing Charm
Conjurations
1x Barracks
1x Garrison Post
1x Archer's Watchtower
Creatures
2x Bloodcrag Minotaur
1x Gurmash, Orc Sergeant
2x Dwarf Panzergarde
2x Orc Butcher
4x Goblin Grunt
2x Goblin Slinger
1x Thorg, Chief Bodyguard
Incantations
3x Power Strike
1x Seeking Dispel
1x Akiro's Battle Cry
1x Knockdown
1x Piercing Strike
1x Perfect Strike
1x Sniper Shot
1x Dissolve
1x Defend
1x Battle Fury
1x Charge
1x Flank Attack
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When posting builds it helps the community if you also post the first 3 turns and the primary strategy of the build. Otherwise it makes it difficult for people to decipher what your intent is with the card list. This makes advice harder to achieve.
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Have you gotten a warlord swarm book to work? I had a decent one going but it dies to Aviary. Grunts can't handle birds and Slingers are even slightly worse then birds. Basically +1 mana cost for +1 hp which isn't worth it.
It depends what you consider swarm. If you consider swarm a mix of level 1's and 2's (grunts, slingers, butchers, alchemists) then yes I believe I've gotten it to work. Goblin Alchemist and acid ball made Warlord Swarm viable, imo (as well as other kinds).
In reference to the particular situation you mention, the way I would go about solving that would be in the following steps:
1). Make Slingers to ranged attack birds
2). Make Grunts to guard them
3). Lay down Fortified position to reduce effectiveness of birds
Not necessarily in that order, but you get the idea. Unless you buff your soldiers with zone/arena wide buffs, you will (should) lose to the beastmaster. Luckily, +2 armor for a whole zone (for 5 mana with discount) effectively increases the health of your slingers and grunts to 6 and 8 or more (66% of the time).
The grunts get punched by the beast master, the fortified position gets dispelled, and the slingers get ripped apart by the birds. My main opponent is very good at playing Aviary. I think in swarm vs swarm there is going to be one that is just more efficient and the other swarm books just need a back up plan vs Aviary.
@Maverick87: Your right.
@George: Sorry I was short with you. Like maverick said please post more then your naked book list, a 3 turn plan and some general thoughts could help a lot. Personally I make a3 turn plan vs aggressive and a 3 turn plan vs defensive and then I build the book around those plans.
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Have you gotten a warlord swarm book to work? I had a decent one going but it dies to Aviary. Grunts can't handle birds and Slingers are even slightly worse then birds. Basically +1 mana cost for +1 hp which isn't worth it.
It depends what you consider swarm. If you consider swarm a mix of level 1's and 2's (grunts, slingers, butchers, alchemists) then yes I believe I've gotten it to work. Goblin Alchemist and acid ball made Warlord Swarm viable, imo (as well as other kinds).
In reference to the particular situation you mention, the way I would go about solving that would be in the following steps:
1). Make Slingers to ranged attack birds
2). Make Grunts to guard them
3). Lay down Fortified position to reduce effectiveness of birds
Not necessarily in that order, but you get the idea. Unless you buff your soldiers with zone/arena wide buffs, you will (should) lose to the beastmaster. Luckily, +2 armor for a whole zone (for 5 mana with discount) effectively increases the health of your slingers and grunts to 6 and 8 or more (66% of the time).
The grunts get punched by the beast master, the fortified position gets dispelled, and the slingers get ripped apart by the birds. My main opponent is very good at playing Aviary. I think in swarm vs swarm there is going to be one that is just more efficient and the other swarm books just need a back up plan vs Aviary.
@Maverick87: Your right.
@George: Sorry I was short with you. Like maverick said please post more then your naked book list, a 3 turn plan and some general thoughts could help a lot. Personally I make a3 turn plan vs aggressive and a 3 turn plan vs defensive and then I build the book around those plans.
So:
1) If the beastmaster is using his action to attack a 4 health, 2 armor grunt...good. Even if it's just a normal grunt with no armor, if he kills it, so what? It did it's job. If he doesn't, massive returns on that 4 mana. It's basically a win win.
