Friday 31 October 2014

New Commander Decks

Commander is one of the most popular multiplayer Magi formats and enthusiasts have been anxiously awaiting new cards and decks—their wait will soon be over! 


Each of the new Commander offerings includes a 100-card preconstructed deck and features its own special Planeswalker Commander (both foil and oversized as well as regular-sized). The decks are filled with cards from throughout the history of Magic, with 15 never-before-printed cards and also include... 10 token cards in every deck! 

Where the first release had five decks which were wedges from the mana pie (that is one color and its two enemy colors.) these five decks all follow are a central color of mana. The series features 61 new cards total, all legal in Legacy and Vintage, making Magic: The Gathering—Commander (2014 Edition) exciting for casual and competitive players alike!

Thursday 30 October 2014

KD Magic Nights for November

KD Magic Nights

As normal all KD Magic Nights will be held at the Royal George on the Holmbush Roundabout and will start at 7pm. The venue will open between 5pm and 7pm each week to allow players to trade, have some casual games or test their decks for the evening.


We will try and get 4 swiss rounds of 40 minutes each week after which the top two players will get prizes.

Here is the proposed schedule of events for this month, in addition to these there will be draft events being held on Tuesday Night, more details to follow soon.

THIS MONTHS DATES AND FORMATS

Friday 7th November ...... Standard 7pm £3
Friday 14th November ...... Standard 7pm £3
Friday 21st November ...... Modern 7pm £3
Friday 28th November ...... Standard 7pm £3

All events will be confirmed in the days proceeding it when the facebook event is created. If you are not getting invites to these events and would like to the please let me know.

D&D Attack WIng

D&D Attack Wing is Dungeons & Dragons themed, and brings the heroes, villains, and monsters of the D&D universe to life in fierce miniatures combat. Along with the D&D Attack Wing Starter Set, seven expansions are also available at launch to help players dominate the skies in ferocious aerial duels!


Utilizing the FlightPath™ Maneuver System, collectors and players alike can command dragons and other fearsome Dungeons & Dragons monsters engaging foes in pitched aerial combat while customizing their forces with magical upgrades!

Monday 27 October 2014

Autumn 2014 Pokemon Tins

Due in tomorrow are ...


The Autumn 2014 tins will feature Venusaur-EX, Charizard-EX, or Blastoise-EX along with four booster packs. The cards have English-exclusive artwork...


Three extra-powerful Pokémon step up to the challenge, each one a master of the arena! Choose from the red-hot blast of Charizard-EX, the dangerous poisons of Venusaur-EX, or the unstoppable hydropower of Blastoise-EX! The Pokémon Trading Card Game: EX Power Trio Tin adds an extra EX boost to your collection, because each of these awesome tins includes a fully battle-tested Pokémon-EX card, plus 4 Pokémon TCG booster packs! Your opponents had better get ready!

Thursday 23 October 2014

Friday Night Clix


Hero Clix at the Royal George is being given a new name and a new focus. Friday Night Clix will start this Friday from 7pm at the Royal George on the Holmbush Roundabout in Shoreham.

We will be running a League for these events. Every game you turn up and play in gets you ONE point (max 3 games in a night). Every game you WIN you get ONE further point. 

Those points can be built up and used at any time to purchase prizes. This is the current list of prizes:-

Special Objects 3pts
GotG LEs (Recorder 211, Talon, Capt Atlas, Colonel Yon-Rogg) 5 pts.
X-Men LEs (Angel, Psylocke, Rogue) 6pts.
Beast Boy (PRIME) 6pts.
Proxima Midnight Super-Rare 7pts
Gen 13 Team Base (Complete) 8pts
Teen Titans Team-Base (Complete) 8pts
Outlaws Team-Base (Complete) 8pts
Beyonder Super-Rare 9pts
Resurrection Man Convention Exclusive 12pts

Obviously with our other events some items will be limited. We will be adding more prizes later. 


Wednesday 22 October 2014

A simple Way to Draft

Last night at KD Games Night we had a Khans of Tarkir Draft and next week we will again be having a 'commons and uncommons cube' for the young players. So I thought as a bit of preparation for that and in fact for anyone that is new to the draft format I would have a look at the method know as BREAD

B – Bombs!

