Who goes first?

[Gold Bearer]

Yea ball of flame always needs LOS. The only two that don't are fire of wraith and genie. It's much better like that I think because it means fire of wraith isn't just a weaker ball of flame, fire of mild irritation as I like to call it and it makes sense for the genie to be anywhere on the board.

All three fire spells are also less powerful in the US version. Fire of wraith and ball of flame should defend with black shields, not 5 or 6 and the US courage can't be used before a fight in the US rules because it's broken if there's no monsters in sight. A lot of people play that US courage lasts until there's no monster in sight but that's wrong, it only your next attack. That is how it worked in the 2nd ed though. The US fire spells are so weak, they were already the weakest set.

[knightkrawler]

I've never noticed how badly written Courage is in the US version.
Now that you've mentioned it, they could have just dropped the whole "broken when" determiner cause it's for one attack only anyway.

[Gold Bearer]

It's so you can't power up before a fight, you have to use an action during the fight.

Edit:
Actually I'm not sure if fire of wraith and ball of flame are supposed to be defendable on either shield, it says for each shield rolled. That would make sense considering the US versions, they'd be about the same power - very weak. I've always used their own shield and that's what I'm sticking with.

[knightkrawler]

Well, both a black shield and a white shield are a shield, so that settles that pretty clearly.
Or you argue that the in-game term "shield" relates only to the symbol that the figure has to roll to negate a skull, before play starts. But the rulebook doesn't tell you to do this and in addition, in makes no sense intuitively precisely because both symbols are called "shields" in the rulebook.
So, the wording is rather clear and you've been playing it wrong according to vanilla rules. But it's the better ruling, of course, in terms of the spell's usefulness and you rightly stick to it.

[whitebeard]

Didn't mean to stir up debate about the fire spells. Los for offensive casting is a good reason for him to go 2nd to last.

[Goblin-King]

Well, both a black shield and a white shield are a shield, so that settles that pretty clearly.
Or you argue that the in-game term "shield" relates only to the symbol that the figure has to roll to negate a skull, before play starts. But the rulebook doesn't tell you to do this and in addition, in makes no sense intuitively precisely because both symbols are called "shields" in the rulebook.
So, the wording is rather clear and you've been playing it wrong according to vanilla rules. But it's the better ruling, of course, in terms of the spell's usefulness and you rightly stick to it.

Of course "shield" refers to a model's specific type of shield you fimir! It's very intuitively
You use the spell on a monster it needs to roll black shields. If you use it on a hero he has to roll white shields.
I wouldn't have bothered specify that on the card as well! They don't specify it's a combat die and not a red die either.
Besides the rulebook states that monsters use black shields and heroes use white. No need to explain this further in every instance!
Nah, the HQ rules is one big ambiguous mess - no need to fight over what is "right"...

[Gold Bearer]

I think it might well be either shield. When the rule book talks about monsters defending on black shields, isn't it specifically talking about standard attacks?

[Goblin-King]

I think it might well be either shield. When the rule book talks about monsters defending on black shields, isn't it specifically talking about standard attacks?

Did you read the censured part?
Yes, it might well be. My point was that I don't think anyone can say anything for certain without making some assumptions.
That's just the way of the HQ rules... sigh...

[Gold Bearer]

Did you read the censured part?

I did and of course that's true but I think you can sort it out most of the time by taking the rules as literally as possible. In this case if the part of the rule book that says monsters defend on black shields is specifically referencing standard combat then then the spell rules that say 'shield' are referring to both shields but if the part of the rule book that says monsters defend on black shields is speaking generally then 'shield' in the spell descriptions means your own shield.

[knightkrawler]

Did you read the censured part?

I did and of course that's true but I think you can sort it out most of the time by taking the rules as literally as possible. In this case if the part of the rule book that says monsters defend on black shields is specifically referencing standard combat then then the spell rules that say 'shield' are referring to both shields but if the part of the rule book that says monsters defend on black shields is speaking generally then 'shield' in the spell descriptions means your own shield.

Exactly.