Cleveland Tournament Wrap-up

Thanks to JustJosh and Ctrl Alt Elite Gaming near Cleveland for hosting a great Summoner Wars tournament today! Eleven people participated, including numerous Plaid Hat Games and PHG forum representatives.

Joe (aka Clarissimus, not me) came away with the victory, going 5-0, defeating all-comers. Adam placed second (sorry Adam, I don't know your PHG/Heroscapers name) while Killer Cactus placed third. I came in fourth, losing to Clarissimus in the final round to finish 3-2. Clarissimus beat all three of us during his five matches.

Many players were generous with prizes, faction dice, Heroscape figures, and reinforcement packs. Most importantly, Colby brought along a Filth Faction Deck and a Mercenaries Faction Deck to give away. These packs aren't available anywhere yet! Clarissimus passed them up, so Adam and Killer Cactus grabbed them. (I was so close!) Taliya's Spirit and Piclo's Magic were not present.

KC and Adam played a quick game with their new decks, so a lot of us got to see the bulk of the new cards. People will be receiving their decks in the next few days, so I'm sure details about all the new cards will be emerging as early as tonight. Although I saw most of the Filth and Mercenary cards, it was such a blur that I hardly remember the specifics of any one card. I can tell you that some of the Filth artwork was not as gross as advertised, and some were much more gross than advertised. I can also confirm that practically every new Mercenary Event and Unit has something to do with Walls. You could almost call them the Wall Faction.

Although I'm not going to reveal any more details about the new decks (I'll leave that to others who actually have the physical cards in front of them to ensure I don't get anything wrong), I can confirm the rules of the new Factions. The Mercenaries are straightforward-only Mercenaries for the entire deck.

The Filth a more complicated, but as far as rules go, I'd say they're a notch below Vine Walls as far as confusion. If you've read our previews you know about the Demagogue's power to retrieve Mutation cards from the draw or discard pile. We now also know that Mutations can replace either Champions or Commons in your deck as you wish. Mutations are added (summoned?) on top of a Filth common during the Summon phase. If there's already a Mutation on top of the Common, the old Mutation goes back into your hand. Wounds are transferred. You only pay the difference in magic (minimum zero). Only one copy of each Mutation is allowed in your deck. When a Mutated common is killed, both the Mutation and the Common card go to the destroyer's MAGIC pile (sorry screwed that up at first).

The Filth seems like a faction with a high degree of difficulty. Although it's nice to be able to summon whichever Mutation you need, you might have to think a turn in advance, as you grab the mutation during your attack phase (via the Demagogue) and only play the Mutation at the beginning of your next turn.

I asked Colby about upcoming projects. He said as soon as the graphic design is done, they'll be ready to announce the next big Plaid Hat Games release. However, he didn't specifiy any sort of timetable. He did say the next game would NOT take place in Itharia.

Thanks to all who came out, especially those who drove in from another state! Thanks especially to JustJosh for planning and running the tournament (and ordering pizza) and to Ctrl Alt Elite Gaming for hosting.

Posted by Joe Ellis