Type: King
Effect Text: Double the strength of one of your rows. Then halve the strength of all Siege rows this round, Or send any unit to the graveyard.
Flavor Text: A life most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible.
Flavor Source: Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Ilych
Artwork: Tsar Ivan The Terrible by Viktor Vasnetsov (1897)
Strategy:
All King cards allow you to double a row of your choosing, essentially functioning as a trump card for the round. Your opponent will likely need to play their King card or some other counter to remain competitive in that round. Remember, Kings also come with the choice of a unique effect (in addition to doubling a row), allowing you to tailor your strategy as the game unfolds. The Terror King’s unique powers give you access to a weather effect (see strategies for Storm), or sending any unit to the graveyard (see strategies for Death).
About the card:
Ivan IV The Terrible was the first Tsar of Russia and his reign would serve as the model for Russian rulers until the present day. All of the elements are there: greatly increasing the size of the army, the formation of the first Russian secret police, and a series of costly wars to expand toward the Baltic, the Caspian and the Black seas. These goals and methods would rise time and time again in Russia from the rule of Peter to Catherine to Stalin.
During his reign Ivan would conquer the Kazan and Astrakhan Khanates (present day southern Russia) increasing the territory of Russia by roughly a third. However, his costly attempts to conquer Livonia (present day Estonia and Latvia) in order to gain a port on the Baltic would prove costly and unsuccessful. His rule was that of the autocrat, where personal allegiance and friendship to the Tsar was much more important than any other political or economic power (see also Wrath).
