Simple Warlord fix (requires card reprint)

[IndyPendant]

Hi all.

I know it is highly unlikely this would ever be implemented, but I believe this would most likely single-handedly fix most the Warlord's issues.  I thought I would share it with the community here, see what people thought.  Essentially, it is to change Battle Orders to read:

"Once per round, when the Warlord casts a non-Epic, Quick Action, Single Target Command Incantation, the Warlord may pay additional mana equal to the spell's casting cost.  If he does so, that spell's target changes to 'all friendly Soldiers in the same zone as the Warlord'."

This 'fix' would serve four primary purposes:

1) It would bring the Warlord's special abilities up to a level on par with other mages.

2) It would guide the Warlord into casting all those War Incantations more often, particularly the low-cost Novice ones.

3) It would allow greater versatility in his soldiers, possibly allowing more Veteran tokens to get deployed (by a critical casting of Power Strike, Piercing Strike, or even a double-costed Battle Fury for example).

4) It would make Horn of Gothos and Helm of Command much more viable for play.

What do you think?

--IndyPendant.

[Sailor Vulcan]

Wow. That actually sounds really good.

[HomelessJoe]

I think it's a good idea and I do think it would solve some problems. Sadly, I think the Warlord is overall inherently flawed. In my group I hear more often than not 'why would you play the Warlord, when you can play any other mage?' That's especially true for Earth Wizard who is superior in every way. The triple arcane is absolutely devastating imo. There are so many necessary arcane spells that your Warlord book just feels empty. Which should be the exact opposite since I think he plays best as a swarm build.  If that was changed, along with your idea then maybe the Warlord would be a contender.
Now don't get me wrong, I truly hope they do make some changes for this Mage. Whether that's an errata to his card, or adding a general that gives battle orders, maybe some stronger creatures, whatever the case i'm all for it. I like playing him. I can see what they were doing when designing him, and since he is so different than other mages its fun to play hiim. Though as it stands, he just can't compete on any real level.

Good idea though mate. Keep them rolling!

[Memnaelar]

It definitely feels like he needs some more War Mage Only / Warlord Only cards, if only to keep the otherwise superior Wizard from stealing anything else he might get.  If the Warlord got an exclusive soldier equivalent of the Iron Golem -- a non-legendary, awesome soldier at a reasonable casting cost -- that might push more interest.  It really is hard to argue that he does anything that an Earth Wizard doesn't largely do better.

[Sailor Vulcan]

I don't think the Warlord is supposed to only swarm. What about his defenses and outposts? Archer's Watchtower is made for wall users. What about his panzerguardes? What about Thorg?

The priestess is best with turtling, and the beastmaster is best with swarming, but I'm sure the Warlord is meant to do both. What would make this possible is zone control. If you control more territory, you can adapt to threats more efficiently by moving the appropriate creatures to offensive or defensive positions with less hindering. I think while the Warlord needs to support his soldiers, he ideally should never have leave the territory he controls unless it conquers more territory before he can get hurt. Traps could be placed on the outskirts of your territory to dissuade potential invaders, or to punish those who do attempt to invade.

His many goblin soldiers are very weak and die easily, but I suspect that the Warlord gets them to swarm by summoning a LOT of them and at least partially protecting them and clearing a path for them. Like casting shift enchantment to move a fortified position ahead a couple zones to help clear a path, then casting his standard bearer on a powerful creature to lead the swarm, probably the warlord himself so that he could use battleorders on his swarm more easily. Because of that I propose that the Warlord himself should be a soldier creature. Afterall, he probably didn't inherit his forces by birth, he probably had to kill another warlord to achieve power (I'm pretty sure that's the way it works). Not to mention he's an Orc wearing a lot of armor and nasty weapons. Maybe I'm exaggerating his soldier-ness.

If the warlord is not a soldier creature then another powerful creature will have to lead the Warlord's troops to victory (like Thorg), and the Warlord will absolutely NEED his Horn of Gorthos to win this way.

