Ironwood | Solo Playthrough

Hi everyone, I'm Tom and today I'm going to be playing Ironwood. This is an asymmetric fighting kind of game. There's the industrial ironclad. There's the woodsy wood walkers. We've got different paths to victory, different unique decks of cards. The ironclad want to build these forges. The wood walkers who I'm playing want to get totems to appear and take them to the outer forests.

Whoever can do three of their thing first wins instantly. I'm going to be playing the solo game today. If you know me, I don't play fighting games multiplayer ever, but against the B, I'm fine. Before we get started, I recommend you turn on the cling on subtitles. If I made any mistakes, they'll be corrected there.

If you'd like to support the channel, you can do it in the corner of the screen in the description. I'd really appreciate it if you can. And let's get started then. So, we have the preparation phase to begin with. The woodwalker player gets a crystal. The ironclad player gets two crystals. And these are like the currency of the game.

And then we draw two cards. So, if you look in my player area, the wood walkers have got their own unique deck of special cards. We've got these vision cards. These are going to be where we can find the totems where we can make them appear. So, I have got three basic cards. You will always have these.

If you play them, you'll get them back in your hand for next round. I've drawn two special cards. And your cards can either be played for their abilities. You'll play three cards in a round. Or they can be wagered in combat to give you extra attack, defense, or dominance. And I have a starting vision card.

So I could make a totem appear in Ora, which is one of the inner mountains over here. If I can get one of my war bands, so just a group of my fighters in a forest adjacent to Ora, no enemies there, and I do a discover action. So that's kind of my starting plan. We want to reinforce and bolster and all of that stuff.

If you had any cards going already, you would remove cubes from them from ongoing things. And then we're going to play three cards alternately. So, I'm thinking Whispers of the Ancients seems like a pretty good card here. I can spend a crystal to draw two vision cards and then I burn one. So, burn is just, you know, get rid of it from the game, discard it.

So, these are two other potential places we could be finding totems. Now, if you make one appear in an inner mountain, you get three crystals for it because they're harder to get access to. They're easier for the ironclads to defend. But, I've got an inner one. I think I'm going to keep Oentimar. So, I'm going to discard Lithar.

So the other player knows that I've done this, knows that I've burnt it, and we put a cube in the solo game to represent that the bot knows that I'm not going to be trying to get anything out of that mountain. So I've had my vision cards. Then move one of the ironclads war bands and move three of my guys.

So a war band is a group of fighters and then it's three of my individual fighters. So I think we've got the original vision card for Ora over here. Why don't we move their war band out distressed by the whispers of those agents and then three of my guys into an adjacent place. One, two, three. We're adjacent to Oria.

Now, I can't make the totem appear yet, but that's a good start, I think. So, that's my turn. I've played my card. I've done everything that's on it. And we go to the bot's turn. So, the bot has got a special sheet to track all sorts of things, to tell me what its actions do, and to check its stances.

There's a completely different sheet cuz it's completely asymmetric cuz you can play against the woodw walkers as a bot and you can play the ironclad if you want but I didn't want. So they start off in the expansive stance and here tells us the check that we need to make. Do they need to change stance?

If I have a war band with a totem on the same forest, they will go aggressive. I haven't got that yet. It's what I'm going for though. If they have five or more crystals and control at least a foundation. So the foundations are all of these outer mountain spaces where they want to build forges. Neither of those things are true.

They don't have enough crystals. They don't control any of these. They have to be in the place to control it, as you might imagine. So, they stay in their expansive stance. And so, we follow their turn procedure. So, if they're defensive, not. If they're aggressive, not. Otherwise, if they're able, they place a foundation on our mountain.

They control with the largest warb band. They don't control one. So, we go all the way down to expend top of bot hand resolve icons on expended card. So, the bot's got its deck as normal, and it's got a pile representing its hand of cards. It's got its basic three cards, and it drew cards the same as I did, and they get shuffled into this.

It only shuffles in when it draws the cards at the start. So, we expand the top of the bot's hand, and we resolve the icons on it. We ignore all of the text as if it was a player. We just resolved the two icons. So, this tells me that if Phum has five or more combat units, they're going to expand. Otherwise, they recruit a golem.

Golems are special combat units that give them extra combat points and have more health. They need two health to kill them. So, the priority for recruiting, it will go in phum if there were less than three fighters in Phum. Then the forge with the smallest warb band. The only forge at the start of the game is Phum cuz they need to build more.

