Druid vs Necro Spoilers

[DeckBuilder]

Togorah can move 2 then guard with intercept. That's awesome.
It breaks the slow Treant / Ent idea (the ones that even talk so sloooowly as they live so long and time relatively moves faster for them).
It's obviously balancing to get them out of reach of a horde of Lumbering Zombies.

The other key point was Fast counters Slow but Fast does not counter Lumbering.
So a Zombie Crawler or Zombie Reanimate can Charge to move 2 but not other Zombies...

[HomelessJoe]

Agreed, there are other creatures that aren't giant akward tree vines things that walk around slowly. If enchanted with mana the Thornlasher who is rooted into the ground is faster than a Hydra (a creature with actual legs). That's a weird thought. I imagined Ents walking around, super slow like Deck Mentioned.  Turns out that's not the case at all. I thought the rooted was going to be more of a restriction than it actually is. Mana is King in this game though, so in actual gameplay maybe they won't be moved very often. 

[lettucemode]

It is weird to think of trees and plants sprinting around, but don't forget that the Druid has to pay mana every time they move. She's basically playing against an indestructible Suppression Orb every game. Not to mention that almost every creature with a melee attack also has Rooted, meaning that there is a additional cost to these creatures if you don't want your opponent to simply sit back and shoot everything down.

[Qube]

Actually, I believe fast does counter lumbering.

Lumbering
Object Trait

This creature is slow and/or clumsy. It may only take one move action during its Action Phase. If this creature gains the Fast trait, it cancels out both traits.

Also, zombie frenzy cancels out both slow and lumbering, then gives all zombies the fast trait... so they will be sprinting and attacking (when properly motivated).

Besides, Tolkien's ents took forever to make up their minds, but once they got going, they were fast enough ... so, the mechanic kinda fits.

[DeckBuilder]

Lumbering (Object Trait)
This creature is clumsy and/or hobbled. It is always hindered, and thus it can only take up to 1 move action during its Action Phase, even if it gains the Fast trait.

The reason why Zombie Frenzy (full action) says what it says in that sequence is to give all Zombies an over-riding Fast trait. Apart from that, Lumbering is an over-riding trait which seems anti-intuitive when it is not meant to be as debilitating as Slow. Another balancer no doubt.

[DeckBuilder]

It is weird to think of trees and plants sprinting around, but don't forget that the Druid has to pay mana every time they move. She's basically playing against an indestructible Suppression Orb every game. Not to mention that almost every creature with a melee attack also has Rooted, meaning that there is a additional cost to these creatures if you don't want your opponent to simply sit back and shoot everything down.

Thornlasher solves this to some extent. It's probably the most interesting Druid creature, just 7 mana and 2 spell points for a great control effect.

[Qube]

Hmmm... must have been a last minute balance thing.  Because I took my lumbering definition off the spoilers page, and yours is from the rulebook.  So, within a month or two they changed the lumbering rules.

[Qube]

Yeah, loving the thornlasher.  It also has some nice synergy with the druid's new bloodspine wall (that does not block LOS).

[aquestrion]

Thornlasher through blood spine wall wow nice

[DeckBuilder]

So a Zombie Crawler or Zombie Reanimate can Charge to move 2 but not other Zombies...

So having no legs (like a Crawler) is less debilitating for a Charge double movement than other Zombies. Can somebody please explain why they changed Lumbering to be so anti-intuitive, in rare cases worse than Slow?

So some Plants can move further in 1 round than Zombies with legs. Omnivorous Zombies are Bloodthirsty, feasting on Plants that can't Bleed (a side order of veg is good with your daily brains). Thornlasher is harmed by Poison effects but Flowers (who squirt acid or poison up to the sky) are immune yet both can't move out of their zone. Realism and consistency was jettisoned for contrived balance.

However Plant creatures (only) can Sleep. To paraphrase Philip K Dick's Bladerunner novel: "Do Plants dream of Carnivorous Sheep?"

I keep contending retaining Fantasy Realism is the game's most valuable asset and sadly this set has eroded it. I really love ideas like Thornlasher. But there are others which make me sad because they destroy the illusion. When teaching the game, players always say "hey it all makes sense!". Its charming intuitiveness should not be compromised. It is its Unique Selling Point in the games market. And you don't destroy your USP.

I will have to learn how to use a scanner to sign that form so I'm no longer so critical in public and can voice my concerns earlier.

I hate criticising this game as I feel so disloyal. I love this game and whilst there are so many clever ideas in this very ambitious set, this set has moved closer to Magic's "I equip my Loxodon Warhammer to my Bird of Paradise". Magic's clever abstract mechanics will always win in that territory. So don't try to compete there.

Please play to your strengths, that deep, intuitive and immersive skirmish role-playing illusion that is Mage Wars.

