ASSAULT ON DARNASSUS (revised)

Custom raid representing a Horde raid on the Night Elves of Darnassus.

BOSSES DARNASSUS
Stage 1-Threat 4 Avanthera (C-TtDP)
Kathia the Quick (C- HfI)
Stage 2-Threat 5 Myriam Starcaller (C- SoB)
Stage 3-Threat 6 Iliyana Moonblaze (E-FoH)
Stage 4-Threat 7 Spirit of Stormrage (E- HfI)
Stage 5-Threat 9 Narthadus (C- SoB)
Stage 6-No limit High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind (E- TtDP)
4 X Wisp (THESE ARE ALLIES NOT BOSSES)

There are 2 modifications to the rules for this raid. Dranassus Sentinels are errated to read:

When Darnassus Sentinels enter play remove a Darnassus Sentinels from your graveyard from the game’.

Also add the following step to the end of the Boss Destruction rules (after placing minions in play).

· Place all Darnassus Sentinels that have been removed from the game into play


MINIONS DARNASSUS
18 x Darnassus Sentinels (C- TtDP)
2 x Sha’lin Nightwind (C- HoA)
2 x Woodsie Leafsong (C- DoW)
2 x Moira Darkheart (C-HoA)
2 x Nerra Lifeboon (C-HoA)
2 x Norrund Grovewalker (C- FoO)
2 x Treewarden Tolven (C-DoW)
2 x Givon (U- MoL)
2 x Braeden Nightblade (C- DoW)
2 x Braxiss the Sleeper (U- HoA)
2 x Bretander of the Claw (C- TtDP)
2 x Kaval the Wanderer (C- TtDP)

ACTION DECK DARNASSUS
3x Lie in Wait 3x Shadowmeld
3x First to Fall 3x Sneak
2x Quick Strike 3x Exhaustion
2x Burn Away 3x Medallion of the Alliance
2x Unraveled Plans 3x Talisman of the Alliance
2x Vanquish 3x Lessons in Lurking
2x Unwelcome Visitor
2x Shattering Blow
2x Malfunction
2x Flash of Steel

# Flags Exhausted Darnassus Raid Effect

1 Target Ally is Elusive and Untargetable until end of turn
2 Place the top card of the minion deck into play as a ready minion
3 Boss is Elusive and Untargetable until the end of turn
4 All opposing Heroes and Allies take 3 Arcane Damage and you draw 3 cards
5 Destroy all opposing Allies, Abilities and Equipment cards

Tyrande should start with 4 wisps in play as her backup.  Keeps the NE flavor as well as makes her ability useful and very "bosslike".  If 4 seems like too many maybe go down to 2 or 3.

For the 4 flag abillity maybe give all night elves in the raid's party nature resistance.  In the MMO NE have a natural bonus to Nature Resist.  Or make it so that the #3 ability is #4 and make the Nature Resist #3.  If Nature Resist seems too weak make Nature/Fire or Nature/Shadow and it'll be much more potent against many more decks.

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Only two things are infinite......

My understanding was that High Priestess Tyrande also has a Mooncloth Robe and a Tiger pet, so like maybe include "Fury" that hunter pet with her guardians, I like the Wisps idea too.

Thanks for the info on the Nature Resistance for Night Elves.

Yellowbrains and I do not play the MMO, our information on the lore has come from WoWWiki stuff we've found.  That's the kind of MMO info we need from players out there familiar with both the MMO and TCG.

Kobradin

1540010:

Tyrande should start with 4 wisps in play as her backup.  Keeps the NE flavor as well as makes her ability useful and very "bosslike".  If 4 seems like too many maybe go down to 2 or 3.

P>

That's a good idea although chances are she's going to start with 4-5 Darnassus Sentinels plus at least 5 other Night elf allies in play so she shouldn't have a shortage of wisps to blow up once they die. Plus my idea of adding another boss increases the health for the final encounter (although I did skip it for the Taurens since they don't really need more health with Cairne in Play)

My initial thought was to go with a Cat ally like Shadow (although an elusive end boss is pretty mean, I tried to keep it to only one elusive boss for my stage 5 'Speedbump') or a Spectral Tiger (don't think there are enough Elusive allies to make it worthwhile) And Fury just has Ferocity which doesn't really do much.