So, they will put it in there. So, the first icon was all about that. Then the crystal icon. They gain a crystal and move the drill. So, one more crystal in their banks. And here's the drill starting out in Fum. So when the drill moves, if there's at least three crystals in the drill's cargo, it'll go towards a forge.

Otherwise, it's going to move towards a mountain without a forge. And it wants the one with the largest ironclad warb band and the smallest wood walker warb band. So it's not going to consider this because there's no ironclads there and I'm there. So any one of these. So we've got these three tide options.

Often when we have tide options, we use the magic die. So we roll it. We have the red arrow with one dot. So red is pointing down. It wants the tide option with the lowest odd number. So 2 3 4 lowest odd number. The drill is moving to paladimore. Two icons on the card. And so they've played their first card.

So it's back over to me and I have to decide am I going to play my visions card. So it lets me draw a card and then I can resolve draw a vision card or discover. Discover. If I am in a place with no ironclads and I've got the vision card for it and I'm adjacent, then I can make a totem appear and I need to get rid of that.

But you can see the turn I discover it, they can then react and start coming over to me. I've got a pretty defensive card. Not incredibly defensive. I'm going to see if we can hold out. I'm going to play my visions card. So draw another special card. I've got oh the same barrel spirit card. And then I'm going to discover.

So I use my vision card. I'm going to get three crystals for that because it's an inner mountain. We pop a cube on to remind the bot that I've had the totem out of there. And we pop a totem in here. Now, I just need to get this to an outer mountain space. And that is one of the three things that I need to do to win the game.

Obviously, he's going to be storming in in a minute to stop me. If the totem's still here at the end of the round, it will move to fading. If it's still here at the end of the next round, then it will disappear. So, there is a time limit on this as well. So, I've done all of my card. Going back over to Iron Boss.

Have I got a war band with a totem in the same forest? Yes. They go to aggressive, which means they're going to get one more dominance in combat, making it more likely they'll win the combat. And then looking at their turn procedure, they're not defensive, they're aggressive. So, expend the top card of their hand.

Doesn't matter what's on it. It moves to chase and then attacks. If able, flip this card. And so next time it is just going to no matter what it's just going to expand the top card and do the icons. So Chase tells us the target of the movement is a mountain. They can only move in mountains. I can only move in forests as I'm sure you've seen where they can use a single warb band movement to form the largest possible war band.

So yeah, they could move from Barum to Ora quite easily. It's if they moved here, they'd be able to attack from any of the adjacent mountains. If they moved here, they'd only be able to move three in. If they moved here, they'd be able to move four fighters and a golem in. So the target of the movement is going to be Oraer, I think.

Source of the movement, the mountain with the largest warb band adjacent to the target. If this is Phum, ignore three there and re-evaluate. So it won't move out the last three units from Phum. So I guess then they would choose Argentar and move all these three guys here. They would keep moving until there are more units in the ironclad war band than the number of wood walker fighters or until the Source Mountain empties.

And it's just emptied the source mountain. And then we're going to do combat. So, first of all, I need to decide, do I want to wager a card? If I don't wager a card, my values for this will be zero. So, I think I do. I'll get a bit of attack, two defense, and two dominance. I'm going to wager this. The bot gets the top card of its deck, and we have done a damage each.

So, it all happens simultaneously. So, we've done a damage to each other each, which would kill off a fighter each, but we've both defended for one, and I've overdefended here. So, we resolve all of the damage and then we work out through dominance who won the fight. So, you get the number of units each anyway and then you add your dominance from the cards and any other bonuses.

So, here we're even on units. So, he gets plus one because he's in aggressive stance. I've got two from my card. So, I actually win that fight. We both defended it, but thanks to my feral spirit. So, this only happens because we're both still in the fight. If one faction have been destroyed, you don't need to work out through dominance who won it.

So, I won that fight and I can force them to retreat. And I think I'm going to I'm going to force you guys to retreat to an adjacent place. You can go all the way over there. Or maybe I don't want them in an outer space. You can go back to the inner space. Back to where you came from. Okay. So, that's good cuz they could have forced me to retreat and leave the totem behind.

But this is a good start. So, now back to my turn and see what can I move with. Just move and then do an attack. Resolve one option or spend two to resolve two. I'm going to move five. Yeah, cuz these don't let me move. So, I'm going to do ransack. So, I'm not going to spend any crystals and I'm just going to move five things.

So, one person is going to take this totem back to the outer forest. And I have one. Now, the trouble is I don't know where they're going to go next. So, you know what? I'm going to go 2 3 4 5 and maybe we're going to attack this drill. Slow them down a bit. Okay, for the bot, we know that they are just they're exhausted from that big attack last time.

