Winter Mage War 2

[VictorE]

Hey everyone,

Really looking forward to a great Winter Mage War 2. We've been working on books here in central Illinois, but I will not be playing, just judging.

I think Farkas already posted most of the information about the game play. The only additions are that we will try to have a 3rd/4th place match as well. The first round will be mostly random, but we try to let people play people that are not from their area, just so you get some games in with new players if possible. Otherwise, the only rules modifications are the same as ADMW. No promos. Any other cards out, including Academy are allowed. So expect some wands of fire and ice, maybe a bee or two too. You play one book for the whole tournament (unlike ADMW). There will be a sheet to write out your book to check the spellbook points. The actual event URL is https://www.winterwar.org/events/event/2328. We are supposed to have 4 tables, which should allow for 8 games at a time if they are the same tables from last year.

I picked up trophies for first and second last week. Funny thing there, I ordered them in 2018, so guess what year I put on the trophies. Still, we have trophies and a few prizes!

We usually have the tables most of the weekend, not just during out time, so there may be time for some fun games, maybe some domination. So bring more than just your tournament book. We played a couple of late games last year. Plus, there are a lot of other games going on. It's no GenCon, but it's surprising large.

Best,
V

[DaveW]

Can someone elaborate on what ADMW rules are? The only thing I saw mentioned was about Disciple of Radiance.

[Puddnhead]

Can someone elaborate on what ADMW rules are? The only thing I saw mentioned was about Disciple of Radiance.

Disciple of Radiance Text Change

• Once per round, whenever your Mage casts or reveals a healing spell, Disciple of Radiance may deal 1 direct light damage to a target creature in her zone

Casting a Spell - Change to the end of the Pay Costs Step

• Previous wording - If you cannot pay all of the costs, the spell is cancelled and discarded, and you have lost the action.
  New wording -If you cannot pay all of the costs, the spell is cancelled and obliterated, and you have lost the action.
  Everything else remains unchanged about the step

Steep Hill

• Steep hill will block Line of Sight if you cast a spell and it goes through two diagonal sections of the zone.

Force Pull

• Once per round, the Forcemaster may cast this quick Force spell. Target creature is Pushed 1 zone towards the source of this spell. Will not Push a creature through a wall with the Passage Attacks trait.

Trample

• - If a Flying creature attacks a non-Flying object, it loses Flying until the end of the attack.
  - Elusive Creatures can ignore guards when making a Trample Attack
  - Defenses that do not work against Melee attacks cannot be used during the Avoid Attack step, however all other types may be (choosing one during the step following normal rules).

In my horrible Forum abilities, I give you a quote from the ADMW2 Open page. Hope it helps!

[DaveW]

Thanks for the quick assist. I am curious now... what is the difference between discarding and obliterating a spell?

If such a spell is bound to an object, does it become lost under these rules? Is the object that it is bound to affected at all?

[iNano78]

Thanks for the quick assist. I am curious now... what is the difference between discarding and obliterating a spell?

If such a spell is bound to an object, does it become lost under these rules? Is the object that it is bound to affected at all?

Obliterated spells don't go to your discard pile. I assume this is to avoid shenanigans with Resurrection/Animate Dead to bring back a creature that was never in play.

I don't quite understand the Steep Hill clarification. What are "two diagonal sections of a zone"? Would this mean "two adjacent (orthogonal) edges of a zone?" e.g. would apply to a Range 3 spell that's "up 2 / over 1" or similar?

[Puddnhead]

iNano78 is correct. Under the "discard" system you could attempt to cast Adramelech on the first turn and "oops, I don't have enough mana". Next turn Animate Dead for half cost.

As for Steep Hill, it was pointed out that the rules only have it block line of sight through edges and not corners. Therefore anything that could target through opposite corners of Steep Hill's zone was technically not blocked by Steep Hill's rules.  Minor quibble, hardly ever comes up, but just in case...we clarified.

[DaveW]

Thanks everyone!

iNano78 is correct. Under the "discard" system you could attempt to cast Adramelech on the first turn and "oops, I don't have enough mana". Next turn Animate Dead for half cost.

