The Guild Dwarves are another member of the original “big three” Summoner Wars factions. Unlike the Tundra Orcs, Oldin’s deck is more defensive as his commons are squishier. It’s still very strong though as they have an insane choice of events and champions. This guide will go into more detail on how to play him well. It will not include second summoner units and mercenaries. Those will probably be added in an update to this post once I have had experience with them. Summoner Wars is a game by Plaid Hat Games. It’s available on android / iOS / Vassal.
Basic idea
Oldin and his Guild Dwarves have one obvious strength: They are very good at wall destruction. They have two events that do three damage to all enemy walls, several commons and champions specifically geared for wall destruction and Heroic Feat / Gror for some more (area) damage. In short: You can *very* quickly take down walls. This is somewhat balanced out by most of his units not being the best in terms of attack dice and health compared to some other factions. Another weakness is that his assassination tool set is pretty limited, which means he often has to win the economic war to win the game. Luckily he has some of the best tools for this as he has four catch-up events.
All this together means Oldin is best not played too aggressively from the start. Especially against aggressive factions like the Tundra Orcs or the Mountain Vargath you need to be pretty defensive initially and switch to offense later in the game. Against more defensive factions you can be aggressive immediately, but I’d still recommend killing some of your own units / getting good trades to start winning the economic war.
Basic tactic and combo suggestions:
– Reinforcements can be placed next to these freshly placed walls, so you can suddenly have two more free units next to a wall you just summoned. This can be used in combination with in example Heroic Feat to give a spearman 5 ranged dice.
– People will often underestimate your sudden damage potential, especially with Heroic Feat (which doesn’t *need* to be used on Gror). Especially against walls, keep in mind how the board would be if that wall would suddenly disappear and check whether you can make that happen easily.
– Don’t underestimate the Defender’s ability. Locking down an enemy unit from moving for a turn can be instrumental in all kinds of situations to set up all kinds of things (like locking them in place for a next turn Gror summon or simply keeping Oldin safe when attacking something). And it can stop units from moving past the Defender.
Deck build (17 / 18 magic for the champions / commons)
– 1 Grog
– 1 Baldar
– 1 Thorkur
– 6 Defender (2 initially)
– 6 Spearman (2 initially)
– 1 Engineer (1 initially)
– 3 Ballista
– 2 Guardsman
Gror is an auto include for obvious reasons. Halvar is a champion I don’t like much, so that leaves four more for the other two slots. One important consideration is that Gror is not that strong one on one against other champions so I want at least one anti-champion champion. Baldar and Grugnor are the obvious choice for that role as the other two champions are more support like. Of these two I prefer Baldar because he’s very cheap and very good against champions with three or more dice. Between the last three it’s close. Grugnor his four dice are excellent and make him a decent anti big health champion, but his ability is not that useful offensively and he has relatively low health. Tordok is best used as a support champion for commons, but right now I don’t really feel this deck needs that most. For that reason I’m using Thorkur, mostly for his three ranged and he’s very hard to kill if you are using him from a (safe) distance.
For the commons it’s pretty hard. With Reinforcements you want to use two cost commons, but both Defenders and Spearman are excellent one cost commons. And Guardman are pretty bad. However, I did include a few as they can be pretty useful to wall block while you are killing their walls or to serve as a meat shield to protect your summoner. I’d still only very situational summon them without Reinforcements. Ballista’s I feel are useful against defensive factions as you can destroy walls safely from your own side; which is especially useful against the Benders. And they can be pretty decent wall blockers (with Reinforcements) if necessary. Engineers are relatively useless as Spearman hit all cards at one distance for two damage, so I prefer using those. The rest of the common slots are (not surprisingly) filled with Defenders (tactical positioning excellence) and Spearmen (2 attack dice for 1 magic and ranged abilities).
Playing the faction
If you are playing an aggressive faction, it’s a good idea to kill the Engineer yourself as he won’t be hitting any walls anyway. In that case I’d recommend taking potshots with the Spearmen while repositioning the Defenders to protect them and slow down the opponent’s offense. Killing off the Spearmen after shooting with them to Magic Drain / get an early champion out is also a good idea in that situation. If you are playing a more defensive faction you can move your units forward more aggressively to start hugging their walls. Leaving the Engineer alive in that scenario can also be good as he will be doing the most initial damage against the enemy wall. You can also move Oldin forward as he’s pretty tanky as long as he’s next to any wall. However, remember to keep building some magic as an offensive like this really requires extra units where necessary to block off all wall positions / deal with a counter attack.
When playing defensively it’s often best to not summon anything until you can get out a big champion / ballista as this will also give you the most chance to get a Magic Drain and / or Reinforcements combo off. Your first units will be your lifeline till then / can give some extra magic. And once you do get that big champion out / your catch up events, you can often switch to the offensive. If you are playing a common heavy faction look for Gror; also consider using a Hero is Born to get him as just the threat alone will influence how your opponent will be playing. Just remember that Gror works best alone, so you will need some defense near your summoner as well. If possible hang on to your Heroic Feat’s to use them with Gror, but if they are really clogging your hand it’s ok to use them for an instant kill with a lesser unit. Finally, focus on specific goals when being offensive. For instance, taking down one wall or killing a specific common (even with the guild dwarves, killing commons is often still much easier magic then killing walls).