I think the adding resistance idea is a good one, but would probably be better for the Blood Elves.

Did anyone have a chance to try this over the weekend? I'm hoping for some playtest reports and suggestions for tweeks.

The actual Wisp ally though returns itself to hand at the start of owner's turn giving her an infinite(if you want to pay for it) access to wisps.  Just seems to be what her ability is about, and once her initial ally group is blown though she isn't that dangerous.  Giving her access to the Wisps essentially puts the players on a clock they have to beat.  It would make Darnassus different from TB, Org and the rest where they can win through attrition.

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Only two things are infinite......

1540010:

The actual Wisp ally though returns itself to hand at the start of owner's turn giving her an infinite(if you want to pay for it) access to wisps.  Just seems to be what her ability is about, and once her initial ally group is blown though she isn't that dangerous.  Giving her access to the Wisps essentially puts the players on a clock they have to beat.  It would make Darnassus different from TB, Org and the rest where they can win through attrition.

Nice. I hadn't thought of that (mostly because I was trying to keep allies out of the bosses hands, which is why I came up with the mechanic for the Sentinels.) Hmmmm. I'm going to give this a try and see how it runs...

Maybe instead of making the wisps go to hand then they directly return to play?  That would make it cost 2 for each of her infinite wisps and not 3?

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Only two things are infinite......

We did a 4 raider test play on the cows of Thunder Bluff tonight.  I can say that I am awful dang tired of Warstomp and warstomp allies.  Seemed like we were exhausted all the time.  Tough raid.  I don't know if I liked it that much.  Spent so much time trying to capture flags, didn't deal enough dmg to the bosses.  Our shaman deck didn't do much.  Flags still seem overpowered.

Kobradin

I think the playtest went OK. 4 players playing Horde (led astray by a traitor priest): Blood Elf Paladin with Holy Allies, Tauren Burn Shaman with assorted equipment, Blood Elf Mage and Traitor Priest (I saw 3 Tithes. 3!!! Grrrrr.) The group made it to the 5th Stage without anyone dying (the most damage I managed to get the priest up to was 18, then he dropped a greater heal) and despite the allies building up, they got cleared out again and again (mage Solanian's an Engulfing Flames to drop 6 on everyone on the board. ouch) We had to call it on time but they were going into Lokholar with very little damage on anyone and board clearing in their hands, so I think it could have gone either way. I do think Thunder Bluff is the toughest of the raids though. Want to try the current version of Ironforge to see if it does any better.. The flags are nasty but they're supposed to be (I was only able to use the flag the bosses started with once before they got taken away and they spent the rest of the game going back and forth exhausted...)

ASSAULT ON SILVERMOON CITY (revised 11/16)

Custom raid representing an Alliance raid on the Blood Elves of Silvermoon City.

BOSSES SILVERMOON
Stage 1-Threat 4 Dannon Spellsurge (C- FoH)
Erindae Firestrider (C-DoW)
Bloodwatcher Denissa (C-FoH)
Stage 2-Threat 5 Instructor Antheol (E- MoL)
Stage 3-Threat 6 Mistress Naila Flameburst (C- DoW)
Stage 4-Threat 7 Aesadonna Al’mere (R- SoB)
Stage 5-Threat 9 Naliss the Silencer (R- BoG)
Stage 6-No limit Lor’themar Theron (E- FoO)
Cerrik Blooddawn (C- SoB)

MINIONS SILVERMOON
14 x Silvermoon Sentinels (C- FoO)
2 x Blood Knight Haeleth (C- FoH)
2 x Jaedan Sunshot (C-MoL)
2 x Selin Duskrunner(U- DoW Starter)
2 x Shadala (C- MoL)
2 x Blood Knight Kyria (C-HfI)
2 x Kelor Valorshine (C-FoO)
2 x Katsin Bloodoath (C- TtDP)
2 x Tyrus Sheynathren (U- TtDP)
2 x Silea Dawnwalker (C- MoL)
2 x Kaelos Sunscream (C- HfI)
2 x Voltrinnia (U- BoG)
2 x Orion (C- DoW)
2 x Blood Knight Tarae (U- MoL)