Bombs are super-powerful cards that are hard to deal with. Usually, if you play a bomb, unless your opponent answers it quickly, you will win the game. 
If you are unsure of what a bomb is when evaluating a pack, ask yourself these questions:
Reaper from the Abyss
  • Is this card a big creature that is difficult to remove and hard to block? Any big creature with abilities that can swing the game in your favor is a bomb.
  • Does this card have some sort of mass effect that provides card advantage? Does it kill creatures, make your opponent discard cards, or make your opponent lose a huge chunk of life?
  • Does this card provide a huge, game-breaking effect? Planeswalkers, mass removal, 
Bomb cards should be picked immediately if you see them—they are the most efficient ways to win games!

R – Removal!

Moment of Heroism
The next cards you want to be looking for are cards that remove creatures or other problem cards. This can include burn, destroy effects, or creature enchantments. Removal is very important in Draft decks, and usually, the more removal you have, the better your deck will perform.
Not all removal is permanent removal. Some spells, such as bounce effects, only remove the creature for a short period of time. Although not permanent, that turn in which the creature is in your opponent’s hand will allow you to put significant pressure on him. Your opponent then has to spend all of his mana to recast that creature.
Some removal doesn’t actually kill a creature directly, but it does so in combat. These cards are commonly referred to as combat tricks.
Finally, some removal doesn’t look like removal at all—it’s just a creature with flash. Flash creatures are also considered combat tricks.

E – Evasion!

The next cards you want to draft are creatures with evasion—creatures that are hard to block. Usually in Limited games, players have a lot of random ground guys in play, and no player can attack beneficially. The game will then go to time and end up in a draw. This is where you need creatures with evasion. Anything with flying, fear, or that are unblockable are considered creatures with evasion.

A – Aggro!

Next step in drafting your deck is picking up creatures that round out the deck and fill up your mana curve. You want to be able to cast a creature every turn if possible. Therefore, it’s important to have guys that have different mana costs. A good rule of thumb is to have between thirteen and seventeen creatures in your Draft deck. Take a look at this deck that I recently drafted:

D – Duds!

The last types of cards you will be drafting are the bad ones. These are the cards that you will be picking up toward the end of the pack and usually don‘t want in your deck. 
These last five or so picks in each pack are the picks where you should keep your sideboard in mind. Yes, you do have a sideboard in Draft. Any card you don’t end up playing becomes your sideboard, and you can sideboard any number of cards in between games. It doesn’t even have to be a one-for-one swap.
The situational cards that aren’t good enough for your main deck but can be great in certain matchups are the types of cards you should by picking up for your sideboard. 

Tuesday 21 October 2014

Pokemon Prerelease

As part of this coming weekends Gambit Sunday we will be running a Pokemon Prerelease event ...


Scout Hut in Vale Park, Portslade

Registration will open at 10am when the normal gaming day starts and will cost £20 on top of the normal club entry of £4. Players will receive 6 boosters from which to build their deck and will compete in a number of rounds dependent on the number of competitors to determine the overall winner. Every player will receive a promo card and a further 2 boosters just for taking part and the winner will get an extra 2 boosters. Please could you contact us to reserve you place at this event.

No 8

So we have had the little shop at number 8 Tarmount Lane for a few weeks now and it looks like we will be getting the whole room before Christmas which will make things a lot easier both from a daily setting up aspect as well as providing a much more practical retail space.

We are not intending to open full retail hours and have provisionally looked at the following as our standard trading hours until the end of the year. 

We will be open ...

Thursday 2pm until 6pm
Friday 10am until 4pm
Saturday 10am until 4pm

It is possible that we will increase the Friday hours until 6/7pm but this will depend entirely on whether I can sort out a location for Friday Night Magic that is in the centre of town.


Friday 17 October 2014

Khans of Tarkir Games Day - EVENT DECK SALE

As you may know this weekend is Khans of Tarkir Games Day - a chance to get your hands on great promo cards and maybe even win the playmat.

For those that maybe have not got a STANDARD deck or maybe want to start something new for this weekend only we will be selling the Khans of Tarkir Event Decks at 20% off.


This deck is ready built for competitive play and has some great rare cards in it. If you have already got one and using it for the basis of your deck then its well worth buying a second this weekend and improve the chances of drawing those all important cards.


Star Trek Mini Game

In Star Trek Tactics: Movie Mini-Game, players go head-to-head, with one or two players controlling Captain James T. Kirk and Mr. Spock and trying to repel a Klingon assault on the U.S.S. Enterprise. The other player controls the Klingons, of course, and wants to see Spock and Kirk reduced to atoms floating between the stars.


We have had this game in stock for a while but never really played it. So this Saturday at KD Games in Tarmount Lane Shoreham I have decided its time to dust off the phasers and see how much fun killing Klingons can be! 

