Heroscape: Age of Annihilation is here! Back it on Haslab!

[Shadowking]

@Dad_Scaper just dropping a line to see if you (or anyone else who was involved reads this honestly) can/are willing to share anything regarding various stuff with Age of Annilihation; not "new info"/info on unrevealed content as such, as a person interested in game design myself I'm just interested in some of the "behind the curtains" info regarding the design side of it. I know you've shared some info & stated you've been open to questions on some of the podcasts and videos you've been on, so was just wondering/hoping if you'd be willing to answer one or more of these questions regarding various things at all?

1. Was there a general "top-down" design philosophy or statement for AoA overall? Did it have specific design goals you guys wanted to capture? Sort of like an overall mission statement I guess. Were elements of it designed with the concept that it would later comprise some form of more traditional Master Set in mind?

2. How did the faction selection come about? Were the faction ideas handed down to you, or did you guys come up with them as a collaborative process? Were more historical-based units decided to not be a focus from higher-ups or was it more just coincidence that they weren't looked too heavily in AoA (or something like it not being a mandate or anything, but just that people didn't feel like they fit the other goals for the set?

3. Do you have any fun stories you can share from the design process? Funny design stories, playtest stories, that sort of thing? Obviously any sensitive info can be redacted if that would otherwise make you unable to share, but I always like hearing those.

4. What unit changed the most during design (either the most iterations or the biggest difference from concept to final card, or honestly both)? Again, specific details of older versions etc can be redacted on that of course.

5. How much intentionality was there behind the inclusion of synergy with older units/how much of it was more incidental or a nice bonus to things? Things like Dorim working with Dwarves, a new Hivelord for the Grubs, etc. Would future units have also been planned to take advantage of those synergies (so you weren't stuck having to buy a 15 year out of print squad)? I really liked this aspect personally, but interested to hear how much of an actual philosophy it was, if you can share.

6. Was there a specific drive to push the boundaries on things that the original run never touched, like multi-life squads, 5-model squads, figures that could create glyphs, etc? That was another element of AoA I found very compelling.

7. This one is very specific but I know multiple people have brought it up so can't hurt to ask if there's a chance you can shed light on it: there's been some contention with how the two Ursine heroes' sculpts and personalities line up, with Adelbern being the unit that ended up Wild despite looking more militaristic/armored and discipled, while Oberon ended up being Valiant but has the giant flailing claws and snarling teeth. Personally I don't really consider it an "issue" but I am quite interested to hear if there's anything you can share as to the reasons behind why it ended up how it did, as generally I think the theming behind AoA is really well-done but that one stands out a bit without knowing what the intentionality behind it was.

8. What was your favourite AoA unit that you created (of what we saw revealed), your favourite one you didn't create, and why? (I'm not uninterested to hear your least favourites too, if you had them, but that seems a bit of a mean-spirited question perhaps? Haha)