True to its name, the Deathgorge is an unpleasant place. Its rime-coated tunnels are filled with deadly wildlife and roving warbands, who hunt its glacial innards for treasures of great power. Unlike the many greedy souls who make the treacherous trek here for glory, the Ghurish mage Zondara Rivenheart journeys not for riches or honour… but for love.
When the love of Zondara’s life succumbed to a terrible curse, she vowed to rescue him from eternity as a beast – even going as far to learn the secrets of necromancy.
Accompanied by three undead thralls and her lover Ferlain – still in beast form – she has made the arduous journey to the Deathgorge, determined to find a way to break the curse. Her cocktail of deathly and bestial magic is a lethal tool for battling through the frozen caverns.
Zondara and Ferlain support each other even in despair, each Inspiring when the other has two or more upgrades. In addition to blasting foes with her Wild Staff, Zondara can use her Stolen Knowledge to heal friendly fighters or damage nearby enemies with each activation.
Many of the objectives unique to Zondara’s Gravebreakers evoke the Tragedy of these two doomed lovers – fortunately, if either Zondara or Ferlain is taken out of action, you can discard and replace now-useless objective cards that pertain to the fallen fighter, allowing the search for a cure to continue.
Pikk, Toyle, and Cracktomb are beast-touched zombies with little will of their own, and so undertake the grunt work, excavating relics for their masters. Their liminal existence is an endless cycle of combat, labour, and digging, and so all three share a trio of abilities, split across their cards for readability – Gravebreak, Exhume, and Unearth.
When one of your undead minions ends an activation atop an objective token, they can Gravebreak to move it into an adjacent hex. Then you can either Exhume a defeated minion, bringing them back into the brawl and Inspiring them in the process, or Unearth an upgrade card from your deck, allowing you to empower Zondara and Ferlain further, and potentially Inspire them.
There are many powerful upgrades to discover in the Rivals deck accompanying Zondara’s Gravebreakers, including Salvaged Intelligence, which helps improve your action economy – and importantly lets Zondara and Ferlain both attack in succession. Cursed Strength offers extra attack power in exchange for a cost in flesh, while Wild Incantation lets you boost your warband’s chances of rolling a success in combat.
The Gravebreakers will need to use all of their necromantic cunning, mindless tenacity, and feral power to overwhelm their opponents and score objectives like Life and Death, and Zondara can pick up more points by carefully managing her workforce of Tireless Revenants.
Soulbound Killers proves that love is a powerful motivator, providing extra glory if scored while the cursed pair are supporting each other – an excellent combo with Salvaged Intelligence.
Zondara’s Gravebreakers will be released for Warhammer Underworlds later this year, ready to slot into a recently refreshed meta. You can dig up more reveals today by heading over to the Las Vegas Open 2024 hub.