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Introduction

Before the widespread commercial success of computer and video games, before even roleplaying games were well-defined, there was a niche of gaming that defined what “hardcore gamers” participated in: wargaming. Back then, when the masses were content with out-of-box board games, the geeks of the day got together over maps of landscapes and kept track of unit attack ratings, defenses, and formations, all in the hopes of outwitting their opponents with military strategy. What may have began as an exercise in military revisionism quickly entered the realm of fantasy, and it wasn’t long before Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings affected gamers to the point of morphing German infantry into Orcs and mortars into catapults. The rest of the story is history, giving us Dungeons and Dragons, spawning the roleplaying craze, and leaving us where we are today, both when it comes to real-time strategy games played on our PCs, as well as the roleplaying and hack’n slash genres on our consoles and computer screens.

With so much glitz to modern-day computer games, however, most gamers have forsaken gaming’s roots, which is quite a sad enterprise considering just how much fun non-digital games can be. While we previously brought you an example of superb modern-day board gaming, we’re now about to do the same for the steadfast wargaming genre, which just may be easier to get into than you think.

To Be a Wargamer

Wargaming, quite simply, is about war. Or, more appropriately, it’s about battles. Traditionally, wargames could be played out-of-box with the purchase of a single set, making wargames a sub-genre of board games. These early wargames represented units with paper or plastic chits, and were rather unimpressive to look at from afar. To the uninitiated, an ongoing wargame may have looked too bland, not fun, and perhaps too technical to be seen as entertainment.

As time went on, wargames outgrew the practice of being bought in a single box, and the era of expansions was upon the gaming world. This too was quickly outgrown, however, which necessitated the need for core sets and smaller additions that helped flesh out a player’s army. What this meant was that if a player wanted more unique units, they’d have to run to the store and pick them up, such that they could focus their energies on expanding their army in whatever direction they so chose. So, if more defensive units were what the player wanted, they’d run to the store and buy whatever units fit that category. This happened to coincide with small models representing a player’s units, which became more intricate as time went on. While such models were very cool looking, akin to the pewter figurines sold at mall kiosks, there were distinct disadvantages associated with them. For one, they were expensive, as their cost was comparable to display figurines, since both were finely detailed and made of pewter. Secondly, they came unpainted, which meant players would have to paint them before playing with them, else look like fools. (Whoever made painting figures a necessity to remain unchastized I’m uncertain, but admittedly, painted pewter figurines look much, much cooler than unpainted ones.) Needing to paint figures added another discouraging variable into the equation: not all would-be wargamers were artistically inclined, and who wants to play with an ugly model? And, even if one did have the artistic ability to paint one’s models cleanly, it was still a huge time hog, even before playing the game could begin.

With cost and time investment being major issues, wargaming lived on in two forms - traditional board games in the form of historical scenarios with rather unimpressive models, and rather impressive looking, painted models that required a significant time and money investment. The latter spawned games as the ever-popular Warhammer, while the former filled a rather tiny gaming niche mostly reserved for history nuts and retired, outclassed generals.

For the purposes of this article, we will concern ourselves with the fancy model-based wargaming ala Warhammer fame. While the information in this article may appeal to other wargamers as well, the comparison between games like Warhammer and Mage Knight are far easier to make, and their pros and cons weighed more appropriately. First, however, an explanation of how Mage Knight differs from the competition.

The New Kid

Mage Knight is the creation of one Jordan Weisman, currently CEO of WizKids, who produces Mage Knight and other games under the “HeroClix” monicker. Jordan’s idea behind Mage Knight was simple: create a miniature-based wargame consisting of pre-painted figures, with easy-to-learn rules, and produce them cheaply. With these goals in mind, Jordan and his fledgling company set off to create the first Mage Knight figures, molded in plastic, mounted on a circular base, and painted accordingly. The first generation of these fantasy figures were of reasonable quality, and though the paint jobs weren’t particularly stunning, painted they were, and that alone got Mage Knight a fair amount of recognition. The sometimes shoddy paint jobs would be significantly improved when WizKids landed a nice licensing agreement, however, which not only brought about new game lines, but also improved the molding and painting process for all their figures.

