At least if it dealt damage to your unit it would interact with the High Elves healing mechanic, which seems to be pretty underpowered at the moment. Also, seeing -HP printed on a High Elf card seems wrong when -HP is typically a Dark Elf mechanic.

yeah i agree. another lost opportunity to improve synergy in an order race. guess they really wanted to make it a drawback instead of something that could be more easily worked around. But it is what it is....

What i dislike more is the structual ambiguity of its card text. It isn't clear to me whether it gets -1 HP til end of turn or permanantly - there's two possible ways to interpret the sentence:

"One of your target units [gets -1 hit points and gains 3 power] until the end of the turn"

"One of your targer units [gets -1 hit points] and [gains 3 power until the end of the turn]"

in first parsing unit gets both modifiers til end of turn. in the second it gets -1 hp (permanantly) and 3 power until end of turn. based on general context of other cards for this game, i'd bet on the first meaning, but sending in for clarification.

If the -hp were permanent it would be a sentence on its own.

Target unit gets -1 hp. That unit gets +3 power until end of turn.

Artemus Maximus said:

I think the lack of a comma suggests the first wording, but it's always good to make sure that's the intent.

Are there currently any effects that give -X HP permanently? Aren't they all until the end of the turn?

darkdeal said:

Yes, that would have made it clearer. So would a comma. Or a colon: "Unitl the end of turn, target unit you control: gets -1 HP & gains 3 power". But, as written, the reality is that it is still ambiguous.

There are cards that increase HP permanantly. I don't recall any that give -HP permanantly, but that doesn't matter - at any point FFG can release a card that does. And if it's in an unclear manner as such, how would we know? I realize it's probably both modifiers until end of turn, as there would've been errata/clarification on Wee Need Your Blood as well. The point i'm trying to make is that there is a big difference in the two possible interpretations. We really should not be having to guess the designer's intended meanings. I feel there should be no place for grey area in such a game. Hopefully we'll see in the next BP cycle better editing / templating of text.

If memory serves, James replied to a question about Blessing of Valaya saying that all tactic-based effects expire at the end of turn.

awesome! thanks cyberfunk. works for me

"Hi,

Unless otherwise stated, card effects will end at the end of the turn.
This means that blessing of valaya's effect will end at the end of the
turn.

Hope this helps

James"

LordMalinari said:

I think you are thematically wrong here. Charging recklessly won't damage a unit, but makes it more vulnerable (for example against a line os spears) until the charge goes on. But after the charge (if the unit survives it) it cames back to it's full combat strenght.

So this cards is very fine as it is.

Cain_hu said:

I'm not arguing flavour, just the mechanical fit for the High Elves (as an aside, I don't think High Elves would ever charge 'recklessly' considering their fragility, maybe 'heroically' as part of a last stand, but that's semantics and personal opinion). If I changed the name to Charge of the Dark Riders it would fit Dark Elf mechanics even more strongly, paying a negative cost to get a bonus effect AND that cost being -HP. Maybe the flavour isn't spot on, but even if the card remained in High Elves the damage could represent the unit having lost a portion of its members as a result of increased susceptibility to damage due to the charge.

I was just thinking this would have been the ideal time to ping one of your own units, to allow you to heal it with all of the various "heal 1" effects the high elves throw around that don't get used very often.

LordMalinari said:

I think this is exactly why it is not damage. Could you heal the vunerability to a spear-wall ? Hardly. It would be a synergy, where synergy would not intended.

BTW, the Silver Helms in my knowledge are the elite cavalry of the Elves, if they charge into the enemy it's not a last stand... it's an effective attack with heavy cavalry to break enemy lines. (like feudal knights would do) Also, the card is synergetic with Swordmasters and Dragonmage, since they don't realy mind that -1 HP until EOT.

However I agree that we need more cards to use elven healing. since currently most of their units won't survive to be healed. Loremaster of Hoeth currently the only HE card where healing is benefical.