Harrowdeep - Grand Alliance cards review

 Welcome again to my blog! This is the second one in the series covering the new release of the Harrowdeep. In my previous article, I did go over the new rules and all the important changes that were made with the start of a new season. In this one, I’ll be covering all the Grand Alliance cards from the Core Set. 

The new box has brought us massive card drop - in total 84 new universal cards were introduced. To make it a bit more manageable I’ve had to split this into smaller chunks and this time around we’re looking at the grand alliance part of the package.

o quickly recap - every warband belongs to one of the grand alliances: order, chaos, destruction, or death. This is the same as in the Age of Sigmar, where every faction belongs to one of those alliances. Each grand alliance card has an icon indicating which alliance it belongs to and only warbands from that alliance can include it in their decks. So, for example, any Stormcast warband, which belongs to Order, won’t be able to include cards from Chaos or Destruction or Death in their lists. They’ll however be eligible for cards from Order. My initial concern is that this is a potential source of imbalance if one of the factions will receive a significantly better deal than the others.

In the core set, we’re getting 9 cards for every alliance. Those are 3 objectives, 3 gambits, and 3 upgrades for every faction. So lets without further ado let’s get into those cards.

Again, big thanks to the guys at the Path to Glory podcast for letting me use their card images, you guys rock! 

While rating the cards I will be following the system as below:

1 - a very powerful card. You should take it in nearly every deck. A staple.

2 - a very strong card that you should consider taking. Might not always make the cut, but should usually contend with other options.

3 - a situational card that might prove to be good in certain situations or with proper card support

4 - a weak card. You might find a use for it, but in general, most often you’ll be better off with other picks.

Order

First up we’re going to take a look at the Grand Alliance of Order. I’m not going to lie that most of the warbands I enjoy come from Order and Destruction. So I’ve been super curious about the cards for those.

Elimination Order - the first card is a surge objective that is fairly good if you have an access to assassins. If not - it’s pretty hard to score. At this point, we don’t have the required fighters in the game, so the usability of this card is very low. Going forward rating of this card might change, but for now, it’s not a good objective.

Rating: 4

Path of Order - dual end phase objective that is a Path to Victory with a small twist. You don’t have to kill a fighter this round, but you have to ensure that there are two enemy fighters out of action. Overall it is slightly weaker than PtV, but it’s not a bad card. The main trouble with it is that there aren’t too many warbands who would want to play it. Outside of Seraphon and Thundrik, it’s difficult for me to find a good candidate for that card. I would rate it as “2” if not the fact that most of the Order warbands find it rather poor. It would’ve been an amazing death card though.

Rating: 3

True Grit - we’re still living in the meta, where one-shotting is a thing. So it’s quite likely that if your opponent will go for your leader, he is going to aim for enough damage to kill him. And even if that wouldn’t be the case getting 2 wounds onto your leader for 1 glory is not a great idea. Unless you’re a Mollog. But Mollog is not excited about that particular alliance.

Rating: 4

Arcane Bulwark - this gambit spell could be decent for Myari or Ylthari. The rest wouldn’t care about having a guard or has no means of casting this reliably.

Rating: 4

Cautious Manoeuvre - this card’s effect is cool - I like it. It’s the limitations on this card that are breaking the deal for me a bit. The requirement to be a hunter or on guard is not great and limits this card a bit. Still, you could use this card to make one of your slower fighters make two move actions and pull them to the front, where they would like to belong. This would be amazing for all the Stormcast if we could reliably get them on guard or turn them into hunters.

Rating: 2

Drilled Determination - mass heal that targets fighters that are adjacent to enemy fighters or have a guard token. I guess you could combo it with mass guard gambit or something. But healing 1 wound is not worth the trouble in my opinion.

Rating: 4

Castellan - this is another card that works around Guard tokens. In this case, it’s a token dispenser similar to Arcane Bulwark, but better because it can’t fail and you can use it multiple times. I don’t feel it will see the game though unless there will be some crazy defensive builds out there, that will care about being on guard a lot.