Jake and I will give it a go as soon as we open up so hopefully we will have the rules pretty much sorted after a couple of games.

Its looks like a really simple game for two players and is definitely a  great introduction to the mechanics of Hero Clix, so if you want to have a go then why not pop in? The shop will be open Saturday from 10am through until 4pm but there is a Khans of Tarkir event being held at the Shoreham Centre between 11:30am and 2:30pm so there may be periods of the day when the shop is closed during that time. You can of course pop along to the Shoreham Centre or give me a call on 07840 785885.

Thursday 16 October 2014

Lords of War - What will you new deck look like?

With the deck size changing from 36 cards to 54 cards the structure is obviously going to change as well. The new breakdown of cards will be as follows ...

1 General obviously
7 instead of 5 Command Cards 
8 Recruits, 8 Soldiers and 6 Veterans as in the core set.
6 instead of 4 Elites
6 instead of 4 Special Units

plus
4 Champions
8 Privates

Learn more about what these symbols mean on our website, www.lords-of.war.com!

So far the units that have been previewed the monstrous creatures are champions and the flyers and magic casters have been privates, so this should give you some idea of what you deck might look like. Faction based decks will be interesting enough but mercenary decks which allow units from any faction have an almost endless amount of possiblities, especially if we read the stretch goals.

To see more details have a look at the kickstarter, it almost at 50% funded so its looking good for something special for Christmas in the world of Lords of War

Wednesday 15 October 2014

Lords of War - Spell Casters

Yesterday I had a look at monstrous creatures which certainly will give us Lords of War players something to think about but probably the most exciting new units are the spell casters. However before I have a look at them there are some pretty annoying additions to the armies of the Orcs and Dwarfs that need to be discussed which are...

Flyers




Flying Units are the crafty creatures of Lords of War, by themselves they do not seem that threatening and will primarily be used to interrupt your opponent's strategies.

What makes them unique is that, despite having low Shield Values, they can ONLY be damaged or Engaged by Ranged Units or other Flying Units. This means that they are likely to move around the battlefield quite a bit being quite annoying allowing you to work towards your own strategies and may be forcing your opponent to play cards that could be saved for bigger prey.

They may seem small but put simply they are MAJOR pests!

So this brings us to...

Magic Units


Magic Units are a major addition to Lords of War - not just because they look pretty cool, but because they introduce Tokens to the game!

Each Lords of War Faction contains multiple Magic Units in its Magic and Monsters Expansion, with each Faction having unique spells that only they can cast.



For the Dwarves, harnessing the Icy Winds of the North, their Magic Units can either deal +1 Ice Damage to their foes (Damage which lingers, even if the Magic Unit Retreats or is Eliminated) or they can cast +1 Shield onto allied Units!

The Orc Magic Units meanwhile can cast +1 Fire Damage or they ALSO have the power to turn ANY Orc Unit into a Berserker, enabling them to rampage across the battlefield and achieve multi-elimination combos!

Both of these abilities fit really well with their race and have the ability to seriously mess with your opponent. My advice is simple - kill these units before it is too late.

Magic Units with Ranged capability have another MAJOR advantage: they can Fire even if Engaged! This is different to any other ranged attack and means that there it is very hard to stop these guys, the only weakness is that they can be killed in one hit as do not have the high shield values of the command cards.

Its worth pointing out that Magic Units can deal Ranged damage OR cast a spell in their turn, not both so strategical placement is very important.

All three of these new unit type by themselves are pretty cool, but together the game is just awesome!

There really is not option - you must back this game.

Tuesday 14 October 2014

Lords of War Kickstarter - Will it change the game?

The short answer is yes. The change is going to be quite a big one actually especially once all three expansions are out.

You can continue to play with the existing Lords of War products and I am sure for some people that will be enough. However for the majority I think once you have seen the new creature types you simply won't go back.

The first change is the deck size we go from the current 36 card deck to a 54 card deck which will of course change the breakdown of unit types. (which I will talk about in another article)

The hand size also changes from 6 cards to 7, which will give you a little more option when choosing which card to play.

The biggest change however is the victory conditions, you now need to kill 30 units of 6 command cards to win. It actually makes the win by command much harder to achieve so is likely to have a big impact on tournament games.

So that is the technical change but the one people really want to know about is the new creature types, so lets start off with...

Monstrous Creature.


Monstrous Units bring a whole new level of strategic thinking to Lords of War. Not only can they all move which is a pretty impressive skill to have but, as you can see form the number in red on a black circle next to the shield value, they also have a monstrous defence value.

