Fearsome Fortress
The new Fearsome Fortress Rivals deck has arrived! As always, thanks to GW for providing a review copy of this rivals deck and to our patrons for their generous support. To take a look at the concurrent Looncourt release, follow the link below:
First Impressions
[D]AVY & [P]HIL
There’s a clear mission statement on this deck: Hold the middle of the board. How doable that is? Well let’s take a look.
D: A plot card! Hoo boy. Continuing to limit the ability to mix universals in championship play. Will be interesting to see if there's a universals release not gated with Plot cards.
D: As to this one- as simple as it gets. I'm curious how the interaction will play out with Daring Delvers. This robs one of the starting available feature tokens, which will sting if you're working with cards like Temporary Haven. This definitely sets the table for the deck, though. Get into that middle zone!
P: Really starting to wonder if the plan is to push champ and nemesis closer together to eventually just have nemesis... Either way this plot is very simple and helps out a bunch of different warbands and hold strategies
D: A surge scoreable without dice is always welcome... but without tricks this isn't scoreable in R1, so you need to make sure your others can be. Weirdly, I think this is *better* in champs than leaning into the deck's theme, where you may end up on features in neutral or just over the line.
P: Some bands can really abuse this because of nifty push tricks or extra move shenanigans. Solid but not amazing for most bands.
D: I underestimated this until I played it. At worst, it's an ok 1 glory EP. At best, you're getting 4+ glory... as early as R1. This is going to put a lot of pressure on controlling those objectives near the middle for both warbands throughout the game.
P: Love this card. High ceiling for scoring with almost no chance of bricking. Very nice design I think.
D: Whoa! At its very worst, you can score this with two activations (move, then guard action), but if you have any push or move tricks or guard tricks, you can get this real easy. And without rolling dice!
D: And can be scored in the power step!
P: Something to reward going on guard! I love stuff like this as it starts to open new deck building avenues.
D: Tasty. You're going to be on those features. Plenty of opportunities to score this, and landing a surge in the opponent's turn is choice.
P: We have seen a bunch of flavors of this now and they always seem to be at least okay. I think this one is better than that too because you will be rewarded for your opponent trying to stop your plan.
D: Can get it with a ping, for what it's worth. Kill surges can get a little tricky, and might get replaced in championship or if you have something in Nemesis.
P: This is fine, but you have better options. Even among kill surges.
D: I suppose so, but this is a pretty big swathe of the board.
D: Not going to blow the doors off. But fine if you can risk your leader forward.
D: Actually, wait no. This is pretty bad. Very restrictive. Has to be a feature *and* in your territory *and* within one hex of no one's territory.
P: Maybe a big leader or ranged leader camping out on an objective but outside of that this looks mediocre
D: Even then, I think this is one of the first cuts if you’re constructing outside of Rivals.
From the crew that brought you a squigapult comes a wall that definitely for sure won’t just fall over.
D: You'll need power card help for this. You can get 2/3 of the way there with your plot card. But it does play into the playstyle. 1 glory EP isn't anything to get excited about, but you *can* score it even with heavy casualties or if you get pushed off your spot.
P: I like that they are trying to do something new and different. I think this could be okay if you build around it. I hope they keep doing stuff like this to spice up the game!
Saek building the only way Saek knows how.
D: If the plunder reaction worked for non-objective feature tokens this would be a little easier. As it is, you need some power card help *and* a kill. And the timing has to be right on the power card, because if you've already placed all available once you've played this you've got problems (though there's some power card help in the deck even in that situation).
P: Another kill surge that gives you more hoops to jump through than many others. I guess it is fine in rivals but otherwise I think you skip this.
D: I mean… it’s not exactly a kill surge. You can bank the kill earlier. But you’re still pretty restricted by the need for power card help to place a token.
D: Kind of tough, but not terrible in Rivals or Nemesis, especially in R1.
P: Denial you can score in any round. Probably fine but not great. Especially the way the meta is right now...
D: I really like caring about numbers on tokens. Feels like a fun mechanic. Definitely easier for some warbands, and this will work against anyone trying to run beasts with this deck.
P: This seems solid to me. If you have objectives 4 or 5 this becomes a hold 2 most likely which is usually pretty good
Of course Grymwatch makes their walls out of dead bodies. I mean… gleaming marble!
D: Kind of tricky, but if you're willing to set this up in later rounds by delving problematic tokens in R1, you could have a nice diceless surge.
P: You can make this happen with set up if you want, but most of the time I think this will be a hold 2 or 3 surge for 1. Not bad but you might have easier options.
D: Two glory EP is worth watching. You can score this away from no one's territory, but you're unlikely to do so, since the available tokens are probably in the middle.
P: Get walled up in the middle and this feels doable. I like the concept and I think this giving 2 glory probably leaves room for champs play.
Very meme-able art here.
D: Another ping?! In this economy?! This feels pretty reasonable though. Positioning dependent and will only trigger if you didn't get driven away.
P: I think this is how pings should be designed. Useful, but situational. You probably don't always take this but it could be quite nice when you are set up for it.
D: Errr, if you have the option of taking sidestep, that's probably just better, although this going at reaction speed can help with surge scoring, like To the Walls.
P: What a weird push. I get why they worded it the way they did but talk about clunky. There are so many pushes you could take before this. Rivals only I think. Maybe nemesis.
D: Sets up a nice counterpunch situation for you to defend your feature wall. There's a card coming up that really wants the other side to be staggered too...
P: I like this design. Make your opponent think twice about charging your position, especially early.
D: Not great, Bob! I think the designers are going to be (rightly) very conservative with healing after some of the excesses of Beastgrave/Direchasm.
