The Mage Guild

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The Mage Guild represents a faction built on versatility, teamwork, magical mastery, and specialized roles. Unlike factions that rely on a single overwhelming strength, the Mage Guild brings together an eclectic collection of mages, warriors, healers, protectors, constructs, and magical creatures whose abilities are designed to complement one another.

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No single member represents everything the Guild can do. Some unleash devastating spells from a distance, others manipulate the battlefield or restore wounded allies, while dedicated Tanks stand between the enemy and the Guild's more vulnerable members. The strength of the Mage Guild comes from understanding what each member does best—and putting the right Mage in the right place at the right time.

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A well-coordinated Mage Guild team can adapt to almost any opponent. A poorly positioned one can quickly find its powerful specialists exposed and overwhelmed.

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The Mage Guild — Core Units

• Essa: A powerful offensive mage and one of the Guild's premier spellcasters. Essa specializes in magical ranged attacks, using Mystic Missiles and Arcane Blast to threaten individual enemies or groups. Her Arcane Armor gives her limited protection, while Forbidden Study allows her to dramatically amplify her magical offense when the situation demands it.

• Nona: A master of mist magic and battlefield manipulation. Nona uses Mist Armor to protect herself while Mist Bolt provides a reliable magical attack. Shifting Mist allows her to reposition across the battlefield, while her Wall of Mist and more powerful magic allow her to interfere with enemy positioning and control important areas.

• Krystal & Ali: A psychic Mage accompanied by her Psychic Familiar, Ali. Together they specialize in mental attacks, support, and disruption. Their abilities allow them to pressure enemy Willpower, assist allies, and create unusual tactical problems that conventional weapons cannot always solve.

• Midknight: One of the Guild's dedicated Tanks. Armed with her sword and shield, Midknight protects vulnerable Guild members by placing herself directly between them and danger. Unlike many Guild members, she is built to withstand close combat and give the rest of the team room to perform their roles.

• Sam: A Mimic and perhaps one of the strangest members of the Mage Guild. Sam is a Tank who protects his friends through lockdown rather than interception. His MINE! ability can drag enemies—including enemies already fighting his allies—into combat with him. Once Sam has claimed an opponent through Possessive, escaping him becomes a problem all its own. Sam can hold multiple enemies simultaneously, allowing one very determined treasure chest to occupy a surprising amount of the opposing force.

• Guild Specialists: The Mage Guild contains healers, summoners, magical constructs, engineers, and other specialists whose abilities fill gaps in a team. These units reinforce the Guild's central philosophy: there is rarely one magical solution to every problem, so bring someone who knows the right one.

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Core Faction Mechanics

1. Specialized Roles: Mage Guild units tend to have clearly defined battlefield jobs. Damage dealers, Tanks, Supports, Controllers, and other specialists each contribute something different. The faction is strongest when these roles are combined rather than when individual Characters are expected to handle every situation themselves.

2. Magical Versatility: Magic within the Guild takes many forms. Arcane missiles, mist manipulation, psychic attacks, healing, teleportation, summoning, defensive enchantments, and magical constructs all exist under the same banner. This gives the Mage Guild an unusually broad collection of tools for responding to different opponents.

3. Team Synergy: Mage Guild Characters are often at their best when another member of the team is enabling them. Tanks protect fragile spellcasters, Supports keep important Characters fighting, Controllers interfere with enemy plans, and damage dealers capitalize on the opportunities their allies create.

4. Battlefield Control: The Guild does not need to solve every problem through damage. Walls, movement effects, teleportation, control abilities, summons, and other forms of magic allow the Guild to manipulate how a battle develops and force opponents to respond.

5. Fate-Fueled Magic: Fate is particularly valuable to the Mage Guild because many of its Characters possess powerful abilities that can dramatically alter a situation. Managing Fate carefully is often the difference between having the perfect magical answer available and realizing you spent it one activation too early.

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Strengths

• Exceptional Versatility: The Mage Guild can build teams capable of dealing with a wide variety of battlefield situations. Its roster provides access to damage, protection, healing, control, movement, and magical utility.

• Powerful Specialists: Individual Guild members can be extremely effective within their intended roles. Protecting those specialists and allowing them to perform their jobs can produce devastating results.

• Strong Team Synergy: Mage Guild units complement one another exceptionally well. A Tank protecting a spellcaster or a Controller creating an opportunity for a damage dealer can be considerably more powerful than either Character acting alone.

• Excellent Battlefield Control: The Guild has numerous ways to influence positioning and disrupt enemy plans without simply trying to destroy every opposing unit.

• Multiple Forms of Protection: The Guild's defensive options are not limited to Armor. Shields, magical defenses, healing, battlefield control, Tanks, summons, and repositioning can all contribute to keeping important Characters alive.

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Weaknesses

• Specialist Dependency: Specialization is both the Guild's greatest strength and one of its greatest weaknesses. Losing a key Tank, Support, Controller, or damage dealer can remove an important capability from the team.

• Vulnerable Backline: Many of the Guild's strongest spellcasters are not designed to survive prolonged close combat. Fast opponents that bypass the frontline can create serious problems.

• Positioning Intensive: The Mage Guild rewards careful placement. Tanks need to be where they can protect allies, Controllers need useful angles and ranges, and spellcasters need space to work. Poor positioning can cause the entire team to unravel.

• Fate Management: The Guild has many tempting ways to spend Fate. Using powerful abilities too freely can leave a player without the resources needed for a critical ability later in the round.

• Complexity: The Mage Guild has answers to many problems, but the player must recognize which answer to use. Compared with more straightforward factions, getting the most from the Guild requires understanding how its Characters interact.

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The Mage Guild Playstyle

Playing the Mage Guild is about assembling the right team and making its members greater than the sum of their parts.

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The Guild does not ask every Character to do everything.

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Let the Tank hold the enemy.

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Let the Controller disrupt their plans.

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Let the Support keep everyone fighting.

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And when the opportunity appears, let the Mage remind everyone why throwing fireballs is a perfectly reasonable solution to a tactical problem.

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The Mage Guild rewards players who enjoy options, combinations, positioning, and adapting their strategy as the battle changes. There is rarely only one answer to a problem—and a good Guild player usually has another spell waiting when the first plan fails.

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Other factions may overwhelm you with numbers.

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Others may endure through sheer toughness.

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Others may simply charge straight into the fight.

 

The Mage Guild prefers another approach:

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There is a spell for that.