Rating: 4

Drill Sergeant - this is similar in principle to Paymaster from Profiteers. I used to experiment with that upgrade with a degree of success. But that was mainly because of the superior range of the Profiteers. It allowed you to deathball your fighters and shoot enemies to bits while buffed by an aura from an upgrade. The extra speed and extra dice are interesting options, I’m just not 100% sure how viable it will be to pull off. I guess this could work well with Profiteers or other warbands where you can keep two fighters together and make multiple attacks with them. It is also one of the few +dice cards that are not limited by range.

Rating: 3

Perfect Stance - it is an okay defensive card. it gets better with multiple defense dice. Stagger protection can be nice, but I’m not convinced it is that big of a deal. But overall it’s not something I would write home about.

Rating: 3

Order cards - general thoughts

Overall this selection of cards is… disappointing. It feels like those cards were mostly focused on full defense mode with a lot of emphasis on Guard tokens. Their surge is not really playable right now and feels like it is thematically from a different universe than the rest of the cards. Overall I can’t say I like any of those cards. I might experiment with some - like Drill Sergeant and Cautious Manoeuvre, but I don’t see anything I would feel I want to include in my decks. Order Alliance fans can feel disappointed with this selection. 

Destruction

Coming up next are the cards from Destruction - arguably my most played alliance as of late. The Order felt pretty bad, so hopefully, Destruction cards will be better. I feel that the bar is set pretty low…

Easy Come, Easy Go - this card works. But I’m not sure I would like to use my entire hand just to score 1 glory at times. I’m not a fan, but this card is pretty reliable.

Rating: 3

Scant Rewards - this card is a bit strange. The first condition feels very hard to do - there’s only so much space in enemy territory. So there’s a need for some kind of token removal cards. The alternative scoring condition is a mini Feet the Beastgrave. Doable with some tech - especially with new rules regarding objective tokens. But then you’d have to ask yourself: is it worth it for 2 glory? I would say it is not.

Rating: 3

The More The Meaner - this feels like Da Kunnin’ Crew’s in-faction card. It should also be very good for good old Gitz. For them, this is a fairly easy card to score.

Rating: 2

Shattering Blow  - a worse version of Acidic Strike. It’s an okay card, but nothing special. I don’t think it will see the play unless we will get some super-abusive upgrades.

Rating: 3

Stupefy - this card did make me play one of Disturbed’s songs after a good while of not listening to it. That’s the biggest plus of it, pretty much. It is a ping damage card useable only against fighters with illusions attached to them. Alternatively, it is an option to stagger an enemy fighter. In both cases that fighter has to be adjacent to one of your fighters. That range limitation kills the card. It would’ve been fairly decent without those restrictions. Not amazing, but serviceable. But in its current shape, it’s a waste of a slot, sadly.

Rating: 4

Tremendous Roar - mass stagger ploy. Because of its range limitation, it will be fairly difficult to hit more than one target with it. And you’d need to have a wizard for a granted effect. This means Headkrakka or Zarbag. So… not a huge selection of wizards here. Everyone else has a 50% chance to land an effect on an enemy fighter.

Rating: 4

Spitemaul - it is a weird attack action upgrade. If placed on a minion it can break an upgrade after landing a successful attack. We don’t have too many minions in the game right now - this is the first issue. The second is… that it’s not worth it in my opinion. I would rather get an upgrade to help me eliminate my target than something that allows my weakest fighters to maybe break an upgrade.

Rating: 4

Troggoth’s Blood - I like this card. It’s not super strong by itself, but if you’re intending to Voltron one of your fighters - like Rippa - this card could help sustain him through the game. If the meta will shift from big one-shots to a higher number of lower damage attacks, this card could become pretty handy. The only problem is that it could not bring enough value to justify keeping it in the deck. But overall I like the concept behind this card. The limitation to fighters with 4 or fewer wounds is an interesting little thing. Feels like the developers have taken some steps to stop high wound fighters (destruction has lots of those) from spiraling out of control again.