So what is a monstrous defence? Well is means that no attack arrow which deals EQUAL OR LESS THAN a monstrous unit's monstrous defence can damage it.

Weaker units might be able to engage them but your heavy damage units will be needed to actually eliminate them.

Strategically this changes things a lot. Do you commit high hitting cards early or wait until these beasts hit the battlefield? If you do will you allow your enemy to build up to quickly, if you don't will you still be able to kill the monsters that you know will come in the end?

For a game that can already be quite tense this could really put you on the edge of you seat.

I will have a look at flying units and possibly the most exciting cards, magic casters tomorrow in the mean time why not have a look at the kickstarter and back it at what ever level you can afford.

Khans of Tarkir Gameday

This weekend is game day for the newest MTG release Khans of Tarkir. We will be holding a STANDARD event on Saturday 18th October at 11:30am.

The venue will be the Shoreham Centre on Pond Road and entrance will cost the same as an FNM event.

Everyone that attends will get ...


Will be be having three or four rounds with each round lasting 40 minutes. At the end of the rounds the top eight will each receive ...


and the player with the highest score will get to be the champion and get this play mat ...


The event should finish at about 2:30pm. Due to size of the venue there will be a limited amount of places for this event. Please confirm your attendance by paying for your ticket in advance if possible.

Monday 13 October 2014

Black Box - New Kickstarter

So the waiting is over and the new Orcs vs Dwarfs set from Black Box is on kickstarter, they are already at 25% funded so its looking good that we might see this by Christmas.

This is an expansion to the game and changes the deck size and winning conditions. It makes it a bigger game with many more variable. We will now have sell casters, monstrous creatures and flying creatures. All of these are excellent additions to the game and will make you need to think a lot more.


There are more details on the facebook page and the kickstarter page, so why not take a look.
In addition to the expansion for Orcs and Dwarfs there is a potential that we will also get the expansions to the other two sets if we can reach the stretch goals. For me this is a must the game will be great with the one expansion but with three its going to be amazing. Please have a look at in the next few days and back at whatever level you can.

I will be having a look in at the new card types in a bit more detail in the coming days starting with monstrous creatures and the new game structure tomorrow.

Sunday 12 October 2014

Lords of War Play Mats

I have today received a re-stock of the popular Lords of War Undead play mats as well as two brand new designs.

First we have the Templar general Father Nicodemus...

then we have the basic Orc vs Dwarf play mat. All three are excellent quality and are essential if you play on a regular basis. They are on sale from this week at Tuesdays KD Games Night and will be in the shop this weekend. They are £12 each or 2 for £20.

Friday 10 October 2014

KD Games open tomorrow from 10am

KD Games in Tarmount Lane will be open again tomorrow (Saturday) from 10am until 4pm.


So if you want some boosters,  brand new game or just want come in and help us to test the new control deck for Polar Panic why not pop along?

Lords of War Junior Faction Tournament

On Tuesday as part of our weekly KD Games Night we held our first Lord of War Tournament just for the younger club members.

The event was a faction only constructed decks, but without Templars or Undead. We had six players and played three rounds.

It was pretty close but the final standings were as follows...

6th with 38 points Ed
5th with 42 points George
4th with 52 points Louis

then the top three with only 4 points between them...

3rd with 75 points Alex
2nd with 77 points Jake

and the winner with 79 points was Tobey

Tobey becomes only the third person to win one of the Lords of War Command Stars and is our Junior Champion. Tobey will get the tra points for winning the event and all point have been added to the Honour Roll for 2014, which can be found on the website...

The next event will be held in November which will be a mercenary constructed deck format, more details will be posted in the coming weeks.

There is also a Lords of War tournament at our next Gambit Club Day, so hopefully we will see some of these guys there to give some of the experienced players a "run for there money"

Thursday 9 October 2014

Oligarchy

A couple of weeks back you may have been lucky enough to get a look at and a chance to play the new game Oligarchy designed by Gary Wareham at CONQUEST in Hove,

Unfortunately I did not get the time to play it but I did get to hear some really positive feedback. The week however I finally got the chance to play and I must say I loved it.

Gary came along to KD Games Night at the Royal George and demonstrated for the whole evening...


At first glance it look a little complicated and there seemed to be a lot to take in, this however is not the case the game is ssurprisinglysimple. The basic mechanics are very simple to learn and you can be playing in a very short period of time, especially if you are familiar with other card games.

