Public request to Sailor Vulcan

[iNano78]

Hello good sir, 

I notice you like to post alternative play modes for Mage Wars.  While this is certainly a welcome and valuable contribution to the community, it seems most of your suggestions are two-player modes that compromise between Academy and Arena - or in some way modify Academy or Arena.  For me, the official two-player, team and multiplayer free-for-all modes presented in Arena, Academy and Domination are sufficiently satisfactory that I'm not really interested in committing time and energy to learn unofficial game play modes for the same player counts - not to mention having to get other players on-board to try them out.

That said, I've noticed a desire on BGG, etc, for solo and/or cooperative Mage Wars game play. I was wondering if you've considered any solo or co-op game modes.   Or even "one vs many".  My guess is that an "Archmage" Battlegrounds expansion might cover a "one vs many" game play mode, and there are hints regarding a dungeon crawler but I haven't read/heard anything suggesting whether or not this would require a dungeon master (and thus be another "one vs many" format).  But in the meantime, these sorts of game play modes seem like untapped directions for unofficial alternative play.

A cursory search of the forums only lead me to this 2+ year old variant:
http://forum.arcanewonders.com/index.php?topic=12983.msg22186#msg22186
It looks neat... but I'm sure you could do better.   

Just a suggestion.  Happy holidays!

[Sailor Vulcan]

Hello good sir, 

I notice you like to post alternative play modes for Mage Wars.  While this is certainly a welcome and valuable contribution to the community, it seems most of your suggestions are two-player modes that compromise between Academy and Arena - or in some way modify Academy or Arena.  For me, the official two-player, team and multiplayer free-for-all modes presented in Arena, Academy and Domination are sufficiently satisfactory that I'm not really interested in committing time and energy to learn unofficial game play modes for the same player counts - not to mention having to get other players on-board to try them out.

That said, I've noticed a desire on BGG, etc, for solo and/or cooperative Mage Wars game play. I was wondering if you've considered any solo or co-op game modes.   Or even "one vs many".  My guess is that an "Archmage" Battlegrounds expansion might cover a "one vs many" game play mode, and there are hints regarding a dungeon crawler but I haven't read/heard anything suggesting whether or not this would require a dungeon master (and thus be another "one vs many" format).  But in the meantime, these sorts of game play modes seem like untapped directions for unofficial alternative play.

A cursory search of the forums only lead me to this 2+ year old variant:
http://forum.arcanewonders.com/index.php?topic=12983.msg22186#msg22186
It looks neat... but I'm sure you could do better.   

Just a suggestion.  Happy holidays!

Funny thing I was actually just starting to think about this a few days ago. Like a Mage Wars solitaire format or something.

There are a few directions I could go with it:

1. No enemy creatures, just an enemy life value and maybe some enemy armor as well.
2. Waves of enemy creatures like a tower defense sort of format.
3. An automated enemy Mage

1 is probably too easy. 3 probably isn't good because the enemy Mage can't use any strategy, which could make for very cheesy games. I'll probably end up going with 2. I'll think more on this.

[Fentum]

Rules for solo Mage wars would be FANTASTIC.

Looking at Descent 2, Gears of War, Galaxy Defenders,  D&D adventure board games,  etc, I am sure that a talented team of game designers could figure it out.

In fact, the Descent 2 Model covers a board, with movement, and monsters, each with special abilities. You could imagine how that might work in a translation. Galaxy Defenders and the upcoming Swords and Sorcery use boss style monster cards which could be used for the Mage whilst general AI by 'monster type' could be used for the monsters.

Regarding point three, there's a guy on BGG called Redjak who writes very high quality solo rules for all sorts of complex games. E.g. Descent, Star Wars Imperial Assault. They create AI for the big bad guy which is comparable in complexity to Mage Wars. Give him a call!

Also, Card Hunter, Loot & Legends, Hearthstone, Magic from the video world.

[Sailor Vulcan]

Rules for solo Mage wars would be FANTASTIC.

Looking at Descent 2, Gears of War, Galaxy Defenders,  D&D adventure board games,  etc, I am sure that a talented team of game designers could figure it out.

In fact, the Descent 2 Model covers a board, with movement, and monsters, each with special abilities. You could imagine how that might work in a translation. Galaxy Defenders and the upcoming Swords and Sorcery use boss style monster cards which could be used for the Mage whilst general AI by 'monster type' could be used for the monsters.

Regarding point three, there's a guy on BGG called Redjak who writes very high quality solo rules for all sorts of complex games. E.g. Descent, Star Wars Imperial Assault. They create AI for the big bad guy which is comparable in complexity to Mage Wars. Give him a call!

Also, Card Hunter, Loot & Legends, Hearthstone, Magic from the video world.

I just started playing card hunter! It's really awesome! I ended up not realizing that you get more than one character until it was too late though. I picked a human warrior, elf wizard and dwarf priest, but I think I would have preferred a dwarf warrior, elf wizard and a human priest or an elf warrior, human wizard and a dwarf priest. Ah well.

