FAQ

All questions that were asked by playtesters of the prototype are incorporated in the rulebook under ‘notes'. If you ever have any questions about the rules of the game, please send them to info@dotwoodgames.com. I will answer your question and place the question and corresponding answer here (anonymously).

General

Can you take free actions before and after taking an action that requires energy?

Yes.

Can you take free actions before you pass on the same turn?

Yes.

Surround makes it easier to defeat an enemy, but is it possible to defeat an enemy without paying any energy? If my Knight attacks a Fire Bringer it would normally cost 2 energy. But in this case I have two other knights adjacent to this Fire Bringer, giving me a surround of -2. Do I defeat this Fire Bringer for free?

Yes, if you sufficiently surround an enemy, you can kill it for free.

Do abilities and surround stack? If Angel is adjacent to a Knight which is attacked, does this Knight take 7 energy to defeat (1 base + 5 extra for the Divine Shield and 1 extra energy for 'surround') or 6 energy (1 base + 5 for the Divine Shield).

Yes, every defend and surround gets added to the unit's base power.

Are we meant to be placing rocks from the 1st round even if there are no units to defeat? I have checked rules but I'm not sure if it means you only don't place a rock if there's a non-defeatable unit or also if there's no unit at all?

You always place the rocks after each round.

Some abilities allow free movement on the "shortest possible path". What if a tile on the "shortest possible path" is influenced by taunt or a fire or fog tile? Does the "shortest possible path" go right through these tiles and the unit has to stop there or does the unit walk round such tiles?

If taunt, a fire tile or a fog tile is on the path, this is not considered a possible path (unless the unit is somehow immune to the effect).

during the volcano the fire elementals shoot in a straight line, but we couldn't find if it could pass inpassable tiles, we assumed it could.

Assumption correct.

Not quite sure if we were using powers correctly. Powers become available when you meet the power threshold. Once available you can activate the first slot. But what about the other slots? Do they become available when the corresponding powercard has become available? The 'round' abilities can be used each round right? Given the round powers of the Humans isn't this basically a permanent effect? Don't see any reason not to use the power each turn.

You are correct in that you can only activate the first slot when you first uncover the Power card. You unlock the next slot when you reveal the Power card with that number. The round abilities however, only last for the round that you activate them. You still mark off usage of the slot and will have to wait until you reach the 20 Power card before you can use it again.

Humans

during the Knights activating shrine step, can one unit count towards multiple shrine activations if it is standing between 2 inactive shrines?

Yes

If you can move through an enemy token, can you move through a knight or are you blocked by taunting? Assuming the taunt prevents it.

Correct. Taunt lets your unit stop moving as soon as it reaches a tile adjacent to the Knight.

Do the abilities Barrier (Cleric) and Divine Shield (Angel) increase the cost of the abilities Breathe Fire (Red Dragon Wyrmling) and Death's Presence (Death)?

Can you combine Angel's Fly and Protective Wings abilities?

Yes

Protecting Wings ability: Do the carried units have to stay in "formation" during movement and at the destination tiles or can they just take any path over accessible tiles and end their movement on any tiles adjacent to the Angel?

The carried units ignore the rules for movement. As long as there are 2 accessible tiles next to where the Angel decides to go, you can move 2 units with Angel. So you can also position them any way you like.

To summon an Angel (as the Human) I need 4 Light Bringers adjacent to an activated shrine. If I move my Angel the turn after summoning it without taking any friendly units with me, do I summon another Angel immediately? This way you've basically created an 'Angel-factory' (until the Goblin defeat one of the Light Bringers). Or can the other Angels only come into play when you use Ascent?

The extra Angels can only be spawned by using your level 20 Power.

Goblins

Funny one this but can a knight taunt a goblin down a tunnel? Meaning: if tunnels count as adjacent and a knight is on a tunnel, does he stop all goblin units on tunnels from moving? I am assuming the answer is no but want to check.

The tunnels are only adjacent for Goblin units and only when moving. So your assumption is correct.

What happens when a commander enters a tile with a flame token?

The flame token is removed. Nothing else.

Are the goblin fighters allowed to move through enemy tiles with their slippery ability? Or are enemy tokens no more inaccessible than e.g. rocks?

