The Daily Deal

Magma Scepter - it's one of best items for SP farming in my experience.. I had 4 and bought 1 more ..

 

It's actually pretty easy to fit an Aegis and have plenty of blocks/dodges.

You really don't even need to give up Team Run to use it. Apprentice Ferocity, Quick Jon's Axe or Reaper's Scythe, Doubled Edged Sword, + either Infused Greatclub, Dangerous Club, or Maquah of Ancient Blood. Bam, you have 3 blocks and 2 dodges on each character, 6 Defender's Block in the party, and you are still capable of using all 5 Team Runs (if you don't need that many, use IG).

On top of that, Aegis has synergy with itself, allowing strategic formations that make it virtually impossible to counter. The only reason you don't see more people using it is not many have 3 Aegis yet.

 

Phantom Pain
Multiplayer-4
Illusory Barrier is a powerful card but it is most effective in multiples and only for wizard based parties. Unless you can plaster the floor with them you are basically only throwing up a difficult terrain speed block depending on how close you are to your opponent. Illusory Barrier is worse than Flash Flood when it comes to keeping enemy characters at a distance and it is also can't be used to occupy victory points. However, it can be used to travel over difficult terrain and cover any damaging terrain enemies may deploy. If you expect to see a lot of wizards Phantom Pain can be a powerful tool, but to use it to it's full potential you need more than two copies. Because of that, I would pass on Phantom Pain unless you already have multiples or Ixtli Amulets. If you are willing to forgo attacks in favor for Illusory Barriers and have a major token to spare, Illusion is a better deal as it will get you slightly more per token.

Singlplayer-4
Phantom Pain is obviously most effective against ranged characters and they will not chase you down so using multiple simultaneously isn't necessary. It is very useful for avoiding line of sight for 1 HP quests against ranged characters. It can also be used for terrain issues but that isn't reason enough to purchase them. While Phantom Pain is a nice addition to have in your arsenal it isn't necessary to obtain unless you need additional copies of Illusory Barrier for quests.

Overall power level-Very good if you rely on wizards and expect to face them as well. However, you will most likely need more copies of Illusory Barrier than the two Phantom Pain offers so be prepared to shell out a lot of gold if you plan on going down this path.

Substitutes- none for minor token, Ixtli Amulet (E) major token

Sparkling Shield
Trogsbane
Weighty Wand

5-Will fit in any deck. Sees a lot of play in multiplayer or has great utility in single player.
4-Powerful, but deck specific. Popular in multiplayer or useful in certain adventures.
3-Average. You could do better, you could do worse. The cards on this item will not make or break a build.
2-Subpar. There are unplayable aspects to this item or many better alternatives exist.
1-Very bad to totally unplayable. Little or no redeeming qualities.

 

Wow Peon, im totally digging your thorough assessment. Reminds me of how they review MTG sets when the first come out. Well done, sets a good standard.

 

Amulet Of Blades
Multiplayer-3
Path Of Knives can certainly be annoying to play against but it isn't the type of card that you want too many of in your build as they do not stack. How much mileage you get out of it depends on the rest of your deck and the board state. At its worst Path of Knives is an optional halt effect if they can avoid damage and wait out the effect. It shines when you can pressure the afflicted characters into moving either through threatening damage, controlling victory points, or baiting them into chasing one of your characters down. If mind games aren't your thing then just move them yourself using cards like Force Cannon or Violent Spin. Similar to burning effects, armor can really shut Path of Knives down. Do not under any circumstances use it on a character with Elven Maneuvers or Martyr Blessing attached or you will be a sad panda.

Singleplayer-2
In the land where you can be surrounded by a dozen zombies a single target spell with no immediate effect is not ideal. It is more of a fun strategy than an effective one to employ. Do not use Path of Knives on targets with armor or short move sets. Of special note, you have not lived until you use Path of Knives on a Trog Gouger with Crude Plates.

Overall power level-Not an item that I would recommend. You never want to draw too many Path of Knives and it is very easy to get enough on cheaper items.

Substitues- Sarigo's Wand (E), Bloody Bracelet (E), Booming Ring (E) tokenless

Flaming Sword
Jaguar Buckler
Lochaber Axe-This was a pre-nerf powerhouse back in the day. With damage so low it is now primarily used to Fly in certain leagues. Would not purchase unless you play leagues or you plan on massively buffing the attacks for the backstab potential and added movement.

