Krall Ironhelm --evaluation for Auggie's

[superfrog]

Balance

He might be slightly undercosted, but I think his cost is relatively accurate, his weak stats make up for his powerful movement bonding.

Playability

He works well with existing goblin squads, moving them into position and getting an attack bonus from them.

Creativity

The goblin sneak attack power is a combination of sneak attack and powers like mob attack, and I think it is very thematic.

Theme

The goblins need a hero, and he provides a cheap option for that.

[Scytale]

Nice design. Good concept for a commander figure without relying on raw bonding. Speaking of which, I recommend adding the "After revealing an order marker" wording to Goblin Movement Bonding to prevent bonding chains. Right now Ornak would allow Krall to move goblins as well as activate another hero. Not a problem, per se, but strong. More dangerous would be another goblin squad with goblin hero bonding.

I am a bit concerned about Krall's order marker value. He does provide a bonus figure movement, but at the cost of a fair amount of attacking power. Cutters can do 4 attacks of 2 with Mob Attack and Brutes 3 attacks of 4; you're giving that up for a single attack. That attack is fairly easily boostable, and there are times when a single attack of 6 would be nice. Still, I don't know if there would be many times I would prefer to activate Krall instead of Cutters or Brutes. Worse, order markers on Krall are more susceptible to being lost due to Krall dying.

[Arch-vile]

A Goblin hero is cool, we need one of those. Basically, Scytale said it all. Raising his attack up 1 (to get an attack of 7 at times) would help make him a more effecient use of an Order Marker.

[Ace_of_Spades]

Originally Posted by Arch-vile

A Goblin hero is cool, we need one of those. Basically, Scytale said it all. Raising his attack up 1 (to get an attack of 7 at times) would help make him a more effecient use of an Order Marker.

Not exactly, the Horned Skull Brutes' three attacks of 4 rolls 12 dice total and can increase to 15 with height advantage. The difference between 6 and 7 attack dice on one figure doesn't help significantly because it is already overkill on most squads. Also, have the flexibility to attack in different locations as with the squads is usually more useful than one powerful attack. I noticed this problem when I tried out qt-bangerang's custom, Horned Skull Champion.

[Arch-vile]

Against a big hero like Charos or a Raelin-boosted Samurai it may be worth it. Sure, not often, but any figure with a lot of defense and low life (Brunak, Q9, Deathwalkers), I would rather have a big attack than risk 3 small attacks doing nothing. It would be a somewhat rare occurance regardless though

[Taeblewalker]

I like Scytale's edit, and I think he would really be worth more points. I also think that his main strength is not immediately obvious - he lets you choose with squad to move in the middle of the round, after order markers have been placed. This flexibility is great for when positioning is important. I think his attack is fine at 3, and that he can be a pretty powerful hero killer if he can stay alive.

You might also change Goblin Sneak Attack to also give Krall a bonus to Defense when he is hiding among his Goblin allies.

[superfrog]

Originally Posted by Taeblewalker

I like Scytale's edit, and I think he would really be worth more points. I also think that his main strength is not immediately obvious - he lets you choose with squad to move in the middle of the round, after order markers have been placed. This flexibility is great for when positioning is important. I think his attack is fine at 3, and that he can be a pretty powerful hero killer if he can stay alive.

You might also change Goblin Sneak Attack to also give Krall a bonus to Defense when he is hiding among his Goblin allies.

Thanks for the input everybody, I'll try to get a new card up today.

[superfrog]

Now he gets a bonus to number of attacks, solving the "good use of an OM" problem. Thoughts?

[Scytale]

As written the power is a little confusing. If I attack a figure with three other goblins adjacent to it and kill it, can Krall then attack another figure with no goblins adjacent to it? The problem is that the "defending figure" could change. Either change the power to only allow Krall to attack that one figure with multiple attacks or remove the defending figure restriction. Perhaps he could get a number of bonus attacks equal to the number of goblins adjacent to Krall himself.