Wizards are the second Blue Class in Ivion, from the Calbria expansion. They excel at manipulating their Initiative tokens for great efficiency and dealing high, consistent damage at a long range.
Casting a spell is no simple task. It takes years to refine even the simplest of incantations, decades to render the notions and intricacies muscle memory. And yet, Wizards have perfected their craft nonetheless, able to conjure magic out of thin air from the Ley with staggering consistency. To them, some spells are nothing more than Cantrips.
Wizards bring a new keyword to the fold: Cantrip. When playing Magic Missiles, instead of paying 1 Action and gaining 1 Power, you may instead spend an Initiative token to override the Resource cost and gain, making no change to your Resources at all!
This isn't always a clear choice—it can be very important at times to spend Actions or gain Power—but a Wizard knows that having the option is superior to having none at all.
If you'll be spending Initiatives to play cards instead of moving or drawing cards, you may need a way to generate more. It could quickly prove to be more trouble than its worth to play all these cards with one of your most valuable assets. But Wizards are a bit different than other Classes...
... they can easily generate Initiatives with Manafold!
These can be used normally to great effect, but also funneled into your numerous Cantrip options. The problem is, if you'll be able to play so many cards without paying any Resources, you'll be running low on cards in your hand fairly quickly. Luckily, Wizards also have a solution to this problem. They are academics, after all.
Eureka!
Eureka has a more interesting cost choice than a card like Magic Missiles. Playing Eureka as a Cantrip means that you'll dodge the heavy Power cost, but you'll net gain less cards than you would have otherwise. If you invest in the card, you'll have more potential card draw available to you, but at the cost of most of your Power. Either way, it's great fun to have that moment of clarity!
Now, drawing cards, paying Resource costs with Initiative tokens and gaining more is all well and good, but a Wizard wouldn't have a complete repertoire without a way to zip and zap around the battlefield with fancy starbursts and outlandish displays of magical prowess.
Hold on to your hats, Wizards!
Teleport is personally one of my favorite cards as it thematically and mechanically enables you to take Wizard as one of your Classes as a short range fighter or a long range blaster hero. It makes you highly mobile, and presents an option similar to Eureka, but with movement instead of cards.
You can use it to close the gap as a Knight, or to flicker away as a Wizard proper. You can pay the action cost and then an Initiative to move even closer, or the Cantrip cost to close the last two tiles, or rush away to relative safety. The text may be simple, but the implications are numerous!
So far, we've seen some cool stuff, but nothing big. Well, Wizards also have some powerful spells up their metaphoric (and probably physical) sleeves.
Strike from the stars above!
With such a high Resource cost, its a wonder that this card has Cantrip at all! However, it has a special condition that makes it less effective if it is played using an Initiative instead of its Resource cost. Once again, you'll need to make a choice during game play with this card.
Should you quickly dump it from your hand for a small damage boost, or wait until you can pay the significant cost for somewhat inefficient damage? It may seem modest on paper, but the variable damage and investment levels lead to favorable options as the game nears its end.
There are many more ways to manipulate your Initiatives, draw tons of cards, and even tap into the power of different timelines in more Wizard cards, Traits, and Specialization cards to be revealed!
Play as the calculating and meticulous Wizard in Ivion, the Herocrafting Card Game!
You can find Calbria on Kickstarter, September 1st, 2020. Scroll down to subscribe to more updates!