Besiege the Walls is a key event card, especially in offensive situations. Ideally I’d like to use it to finish off one or more walls that turn so I get the magic. It hitting only one wall isn’t necessarily bad as long as you get something more out of that. Holding on to it for a short while isn’t that bad as you can often set up a strong combo for a future turn (i.e. summon, destroy wall, walk through that spot and attack enemy summoner). If you get to the end game with the Guild Dwarves, you should have a magic or champion advantage. If not, you are probably in trouble as Oldin isn’t that good one on one against other summoners. Ideally you will have summoned all three champions as Magic Drain makes it relatively easy to get enough magic to do so. Especially Baldar and Thorkur shine in the end game as they are pretty sturdy against big champions. Gror instead is pretty useless in the end game as he only hits for two dice one on one. Also remember that you have no magic gain ability like some factions, so be more offensive against those where necessary.
Match up analysis
I might do a faction by faction analysis eventually, but I’ll start this off with a few general observations. Factions that have a wall mechanic are great match-ups due to Besiege the Walls. Secondly, factions with heavy common play are great match-ups due to Gror. Finally, factions that are pretty defensive like the Deep Dwarves, Benders and the Filth aren’t bad match-ups due to the wall destruction options Oldin has. Phoenix Elves is probably the toughest match up.
First summoner specific cards
| Card | Deck | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Base | Oldin isn't one of the strongest summoners around. His ability can be useful though as it increases his effective health to 9 (the number of dice to kill him goes from 9 to 12) when next to a wall. Also note that this can be an enemy wall, so it's often a good idea to try hugging an enemy wall if you are playing aggressively. |
 | Base (x2) | This card is insanely good against any faction that uses low health walls (Swamp Orcs, Tundra Orcs). Against other factions I'd still often recommend using it as it's very useful to unexpectedly destroy someone's walls or make using abilities that take advantage of wall health much more dangerous. Also consider how many walls are out. If two or three are out, you'll be doing 6 or 9 instant damage on those walls (which generally is worth it). The only situation in which I'd probably build it, is if I'm playing a very offensive faction with full health walls, in that case the built magic is more useful. |
 | Base (x2) | You should generally not build this event as it can be very useful pretty much anywhere in the game to get way more dice on a target. With Gror this event is pretty much broken against multiple targets as you can get six dice on everything in a two square radius (12 squares). Without Gror it's still very good. |
 | Base (x2) | As always with Magic Drain, it's very good. Not much else to say about it other then that it's generally a good idea to try kill your own units to threaten to play this the next turn. Don't be too afraid to build it it's clear your opponent won't ever let that occur though (or use it to get 1 magic instead of 2). |
 | Base (x2) | Reinforcements is especially useful with high magic cost commons and can be used with a freshly placed walls for a surprise attack. Do note that you need to have those commons in your hand so you'll need three cards in hand to use this most effectively. Magic wise you are paying 3 magic (1 event card + 2 commons you can't build) for 2 commons on the board so it's cost effective if you can summon at least two 1 cost units (which would cost 4 magic normally). If you have to choose between building Magic Drain or Reinforcements I'd generally build Reinforcements. |
 | Base (x1) | Like in most factions this is a situational card to use. A reason to use it could in example be if you need Gror and you have two Heroic Feat's in hand. Or if you have a champion in the deck that needs to be summoned early to be effective. Otherwise build it. |
Generic cards
| Card | Deck | SSCF* | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
 | Base | -1 | Gror is easily the best Guild Dwarves champion due to his special and it's incredible synergy with one or even two Heroic Feats. Even without it his special ability is very useful as within two spaces means he can hit 12 squares. Naturally opponents will try to play around that, which is almost impossible when he's not yet been summoned (so it can useful to wait a few turns before actually summoning him). And when he is, it'll give you lots of space to do what you want. Just remember he also hits his own units, so he's pretty bad at wall crowding. And don't expect him to beat champions with more dice one on one. His strength is his area attack. Note: You can also hit your own walls / units to trigger his effect at a specific point you want to hit. |
 | Base | 0 | His hitpoints can be valued according to what is attacking him. Against a 1 dice attacker, he has 4 hitpoints (6 attacks). Against a 2 dice attacker he effectively has 6 hitpoints (roughly 4-5 attacks). Against 3 dice attackers doing 3 damage against him costs 3-4 attacks, which is roughly 8 hitpoints if you include the effort to do the extra 1 damage (6-7 attacks if you need to hit him twice, which is 13 hitpoints roughly). And against 4 dice attackers it costs 5 attacks to kill him on average (13 effective hitpoints). For his cost and attack power this means he's an interesting champion unless you are facing a faction that can easily do extra damage like the Phoenix Elves. |
 | Base | -1 | Another interesting champion. With his changed mechanic (can only block one wound) he's no longer as powerful as he was. However, he's still interesting due to his three ranged attack. His ability can keep him alive longer, but won't safe him from concentrated attacks, so keep him safe. The one magic for one wound is something which I consider to be an average ability as you are basically paying 1 magic for 1 health. It can however be worthwhile to use one magic to get another three dice in (or if you have no further use for the magic). Note: He can also block Burn. |