Rating: 2

Visage of Destruction - first Illusion card. It will turn its bearer into a hunter and will apply -1 attack dice to adjacent enemy fighters. Sounds like a pretty solid brawling card. My main worry is that it can be removed too easily. A simple distraction-like card will do it. Or a friendly gambit. Still - this is a pretty strong defensive effect. Leader-only restriction is a bit sad, but it’s not a deal-breaker in the case of this card.

Rating: 2

Destruction cards - general thoughts

This set of grand alliance cards is not thrilling. The good news is that it is better than the Order cards, but as I’ve mentioned before - the bar was not set high to achieve this. Destruction gets one decent objective for some of its warbands and one that could work if you really wanted it to. Ploys are not worth the slot in the vast majority of the decks. Upgrades are looking a lot better though. While Spitemaul is rubbish, the other two are a lot more interesting and could even see some play. Overall there aren’t any compelling options here unless you’re playing gitz or new orcs.

Where Order has been centered on guard tokens Destruction has been focused on stagger and upgrade breaking. This is very thematic, but… I don’t know, maybe those cards were simply too restricted to be appealing. So far no fireworks in the Grand Alliance cards department. Let’s see what we have in store for Chaos.

Chaos

This Grand Alliance has a very diverse mix of warbands, so it will be interesting how those cards intend to support them.

All Too Real - first way of scoring this card is fairly decent for warbands that like to use weapon upgrades and maybe add a Punching Up or something like that to the mix. Chaos has at least two of those, so this card could see some action there. The second condition is impossible right now - I believe there are no Illusion attack actions in the game.

Rating: 3

Path of Chaos - I wish I’ve had this in Destruction! This is a proper aggro objective and I really like it. There are quite a few warbands that would like it in Chaos. Very good card.

Rating: 2

Pawns of the Gods - this is another decent objective card. It’s a bit unfortunate that it does require opposing fighters to inspire, but this happens more often than it doesn’t, so this should be a very reliable card - especially for the warbands that inspire easily.

Rating: 2

Agonising Bolt - a pretty neat ping damage card. I don’t expect its stronger effect to happen too often, but even 1 damage is very interesting. I’m expecting to see it a lot in warbands who can cast it.

Rating: 1

Chaotic Paths - chaotic version of Toxic Gases is here! I really like it. Scatter gives this card a proper chaotic feel.

Rating: 2

Desperate Bargain - you’d have to be very desperate to play this card. I don’t think fighters will be vulnerable too often in this game. And keeping a ploy for that rare occurrence is not a great idea. Especially if that ploy allows you to risk one of your upgrades by attaching them to a vulnerable fighter. All that to not have to spend 1 glory while applying upgrade… 

Rating: 4

Devoted Curse - it is a neat way of bringing a bit more lethal hexes back on the battlefield. I like lethal hexes. More lethals can be good. This card is a bit limited in range and by requiring activation of upgraded fighter, but overall it could fill in some niche.

Rating: 3

Gifted Bulk - this is super cool. Not only it is a flat +1 wound, but you could also apply it for free. It is also a reaction, so it could satisfy any reaction-based objectives should they come. Very solid card. At worst it will replace Great Fortitude for Chaos. It might not be very exciting, but it is for sure a very solid option. And who knows? Maybe that “mutation” keyword will mean something later on?

Rating: 1

Phantom Pain - extra range at the cost of defense? An illusion? Not that great. I’m struggling to find a scenario where this would make its way into any deck.

Rating: 4

Chaos cards - general thoughts

Quite fittingly for chaos - there’s no clear theme in those cards. It is also quite a mixed bag in terms of quality. This set is noticeably more consistent and interesting than the two I’ve reviewed already. Most of the cards here might see some play, as they’re offering very interesting options. There’s one auto-include as well. Overall Chaos seems to have received a better deal than Order and Destruction. And this is something I’ve been worried about.

Death

Lastly, let’s take a look at the Grand Alliance of Death. This is the alliance that has the least appeal for me warband-wise, but at the same time, it is one that historically has received the most support from the game. Will history repeat itself here?

Coup De Grace - a slightly worse version of No Mercy. Still an excellent card and one of the better kill surges out there. With a lot of easy surges rotating out this might even deserve a rating of 1.

