I’ve written at great length about how to help new players learn, how to be a good opponent, and what to do to be more accommodating and courteous. Today, we’re gonna ‘ave a good time, chuck all of that ‘sportsmanship’ rubbish in the bin, and WIN AT ALL COSTS.

Normal power gamer stuff like taking the meta warband, the meta decks, maybe a netlist that won a recent grand clash; that stuff is child’s play. Anybody can do that. You don’t need my expert opinion to help you put that plan together. What you need is something to take you to the next level, and I have just the dude you need to meet.

Introducing: That Guy. He always wants to win, and doesn’t much care for how he does it, nor does it bother him if you don’t want to play him again. He already beat you anyway, right? Maybe he cheated a little to get it done, but you were probably cheating more anyway. And he deserves to win, because he’s special. He’s That Guy.

You can be too, if you follow these ten weird old tips. Doctors hate him!

Low-Effort Listicle: ENGAGE

1. When Drawing Cards, Treat Yourself

Oops, I drew four objectives to open the game. Guess I’ll just put this one back. It was annihilation, which totally was the fourth and extra one. So I probably should shuffle again – wouldn’t want it to be on the top since I know what it is.

I’m also gonna have to mulligan my power cards. Better draw my new ones before shuffling the old ones back in. Wait, which grip of cards was the old one? Just want to check if the new ones I got are better or worse, you know, for my learning. Just because. Now I’ll put five back in the deck, and we both know it was the correct five. Maybe I only put four back, because that hand DID have Twist the Knife in it. Must have gotten lost in the shuffle.

2. Never declare your dice rolls

It’s your activation: just pick up some dice and roll. Depending on what you get, well that’s which fighter attacked. Different models have swords or hammers, and man it sure is a good thing you picked the three swords guy for this seeing as your rolled so many swords! If you’re lucky, they’ll even roll defense before you’ve clarified who the target was. After you see that roll has two crits, well they’re gonna need to roll it again since you were actually targeting their one shield fighter, not the two dodge guy.

As a side wrinkle, cocked dice? Not defined in the rules, so just do what feels right. That sure looks crit side up to me! I mean, it fell on the floor and is super skewed, but we’re gonna call it a crit. If it’s a surrounded result though, I mean obviously that’s cocked so let’s just roll that one again. Out of a dice tray? I mean maybe you can reroll it, but I did get a hammer and like, we both know that’s a hammer (flanks can totally be rerolled in the tray though, since we’re trying to be above board here after all).

3. Roll First, Ask Questions Later

After you’ve done something, say rolled for an attack, and now you’ve seen the result full of flanks, it’s a great time to say ‘oops, meant to play hidden aid before the charge. Totally reasonable for me to have done that, we both know that’s the smart thing to do and what I had planned. Let’s just slap that on, and now you can roll defense. I have three successes.

4. “Oh I Meant to Do THIS” Style Takebacks

You’re gearing up for an attack, roll the dice, and your opponent has just informed you that they get a defensive reroll, immunity to flanked, extra dice, what-have-you because of something on their warscroll or an upgrade they have equipped. Is that public knowledge, and your responsibility to know? Heck no! That’s a gotcha and bad manners on their part. You totally would have done something different had they been more up-front with you. Just because you rolled a whiff doesn’t mean you can’t take it back and target something else, play a card before the charge, or more. It’s only fair.

5. Heaps of Glory

You score glory as the game goes along, and you put it in your glory pile. Not a row, not a grid, not helpful stacks of 5, just chuck it on the mound. Some of them are spent, some are not, who’s to say? If one gets flipped to say the 5 side instead of 1, maybe it was a mistake, or maybe it wasn’t. You just like seeing a big ole pile of tokens, and while you might enjoy looking over to see how much glory your opponent has, there’s no need to clarify your count for them.

Alternatively, you can stack your tokens. Maybe in stacks of 4 or 6, that’s just your style. Your opponent assuming they’re stacks of five isn’t your problem, and if they make a move thinking they’re ahead or behind by the wrong amount, well, tough cookies. If they actually ask you to count it out, well… you’d never lie to them on purpose, but accidents certainly happen, you know?

6. FAQ-fu

Your abilities have an FAQ or Errata/Rules Update that benefits you? Loudly, proudly state it. Maybe even take it an inch further if they haven’t read the update themselves. Some FAQ’s got published that might dampen your potency? Well, it’s totally unreasonable to remember ALL the changes, after all. Just play whichever wording makes the most sense to you. Your opponent doesn’t like it? They’d better produce the rules document in question since you’ve sure never seen it. In fact, you’re pretty sure THEIR warband/deck was errata’d and doesn’t work like the card text said. Burden of proof is still on them though.

