Essential cards pack

[FernandoKL]

Hi!

I'm sorry if there is, but I could not find a topic about this issue.

I've not been around the foruns for a lot of time, but my love for MW is persistent from 2013, and even since then, I've always missed an essential cards pack. I got 3 core mw box and 2 of every expansion, and, even like this, I get short of essential cards for spellbook construction.

Why don't you guys develop a pack like that? I think it would sell like water.

By essential cards I mean:

-Teleport
-Lesser Teleport
-Dispel
-Disperse
-Seeking Dispel
-Dissolve
-Crumble
-Nullify
-Arcane Ward
-Force Push
-Mage Wand
-Acid Ball
-Regrowth

And maybe toss inside the pack 1 or 2:

-Brace Yourself
-Leather Boots
-Leather Chausses
-Leather Gloves
-Leather Belt
-Bear Strenght
-Mongoose Agility
-Minor Heal
-Regrowth Belt
-Wall of Thorns
-Battle Forge
-Mend
-Enchanter's ring
-Elemental Cloak
Any other suggestions guys?


So, if there is a topic in that matter, please move me there to give my support for the cause! 

[bigfatchef]

Hi,

There have been topics like yours, but they might be old and pages over pages long.

The staples in my eyes are getting less with every new expansion. For example Dark school has many ways of passive healing now, so instead of regrowth you might find cheaper versions sbp wise. With chitin armor out and other ways to deal piercing damage acid ball lost its importance. And so on.

Also there are types of books that behave different. A rush book needs no healing at all.

I think there are spells that can be good for a lot of books, but you can also live without (regrowth, pillar of the righteous flame) but only some few are auto-include:
- nullify
- lesser teleport
- teleport (counter death zone)
- dissolve (even witc crumble out)
- dispel
- force push (not shure)
- leather chausses (not sure also)

[Biblofilter]

Pillar of Righteous Fury 

[iNano78]

+1 Pillar.

Also Consecrated Ground!

Or some new cheap universally beneficial terrain. Or something that "undoes" terrain. Right now CG is the only  terrain costing <8 mana that isn't Siren Only.

In addition to more Teleport, many more Lesser Teleport, and more Force Push, I could personally use a few more Force Wave and Repulse, partly because I play Domination and have several books available at a time.  I have about 20 spare Minor Heals, though, so I don't have a need for more of them.

I'd tend to stay away from cards in the core set, aside from maybe Teleport, since (1) they're available in the Arena core set (e.g. if you find you always need more of them, you should probably buy another core set) and (2) they're in at least one of the Core Spell Tomes. Cards exclusive to expansions are exactly that... so Acid Ball, Meredia's Blessing, Pillar, Minor Teleport (!!!), Force Wave, Repulse, Leather Chausses, Disperse, Crumble, Arcane Ward, Mend, Brace Yourself, Glancing Blow, Redirect, Chitin Armor, etc, would be preferential candidates for such an "essentials" expansion.

[drmambo23]

Add chant of rage, magebane and tanglevine to your list

[Biblofilter]

Let me mention:

Raincloud
Gravikor

Battleground Domination is probably the expansion i have the fewest off.
And i don´t play much Domination so not really needed.

So anything from Domination really good  should go on this list.

[Zuberi]

I think what we've seen in the past, and are seeing here, is that different people have different ideas as to which spells are essential. AW could take a poll and reprint the most popular spells, sure, but these spells aren't really essential, and you can already get them in other sets. Instead, I'd rather see new spells.

Certain functions are essential. Countering your opponents enchantments and equipment. Controlling positioning. Things like that are essential, and traditionally we've seen a select few cards excel at these abilities, giving an illusion of necessity. But I'd rather see new things that cover these functions. More things that do these jobs well, like Crumble, Disperse, Curse Item, Remove Curse, etc. Something new to deal with terrain like iNano78 suggested. That's what I'd rather see.

I'm also really surprised to see that this discussion, which has been had before, has kind of overshadowed the fact that Forcemaster Academy is currently being revealed in it's entirety this week by Arcane Duels. I would have expected much more discussion around that than we've seen.

[bigfatchef]

I'm also really surprised to see that this discussion, which has been had before, has kind of overshadowed the fact that Forcemaster Academy is currently being revealed in it's entirety this week by Arcane Duels. I would have expected much more discussion around that than we've seen.

This post has 6 comments and now 7 with my reply to you, Zuberi. If this is overshadowing then the release-related articels seem to be extraordinary small ..... (they are NOT! I am absolutely looking forward to get my hands on the new sets and I bet many others feel the same. No fear )

By theb way I was reading three topic wrong. I thought it's a discussion about staple cards, not cards that are so essential that they need to be reprinted.
In that case the most logic thing I see would be a spell tome 3 with only cards that have not been reprinted with spell tome 1 and 2.