 | Base (x8) | 0 | Very useful common as it can be used to lock down enemy units while other units hit the enemy unit from ranged. And you can in example have Oldin hitting an enemy wall while a defender blocks the enemy units from getting next to Oldin. Also, any unit like a Lioneer or Cavalry knight will get stopped when moving past a Defender. Basically use it to control the battleground / defend your more important units and as it is only one cost it can be worth it to summon them where necessary. |
 | Base (x6) | 0 | Another good common. Their 1 attack at range with 1 health isn't that good, but they make up for it by getting two dice if attacking close by. If used in conjuction with Defenders you can also safely throw one dice from range. Do remember they only have one health though, so I'd be careful about summoning them where they can be taken out for magic easily. |
 | Base (x4) | -1 | An interesting common. I'd call them situational as you won't have any use for these if you are defending from an aggressive faction. However if you are doing the aggression then they can be an extremely cheap way of throwing a lot of dice on the enemy walls. Once again remember that they only have one health though, so using them against in example the Phoenix Elves (Burn) can be very cost inefficient. |
 | Base (x3) | ||
 | Reinf | 0 | Four dice for six magic. Yet another hard hitting champion which his attack dice alone make him useful to use. His five health is a bit low for his magic cost. The worst thing I'd say is his ability, which I'd recommend to mostly use to quickly move him around to where he's needed. Unless you have defenders around to protect him. If you are using him offensively he will often die before he can attack the next turn. |
 | Reinf | 1 | This champion I don't like. Eight life is nice, but one attack is really bad for five magic. And if you rage him twice you only have four hitpoints left and are once again back on 1 dice after that round. There are much better champions around for the guild dwarves. A plus punt though is that he can be adapted according to the situation. If you need one, two or three dice, you can choose when to get that amount. |
 | Reinf | -1 | Two ranged dice for five magic and four health is slightly expensive. His ability is very useful if you are using commons effectively as it reduces their chance to be hit from 67% to 33% (a two health unit will take six dice to kill instead of three on aveage). Otherwise it's completely useless. This is one champion you really need to keep safe or you'll lose him quickly. He's interesting to use with in example Ballista's. |
 | Reinf (x5) | 0 | I don't really like this common very much. Yeah, it has three health and a special ability which makes it so you need on average six dice to kill one, however it doesn't do much in terms of damage and it costs two magic (three if you count not building the card itself). For two of these you could have a good champion out. Only reason I'd consider including a few of these is if I'm going champion heavy and I want to get some expensive meat shields out with Reinforcements. |
 | Reinf (x5) | 1 | These are pretty interesting. You can very quickly punish a very defensive player (like Tacullu) as these can most of the time hit a wall from their own side of the battlefield. And they have three health, so there aren't that many ranged units that can take them out in one go. Still they are pretty expensive, so try to get them out with Reinforcements. Or if you are playing a very defensive faction, summon it manually. Note: You can hit anything at five distance, so you can also use them to in example ping a summoner. |
 | Second | 2 | For now this champion is only really interesting in Bolvi's deck as it's inability to move makes it easy to work around unless you can use the events that Bolvi can. |
 | Second | -1 | This champion would fit great into a deck specialized in wall destruction as it gives you four attack against walls for five magic. In any other deck, he's probably not worth it as 2 attack die for 5 magic is not good. |
 | Second | 0 | This is one of those very rare support champions. What makes me somewhat interested in this champion is that the common doesn't need to be adjacent to Ulfric, but that it's good enough to be adjacent to the wall Ulfric is next to. The idea I assume is to clog walls with commons and use Ulfric to protect the commons clogging the walls (this will also make that wall harder to hit!). His stat line isn't great, but pretty decent considering it's a (rare) ranged champion. |
 | Second (x8) | 0 | This is a pretty interesting common as it will give you two AV and two health for one magic against units that cost two or more to summon. It's weakness are summoners, zero / one summon cost commons / champions and units that kill it in one hit. |
 | Second (x5) | 0 | This is one of those units you either factor very heavily in your strategy around or you don't include them. The reason being that removing one wound generally isn't enough to make a unit survive and unless they are safely behind that unit they will probably get killed themselves. So you need to use them in bottleneck situations so that you don't need the three attacks. |
 | Second (x5) | 2 | Two ranged AV and three health for two magic is a great deal. However, not being able to move is huge. In most cases you'll only get one attack out of them after which the opponent either avoids them or waits until they can kill them effectively. Because of this it's a very situational unit which is only viable if you can in some way get more innate value out of them. |
References
– All Guild Dwarves cards (especially strategy section and comments are useful)
– A Doug’s Guide To Summoner Wars podcast (strategy discussion and community news)
– Mythacle Battleplan for Summoner Wars (deck builder)
I’ve added the second summoner units to the table, but I haven’t yet updated the guide yet to take these units into consideration (and their Notes aren’t all written out yet either).