5-Will fit in any deck. Sees a lot of play in multiplayer or has great utility in single player.
4-Powerful, but deck specific. Popular in multiplayer or useful in certain adventures.
3-Average. You could do better, you could do worse. The cards on this item will not make or break a build.
2-Subpar. There are unplayable aspects to this item or many better alternatives exist.
1-Very bad to totally unplayable. Little or no redeeming qualities.

 

Amulet Of Blades. Definitely isn't worth 2500 gold. There are many epic items with two Path of Knives, and you generally don't need a lot of them.

Flaming Sword. A very good weapon for , used in many builds. The only weapon with three Fiery Stabs besides Blazing Shortsword. Has Combustible though which can be very dangerous versus the burning wizards.
Jaguar Buckler. A wonderful shield, well worth 500 gold. Better than many legendary shields.
Lochaber Axe. Has two very bad cards that we had to live with before the rebalance. Now it's utter crap.

 

OK, makes sense.

What the??
How is flaming sword a very good weapon exactly?? The only time I ever used one was for drawback quests, but only because I was out of Blazing Shortswords.
I don't think this item is a good pick for any MP build, total waste of tokens.

Lol, you could say that about a lot of shields. Just because many legendary shields are terrible, doesn't mean a particular epic shield is any good.
However, in this case you're on the money.

I understand the bitterness towards lochaber axe. It's still not bad compared to Rageblood Dagger though, it has it's niche uses. Mainly it's just a way to get movement out of only two minor tokens.

 

Today's Daily Deal: Hand Of Wicna, Cobalt's Chalice, Godtouched Spear and St. Ozark's Blade.

Hand is just a legendary double Flash Flood item with Path of Knives. At least there is some synergy there, impassable terrain forces your opponent to go around?
Unique: No
Superior: No
Playable: Maybe
Value: Overpriced

Cobalt's Chalice is an odd item, it gives Cone of Cold along with magic-removal spells. Good against speedy enemy magicians like wisps I guess? Not particularily great at one thing or the other, plus there are cheaper items out there tokenwise.

Godtouched Spear: Team Heal + Inspiring presence. Not bad but not that good, questionable uses.
St. Ozark's Blade: Really nice item against monsters in SP, if you aren't sure what else your priest should be using, use this. Not really exciting enough to buy.

 

Hand Of Wicna
Multiplayer-3
Flash Flood can be useful in limiting movement against melee characters but gets relegated to victory point denial duty against wizards. It is much more useful in cramped maps where you can use walls or impassible terrains to help block off paths completely. In open maps Flash Flood usually only serves as a speed bump. Flash Flood does not see much play but the Haunted Map rotation is a good place to try them out.

Singleplayer-3
Flash Flood plays essentially the same in singleplayer as multiplayer but you have much better knowledge of maps and attack types. Don't play it against ranged characters, in wide open maps, or against things that fly or teleport. Flash Flood is very useful against the giant monsters that take up 4 squares as they have a harder time maneuvering around.

Overall power level- Fine item but really map dependent and nearly dead against wizards. Would not recommend buying it as there are multiple cheaper options.

Substitutes- Bimson's Water Stone (E), Tauri's Watery Maze (E), The Soulstone (E), Pip's Anklet (E) major token

Cobalt's Chalice
Godtouched Spear
St. Ozark's Blade

5-Will fit in any deck. Sees a lot of play in multiplayer or has great utility in single player.
4-Powerful, but deck specific. Popular in multiplayer or useful in certain adventures.
3-Average. You could do better, you could do worse. The cards on this item will not make or break a build.
2-Subpar. There are unplayable aspects to this item or many better alternatives exist.
1-Very bad to totally unplayable. Little or no redeeming qualities.

 

It's a pretty good weapon for its tokens. If Blazing Shortsword wouldn't exist, you'd say that yourself But the Blazing Shortsword is much better, right. You aren't going to proclaim all weapons worse than The Strongarm "a waste of tokens", are you?

OK, let's say that it's better than many good legendary shields. I tend to just ignore crappy items as if they wouldn't exist at all.

I'd sooner go with Vibrant Pain that I've bought after the rebalance just for movement and flying. Yes, it costs more, but when you really need the flying, you generally need it more or less reliably, not just three copies in a deck.

Actually, it's very very good for a supporting priest. If you compare this to Healing Hand Mace, you will see that the Spear has much weaker attacks, but better support, since Inspiring Presence is generally better than Team Heal. As long as you plan to destroy the enemies with spells, not with the melee attacks, the support is more important than the attacks. Plus, the Spear has two long-ranged attacks that can be launched from the safe position, and one step attack that can be used to disengage.
I rate the Spear as excellent supporting weapon, second only to the Healing Hand Mace (second due to the great attacks of the Mace), and I quite frequently play it instead of the Mace in SP. So it's a very good buy for 500 gold.