P: This is so tame it probably is too hard to actually use. Maybe if you have a big fighters to keep alive but even then...
D: I really appreciate the flexibility of this card. Set yourself up with some re-rolls or mess with positioning. Distraction effects are especially rare these days. Nice one.
P: Bit of set up required but the payoff is worth it I think. A very lite distraction or a accuracy buff for possibly more than one attack feels solid to me.
D: Here it is! This is why you want to get the enemy staggered. I like that it makes things a little harder for Tooth & Claw that might be voluntarily staggering, especially with late-in-the-round charges.
P: Ooo boy! Set someone up and then get em on the crack back. Nice thing with this is any friendly fighter can make the attack so ranged fighters get a bit more mileage.
D: Usually not a huge fan, but you are going to get on to plenty of features, and you *are* going to want to stay there. Helps with Impregnable Defences too.
P: Nice defense boost but perhaps too short lived to really save you. I guess there will be times where you just need to hold one one more activation though.
D: Weird one. Great early, not as great late... when you might no longer be on stuff in your own territory. But good for warbands running this that will have a second wave of attackers. Or for boosting a backline fighter to a relevant spot.
P: There will almost certainly be some galaxy brain plays with a push 4, but it isn't always going to have play I don't think. Bands that want it will know and everyone else probably leaves it at home.
D: Similar to Redeploy! This one is super good early, and in another Championship environment, this feels amazing, especially for hold warbands. Push 2 fighers is always worthy of consideration.
P: Lots of restrictions, but pushing two fighters is often more than enough to make a push card great.
D: Good if there's still feature tokens available. Helps set things up offensively... or use it late in a round and you can snare your own fighter safely. Worth a glory with Conquered Domain. Won't be able to delve it into cover right away, though- because it will stagger anyone it lands on.
P: If you need to place a feature token you likely want this. Otherwise, you could potentially use it as a free stagger but I'm not sure that is a good use of this card?
D: The reaction's the especially important part. Provides more positioning flexibility and helps to steal a token if you can push an enemy fighter or kill them. Notice that reaction is after *any* friendly fighter!
P: Hex movement shenanigans are always surprisingly good. The timing on this reaction just makes it even better since you can set up lots of different ways to take advantage of this.
D: This is potentially a *huge* radius, though I think you should mostly plan on it hitting one enemy.
P: A decent defensive play. Probably works best if you are actively playing feature tokens and making it hard to avoid them.
D: Only for 3 wound fighters and below. It's a bit of a weird fit in this deck- because that extra wound gets turned off if you get driven back into your territory, and you're likely to be close if you're running this as Rivals or Nemesis. I like it a little more in champs. Maybe a lot more in champs.
P: There are plenty of fighters that would use this I think. Aggro weenies being faster and tougher is certainly nothing to be overlooked. Watch out for knockback though!
D: Pretty decent weapon, even without the reaction. Grievous doesn't trigger all that much with only two dice, but this as as close as it gets to a damage boost in this deck. The reaction is super situational, but just placing a feature helps with Raw Materials, and may help with Stockpile.
P: Probably best in rivals/nemesis. This weapon is fine but we have some outstanding choices in champs at the moment.
D: This is actually just about as accurate as a four fury attack (see: Cursed Weapons) when targeting a fighter on block, and better if they have more than one block dice.
D: Shadeborn, what's up?! It's only one upgrade, but it can turn on some of that Nethermaze/Harrowdeep tech that fell into disrepair.
P: I think this could essentially be thought of as letting this fighter provide support from two hexes away. There are obviously more tricks you could pull with making objectives cover but I'm not sure you build around this?
D: Yeah, you can’t really build around a single upgrade but if you have other reasons to care about or create/manipulate cover…
Hungering Skaven made me think this was Rabid Defender at first glance.
D: That art... I think this is great, especially if you've got a big bruiser who wants to put in a lot of work. Can be a bit of a headache for attackers.
P: Mollog likely loves this (D: vomit emoji). Or a number of other ranged fighters that need to play defense in their territory.
D: Really flexible for placement. No range restriction. Ghosts like the idea of this one... a lot, I think.
D: Can even use this to counteract the effects of a delve very easily.
P: Like this one a lot. I'm not sure how much more support for a guard/defensive build we will get but I'm here for it. So many two defense characteristic fighters that would love to get put on guard almost at will
D: Love these. Not quite as good at the anchor, but very powerful.
P: Not being able to be pushed can really mess up an opponent. Don't underestimate this, a fighter that gets this on a objective they need to hold can be a real problem.
D: Here's a way to stay involved even with the positioning requirements for this deck.
P: These range 4 weapon upgrades recently are very solid support pieces. This is downright scary in certain warbands because this can set up future accuracy with the long range stagger.
D: So... this card is a blank upgrade outside this rivals deck, but can help pull in a few of those trickier objectives and trigger some of your power cards too. A good inclusion for keeping this deck cohesive in Rivals and Nemesis.
D: What a weird one. Probably busted if it worked everywhere but as is it may not see much play outside of rivals. A very powerful effect though so maybe someone will find a build that can leverage this
Summary
D: I think we here at WTH Incorporated really like this one as a whole. It feels more cohesive and focused than Tooth and Claw and potentially more functional than Daring Delvers. Holding objectives makes for some interesting options beyond "Smash!”, but having to do so in the midfield ensures conflict. We tried this with Da Kunnin Krew and Xandire’s Truthseekers, but I might also like to see it with the Looncourt! The continued “siloing” of cards for championship play is a little concerning, but appears to be “as intended”. We’re excited to see the Nemesis format mature with more solid Universal Rivals decks.