The Thursday Night Thing!!! (TNT)

Our TNT events on Thursday evenings will continue in to March and April.They will be a mix of casual games, beginner sessions, leagues and the occasional tournament.  

We will be continuing with Dreadball and Blood Bowl as our main systems as these are currently very popular. There will also be some D&D Attack Wing and X-Wing added into the mix.

Here is the full schedule for March and April. It is subject to change and the best way to keep up to date is on our discord channel ... 

MARCH 2nd        DREADBALL, BEGINNERS SESSION AND CASUAL PLAY
MARCH 9th         BLOOD BOWL, BEGINNERS SESSION AND CASUAL PLAY
MARCH 16th       X-WING AND D&D ATTACK WING, CASUAL PLAY
MARCH 23rd       DREADBALL, BEGINNERS SESSION AND CASUAL PLAY
MARCH 30th       DUNGEON BOWL, BEGINNERS SESSION AND CASUAL PLAY 

APRIL 6th            DREADBALL, THE LEAGUE BEGINS
APRIL 13th          X-WING AND D&D ATTACK WING, CASUAL PLAY
APRIL 20th          LORDS OF WAR, CASUAL PLAY AND BEGINNERS SESSIONS
APRIL 27th          BLOOD BOWL, THE LEAGUE BEGINS

We should have May's schedule before Easter. If you have anything that you want adding to this then please let us know.

Advent Offers - Days 10,11 and 12

The last three days have seen some new offers on the advent calendar, which are...

Beyond Baker Street
A heinous crime has been committed. A team of the Kingdom's finest detectives has been assembled and put on the case. They have a prime suspect, they have a motive, and they know what the opportunity to commit the crime was. Now all they have to do is prove it.

Is reduced from £30 to just £25!

Ixalan Bundle
Includes a Player's Guide with pictures of all cards in the set as well as ten 15-card booster packs, 80 basic land cards, 1 Ixalan card box, a learn to play guide, and an Ixalan themed Spindown Life Counter. 

Reduced from £33 to just £30

Lords of War - All packs!!!
Lords of War is a dual-deck strategic card game for two-plus players which sees fantasy races engage in dynamic, tactical card battles. This offer applies to all the expansions we currently have in stock, which is Orcs vs Dwarves, Elves vs Lizardmen, Templars vs Undead.

Reduced from £12 per pack to just £7

Lord of War - Digital?

So this was announced a few days back and has already caused a bit of excitement! That is right the already great game of Lords of War but on your PC. It is currently available on Steam and I believe that there is even a tutorial video on the way for people like me who a little out of date!

So if it sound like something that might interest you then here is the trailer...

Lords of War

Its been a while since we ran a Lords of War tournament so it was quite nice to issue another Command Star tonight!

Congratulations to Alex on become one of only a few two star commanders and winning a new storage tin for his deck!

This was the first event that we have done with the new magic and monsters expansion and it was interesting to see what the impact on the tournament structure would be, Initially I thought it would make the games longer, but only one game went to time and that was playing to the full 30 unit/6 command cards to win.

The games were very interesting and the 54 card decks really created a varied selection of cards, everyone had gone with a different strategy. For Alex he had concentrated on flying units, electing to take no magic casters and it certainly seemed to pay off!

All the points will be added to this years honor roll in the coming days.

If you have not had a chance to play Lords of War and would like to give it a go then why not head along to Salute in London this weekend where the Black Box team will be demonstrating this exciting game!

New Lords of War Images

Last time I had a look at some of the new artwork for Lords of War I concentrated on Lizardmen, this time I thought I would have a quick look at some of the artwork for the new Elves...

They are all pretty cool, but for me its the two flying units that look the most interesting.

Artwork Previewed for EvL2

For a little while now Black Box have been previewing some of the art for the new Lords of War set Elves vs Lizardmen 2 which is due to be launched on kick starter in the coming months. So far we have only seen some of the Lizardmen but I think you will agree that it is looking pretty impressive so far...

We will keep you up to date with all the card and set information each week right up to this exciting launch. Also if you have not had a chance to play Orcs vs Dwarfs 2 then look out for our Lords of War event which will be coming soon.

Lords of War Play Mat Offer

We have the full range of Lords of War Playmats in stock and currently we are offering them at the standard price of £12 or 2 for £20...

Lords of War Draft Tournaments

Today as part of Young Guns we will be holding a Lords of War Tournament. This will be our very first event of the year and will see us issuing our very first command star. This time we are going to do something a little different and we will be running a draft. I have six decks ready to go and as I will be taking the cards back at the end of the event there is no additional cost for this tournament. I will need a minimum of 4 players and a maximum of 6 for this event.

The Setup

Give each club member a full Faction deck at random and have them open it.

Using the Rank symbols on each card (as found in the Lords of War Rules) have players sort their deck into 6 decks by Rank but have them hold onto their General.

Next, take all the cards of each particular Rank belonging to ALL players and sort them into 6 decks containing all cards of a giving rank.