ACTION DECK SILVERMOON
3x Lie in Wait 3x Arcane Torrent
3x First to Fall 3x Desperate Block
2x Quick Strike 3x Sudden Reversal
2x Burn Away 3x Talisman of the Horde
2x Unraveled Plans 3x Major Healing Potion
2x Vanquish 3x Turn Aside
2x Unwelcome Visitor
2x Shattering Blow
2x Malfunction
2x Flash of Steel

# Flags Exhausted Silvermoon Raid Effect
1 Target Blood Elf gains Resistance (Choose 1: Arcane, Fire,
Frost, Nature or Shadow) until the end of turn
2 Place the top card of the minion deck into play as a ready minion
3 Interrupt Target Ability, Ally or Equipment card
4 All Opposing Heroes and Allies take 3 frost damage, any character
dealt damage this way can’t attack or protect this turn.
5 Destroy all opposing Allies, Abilities and Equipment cards

Ok, put together the Blood Elf raid over the weekend. I also made some very minor adjustments to the base rules (moved the order bosses enter play to help the Blood elves not get pinged by their own Sentinels) and the Darnassus and Thunderbluff raids (added missing stuff for the former and dropped War Stomp by 1 in the latter). With any luck I should be able to playtest one of these again this coming weekend.

Some additional playtest notes...

One thing that I did throw in against the Thunder Bluff raid was a ton of Arcane Torrent allies.  I think this helped us get so far.  We were able to turn off the War Stomp effect and bypass protectors this way.  Canissa the Shadow, Karina of Silvermoon, Voltrinna, Naliss, Nea Sunmark were in both the Blood Elf decks.

Cheap protectors are a MUST!!!  Jazmin Bloodlove is good.  I think you need to get out protectors to protect your flags once you have them captured.  You must also be able to divert the tough hard damage coming from the minions.

Stealth and Long Range are attributes that we really haven't taken advantage of.  Our Rogue player is out of circulation because of a new baby, but this would usually be his role.  Find some Stealth allies that can bypass protectors and steal flags.  Long Range would be good because it keeps the hitback damage to nil.  We don't have a hunter player in our group usually.  I think it's because hunters are not that powerful or popular.

I think our regular lineup would wreak havoc on these city raids, so we haven't pulled out our toughest decks.  But going against people who haven't put in enough protectors will tilt the scales of favor in the direction of the raid boss.  You must have protectors.

Kobradin

Yes, I erred on the side of hard since I figured these would be going against the honed raid decks. On Sunday I will be adjusting the rules to allow the flag effects to be interrupted as if the boss were playing an ability card. We'll see how it goes.

Anyone else put one of this together to try? Bueller? Bueller?

Had a good playtest over the weekend. 6 man demon/alliance against Orgrimmar (so I figured I was going to lose, but at least I'd get to see all my bosses in action)

I was up against an Obliverion that used Infernals to good effect (oh, Orgrimmar grunts, you are so fragile....) a Blaze Brightspark who packed lots of burn (turn 1 Scorch + Flip = dead Warlord Goretooth) another Mage who was running some beefy protectors, a Shaman who healed, A Boomkin Druid (luckily he never got Moonkin form or Dreamstate into play but those Moonfires were sure annoying) and a Kurzon the false who managed to get 3 Myriams into play at the end.. ouch). The group worked together very well, saving the Myriams until after my turn so that the mage could burn down all the allies that entered play before they could attack and though I managed to clear the board of most allies (except all the untargetable ones) I could never get much damage to stick or hang on to any flags. I think the Orc build is pretty good as is, and would probably do better against a 4 man raid. Nazgel as an end boss is a bit underwhelming so I've moved him up to be an earlier boss and pushed the other guys back (see revised Orgrimmar raid).

This play also made me think about the Silvermoon raid and I've realized I need to pull back on the sentinels. Since I seem to regularly see 4 grunts in play in the final stages, I realize that that equates to 10 damage to every hero if it was silvermoon sentinels and that just seems too harsh. Dropping the sentinels from about 50% to 30% means that it's more likely to be only 3 sentinels for 6 damage with the 10 being possible, but much less likely. I revised that raid as well. I also realized that the orc bosses need to enter play before the minions for Blood Guard Gulmoc to be effective.

Next week is the sneak peak, so I may have new cards to put into the mix. I'm definitely up for suggestions.