Yes. They can move through any tile you could normally not move through. Tiles with rock tokens, tiles containing enemy units, Elemental tiles and the Firelord tile all count as inaccessible tiles for normal movement rules.

Can Sorcerer shoot Fireball on himself for 0 energy, using the Eternal Flames power and surrounding himself with flame tokens, then walk into the flame to activate a fire beacon on the same turn?

Yes

Fireball & Lasting Flames. Can I use this ability and power to light up the area even when there aren't any units in the area? Basically when playing the 2p setup on page 7 of the rulebook I wanted to shoot a fireball at the tunnel at the topleft of the gameboard with range 1 so I would hit al the tiles adjacent to the tunnel. Using Lasting Flames I wanted to place fire tokens on the two adjacent shrine tiles (using the tunnels I could send Fighters to the shrines which would be defeated by the fire tokens and activate the shrines). But there weren't any units on any of the tiles. Is this a legal move?

Yes, that is a legal move. In this case, you would only pay for the Fireball's range and pay 0 for its power. The Lasting Flames can be used on any Fireball, regardless of power.

The red dragon wyrmlings breathe fire ability felt way overtuned, if we understand correctly you can cast this as many times as you want? Since you get rage for killing something you basically kill anything that gets close for "free" (okay you need to spend 1 natural energy but by killing something you get a rage and a faction energy). When we figured this out we desperately tried to find something in the rules that prohibits the breathe fire ability to just be cast every turn, but no luck. In the end we decided that the ability could only be played once a round. The question therefor is: was this assumption correct?

There is no limit to the use of the breathe fire ability. Burn them all I'd say!

talking about the red dragon wyrmling, it can only be defeated when surrounded, the rules say that you need 3 units but not adjacent. The way we read this is that none of the 3 units could be adjacent, but this posed a problem when the wyrmling stood on the last rune the undead player needed to activate. With no way to force move the wyrmling away the only option was to kill it, but the inaccessible tiles created by the fire and earth element were arranged in such a way that it was in fact impossible to surround the wyrmling with 3 units without being adjacent. This is because the tile around the rune and the wyrmling were arranged (around the clock) like this: inaccessible - free - free - inaccessible - free - free. This let us to make another assumption: if 2 of the 3 units surrounding the wyrmling are adjacent that's fine, just not all 3. Is this assumption correct? Because if it isn't the undead player can be locked out of the game just like that. But even if only 2 units need to not be adjacent the wyrmling could be invincible in one of the corners of the map.

Your assumption is correct. This is not clear from the inteligent ability. Sorry for that. I'll take it with me for the second printing.

the lv 20 power from the goblins let you fire in 2 straight lines, the art makes it look like they should originate from the red dragon wyrmling but that is not actually mentioned. So can the goblin player really choose any 2 lines on the board or should they originate from the dragon?

The goblin player can choose any 2 straight lines.

Undead

if multiple units and a necromancer are killed at the same time, does the necromancer ability still trigger?

If things happen simultaneously, the active player decides in which order things happen. So if the Necromancer is the active player, he will most likely choose his Necromancer to be defeated last, so he will summon the Warriors. Another player will most likely decide that the Necromancer is defeated first, in which case he will not summon Warriors.

the undead lv 20 power states to summon as much as you want, but we found it unclear whether this can bypass normal summoning rules or not. Or maybe a hydrid of the 2 where you can summon bone warriors on boneyards.

You can place all Undead units from your reserve on any accessible tiles. So you ignore normal summoning rules.

Chaos

When Chaos takes over your unit. Is it considered defeated?

If a chaos controlled goblin token gets defeated, does it count as a defeated goblin?

Yes. However, the Goblin player does not receive faction energy for it, because it is no longer one of his units.

If Chaos scores controlled units points, is the unit considered defeated?

Primals

Is a non-commander Primal unit on a jungle tile immune to the Taunt ability of the Knight?

Yes

Can Rex use his Roar ability while adjacent to a Knight?

No. The Roar ability does not defeat the Knight.

Can a Primal unit move away from a Knight if a Rex uses his roar ability?

Yes. The unit next to the Knight does not take an action.

Can Ultimatosaur hide in the jungle if only one tile he occupies is in the jungle?

No. The effect of the jungle tile only applies to Ultimatosaur if all 3 of his hexes are in the jungle.