by darth plagus
Hi my name is ray and I am a veteran gamer with many miniature and boardgames in my collection, primarily of the war and fantasy genres. Some of these include War of the Ring, Star Wars X-Wing, Talisman, Descent, Twilight Imperium, Axis and Allies, Battlelore, Memoir 44, Dungeons and Dragons, Magic The Gathering and many more....Despite being a fan of BGG for about a decade this is actually my first review after about 10 plays of Mage Wars.
I must admit I have been highly anticipating this game for a long time and must state before I go on that I haven't been disappointed. I will separate this review into a number of categories as many previous posts have done.
Components
The components are well produced. I love the artwork of the cards and the spellbooks are a great idea. The dice are well crafted and the gameboard is well designed as an arena. The only small quibble was that the backs of some of the large tokens weren't centred when printed. The rulebook was well written, although it's the codex that really shines, helping to summarise the many codewords that influence the gameplay. Overall Arcane Wonders has done a great job. 9/10
Gameplay
You can choose from 4 mages, Warlock, Beastmaster,Wizard and Priestess. Each have their own flavour of class specific spells and special abilities but a player can also choose many spells which belong to various spell schools. To build your book of spells simply add up the spell level, printed on each card to a total of 120 points for each mage. If your mage is not trained in a school it will cost you double the spell level in points while some in an opposing spell school may cost your mage triple the amount of points. This deckbuilding aspect of the game to build your mage's spells is as fun as the game itself although it does take a while. We usually prepare our books the night before a game so we can get straight into the game the next night. You can also use pre-prepared spellbooks which have been updated on the Magewars website.
I'd be here forever if I went over all the rules of the game, so have a look at the rulebook on this site if you want a detailed analysis. Simply put, you need to destroy the opponent's mage in an arena which consists of 12 zones. Your mage can cast 2 spells of your choice from your spellbook on any given turn, as long as you can pay the mana cost to create the spell. Spells vary from creatures to summon, attack spells such as lightning bolt or fireball, enchantments which you can cast on yourself or the enemy and reveal at a later time, defensive spells and many, many more. To deal damage to the opposing mage or their creatures you need to roll dice which I love, dealing misses, hits which can be reduced by armour or critical hits which ignore it. you can also roll a 12 sided die on some attacks to deal long lasting effects such as stun, burn, rot ,weak, daze, push, cripple etc
The gameplay is a combination of miniature play (as cards), strategy, with a dose of fortune from the dice. You can choose any spell at any time and don't have to wait for that special card to be drawn out of the deck. Your first few games will take a while as you learn the many rules and codewords but once these are digested, time reduces to about 1-2 hours, especially if players are aggressive. The best aspect of gameplay is it's logical and the meaning of the rules and codewords are clear and mean what they should mean, without too much clarification or reference, after a few plays. Balance would've been difficult for such a game and future planned expansions will have to be wary not to ruin this. We have early concerns about weaknesses of the warlock and the power of the priestess but this could be just our poor play or poor strategy. It is a game best for 2 players at the moment and I think you'd need 2 boards to play with 4. Overall, a lot of fun for a variety of different gamers but expect to play for a while.8.5/10
Value and Support
The price of this game is excellent when you consider what you get. ie 322 cards, tokens galore, dice, status boards, gameboards. The staff are very helpful and contribute regularly to their website, listening to advice and feedback and giving honest information about their product. I also love the story about how Bryan Pope came to design and create this game for us. Congratulations Bryan on persisting, you've inspired me to keep going with my ideas. 9.5/10
I recommend this game for a variety of gamers over 10+. My 12 year old daughter thrashed me last night. It reminds me of chess with dice, spells and monsters. Hopefully many expansions to come. A great start Arcane Wonders! Game Rank 9/10