It is set in the not to distant future and has a realistic feel to it. Gary has built some decks for demonstration purposes but it is intended as a deck building game, where you would buy boosters to construct your own winning formula.

Hopefully we will get a chance to build some decks soon.

You can keep up to date with what is going on on the facebook page : https://www.facebook.com/pages/Oligarchy/1482508515349207

Tuesday 7 October 2014

Polar Panic - What Now?

Tonight I have been testing some of the ideas for a control deck to use in the game we are developing with Black Box called Polar Panic.


The idea is to have a small deck of cards, currently 50 that players can use to effect the game. In the first draft there are 18 difference effects from take another turn to add another bear to the game.

Players start with one card and then play them according to the wording on the card. If players do not use it then they will have the chance to discard it at the beginning of their next turn before redrawing back up to one card.

After the first night of testing the feedback is pretty positive, the mechanics all worked ok with a small amount of rewording needed.


I will now work on the second draft ready for testing next week, so watch this space.

Monday 6 October 2014

Commander Decks


Commmander is one of the most popular multiplayer Magic the Gathering formats and enthusiasts have been anxiously awaiting new cards and decks—their wait will soon be over!

Each of the new Commander offerings includes a 100-card preconstructed deck and
features its own special Planeswalker Commander (both foil and oversized as well asregular-sized). 


The decks are filled with cards from throughout the history of Magic,with 15 never-before-printed cards and also include... 10 token cards in every deck!

Where the first release had five decks which were wedges from the mana pie (that is one color and its two enemy colors.) these five decks all follow are a central color of mana. The series features 61 new cards total, all legal in Legacy and Vintage, making Magic:The Gathering—Commander (2014 Edition) exciting for casual and competitive players a like!

Junior Lords of War Tournament


We will be holding a Lords of War tournament for the under 16's this week as part of our Young Guns Club.

The Structure;
  • 3 Rounds 
  • 40 min time limit on each round. Once reached players will have 5 turns to finish the game. If no victor is confirmed it will be a draw.
  • Each round best of 1 game 
  • Each round computer generated 
  • Computer will work out the victor at the end based on match wins and various percentages. 

The Rules set we will be using; 

  • Player 1 decided by D6 roll offs
  • We will be using the Lords of War play mat, so as to constrain size and length of games
  • Each game will be won by the first player to kill 20 of the opponents units/characters or the first player to kill 4 of the opponents command units (this includes the general)
  • Deck construction will be restricted too;
1 x General
5 x Other Command Units
4 x Special Units  
4 x Elite Units
6 x Veteran Units
8 x Regular Units
8 x Recruit Units
(See the rules pack to find the unit types, or ask on Sunday morning)
  • Points will be award as follows;
1 for each unit killed
an additional 1 point it the unit is a commander (not general)
an additional 2 points if the unit is a general
an additional 5 points for winning the game
an additional 1 point if the game is drawn.
  • The winner will be the player with the highest score at the end of the event, not necessarily the most game wins.
Right, with all of that out of the way, kick off will be at 4pm, there is no addtitional charge for this event but there is a prize! The winner will receive a command star and a limited edition foil command card. It should be a lot of fun, hope to see you all there.


October KD Magic Nights

KD Magic Nights

As normal all KD Magic Nights will be held at the Royal George on the Holmbush Roundabout and will start at 7pm. The venue will open between 5pm and 7pm each week to allow players to trade, have some casual games or test their decks for the evening.


We will try and get 4 swiss rounds of 40 minutes each week after which the top two players will get prizes.

Here is the proposed schedule of events for this month, in addition to these there will be draft events being held on Tuesday Night, more details to follow soon.

THIS MONTHS DATES AND FORMATS

Friday 3rd October ...... Standard 7pm £3
Friday 10th October ...... Standard 7pm £3
Friday 17th October ...... Modern 7pm £3
Friday 24th October ...... Standard 7pm £3
Friday 31st October ...... Standard 7pm £3

All events will be confirmed in the days proceeding it when the facebook event is created. If you are not getting invites to these events and would like to the please let me know.

Friday 3 October 2014

Buddy Fight Sneak Peak

At the next KD Games Night we will be holding our very first Sneak Peak for Buddyfight.
For more details of this event please have a look at our events page on the website.

Thursday 2 October 2014

Rebel Aces

Due in tomorrow is the brand new Rebel Aces pack for the Star Wars X-Wing miniatures game...


I only have a very small amount of these so if you want one you will need to be fast. I will have them with me at this week KD Magic Night which is being held at the Royal George as normal from 5pm and if there are any left I will have them in the shop this Saturday.