A number of suggestions

[Joshua]

1. Reposition can be powerful. Make it so that you can only reposition horizontally, vertically or diagonally instead of "line of sight".
2. Samurai is too powerful. Either: reduce its defense (or life), or add +1 to attack or reducing the number of dices. He lays > 3 dmg almost every attack.
3. Samarai's ability to kill enemy with one life left. Perhaps we could make it (all) surrounding enemy that has 1 life left. If that change was to be made, make it 2 cards cost.
4. The spell that rolls 5 dices + 2 dmg is quite powerful... I killed two heros with full health with that spell twice. Perhaps making it 3 dices + 2 dmg?

[Ross Przybylski]

The spell you are referring to is Demonic Lash- and we are quickly seeing how overpowered this spell can be (especially with a Sorceress and Rogue/Psionist combo on the very first turn).  It is quite easy to sprint Psionist, Psychic Blast for 2-3 Damage, Mind Control a mage out of cover, and Demonic Lash with bonus die from Destruction Aura for a total of 4 Damage.

By changing the targeting requirement from line of sight to horizontal/vertical/diagonal path, the power of the spell remains in tact but the outright abusive first turn kill is averted- a wonderful solution!

I think the same applies for reposition (a very potent spell given the right context) - but in this case, the heavy cost of 2 would need to come down to 1.  We're not as sure for this one- so we want to know what others think.

We feel the Samurai is very balanced as is- though we'd love to hear what others feel.  For clarification, the Samurai, unenchanted, can only deal 3 max damage per turn.  The common misunderstanding is that Damage +2 means he could easily deal 4-5 damage with a good roll.  However, this is not the case, since the global rule states that your total damage may never exceed the number of dice rolled.  The idea behind the samurai is that if you hit something with a katana at all, it's going to cause a serious wound- hence his ability.  Changing eviscerate to a multi-attack would limit the cost effectiveness of his power to take out heavy creatures like Iron Golems.  Also- this ability already costs 2 cards (as it is exceptionally powerful).

[Baker]

Actually he was referring to Disintegrate. Since it's almost a guarenteed 3 damage vs any character, and most likely 5 vs. mages, the 3 mana cost and adjacent restriction is still not enough.

That is unless you give mages resistance to spells, 13 defense to physical attacks makes sense for puny robe wearing wimps, but something along the lines of 17 or 18 defense to spells would make it much easier to balance, rather than neuter spells that are too powerful that one-shot or easily destroy mages. I would keep the fighter mage at 15 for all attacks, since he specializes at physical combat more than magical.

Finally, the summoner's ultimate ability is still pretty crummy. Instead I would like to see the ultimate give the flesh golem's ability to any of your summons, life taken in the order they were cast. And i would also like to see the ability of the flesh golem and this ultimate to be limited to the number of hit points on the respective summon, so that if you deal 5 damage to the mage, 2 would spill over after killing fleshy.

[Joshua]

I like Baker's idea for physical and mage defense and it makes sense too.

But this may get tricky. What about guardians? If they had low magic defense, it would be easy to kill them with magic. Maybe just for hero mages? Guardian defense is magic/physical defense.

Someone suggested this: Making player's hero mage invulnerable to damage until the start of their first turn. I think this is a very good idea - this will prevent unfair first-round-mage-kill-before-they-had-their-first-turn especially on poorly designed maps. So, for example if I was second. My mage would be invulnerable, and the mage who goes first cannot kill me (or any other mages) until the start of their first turn. On my turn, I become vulnerable for any players whom turn goes after me. I can however, attack the first mage since he already had his turn.

[Ross Przybylski]

We applaud the idea, but are hesitant to grant mages a special defense against spells for two reasons:

1) Doing so adds an additional layer of complexity to the game (effectively splitting damage into two types "physical" and "magical").  This detracts from the simple mechanic of "dice  hit on rolls equal to or greater than defense" and simplicity is one of the key draw points to Hero Mages vs. similar games.

2) Doing so negatively affects the abilities of the Sorceress in an extreme fashion.  Using her abilities and Destruction magic to eliminate enemy mages is the core of her play style.  By granting special defense to mages for destruction spells, we open a slippery slope of debates- such as "Mages should receive special defense against summons" or "Mages should receive special defense against augmented units".

Ultimately, Mages were meant to be exceptionally vulnerable (aside from the Fighter Mage).  As the greatest source of your power, they must be used wisely.  The allure of going after the enemy mage is one of the most exciting and rewarding aspects of the game- and careful consideration must given to any change that would take away from this element.

[Aerotheos]

I applaud your restraint, Ross!  Divorcing physical and magical damage would not just make things too complicated, but also destroy much of the accessibility enjoyed by new players as well as much of the turmoil that veterans must endure when exposing their mage.  I think that many players would do well to remember that their two guardians are just that, GUARDIANS.  They exist principally to defend their vastly more powerful and vulnerable mage.  Defend your mage with your guardians effectively, and (for the most part) the victories will follow.

That said, Baker tops the leaderboard and has beaten me every time we have played, so he's clearly doing something right.

Cheers, Aerotheos

[Baker]

I'm not suggesting an entirely separate defense for mages, as Ross pointed out that it would adversely affect the Sorceress the most. In that same vein, why wouldn't the sorceress have some natural defense to her own school of magic? Fighter Mage has increased physical attack resistance after all.

I would definitely like to see some different defensive abilities of the mages. This wouldn't make mages more or less vulnerable necessarily, but would force players to come up with interesting strategies to perform a coveted one-turn insta-mage-kill.

Fighter Mage I think has a perfect balance of defense and counters, you can dispel magic him when he thinks he's safe under a 15 point ultimate (as well as stripping any other augments on him). But the more i think about his ability to not be stunned makes me wonder if he has too much defensive capabilities, however, as currently there are 2 ice shards, 2 sleeps, 2 iron golems, and 1 blizzard, which is 7 out of 47 cards that aren't optimal vs the FM.

The rest of the mages...not so much. As I suggested before, maybe make the summoner's ultimate a flesh golem type aura for all of her summons, but allow spillover damage to the summoner (which i think should still work on the flesh golem as well).

Giving the sorceress a solid + defense to destruction spells seems like it would suit her style of play perfectly.

For the wizard....I don't have any easy ideas, but i have some cool sounding ones! Some sort of ability to create an image of himself to give him line of sight from that image. The idea would be that the wizard would be able to cast spells through this image gaining distance and line of sight from across the map...anyone get what i'm saying?

[Joshua]

lol Baker,

if your idea (for wizard mirror image) was implement, then you won't be able to lose lol. Having correct line of sight is the hardest thing to achieve, and imagine if you cast your mage right beside me and do that powerful spell = K.O.

[Baker]

You caught me Josh...but look how many people default to the fighter mage?

Why is the wizard the least played mage? (outside of the fact that some players can't access th ewizard unless they pay?)

BTW...i haven't lost with my wizard yet (check the leaderboards) and I welcome any FAIR challenges

[Joshua]

If you havn't lost with Wizard yet, then Wizard is good! I would say Wizard is a bit powerful, especially with free 2 mana, and swap a card. -1 to manipulation spells is plentiful, because I did this in one turn: Teleported to the other side of the board, killed a guardian, then teleported back to where I was haha

[Warmage]

I like how the heros are now, they do a ton with the spells, if you gave them too much staying power I think it would be tough.