by games56
I was going to make this a review, but it won't be fair to this game. I can tell that Mage Wars is a good game, possibly a great game, but our first session was a disaster. So I give this session report as a warning how not to begin this game.
I bought Mage Wars for my cousin for Christmas. He is a big fan of Summoner Wars, Memoir '44 and Warhammer invasion. After all the hype I thought this would be up his ally. On Christmas eve we decided to look over all the instructional videos on this game, I printed out a copy of the rules, and he studyed the game over Christmas week so we thought we would give it a shot on New's Year's Eve. The box siad a game would go 1 1/2 hours. We figured the first game would go longer, but we had no idea what "Longer" would mean.
Mage Wars is a tactical fantasy battle in an arena made of several large squares. Depending on the "Mage" you choose you have a certain number of lives, resouces (Manna), and replacement (# of Manna recieved each round). There are actions, quick actions and follow-ups allowed. Mages have a spell-book of about 50 cards which allow you to make allies, give enhancements, objects to help the Mage or Creatures created and spells you can leave in an area to influence movement of battles in this spots.
The first problem at the start is where to start. If you have ever played a game of Summoner Wars in which you went back and forth over 3 of 4 choices on a turn, imagine staring at a spellbook with dozens of choices of spells you aren't all that clear about. I pride myself at not falling victim to AP, but I was dizzy with the number of choices.
We were constantly going to the rule book for clarification. There are different types of spells, creatures and equipment that effect different types of thing in different situations. This was New Year's Eve, but we consumed no alcohol until the ball was dropping at Times Square and we dropped the game for the evening after almost 7 hours of stuggle.
We both agreed that we want to return to another round of Mage Wars, but first we are going to do some study. We actually thought we would be able to play another game or two that evening, but it wasn't the case.
In a few weeks we are going to try it again, but this is not a game to play in one sitting. And the first session was a long drawn out disaster.