[HomelessJoe]

With that said I would have loved to see more Rooted creatures without the possibility of moving. This not only gives her a very different flavor, but it's a thematic flavor that you would expect from a plant based mage. I love the idea of avoiding the really big baddies that are stationary. I also really like the snatch mechanic. Allows for the stationary to still bring a creature to same zone combat. This to me should have been implemented more rather than just giving them the ability to move. It would add a whole new level of planning for the Druid. Her gameplan would have to be a lot more fleshed out than most. It would almost give her style a dangerous maze of creatures of sorts. One you have to avoid or attack. But again, to me that is very thematic as it gives the board more of a dangerous forest like feel.  It's a missed opportunity imo. She is different enough to not be a Beastmaster spinoff, but I would have liked to see more unique mechanics change to set her apart from the rest.

As a side note I have always had a beef with the fact that only "Creature" based plants are susceptible to poison's when non creature plants state they are alive. I would think any and all living organisms could be poisoned unless they were immune. In my book, if they are capable enough to regenerate, they can also die by poison. Besides, poisoning plants just makes sense. 

Alas I wish everything could thematically make sense. At the end of the day however this is a game, one that needs balance. It's easy to lose track of that when so much is alarmingly realistic. In their credit, I'm sure they feel just as strongly as us that they want everything to make as much sense as possible, but some things need to be tweaked or skewed for the sake of the game.

[Zuberi]

Who said only creature based plants are susceptible to poison's? If a conjuration has the Living trait, it no longer has Poison Immunity, right?

[Kharhaz]

Who said only creature based plants are susceptible to poison's? If a conjuration has the Living trait, it no longer has Poison Immunity, right?

Correct. Living replaces the Non living trait.

You can rot Mohktari or any living conjuration

He might be referring to Idol of Pestilence's arena damage, but that specifically states damage to living creatures.

[HomelessJoe]

Oh Awesome! I was under the opposite understanding. Great news for me and my Poison Based Necro!!!

[DeckBuilder]

Who said only creature based plants are susceptible to poison's? If a conjuration has the Living trait, it no longer has Poison Immunity, right?

I did not say Poison Immunity, I said "Poison effects by" which I meant poison damage and effects such as...

Altar of Skulls (which unlike Deathlock does not even give conjurations Finite Life)
Idol of Pestilence
Poison Gas Cloud
Malaconda
Weak counters
Ichthelid counters
Ghoul Rot
Plagued
Poisoned Blood
Cripple counters (irrelevant as conjurations don't have action markers to move)

In all the above cases, a Thornlasher is affected but a Flower is not.

You can place Rot or Tainted on a Living Conjuration and attack them with rare poison attacks (a Lotus is not immune to another Lotus). But that's it. In all other cases, Living Conjurations effectively have "most cases poison immunity" as they are excluded from those effects.

The rules were rife differentiating between Living Creatures and Living Conjurations yet this difference seems purely artificial for Plants.

You can't target Living Conjurations with most spells whilst having an action marker means you can
You can't heal Living Conjurations except by innate Regeneration or new Renewing Rain or Butterfly
You can't remove Rot or Tainted off a Living Conjuration using Priestess's Restore or Healing Wand

I appreciate that mechanically, they had to give Thornlasher an action marker as giving it a ready marker action like a Flower (you can only have 1 of each in a zone with 0 range effect) would be open to abuse with Thornlasher's range 1 effect (up to 5 zones).

The solution would have been to play-test Druid under a rules amendment: "Any effect that cites Creature includes Living Conjurations". Effectively undo the inconsistency in the base set which was only ever visible in 2 cards before this: Tanglevine and Wall of Thorn. But this was not done. And so those inconsistencies have been propagated.

I brought this up 2 months ago in my "House Rules (and some clarifications)" thread (Rules section), still being addressed in a new FAQ.

I feel bad highlighting this because the ambition of Plants is laudable and some of the creativity excellent. It just had rules inconsistencies to begin with that could not be fixed really. Creature based description enchantments applied to Plant creatures? Yet the game demands action markers for its dynamic. This was always going to be a Pandora's Box to open. I'm surprised they did not have a War Mage against the second Dark Mage just to round off the card pool more evenly, bring Warlord back in. It would not have had the Life vs. Death concept but it would have filled in the gaps instead of propagating fantasy realism issues. Oh well, hindsight is a wonderful thing. Most of the new cards are very interesting and I am looking forward to playing them. Just that they are eroding their USP and probably their greatest asset.

New player: "Dad, why does the Poison Gas Cloud hurt the Thornlasher but not the Flower? It don't make sense!"

And so this mechanical aspect of the game which creates inconsistency and a spell category-based artificiality destroys the illusion.