Card Synergies and tips

Bungled Heal is nice to help draw out blocks if one of your characters is hurting and the closest enemy is at full health. When playing my vampire only party it has regularly been drawn at the same time as Loner at the beginning of the match. It then only costs a turn to get him back to full health. Not a terrible trade, imo.

 

I didn't think to mention this until I started spectating MP matches, but something I don't think a few players realize is that you get a positive opportunity for synergy on your handicap trait cards when mixed with positive traits. I see players missing this opportunity a lot so I thought I'd mention it. Consider this example:
You're a firestorm mage, and you've stacked a whole ton of combustible, squeamish, and Firestarter in your deck. So many, in fact, that it's relatively common that you draw all of them in the same hand. In that case, it's almost always an advantage to play the negative traits first, specifically. This is because as attachments are added, you can push older ones off of yourself (because there can only be three total), so stacking the bad stuff first guarantees that it will be the first to be removed (unless you refresh it ). I regularly remove combustible from myself in this way with my own traits, even on the turn I attach it to myself, just by playing them all in the right order when they're all presented to me at once.
It's a simple rule, but probably due to player impatience it's ignored a lot, from what I can tell. I see players jumping on their positive traits first, then reluctantly playing the bad stuff afterwards. This is stacking their attachments in a self-defeating arrangement that is easily avoidable. If you play your traits in a wise order, you can (admittedly very slightly) enjoy the benefits of your negative traits without letting them harm you quite as frequently.

 

This is a great tip. I play a deck with tons of traits but I have never really thought about this before. I did think about this in earlier when I used cards like Brain Burn (always click Brain Burn first to avoid any extra damage) but now that I have only non-direct damage drawback traits like Vulnerable, I can honestly say I have never even considered the order. I've been just clicking the traits randomly, mixing good and bad traits, which has no doubt affected my game at some point (like dying in lave because Combustible pushed out Hover). Wow, I can be pretty dumb sometimes

Anyways, thanks a million for the tip.

 

No sweat. I didn't want to name names, but you're a popular one to watch in MP lately.
GLHF.

 

From my experience, it's only a good idea if you have exactly 1 copy of that trait in your deck. For example exactly 1 Fright or 1 Trip. Then you can ensure that the more traits you draw, the further it is pushed back. If you have just 2 copy of a drawback, redrawing it will refresh the duration as well as putting the negative trait in front of the queue.

But 90% of the time, use the negative first since there's always a chance you can take more dmg etc... if you don't.

 

It won't ever hurt you to play drawback attachments first. In the event that you redraw it, it makes no difference what order you played it in.

For example, suppose I have Dimensional Traveller, Spark Inductor, Spark Generator (thank you Electroporter Novice), and 2 Combustible in my deck. In this example, I have all three positive traits and one Combustible in hand. I play all 4, and then end up drawing the second Combustible at the end.

If I play Combustible first, then play the three positive traits, and then play another Combustible, my character's traits will be as follows (strikethrough denotes removed traits):
Combustible, Dimensional Traveller, Spark Inductor, Spark Generator, and Combustible.

If I play both Combustibles at the end, my character's traits will be as follows:
Dimensional Traveller, Spark Inductor, Spark Generator, Combustible, and Combustible.

Note that the attached traits are still the same in both cases. If I didn't draw the second Combustible, however, playing Combustible first would have left me with three positive traits in the end.

 

There are rare cases where playing drawbacks first can hurt you. Those can happen when having a "benifical" attatchment is a bad for you current situation. A good example would be an area effect spell + damage enhancement attachment when you can not avoid also hitting allies with the spell and the extra damage from the attachment will kill your allies. In those cases you want to get rid of the beneficial attachement, so it can make sense to not play the drawbacks first.

Granted, it is rare and very conditional, but it can happen. But for a standard situation playing drawbacks first is always the way to go.

 

Thanks for expanding upon that, I agree with you that those cases would constitute playing a "positive" attachment first.

 

Not a a synergy, but a reuse of terrain damage worth consideration if you are in need to regain initiative at the end of a round: Assuming got Acid Blast or Stone Spikes left once the passing game begins and you are behind. You could try to bring that terrain damage home and cast it under an opponent who can't move anymore, but you can aswell incentivize your opponent to give up initiative by casting it under someone who has moves left and might move to avoid the damage or the discard effect. It can be the poor mans cantrip move to gain initiative.

Other uses of terrain damage that might not cross the mind of beginners is the possibility to regain line of sight by replacing illusion and smoke tiles, soothing difficult terrain with illusion or lava (to make an unexpected passage for your heavy hitters) or simply overwriting the terrain your character is stuck on with a lesser damage version. (if you HAVE to get your feet ruined, acid > stones > lava).
Also you can change the facing of your caster by targeting terrain in a direction of your choosing.

 

This is a good tip but it always seemed obvious to me. I always play the trait I least want to lose last (since I rarely play neg. traits). Same comes with casting buffs, I usually will save Martyr's Blessing for last unless the character is about to get popped.

 

I saw a sweet little combo last night that I thought is worth mentioning. Rushing Aura plus Healing Dash, makes it possible to heal +6 which can very nice for a non-Preist, especially a D-Warrior.
Of course would work with anything that gives you extra move distance.

 

Also worth being mentioned: Healing Dash will heal 2 additional hp if used by a priest with Talented Healer. That's on top of your move gaining cantrip!

 

A few more, likely already known by most but still worth being mentioned:

Elven Maneuvers will indeed draw step attacks and other assorted Move-hybrid cards (works great with Hard To Pin Down, Nimble Strike, Vicious Thrust, Dodge, etc.).

Officer's Harness works great as a throw-away card in conjunction with Savage Curse, or any other effect making you discard if a certain condition is met. Those will also make you more vulnerable to punishing attacks though (Punishing Bolt, Touch Of Death, etc).

If you have 2 Sparkling Cloth Armors in your hand and you get damage (after both armors get to roll), you will get to move twice in a row.

This last one is untested, but I think it works too (please confirm/deny):

Rushing Aura and similar effects will boost Sparkling Cloth Armor's movement, making you able to reach even further after taking damage.

nevermind, tested it out and it doesn't work. Thanks to Feleran, who was the first to point out the combo didn't work

 

This tip is from several months ago, so I'm unsure if this never worked or if it was patched out of the game: if Inspiring Armor gets activated by one of your attacks, none of your guys get to draw any card (this is mentioned in the card's text too!).

 

Does it?

Heres another card reuse, a little far streched, but can save your neck when a match is approaching its end: Savage Curse + Bloodied Block / Lifesaving Block (and other blocks with high likelyhood of triggering) - Cast the savage curse on the attacker that is about to unleash his attacks on the character with the blocks. He will burn two cards, hopefully the second attack that might have got you.
Very useful when you have to stand your ground, earning a deciding victory point.

Dont try it midbattle or when the enemy priest inspires.

 

I think I remember (unintentionally) pulling that combo at least once, several weeks ago. My memory might very well be wrong, so definitive confirmation/denial would be welcome (and I don't have the time to test this myself atm)!

 

The change to Inspiring Armor being triggered by an ally's attack was a bug fix.

 

Just keep in mind that Livesaving Block only triggers based on the base attack. For example if you have 6 HP and someone attacks with Bludgeon (4) and has a Mass Frenzy (3) the Lifesave will not trigger even though you will in fact be killed. I learned this the hard way and between LS block not triggering and penetrating not going through Toughness I was ready to quit.
Haven't checked in a while though was the trigger for livesave ever changed?

 

Nope. Punishing Bolt gets by it every time because of it too.

 

Shame, such a nice card too bad it is nerfed by the order of operations for CH.