Ronin's Public Workshopping Thread

[japes]

Originally Posted by Ronin

Pshaw. A hundred designs at a time is the way to go!

It's not homework, though, Xael, so don't feel obligated to read all of it.

Don't listen to this guy Xael...there's a quiz.

[IAmBatman]

But no sobriety test!

[Ronin]

Originally Posted by IAmBatman

But no sobriety test!

Definitely not. Gotta workshop at the Ballmer Peak.

[Scapemage]

I believe we're trying to increase public participation, not public inebriation.

[IAmBatman]

Originally Posted by Scapemage

I believe we're trying to increase public participation, not public inebriation.

You say tomato, I say bloody mary ....

[Arkham]

I’m loving it. I figured Jason and Freddy would be one offs. Giving Slashers their own little faction along with a counter faction, and even cross faction play, is pretty cool.

[Ronin]

Okay, here's something specific I'd like to talk about:

The figure used for this unit is a Heroclix figure from the Superior Foes of Spider-Man set.
Its model number and name are #056 / Chameleon.

NAME = CHAMELEON
SECRET IDENTITY = DMITRI KRAVINOFF

SPECIES = HUMAN
UNIQUENESS = UNIQUE HERO
CLASS = CRIMINAL
PERSONALITY = UNSTABLE

SIZE/HEIGHT = MEDIUM 5

LIFE = 4

MOVE = 6
RANGE = 1
ATTACK = 4
DEFENSE = 4

POINTS = ???

CHAMELEON INFILTRATION
At the start of any round, after Order Markers are placed, if Chameleon is on the battlefield and unenaged, you may choose up to six medium enemy Unique Heroes. Place Chameleon on this card and place a white Chameleon Marker face-down on each chosen Hero's card. Each Hero with one of your Chameleon Markers on its card is considered a Suspect.

CHAMELEON REVEALED
Whenever a Suspect begins to take a turn, you must turn the Chameleon Marker on that Suspect's card face up. If the Chameleon Marker does not have Chameleon's face on it, remove that marker from the Suspect's card. If the Chameleon Marker has Chameleon's face on it, immediately switch Chameleon and that Suspect, place that Suspect on any empty space in its Start Zone, and then remove all Chameleon Markers from the cards of all Suspects. After Chameleon is placed on the battlefield with this special power, if the player controlling the Suspect that he replaced did not reveal an Order Marker on that Suspect's card at the start of their turn, that Suspect's turn immediately ends.

The intent here is that Chameleon gets six markers kinda like Mirror Master's - five blanks, one with a face. Got the idea for this after catching this episode of Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends. Goofy as anything, but a really fun Agatha Christie riff.

Thought it would be cool to get a Chameleon that could riff on impersonation in a different way than the old - Chameleon I fools the other characters, but this take lets you actually get into some mindgames with other players. (And a class of Criminal lets him play in a synergy web more conducive to Spider-Villainy)

I like the idea of actually introducing a little uncertainty and mindgames into Chameleon's shenanigans, instead of all the players being clued in on what he was up to. Here, an enemy might know Chameleon's among them, but they don't know exactly who to trust.

I've touched this up a little bit since I first came up with it, but I've had the core design for a while now.

[Lazy Orang]

I like the concept, but that's a lot of effort to basically just end one enemy figure's turn once....

[Ronin]

Originally Posted by Lazy Orang

I like the concept, but that's a lot of effort to basically just end one enemy figure's turn once....

Yeah, I have some worries about how easy it would be to keep him interesting to play after he pulls his trick for the first time. It's hard to use multiple times, but it's a pretty good trick, so he doesn't strictly need to be able to pull it off multiple times to be valuable. Plus there are some indirect benefits from sowing distrust - if he pscychs Batman into not advancing Robin for fear of Robin turning out to be an unfriendly, that isn't nothing.

