Hello, Gloryseekers!
Jonathan here, with a review of the Universal cards found in the Kainan’s Reapers expansion. Thank you to Games Workshop for providing me a preview copy to review. While I can’t get into the physical contents just yet, I can go over all the cards previewed over at Warhammer Community, and you will be able to pre-order this product on the 22nd of May.
In this article, I will be talking about the 10 universal objectives, 10 universal gambits, and 10 universal upgrades that are included in the Kainan’s Reapers expansion. If you prefer to listen to this review, check us out over here on Podbean.
Note: As per our previous articles, I’ll be using the following rating system.
- A score of “A” means that the card is very powerful and should almost always be included in your deck builds.
- “B” means that the card is strong and will usually be included, but not always.
- A score of “C” means that card can be good in certain situations but will usually require extra support.
- Lastly, a score of “D” means the card is on the weaker side of things. It doesn’t mean that it is inherently bad but perhaps can be considered hard to use or counter intuitive to your game plan.
If you prefer to watch, then check us out on our YouTube channel. Aman might chime in from time to time. If he does, it will mark his name in bold.
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Universal Objectives:
Formidable Prey: This card is decently scorable for high wound warbands like Kainan, Mollog, and Hrothgorn due to popular Quarry cards like Strength of Terror, or for anyone that just wants to take a lot of Quarry cards, but 1 glory probably means it isn’t worth the effort.
Aman: I do think there enough Quarry cards now where you can seriously build a deck around it and do quite well. Mostly with Starblood Stalkers but I think a bunch of warbands can do it.
Rating: C
Futile Hunt: I think the first part of this card is a bit too hard to score, even for Warbands like the Dread Pageant that start with a Quarry, and there are better options. For the second condition, it’s too difficult to apply Hunger to enemy fighters, and you can’t count on playing vs the Crimson Court every game.
Aman: Hrothgorn players are gonna love this one LOL
Rating: D
Immortal Hunger: A very niche card that really only the Crimson Court can consider, but is still much too hard, if not impossible to score.
Rating: D
Peerless Hunter: This card is fairly easy to score for warbands that are decent at Primacy and have at least 1-2 sources of Cleave or Ensnare built into their attacks, but competes with all of the other “have the primacy token” objectives.
Rating: C
Perfect Strike: I think this card is actually fairly strong in any meta where you expect to get a solid number of kills over the course of a game, especially for for warbands that have naturally high damage and attack on 2 smash, or have a lot of re-rolls, since about half your successful attacks should meet this condition.
Aman: Completely agree, this reminds me of Steady Aim in a way. It’s not the most efficient card but I can see this being scored in an aggro build more often than you’d think.
Rating: B
Primal Assertion: An interesting surge card that may find a place in Primacy decks that seek to both gain and discard Primacy often but is likely too difficult to accomplish for decks that aren’t built around this.
Rating: D
Proud Commander: This card is actually fairly easy for a lot of warbands to score, but the 3rd end phase condition is a bit too slow for my liking (it will clog your deck up), and I think there are better options for 2 glory.
Aman: I actually think this is quite doable. If your warband struggles with end phase stuff, this could be a nice glory multiplier if you can spare holding it from time time between rounds.
Rating: C
Sated Hunger: A niche card for those looking to stack and then spend Hunger.
Rating: D
Scant Resources: I think the second condition is too hard to really consider (if you go second, the opponent is very likely to have unspent glory in round 1, and in rounds 2-3 the amount of glory both players have is very likely to outpace their ways to spend it), but the first is something to consider in a meta where lots of players are holding objectives, or in a deck that is trying to remove/flip objectives, but is somewhat overshadowed by Coveted Spoils, unless you want to take both.
Aman: I feel like Hrothgorn is going to love the second condition on this one. He actually plays Feed the Beastgrave style decks very well without actually trying to score Feed the Beastgrave. Also, my dream of playing a Gitz deck with Infestation sees a but more viable… kinda.
Rating: C
Tale of Victory: This card requires you to wipe out the opponent’s warband, and only have hunters left yourself, so it’s basically a niche Hunter only version of Annihilation, which is too hard to score, and if you do score it, you probably already won the game.
Rating: D
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Universal Gambits:
Call to Hunt: This is an interesting effect, but I don’t think it’s worth discarding the Primacy token, and is limited by having to get the Primacy token in the first place just to play it. Hunting Season is much better if you are looking for something like this.
Rating: D
Carnivores All: An interesting card mostly because it allows you to inspire the entire Spiteclaw’s Swarm warband with one card…otherwise pretty bad unless you need Hunger for something.
Aman: Skaven low key might be top tier now.
Rating: D
Eternal Chase: A very neat card for the slower warbands, and a cool bit of anti-speed package tech that could be very annoying for the faster warbands. I think the main weakness with this card is that it doesn’t play well with your own versions of Spectral Wings and so on, but you should be able to plan around that as needed.
Aman: I’m a bit more high on this one. I think this card could be possibly be best tech piece we’ve ever seen. Great for slower, elite warbands and bad for faster moving warbands. I expect to see this one a lot.
Rating: C
Great Tremors: The math on this card says you have about a 40% chance to roll no crits, 60% to roll at least 1, and 19% chance to roll 2+. I think this makes it a bit too random for my liking, but the lack of a range restriction may make it worth thinking about for a Feed the Beastgrave deck.
Rating: C
Keila’s Clarion: Double channel spells are almost too hard to cast to be worth taking, and although this effect is fairly interesting, I don’t think it is an exception to that rule.
Rating: D
Mazzig’s Machinations: An interesting bit of anti-objective tech. I think this card could lead to some cool moments with wizards flipping multiple objectives at once and denying enemy scoring, but it’s a little hard to cast, and I’m not sure that it has much synergy with what most of the magic warbands are trying to do.
Rating: D
Quintok’s Quarrel: For a level 2 wizard, this is about a 44% chance to work (88% to cast, then 50% to win the roll), and provides a fairly powerful effect. I think it is too random at the end of the day, but it’s a cool concept.
Rating: D
Roar of Defiance: In general I think holding on the Primacy token and being a quarry is a good thing, so I don’t really think this card is worth putting a fighter on guard.
Rating: D
Sanity Siphon: This card is a very interesting design space, and could be quite annoying for fighters with ranged attacks. I suspect it may not be worth the deck slot very often, but it’s cool.
Aman: The 50/50 turns me off from this card.
Rating: C
Untapped Resources: An interesting way to gain the Primacy token, or spend the token for card draw. I think it is decent, and might see play in larger warbands that are good at holding objectives if we didn’t have better card draw options.
Rating: C
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Universal Upgrades:
Armour of Disdain: This card is another source of Quarry, but I find the other effects fairly weak in general.
Rating: D
Driven by Envy: I like the design space on this card, but with so many other sources of +1 dice, or dice rerolls in the current meta, I don’t think it will see much play.
Rating: C
Driven by Hunger: An interesting card that you might consider for Crimson Court in order to both score speed cards and inspire a fighter, but there are probably better options.
Aman: Crab!!!
Rating: C
Eye for Weakness: Sadly I’m not really sure why you would want the enemy players to be quarry’s in the first place, and even if you did, it’s too hard to get Hunger counters on them.
Rating: D
Inured by Hunger: A very solid defensive upgrade for the Crimson Court, or anyone taking a lot of Hunger cards. You will probably only get one use of this effect, and you do telegraph this durability by applying the upgrade, but it makes them very hard to kill if they have 2+ Hunger counters, and is great if the opponent really only has one viable target.
Rating: B
Painful Brilliance: A very powerful defense card for warbands that are likely to get and keep the Primacy counter. Very annoying on fighters like Mollog or Hrothgorn.
Aman: I think this is a sleeper. I have a feeling it’s going to be very good in the upcoming meta. Might need a FaR list to make room for it.
Rating: B
Primal Lunge: A powerful upgrade reminiscent of Ready for Action. The better you are at Primacy, the more you like this one, and the ability to charge, kill, gain primacy, react, attack, kill, and regain primacy is pretty cool for warbands like Madmob.
Aman: *cackles manically*
Rating: A
Silent Shield : Another Silent Relic, this one does the least on its own, though it has a very strong effect while in enemy territory. The guard effect is nice, but I think there are easier ways to get guard, so you might not consider this card unless you are playing with A LOT of Silent Relics.
Rating: C
Soundless Step: A very nice upgrade similar to Duellist’s Speed, but probably better, since it can be used after any action (move, guard, charge, fighter card action, etc) during an activation rather than just attack actions.
Rating: B
Wicked Lash: A very neat weapon upgrade that goes from okay to decent to great based on how many wounds are in the mix. I’m not exactly sure how this compares to some of the other weapon options out there, but I think I will at least give this one a try.
Rating: B
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Closing Thoughts:
In general, I think the cards found in this expansion are fairly low in power. Primal Lunge is probably the best card in the set, with a few more being worth considering for specific play styles, and perhaps a few others will be useful for those of you playing the vanguard format. I think it’s difficult to rate cards in the current meta–with so many powerful cards in the mix right now, new cards have to be very strong in order to stand out, and anything that doesn’t compete with the best of the best will find it difficult to see play.
Overall, I think Kainan’s Reaper’s is a very cool expansion for Primal Lunge, the Warband itself, and perhaps for more Vanguard options, but I don’t think you buy it just for the universals.
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As always, thank you to Games Workshop for providing us with preview copies. Be sure to head on down to your local Warhammer Store or FLGS to pre-order yourself a set. If you prefer to shop online, check this out here on Saturday.
As always, best of luck on YOUR Path to Glory.
Jonathan