This should lead to 1 deck of assorted Command Cards, 1 deck of assorted Special Units, 1 deck of assorted Elite Units, 1 deck of assorted Veterans and so on.

Next, shuffle the Command Card deck and deal these cards out to each player.

Players should then all look at their hands (in which there should be 5 Command Cards plus their General) and pick ONE Command Card to keep.

Once they have chosen the card they want, they then pass the rest of their hand to the player on the left and take the hand of the player to their right.

Continue this process until all players have 5 Command Cards, then do the same with the Special Units deck, Elite Units deck and so on until each player has a full deck of 36 cards.

Next, simply play a standard Lords of War Tournament.

At the end of the Tourney we will have a winner and the very first Lords of War Commander of 2015!

New Lords of War Mats in Stock

The new Lords of War playmats have arrived today. There is a design for both the Orc and Dwarf  armies. Playmats cost just £12 or 2 for £20. We also have stock of the Undead, Templar and Sepia mats which are in the same offer.

Time to Fly!

Having played a few games of the new Lords of War expansion which you add to the original Orc vs Dwarf decks I can definately say that it takes the game to a whole new level.

There are three new unit types but the one that I am really loving is...

... and in particular this card. Flying units a quite simply awesome. On first glance it only has two shield and attacks for 2 - so pretty unexciting. There is however a lot more to this card, firstly it can move in four directions which makes it really easy to get to the areas of the field where you need it. The big thing though is that it flies and this makes it a really annoying little creature.

Flying units can not take damage from attack arrows unless they are being engaged by another flyer. They do pin down enemy units however so can make a good set up card for a big kill in the next turn. They do take damage from ranged units so they will not last forever but you will probably get a few turns of fun before they fall from the sky. It also forces your opponent to commit good ranged unitts to the field on what is a low ranked card. They also take damage from magic casters but as this is likely to be just one damage you will have time to remove the trouble maker before your hawk gets turned to smoke!

I really love this seemingly innocent little card - an early game hawk can seriously mess with your opponent. I simply can't wait for elves to get some flying support!

Orcs and Dwarves 2

Today I have received my first stock of the great new expansion for Lords of War...

Included in the box are...

18 new Orc cards,

18 new Dwarf cards,

12 Fire counters,

12 Ice counters,

12 bezerker counters,

12 shield counters,

1 Rules Sheet

When added to the original Orc vs Dwarf set this will increase the new deck size to 54 cards and introduced monsterous creatures, flying units and magic units.

I will be demonstrating the new set on Tuesday this week as part of KD Games Night at the Royal George as well as selling this great new expansion at just £10. I don't have much stock at this point so it will be first come first served.

Lords of War at Dragonmeet

 On Saturday I had the pleasure of joining the Lords of War team at Dragonmeet to celebrate the games anniversary and run the end of year tournament.

We were busy all day demoing having to extend our play area and at one point we were even demonstrating the game on the floor as there was quite simply no more space. For the tournament we had 12 players which was as much as the space would allow.

We had a real mix of ages and abilities from children as young as 9 and players that had learnt the game just a few minutes before the event. Everyone played well and in the spirit of the game and after 3 rounds we had two players joined at the top of the field with an impressive 76 points.

Jake Cambell-Smith and Kevin Hearne then played the final match which was as tense a game as you would expect, it was clear that both players really wanted to get their name on the sword and in only a few turns both players had lost their Generals, a few turns later they had both lost 3 command cards. As both players tried to get the fourth command Kevin started to move ahead on units and eventually claimed his 20th to win and become the first player to win the right to wield the Sword of Champions!

The final scores were ...

1st Kevin 105 (claiming an extra 25 points for winning along with a well deserved command star)
2nd Jake 95 (claiming an extra 15 for second place)

3rd Kieran 68
4th Alistier 61
5th Innes 60
6th Jamie 57
7th Gabriel 55
7th Hamdi 55
7th Rob 55
10th Binh 51
11th Jasper 50
12th Tobey 46

All of the points have been added to the Lords of War Role of honour for 2014, details of which can be found here...

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GsN3b9cw8xuW4XXa7WR6iSGobOuVs6FtTG2aXpX0Ikk/edit?usp=sharing

Dragonmeet

This weekend I have the pleasure of joining the Black Box team at ...

I have also been given the privilege of running their end of year tournament. As this is the venue that the game was launched in 2012 it seems fitting to have something of a special prize for the winner, so in addition to winning a command star and some 'shiney' prize cards the overal event winner will have their name engraved on the Lords of War Sword. They will also get to take home a mini sword in the form of a letter opener.

   

The event will start at midday and players will need a constructed deck. It will consist of 4 rounds of swiss followed by a top 4 play off. The best bit is that there is no extra charge to join in the event - so if your going to Dragonmeet you might as well give it a go!

Last Sunday at Gambit Games

Last weekend at Gambit Games we hosted another Lords of War Tournament which saw Will become the first two star general of the year. It was pretty close but he kept the pressure on all of his opponents and never lost a game. The final result was ...