While Mage Knight was set in a fantasy world, WizKids went on to create similar games built on their HeroClix system. Since unit attributes were cleanly available on a figure’s base, playing Mage Knight required little more than a pair of dice and a ruler, and this ease of play caught the eye of Marvel Comics, who later licensed their characters to WizKids for a second gaming line, complete with rules similar to Mage Knight, only with the world of comics as the background instead of a world of medieval fantasy. Marvel’s jump on the HeroClix bandwagon heralded a similar licensing agreement with DC Comics some time later, and characters from both companies can be used in the same gaming world. A third installment consisting of characters from indy comics will help flesh out this gaming world, making it the second most popular to Mage Knight, both in number of players as well as number of expansions. In some areas, the comics-based HeroClix line already calls on a larger player-base than Mage Knight, mainly because of the familiarity of a player’s units.

A third HeroClix line is based on the Mechwarrior Dark Ages world, licensed from FASA and allowing players to field mechs, tanks, and infantry units. A fourth line, based on the PC game Crimson Skies is also due out soon, and a Shadowrun action-figure game also based on the HeroClix system is due out shortly thereafter. WizKids is even smart enough to go after younger gamers with their announced Creepy Freaks line.

The rapid success of WizKids is a testament to the simplicity and elegance that Mage Knight is known for. Rapidly rising in popularity in the wargaming arena, Mage Knight not only took hobby stores by storm, but also stepped on the collectable card game craze, and made its way into such commercial outlets as video game stores, where wargames previously had no place.

Mage Knight, still a growing line, complete with an in-character storyline influenced by the results of actual player tournaments, has already borrowed the necessary traits to make it a success. Let’s look at what these traits are, however, and how Mage Knight was able to wrestle its way into the market by converting gamers to its addictive path.

Rules of Play

Before you get discouraged and surf on, I’ll append what I’m about to say with this: Mage Knight can effectively be played, even in a tournament environment, with easy-to-come-by units. I say this because I don’t want to scare people away with the realization that Mage Knight is more than just a wargame - it’s a collectible wargame. Much like Magic: the Gathering and the ilk of games following thereafter, units in Mage Knight take a variety of forms, but are not purchased based solely on player desire. Rather, units are purchased by buying Starter or Booster packs, the former including everything one needs to start playing, while the latter includes additional units. The units contained in these boxes are randomly inserted, so when someone buys a box, they don’t know exactly what they’ll get. When Mage Knight first started up, players could narrow down their unit search by purchasing Starter sets aimed at a particular Sect (there are eight factions in the Mage Knight universe). Now, however, Starter sets contain a random assortment of units, which really isn’t that bad, since players are not limited by requiring their army to consist of only one faction (we’ll get into Sects later).

Booster sets are sold by series, each series a newer expansion than the last. Starter sets are sold in the “Unlimited” line, which is basically a conglomeration of three retired expansions. While some expansions are retired, however, they’re still on store shelves. Among the expansion sets available are Unlimited, Lancers, Rebellion, Sinister, Whirlwind, Dungeons, and Pyramids. Each set has around a hundred and fifty units to collect, many of which come in yellow, blue, and red (weak, standard, and tough versions, respectively). Those that don’t are unique figures, many times repainted units with different point values and a different name, though the cooler ones have completely different models. All of the booster packs come with the typical one-base unit, though the Lancer and Whirlwind expansions include one mounted unit per box, which has an extended base with a unit riding some form of mount, be it a horse, a mechanical beast, or some other creature.

Starter sets contain enough units to get a game going, a flexible ruler, two dice, a card listing all the special abilities units can have, a set of blank stickers for writing one’s name on the bottom of one’s figures, and a rulebook. Armies are put together with a point value system; each unit has written on its base a point value, and armies are constructed by adding these points up. For example, two new players may want to play a 200-point game, which means they’ll use whatever units they want so long as the sum of their individual points is less than or equal to 200. Units are balanced well enough that a random assortment of units can be played effectively against another assortment of units of similar point values.

A simple, first-time game will begin with two players rolling dice to see who goes first. The rules recommend playing on a surface of three feet by three feet, but any surface will do. Each player places her units on one side of the surface (the “battlefield”) within three inches of the battlefield’s edge. For every hundred points an army consists of, divide by 100 and that’s how many turns, per player, one gets to complete a round.

