Greetings! We’re again facing an exciting time in WHU - a new FAR list and FAQ were released. As usual, I will be diving into changes presented by those documents. Are new additions good? How will they impact the meta? Let’s find out!
FAR update
I believe this is the part everyone is most interested in. What new cards landed on the FAR list. Let’s check out!
Forsaken Cards
No cards were forsaken this time around!
Restricted Cards
Oh boy, there have been some serious action over here! 20 new entries and 2 cards leaving the pool. That is quite the balancing effort.
New Additions to FAR
Contest Of Equals - no surprises here. A super easy surge that could’ve been scored for you by your opponent failing his attack action. It does involve some luck and it’s almost impossible to control when you’d score it, but it was everywhere - and for a good reason.
Everything To Prove - another super easy surge, that was being played virtually everywhere. It joins its sister - Surge of Aggression on the restricted list. This card is not only very reliable but also gives easy access to primacy for aggro warbands who also enjoy this card. It has been a decent replacement for Surge of Aggression as many offensive cards do provide access to the Quarry keyword.
Scant Resources - it’s amazing how rule changes turned an average card into hotness that was being included by everyone. If your dog played WHU he would’ve run with this card too. Gloom tokens made this card super easy to score making it almost a guaranteed 2 glory.
Underdog - yet another very low-effort objective and awarding 2 glory while at it. In meta where there’s a lot of brawling and damage is very easy to get this is a perfect card to have. The odds of scoring it are very high and what’s best is that you score it thanks to your opponent trying to gain an advantage over you. I’ve never enjoyed the design behind this card - you shouldn’t be awarded for being on the losing side.
Augmented Limbs - accuracy cards have a long history of receiving restrictions. This one is fairly limited because it helps only range 1 fighter. I’m not 100% sold on it deserve the hit. But on the other side, this might be an attempt to calm down the Thunderdome a bit and direct the game in directions other than the mid-board brawl. This card provides great value with +dice and Quarry, so I’m not going to argue against it getting hit too much.
Daylight Robbery - it’s simply a fix from the previous FAR mistake. TBH I would simply Forsake this crap if the call was mine ;)
Duel of Wits - now, when everyone is well aware of how powerful card draw is, restricting this card is making a lot of sense. It also feels like a move meant to lessen the impact on how reliable power card decks are - new mulligan rules already made it very solid. Extra card draw is even stronger now as it is making it much easier to get perfect combos early.
Partial Ressurection - the only thing I’m surprised about here is that this abomination wasn’t restricted in a previous FAR. It’s pretty much a mandatory card for any Death deck.
Punching Up - another expected and overdue addition to the list. This card provides an amazing value and helps turn smaller fighters into killers. Gaining both +dice and +damage from a single ploy is just too good to pass if you can play around its limitation. Low-wound fighters are pretty scary when this card is in play.
Savage Soldier - I’m not going to lie - this is one of my favorite accuracy upgrades. Its power level is through the roof. If you can stack enough upgrades you’re not only getting +dice but also Cleave and Ensnare. Such a fighter is truly a savage. What I like the most is that Cleave and Ensnare are not range limited, so this went well with turret Hrothgorn. This is probably one of the reasons why it got hit - old ogre abuses that card like a boss.
Scavenged Armour - this has always been a very solid card. The state current meta is in probably didn’t help it avoid getting restricted. Charging your fighter in to make some mess and upgrading him with this meant you get a solid defensive net for that fighter. That’s probably a little too good right now and so Armour landed on the restricted list.
Astromatrix Alignment - Delve rules made this card receive restriction. Flipping feature tokens is the easiest it has ever been, so there’s no surprise this card got restricted. Especially because it is a very easy surge that requires no engagement with enemy fighters. And this is something the development team is bent on limiting in this season.
Bitter Strength - an in-faction Great Strength. I think this is a good move - I’ve been saying for a while now that we’ve got access to too many damage enhancement cards. Last season we’ve seen an arms race between +damage and +wound cards. I think it’s a good thing to tone this down at last. Both of those card types were introducing problems to the game when stacked too much.
Bonded - Rippa has a very solid pool of faction cards and this is their second faction restriction after Cruel Hunters. It’s not a big surprise to see this card being hit along with other accuracy cards. This one is in addition a defensive option, so great value - not too surprising it got restricted.
Famed Hunter - another accuracy card targetted. Hrothgorn is a menace right now and him receiving his 3rd faction restriction only confirms how strong his kit is. It will hurt his reliability but to be fair he has enjoyed too much of it lately.
Infestation - a sudden spike in this card’s power level is a byproduct of the introduction of gloom tokens and delve mechanic. Suddenly Gitz became able to score 5 glory from holding a single objective. While easily counterable, this is a bit too good and has been putting too much pressure on gitz opponent for free. Personally, I would errata this card to require at least 3-4 objectives held.
Claim The City - same deal as Infestation.
Black Hunger - it’s a mix of + damage, offensive powerhouse, and quasi-accuracy card - all in one. I think it’s good this is getting restricted, I’ve seen this card wreak havoc many times.
Expendable - I’ve never suspected I’ll see the day when this card receives its well-earned spot on the FAR list. This is easily one of my most disliked cards in this game history, so I’m very happy to see it get restricted. It’s especially important now when most of the surges require a successful attack to work. This card would be a bit too effective at stopping them.