7. What’s in a Deck, Anyway?

Change cards between rounds if something isn’t working out. That’s what winners do, after all, they adapt! It’s nice to keep a substitute nearby, you know, a little extra card up your sleeve. Maybe even literally up your sleeve. Did I say between rounds? Heck, why not between activations? Of course you were going to include Trial of the Tempered. Must have forgotten to shuffle it in. Good thing you didn’t get to the end of the game and forget about it!

Casual banter at the table about cards in your deck or cards in their deck is also totally cool. Maybe they reveal their Restricted card, or tell you they can’t risk that big glory bomb since it’s not consistent enough. Nice intel you just got there! Now you of course won’t be sharing anything like that about your deck – wouldn’t want to tip your hand – but you certainly COULD make some off-hand vague comments about cards implying you have them when you don’t. You’d never lie intentionally of course, but if they so happen to believe you didn’t take Strip the Realm when you did, or that Alone in the Dark is bottom-decked/on the cutting floor when you have it in hand, well that’s no fault of yours.

8. Blame Dice At All Times

So this one isn’t expressly going to help you win, but I wanted to make the list be 10 items long for the aesthetics and it’s also a That Guy classic. Plus, sometimes being annoying and distracting can force a misplay from your opponent, so ham it up, baby!

You have a mastery of the game few can approach. Your plans upon plans would rival the greatest generals of yore – it’s not your genius failing here, it’s your dice. Simultaneously, everybody here knows your opponent has nothing on you. They’d never stand a chance in a fair fight, but their dice have been unreasonably good. They didn’t do that, the dice did. When the dice go your way, that’s just within standard variance, but anything slightly below average is worth complaining about loudly, especially if you gripe to the neighboring table, and then continue to gripe about it for the following hour.

9. Move Distances and Fighter Positions are Subjective

Sure, your fighter has a 4 hex movement characteristic, but it would be really nice it they had 5 right about now. If you tap-tap-tap each hex, it’s pretty obvious how far you can go. But if you just say ‘this guy charges that fightere’, pick them up and put them down, there’s a chance nobody says anything. Get called out on it? you weren’t charging from THAT hex, your guy started in THIS one. Something must have gotten bumped when we were clearing tokens between rounds, man, don’t point your finger at me! Look dude, all I know is I can make this charge – you think I would have done all that stuff in the power step if I couldn’t? Who are you gonna believe, huh? Me, or your lying eyes and unreliable memory?

10. Upgrades Cost Glory, and I’m Sure You Have Enough

We’ve all been there. Your leader has something like 5-6 upgrades on them and they’re all physically overlapping and running off the table. Some of them are probably 2-glory upgrades, but that gets hard to remember. Somebody dies and you got some glory refunded from their upgrades. I don’t remember how much is spent and how much is available, and neither do you. Don’t count them – what are you, a child? You have enough Glory for that Great Fortitude AND Keen Eye, just put them both on. Your opponent isn’t keeping track and won’t ask you to check, since who would do that anyway? I mean, maybe it was an accidental oversight, totally reasonable. Totally reasonable to do multiple times, even.

Wrap

I recognize that this is a comedy article, but I do still have some serious stuff to say.

Obviously, don’t do this. Don’t do any of this.

If your homie does this kind of stuff, shame them (gently) and try to get them to behave a little better. If somebody’s doing this at an event, don’t be afraid to call over the T.O. If you are the T.O., please don’t be afraid to give penalties or call a game loss for the cheater.

I’m personally more into having fun than playing to win, but even if you really are the type to go full tilt and fight for every advantage, you still should want to stay within the bounds of gentlemanly/gentlewomanly competition. If you’re winning at all costs, not only should you ask ‘geez, what was the cost’, but you should also ask yourself, ‘is that really winning?’ I’d wager that no, it’s not. And in your heart, you know it isn’t either.

Fortunately, it’s exceedingly rare that this kind of thing happens in the wider Underworlds community. I have only heard of a couple instances of foul play across nearly a decade since Shadespire – part of why this game is so great is because of the people who play it. So do your part and don’t be That Guy! Now get out there and spend some glory, and don’t forget to ‘ave a good time while you’re at it.