Will 76 point and 3 wins (gets an extra 25 points for winning)

Gary 76 points and 2 wins (gets an extra 15 points for second)

Olly 63 points and 2 wins

Tobi 53 points and 1 win

Kevin 50 points and 1 win

Alex 41 points

We also had a lot of games of Star Realms which was by far the most popular game of the day. It is really easy to play but great fun, its well balanced and caters for 1 one 1 as well as multi-player. More details on how to play can be found here ... http://kidsdreamsgames.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/how-to-play-star-realms.html

Another very popular game was Space Cadets ...

Space Cadets: Dice Duel pits two star ships against each other in quick-paced combat. The players are divided into two teams, each team playing the crew of their ship. The team will win or lose together. The game ends when one side destroys their opponent by causing four points of damage through torpedoes or mines.

Each ship has six Bridge Stations:
Engineering generates power for the other stations.
Helm maneuvers the ship on the map.
Weapons loads the torpedo tubes to attack the enemy.
Sensors locks onto the enemy so torpedoes can hit, and uses jammers to stop the enemy from locking on.
Shields helps protect the ship from enemy torpedoes.
Tractor Beams can grab the powerful crystals, move the enemy ship on the map, and launch Mines.

There are no game turns in Space Cadets: Dice Duel. The game continues with players acting as quickly as possible until one side wins.

Each player will be in charge of one or more of these stations, or have the overall roll of Captain to coordinate everything.

Here is some of the action from Sunday ...

This game is available to order, so if you are interested please let me know.

Lords of War Tournament

Today at KD Games we will be holding our second Lords of War Tournament for the younger players. Starting at 4:30pm we will see if Tobey can defend his title in a three round 'mercenary' event.

A 'mercenary' event means that players are free to change their decks to include cards from any of the three races, Elves, Lizardmen, Drawfs, Orcs, Undead and of course the mighty Templars.

Just how many Palisades will we see if uncertain, but I expect a few!

This event will give all the players to have a real mess about with their decks and hopefully we will see some well thought out armies competing for the chance to be a one star or maybe even a two star general.

Jake has asked me to take his deck along a bit later for him, so I thought I would have a little look through to see what direction he has gone. Jake has gone for a Lizardmen and Undead mix, keeping it to just two races. He is using a similar strategy to me in that he has used the cards he likes the look of and will enjoy playing. With only an hour until the event, hopefully I will not spoil his chances to much by showing you what he is using...

Lords of War Elves vs Lizardmen

Now that the new kickstarter from Black Box has been fulled funded we have been awarded with the release of the Lords of War : Elves vs Lizardmen Audio story which is available on YOUTUBE.

This story is again read by Tom Barratt and tells the back story of the second Lords of War set. It is very well written and is well worth listening to. I have added part one to this post but there are a further 9 parts available. 

If you have not already seen or rather heard the Orcs vs Dwarf storyline then part one can be found here : http://kidsdream9.wix.com/kd-games#!lords-of-war/c1p1v

There is also still time to back the campaign and try and reach the stretch goal that would give us Elves and Lizardmen 2, so if you have not already seen it please have a look : https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/388956994/lords-of-war-magic-and-monsters

Could you be the FIRST 2 Star General?

At the last Gambit Games weekend we held a Lords of War Tournament which was won by Game designer Martin Vaux, and although he passed the prize down to second place it did earn him a place on the honor role for 2014.

It also means that we still do not have a 2 star general for this year and there are only two month remaining. (even less before Dragonmeet at the beginning of December where Black Box will be holding there end of year tournament)

There are two new events on the calendar which could make this change, first will be the junior event which will be held on Tuesday 11th November at KD Games night, where Tobey will be keen to defend his title. The second will be another event at Gambit Games on the last Sunday in November. Both of these will be mercenary events allowing cards from all three sets, which should make for some very interesting decks. If your interested in playing in either of these events or hosting one of your own please let me know as soon as you can.

For now here is a list of the current top ten players for 2014...

RANK	PLAYER	LOCATION	VICTORY POINTS	TOURNAMENTS PLAYED	AVERAGE SCORE
1	Will Bowen	Gambit Games	323	4	81
2	Kevin Hearne	Gambit Games	271	4	68
3	Jake Cambell-Smith	CONQUEST 2014	227	3	76
4	Tobey Hearne	KD Games	160	2	80
5	Alex Bowen	CONQUEST 2014	144	2	72
6	Chris Scahill	CONQUEST 2014	123	2	62
7	Martin Vaux	Gambit Games	113	1	113
8	Olly James	Gambit Games	109	1	109
9	Kieran Wilkinson	CONQUEST 2014	108	2	54
10	Phil H	German Masters	106	1	106
	Marceel Obenauf	German Masters	106	1	106

For the full list see ... http://kidsdream9.wix.com/kd-games#!lords-of-war/c1p1v

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

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

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.