wriggz's Customs: Battle Ball - 2024-03-28

[caps]

Rejected by Death on a Unique Squad is really fun!

I also like Okunnigr with the Thralls.

[wriggz]

It has been years since I posted any customs, but with the AOA sets releasing soon, decided to dust off these customs I created a while ago and post them here.

Battle Ball Converted – Cyborg Thugs
A while ago I picked up the Battle Ball set off Ebay for a fair price. This set seemed like the perfect collection of figures for a faction box, and it did not disappoint. The figures look great with other heroscape units and add some more sweet science fiction units balancing out all the fantasy we got in the D&D era.

Z-Blok Thugs

I decided to make this faction all Cyborgs even though that class was taken by the Marro Havech Eradicators. This might end up with some weird synergies if the Havech ever get expanded, but with hundreads of untis that is bound to happen somewhere anyway. I wasn’t going to pick up multiple sets so this common squad will be limited to 2 sqauds in my personal collection, but that is okay since I prefer smaller armies when playing. This is a case of squad vs squad, as they only get there bonus attack against common figures. This does allow them to strike hard against Elemental and Shadow builds as well. Strong defence keeps them on the board long enough to support their bonding heroes.

Ursa Minor

Anyone familiar with my customs knows I enjoy the design space of having one unit “turn” into another. The Zombies kicked it all off, but my own Wereshark, Bear and Raven Spirits and the AotP werewolves all implement this gimmick in different ways. Here we have the option to replace Ursa Minor with a beefed up version. There is a bit of gamble here since the Cyborgs are all melee, and when you covert you may be sacrificing some of Minor’s life points. Until Minor is converted he strengthens the Thugs into lasting longer as they make their way up the battlefield potentially under enemy fire. I especially like the naming of little and big bear and his personally moving from reckless to…

Ursa Major

Relentless. Once Ursa Major is on the board he is ready to wreak things with his big attack and boosting the remaining thugs attack. Major has a huge benefit of not taking wounds while moving up the board, so he is ready to inflict lots of wounds on any figures in his path. As mentioned before there is always the risk that Ursa Major will not appear on the board at all since 50% change each turn is only improved to 87.5% after an entire round moving up the board. After loosing all his life Major will revert to Minor, except up to 3 wounds will be carried back to Minor, so if minor already had wounds it is possible both Ursa’s end up destroyed.

[Myriadite]

Such a cool concept! Pummel is a nasty power, but the costing seems to keep it in check.

The transforming power is also very cool, ties into the miniatures nicely, and looks really well thought out.

So you are a fellow Canadian.... "Zee - block" rolls off the tongue so much nicer than "Zed - block" even though it is slightly completely wrong. Which do you use?

[wriggz]

I switch between the two, in the same way I might spell color or colour depending on the day and interface.

Hard to end the alphabet song with Zed

[DarthLegolas]

I like the Ursas gimick a lot. Feels like a video game boss fight with different stages. Clarification; Ursa Minor's Growth Hormone ability states that you can only use it once per game. I believe that implies that you can only attempt the D20 roll once in the entire game, and if you don't roll 11, you simply don't get to play Ursa Major. I don't believe that's the intention and just thought I'd ask.

[wriggz]

Originally Posted by DarthLegolas

I like the Ursas gimick a lot. Feels like a video game boss fight with different stages. Clarification; Ursa Minor's Growth Hormone ability states that you can only use it once per game. I believe that implies that you can only attempt the D20 roll once in the entire game, and if you don't roll 11, you simply don't get to play Ursa Major. I don't believe that's the intention and just thought I'd ask.

Your correct, you should be able to attempt to convert multiple times, but only succeed once. I think the once per game wording is a leftover from earlier wording when I was trying to limit the switches and is now confusing and redundant. Will have to make an edit soon.

[wriggz]

Battle Ball Converted – Microcorp Security

Microcorp Security

The color pallet of these figures aligned well with Vydar with the claws mimicking the Gladitrons, so it follows that they would fit as a common squad of 4. Again, I will only ever have 2 squads, but that should not be a problem. Like the Thugs, Microcorp Security figures target common figures reducing defense. Removing 2 defense dice from most common figures leaves them with little left to defend against an attack of 2. As Microcorp agents they get access to Stealth armor similar to their ranged cousins. Overall the Security team make terrible hero killers, but are an excellent screen with high defense and a great defensive power, while still being dangerous to squads.

Commander Steward

Cheerleaders can be both the hardest and most rewarding units to design. Steward can take a turn before the official gorllianators and Microcorp Agents, the members of orders agents units listed below and the Security force. He doesn’t really add much when taking a turn, other than moving up the field waylaying inbound melee or grabbing an isolated glyph. You may not want to move him up the field as +1 to Stealth armor, Smoke Power or Engagement Strike can be a real boon for under used units. Finally he has stealth armor to tie him in with the rest of the Vydar agents.

Commander Amuro

At first glance Commander Amuro is a powerful hero. He is able to move fast and has a strong attack of 6 while able to pull in small in medium figures with his Hydraulic Claw. However, add a couple of wounds and his assault can quickly grind to a halt. With 2 wounds Amuro falls to 4 move and 5 defense, and with 4 wounds he only moves 2 (meaning as 2 space unit cannot move up levels) and has only 3 defense making him all the easier to destroy. A fun flash in the pan figure that can grab a key figure and pull them into the battle, Amuro is the definition of a shark unit.

[Sherman Davies]

Nice work, I always love to see what 'Scapers do with these minis. If the availability were more secure, I totally would've tried to push these figs for use in C3V back in the day.

PS - Grapple has a typo in the word "maximum."

[wriggz]

That's for the spell check.

I got the box for like 15 bucks on eBay - such a great deal for painted minis, especially for sci fi which for me is the icing that makes the Heroscape cake (fantasty being the cake and historic being the tasty filling - not required for the cake but when it's done well elevates the entire dessert)

[Myriadite]

Those look so good! I am really tempted to pick up a box or two now.

[DarthLegolas]

At first glance Commander Amuro is a powerful hero. He is able to move fast and has a strong attack of 6 while able to pull in small in medium figures with his Hydraulic Claw. However, add a couple of wounds and his assault can quickly grind to a halt. With 2 wounds Amuro falls to 4 move and 5 defense, and with 4 wounds he only moves 2 (meaning as 2 space unit cannot move up levels) and has only 3 defense making him all the easier to destroy. A fun flash in the pan figure that can grab a key figure and pull them into the battle, Amuro is the definition of a shark unit.

This blurb says he loses defense from battle damage while the card says he loses attack. Just a head's up. He might be my favorite interpretation of a Battle-Ball unit you've come up with btw. I'm a sucker for "Get over here!" moves

[Maklar the Silver Prince]

Originally Posted by Myriadite

Those look so good! I am really tempted to pick up a box or two now.

That's exactly what I did. These designs are really tight. Going to try out the cyborg thugs this weekend. Curious: why the choice of a range of 2 for Ursa's auras? With a bonding squad that can keep up, this seems as good a place as any for an adjacency aura.