Arcane Duels - Domination 3 For All!!

[Coshade]

Fun game guys I was just wondering... Does the AoC give mana to the mage? The card says - spawnpoint or familiar and your mage is neither of that.

You are absolutely right!

[adanaz]

I haven't played a single game of Mage Wars where either myself or my opponent haven't made some kind of mistake or another.  Even during tournament play there's always a forgotten spawnpoint channelling, a targeting error or something along those lines.  It's not surprising, as there is so much to keep track of and so much going on.  This is one of the features that makes Mage Wars such an amazing game to play; there are so many levels of depth.

As Coshade said:

The possibilities are crazy for this game!

[jhaelen]

I haven't played a single game of Mage Wars where either myself or my opponent haven't made some kind of mistake or another.  [...]  This is one of the features that makes Mage Wars such an amazing game to play;

Umm, yeah. To be honest, a different conclusion came to my mind...

[flamespeak]

I haven't played a single game of Mage Wars where either myself or my opponent haven't made some kind of mistake or another.

That is one of the biggest problems that I have with teaching the game to new players, to be honest with you. The amount of upkeep each round in the late game and rule changes with different attacks and such wear on newbies. The apprentice mode helps somewhat but even that is a little too micro-management heavy for someone coming in from other games. Amazingly enough, I am mainly talking about Magic and Android players here, war gamers get a hang of micro management quiet easily. Then again, it IS war gamers.

I am sincerely hoping that Mage Wars Academy addresses this issue quite a bit. I am hoping the progression could be Mage Wars: Academy. Mage Wars: Arena Apprentice, Mage Wars: Arena full stop, Mage Wars: Domination (let's get crazy).

Definitely one of the deepest games I have played in terms of what can be done on any given turn and I still recommend it to many folks but that box sitting on my shelf scares people something fierce no matter how gentle I am with teaching it to people.

[V10lentray]

Fun game guys I was just wondering... Does the AoC give mana to the mage? The card says - spawnpoint or familiar and your mage is neither of that.

It really didn't make much difference in this game. I actually lost mana on the Altar do to my incredible rolling skills and the ridulousness of the SSlak and the Usslak armor. I think I only games 2-3 mana from the Altar and I continuously summoned creatures so had the mana gone on the Barracks, it would have had the same end result. The focus of the build was a goblin rush build.

After playing that match, I'm not sure how much I like the Altar of Carnage. I think I need to try it again and find a way to get the armory out as well. The peircing from armory would have helped dramatically. With that board shape, and the 3 players, there was no where on the board I could have played another outpost.

So again we get to the big dilema of most people who love this game - finding players to play with.

[V10lentray]

no double and triplestrike would not get the melee bonus other than the first attack of that sequence.

Sweeping?

[Bluebaron]

Same for sweeping. No exceptions for that rule.

[adanaz]

Umm, yeah. To be honest, a different conclusion came to my mind...

Would you care to elaborate jhaelen?

[Laddinfance]

no double and triplestrike would not get the melee bonus other than the first attack of that sequence.

Sweeping?

Blue is right, sweeping is also part of the same attack sequence. Currently the only way to get your full melee bonus multiple times in a round is if you can counterstrike.

[iNano78]

By the way, there's a nice chart on page 5 of the Official Rules and Codex Supplement (aka FAQ) that illustrates which bonuses apply to multiple attacks and which don't. With rare exception, things that affect the defender, like Flame +2 or Aegis or Armor, will apply to every  incoming attack (including multiple strikes), whereas things that apply to the attacker, llike Melee/Ranged +1 or Vampiric, don't.   "+/-X vs _____" (e.g. +2 vs corporeal conjurations) applies on every attack.

Damage type (like Adramelech Warlock's flame basic attack) and Reach and Ethereal (eg when granted by a weapon or Enchantment or Incantation) apply for all attacks (eg Battle Fury) as well.

[Coshade]

Hey there,

Just wanted to say that we all make rule mistakes, but most of the time they don't really matter. If you're playing in a casual setting then use the suggestion of just playing what you think is right. The point of playing the game is to have fun. You shouldn't let a rule ruin your experience with not only Mage Wars, but any game.

I put a lot of my games up on the internet and there is always some rule mistake I make, it doesn't bother me because I remember that I really enjoyed that game played. All those games are also casual and hanging out with my friends. I know we have an episode coming out with my Lifelock where I make a mistake with Bloodthirsty, we're not gonna scrap the video because of that. We had a blast and that's all the matters.