So, they are going to expend the top card of their hand and do the stuff on it. First of all, do they need to change stances? Yes. I don't have a totem anymore. They don't control any of these things. So, they're back into expansive. And so, the card symbol tells us, draw a card and put it on top of their hand.

They gain a crystal. And then, if they were aggressive, they would chase. If they were defensive, they'd protect. Regardless of stance, they attack if able. So, they can form the biggest war band by bringing out the golem and the fighter over here. And maybe I've bitten off a bit more than I can chew here.

I think it's it's going to be the feral spirit again to get some defensive. I'm going to wager a card. They are going to wager their card cuz the one they drew goes on the bottom. So, they do no damage and I defend both of it. I do a damage, they defend it. And then we are tied. So, the attacker wins toys.

So, it wants to move me away from this mountain. means it's going to be here or here. So, we roll the magic die and it's going to be the lowest even numbered one. So, 13 or 16. There's the even numbered one. We have to retreat. Our will's been broken. The law has been broken. And then this flips and they'll behave more normally after that.

So, at the end of the round, any base cards I used go back into my hand. Everything else gets discarded. I haven't got any ongoing things to stay out. Special cards it played get discarded. And then the base ones come back to it same as me and they get shuffled into the hand that it has in a bit. Totems would fade.

I got the totem luckily. Then recruitment. I can recruit as many fighters as I like for two crystals each. So I can recruit one. So I think let's uh let's keep bolstering in here. I can recruit in the outer forest and I'm safe in the outer forest. I can't be attacked in those. But I can't attack from them either.

So the bot if it has five or more crystals, it will recruit until it has fewer than five. So it won't recruit. And then we go to a new round. So, I gain a crystal, they gain two crystals. We draw two cards each. So, they shuffle their cards into their hand. And what have I got? Shaman's Guidance. Burn two cards to discover, even if the area is controlled.

That would be good. I haven't got a vision card, though. Meditation. Good for winning a combat. Maybe. Draw a card and mark this card. When this card gets exhausted, resolve two of these. Draw two cards. Recruit a fighter to any outer forest. Draw a vision card. Oo, you know what? We're going to go basic first.

So, I'm not going to be getting a totem out this time, but I am going to draw a card. Wait a minute. Subtitle. When I was going on about the golem, it's just a fighter. I'm misinterpreting me symbols. So, I've drawn nature's aid, which is remove a fighter or draw two cards and then burn one. Okay, so that's my drawing a card.

And then resolve one. I'm going to draw a vision card. So, my vision is in Zincer, which actually, if we ignore the drill for a bit, we could just flood in and maybe try and fight them out of there. That's a job for later on, though. So, he doesn't know what I've drawn. And we go into his turn procedure.

There's nothing to change in his stance. He's expansive. So, can he place a foundation on an outer mountain it controls? No. Doesn't control any outer mountains. So, it's going to expand the top card and resolve the icons on it. So, we've got draw a card, put it on top of its hand, he gains a crystal and he attacks if able.

He is not able. If there is anything that he's not able to do, then he gets a crystal. Like, if he takes an action and just can't do anything of it, he's going to take a crystal. So, he's going to be reinforcing soon, isn't he? So, there's his first card played. Then, I'm kind of thinking I'd like to move five in again.

And we could perhaps discover even if it's control, but that's a good card for winning the combat, even if you take casualties and not having to retreat. We just discover next time. Yeah. So, I'm going to move five and that's going to be all five guys in here. Let's not go next to the drill. But stance doesn't change.

So, nothing's true apart from get a card. And he is going to if alert. He is alert. We haven't had to flip this yet. He moves to chase and attacks if able. I should have stayed out. So, he won't move the three out of Phum. So, he can get the biggest attacking force. He wants to be equal or greater than mine or empty the mountain, doesn't he?

So he will move these guys out here and fight from cobaltus. So a card. So he's got plus one damage. I think I'm going to go for meditation as my wagered card. So the top card is whatever they just drew. I do two damage to him. He blocks it. He does damage to me. I do not block it. We're both still present.

Actually, he does two damage to me because he's got plus one because of the stance he's in. We're both still present. So we look at the dominance. I've got three to his two. So I'm going to make him retreat. Thank you very much. You can go back over there and not get in any of these outer places. Okay, then.

So, for my turn, it's tempting to just discover, but it's the end of the round. You'd want to do that at the beginning if anything, wouldn't you? I'm going to play Nature's Aid. So, remove a fighter. I'm going to remove one from Zincer. Draw two cards and burn one. Have some cards for next round, maybe.

