Host Warring Card Game - The State of Play April 2024

Article by Adam Ray

Our good friends up the country have been hard at work making their unique and powerful game. We've talked a great deal about it with the game's creator on the Fantastic Universes Podcast. There have been many developments with it and it's time we let you know about.

Tournament Format

As the game starts to ramp up into its competitive circuit, the team at Host have developed a familiar but fun tournament structure. Matches of Host are Best of Three in a two deck format. Each deck must have Hosts from different factions. If you want to play Amatheia, you couldn't then play Graxis as your other Host.

The two decks must then be built according to the current rules. 50 cards, up to 4 copies of each card. Bring two decks to Best of Three games. You choose which one will be your "First" deck. You'll play against your opponent's First Deck for Game 1. The loser switches to their Second Deck. If the winner beats both decks then that's a Match Win, otherwise both the Second Decks will face off for a third and final game.

There are no limits on what can be played in the two decks, player collection not withstanding. Some players in the game have noted the power level of certain cards in the Meridius Package being quite strong, and wanting to curb their play may have lead there to be no duplicates across both decks. Though this is not the case, the ban and restricted announcement has saved the game from certain styles of egregious play.

Ban List

Yep, even a labour of love like Host has meant that the game has had to be curbed in the odd place here and there. The Host team have taken great care to not entirely kill cards, but make them more reasonable and palatable in certain styles of deck. 

We've had quite the competitive interest pick up with Host both over their Discord games, as well as in person play at The Elite Gaming Lounge and the Reroll Board Game Cafe, and certain cards shone a little too bright and needed to be brought down to size.

They're taking a very fair stance on how they Restrict Cards, with the very interesting idea of "Soft" and "Hard" restrictions. It take cards anywhere from allowed, only one, two, and three ofs.

Breath of Fire is a very efficient removal option that takes out a vast number of Entities in the current state of the game. It being one Emotion to play means nearly every deck can take half a turn off to take out nearly anything.

Encroaching Seas is the efficient Mill engine that works on both player's turns and drills through a deck faster than expected, even with cards like Stillness of the Lake and Sorcerer of Margisak out there. Despite that hate, I've fallen prey to Encroaching Seas and it's an unlikely feel-bad.

Mind Control is a versatile card that can be used in many situations, but can also utterly Uno-Reverse your expectations and utterly ruin your plans. This adds to the mystique and the skill needed to play around the card, knowing there are fewer in a given deck.

Though not a ban or restriction, they instituted a new rule which is sorely needed. Any activated ability that costs one action point is now a once per turn. That's a very welcome change when we look at the immense amount of resource that Mermaid of Desire can generate.

Binky

Amity, closely connected to nature and growth, the fourth resource type, is finally here!

The Everlasting Youth has gone through many iterations behind the scenes. The official version has a great deal of care for how the archetype plays. The dynamic of predator and prey is definitely prevalent, but we also get a lot of use in the marker mechanic. When a predator eats a prey, or certain effects work, you can add cards to your Entities as Markers to make them stronger.

We can expect to see this new play style to bring new and unique play patterns. The Everlasting Youth will turn any Entity into a Prey, so things that have effects when they're destroyed or when they leave a slot will go off in addition to giving the Predator that ate it their buffs.

The Host team are also giving us players another treat in this new release. This time, we get the full 51 card deck, but for a minor price bump, we also get the new cards filled in so that we have our full four copies of the cards we need to build new Amity brews going forward.

The Everlasting Youth comes out May 1st, with a Prerelease on April 20th at the Elite Gaming Lounge.

End of Turn

You can expect more regular news on Host Warring Card Game right here on Fantastic Universes. Now we want to hear from you, will you be attending the Prerelease of The Everlasting Youth Character Deck in few short weeks? Let us know in the comments below.