If we wanted to make it a hair easier for him to survive and reinfiltrate (and just generally up his utility), I could see knocking his Defense down 1 and reusing a special power off a certain On Deck unit (name updated to Chameleon's to conceal who that is):

SMOKE SCREEN
Start the game with two Glyphs of Utility: Smoke Pellets on this card. Chameleon cannot lose these glyphs by receiving wounds unless he is destroyed.

[japes]

I'm kind of with LO here. It's cool in concept but gameplay it seems weird. Each round you basically pick a new figure to teleport back to the startzone despite just watching him appear across the board as another figure the last round.

Seems more believable if you started with a squad of civilians or something and did the skrull infiltrator type thing with them.

Maybe have a power on Chameleons card where the civilians can't be attacked and then at some point he can destroy one civilian and replace it with chameleons figure.

Maybe allow him to go back on his card whenever he's hidden from LOS from enemy figures and do it again with the remaining civilians.

Make it worthwhile by allowing him a free move of civilians at the end of each round...


Probably horrible ideas but I didn't want to criticize without at least throwing something out.

[Lazy Orang]

I like the Smoke Screen - Chameleon commonly employed knockout gas in the 90s Spidey cartoon, and that gets across some of that theme.
I don't like that he has to use it immediately. It's going to be used early in the game before the given figure's really advanced, they're going to be replaced while in their start-zone, and Chameleon's just going to have scuppered one turn early game as his only effect. Not exciting me. I did miss that he can re-infiltrate after doing his thing - that makes him better, but he's just going to be killed before he can when he's trapped in your opponent's start-zone like this. Here are my thoughts:

1) Make unmasking Chameleon optional. Chameleon should be able to play along as long as it suits him.
2) When he unmasks, allow him to roll an unblockable attack die against a nearby figure, as though he's taken them by surprise.

Something like:

NAME = CHAMELEON
SECRET IDENTITY = DMITRI KRAVINOFF

SPECIES = HUMAN
UNIQUENESS = UNIQUE HERO
CLASS = CRIMINAL
PERSONALITY = UNSTABLE

SIZE/HEIGHT = MEDIUM 5

LIFE = 4

MOVE = 6
RANGE = 1
ATTACK = 4
DEFENSE = 4

POINTS = ???

SMOKE SCREEN
Start the game with two Glyphs of Utility: Smoke Pellets on this card. Chameleon cannot lose these glyphs by receiving wounds unless he is destroyed.

CHAMELEON INFILTRATION
At the start of any round, after Order Markers are placed, if Chameleon is on the battlefield and unenaged, you may choose up to six medium enemy Unique Heroes. Place Chameleon on this card and place a white Chameleon Marker face-down on each chosen Hero's card. Each Hero with one of your Chameleon Markers on its card is considered a Suspect.

CHAMELEON REVEALED
Whenever a Suspect begins to take a turn, you may turn the Chameleon Marker on that Suspect's card face up. If the Chameleon Marker does not have Chameleon's face on it, remove that marker from the Suspect's card. If the Chameleon Marker has Chameleon's face on it, immediately switch Chameleon and that Suspect, place that Suspect on any empty space in its Start Zone, and then remove all Chameleon Markers from the cards of all Suspects. After Chameleon is placed on the battlefield with this special power, you may roll an unblockable attack die against any opponent's figure within 3 spaces of him and, if the player controlling the Suspect that he replaced did not reveal an Order Marker on that Suspect's card at the start of their turn, that Suspect's turn immediately ends.

******

That feels more exciting to me, and more like Chameleon.

[MrNobody]

I like it. Chameleon I can be pretty good for his cheap price, but sometimes it can be difficult to justify putting OMs on him. (We’ve actually had fun taking a cue from some Kolakoski post and house ruling him as a 120 point assassin played with hand ninjas.) My main note is that right now, it seems to me like the opponent is penalized for “guessing” the correct suspect. They lose their positioning on the map, and possibly lose their turn. Just an idea, but what if there was a power to represent the paranoia of knowing there’s an enemy in your midst, and revealing Chameleon cancels it out?
Edit: Oh wow a lot of discussion happened while I was typing this up and checking how to spell “Kolakoski”