This week I’m going to do something I haven’t done before. I’m publishing an expansion for an existing game, Tom Jolly’s Wiz-War.
As I’ve written elsewhere Wiz-War was a much beloved game of my ‘tweens. I suspect it was the most played board game for my group throughout the later ’90s. As we played it more and more we also developed a rule: we added one new card every time we played a game. This was made possible thanks to Chessex putting out blank card packs.
So I offer you up all the bonus cards from my set, with no (or rather, few) comments on whether they’re good or bad. I’ll also offer the caveat that if you’re going to add cards, you should put in more numbers too, to keep things balanced. Just follow the normal distribution from the base game. We also put in duplicates of some of the more common spells (which I hopefully didn’t copy any of below).
Amnesia. (Trap!) Lose a random card. PLAY IMMEDIATELY.
Beavis. (Neutral) Play this card out of turn when a fire attack is cast. Attack does damage to all wizards in game. Must chant, “Fire, fire, hehe, hehe.” OR: you may discard this card to retrieve Butt-Head from the discard pile.
Brave New World. (Neutral) Adds a new sector to the playing boards, if any is available. This sector may be placed in any legal location.
Cone of Cold. (Attack/LOS) Does 3 points of magical damage to everything in a straight line within line of site. User cannot exclude any targets in path.
Create River. (Neutral/LOS) This spell creates a straight river between two points, both within the caster’s LOS. The caster must declare the direction of the river’s flow when it is created. Movement upstream costs 2/space, downstream costs .5/space.
Eye of God. (Neutral/LOS) Gives caster LOS to any square on the board for the purpose of casting 1 LOS spell during this round.
Fill Square with Glass. (Neutral/LOS) Fills one square with impenetrable glass. Can only be used on empty squares. Can’t be cast on home bases. Does not block line of sight. Some schools of magic call it “ethereal poodle”.
Fire Alarm. (Neutral) Player must make fire alarm noises, forcing other players to leave the room. The player can then move one token anywhere one space. The other players may now return to the room.
Fist of God. (Attack/LOS) Player strikes table with fist. Objects moved are placed as in Thumb of God. 1 point of damage per wizard that falls taken by player of card.
(We used to regularly play on a card table.)
Flame Burst. (Attack) Area effect flame spell does magical damage equal to NUMBER CARD played except to walls and doors. Each square away reduces damage by 1. Walls/doors stop, but it can go around corners.
Fog of War. (Neutral/LOS) No line of sight on the board on which this is cast. Duration equal to NUMBER CARD played.
Gelatinous Cube. (Attack/LOS) Creates a gelatinous cube with a move of 1. Always heads towards nearest item on floor. Destroys item if not chest, which it carries. Takes 4 physical damage to destroy. Blocks LOS and movement.
God Help Me. (Neutral) You may take as many “God” cards from the discard pile as you want. Must say “God Help Me.”
Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch. (Attack/LOS) Throw this grenade to a square within LOS. At the beginning of your next turn it explodes doing NUMBER CARD physical damage to everything in the sector except walls and doors.
Hot Potato. (Trap!/LOS) Player with potato takes 1 point of physical damage at end of round. Card may not be discarded or dropped. Can be used as an attack to pass to another player. They must catch it unless counteracted. If needed, they must discard other card. DISPLAY IMMEDIATELY.
Illusionary Treasure. (Neutral) When a player picks up one of your treasures you may play at that time (out of turn) this card on him. The treasure teleports to one of your treasure spaces.
Intermittent Door. (Neutral/LOS) Must say, “When is a door not a door.” Door appears and then at the start of player’s next turn it disappears for one turn. Each time it alternates.
(This sounds pretty annoying to keep track of.)
Last Ditch. (Attack/LOS) When played the caster does magical damage equal to his remaining life points to all wizard in his LOS (including himself).
Lead Chest. (Neutral/LOS) This spell transforms your wooden chest into a lead chest. When carrying this chest, movement is reduced by 2. The player must say, “All this gold is weighing me down!”
Lever of God. (Neutral/Counteraction/LOS) Players lifts one side of a board. Gravity pulls everything to the other side until a wall stops it, or it exits the board.
(The lifting can be figurative, not necessarily literal. The main point is that everything slides.)
Magic Armor. Reduces all damage by 2, except curses. Reduces movement by 1. DISPLAY IMMEDIATELY.
The Marvelous Merry-Go-Round. (Neutral) Each player moves his wizard to the position now taken by the player on his left. This card can be used 1D4 times. Hand the card to the player on your right for its next use. Counts as a card in your hand.
Meta-Phasic Shield Stone. (Stone) Stops all fire/heat damage. Protects all carried stones from destruction due to fireball.
Mistaken Identity. (Neutral/Counteraction) Next spell attack on you is redirected to a random wizard other than yourself.
Patch of Darkness. (Neutral/Counteraction/LOS) Fills a square with inky darkness which blocks line of sight, unless a 1 is rolled on a d4. Duration equals NUMBER CARD played.
Pet Goat. (Attack/LOS) This friendly goat can bite for 1 damage. It always stays in the same square as controller. It takes 3 points of damage to kill the goat. The pet goat likes to eat stones. Permanently add +1 HP and +1 damage per stone you feed the goat (from your hand).
Plague of God. (Attack/LOS) A dread disease descends upon all living things. All living things in play take damage equal to NUMBER CARD played, including caster.
Rightful King of the Island Marnon. (Attack) Randomly take as homage 1 card from each player.
Stone to Flesh. (Neutral/LOS) Turns a wall or solid square into bleeding flesh. Wall now has 5 hit points, solid flesh square has 15. Must say, “Eeewww, it’s bleeding!” to work.
The TARDIS. (Neutral/LOS) Your home sector is warped by time and space to become the TARDIS. Move home sector aside and it can only be entered and exited from the TARDIS.
(Probably too annoying to use.)
There’s No Place Like Home. (Neutral/Counteraction) You teleport to your home base. If you have a treasure it remains in your previous square. May not move after playing.
Tommy Gun. (Attack/LOS) A magic wand that does 1d4 physical damage to all targets within 1 square. Number of bursts equals number card played.
Twister of God. (Neutral/LOS) All boards rotate 90 degrees clockwise.
Ventriloquism. (Counteraction) Caster may replace opponent’s spell with an attack from the caster’s hand. Both attack cards are discarded. You are then affected by the card you gave away.
Wrath of God. (Play Now!!!) Every player must play or discard his entire hand on their next turn. He may draw up to seven cards when he is done. PLAY IMMEDIATELY. No counteractions.
Wrest Control. (Attack/LOS) This spell can only be cast on monsters. Control of that monster immediately turns over to the caster. The monster now moves and attacks on the caster’s turn, starting this turn.
We also made changes to a few existing cards:
Butt-Head. (addendum) This card was amended with the text: “OR you may discard this card to retrieve Beavis from the discard pile.”
Fire Imp. (addendum) It’s noted that a river also destroys the imp.
So those were the additions of my Berkeley gaming crew. I know Eric R., Dave S., Donald K., and Dave W. contributed to those, as I’m certain did other members of the group over the years.
Author’s Note: This was written long before the FFG revision of Wiz-War. Sadly, I’ve never played it, so I couldn’t tell you whether any or all of these would integrate into the modern game. —SA, 4/23/13
