Black Rider, They Ride Together and Heralded Lord V

Leon
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Please take a look at my post with Ringwraith manual V for my complete reasoning and reference.

Short overview of abilities
The Witch-King → active leader
Khamul → Fell Rider
Dwar → wolves
Indur → underdeeps
Akhorahil → magic (Malady)
Hoarmurath → sitting
Adunaphel → lone attack?
Ren → corruption
Uvatha → follower

I think in this list The Witch-King is still under-appreciated, even with the virtual cards. These are my suggestions

Black Rider Virtual
Permanent event. Black Rider mode. Your Ringwraiths company may move to non-Darkhaven sites. Any number of otherwise playable followers may be played during your turn in addition to any other one character normally playable. Additionally uring your organization phase (or immediately after opponent plays a ring), you may place a Black Horse from your sideboard with this card. You may play such cards as if they were in your hand. You may start the game with this card in lieu of a minor item. [85 words]

I want to word it in such a way that other cards are still needed to play Ringwraith followers: The Witch-Kings ability, Uvatha, They Ride Together, Black Horse. Here, your Ringwraith does not need a Black Horse himself, so that the risk of discarding the whole group is smaller. Also, I want to encourage using Black Horse, but do not think it is necessary to play nine of them.

They Ride Together Virtual (new version)
Permanent event. There is no limit to the size of your Ringwraith’s company. If at least half the number of Ringwraiths in the company (fractions rounded up) have a Black Horse, the company may move with region movement. If you have at least six Ringwraiths in a company together you may tap this card at the end of the company’s movement/hazard phase to allow them to move again to a site not in or adjacent to Gorgoroth; this card gives 1 marshalling point for every three Ringwraiths in the company when tapped. [93 words]

In this way Black Rider allows movement and followers and They Ride together gives an improvement and a large mission. You start with Black Rider, move around, play some followers and as the company and the number of horses grows you can play They Ride Together somewhat later in the game. This card will have little effect early in the game.

Heralded Lord Virtual
Permanent event. Heralded Lord mode. Playable on your Ringwraith's company at a Darkhaven during the organization phase. -2 prowess, +3 direct influence to entire company while not at a darkhaven. His own company may move using starter movement. [38 words]

I believe this circumvents the main reasons not to use Heralded Lord. Followers and the card itself are no longer discarded, but the extra influence only works at non-darkhaven sites so it has no use for cheese as far as I can see. If it needs more interesting abilities, please come up with ideas.
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Nerdmeetsyou
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like the new version for THEY RIDE together...very much!
easy! and has nearly the same effekt in game!!!
(and it finaly makes sense for the card to untap and tap again.
To gain more MP)

Maybe the only thing to add would be to choose if to untap or not...!
(but that would be something to test)
Leon
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Joined: Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:18 pm

Right Boderhamster, I forgot that tap/untap part. an easier idea is to replace tap with invert. Once extra movement is ok I think.

options:
1) add You may choose to leave this card tapped during untap phase.

2) replace tap with invert.

I like the 2nd option, because it is easier. Extra choices and text is extra complications and you already get a lot of movement.
marcos
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your virtual heralded lord makes the old one obsolete
Leon
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I know, Marcos. The same is true for several virtual cards, where the existing cards are far worse. Bard Bowman, Reforging, The Great Goblin, Rogrog, Gothmog. I do not think this is a problem.
marcos
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Bard bowman = the old bard has a modifier for playing a faction, the new one is only usefull if he bears the black arrow

great bolin = virtual is a half creature while the old one has bigger body and is a complete creature

rogrog/ gothmog = virtuals are half creature, normal are entire creature and are keyed to different sites

reforging = the old one gives 1 MP without being stored and has a different text (can take major items from discard), while the new one is only usefull with german promo items

for little the differences are, some times you might still pick the old ones over the new ones with this cards... For your heralded lord and galva, there is no reason for picking the old ones over your versions and it wasnt the purpose on virtual cards as far as i know...
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Bandobras Took
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The -2 to the company's prowess is the main reason Heralded Lord is such a pain in the butt. Keeping somebody untapped when their company is only 1 or 2 characters can be a chore, especially at the sites where you'd want to use the DI boost.
Leon
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Joined: Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:18 pm

I know Heralded Lord is still a risk, but if your followers are not discarded you at least have a company that can act more than once in the game. I also do not like to make a card obsolete, but if you have better ideas please inform me.

Also, what do you think about the Black Rider and They Ride Together ideas? These are more important than Galva or Heralded Lord as far as I am concerned.
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Nerdmeetsyou
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although a lot of cards might be different....

still their old versions would not have been played at all.... (maybe excluding bard the bowman e.g.)