2). You pay 5 for fortified position (w/ring). He pays 6 to dispel. Winning. (carry enough FP's)
3). Yeah, the backup plan is probably to fireball his tree. The Warlord is all about efficiency, you just have to make it work. Aviary really isn't that great without the tree. The extra health is what seems to make it very strong.
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With the Etherian Life Tree since it states "All other Living creatures and conjurations gain Innate Life +2" your Grunts get the additional Life +2 also. Seems that it help keep your Grunts alive in same manner it keeps the birdies alive. If playing mean green there is even a reasonable chance that your Grunts become vets...
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With the Etherian Life Tree since it states "All other Living creatures and conjurations gain Innate Life +2" your Grunts get the additional Life +2 also. Seems that it help keep your Grunts alive in same manner it keeps the birdies alive. If playing mean green there is even a reasonable chance that your Grunts become vets...
Oh right, right. I don't know why I forgot about that, lol.
Yeah, then I probably wouldn't even take the tree down because it's a very real possibility that Bloodwave would get just as much or more benefit from the extra health than the beastmaster.
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Beastmaster doesn't play tree against another swarm. You don't get any vet tokens because your guys can't get any melee kills, an injured bird won't be the one to attack a guard so your have to get very lucky for a grunt to survive and kill a fresh bird in a counter attack. Playing ring of command isn't worth the action, whichever swarm achieves dominance will win and that will happen before round 4 of the game. Swarm vs swarm is very swingy.
The biggest problem I had is making my mage melee attack valuable. I was defending which got me pushed through a wall of thorns effectually losing 3 actions for his 2 since the guard is now irrelevant and I have to walk back to the action. I think a reach weapon is needed, which sadly means mage staff for the warlord as a meta play against aviary. Either that or Torak the sky hunter (who can get a very token too...)
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Beastmaster doesn't play tree against another swarm. You don't get any vet tokens because your guys can't get any melee kills, an injured bird won't be the one to attack a guard so your have to get very lucky for a grunt to survive and kill a fresh bird in a counter attack. Playing ring of command isn't worth the action, whichever swarm achieves dominance will win and that will happen before round 4 of the game. Swarm vs swarm is very swingy.
The biggest problem I had is making my mage melee attack valuable. I was defending which got me pushed through a wall of thorns effectually losing 3 actions for his 2 since the guard is now irrelevant and I have to walk back to the action. I think a reach weapon is needed, which sadly means mage staff for the warlord as a meta play against aviary. Either that or Torak the sky hunter (who can get a very token too...)
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Ring of command is absolutely worth the action. With all the command based support your mage should be dishing out it definitely pays off.
Dominance on one side or the other before round 4?? Id like to know what happens in your games to make that happen, it sounds a bit ridiculous to me.
Maybe I shouldve made this point sooner but yoy dont always guard them with grunts. As soon as you have your economy down butchers become your main melee troop most of the time, or like 50/50 grunts/butcher. Even so, birds are statistically unlikely to kill grunts in 1 hit (3 dmg vs 4 health) so barring any other kind of buff to their attack grunts will get the counterstrike. It doesnt matter if grunts/butchers get vet off injured birds, theyll die to slingers if theyre too afraid to attack anyway.
You dont need to utilize your mages melee just because he has melee buff. Running many creatures means you need to stay as far away from combat as possible because your mana is sunk into creatures and not your mage. Good thing Warlord has the horn to perfectly support this.
Done right swarm vs swarm isnt swingy imo. Sure if you onlt play lvl ones and then dont really support them that could be more true, but imo that isnt "swarm". Swarm is lvl 1-3 creatures and support from a mostly unbuffed mage. At this point I feel you dont really care for my logic so I dont really have much else to say. Ive literally been playing creature heavy Warlord since FvW release and ive never felt ring of command as not worth casting (except as AT Warlord) along with other sentiments of yours.
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Beastmaster doesn't play tree against another swarm. You don't get any vet tokens because your guys can't get any melee kills, an injured bird won't be the one to attack a guard so your have to get very lucky for a grunt to survive and kill a fresh bird in a counter attack. Playing ring of command isn't worth the action, whichever swarm achieves dominance will win and that will happen before round 4 of the game. Swarm vs swarm is very swingy.
