Summoner Wars Puzzle--Filth
March 21st Puzzle by killercactus
To those familiar with Chess, you might have seen a Chess problem. These show a board position and tell you something like "White to Mate in 3" meaning White can checkmate the opponents King in 3 moves. Your goal would be to figure those out.
Awhile ago, I thought it would be fun to create these for Summoner Wars. Of course with the dice aspect of Summoner Wars, you cannot perfectly plan out moves or ensure victory, the dice ultimately decide. That was an obvious limitation and struggle of trying to figure out how best to do these. After a bit of thought, I figured that I may as well go ahead and create some, even if you could get so far.
For a few weeks now, Summoner Wars Puzzles have been finding their way in the forums, in this thread. The opening post links to the first 7 puzzles and a further explanation of guidelines, rules, and thoughts. From now on, every Thursday, a brand new puzzle will be set to meet you on the news page.
The goal of the puzzles is to challenge you to see the full board and maximize your abilities and powers. Not all puzzles will be in a very likely situation, but the tactics utilized in the solution have a broader usage in all games. Some puzzles might ask you to make moves that might not be the truly best for the long game, and care only about you maximizing your chances this turn. Again, the goal isn't to try and debate what the truly best move set is for future rounds, as the dice mechanic of Summoner Wars ensurs you can never fully be sure what the best path might be without delving into absurd probability calculations. Instead we're focused on what you can do on your turn, and the tactics and rules interactions utilized in those movements are capable of being used in your own games to increase your ability. Ultimately they are fun diversions to strain your Summoner Wars knowledge and test how well you can find all possibilities of movements and abilities.
I'd just like to mention a few more things before delivering the goods. Anyone else who desires to make a puzzle is more than free to go ahead and do so. Send a private message (PM) to myself, Ranior, with any ideas, and we can go from there on how to get it to a publishable state and ensure it is of a high quality in the solution and presentation. If you have talked to me in the past, restarting a line of communication might be the best.
Finally, I request that you do not publicly share answers or even post hints. Many puzzle solvers find the joy in discovering the solution themselves, as I do. Ruining the puzzle for them in the comments section is rude. Feel free to PM me or others who claim to have the answer if you wish to get hints or discuss answers, or just sit tight and wait for the solution in next week's puzzle. Ultimately, the fun is from challenging yourself and finding the answer, so please be courteous to others trying to find the solution.
This week's puzzle is brought to us by killercactus. Feel free to PM him for the answer or for any clarifications. Thanks kc for an excellent puzzle #8!
After an early strike from the Filth, Tundle and his mages have been runing the Demagogue's day. A Winged Mutant and a Bestial Mutant were able to rush Tundle early for 4 wounds, but both were destroyed by the Dwarves, and then Kynder was able to hole up a Rune Mage and start Siphoning. The Demagogue has been operating without much magic now, and was able to use both Channel Corruptions to get out the Tentacle and Absorption Mutants on the defensive, but hte Dwarves kept coming. Liking his hand and not wanting to leave anything for the Rune Mage to Siphon, the Demagogue kept all 5 cards in hand last turn and used Mutagist as well, giving him a 6 card hand. However a Lun blitz has left him reeling, and he knows Tundle needs to meet his end now, or he will meet his own.
Objective: Maximize your chances to destroy Tundle this turn.
Situation: You are the Filth at the start of your turn, and have 6 cards in hand. At least one of them is a Mutant, you have no mercanaries. the Rune Mage on the board belongs to the Deep Dwarves, and the Mutatants both belong to the Filth. You may select the 6 Filth cards in your hand, but you do not have access to the Winged Mutant, Bestial Mutant, or either of your Channel Corruptions.