Got Hunter's Instinct. Burn a card to move for attack and get plus one shield. Victory steal a crystal. If you control five or more inner forests. Yeah, I'm going to burn this card cuz if you burn it, you gain a crystal. Boom. And I'm nowhere near the criteria it wanted me to be. And then for the bot, he's still alert.

So all the way down to expend top of his hand. And he does the icons on us. So he is going to be doing he's in expansive stance. So he's going to spend a crystal to recruit a fighter and then move to expand. So spend a crystal gets a guy in Phum. Hasn't got any forges yet. And then for the first time he's going to try and do expand.

So the target of expand an uncontrolled and unmarked outer mountain. He wants to be unmarked cuz he wants to be in places where I might want to go as well to try and stop me without a forge and the fewest total wood walker fighters adjacent. Prioritizing a mountain with a foundation over one without one.

So I'll get rid of our wages. So it's basically going to be not these two, isn't it? Oh, and these two have got me adjacent. And they're the ones that he's nowhere near anyway. So it's out of these two. Eight or 10, please. So it's going to be the lowest odd. Nope, that didn't narrow it down. Uh, highest odd.

Keep rolling until we get one that says odd. Could just be using the arrow and not the dots if that doesn't matter. Here we go. Highest even. So there, that's their target. Source of the movements, the mountain with the largest warb band adjacent here. Move all combat units out except one. Okay, so they've got four in there.

If nobody could have moved, pick another mountain. And then they gain a crystal and move the drill. Gain a crystal. So they basically want to move along with these guys to the highest war band and they gain another benefit. Oh, they should have had some crystals in there subtitle. So they can now look at my vision cards.

They don't do that. They actually if I've got more than one, they actually get to shuffle them up and get rid of one from me. So if they take Dinko, then yeah, I'm I'm next to either one of them. So it's Aentimar that goes back in the deck. So we've got to focus on getting them out of there or playing Mikord.

That means I can discover it while that's been the case. I'm glad they've moved away from that actually. So they've done all of their stuff. So round end, any cards that are basic, they get back. So do I. No totems to fade. Recruit stuff. I think we'll recruit one to this forest here. So the bot's got many crystals now.

So there is only one forge. So he'll recruit until he's got less than five. So, two more fighters in Phum and then they're ready to move out of there in the future. So, he probably want to move some in here to fight me. Then, new round. I get a crystal. He gets two. He gets two cards and shuffles up his hand.

I get two cards and we've got calm before the storm. Draw a card. Move two units. If you have five or more adjacent to Phum, recruit two to any outer forest. That's nice. We're not out outside Pham though. Pilford crystals. Move two. Mark this card twice. And while it's out, your first victory in each round, you get to steal a crystal.

Okay, so I am going to do Shaman's guidance. Burn two cards. Let's see. You would help me win a combat. So I'll probably keep you. I burn the things I just drew. And I'm going to discover even if the area is controlled. So I'm discovering in Zincer and getting three crystals. A totem has appeared. So suddenly they go all aggressive.

And so on their turn procedure, expend the top of bot's hand. They're going to chase then attack. the target where they can put the most in. If they have to leave three in here, they could get five here. So, I think yeah, that's their strongest possibility. So, they'll move in there. And then for me wagering, I want to not have to retreat.

So, I think I'm going to wager Hunter's Instinct. They wager the top card of their deck. Some expansion. So, they do a damage. I've blocked it. I do no damage. They block it. And then we count. So 1 2 3 4 5 plus zero dominance. 1 2 3 + 4 7 dominance. I scare them off against all odds. I think they're in trouble here.

Oh yeah, they need to expend a card to do that as well. Then it's over to me. I just got to move this out. So we'll just ransack to move five. Move out here. Maybe we want to go out with the drill. And that's my second totem. So I don't want to attack farm and steal any of the bits. So he's back to expansive.

And he is going to place now. He controls an outer mountain. So he is going to place a foundation on here and he might end up getting a bit defensive here. He gains a crystal, expend the top cord of his hand, flip this cord. So in the future he'll be defensive and his priority will be to build that cuz building three of them is how he wins.

He's now got a foundation for all of that other stuff. Okay. So now I think we need to know where the last um totem is coming from. I could still get attacked, but let's draw a card because I'm a bit light on cards as well. Dashing Spirits, burn a card to move the same four people twice. You cannot move totems during this card's resolution.

