Wizards Cup Board Game Review: Fresh off the Shelf

About Wizards Cup, from BoardGameGeek:

Tonight starts the Wizards' Cup, a magical dueling tournament held once every century. As the king of a country, you will select the six best wizards from your kingdom and decide the order in which they will compete. Yes, your role ends there, and all that remains is to watch your trusted wizards battle it out. In Wizards Cup, you want to build the best team you can, anticipating how your opponent might attack. Each player starts with a set of 18 cards, and your opponent draws a card at random from your deck that must be one of the wizards on your team. You then choose five more wizards, arrange five of the six wizards into a deck, then place the sixth aside in a waiting zone. Each player reveals their top wizard and places it in the duel zone, then you see who wins. Resolve wizard powers first, then (if needed) compare the elements on these cards (e.g., light beats shadow, nature beats water); if they share the same element, compare values. The losing wizard heads to that player's discard pile, then they draw the next wizard from their deck to go against the opposing victorious wizard. Keep resolving duels until a player has no cards remaining; the other player claims a victory token. Each player can then swap one wizard from their six with an unused card, after which they again create a five-card deck and duel. Whoever collects two victory tokens first wins. ____ 1006