If you have a means to protect the swarm so enough of them can survive to attack the enemy mage, you have enough attack power in your swarm and its leader to kill the enemy mage, and you're not in danger of being killed yourself first, then that is the moment to march forward and take 'em out. Think of winning "Tower Defense" style, except that you're the one sending waves of enemies forward.

I think this edited version of the battle orders ability you came up with is brilliant. And as I write this post, I think I finally realize why the Veterans ability only works with melee attackers: because the ranged attackers are meant to be defensive, helping the Warlord maintain his territory by holding off invaders, while his melee attackers are for expanding his territory and invading into enemy zones.

Thoughts?

[DeckBuilder]

Good idea Indy, simple ones are often the best. I like how it encourages large number of troops.

I would add "pay triple for untrained schools in enchantments" instead of triple arcane to force him down commands not persistent effect enchantments. The real tricksiness in the game is instant effects from reveal anytime. He does not do instants, he does sorcery speed one shot commands. Triple Arcane like Triple Nature is too debilitating for any mage.

He needs Altar of the Iron Guard rewritten as a non legendary outpost "your soldiers enter play with guard counters" to buff up Barracks to playable (Kharhaz idea).

And give him a worthy one handed weapon (counterstrike?) to go with horn so he can leverage both his +1 melee and his general theme.

Then he can the join the gang.

[IndyPendant]

Thanks guys.

DB, I *really* like your idea of "Non-war enchantment spells cost triple during spellbook construction" instead of Arcane spells costing triple!  Put that on the card along with my change, then give him a good one-handed weapon, and he's right back to being a viable mage again.

The more I think about this, the more I think it would resolve nearly all of the Warlord's problems.  Granted, there were still some rather odd design decisions made for him:

--Making his 'signature weapon' two handed.
--Not allowing Garrison Post to work with Barracks.
--Giving him Earth magic, and then all earth creatures Slow, with no feasible access to Teleport.

Maybe it was partly because FM vs WL was the first expansion in the game...

[Aylin]

My first impression is that making non-War/Earth enchantments cost triple (as opposed to Arcane spells) would make him even worse than he already is.  It would discourage him from taking Animal buffs, curses, Mind-school defense buffs, and the Divine buffs making him even worse at supporting his soldiers (while leaving him worse than the Wizard at supporting Iron Golems).


I think what is most needed to fix the Warlord is more War spells (enchantments this time) and some War/Earth spells or War Mage only Earth spells.


Also, I don't think the Warlord is swarm at all. The Barracks is just awful (at least with the current outposts), and none of his creatures are that great until you get to the level 3 Dwarves. Makes me think that he's better with just a few big creatures, probably just 2-4 in a given game.

[IndyPendant]

Giving my old thread a bit of a necro, for a quick update: as others have said, he does need a bit of help with his triple-cost arcane school issues.  Presumably, the new mini-expansion (which is apparently Warlord vs Warlock) is going to release some of the war-school promo cards we've been seeing for a while now, but the triple-costed Dispel and Teleport remain rather crippling.  (Nullify is inconvenient, but hardly game-breaking in my opinion.)  However, that seems rather easily fixed with two new cards:

Minor Dispel
Incantation
Cost: X
School: Arcane 1 (Novice)
Range: 0-1
Target: Creature
Effect: Destroy one level 1 revealed enchantment attached to the target creature.  X=total mana cost of the enchantment (casting plus reveal cost).

Dimensional Hop
Incantation
Cost: 4
School: Arcane 1 (Novice)
Range: 0-1
Target: Friendly Creature, Zone
Effect: Target creature is Teleported to target zone.  The creature cannot be Teleported more than one zone using this spell.

With these two cards in play, the promo cards coming, and the Warlord fix in my original post, we're getting much closer to a viable mage.  About the only things left to fix would be the outpost/spawnpoint issues, and providing viable low-level soldiers.  (Although I wouldn't be surprised to learn I'm forgetting something else that's broken about the much-maligned Warlord. ; )

What do you think?

