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Pojo's
Dreamblade Mini of the Day
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Image from
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Fleshworm
Broodsire
Madness
Reviewed April 17, 2007
Constructed: 2.50
Sealed: 3.00
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst. 3 ... average.
5 is the highest rating
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Chen Wan Lee |
Fleshworm
Broodsire
My review for today is coming in pretty late, so
I’ll make this a little shorter. The Fleshworm
Broodsire is a Madness rare from Baxar’s War
(and incidentally, my first ever Baxar’s War
rare). Coming in at 8M, this piece has a good
attack rating for its stats, but with relatively
poor defense and life values. Its biggest
competition for this slot in Madness would be
the Chysalis Spinner, that hasn’t seen too much
gameplay lately, although it would probably make
a show soon with all the Hiveling love in CP and
Anvilborn. The Spinner is significantly tougher
with 2 extra defense and 3 extra toughness, with
a good ability to bring back a piece from the
grave.
However, under almost all situations where the
Broodsire would be played (if ever), its for its
effect. Its effect significantly aids warbands
that suffer from serious casualties (eg.
Passion-heavy warbands or weenie), allowing you
to play a game of attrition if need be. Most
people do, however, make two mistakes when
playing this piece. The first mistake is holding
it back for too long; although this makes its
effect more effective, you may sometimes want to
spawn this piece when you still have about ½ or
¼ of your warband left, just in case your entire
warband gets destroyed in a single, massive
field maneuver. This is sometimes a little
difficult to tell, but seriously, don’t hold
this until the very last minute.
The second mistake is forgetting that the
Fleshworm Broodsire is actually a 5-attack
creature. Most people just spawn this, run it
into a cell, and sacrifice it, without it ever
seeing combat. Although sending this piece into
combat is risky if you are going to need its
ability, one mustn’t forget that behind that
ability is a relatively hard-hitting creature.
It also has a big target painted on its
forehead, and almost always your opponent would
want to allocate 9 damage to it so that it dies.
Which, in a way, is good. You could think of it
as a 9-life Bodyguard.
Overall, it is a piece that has its uses in a
very specific range of warbands, that require
recursion to prevent from running out of gas.
Otherwise, even in a mono-Madness warband,
Chrysalis Spinner is probably better.
Constructed: 2/5 for normal warbands, 3.5/5 in
casualty-heavy warbands.
Limited: 4/5. Having a huge recursion ability
might actually win you a game in these kind of
tourneys. Plus, its still a big creature.
Art: 1/5. I have no idea what its supposed to
be. |
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Josh
"Thespian" Gatner |
In Dreamblade,
an aspect’s worth is measured by the strength of
it’s eight-drop. Looking down the long list of
very competitive pieces and we see cornerstone
figures like the Brighthammer Avenger, Bloodhawk
Barag, and the Voodoo Manipulator. If you keep
looking past them, and then behind what you
might find there, you might find today’s Mini of
the Day – the Fleshworm Broodsire. Maybe this is
why Madness continues to stand as Dreamblade’s
poor brother.
Fortunately for the Fleshworm, there isn’t much
competition in Madness in the eight-slot. It
competes with the Gutsoup Golem and the
Freakazoid, which is to say that it just might
make the cut in your warband. Now what does it
have going for it? Read on to find out why you
should or should not choose it.
The two strengths that this figure has going for
it is it’s five power and the ability Awaken.
Having a five for power is nice, but it doesn’t
hold up as any kind of beater when it hangs on a
frame with a four in defence and nine for life.
It certainly won’t last long enough to matter
except maybe once. So that leaves us with
Awaken. I like this ability and it is certainly
is the reason to play it. Essentially, you can
sacrifice the Fleshworm Broodsire during the
spawn phase (as long as you are in a scoring
cell!) in order to bring all the minis in the
graveyard to your reserves. Talk about a reload!
It is an enticing ability that can work well
with a band that has a very low spawn curve so
that the investment of 8 spawn points isn’t
missed so much. However, you are not just
sacrificing a creature. You are sacrificing 8
spawn points worth of board presence, which
usually leaves you with such a hole that you are
going to likely give up a turn or two. So the
question needs to be asked – can your warband
rebuild quickly enough to be dominant through
the stretch? Not many can say yes – and for that
reason, you should probably just say NO!
I have played this piece in a Hiveling band that
I was very fond of, and it did find a bit of a
niche there. It had a nice combo with the
Tattooed Squashbug, but it certainly didn’t
elevate my band to the level of “competitive”.
Besides, with Anvilborn around the corner, this
piece won’t be playable with the Hivelings for
long!
Constructed: 3/5 – It can work in the right
band.
Limited: 2/5 – Play it if you are low on power.
Artwork: 3/5 – Interesting piece that makes me
think, “What am I looking at?”
Dream On!
Thespain
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