Rating: 2

Death’s Champion - Drepur, Kainan, Queen, Duvalle are going to welcome this with open arms… bones… or whatever they have left in there. Another very solid aggro objective.

Rating: 2

Lurking Death - this card is almost a hold 2 objective that is worth 2 glory. Yes, it is an end-phase card. It does force your fighter to go into enemy territory. And it does allow an opponent to deal 1 damage to one of your covered fighters, which is not a big deal. I do expect ghouls and ghosts to abuse this card a lot.

Rating: 2

Partial Resurrection - this card… wow. While it is restricted to be used with a leader on board, it is super powerful. You can bring back your fighter for at least one more attack. Sure, he’s on a single wound, but still - nothing stops you from healing him. And reviving Gorath, Khenta, Gristlewelt, one of the banshees, etc… that can be a huge deal. Especially if they’re upgraded already. Instant restriction candidate. This card is disgusting.

Rating: 1

Reborn in darkness - this might be a good way for SG to teleport a petitioner deeper into enemy territory if you really need to grab an objective or score Lurking Death. It’s very niche though as Raise tokens are hard to come by outside of SG.

Rating: 3

Swooping Shadow - that can turn out to be quite an accuracy boost. Especially vampires and ghouls can abuse this thanks to many of them being hunters. If the flying extends back to ghosts (just as scything did to older versions of the wording), then banshees, Thorns, and Wraithcreepers can become quite a nuisance with this card as well. 

Rating: 2

Fatal Scheme - this cannot be! A bad card. Must have been a fluke or something… but yeah, this one is not really worth the slot. And the action provided is pricey for what it provides. So I don’t expect anyone to go for this unless you’d be desperate to cycle your power deck at all cost. I don’t see the reason to do this at this point though.

Rating: 4

Lifeseeker - cleave alone is probably not worth the upgrade slot. Having said that - this card might turn out to be very strong if we will get an assassin in a death warband. Then it will get really deadly with accuracy. For now, we don’t have any, so the useability of this card is very limited.

Rating: 3

Shade Leech - a very conditional heal(1) upgrade. Very unlikely to bring you value during the game. I don’t expect to ever see it on the table.

Rating: 4

Death cards - general thoughts

Well, Death warbands cannot complain. They’ve got an assortment of 4 very solid cards and one absolute banger. What is interesting is the fact that the faction historically associated with holding objectives has received an aggro toolkit that everyone else would drool over. Their main theme seems to be accuracy through cleave and ensnare and simply killing. Fitting to death as a whole, but damn… 

One of the cards - Lurking Death - offers a solid 2 glory option for more control-oriented players. So overall… they’ve got it all.

Final thoughts

To be perfectly honest I’ve had some hopes for Grand Alliance cards. The entire concept felt a bit weird, but at the same time gave promise that we could get some cool cards that won’t break the game thanks to their faction limitations. What happened instead is that Death has received a sweet package of very cool and strong cards while everyone else got a few scraps to fight over. It does feel super odd that one Alliance gets more powerful cards than at least two others together. 

One could argue that this is indeed a balancing act - they would get more powerful cards to even out the gap between those warbands and the rest of the pack. And this would be a valid point if not the fact that most of those warbands are sitting at the top of the viability chart (or close to) pretty much since their inception. It sure does feel like someone worked hard to ensure all of our walking corpses are not in danger of having a similar power level as the rest of the lot.

And this is something I’ve been worried about when I was talking about the risks of GA cards in general. As it stands now Death with their very strong warbands has received the best cards (including 2 strong surges, which is huge at the start of the season), Chaos has got much-needed help in some areas and the rest was left to rot. If this is how the GA Cards are going to work going forward then maybe it would’ve been better for the game to remove them right off the bat. At the moment it is difficult to state how disappointed I am with how those have turned out. Definitely the worst part of the new release for me. 

As always - I’m very interested to learn your opinions. How did you enjoy Grand Alliance cards? do you feel they’re good for the game? Is their balancing okay? Let me know in the comments!