Warlord Alternate Rules

Ancients

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Ancients is a limited Open format. What this means is that the majority of cards printed in Warlords history are legal in an Ancients deck. However, in order to create a more balanced environment, there is a Ban list, a Restricted list and a Reserved list. (See below)

In addition, due to the older wording on many cards involving the targeting rules, the following rules are in place.

An action "targets" a card when:
1)    The action declares the card as a target.
2)    At the time the action is performed, it directly modifies the attributes, location or readiness of a card in play or in the discard pile, or requires it make a check, test, or save.

Reserved
The following cards are Reserved in Ancients, meaning they cannot start in play, regardless of card text.
•    Archer Tower
•    Ring of Blasting
•    Ring of Guile
•    Ring of Mending
•    Ring of Piercing

Restricted
The following cards are Restricted in Ancients, meaning you may not have more than one copy of each card in your deck, regardless of card text.

•    Archer Tower
•    Helm of Undying
•    Improved Invisibility
•    Into the Tunnels
•    Kapix
•    Nightmaster Rress
•    Nodwick
•    Paradigm Shift
•    Perfect Self
•    Phantasm
•    Supply
•    Toren Yscar

Banned
The following cards are Banned in Ancients, meaning they cannot be played or performed in Ancients games for any reason.

1)    Any and all cards specifically related to "Medusan Lords," including, but not limited to; items, actions, characters, and dungeons.
2)     Any and all cards specifically related to "Destiny Lords," including, but not limited to; items, actions, characters, and dungeons.

EXCEPTION: The above line items are void in regard to actual “Medusan Lord” and “Destiny Lord” challenges FOR THE RUNNER OF SAID “LORDS.” Challengers of said “Lords” must adhere to the above line items. Runners of said “Lords” are not required to do so.

•    A Prophecy Fulfilled
•    Amber Gargoyle
•    Apprentice Ramah
•    Brother Averil
•    Children of Yscar
•    Field of Bones
•    Gravity Flux
•    Jautya Syne
•    Lilah
•    Malrog's Lair
•    Negotiated Surrender
•    Olivark the Quiet
•    Orm Al’Ghast
•    Overwhelm
•    Rouse
•    Sakarian Manticore
•    Shadan Adler
•    Sword of Chaos
•    The Restless

Doubles

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Doubles format is played with teams. Each team has 2 players who build their decks normally with 1 exception, that is that they may not use the same warlord. In doubles games, 4 players play at the same time (2 on each team) and both opposing Warlords must be defeated in order to win. In a doubles game, seating is important so that two teammates don’t get consecutive turns, so each player should sit diagonally across from them team mate.

Field Promotion

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Field promotion is an alternate format where you choose a non-Warlord character to play as a Warlord of their faction. The rules for field promotion are pretty simple, instead of choosing a Warlord as normal. Choose a level 5 (or a character that enters play as level 5) non-Warlord character and use that character as your Warlord. For the Field promotion deck, the chosen character is considered to have the Warlord trait. For example, if you wanted to play a Nothrog fighter deck, you could choose Rrok to be your Warlord or if you wanted a fighter/rogue, you could choose Kel’suk.

Kerebrus

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Kerebrus is an alternate format where players use older Warlords that are not legal in 4E games, instead of a normal Warlord. The players must however, use an older Warlord, 4E Warlords are not allowed.

Ferris Bachman & Zartoch It is worth noting, that these two warlords allow multiple copies of themselves, so having multiple Ferris or Zartoch cards in your deck is legal in the format.

Open

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Open is an alternate format of Warlord that allows you to use any card printed in the history of the game. However, remember to visit the FAQ and Errata pages, since Warlord has been out for so long, there are a number of them.

Reclassified

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Reclassified is an alternate format where you take a normal warlord, and change their class to a different one. For example you could make Krenthor a wizard, or Niobe a fighter. Other than that, decks are constructed as normal.

For Multi-Class Warlords, you choose ONE of their classes to change, and the other(s) remain as printed. For example, Scyrax could change his Wizard class to Fighter but his other class would remain Rogue, or he cold change his Rogue class to Fighter and keep his Wizard class. You could also choose to change his Rogue class to Wizard, and effectively make him one class, instead of Multi-Class. While this is legal, you do not gain any bonus for making your warlord single class.

