Thorns of the Briar Queen
Welcome to our rundown of new Thorns of the Briar Queen! We’ll be celebrating this giant release of new Underworlds content with a whole week of content! That’s right, you’ll be getting a podcast episode every day for six days until we’ve covered it all! And to kick it all off, below are links to each of our card-by-card rundowns for your perusing pleasure.
Thanks go to GW for providing a review copy to make this content possible.
Introduction
[D]AVY & [P]HIL
P: The Thorns of the Briar Queen used to be a true terror of the underworlds. With time though, they have faded out of favor. With a refresh, let's see if they will retake their place of power!
Historical Intrigue
If you’d like to reference their previous cards, here’s an Underworlds DB link pre-loaded with all their cards. Click the [Fighter cards] button above the deck list to gain quick access to those as well.
Uninspired
D: Ah, the queen returns. Uninspired, she's as she was before, but Wave of Terror shows up... and it's on all the fighters. Watch for the new design aesthetic that gives more options for handing out charge tokens. Helping your warband get charged out, or setting up Wave of Terror. Or both.
Inspired
D: No longer jumping to three damage is a bit of a bummer, but she can threaten it at least. Still a scary enough beater.
Uninspired
D: Varclav is a wuh wuh wizard?! Limits the ability to salvage any spells you might have been planning to cast with the Briar Queen, but I suppose it gives a back-up. That solemn march is a big change- just two fighters, but in any direction, repeatable, and with optional charge tokens. I like it!
Inspired
D: Extra defensive die is a good enough motivation to get inspired. +1 move. No getting to three damage with 'Clav any more though.
Uninspired
D: Check it out, the boss Chainrasp. He got a little less accurate uninspired, but the throttle will help others. Can... that reaction be used after every one of your activations?
Inspired
D: There's the attack profile that made him do work! Two smash and cleave in this block heavy environment is tasty.
Uninspired
D: Yay! They got names! Note that these next four fighters are minions *and* chainrasps, and that distinction is important on several cards.
Inspired
D: There's that ghost inspire we know and love- extra defense and move. The axe wielding rasps go to two fury, two damage. If there's staggers out there, it isn't terrible...
Uninspired
D: Always the Chairman of the Board in our hearts.
Inspired
D: I remember the top level of Thorns play getting multiple inspires set up in the power step to really capitalize on the extra defense.
Uninspired
D: The Silenced has a whammy club that goes to...
Inspired
D: ...three fury, knockback 1 and stagger.
Uninspired
D: Totally Headless Nick. Or the Uncrowned.
Inspired
D: Even holding his head in one hand, he gets cleave with the other.
Objectives
P: In an interesting decision, it seems they kept the art the same on a lot of cards but changed their name and how they score. I think people who are very familiar with thorns will potentially get tripped up by this.
P: This is the same art as swarming spirits and although they are both about moving through enemy fighters this change is considerably faster and very similar to a surge in Mournflight. This should be a staple card and pretty easy to score.
D: Love this one. No dice necessary. Other than surviving after the fact. And of course, it can be the move portion of a charge, or... barge.
P: This was a pre-existing card from the power unbound card expansion. The inspiration condition is the same with more modernized wording. Conveniently, they added this hybrid condition in case you cannot get inspired, either because all your fighters are already inspired or because your opponent is being cagey. Overall a decent surge though it puts the chainrasps in danger.
D: Back half might be a lot of work, but they have a lot of positioning tricks. With the right gambit support, Deathly Clutches is a huge get too.
P: This is the same art as death sentence but so much better. Having a single fighter adjacent while holding two, albeit with different fighters, should be almost incidental with thorns.
D: Does this mean that the fighters on objectives that are scoring this *can't* be adjacent to an enemy fighter? Seems like it?
P: Same art as As Nagash Commands, but again it is better. Depending on the matchup you will probably prefer one condition over the other. I think most often you will want to work towards the second, which would normally be hard with seven fighters but your power cards and Varclavs action will make it easier. The first is probably only realistic if you are facing an elite war and or near the end of the game.
D: With printed actions, you can only get six fighters with move or charge tokens while at full strength and it'll constrict your choice of actions, but I think this is an include. No dice, positioning 2 glory end phase? I can work with that.