Cards Removed From FAR
Harness The Storm - an old staple and a long-overdue removal from a restricted list. It’s still a very strong card, but its power level dropped a lot with heaps of gambit ploys rotating out. CB can still score it without too much effort, but it’s fine for them to have that one reliable surge like most of the modern warbands do without restricting it. Especially when CB are not even close to what they were in their prime.
Toughened Hide - this one comes with a twist. It’s not a buff for Hrothgorn because this card received an errata. From now on it’s limited to Thrafnir. This makes it effectively dead. I don’t foresee anyone putting it in their championship decks ever again. This puts Hrothgorn at the front of the pack with 4 faction cards being nerfed in one way or another. No surprises there - his kit was incredible and damage reduction coupled with his wound pool and 2 shield defense was making his super difficult to kill. Removing this reduction from the equation is going to make balancing the game easier.
FAR general thoughts
This is a large update to the FAR list. Most of the cards that received restrictions are the cards that we all expected to see there. What is an interesting twist is to see a large number of accuracy cards being restricted while overabundant damage cards were mostly left untouched. I would love to see cards like Silent Sword or Giant Strength restricted. I also feel that leaving Berserker Rage unchecked is a mistake. This card’s drawback looks strong enough on paper, but this card is often applied to a torpedo-style fighter and that drawback is almost non-impactful there. And if that fighter survives to activate again in the next round you get even more value from that card. Another card I’m a bit torn about is Drawing Power. It is slow, requires setup, and hurts your fighter. But it gives a permanent +dice and +damage which is massive. When played on Mollog or Kainan it can impact the game massively. With current mulligan rules, there’s a very high probability of drawing it in the first round. Because it has high requirements to benefit from it I’m not certain I would restrict it, but for sure it is a card I would keep an eye on.
Designers Commentary and Errata
Inspiration Fixes - this is something everyone was waiting for. Inspiration is now fixed with two new steps being introduced - at the start and the end of the action phase. This solves the problems with warbands like The Farstriders, Soulraid, Chosen Axes, etc. In addition to that, it has been confirmed that warbands like Profiteers or Madmob inspire as the ability condition is met. Interestingly though Thorns and Wraithcreepers were left screwed a bit - they will still inspire at the end of their activation once their inspire condition was met.
I’m really glad the inspiration topic has been addressed and cleared. It has been one of the huge issues the game has had after Harrowdeep was released. The community has been doing a great job at managing this problem, but it is now officially addressed and I’m really glad this case is now closed.
Fighter Keywords - all the fighters from seasons 1-4 were updated with keywords! The game has gained 19 brawlers and 9 assassins overnight. We’ve also received quite a few hunters, minions, and a few priests and companions. Right now it’s difficult to tell how impactful this change will be, but I think it’s great that this has happened. This opens the doors for older warbands to interact with newer mechanics and I wish this has happened earlier. Playing Farstriders would’ve been so much more fun if they had an access to all the Beastgrave hunter tech… This big influx of fighters with different keywords will put brawler and assassin-related cards in a new light. We can also expect some Priest tech - it will be really interesting where this keyword takes those fighters who have it.
Deathbeat - a fix to the Deathbeat wording. Brings it back to original wording leaving in place the limitation that it only works on fighters in friendly territory. Nothing surprising here, but it’s good to have it clarified.
Illusions don’t count for inspiration requirements - this time it has been clarified for Rippa. This has most likely been intended for them from the start but was omitted in the previous errata when this change was announced for the Godsworn Hunt. It’s only fair this is consistent between all the warbands, so no big issues here.
Flipping token clarification it has been confirmed that “you” and “your warband” are the same while flipping a feature token. Effectively this confirmed that by delving you can score surges that require your warband to flip a feature token. This has been a source of confusion so it’s good this has been cleared.
More clarifications on resolving the cards - I think it’s important that there are more clarifications over the fact that you have to be able to resolve the card or ability effect to play the card/use the ability. This time around it has been stated that effects that affect “each fighter” need to be resolved for at least one fighter to be eligible to be used. This is fair. There’s also another clarification stating that Heal(0) cannot be played on a fighter with no wound counters. No shooting blanks in this game!
Contest of Equals clarification - this clarification feels a bit like stating the obvious, but if it puts some people at ease then by all means it’s good it’s here.
Closing Thoughts
Overall this is a very good set of changes and clarifications. The FAR list was needed and hardly contains items that are surprising or could be argued against. It could include a few more cards to make it even better. Errata and commentary are providing a solid set of clarifications.
Who are the winners and losers after this release? While it’s hard to point at clear winners, there’s one big loser - Hrothgorn. He’s been hit again and he’s now having 3 restricted cards and one effectively deleted upgrade. This coupled with restrictions made to accuracy cards makes him hurt a lot. I would expect him to drop in power level a lot.
It’s interesting to see more easy-to-score objectives taking the hit. While on one hand, this encourages a more interactive play style, I’m getting worried that this will continue to push the game in direction of constant brawling in the middle, and warbands that have some easy surges in their faction decks will be promoted a lot more.
Overall I’m really happy with this edition of the FAR update. It will be interesting to see how the new batch of cards will change the meta. It will be interesting because the card pool is very limited right now and 20 new restricted cards are not helping to build lists. Still - if you enjoy aggro it’s a good time to play the game now!
As always - I’m keen to hear from you, so if you would like to share your thoughts please drop a comment!
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