In tournaments though I am a jerk with rules. I'll be honest I stick to the letter on the rulebook and pay really close attention. I don't feel bad about calling people out in tournaments for cards like [mwcard=MW1J08]Hand of Bim-Shalla[/mwcard] (most people activate - move - attack then before rolling attack dice, decide to use bim-shalla).

[jhaelen]

Would you care to elaborate jhaelen?

Isn't that obvious? If you cannot play the game without making (rule) mistakes, there must be something wrong with the game('s rules).

Now, don't get me wrong, I enjoy playing games with complex rules, e.g. Arkham Horror, which has an insane amount of corner-cases and non-obvious card interactions, once you play with all expansions. Or the Call of Cthulhu LCG which cannot be played without an intricate knowledge of the game's current FAQ.

To be honest, if I got to play Mage Wars as often as either of these games, I would probably make less mistakes, too, but I still think it's harder to miss them as in either of the other games. First, Mage Wars has an ever-increasing number of keywords, many of which are similar. While the Codex helps, definitions too often refer to other entries to grasp all of the implications. In Mage Wars, cards also tend to have a lot more text than either of the mentioned games.

And what seems to trip up even Mage Wars pro players: the game board is too busy. Between stacks of cards distributed across and around the board and various counters it's just too easy to miss something.

[Kazador]

Fun game guys I was just wondering... Does the AoC give mana to the mage? The card says - spawnpoint or familiar and your mage is neither of that.

It really didn't make much difference in this game. I actually lost mana on the Altar do to my incredible rolling skills and the ridulousness of the SSlak and the Usslak armor. I think I only games 2-3 mana from the Altar and I continuously summoned creatures so had the mana gone on the Barracks, it would have had the same end result. The focus of the build was a goblin rush build.

After playing that match, I'm not sure how much I like the Altar of Carnage. I think I need to try it again and find a way to get the armory out as well. The peircing from armory would have helped dramatically. With that board shape, and the 3 players, there was no where on the board I could have played another outpost.

So again we get to the big dilema of most people who love this game - finding players to play with.

I know, that it did not make that much of a diference, besides, you were using that mana mostly for creatures... so as it was on the barracks... I just wanted to be sure, if I did not miss any errata on this card

[Sailor Vulcan]

Would you care to elaborate jhaelen?

Isn't that obvious? If you cannot play the game without making (rule) mistakes, there must be something wrong with the game('s rules).

Now, don't get me wrong, I enjoy playing games with complex rules, e.g. Arkham Horror, which has an insane amount of corner-cases and non-obvious card interactions, once you play with all expansions. Or the Call of Cthulhu LCG which cannot be played without an intricate knowledge of the game's current FAQ.

To be honest, if I got to play Mage Wars as often as either of these games, I would probably make less mistakes, too, but I still think it's harder to miss them as in either of the other games. First, Mage Wars has an ever-increasing number of keywords, many of which are similar. While the Codex helps, definitions too often refer to other entries to grasp all of the implications. In Mage Wars, cards also tend to have a lot more text than either of the mentioned games.

And what seems to trip up even Mage Wars pro players: the game board is too busy. Between stacks of cards distributed across and around the board and various counters it's just too easy to miss something.

Or maybe your attitude towards rules mistakes is a little too harsh. Rules mistakes don't happen every game. I don't know about everyone else, but at least in my experience they're usually things that are easy to rectify, like forgetting to increase your channeling after you cast a mana crystal. If my opponent makes any more serious mistakes than that, I let them know immediately so they can correct it. If there's any disagreements (which doesn't happen often) we look it up in the codex or the rule book.

And this is coming from the guy with ADHD. Mage Wars isn't a game that a beginner is going to completely get right away. It takes practice to learn. And that's okay. A beginner will still understand the rules well enough to have a great time playing mage wars casually, even if they do make rules mistakes.

Of course, there's also the matter of the game only being three years old. Even some of us pro players have room to improve. Every once in a while I forget something or become unsure of something, and when I do I just look it up in the codex or the rules supplement. It doesn't happen that often, but when it does I realize that I've forgotten something and what I've forgotten.

I honestly think that we should use block formats to make Arena organized play more accessible to beginners. By block format I mean a format where only cards from the core set and zero, one or two expansions are allowed.

[Mystery]

just to add altar of carnage doesnt trigger with the warlord, he is no soldier or?