The biggest problem I had is making my mage melee attack valuable. I was defending which got me pushed through a wall of thorns effectually losing 3 actions for his 2 since the guard is now irrelevant and I have to walk back to the action. I think a reach weapon is needed, which sadly means mage staff for the warlord as a meta play against aviary. Either that or Torak the sky hunter (who can get a very token too...)
If he doesn't play the tree the birds are too fragile......two slingers can take one out a round.
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And two birds can kill one slinger. Guess who summons faster? Lair cost 1 less mana then barracks+outpost and Beastmaster can summon as a quick action and birds cost 1 less mana and most importantly the pet gets is amazingly efficient. On round 3 Beastmaster, a pet falcon and a regular bird are attacking. Warlord can have two slingers or a slinger, a grunt and a ring or enchantment. By the end of round 4 someone has lost more of their creatures and is going to fall behind if they are not lucky (barring play mistakes).
When you are engaged in melee on turn 3 a ring is not worth your QC. Hurl rock to try and kill a bird or magestaff and melee a bird are far more worthwhile. Either way though the Beastmaster is still more efficient.
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And two birds can kill one slinger. Guess who summons faster? Lair cost 1 less mana then barracks+outpost and Beastmaster can summon as a quick action and birds cost 1 less mana and most importantly the pet gets is amazingly efficient. On round 3 Beastmaster, a pet falcon and a regular bird are attacking. Warlord can have two slingers or a slinger, a grunt and a ring or enchantment. By the end of round 4 someone has lost more of their creatures and is going to fall behind if they are not lucky (barring play mistakes).
When you are engaged in melee on turn 3 a ring is not worth your QC. Hurl rock to try and kill a bird or magestaff and melee a bird are far more worthwhile. Either way though the Beastmaster is still more efficient.
Completely understand what you are getting at, but if you start taking out the birds at even a two to one ratio it is not going to be a good day for the Aviary as it is highly dependent on keeping all of them alive to aggregate there damage rolls into something truly frightening. 3 birds without Innate Life +2 is something that can be handled, 6 birds Alfred fricken Hitchcock....
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You guys should battle the two swarm decks on OCTGN and post the results. Would be interesting to see play out.
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And two birds can kill one slinger. Guess who summons faster? Lair cost 1 less mana then barracks+outpost and Beastmaster can summon as a quick action and birds cost 1 less mana and most importantly the pet gets is amazingly efficient. On round 3 Beastmaster, a pet falcon and a regular bird are attacking. Warlord can have two slingers or a slinger, a grunt and a ring or enchantment. By the end of round 4 someone has lost more of their creatures and is going to fall behind if they are not lucky (barring play mistakes).
When you are engaged in melee on turn 3 a ring is not worth your QC. Hurl rock to try and kill a bird or magestaff and melee a bird are far more worthwhile. Either way though the Beastmaster is still more efficient.
You're going to have to break down what exactly your saying because there's a lot of ambiguity in when and where things are happening on the board. You make a lot of claims and don't really back them up with strong evidence. Case in point, you claim you'll never get Vet tokens vs Aviary because "goblins get 1 shot by birds" but statistically you're wrong and the grunts (or butchers) have a better than average chance to swing back. You seem like you're absolutely sure in your logic but I see no substantive basis for it, so until you better explain I guess I'll just say I disagree.
Hurl rock and/or magestaff definitely don't seem like good ideas (in most cases) and are unneeded. You're effectively spending just as much as the cost of the bird and an action to -try- and kill it. You roll any less than 5 and you just degraded your action to crap tier and have to do it again.
It doesn't even seem like a healthy debate at this point, it just feels like I'm offering legitimate advice to someone who's not willing to listen, or even consider. I tend to be that way in MW too; get crushed by a book and then get frustated...I'm definitely part of that club. In any case, I've offered really all I can at this point.
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You guys should battle the two swarm decks on OCTGN and post the results. Would be interesting to see play out.
That doesn't sound like a half bad idea, I've just had (and heard of) less than positive experiences with players on OCTGN so I don't really log on anymore and MUCH prefer play IRL. They just tend to be very click-y and take liberty with the fact that it's online communication (interpret as you wish). Not that I don't think playing with Boomfrog wouldn't be a great time, it probably would, I might just be slow on the controls (haven't logged on in like 2 months).