[Confred]

A tornado knocked power out in my area, so I'm way behind on my reviews. They're fun to do, so here we go!:

Wood Golem
Breaking the mold with going golem vs typical natural plant creature, but no ratings gained/lost. I'm not a fan of Golem/Construct - one or the other I say. imperfect/unpolished wording and punctuation.
Fury of the Forest - not sure if once per round is necessary. fun factor vs tactical i suppose, but with slow Move, having a decent attack power makes sense. I think another said the power is generic for the name, might as well make name generic so that it may be used elsewhere.
Bark Hide Armor - odd name. again, could be generic. I do however like the power and it gives the figure much needed edge. also golem flavor - yet challenge isn't golem; it's ent.
Root Entanglement 11 - lots of tracking issues
overall - an unpolished figure that could be something after it returns from the drawing board - lower points depending on revision
C-

Gnarl of Elder
Cool name. Gnarl is an aspect of tree, but here it feels like it's doing double duty as a title, like Earl of Elder: kudos! fun trivia: when I first read this card's sidebar, my eyes played tricks one me - it took an entry and duplicated it, but altered it: I saw Treant. but for class, I read "Tyrant" and i thought him like this mean old Uncle Gnarl. and then I saw his Undead Hatred and his figure looks like a scowl. cool. but that's not what happened lol.
Tree Ally Strike - Well that's a cool power. At first I didn't like the "tree or bush" phrasing, but it has grown on me.
Boulder Throw Special Attack - top down design (figure is holding a rock) but I vaguely remember the Ent's throwing stones in LotR. Also a game I grew up with as an adolescent had stone throwing treants. cool. Instead of throwing more stones (not a fan of hasty trees), I think adding Range would be better. Interesting that trees don't help the defenders. unlike "tree or bush," i haven't warmed up to "Palm Trees and Underbrush" - keep it tree or bush.
Undead Hatred - cool flavor without having to read backstory. questionable phrasing though; i may need references.
Overall - one of the more polished submissions.
A

Entrean the Elder
Now that the contest is over, *I reveal this is my entry.
I was stumped as to his species at the time. I love using official classes and personalities, so when I saw Sentinel, I was like "yahs!"
I really like how I framed his picture, tall and looming and judging.
Shepherd Evergreens - the concept of ents herding trees has captured my imagination since a boy. in several rpgs that I have created, I've incorporated beefy tree walls to good effect. Evergreens are specifically mentioned because of their base, jungle pieces lock in. The trees have smaller stats then Entrean purposefully. They're like his squad that he bonds with. they had to be destructible to prevent stalemates. I admit, that I haven't parsed out how long it takes to actually position trees the way you'd might want, nor did I spell out dealing with elevations, but I love the thought of this treeman just shuffling his trees about. He's Aquilla due to this neutral removed daresay roguish state.
Root Crush - I wanted this to be a flashy power that roots and crushes. I wanted a trample power. i admit I overlooked the tracking issues. at one time, the rooted figures were adjacent to trees and that was the tracking help. but that didn't make sense because the trees were the kicker - i wanted a power that didn't require trees, but comboed off them. i then used entrean himself as the aide - they couldn't move as long as adjacent. but at the last minute it was like he's slow enough. I'd like him to get rooted and the herd move on (which is why i added the no leaving strike clause)
as far as body. I wanted him big and sexy and rare and impressive. but Move 4 is significant. it's only one less than average, but ive done enough customs to know that matters. he had to be beef to matter. i didn't want him simply shot down before action. but then to have that many points he had to be justified. what is his purpose? hes a shepherd. some say being able to destroy evergreen trees is worth it enough.
Overall- I was surprised his vote was on the bottom curve.
N/A*

Oakshadow
First impression - cool name, small bod, Warden is cool I wonder how it plays out.
Nature's Wrath - may need to check phrasing, but cool power. range is low, but two targets is significant.
Barkskin Defense - cool name. may need to check phrasing, but cool power. makes me take back his "small bod" comment. I like this actually.
Overall - one of the more polished figures.
A

Arboris
First impression - 1 Life Unique Hero? capitalized markers? a power that's literally worthless without another power?
Overgrowth - pretty much everybody didn't interpret this adding the marker on the first round. perhaps add that. I like the growth theme as it felt quite planty, not treey, but planty. encouraged turtling isn't the best, but we're talking treefolk here, so slow play is just fine.
By the Roots - I really really don't like powers that create markers without a use for them and powers that require markers without a means to create them. My initial thoughts were to remove this power and replace it with something simple to balance the above complicated power. But if this power also added overgrowth markers, with payment from rooting, like maybe not moving or something, and then perhaps spent markers to get the additional attacks or something. this was a miss for me.
Guardian - I like this class. in EverQuest, there are Protectors of Growth, that have a similar figure stats and beat bottoms.
Protective - not a fan, but didn't really count the sidebars against, only for.
Overall - a bit wonky, but it captures the theme of a growing organism in a standout way.
B