Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Eleazar - 7/2 Red WC hero
II Samuel 23:10
X = Number of opponent's evil characters in play
"If attacking alone, you may reveal your hand; if no good cards are revealed, draw X or protect heroes from evil cards.  Good II Samuel 23 cards cannot be negated."

Eleazar's Sword - 3/2 Red weapon
II Samuel 23:10
"Each time an evil character blocks, discard the top card of opponent's deck (put lost souls in play instead)."

Biblical context:  "and after him was Eleazar the son of Dodo the Ahohite, one of the three mighty men with David when they defied the Philistines who were gathered there to battle and the men of Israel had withdrawn. He arose and struck the Philistines until his hand was weary and clung to the sword, and the Lord brought about a great victory that day; and the people returned after him only to strip the slain."

Thought process for these abilities:  I'm trying to think outside the box with these.  Eleazar defeated the Philistines after Israel had already retreated.  His ability only works if he is alone in battle and you have no good cards in hand, representing him fighting alone after the army had withdrawn.  I know unconstrained draw abilities are dangerous to print, but I think this one will be ok.  Its strength is determined by the opponent's ECs - the "army" that Eleazar has to fight by himself.  It's not easy (and not good, from a rescuing standpoint) to have no good cards in hand.  And a player might have to make sub-optimal plays (use AotL in Prep Phase, etc.) to access Eleazar's draw.  The protect ability won't do much if you have no good cards in hand; it just allows you to abuse a weapon attached to him.  (And give your opponent a lot of initiative...)  And as for the weapon, I thought it would be cool, and would reflect the Biblical story well, to have something bad happen to your opponent every time an evil character enters battle.  This would also create other strategies; you could try a Red offense focused on weapons so that you have fewer good enhancements in hand for Eleazar, and it works well with Red's never-used side battle card (Sing and Praise).

What if the ability on the sword was chaged to, each time opponent places an evil character in battle . . .
That way side battles can't be used to destroy an opponents deck. Your opponent will essentially determine how many cards of his deck would be discarded.

I have a major distaste for deck discard, because it is so randomly punishing in a game like Redemption where certain cards are absolutely to success in a game, and you can't have multiple copies of a card in a deck.

Eleazar seems fine though.  He kind of goes against the standard red synergy of warrior class bands, but that's fine.