Wow. Just... wow.

As for Steep Hill, it was pointed out that the rules only have it block line of sight through edges and not corners. Therefore anything that could target through opposite corners of Steep Hill's zone was technically not blocked by Steep Hill's rules.  Minor quibble, hardly ever comes up, but just in case...we clarified.

So it would have to be like a range four effect, from the corner zone to the hill to the opposite corner zone. That makes sense... though I can't think of anything that might make use of the ambiguity.

[iNano78]

As for Steep Hill, it was pointed out that the rules only have it block line of sight through edges and not corners. Therefore anything that could target through opposite corners of Steep Hill's zone was technically not blocked by Steep Hill's rules.  Minor quibble, hardly ever comes up, but just in case...we clarified.

So it would have to be like a range four effect, from the corner zone to the hill to the opposite corner zone. That makes sense... though I can't think of anything that might make use of the ambiguity.

There are a handful of effects that require line of sight with no range restriction, like a Druid using a vine marker's zone as the target of a Vine spell, effectively bypassing the spell's range restriction. So rules as written, one could argue that perfectly diagonally across Steep Hill corner-to-corner had "tunnels" in an X that allowed LoS even though any other direction across Steep Hill (+) was opaque. Huh, never thought of anybody trying to argue that.

[DaveW]

Thanks for arranging the great fun for us this year.

Dave

[VictorE]

Results are in. First, we all had a lot of fun at this year's Winter Mage War (complete with snow this year). Many of us played for fun the day before and into the night after the event. We look forward to seeing more players next year.

1st - Stanyer playing a Wizard with a record of L W W W, taking the tie breaker against Farkas.
2nd - Farkas playing a Druid with a record of W W W L, taking the tie breaker against Zot.
3rd - Zot playing an Ax Warlock with a record of W W L W
4th - JBuzz playing a SW Beastmaster
5th Tie between
-- DaveW playing a Wizard
-- Pudding playing a Siren
7th Tie with the same record and a tie head-to-head
-- Brian C playing a Siren
-- Brian R playing a Forcemaster

Interesting Stats
- No one ended udefeated
- Two mages ran bee swarms, but no one ran 4 of them. I'll leave it to the mages who played them to let you know how they felt it went.
- Three games of 16 were ties due to time.
- We had one player who just learned how to play. The slower play led to two ties, but did not effect the final top outcomes. We were very pleased to see a new player at the event.
- We had players from Wisconsin, Missouri, Indiana, and Illinois

My thanks again to everyone who was able to make it.

[zot]

thanks for hosting and running the event. thanks to all who made it. it was a great time. there were many who wanted to come but were not able due to life insisting on something else. congrats to stanyer for his win, and to farkas on second place finish.

[Kelanen]

Force Pull

• Once per round, the Forcemaster may cast this quick Force spell. Target creature is Pushed 1 zone towards the source of this spell. Will not Push a creature through a wall with the Passage Attacks trait.

I know the question it's trying to answer, but I'm still not clear which way this wording falls...

Would it pull towards the FM or the Minds Eye?

[iNano78]

Force Pull

• Once per round, the Forcemaster may cast this quick Force spell. Target creature is Pushed 1 zone towards the source of this spell. Will not Push a creature through a wall with the Passage Attacks trait.

I know the question it's trying to answer, but I'm still not clear which way this wording falls...

Would it pull towards the FM or the Minds Eye?

If Mind's Eye is the source of the spell, then this ruling above makes it push towards Mind's Eye. See Mind's Eye text attached, which state's it becomes "the source of the spell."

As written on the Forcemaster's card, it pushes towards "her" = the Forcemaster who cast the spell (identified as "she" earlier in the card text).

[Kelanen]

Agreed, I know the arguments both ways (and have weighed in on which I think it should be), but as expressed above, it wasn't clear to me.

In fact, I agree I think it ought to pull towards Minds Eye, but Zuberi disagrees, which I expected to be the basis of any temporary ruling.