P: A brand new card with brand new art, but personally not one I'm super excited about. This is pretty close to Annihilation but only worth two glory. Pair that with a warband with a pretty low average damage and this seems like it will be tough.
D: Let the record show that this art is not new- it's from Power Unbound's Freezing Fear gambit. Always gotta be a little suspicious of end phases that are asking you to keep an enemy alive. For two glory, getting the enemy down to one fighter is a pretty tall order.
P: Using the same art as The Vengeful Dead reclaimed turf is an odd card in my opinion. Essentially Supremacy but harder for less glory? I thought we had stopped doing this. This is quite a difficult score which is a shame. With power card support it isn't impossible but it just feels like hold three with extra conditions should never be for less than three glory.
D: I have to assume that they found the positional power card tricks in this warband made this easier than you'd think at first glance. Champs players gotta grab Supremacy first, though.
P: Using the same art as Drag Them Down, Scores To Settle is actually pretty close. By reducing the number of successful attacks needed by making it require minions I think the first condition is pretty comparable and not very easy, though for two glory it probably shouldn't be. The new alternative condition is, I think, pretty interesting with the ability to teleport some of your ghosts now. Holding all in enemy territory is risky, but sometimes in setup you can have this be hold one objective and that makes this pretty enticing to me.
D: I think the other interesting thing about this is that whether or not this is in your deck, the opponent has to play to respect this. And you don't have to wait for after an opponent's activation to land it either. The two halves of this are very different which makes it feel pretty adaptable.
P: Using the same art as Execution, Sorcerous Syndicate changes from a leader assassination end phase, which we always tough, to a kill surge where your wizards need to do the killing. This seems fine to me since the Briar Queen and Varclav are your best fighters anyway. I believe gambits cast by a wizard count the damage as coming from the wizard so you could score this in the power step as well.
D: Not the worst kill surge, but with only two fighters who can land it, I'm a little nervous. Of course, Force of Frost could get you an extra wizard...
P: This card is effectively unchanged. Score one for holding all objectives in a territory. The only difference is that you couldn't previously score this for holding no one's territory which I think makes this better. It's odd that it is a hybrid though because most of the time there is just remind text to say to hold all you need at least one.
D: This is... fine. I think if they had the traditional 2 glory for this sort of objective they'd really nail it. Probably sneaks into a fair number of decks.
P: A pretty big departure from Vengeful Advance where this art was taken. Holding one odd and one even is not a big ask, but maybe it is for one glory. Having the alternate condition for getting a kill of a fighter on an objective is pretty nice because sometimes your opponent will just body block you and all you can do is chop at them.
D: One glory end phases aren't going to set my hair on fire, *but* this is just going to kind of happen for you in the course of getting your bigger stuff.
P: Oh how the mighty have fallen. Throatcutters is using the same art as Treacherous Foe but is a far cry from that card. A kill surge that requires an opponent to be either inspired or standing on a starting hex is not really what I want for this warband. It isn't an awful kill surge but I can just imagine a bunch of scenarios where you have no valid targets to trigger this.
D: Not a fan. This can randomly just get kinda jammed up in your hand, I think.
P: New card, new art, same old Dominant Position. I love this end phase and think it will be used in just about every Thorns deck.
D: Auto-include! At least someone gets Dominant Position back!
Gambits
P: The pattern of using old art continues! Wow what a gambit. A guaranteed way to get support but more importantly a cheeky repositioning. I imagine the limits of how useful this are are only your imagination.
D: Wow wow wow. Love it. If your opponent is carless and standing next to an objective you can snag some sneaky hold objective scores with this reaction.
P: This used to be rending scream but is very different now. Slightly easier to cast but instead of a ping to all adjacent enemies bonus dice. I think the real draw to this is also giving that minus defense. Overall though I don't love this one.
D: Should be able to get through some defenses with this. Assuming Wave of Terror is set up, you're +1 dice, fully supported, -1 defense. Might not be on brand enough for the game plan, so maybe gets cut?
P: Just cleaned up wording on this one for the modern rules. A nice solid accuracy boost.
D: Feels like a death warband staple. Even if you're not planning on a lot of aggro, this is still real solid.
P: Again just a wording clean up. I don't love this one, especially now that they have the terrifying presence rule.
P: Erm waves of terror. I like mine better...