Each round, a player can move one unit per turn available. So, in a 200-point game, each player can take two turns, meaning they can take one action on two of their units every round. However, whenever an action is taken by a unit, that units receives an action “token”, which can be a penny, a stone counter, or anything else one can place beside the unit to show that a turn was just taken. So long as a unit has no action token before a turn with that unit is taken, there is no penalty, though if the unit already has an action token on it, it will take a point of “pushing” damage after the turn is taken, symbolizing exhaustion and battle stress. If two tokens are already on the unit, it may not take another turn, suggesting that the unit is too tired to continue taking actions. After a round of not taking an action, however, the unit is cleared of action tokens and is refreshed. With this in mind, players may want to build their armies in such a way that they have twice as many units on the battlefield as they have turns to take, so they don’t end up wasting any turns else damage their units.

Mage Knight figures, unlike figures in most wargames, are mounted on a circular base. This base serves not only to support the unit, but also to keep track of the unit’s condition, attributes, and special abilities. The bottom of this base can be spun, revealing a set of numbers on the top of the base, and whenever the unit takes a point of damage, the base is spun (”clicked”) to reveal a new set of numbers. In most cases, the more damage a unit takes, the smaller his attributes will be as time goes on. Eventually, when the unit has taken enough damage, the base will reveal a set of skulls instead of attribute numbers, representing the death of the unit.

Each turn allows a unit to either move a certain distance across the battlefield, or take a combat action. Movement is managed by use of the included flexible ruler. Among a unit’s attributes are a “speed” value which represents the maximum number of inches that unit can move. Other values shown on a unit’s base are for attack, defense, and damage. Some units also have a ranged attack value which does not change over the course of the unit’s life, and shows not only how far the unit can attack from, but also how many targets it can attack per turn.

Combat is issued by rolling two dice. If the value of those dice, plus the unit’s attack attribute is equal to or greater than the opposing unit’s defense value, the attack is considered successful, and the opposing unit takes as many clicks of damage as the attack unit’s damage rating. That’s basically all there is to combat in Mage Knight, but special abilities make things more interesting.

Each attribute a unit has may have a background color and shape. For instance, a unit’s damage rating always has a green background behind it on the unit’s starting health value. This simply makes it easy to click through a unit’s base values and quickly find the starting position. However, other colors and shapes (squares and circles) are shown throughout a unit’s attributes if that unit has special abilities. For example, if a unit’s damage rating has a black square behind it, it signifies that the unit has the necromancy ability and can bring units back from the dead. Ten possible special abilities exist for each attribute, giving units the possibility of supporting as many as four special abilities per click. Some units will only have a couple special abilities throughout their life, while others may gain new abilities, or lose them, as they take damage. In most cases, a unit will start with a particular special ability and lose it when enough damage is taken, but other units may not display this usual pattern.

Build an Army

A unit’s special abilities will greatly determined the strategy a player will use. While a unit’s core attributes will certainly play a large role in determining which units a player will field in battle, the dynamism of Mage Knight is in a unit’s special ability. For example, I quickly discovered just how effective a defensive army can be built with units possessing the venom and pole arm abilities, both of which do an automatic click of damage to an opposing unit coming into contact with them. While this strategy is quite effective for keeping enemies away from my ranged units, the srategy is easily defeated if the opposing player fields units with the toughness special ability, which automatically reduces damage by one click, making venom and pole arm useless. In this example, knowing the strategy of one’s opponent is very useful, making effective players those who can put together an army under various circumstances.

One advantage to the randomization of units when one begins playing is that it exposes the player to various strategies based on certain special abilities. Since there are forty of these abilities, knowing which ones are really useful in combat is sometimes difficult, and until one tries using a certain special ability, or sees it being used, one may never really give that ability a good look, particularly when that ability works better in combination with other abilities. Once a player has a good idea of which abilities they want, however, it takes building an army to the next level, since one can easily find an online database of Mage Knight units online, searchable by special ability. So long as a player has access to a local gaming shop selling units individually, or E-Bay, army building becomes a fun exercise, especially if one routinely plays against the same people.

