5 Best Thief Skills

Here we go with my list of the five best thief skills for Spellfire: The Antigonish Variant.      

#5 - Use Poison (Night Stalkers, 63/100) 

Pure, instant-kill cheese! I always enjoy making my opponent "draw and discard a card". It could be their Menzoberranzan or their Good Fortune. Even better, with Use Poison if the last digit of said card is a 3, 2, 1, or 0, their champion is instantly defeated (and in TAV a realm is razed). Lastly, the poison sticks around if not successful the first time, allowing you to use it again next battle - if your champion manages to survive despite the failure of the poison. This is a great thief skill, that even gives you a +3 level-up just in case. The fact that it is only #5 on this list is sort of surprising, until you read the four cards below.

#4 - Broad Jump (Dungeons, 85/100)

Even better than a chance to kill an enemy champion in combat and raze a realm, here's a card that offers to let you skip that pesky "combat" thing. Just toss down this baby after defender has been chosen, and if it's a wizard, cleric, or psionicist, you slip around him and instantly raze a realm, earning yourself a juicy spoils in the process, while your opponent's defender stands around, wondering where that sneaky thief went. This card also gives you a +4 level up, but if you are using this against anything but a wizard, cleric, or psionicist, things probably aren't going very well for you.

#3 - Hijacking (Dungeons, 86/100)

Because it's so difficult to counter thief skills, cards like this one are uber-powerful. Let's say your opponent tosses out a Cold Cup of Calamity or a Good Fortune. Not only do you get the cards as well, but your opponent has to immediately discard his. Talk about card advantage! You simultaneously grant yourself a fat hand, while stripping up to five valuable cards from your enemy's deck and putting them straight into his discard pile. Even better, use Hijacking on a Treasure Fleet. All players draw three? Yup, except you get six, and the guy who played the Treasure Fleet gets none, after his three are discarded. Bam.

#2 - Framed (Conquest, 16/81)

Here come the sticker-set cards! Continuing the theme that these sets contain some truly primo cards is Framed. I'm choosing to go with the Brazilian version of the art since it's not stupid. Anyway, framed is a must in any deck containing thieves. As soon as any of your champions is targeted - by anything - this baby lets you redirect the spell, psionic power, blood ability, or whatever to any champion you want, regardless of immunities. For example, let's say one of your enemies tries to Ancient Curse your Bigby, who has the Star Gem of Martek: Clear Crystal attached. But you happen to have Julio, Master Thief, in your pool. Julio casts Framed, and the Ancient Curse is retargeted to your opponent's Gib Irod, who has The Throne of the Gods attached. But wait! Isn't Gib Irod immune to events? Not this event. She dies horribly, as your opponent chokes on his own bile.

Framed is truly primo, but it's only #2 on this list.

#1 - Assassination (Conquest, 14/81)

With Assassination, you don't have to wait for your opponent to target one of your champions. During phase 3, take a long look at your opponent's pool and pick the champion you'd least like to battle. Let's say a big, honking Gib Lhadsemlo. But he's immune to thief skills, right? Not this one. He goes off to the discard pile, and you attack with confidence knowing that big oaf isn't going to be available to your opponent. For pure champion removal, you can't beat this card. Plus there's what, two cards in the entire game that can cancel it? Primo. The small (very small) downside is that you have to discard the thief casting it. How will I ever get by without my Phostrek or Jamlin? :)

There's your best thief skill of all time.

Next time: The top 5 unarmed combat cards!                   

Dangerous Realms

Let's take a look at a few of the more perilous realms in Spellfire.

Raurin (4th Edition, 11/500)

Attack it and you die, one way or another. At least if you win the battle, you get a spoils. Hopefully it's a champion to replace the one who just croaked. On second thought, anyone got a Cataclysm?

The Forest Ridge (Artifacts, 95/100)

Same thing here, except this time the card is explicit as to why your champion dies. Apparently feral halflings eat him. Pity they wait until after the realm is razed. If they ate the attacking champion before he successfully razed the realm and gained a spoils, they'd actually be useful. Oh well, the Forest Ridge is an excellent land, in any case. Anyone got a Disintegrate?

Falkovnia (Night Stalkers, 5/100)

This realm is far better in Standard than it is in the Antigonish variant. In a Standard game you can have many champions attacking Falkovnia during one turn, all of which would die. In TAV it's going to be one champion most of the time. But this land is still just as good as the two above. No feral halflings this time; it's poison that does in your victorious champion. Nice reward for winning a battle - an agonizing death due to poison. Anyone got an Estate Transference?

The Spiderfell (Birthright, 3/100)

Okay, now we're giving the attacker a sporting chance. He's not going to instantly croak, instead a card is drawn and discarded. If the last digit of the card number is equal to or greater than the champion's base level, he's toast. And it's poison again! This time presumably delivered via giant spider. One more salient point: this all happens before the defending player blocks, so you get to wait and see if the attacker kicks the bucket before deciding which champion to risk in battle. At least no spoils is given up by the croaking champion. Anyone got a Creeping Doom?

The Scarlet Brotherhood (3rd Edition,135/400)

Well, this is different. As long as this realm is unrazed at the start of your turn you can voluntarily raze it to discard one champion in any pool. Nice! The only downside is that you have to keep the Scarlet Brotherhood from being razed through everyone else's turn, because you can't use it when you first put it down during your phase 2. The good news is almost no champions are immune to realm powers, so you can even nuke Gib Lhadsemlo and his ilk. Anyone got a Raze?

Furyondy (4th Edition, 16/500)

Finally, we have Furyondy. What a primo land. When you first play it, you get to discard any wizard in play. You can kill Bigby, Gib Irod, Midnight, Titania, anyone, since no wizard in Spellfire is immune to realm powers. Personally, I like using Furyondy to nuke Bigby, because he annoys me. Slap this realm down, and your opponents will be yelling "anyone got a Dispel Illusion?" :)

Next Time: The Top 3 Monsters.

Gib, Gib Trouble!

Yes, my choice of the best Gib is Gib Irod (Night Stalkers chase, 21/25). She just edges out Gib Lhadsemlo, who is also primo.

Both Lhadsemlo and Irod have a laundry list of immunities. But what puts Irod over the top is her card-drawing ability. When in combat, her controller can discard up to three cards and draw replacements. With TAV being a fast format filled with instant-kill cheese, the odds of drawing said cheese are quite good. Given that you have three chances, the odds get even better.

Irod is also immune to the powers of allies (such as the Loup-Garou) and harmful events (Trapped, Takhisis' Mirror, Wine of Eternity, etc). As well, the Wish spell does nothing to her. Did I mention that she casts both wizard and cleric spells? And she's level 13? Primo.

Why anyone wouldn't run a Gib Irod in their deck is one of life's great mysteries. This card rocks, in both Standard and TAV.

Next time: 5 overrated cards (for TAV).