With a new Warlord being added to each faction soon, I thought it might be useful to run through tactics and tips for the Warlord special rules. But before we get into details, let’s make sure everyone understands what I’m going on about.

 

Terms

Each Warlord has a special rule, which unlike their trait doesn’t have to be unlocked – they have it from the start and it doesn’t get any more powerful as the Warlord is upgraded.

Example of what you see on a Warlord’s special rule tab (from inside your card collection).

You can see a Warlord’s special rule by tapping the special rule tab on their card upgrade screen, or by tapping the icon on the Warlord’s portrait during a battle.

Some Warlord special rules are ‘passive’ and others ‘active’.

  • Passive rules are always in effect – it doesn’t matter if the Warlord is on the battlefield or still in your deck / hand. For example, Ghosar’s special rule increases your Tyranid cards’ melee attack every round of the battle, whether he’s on the battlefield or not.
  • Active special rules only trigger when the Warlord is deployed to the battlefield, meaning they’re more risky (as your Warlord can therefore be killed), but are more powerful to compensate. For example, Gloguthrox the Foul’s special rule increases the Wounds of your Chaos cards every time he makes an attack.

All special rules have a restriction on which faction they work with, either only boosting one particular faction, or only triggering when cards from one faction do the relevant ‘thing’.

This means that taking allies in your deck reduces the special rule’s effectiveness – because you have fewer cards from that faction – but can of course pay off with increased flexibility or new tactics.

Finally, your Warlord’s special rule only helps cards on your side, even if you’re battling against the same faction.

 

Families

Now that we’ve covered all that, the rest of these posts will cover the special rule ‘families’. What I mean is that all of the Warlord special rules in a faction work in the same way, meaning we can cover the whole family together, then highlight the small differences per Warlord.

Just one faction to get us started this week:

 

T’au

Where other warriors may use savagery or weight of numbers to win battles, the T’au fight using disciplined, carefully designed, strategic plans. Their mastery of tactics means they can bring sudden reserves into battle just as their enemy think victory is in their grasp.

T’au Warlord special rules are unique, because they only trigger a single time per battle – which is when you deploy the final card from your deck to the battlefield. This will often be when you deploy your Warlord, but bear in mind it doesn’t have to be.

As you only get a single use of the special rule, it makes sense for the benefit to be much larger than the other faction’s rules. For example, Commander Shadowsun’s special rule heals all your currently deployed T’au cards to full Wounds, and increases their ranged attack stat.

With some cunning deck building this can be devastating. Deploying high-Wound, high-ranged cards towards the end of the battle means they get healed (negating all the enemy’s previous work) and boosted by your final card, putting you in a very strong position for the final attacks.

You can increase this advantage if you’ve been using melee attacks (or psychic if you have allies in your deck) beforehand, letting you build up a ranged attack boost before your big cards arrive.

The trick is ensuring the rest of your deck is strong enough that you get to deploy your final wave when you want. If the enemy wipes out your other cards too quickly, you’ll have to deploy your big hitters early (meaning they may be killed before you get to heal and boost them).

Personally, I like the Drone cards for my initial wave – their combination of cheap points cost and high Wounds make them great for tying up dangerous enemies. You can find more tactical advice for the T’au in their faction drill down, here.

 

Next

I hope this post provided some ideas for new tactics or at least clarified how special rules work. Future entries will cover a couple of factions at a time, before a final post discussing how we add new Warlords to the game.

If you have any questions or feedback you can get in touch via [email protected] or through the Combat Cards Facebook page.

Thanks,
Stu