When I began playing Mage Knight, my first instinct was to focus on getting units of one Sect only, and build on that. One quickly realizes, however, that the benefit of this depends mainly on what kind of strategy one intends to use. Each Sect in Mage Knight is primarily cosmetic, though overall they focus on particular types of attacks. The Necropolis Sect, for example, consists of few ranged attacks and devotes itself to close combat, with the added ability of being able to bring back units from the dead. By itself, the Necropolis Sect is not horribly effective in larger games without the Mage Spawn Sect, which isn’t really an organized Sect when one considered in-character terminology, but is instead of Sect consisting of various monsters typical in a fantasy setting. Since the Mage Spawn Sect includes a number of skeletons and zombies, however, an army consisting of these and Necropolis figures becomes a powerful adversary, since the necromancy special ability allows these types of units to be brought back from the dead at full health (other units take 1-6 clicks of damage upon being resurrected).

Similarly, the Black Powder Rebel faction, consisting mainly of ranged units, doesn’t fare too well against close combat brawlers, and see smore benefit on the battlefield when paired with blocking characters who can move quickly and hold their own up close, such that the ranged units can stay back and fire away.

Naturally, units of the same Sect have a similar look to them. Black Powder rebels are mainly dwarves, gun-toting warriors, or units with a more “mechanical” look to them. The Elemental League are a woodland faction consisting of living trees, trolls, and typical elves, while the Knights Immortal are typical high-fantasy looking, complete with war steeds, armor-clad knights, and long-bowmen. Aside from the cosmetic reasons of keeping one’s army relegated to one faction, however, is the ability to create formations.

Formations allow a player to “group” units of the same Sect together, such that one movement action can be taken to move the whole formation, instead of having to move those units individually. This saves much time (and turns) if a player is fielding a group of ranged units or brawlers. In many cases, a player may choose to field a couple like-units, and placing these in a formation makes mobilizing troops to execute a strategy much more efficient.

Getting Hardcore

As mentioned earlier, Mage Knight doesn’t have to be about collecting, though as addictive as it, it certainly can be. One can enjoy Mage Knight by spending only nominal amounts of money on booster packs, though it’s through careful research and purchasing that one builds an effective army. The costs associated with this aren’t that unreasonable compared to other forms of entertainment. When I began playing Mage Knight with my roommates, one starter pack and a couple boosters ran me about thirty dollars, and I wasn’t lucky enough to get any unique figures. Nonetheless, I had tons of fun playing, and since our games were low in point value (200-300 point armies), I had enough units to formulate a reasonable strategy. Furthermore, a friend, who was lucky enough to get a rather expensive unique in his starter pack, couldn’t field the unit because it was also expensive point-wise. The moral of the story: unless one plans on playing large Mage Knight games, large sums of money are not required to invest.

That said, if one wants to collect something, Mage Knight is a cool thing to get started with. For one, getting a large number of pieces from one Sect looks pretty impressive when on display, particularly when displayed along with an opposing faction. Furthermore, it’s not as though Mage Knight pieces ever go bad. Wear and tear on pieces, even those one plays with all the time, is rather minimal, since the only thing being moved is the base dial. The current value of pieces is pretty strong, also, as even non-rare and non-unique units can go for a couple bucks online, since some people are looking for that one particular figure they can’t find in any booster pack they buy. On top of this, WizKids retires their booster series every so often, making many units unavailable to future buyers, so even useful common units may fetch a pretty price in the future. This is particularly true of unique figures, which won’t show up more often on the market since they’re retired along with the booster series they’re part of.

Along with the normal allotment of unit types, players can purchase “limited edition” units in boxes, which allow one to see the contents. These are normally higher-point units sold in bundles (~$15 per box), which presumably are only on the market for a limited period of time. There are also units that can only be obtained by sending in special coupons or winning official Mage Knight tournaments, though these can usually be found on E-Bay after the fact.

