Just a quick question about "Dragonlord Albarax"...

When the dragon is defeated and becomes a rune that states "Your hero may activate this card to inflict 3 damage instead of making a magic attack", does this mean that...

1) Activating the card to do the 3 damage is your hero's attack for that combat round?

OR

2) Your hero isn't actually making a magic attack (wording is "instead of"), allowing him to deal damage with an attack later in the combat either in melee or magic phase.

Thanks for the help!

The card should read "Dragonlord Eregax", and the damage should be in the ranged phase. My bad, the wifey handed me the wrong card.

Well, in order to make "a ranged attack" in the normal sequence of events, you need to declare that the Ranged phase is when you will be attacking (and you'll then be defending in the other two.) The terminology "instead of making a [ranged] attack" would lead me to believe you must first have the ability to make a ranged attack. So it's basically used as a weapon that gets exhausted on use.

In other words, you use it instead of making a regular ranged attack, and you defend on the other two phases. Next combat round you'll have to find something else to use, because the rune will be exhausted.