D: Yeah, this seems like kind of low impact, and that's even if you didn't have Wave of Terror.
P: Wording updated. Still a decent option.
D: A warband often on two dodge and that doesn't want to get shifted off objectives has gotta like this.
P: Same card as before plus stagger. Still don't this quite does enough to make the cut.
D: No range restrictions, so if you're working on a build that is leveraging weapons, then maybe? But this is probably a cut when you're deckbuilding.
P: This was the art for vengeful curse but I like this a lot better! A spell to teleport a chainrasps anywhere? And if you end up adjacent they don't even get a token for doing it? Wild.
D: YES! Love it! A little weird that this *doesn't* set up Wave of Terror. Unless, of course, you're teleporting someone who already has a charge token.
P: This was drifting advance and where you used to get more pushes in exchange you get more flexibility. I like the stagger and not having any direction restriction on the push is pretty handy.
D: A double push with an option to leverage if you're already in close? Not restricted to chainrasps. Straight into the deck, you go.
P: Don't get me wrong, this is a pretty darn good spell, but this used to be howling vortex which was one of the best spells ever so a pretty substantial downgrade.
D: If this was on channel it would be white hot. Still great as it is. Your choice of ping or push, two of the best effects you can get.
P: A slight downgrade from sudden appearance but a solid teleport is a very good card to have available to you.
D: In no one's territory is a bit of a bummer, but you can easily set up an inspire, and then rush deeper into enemy territory if you need.
Upgrades
P: A very different card from face of death. I think there is some solid control potential with this but I'm not completely sure how best to use it.
D: Wow! I think of this as a great one to hold late in the round. Prevent the enemy from charging out. Get their souped up counter punch to lag out. Really powerful, especially at range 4.
P: Basically the same card as before but no longer restricted. Still don't love it.
D: Booo. I almost never have space for cards that just give ensnare and nothing else.
P: Slightly changed from the old printing to specifically get bonus dice whenever you have a charge token rather than when you charge. I liked the old card but this is even a bit better.
D: In the event that you get this warband charged out, you can leverage this more than once. Also, it plays nicely with Endless Malice.
P: For a warband that likes to hold objectives this is pretty good. The bubble is not huge but it's enough to keep at least one chainrasp in range pretty easily.
D: Daaaaamn. I think it should be pretty easy to get this to cover two objective holders. Works on the bearer as well. This can go on either of the wizards or the Everhanged.
P: No changes here, decent but won't always make the cut I don't think.
D: Kiiiinda hard to see this being impactful on a regular basis. Gated behind a successful attack action means it's not super reliable to trigger either.
P: Big change from inescapable vengeance. This is a nice accuracy debuf but with so many ranged fighters these days it will be harder to trigger.
D: I'm a fan. This is gameplan material. Make it hard for the enemy to farm your little guys and you're headed in the right direction.
P: Oh I like this! Keep someone like Varclav in the middle of your band and get rerolls for all the chainrasps defense rolls. Very annoying on two dodge fighters.
D: Hot damn! That's a big bubble too!
P: Very slight change to restrict this to one or two range. It's a solid effect but I'm not sure how many kills you want to be using Varclav for.
D: Now that he can't inspire to three damage, he's less likely to be batting clean-up. Powerful effect, but I think you can usually do better.
P: Same name as the old card but nothing at all like how it worked. Any chainrasp being able to have this and having it keep moving between them is pretty neat. The attack isn't amazing but is definitely still an upgrade over their base attacks.
D: Whoa! I really like this Re-form reaction. Range 2 is pretty nice so you can pull double duty by charging on to objectives and still be able to get some work in.
P: I like this a lot better than creeping terror. The flexibility to get extra pushes or a one off out of sequence attack is, I think , quite a value effect.
D: Really great. Extra positioning tech, or a clutch attack action. Varclav can do some really tricky stuff with this, like Solemn Marching two fighters and giving one a boost, or nudging a third, or even setting up a Wave of Terror and an immediate attack from one of those 'rasps.
Summary
P: By Nagash I think they might be back with a vengeance. Personally, I'll have the ghost busters on speed dial for a bit as people start picking up these spooky specters again!
Week of Warhammer Underworlds
Thorns of the Briar Queen will return to your ears… Monday, March 18th.