[Fentum]

Ah, Sailor Vulcan,

Card Hunter is a truly excellent game, particularly if you grew up playing 1980's D&D. It is now available as an app call Loot & Legends. Very swish.

I contacted Redjak on BGG. He says that he might give Mage Wars a go (solo rules) when he gets round to buying it.

I say to Arcane Wonders... SEND HIM A COPY RIGHT NOW!!!

PS Elf Wizards in CH are not so great. Very squishy. Dwarf Wizards cope a bit better. But I just go with the best artwork!

[Sailor Vulcan]

Ah, Sailor Vulcan,

Card Hunter is a truly excellent game, particularly if you grew up playing 1980's D&D. It is now available as an app call Loot & Legends. Very swish.

I contacted Redjak on BGG. He says that he might give Mage Wars a go (solo rules) when he gets round to buying it.

I say to Arcane Wonders... SEND HIM A COPY RIGHT NOW!!!

PS Elf Wizards in CH are not so great. Very squishy. Dwarf Wizards cope a bit better. But I just go with the best artwork!

The thing about the elf wizards are that they need to stay at the distance from the enemy and they have great mobility. The problem I have been noticing is that there are just not enough magic attacks that have >1 or >2 range, at least early on in the campaign.

Btw is it possible to have more than one party member of the same race and/or the same class?

It would be cool if you could get that guy in on this, since I feel like I'm constantly on the verge of a breakthrough here and I haven't quite reached it.

[Fentum]

Ah, Sailor Vulcan,

Card Hunter is a truly excellent game, particularly if you grew up playing 1980's D&D. It is now available as an app call Loot & Legends. Very swish.

I contacted Redjak on BGG. He says that he might give Mage Wars a go (solo rules) when he gets round to buying it.

I say to Arcane Wonders... SEND HIM A COPY RIGHT NOW!!!

PS Elf Wizards in CH are not so great. Very squishy. Dwarf Wizards cope a bit better. But I just go with the best artwork!

The thing about the elf wizards are that they need to stay at the distance from the enemy and they have great mobility. The problem I have been noticing is that there are just not enough magic attacks that have >1 or >2 range, at least early on in the campaign.

Not to get too far off topic but if you go with an Elf Wizard then you might do well with ice spells which tend to have longer ranges. Few and far between at start though. electrical isn't too bad either.

Also, some of the tropes of fantasy don't marry with the rules. Mobility isn't so much required for Wizards with longer ranges. In fact, elves make the worst wizards due to squishiness. Fighters need better mobility to get into the fray.

Anyway, send Redjak a copy of our favourite board game...

[iNano78]

Funny thing I was actually just starting to think about this a few days ago. Like a Mage Wars solitaire format or something.

There are a few directions I could go with it:

1. No enemy creatures, just an enemy life value and maybe some enemy armor as well.
2. Waves of enemy creatures like a tower defense sort of format.
3. An automated enemy Mage

1 is probably too easy. 3 probably isn't good because the enemy Mage can't use any strategy, which could make for very cheesy games. I'll probably end up going with 2. I'll think more on this.

Along the lines of the tower defense (2), I enjoyed a fan-made "Horde Magic" solo/co-op MtG game play mode:
http://www.quietspeculation.com/2011/09/horde-magic-a-new-way-to-play-magic-and-survive-zombie-invasions/

Maybe something like that could be made for Mage Wars.  Or maybe it could be more objective focused... like touch all the V'tar orbs (Domination) while defending against Wizard's Towers with a certain time limit (some number of rounds). In any case, Domination owners should have plenty of copies of Sslak and Usslak creatures that aren't otherwise used in their spell books (generally speaking), which could be used as generic enemy creatures - especially ones guarding objectives.

[Fentum]

Tower defence is all good and well, but it would be just dandy to get proper Mage Wars, or Academy with AI.

[Sailor Vulcan]

Tower defence is all good and well, but it would be just dandy to get proper Mage Wars, or Academy with AI.

That's been discussed before for arena and it was concluded that it would be just too complicated.

[Fentum]

Tower defence is all good and well, but it would be just dandy to get proper Mage Wars, or Academy with AI.

That's been discussed before for arena and it was concluded that it would be just too complicated.

Check out all of the board games I mentioned above. They are all pretty complex games and all run AI systems that work well. Redjak on BGG has been able to write AI rules for challenging games as a solo effort in his spare time.

But it certainly would be a MAJOR task.

[jupiter999]

Wow, Card Hunter seems interesting!
I'm gonna check it out!

I did play on my own solo rules, but mostly done with random dice.
One big problem: Enchantments are not going to work, because I have no idea how to simulate AI playing secrecy strategy. This is the hardest part to simulate...
Overall game is awesome, but still took me too many hours. So thinking of ways to "save" the game as well.
Nevertheless, still not satisfy with solo rules that I can think of or can find from... 

[Sailor Vulcan]

Any update on this? Has redjak gotten the game yet?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk