(Updated March 13, 2020 - All Enchants now present!)

In SkyWeaver, we have a unique system of attached Spells on characters. Units and Heroes can hold Spells that you can cast to gain their effects, enabling a wide range of powerful effects and combinations.

The inverse of such attached Spells are Enchantments/Enchants, a form of attachment which generally have no effect when “played” by paying their cost, but rather, have ongoing passive effects on the character they become attached to. When you pay to "play" an attached Enchant, you are actually paying to remove the Enchant, and free the Enchanted character from its effects.

Note that any attachment on a character, whether a Spell or Enchant, will be overwritten by any new Spell or Enchant that becomes attached to that character.

We have sixteen unique Enchants in SkyWeaver. There is one positive Enchant and one negative Enchant for each of the eight elements in the game - Air, Dark, Earth, Fire, Light, Metal, Mind, and Water.

Roots

Our negative Earth Enchant Roots costs 3 Mana to remove and prevents the character it is attached to from attacking. This limits that character's ability to be used to fight back against enemy Units. Using Mana to remove Roots will slow down a player's game plan, limiting how they can use their Mana for other plays, but until they do, their Unit will largely remain dead weight. Roots is less effective when used against Units with Guard, because players are already forced to attack and destroy those Units if they want to reach their opponent’s Hero.

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Flames

Our negative Fire Enchant Flames costs 2 Mana to remove, and deals 2 damage to the character it is attached to at the start of that character’s turn. As a result, even if you are able to remove Flames, it will often have already damaged the character it is attached to, potentially destroying it. As a result of this, it's often not worth saving a Unit with Flames on it, because it may already have been damaged too badly. When attached to a Hero, Flames becomes a recurring drain on your health turn after turn, and typically needs to be dealt with, though it can be worth staying on fire for a few turns if you have better plays you need to make with your mana so as not to fall behind.

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Frozen

Our negative Water Enchant Frozen costs 4 Mana to remove. A character with Frozen will take 2 additional damage whenever it would take any damage. If a Frozen Unit takes 2 damage, it will take 4 damage instead. If it takes 1 Wither damage, it will take 3 Wither damage instead, giving it -3/-3, and so on. Frozen and Armor apply on the same layer—that is to say, if an Armor Unit has Frozen, and would take 1 damage, it will take 2 damage, rather than 3 or 0. Because of Frozen’s high-impact effect, Units that are Frozen are often destroyed before their user has a chance to counteract Frozen.

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Hex

Our negative Dark Enchant Hex costs 6 Mana to remove. A character with Hex attached will take 6 damage at the end of its owner’s turn, after which point the Hex will disappear. Because of the extremely high cost to remove Hex, and the fact that it triggers at the end of one’s own turn, it is often advisable to try to use a Hexed Unit to trade with and destroy an enemy Unit or attack the enemy Hero, then allow it to be destroyed, rather than spend 6 Mana to save it. Likewise, if a Hex is on your Hero, it can often be better to take 6 damage, rather than pay 6 to remove the Hex, to avoid losing tempo.

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Chains

Our negative Metal Enchant Chains cannot be removed by paying Mana, but can be overwritten by other Spells or Enchant, as all Enchant and Spells can be. A character with Chains attached to it will lose all its combat keywords, and will be unable to gain or have keywords for as long as it has chains - see our Blogpost on Keywords for more info. Even if its Chains is removed/replaced, the character chains was attached to will not regain any keywords that it had before Chains was attached to it, though it can gain new keywords afterward. Chains is awesome for cutting defensive Units down to size by depriving them of their Armor, exposing Stealth Units, and clearing Guard Units out of the way of your attacks on the enemy Hero.

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Dazed

Our negative Mind Enchant Dazed costs 1 mana to remove. At the start of its owner’s turn, a character with Dazed will be put to sleep, causing it to miss its attack that turn (even if Dazed is later removed). Dazed is hard to counter entirely, since it will almost always have applied its put-to-sleep effect before you have a chance to remove it, but on the other hand, it is easier to remove than something like Roots, so it tends not to be too dangerous overall.

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Blind

Our negative Light Enchant Blind costs 5 mana to remove. A character with Blind can only attack its rightmost enemy, which will always be either the enemy hero, or their most recently summoned Unit with Guard, making Blind Units less useful at destroying enemy Units, since they have only one option as to what they can attack. However, Blind is typically not as detrimental as a more dangerous Enchant like Flames, since it does not immediately harm the Unit it is attached to.

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Silence

Our negative Air Enchant Silence cannot be removed by paying Mana, but can be overwritten by other Spells and Enchants. A character with Silence loses all its triggered effects, such as Death, Glory, and Inspire, as well as any unique effects it may have, but not any combat keywords, like Banner and Armor (you can learn more about combat keywords here). This makes Silence an amazing means of disabling powerful effect-focused units, but its less useful where combat is concerned.

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Shield

Our positive Light Enchant Shield cannot be removed by paying Mana. The first time a character with Shield would take combat damage - that's any damage dealt when it attacks or is attacked by another unit or hero, that damage will be prevented, and then the Shield will dust itself. Shield is fantastic for letting your units trade into enemy units, getting a free hit without taking any damage themselves.

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Barrier

Our positive Mind Enchant Barrier It cannot be removed by paying Mana, and can be thought of as the inverse of Shield. The first time a character with Barrier would take damage from from non-combat source, like a Spell or Unit's effect, that damage will be prevented, and then Barrier will dust itself. Barrier is fantastic for preventing damage from opposing spread damage effects, or your own, as well as negating single-target damage-based removal. Methods to counter Barrier can include overwriting destroying Units with it via combat, or using Spells that outright destroy or remove Units, rather than those that deal damage.

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Shroud

Our positive Air Enchant Shroud cannot be removed by paying Mana. A character with Shroud cannot be targeted by any Spells or Play effects of Units your enemy uses, but Shroud is dusted at the start of your turn, meaning it only protects the Unit it is attached to for a single turn. Shroud offers a good resistance to many removal Spells, as characters holding it cannot be targeted by Spells that would return them to hand, or destroy them outright, or Spells that deal damage to a target. However, it does not protect the character it is attached to from being attacked, or from being affected by Spells or effects that do not target them. As an example, it is still possible to damage and destroy Shroud Units via spread damage effects that don’t target, like Forest Fire.

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Animosity

Our positive Earth Enchant Animosity has absolutely no effect while attached to a Unit, but as soon as it is dusted, by being overwritten by another Spell or Enchant, or by paying 5 Mana to remove it, Animosity will give +2 attack and +2 health to the character that was holding it. This can open up lots of synergies with the other Enchants, since you can overwrite it with other Enchants like Chains, Spell Shield, or Shroud, or even something like Flames, to power up your Units without having to actually pay to remove Animosity.

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Fate

Our positive Dark Enchant Fate cannot be removed by paying Mana. When one of your Units with Fate dies, you will draw a card of that Unit's element (Fire, Water, Earth, etc.) This allows you to get more value out of your Units, but Fate can be countered by being overwritten or via dusting the Unit it's attached to, so it's best to be cautious, as Fate is not a guaranteed return on investment if your opponent knows how to play around it.

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Lead

Our positive Metal Enchant Lead cannot be removed by paying Mana. Lead is unique in that its only ability is that it cannot be removed by any means while attached. Trying to replace it with another attachment, effects that dust attachments, etc. will all fail against Lead, which makes it a solid defense against negative Enchants, like Flames and Frozen, but also a bit of a double-edged sword, since you also cannot replace it with something more valuable like a Barrier or Shield. Note that while Lead typically cannot be replaced/removed, if a Unit was given Lead, and then leaves play via being destroyed, returned to hand, etc. Lead will be removed, since when a card leaves play, it is reset to its base state.

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Quest

Our positive Fire Enchant Quest cannot be removed by paying Mana. When a character with Quest attacks and damages a hero, Quest will give the character that held it +1/+1, draw you a 1-cost card, and then dust itself. Quest is a powerful one-use Enchant if you can get it to trigger, but like all Glory abilities, it's also fairly easy for your opponent to counter it by destroying or disabling your unit before it can successfully attack, so watch out!

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Vapors

Our positive Water Enchant Vapors has no effect while attached to a character, but like Animosity, as soon as it is dusted, whether by being overwritten by another Spell or Enchant, or by paying 2 Mana to remove it, Vapors will give +2 health to your hero, and let you draw a card. However, if the unit holding vapors is destroyed or otherwise leaves play, the Vapors will be lost, and you won't get any hp, or draw a card, so watch out!

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Note that the design of our Enchants is an ongoing process, so some details and effects of them may change as time goes on.

That's all for this post, check back soon for more SkyWeaver info!

Lethal Puzzle

See if you can figure out how to defeat your opponent using the game state presented below. However, there's a twist this time - you are allowed to pass your turn, but you must make sure your opponent is defeated as soon as their turn starts. Hint: (Try to make use of the Enchant Flames to finish them off!) Solution will be in the next post!

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The solution to our last post's lethal puzzle is also right below! Congratulations to everyone who solved it!

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Next: Post 5 - Prisms

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