O disagree with Zuberib that Ib don't want 4 diifferent variants of dispel or dissolve if they more or less so the same. That would mean many more cards to remember without really gaining something. I would prefer it clean and easy and let dispel be dispel. New cards should bring new mechanics.

[drmambo23]

I will say i am in agreement with zuberi. New sets are always better than reprinting cards and by making a pack like this you wont make everyone happy.  But this is a fun and interesting topic to discuss to see what people like, favor, and/or need more of. That being said i second biblo on gravikor

[Sailor Vulcan]

Or you could just play block formats in arena or stick to academy for a while; cost isn't a big issue if you have a local playgroup and aren't playing at big tournaments and are reusing cards in multiple spellbooks. That being said with the game's recent drop in popularity some locations might be harder to find people to play with than others. I know octgn just isn't the same as offline play, but it's a good way to test spellbooks and get practice before you go buy expansions. So long story short, arcane wonders probably isn't going to make an "essential card pack" because majority of players probably don't need it.

I think the bigger problem is the the recent drop in popularity means mage wars players are a lot less common in some places, so any mage wars players without a local playgroup or access to octgn is basically out of luck and can't get enough practice for tournament play. I found that out the hard way at origins lol. I made some very stupid mistakes in the early rounds of all four of my matches which cost me the game in all four of them. And I'm pretty sure that if I had access to octgn or a local playgroup, I would have sucked less. It was very frustrating.
And on top of that there have been some money issues.

So yeah, most people probably don't need an essential card pack, so it's probably not going to happen. What I would like to see is alternatives to octgn for mage wars online play. They tried this with tabletopia and from what I understand, tabletopia dropped the ball on their end which pisses me off. We were promised academy and arena on tabletopia, we were told we would be able to use expansions and build our own decks, but that never happened and no one ever explained why not.

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[FernandoKL]

Don't get me wrong Zeburi, I'm really really anxious about Forcemaster new expansion too! 

But, as I'm, nowadays, playing more MW than I normally do, and I'm the only person in my city (Curitiba - at Brasil) that have been buying the game and expansions (at least that I know), and all. I'm preparing more spellbooks for my crew!

As I try to leave the spelbooks ready to use when my friends arrives, I always fell short on these essential cards, because I try to balance the books for everybody on the table to have fun.

-I think that buying another Core set or the Core spell tomes is a bad idea, because I have a LOT of cards to spare from these packs I almost never use. Like, 11 or 12 Agony, or something like that, from which I use 2.

-A poll would be VERY nice, to see which cards would enter the tome. I'd guess that teleport, lesser teleport, nullify, force push, dispel and dissolve would be at the top of the list, and the other ones could be filtered by the poll's opinions.

-I know some of you think it is unecessary to have a tome expansion like this, but then just don't buy it! Because I've seen many guys asking for something like that. And since it would have no new cards in it, it would not demand any work at all. Just toss the cards in the tome box and have fun selling it to people like me! 

Thanks for the answers 

[silverclawgrizzly]

First before I ease into this: Sailor don't go making remarks about any drops in popularity. We get that your area isn't big on organized play but the reality is Mage Wars is doing great.

In terms of "essentials" I'm not a form believer in them. I get that certain cards make life easier but we've all played games where we didn't Teleport for example. That being said it's good to have them just in case. An essential pack is pretty unlikely in my view, I typically shuffle cards from book to book. I leave little I.O.U. notes so I know what to put back.

That being said if anyone wants to mail me like 9 Brace Yourselves I'd be a very happy grizzly lol.

[Sailor Vulcan]

First before I ease into this: Sailor don't go making remarks about any drops in popularity. We get that your area isn't big on organized play but the reality is Mage Wars is doing great.

In terms of "essentials" I'm not a form believer in them. I get that certain cards make life easier but we've all played games where we didn't Teleport for example. That being said it's good to have them just in case. An essential pack is pretty unlikely in my view, I typically shuffle cards from book to book. I leave little I.O.U. notes so I know what to put back.

That being said if anyone wants to mail me like 9 Brace Yourselves I'd be a very happy grizzly lol.

I asked Arcane Wonders about it personally and that is what I thought they said. Maybe I just misunderstood.

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[silverclawgrizzly]

I'd argue strongly that you did misunderstand but that's a topic for another time.

[Biblofilter]

"I typically shuffle cards from book to book. I leave little I.O.U. notes so I know what to put back"

That's what I really don´t wanna do.

So I need at least 14 Teleports etc, if im bringing a minimum of just one of each arena mage.

If I want to play Domination I would need 14 Galodyxx or whatever its called - the thing!

And if I ever are going to play and bring academy books im very likely to run out of Wychwound Hound and similar stuff.