[ringkichard]

Do you think Dimension Hop would solve the Teleport Problem? Warlord already has Force Push for the same price as everyone else.

Same question for Minor Dispell and Dispell Wand.

These are not rhetorical questions, mind. Do you think these would be enough? Dimension Hop would let Warlord break Tanglevines, but wouldn't really help against Golem Pit, would it?

[ACG]

Giving my old thread a bit of a necro, for a quick update: as others have said, he does need a bit of help with his triple-cost arcane school issues.  Presumably, the new mini-expansion (which is apparently Warlord vs Warlock) is going to release some of the war-school promo cards we've been seeing for a while now, but the triple-costed Dispel and Teleport remain rather crippling.  (Nullify is inconvenient, but hardly game-breaking in my opinion.)  However, that seems rather easily fixed with two new cards:

Minor Dispel
Incantation
Cost: X
School: Arcane 1 (Novice)
Range: 0-1
Target: Creature
Effect: Destroy one level 1 revealed enchantment attached to the target creature.  X=total mana cost of the enchantment (casting plus reveal cost).

Dimensional Hop
Incantation
Cost: 4
School: Arcane 1 (Novice)
Range: 0-1
Target: Friendly Creature, Zone
Effect: Target creature is Teleported to target zone.  The creature cannot be Teleported more than one zone using this spell.

With these two cards in play, the promo cards coming, and the Warlord fix in my original post, we're getting much closer to a viable mage.  About the only things left to fix would be the outpost/spawnpoint issues, and providing viable low-level soldiers.  (Although I wouldn't be surprised to learn I'm forgetting something else that's broken about the much-maligned Warlord. ; )

What do you think?

My concern is that these spells are too similar to spells that already exist, especially minor dispel, which is strictly worse than dispel (aside from being a novice spell). I feel that dispel should have been a novice spell, but it is probably too late to make that change at this point (since the cost of dispel has doubtless affected the balance of other cards). New spells ought to tread new design space.

I have previously proposed a sort of soft anti-enchantment spell for the Warlord, which operates in a different manner than the traditional dispel. I'll post it here for easy reference. Rather than a weakened teleport, a random, cheaper blink-style teleport spell might be a good candidate for a novice spell; I think your proposed Dimensional Hop is actually quite strong since it is controlled and a novice spell. Alternative also below.

(Blink X : This creature is randomly teleported X many times. Each time it is teleported, roll the D12 to determine a direction at random. If there is an adjacent zone in that direction into which the creature may legally teleport, it teleports to that zone. If not, the Blink fails and any remaining teleports from this blink are cancelled.)

[Zuberi]

I don't find teleport to be a huge problem for the Warlord. It is a weakness, but he has other spells available to him to fill the niche of positioning. Pushes, Fast, Charge, etc. They might not be as great as teleport, but they get the job done. I don't want him to have no weaknesses.

However, Dispel and Nullify are different. There are no non-arcane spells that can perform anything close to the functions of these two spells and a lot of people would claim these as being essential functions (especially the dispel). Thus, I've been thinking of something like the following spells:

Magic Resistance
Enchantment
School: War
Cost: ?
Range: 0-2
Target: Corporeal Creature
Effect: Whenever this creature becomes the target of an Enchantment or Incantation spell, counter that spell during the Counter Spell step unless its controller pays 2 mana.

Forbearance
Enchantment
School: War
Cost: ?
Range: 0-2
Target: Object
Effect: Opponent's Enchantments attached to this object gain the Upkeep +1 trait.

These spells attempt to serve similar functions as Nullify and Dispel without just copying or watering down those spells. Magic Resistance makes it more difficult for Enchantments and Incantations to target your creature and can be a hard counter if revealed at the right time. Or at least mess up your opponents plans with their mana count. Meanwhile Forbearance might not necessarily get rid of an enchantment that you dislike, but it will make your opponent have to pay through the nose to keep it.

[IndyPendant]

I do agree that the spells I proposed are very similar to the existing versions; it would be hard to create viable spells that were not.  ACG, I don't think the Murkh's Belt would serve; if the enchantment provides enough utility, the opponent will just pay the upkeep until he can Dissolve it.  I *love* your Blink idea though, and I hope AW implements something like it!  It even helps (a little) with Golem Pit books, because Walls won't stop it.

Ringkichard, the problem with the Dispel Wand is it is simply not worth including in *any* book except an Arcane-trained mage--let alone the Warlord where it would cost 6 book points.  AW royally screwed up making it Arcane 2 instead of 1, imo.  And Force Push does nothing to help against the bajillion cards that give a creature Restrained and Immovable.

I think we *need* another spell like Teleport that produces a similar effect, but is not Arcane 2--and preferably either another school or a Novice spell.  At the very least, it would help reduce Wizard bullying (muscling in and taking everything not nailed to a mage-only trait ; ).  However!  Both your comments made me realize that what I was primarily thinking of was indeed a method of getting out of those grab-and-hold cards, that currently only Teleport provides.  How about this instead of Dimensional Hop:

Agility
Incantation
Cost: 3
School: War 1 (Command)
Range: 0-2
Target: Creature
Effect: Until the end of the round, target loses, and cannot gain, the Slow, Restrained, and Immovable traits.

This card could even possibly be used offensively, to permit a subsequent Push through a passage-attacks wall, for example.  Might be too similar to Charge, though.

[Damaor]

I don't think the Warlord is supposed to only swarm. What about his defenses and outposts? Archer's Watchtower is made for wall users. What about his panzerguardes? What about Thorg?

The priestess is best with turtling, and the beastmaster is best with swarming, but I'm sure the Warlord is meant to do both. What would make this possible is zone control. If you control more territory, you can adapt to threats more efficiently by moving the appropriate creatures to offensive or defensive positions with less hindering. I think while the Warlord needs to support his soldiers, he ideally should never have leave the territory he controls unless it conquers more territory before he can get hurt. Traps could be placed on the outskirts of your territory to dissuade potential invaders, or to punish those who do attempt to invade.

His many goblin soldiers are very weak and die easily, but I suspect that the Warlord gets them to swarm by summoning a LOT of them and at least partially protecting them and clearing a path for them. Like casting shift enchantment to move a fortified position ahead a couple zones to help clear a path, then casting his standard bearer on a powerful creature to lead the swarm, probably the warlord himself so that he could use battleorders on his swarm more easily. Because of that I propose that the Warlord himself should be a soldier creature. Afterall, he probably didn't inherit his forces by birth, he probably had to kill another warlord to achieve power (I'm pretty sure that's the way it works). Not to mention he's an Orc wearing a lot of armor and nasty weapons. Maybe I'm exaggerating his soldier-ness.

If the warlord is not a soldier creature then another powerful creature will have to lead the Warlord's troops to victory (like Thorg), and the Warlord will absolutely NEED his Horn of Gorthos to win this way.

If you have a means to protect the swarm so enough of them can survive to attack the enemy mage, you have enough attack power in your swarm and its leader to kill the enemy mage, and you're not in danger of being killed yourself first, then that is the moment to march forward and take 'em out. Think of winning "Tower Defense" style, except that you're the one sending waves of enemies forward.

I'm agreed with you. Always seeing the Warlord like a Earth Wizard is an error. Attacks golems are better for E. Wizard, yes. But the ways to play the warlord are others . AND nullify IS NOT a essential card. Force push is good enough to "teleport" at low buying cost.

I think the only problem with the Warlord is the way people want to play him.

[DarthDadaD20]

Well you know....

With more cards coming in- the need for arcane will go down. And for many arcane cards, equivalents will present themselves.

Such as right now- we have "Dispel" a arcane spell. In the future, we may have something that varies from that such as a holy spell that allows you to destroy any Dark enchantment.

Thinks like that will eventually divert the arcane heavy meta.