Then attack this combat. Get an extra attack and dominance. That's nice. And then I'm going to draw a vision card. Oh, and they need to put a cube on Zincer because they know I'm not going to go there again. Paladimmore. Oh, it's another inner. It's not very well defended right now. And I could be going over there to like if I can destroy them in there, I can like make the drill go back and lose all the stuff that's in it.

I can try and beat down their defenses. But I think I'm better off just trying to get the totem out, aren't I? So, I've done my little turn and he is just going to expend his top card and resolve the icons on it. Oh, and his stance should change, shouldn't it? Cuz he controls a foundation and he has got five crystals.

So, he's actually defensive now when we resolve the things. So, first of all, draw a card, put it on the top of his hand, he gets a crystal, and he is defensive. So, he is moving to protect. So, when he moves to protect, it will be Phum. If there are fewer than three units, if there's a mountain with a foundation where there is a larger adjacent thing, no.

An unmarked inner mountain where there's a larger adjacent warb band presence. No. So, I don't think he's actually bothered about protecting. I think he'll just gain a crystal instead. And so we flip this back and next time if he's still in defensive cuz aggressive takes priority then he will build that and he gets an extra like attack in combats adjacent to that mountain.

Right. So round end stuff they go away. He used a basic so he gets that back. I've got my basics recruit. So it's here. I'm going to recruit twice here. So he wants to keep has he got more than five? Yes, he spends until he's got less than five. So he's got nowhere else with a forge. So they have to go in phum, but he can bolster Platimore pretty easily until it has fewer than five crystals.

Yeah. So it's actually going to get another one on there that's pretty well defended. Don't know how I'm going to get things out of Platimore. I'm coming from the top here, but yeah, I can really easily defend that. So new round. I get a crystal. He gets two crystals. Oh yeah, cuz he's getting two, isn't he?

So he's on five again. Was wondering what he was doing. Then draw two cards. So he gets his two that get shuffled in. I get my two, which will be galvanizing charge. Spend a crystal to move four. Attack victory. Recruit two. That would be pretty good for clearing plat out, wouldn't it? Then children of the forest, recruit two to any outer forests.

If you burn the card, spend one to recruit to any outer forest. Okay, so first card. I'm going to do that. I spend a crystal to move four. So one, two, three, four. But then they are adjacent to attack. Whereas if I But if I come through here, they're just going to move in from Phum anyway. I don't think it matters.

We're moving in here and attacking Paladimore. We're going to use Dashing Spirits. So their top card and it's expansion. They keep using that, don't they? So one attack on me, which isn't defended. Two attacks on them, one is defended, but that's what I want. And then there's no need to do dominance because they aren't there anymore.

So their first thing I don't have a totem out so they are defensive. So they spend five to flip the foundation into one of their three forges. Expend the top card of their hand. Flip this card. We could find our gentar or Galamore again. It's like a bit harder for them to come and run in at. Is it a bad idea to discover here and just have them destroying me with these massive things?

I'm going to go for visions again. Draw a card. Double strike. Attack. Victory. Attack again. Oh, I got victory here, didn't I? I should have recruited two to an outer forest. Attack again with any warb band with plus one defense and dominance. Okay. So, are you drawing or discovering? I'm discovering because they aren't necessarily attacking on their next thing.

They're exhausted. Totem in Paladimore, please. And three crystals. Thank you very much. Cube in there. Totem in there. And no matter what I'm doing, they are just doing the card. And he's doing some careful planning. So, draw a card and put it on top of its hand. He gets a crystal. And then it gets a crystal and moves the drill and goes to the next thing.

So, it gets a card. So, moving the drill, he's out of forge. So, he gets all of the crystals that's in it. And then I'll just need anything that moves me. So, I'll just resolve one, move five. Let's just move out with this. That's the third totem. And while they kind of mucked around, kept playing basic cards as their wages.

Built up this massive force in Phum. I found my third totem. There are of course a billion ways to increase the difficulty. And you can play the ironclad. So, you can be building this stuff and play against the woodbot that plays differently. Anyway, but there are 15 levels of difficulty to this. putting more things in setup, shuffling special cards into their starting deck, starting out with foundations out there, starting out with golems.

Yeah. So, loads and loads of ways to ramp it up. As I said, you can play a completely different asymmetric game by being the ironclad trying to build this and fend off the woodworkers. So, there we go. That is Ironwood. I hope you enjoyed that and it gave you a good idea of what the game is like. If you'd like to see more from me, there are hundreds of videos on this channel.

There way to support me in the description. help me keep being able to do this. Thank you so much for watching though and I'll see you for the next game. Bye everyone. [Music]