A collector, or fanatical booster pack buyer, may find themselves buried in units rather quickly, or at least, with way more units than they can reasonably field in a normal game. For this reason, the official Conquest rules were designed, which are pretty much the same as the normal rules albeit with minor variations to speed gameplay. These rules were designed to field armies of 2000 points or more, and spawned new units like artillery pieces, dragons, chariots, castles, and titans (giants). The upside of this is that there’s a reason to hold onto all those crappy units one thought they’d never use in a normal game again, though the downside is that there’s an easy attraction to the larger units available, which, of course, means spending more money.

Average cost for one of these larger units is upwards of $25 new, though titans are as little as $15. Online deals are a Mage Knight player’s best friend in this case, with the plastic, albeit sturdy castle sections lending a very cool aspect to siege campaigns. While it didn’t take me long to delve into the possibilities of Conquest games, it also didn’t take long for me to consider terrain aspects. While the Mage Knight rules are somewhat lacking in terrain modifiers (admittedly, they’re working on it), it took about two weeks before my kitchen table saw some creative use of cardboard, styrofoam, plaster, and paint. (We’ll try to get an article on terrain building in the upcoming weeks.)

In addition to the Conquest rules, there’s also a second official variant to the Mage Knight rules entitled “Dungeons,” which is basically a dungeon-crawl through a colored map where players use “Hero” units instead of normal units to obtain treasure. Think computer games like Diablo, minus the item-whoring, with a group of friends and a gamemaster moving the monsters through the dungeons to get at one’s characters. Play is different in that the game becomes objective-based, but the possibilities for dungeon design remain significant.

Since Mage Knight is not only a cheaper alternative to wargames like Warhammer, but also comparable in its fun-factor and rules, there was enough of a demand that WizKids released metal versions of some of their figures for the painter in mind. These figures appear to be sold in non-randomized packs akin to other wargames, though the number of metal figures available is dwarfed by the number of normal Mage Knight figures. Nonetheless, it’s nice to know that they’re available should people want them.

Conclusion

Mage Knight is an excellent approach to an old genre, and a cost-effective one at that. While it’s true that the collecting-based nature of the game makes it more expensive than if one could simply purchase figures directly, the construction process of the figures makes them much more affordable than non-plastic/unpainted figures. Since the sponsorship of WizKids by Marvel Comics, the quality of the figures has increased significantly, despite the fact that the figures are mass-produced. About the only gripe with the models is that some thin parts may sag right after the molding process, resulting in a bent sword or staff every now and again. The paint job on the units is quite good, however.

While playing only with a Starter pack and a couple Booster packs will earn a player a good time, playing with the same weak units all the time won’t establish much staying power for Mage Knight. The true joy of the game comes not only in the process of building an army for whatever needs arise, but for fielding units of the player’s choice. In this respect, Mage Knight is most fun when a local gaming store allows one to purchase individual figures for cheap, or if one is lucky enough to land a fair price on a couple good E-Bay auctions. In other words, for maximum enjoyability, expect Mage Knight to be a long-term investment, with a lump of cash put down when you get started, and a few bucks here and there spent on new units. A word to the wise: unless you want random units, you’re better off buying units in singles at a gaming store or online, rather than shelling out six or seven dollars on a booster pack with units you may never use.

The creative aspects of Mage Knight are just as great as the built-in rules. Mage Knight appeals to both veteran wargamers and novice players who may not have the money or time to get into games like Warhammer. There’s something to be said for the process of building one’s own terrain, which takes Mage Knight into the creative zone, which is great for kids and adults alike, either as a way to get away from the TV for a change or to relieve some stress. Despite the name of the company, Mage Knight may be easy enough for kids to get into, but it’s also flexible enough to appeal to more mature gamers, which not only makes the target market bigger for WizKids, but makes Mage Knight a game that parents can actually play with their children, assuming you haven’t given into the whole “violent games makes Baby Jesus cry”-thing.

As it stands, for most people, Mage Knight is a fun game to get into, with a starting cost appropriate for most board games. The fact that one can build upon previous Mage Knight purchases is rather nice, especially since one’s older units can be used in larger games. A game to breach the age gap as well as spin up one’s creative gears can’t be a bad thing, so head down to your local gaming store and give Mage Knight a look… unless you don’t need another addiction.

Wyld, Wyld Rumpus Rating: 8 outta 10.

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