Swamp Mercenaries: The Events
Glurblub's approach to using Vine Walls
After previewing the Swamp Orc and Mercenary units that make up the Swamp Mercenaries, we fill finish off by looking at their Event cards, with deisgner's notes in italics.
Many of you have noticed the dearth of minion abilities to place Vine Walls on the battlefield. Glurblub is not as prolific in that regard as Mugglug, but this Event helps make up for it. There are four copies in the deck, each of which lets you destroy up to 2 Units you control and replace them with Vine Walls.
The other way you typically get Vine Walls into play. Spore Carriers was the only Event not in my original repertoire; instead, Prong's old ability was in this spot and known as Vinemancer Shelter, where Vine Walls would get the ability to block Wounds for Units adjacent to them. Spore Carriers carry with it a bit of the flavor of the Plague the Vermin carry with them, except modified a bit to be fertilizer for Vines. And people said the Swamp Orcs didn't care about nature :P
Glurblub also has some nice uses for the Vine Walls in combat. Vine Bind's ability to stop adjacent enemy units has obvious uses for defense or setting up an offense.
Word for word how I designed it, Vine Bind is an interesting tool for Swamp Summoners without many Vine Walls, as the act of protecting these Walls also prevents their usage for this Event. If you've pushed too far, a Vine Wall here or there will allow you to retreat somewhat.
Vine Lash is obviously offensive, giving 1 Wound Marker to every enemy unit adjacent to a Vine Wall. These Events will make the enemy a bit paranoid about approaching Vine Walls -- or even SM units, given the possibilities of combining these with Spore Carriers.
A slight tweak from when I made it. It doesn't deal one damage per Vine Wall adjacent, but just one damage if you're adjacent to 1 or more Vine Walls. Still fine, and another push and pull mechanic for your Vine Walls.
Finally, the coup de grace: for that special moment, Swamp Dominion lets Glurblub draw strength from the Vine Walls, adding 1 to his Attack Value for each one he controls, up to a maximum of +5.
Swamp Domination - Vine Pulse. In all its glory. I took the power of Magic Pulse, and instead of limiting it to the number of cards put into your Magic Pile, I gave it as a straight up bonus for having Vine Walls on the field. Of course, it was always a 1x. The limit of +5 was something I was sad to see; as I wanted the Event to mimic Magic Pulse quite heavily, but it was necessary for balance's sake. (Oh well, 7 dice is still a lot.)
Thursday will have the last of the previews for SW: Alliances. It has been a fun journey.
Click here to pre-order the Summoner Wars Alliances Master Set.
Cave Filth: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Deep Benders: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Fallen Phoenix: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Jungle Shadow: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Sand Cloaks: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Swamp Mercenaries: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Tundra Guild: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
Vargath Vanguards: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3