 

OK see that is good input on the Godtouched Spear. It does fit well in a priest supporting wizard role. Particularly wizards who aren't too shy on the friendly fire.

To the first part: You make a good point. If Flaming Sword was the only item for warrior with Fiery Stab, I would agree that it is a good weapon for the cost, IF you need the fiery stabs.
Because Blazing Shortsword DOES exist, and you can get much more value out of those two tokens elsewhere, I would say the Flaming Sword has very little use, unless you're counting those SP levels where Chops are good, and drawbacks again.
Otherwise, you stick two tokens in and out comes the same three Fiery Stabs and the same Combustible, along with some slightly different attacks (you lose a Stab, which I consider a drawback!). When putting the tokens elsewhere, it's easier to make a bigger impact on the deck, instead of just two Chops.

Why would you handicap yourself with a good weapon like Flaming Sword when a better weapon (Blazing Shortsword) is out there?

To the second part: Kind of unnecessary. Let's get some things straight. I don't even like the Strongarm. There are going to be items that seem mediocre by comparison. But in a lot of cases, those items function better than the Strongarm, which is purely attacks. Comparing pure attack weapons is easy, especially among ones with all range 1.
What am I getting at? There are items out there that are worse than others. Does that mean that they're bad? Not necessarily. But when they are bad, and there are even more items available out there that do the same thing cheaper/better/faster, I'm going to point it out.

 

Daily Deal: Mokad's Unholy Tome
... Yeah, I'm going to recommend a hard pass on this one. Mind worm is totally not going to help this one. I would, however recommend Incense Of The Caged Demon and Mokad's Reeking Skull for the drawpower; if you're lacking gold then use Ebony Prayer Beads, they're fantastic and only 100g.
Also, there's Savage Tome. Usually I would use two Savage Tomes, but once I got the Skull Of Savage Iljin, I could optimize to Skull + Incense.

Talisman Of Grief: Ick. No, this item is awful. It just doesn't know what it wants. Save your gold.
Manifold Medic: Why you would want to buy this when there is Manifold Healer?
Armor Of Negation: I use Cleansing Hide Armor quit often, and this is just a small step up. In general you would be better off with two Arrogant Armor items, and get your Cleansing from divine items. Or at least the common divine armors with Cleansing Burst.

 

Mokad's Unholy Tome
Multiplayer-2
Unholy Energy draws you 3 cards and only costs a couple life but what it offers in raw card advantage is overshadowed by how long it takes to get those cards. It will help you maintain a lead but drawing a card at the beginning of your next turn is not where you want to be when you are losing. Add the facts that it doesn't interact with any priest skills and can't self target and you can see why it's rarely played.

Singleplayer-2
If you are playing in an adventure where the enemies will give you time before they can interact with you the Unholy Energy is pretty decent. On average though, enemies start relatively close or on victory points so you don't have the luxury of waiting for extra cards.

Overall power level- There are so many things for priests to do. Delayed card draw should be near the bottom of the list. Also, there are cheaper items with Inspiration that will trigger Altruism. While they don't offer as many cards over the course of the game, the draws are immediate and can self target. If you're in the market for immediate card advantage Demonic Power gives you two cards but it does come on items with less than desirable cards. Would not recommend getting Mokad's Unholy Tome. Just stick with Inspiration for your draw priest needs.

Substitutes- Ebony Prayer Beads (R), Incense of the Caged Demon (E)

Armor Of Negation
Manifold Medic
Talisman Of Grief

5-Will fit in any deck. Sees a lot of play in multiplayer or has great utility in single player.
4-Powerful, but deck specific. Popular in multiplayer or useful in certain adventures.
3-Average. You could do better, you could do worse. The cards on this item will not make or break a build.
2-Subpar. There are unplayable aspects to this item or many better alternatives exist.
1-Very bad to totally unplayable. Little or no redeeming qualities.

 

Top-decking Unholy Energy in a crucial moment is not going to help you, that's true. On your last turn, it's the last card you want. That can be said about several cards. However, if you can draw it in the early game it can give your character some overwhelming momentum. I understand that it's harder to feel the advantage of those cards later VS bursting out those cards NOW, but it can make a big difference. Card draw is a tricky thing to balance, and Unholy Energy gives the most value/cost of any card besides Bless, which is a bit extreme anyways.