Turncoat

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Turncoat is an alternate format where you choose a Warlord to be a different faction than normal. For example, you could choose for Niobe to lead a Dwarf army into battle, instead of the Free Kingdoms.

When you choose your Warlord for a Turncoat deck, you change every instance of their faction to the new faction. For example, Niobes’ text box has:
“Free Kingdoms • Warlord • Druid • Nymph • Isle of the Gods
While Niobe is spent, she and adjacent Free Kingdoms gain +2 AC and Riposte +5.
Spend Order: Target a Free Kingdoms you control within 2 ranks: Move the target adjacent to Niobe.”

However, in a Turncoat deck where Niobe is a Dwarf, her text box would now have: “
“Dwarf • Warlord • Druid • Nymph • Isle of the Gods
While Niobe is spent, she and adjacent Dwarves gain +2 AC and Riposte +5.
Spend Order: Target a Dwarf you control within 2 ranks: Move the target adjacent to Niobe.”

In addition to their faction changing, many warlords have abilities that effect characters with only certain traits, we call these Sub-race traits. For example, Thekk Rockbenders text box has:
“Dwarf • Warlord
Adjacent Dwarf characters gain the Gargoyle trait.
Your Gargoyles within one rank gain +3 ATK and Powerattack +5.
Dwarf clerics you control may equip one fighter item.”

However, lets say in a Turncoat deck, you decided to play Thekk as an Elf. Since elves don’t have gargoyles in their faction, instead their sub-race is Undead. So, Thekks’ text box, when played as an elf would have: “Elf • Warlord
Adjacent Elf characters gain the Undead trait.
Your Undead within one rank gain +3 ATK and Powerattack +5.
Elf clerics you control may equip one fighter item.”

The Sub-Races by faction are:
Deverenian: Stormwraith
Dwarf: Gargoyle
Elf: Undead
Free Kingdoms: Lycanthrope
Nothrog: Siege
Mercenary: Monster
The Chosen: Thrall and Daemon

The Chosen
You will notice that The Chosen have two Sub-Races. While this makes for an interesting dynamic when you build a deck normally, it needs its own special rules in a Turncoat deck. Whenever you make a The Chosen warlord another faction, all instances of Thrall and Daemon are changed to that factions Sub-Race. For example, Nin-Gulas’ text box has:
“The Chosen • Warlord • Cantor • Ursuloth
React: Once per turn, before a Thrall you control is killed as part of an action's payment: Target Thrall gains +1 HP until end of turn.
Order: Once per turn, kill a Thrall: Target non-Daemon The Chosen that has not gained any permanent bonuses gains +2 (+3 if the Thrall was Level 3 or higher) ATK, AC, and Skill permanently.”

If you converted her to a Nothrog for a Turncoat deck, her text box would instead have: “
“Nothrog • Warlord • Cantor • Ursuloth
React: Once per turn, before a Siege you control is killed as part of an action's payment: Target Siege gains +1 HP until end of turn.
Order: Once per turn, kill a Siege: Target non-Siege Nothrog that has not gained any permanent bonuses gains +2 (+3 if the Siege was Level 3 or higher) ATK, AC, and Skill permanently.”

However, whenever another factions Warlord wants to convert to The Chosen, since they only have one Sub-Race, we only use the Daemon Sub-Race for converting, so you would change all instances of the original Sub-Race to Daemon. For example, Shah’Syss’s text box has:
“Mercenary • Warlord • Barbarian • Monster • Sutek
Your other Monsters gain +2 ATK.
React: After Shah'syss kills an opposing character: Move a Monster you control forward one rank.”

However, if you played Shah’Syss as a The Chosen, his text box would have:
“The Chosen • Warlord • Barbarian • Daemon • Sutek
Your other Daemons gain +2 ATK.
React: After Shah'syss kills an opposing character: Move a Daemon you control forward one rank.”
Khilkhameth Khilkhameth is a special case, in that his ability puts a character into play from your collection. Whenever Khilkhameth puts a Forest into play from your collection, they gain whatever Faction Khilkhameth is. So if you were using Khilkhameth as a Nothrog, the Forest of Bones would have the Nothrog trait. This only applies to Forest of Bones being put into play with his ability, not any inside your deck.