I believe you guys have to accept that some cards might render obsolete when we design V-cards...
THIS is just a normal design process...that some cards might become useless.... but not by us designing new better cards...but because they were VERY BAD in the first place.

Why should we limit ourselves by limits that are created artificaly by ourselves!

Here is a good example from magic design:
For a long time... Creatures in magic have been VERY BAD....
so most of the tournament decks played very few creatures...!
But creatures and attacking your opponent with them should have been the key part of magic, and is the one that is the most fun!
So at one point the designers realized that there is no way in improving the game as a total, than creating significantly better creatures than before!!!
And it realy made the game better!
Allthough a lot of old creatues that had been played a lot, became redundant throughout this process...
it was good for the game.... !!!
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Thorsten the Traveller
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I would not like for us to walk the way WotC and Magic have walked, they have completely other interests at heart, meaning: selling as much as they can. So they don't care about banning cards, or making them obsolete.

Anyway, back on topic: black rider. The way you propose it Leon, why would I ever even want to play a Black Horse, if my RW's can move from turn one anyway?
You don't play it on your RW, so it must state your RW is in black rider (it says only black rider mode now). Maybe it's best to make it like some stage: place on your RW if in play.

Any number of otherwise....why do RW's need to be able to form big companies fast? if we up their movement abilites, they are pretty good companies for active use, more so because with 1 horse you can move with region movement according to your TRT, that's very good! So I don't think this is needed.

all things considered though, I like these two propositions.
Stone-age did not end because man ran out of rocks.
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Nerdmeetsyou
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I was not refering... that those cards were needed....
I don't know enough about moving RW to have a proper opinion...

I was just refering to making new cards in general!


(by the way... Magic has the no banning policy... although it is not allways possible because of misstakes they have made in the past.... But there hasn't been banned a new card since over 2 years in magic... and if it hadn't be for "Skullclamp" they have not banned a new printed card for about at least 5 or 6 years (And Skullclamp was a Misprint/Design Error they admited, because they had accidentaly changed a +1 to a -1)
Leon
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I guess the part about region movement is somewhat over the top indeed. Perhaps that should only be for six or more RW and at least half of them a Black Horse.
Leon
Posts: 312
Joined: Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:18 pm

Marcos, I think you are right. For this reason, I have come up with a better text for Black Rider that does not make the existing obsolete:

Black Rider Virtual
Permanent event. If at least half the number of Ringwraiths in your Ringwraiths company (fractions rounded up) control a Black Horse, the company is in Black Rider mode and may move to non-darkhaven sites. Any number of otherwise playable Ringwraith followers may be played during your turn in addition to any other one character normally playable. Additionally, during your organization phase (or immediately after opponent plays a ring), you may place a Black Horse from your sideboard with this card. You may play such cards as if they were in your hand. You may start the game with this card in lieu of a minor item. [106 words]

They Ride Together Virtual (new version)
Permanent event. There is no limit to the size of your Ringwraith’s company. If you have at least six Ringwraiths, each controlling a Black Horse, in a company together you may move using region movement. Additionally, you may tap this card at the end of the company’s movement/hazard phase to allow them to move again to a site not in or adjacent to Gorgoroth; this card gives 1 marshalling point for every three Ringwraiths in the company when tapped. You may choose to leave this card tapped during untap phase. [91 words]

In this way you do require Black Horses to move. They Ride Together hugely increases your movement abilities if you build a large company with a load of Black Horses. If anyone can think of a way to put this down in fewer words, please tell me.

For completeness sake:

Heralded Lord Virtual
Permanent event. Place this card with your Ringwraith if he is in play. Your Ringwraith's company is in Heralded Lord mode and may move using starter movement. -2 prowess, +3 direct influence to entire company while not at a darkhaven. [40 words]
marcos
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is there any reason to still pick the old one over this? I'm just trying to figure any, but i can't, my mind is tired today :) ... anyone?
Leon
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Joined: Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:18 pm

For the old Black Rider you do not need Black Horse. If you move with Black Horse and use cards to move again so you are never at the darkhaven during the organisation phase it is possible to play with the existing Black Rider. Forcing the use of Black Horse is a weakness in Black Rider Virtual as I propose it, that does not exist with the original Black Rider.

So this is a reason.

Similar to the cards we mentioned as examples in this discussion, I do indeed not expect people to use the original. If it is too strong you can alway remover the clause that says it can be used in lieu of a minor item.

I hope you are satisfied with this reasoning.
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