 

I can understand throwing a couple into a buff priest deck to get ahead early but Unholy Energy is just too unreliable for coming back from behind. Even on an even board state you are going down a card for the turn and only breaking even the following turn.

 

Evasion
Multiplayer-2
Flanking Move is really useful on wizards. Too bad you have to use an elf wizard which is without question the least played race class combination due to being one Obliterating Bludgeon away from pushing up daisies. With wizards out of the equation you are left with stab warriors, step warriors, and ranged vampire priests. Evasion is an ok skill if you have one of these builds but if you're willing to replace a Flanking Move with a Shuffle you can get two copies of the far superior Quick Run from Superb Footwork that goes with any attack. Then maybe you could get some surprise Obliterating Bludgeon hits in on some elf wizards yourself (if those things existed).

Singleplayer-3
Flanking Move will most likely be used for the cantrip effect here. For 1 HP quests elf wizards are commonly used since low HP doesn't matter. If you find you need 3 more cantrip cards than boots alone can provide then Evasion is the item for you. Otherwise, it's just a decent albeit unexciting skill.

Overall power level- Flanking Move is great but it is going up against amazing elf skills like Elven Maneuvers and Slippery. Would not recommend getting it especially when the common Superb Footwork does the job better 2/3 of the time.

Substitutes- Clever Mobility (E), Superb Footwork (C)

Axamander's Ringmail
Keen Baselard
Ulalia's Boots

5-Will fit in any deck. Sees a lot of play in multiplayer or has great utility in single player.
4-Powerful, but deck specific. Popular in multiplayer or useful in certain adventures.
3-Average. You could do better, you could do worse. The cards on this item will not make or break a build.
2-Subpar. There are unplayable aspects to this item or many better alternatives exist.
1-Very bad to totally unplayable. Little or no redeeming qualities.

 

Spear Of St. Qaith
Multiplayer-1
Vicious Thrust is good, Spear Of Darkness is good, and everything else is poop. Soothing Darkness may heal a potential 15 HP but delayed healing is just awful. When you need healing you can't afford to wait a turn to get it. Soothing Darkness isn't even good preemptively. Either your buffed up character is ignored for three turns in which case you've wasted a card or it's getting hit which means it's probably going to die. Maybe if you really want 5 attacks on your priest weapon but I only know the rule for warriors. Still waiting to hear from the proper authority on priests.

Singleplay-1
Have you ever wished the campaign was more challenging because your priest weapons are too powerful? Do you enjoy slowing your characters down for 3 turns? Well for 5 easy payments of 500 gold you can get all this and not much more! No refunds.

Overall power level- Spear of St. Qaith and power don't belong in the same sentence. I might have just used them together but I'm a rebel.

Substitutes- Why would you want anything that resembles this?

Bahoxl's Maul
Basher's Delight- One of the best bashing weapons if you're into that sort of thing.
Crown Of Mad Eskin

5-Will fit in any deck. Sees a lot of play in multiplayer or has great utility in single player.
4-Powerful, but deck specific. Popular in multiplayer or useful in certain adventures.
3-Average. You could do better, you could do worse. The cards on this item will not make or break a build.
2-Subpar. There are unplayable aspects to this item or many better alternatives exist.
1-Very bad to totally unplayable. Little or no redeeming qualities.

 

I shelled out 5k gp on Mokad's Unholy Tome and Spear Of St. Qaith. Two items to rage at if they drop and waste a legendary rarity roll, but aren't fun to buy either. Collecting sucks sometimes.

 

Add this list after every post, maybe in a smaller font. So people know what your numbers mean and other can use your rating system more freely.

 

Today is:

Igneous Scorchstaff 3 MP/3 SP. It would probably be nice in SP, if you don't have White Flame, especially for the lower levels where every token counts. But I cannot recommend spending 2500 gold on this.

Blessed Mail 4 MP/ 4 SP. Dark Chain Shirt is better IMHO, especially for a vampire priest, but Blessed Mail is quite good too.
Frennik's Soulstone 2 MP/ 2 SP
Pol's Prayer Beads 2 MP / 2 SP

I feel that the number cannot incorporate all aspects like "deck specific" and similar, so I will use two additional symbols. The "?" symbol will show the need of special deck, and the "!" symbol will indicate that the item is the best available item in its theme (or for its price in tokens). Then, the number can indicate only the item power in the appropriate deck.
So, White Flame will be "5?!" instead of "4" which actually says nothing. Bloody Command will be "4!" since it isn't as powerful as White Flame, but it's really the best human skill for a blue token, and it doesn't require a specific build.