Did a quick test play tonight.
270 points
Map: DANCE OF THE DRYADS (BftU, VW, RttFF)
Glyphs: None
Army 1: Pyria (P), Agent Carr, Tarn
Army 2: Dienekes (D), Krav Maga Agents, Thorgrim
Which units survived?
At the end there was a single Krav, a half-life Dienekes, and a full life Thorgrim left (~150 pts).
Full report here:
Spoiler Alert!
Plan for D team is to use his power to auto kill using molten lava if people get close, otherwise use Krav to ping away from range.
Plan for P team is to use P’s range special to draw down Krav, then force D to move and close with melee
Rd 1: D pod (Thorgrim giving defense to D while both on Shadow and krav at level 2 get defense boost from T) forms in level 0 shadow by molten, gets one on P going up. P gets one on D and on two fire lines gets 0 ds (1 skull each roll)
Rd 2: On init switch, P gets adj attack killing one Krav. P and AC get no damage, P takes 1 from Krav and one from lava (didn’t move her off to save extra def against Krav and since @ start she was vulnerable to Krav w/ height)
Rd 3: Krav kill off P, while AC puts two on D, taking him to half
Rd 5: AC does nothing against D (3 vs 6 (4+shadow+thorgrim) is tough to break) and AC finally takes one from Krav. End of round tarn start rolling and Thorgrim moves up.
Rd 6: Krav start by killing Carr (4 skulls 0 shields!). Three Tarn move into D range (he pulls one in hot lava death) but Krav holds on from two engaged Tarn. Tarn return the favor blocking both Krav shots. Tarn take down one Krav, while D moves to attack Tarn. No more HLD, and D's attack with height fails.
Rd 7: D kills Tarn, and another moves in, with D’s current position unable to move Tarn. No more damage done this turn.
Rd 8: With Tarn held by D and no success killing him, the lone Krav picks off the remaining Tarn to end the game.
How useful were playtesting units' powers and how often did they come into play?
Pyria's special was moderately effective. Rolls didn't go well, but getting to attack multiple figures while just outside Dienekes range was useful. Due to positioning she had to sacrifice height to get an extra attack line. She did ~50 points of damage before dying and the 7 range was good at making sure she had height when attacking with her normal.
I intentionally tried to abuse Dienekes' power by putting him on shadow adjacent to molten lava and Thorgrim. His position heavily discouraged melee hero engagement (hot lava death!) but wasn't a huge impediment to melee squads, with the Tarn effectively engaging.
Any additional comments (theme, balance, fun factor with and against)?
I played myself so it was fun to win no matter what. This particular map made it very challenging to play against Dienekes, but in this build he played very on-theme as a protective tank type of character. I appreciated that his power is more of an aura type effect rather than pure adjacency. Paired with terrain and Thorgrim boosts and 6 life he was very stout, and even after moving out of both areas still performed well against multiple Tarn attacks of 3. I would like to see him played against Heavies/Grimnak/Tornak which could both flood him with more disposable commons and engage with larger figures that can't be moved.
Pyria with higher life and low defense typical of elves seemed very on point. My only criticism would be to maybe give her one extra space for the special attack. With just three spaces each, it leads her to want to be close to engagement, but she's far too frail for that.