Heya folks,

I have a few questions about the Call of the Ravens overlord card. Hoping to have these cleared up before my play session with this expansion.

1) Judging by the rulebook, Call of the Ravens can be used even when the Raven Flock is already on the map. The rules specify that when a summon card is used the Raven Flock moves from its 'current location' to the new location specified by the summon card. However, it doesn't say anything about the Raven's injuries and conditions. It also doesn't say anything about all the augmentations you can give to your Ravens (Feast/Beneath the Shadow/Beware/etc.) Does it heal? Does it lose all its buffs?

2) Is it possible to use the "Envelop" Overlord card to capture a Hero, and then use Call of the Ravens to move the Raven Flock somewhere inaccessible? There are at least two quests in Manor of Ravens alone where you can place the Raven Flock next to a very hard to access monster. (e.g. The master bandit in the Rookery in "Wrong Man for the Job", or one of the locked away monster groups in "Where the Heart Is".) If this is doable then it could effectively eliminate a hero from most of the encounter :-(

I guess the heart of this question is whether or not resummoning the flock "removes it from the map". Unfortunately, RAW isn't helping here.

Thanks for your help!

1: My guess would be that it works the same way all familiars do, in that the raven at the new location is a completely new raven flock at full health, no conditions, and the old one is discarded. I'd have to look at the cards again, but do they mention being discarded when the raven is defeated or merely removed from the board?

2. I would guess no, since it's a new raven flock and not the same one.

3. You're missing the rest of your question.

Thanks Whitewing. Thats what I get for writing forum posts so late at night

And yeah, I'll go with the idea that it follows the rules for Familiars. Any summon will count as the monster having been defeated, and then a brand new monster replaces it.

I'm gonna hijack this Post quick and dirty

I already send this Question to ffg but would be interested in your Opinions:

I realized, that the Summon Card could be interpreted in a very interesting way:

when the raven flock is on the map, you could, at the start of your turn, activate it and name your own raven flock.

From wherever it is, the raven flock would be removed from the map, entering as a new raven flock (fully healed and moved one space in a direction of your choice, jumping over pits, or entering lava without getting damage since he is not entering that space etc etc.)

since it now is a new ravenflock, the summoncard would not target it - would it?

what are your thoughts?

urs

krawallbuerste

You mean deal 4 points of damage to your ravens to summon more? That's perfectly legal, but it gets less useful later when you've got cards out buffing the raven flock to make it strong which become discarded as soon as the raven flock is destroyed. It seems cute but it's a lot less useful than it actually appears.

technically he never gets defeated, he gets first replaced, then the damage would be dealt - which would never happen since the original raven flock is not on the map any more. since the skills read when this servant gets defeated (which he never does) they would stick - wont they?

I believe it counts as the old servant being defeated.

i have a question about Call of the Ravens that i think i already know the answer to, but i figure i'll just double check.

if you choose to use the summon at the start of your turn, and you have reinforcements (let's say Goblin Archers) that spawn at the start of your turn, could you, per the Golden Rule, spawn the Raven servant next to a goblin archer, which would then die, then spawn that same archer for reinforcements? i've been playing that way, but i wanted to make sure i'm not doing anything incorrectly.

If the archer is on the map before you use Call of the Ravens, the answer is yes. If the archer was not, you cannot reinforce twice.

If the archer is on the map before you use Call of the Ravens, the answer is yes. If the archer was not, you cannot reinforce twice.

yeah, in the situation i described, the archer is already on the map. thanks!

Disregard, q answered.

Gonna revive this thread from the dead for a quick update. Having played through part of two campaigns now with Call of the Ravens as my first OL card pick I have to say this card is VERY good, bordering on too good. Neither time did I even bother getting any other Unkindness cards, the one is enough. It is now my go-to first card over Imploding Rift, Webtrap, or Bloodrage, which were other common choices.

There are many Act 1 monster groups which possess monsters that can survive the Ravens appearance, and suddenly your monsters' ranks have grown by 1 at the start of your turn. The raven is no slouch either. 4 hp, grey defense, surge for damage, red/blue attack which upgrades in Act II.. Just ****! Nuts. He combos great with Verminous' deck too for even more optional synergy. I will be trying that next time I play with Vermy.

I crushed a hero group in A Fat Goblin Encounter 1 today using Bandits as my open group. Bandits are extremely awesome in and of themselves, but with the Raven coming out of the master bandit it was a massacre. The heroes were totally wiped out and repeatedly defeated. They never even got to the goblins' tile to take care of a single crop. I effectively had 4 red/blue attackers and a yellow/blue Doom condition maker as an opening salvo and they could never recover from that. Me reinforcing the master bandit and/or the Raven and an optional third monster with Belthir's hazard pay each turn right next to them at the Entrance didn't help matters, and they couldn't even get a search token as consolation as the bandits pillaged it. You can imagine how encounter II went with a fully fed Splig (29 hp!) and more lovely Raven-bandits vs. critically wounded heroes..

This is just one example too. The Raven remains a dominant force throughout the campaign. I can use him whenever I want, he doesn't take up space in my OL deck, doesn't require a lucky draw, and costs a mere 1 exp. You can even use nasty tricks with it like summoning the Raven from a minion, killing it, and then using Golden Rule and start of turn reinforcement rules to get the Raven out effectively for free! Madness!

Anyone else having as much dominance with this thing? My heroes were not at all happy... And I am concerned about it. I'll post more if they find a way to counter, but I don't think there really is a way. I think the main thrust of its problem is that at worst it denies a hero at least 1 action, possibly 2 or more to deal with it for very little cost, and at best you are inflicting considerable damage to the heroes for no cost at all.

The ravens are strong at the start of the campaign, but they aren't particularly good as the game goes on without the other unkindness cards. They have middling defense, middling hit points, middling speed, and no real special abilities. They deal 4 damage to a monster for being summoned, meaning that the card can grant you actions at the expense of substantial damage to an important monster (if you sacrifice a weaker one it isn't granting you actions). It can synergize with high hit point reinforcements, allowing you to get multiple extra ravens out of a single reinforcement, but the Raven lacks power and often dies in 2 hits.

However, bandits are AWESOME, so I think that has a lot to do with why you stomped them.

The ravens are strong at the start of the campaign, but they aren't particularly good as the game goes on without the other unkindness cards. They have middling defense, middling hit points, middling speed, and no real special abilities. They deal 4 damage to a monster for being summoned, meaning that the card can grant you actions at the expense of substantial damage to an important monster (if you sacrifice a weaker one it isn't granting you actions). It can synergize with high hit point reinforcements, allowing you to get multiple extra ravens out of a single reinforcement, but the Raven lacks power and often dies in 2 hits.

However, bandits are AWESOME, so I think that has a lot to do with why you stomped them.

If it were any stronger than it already is, it would certainly be broken. I'm not saying it needs to be changed now, but I would like more opinions on it. There are very few things the overlord can get that can so reliably and consistently damage the heroes' action economy, even in later parts of the game where it will probably die in one hit. That's one less action for the heroes, and possibly significant health loss too as the Raven gets in an attack that hits harder than most small act II minions before they bite the dust.

Oh, and I just thought of a gross usage of these things.. Pick flesh moulders, summon it out of the master moulder, then double heal the moulder on its activation for possibly endless reinforcements on top of the regular quest ones. The Raven is significantly stronger than a moulder.. And of course even more so if you do end up investing in Unkindness. My heroes might lynch me! :-p