The New York City Gang Of Four

[chas]

SESSION REPORT

The Hidden Wellspring (Map)
and "Age of Annihilation Tag Team Match" (Scenario)
By Chas


*The Map*

That's the title of my freebuilt map we just had two games on yesterday, using the three new Renegade Revival terrain types (by proxy) and some of the AOA units, including some newly revealed ones.

The map on both long sides had raised Start Zones (don't think we've ever done that before) and a one space wide river leading the the Central Hill. There was a fifth Start Zone off to one side, but it was not used because one of us couldn't make the game.
I left it there because it would have made a great three player starting location if another person couldn't show up, but this was not the case, and it was not used during either game at all.

At four locations at the corners in the two rivers was one hex of Wellspring Water (a Sparkley Water hex with a gold paper star on it, for contrast the other water hexes were nonsparkly--2 or 3 of which broke when we took the map down). Between the two start zones on each side was a set of normal Ruins. Next to the Wellspring Water were Jungle Bushes, two adjacent to each, one on either side of the two rivers near the two long board edges. I used bushes closer to the edges for foliage because its easier to bend over the board to reach the center without tall Palm Trees there; I saved the taller Trees for the central pool.

On each end of the large Central Hill, which took up the entire center of the board (about 50% of the total area) were upraised asymmetrical ruins which stood on Dungeon terrain, using TD's 3D printed fan made version, which are close to the upcoming Official Renegade Walls. This looked quite nice, since both Dungeon hexes and the Walls were made in different shades of gray.

Between those two Wall areas was a central pool with palm trees around it. The pool was made up of one ring of normal water and three central hexes of Wellspring Water. A ring of surrounding raised terrain around it and the five palm trees on it were at Level Five, the highest terrain on the map.

Several people took photos, and I hope to see them up here so you can see my map. Supposedly our new server will make it easier to post photos here!

*The Armies*

Taeblewalker couldn't make it because of the snow upstate, but in the second game Sherman Davies used a version of the army T. planned to use. Here were the armies the four of us remaining used:

Sherman Davies

Game One
Axegrinders x3 210 12 SP
Migol Ironwill 110 1
Major Q9 180 2
Dorim The Bulkhead Brawler (AOA) 100 1
600 Pts 16 Sp

Game Two
Kaemon Awa 120 1
Tagawa Samurai 120 3
Tagawa Archers x3 195 9
Sgt. Drake III (AOA) 135 1
570, 14 Sp


Kolakoski (Both Games)
Shi Tarkas x2 150 2 (Custom Playtest)
Deathwalker 9000 140 1
Krug 120 2
Izumi Samurai 60 3
Brave Arrow 50 1
Fia Bonny (AOA) 80 1
600 Pts, 10 Sp

Thrasher Darkrai

Game One
Tor-Kul-Na 220 2
Maardan Nagrubs x4 12
Brute Gruts 65 4
Thyraxis Dragoon (AOA) 195 2
600 Pts, 20 Sp

Game Two
Concan The Kyrie Warrior 80 1
Tyrian The Kyrie Warrior 110 1
Marro Stingers x5 300 15
Ordo Borealis (AOA) 110 3
600 Pts, 20 Sp

Chas
Game One "Revenge of Talingul"
Talingul 100 1
Avernus 135 2
Boreos 115 1
Lilja 115 1
Hellforge Mandukor (AOA) 130 1
595 Pts, 6 Sp

Game Two
"The Gray Ghosts"
Calibrax The Kyrie Warrior 130 1
Agent Skahan 120 1
Agent Carr 100 1
Dund 110 2
Sgt. Drake III (AOA) 135 1
595 Pts, 6 Sp

Taeblewalker (Not Used)
Kosuke Samurai 100 3
Tagawa Samurai 120 3
Tagawa Samurai Archers x2 130 6
Kaemon Awa 120 1
Guilty McCreach 30 1
Raelin The Kyrie Warrior III (Utgar, AOA) 100 2
600 Pts, 16 Spaces

*The Action: Sherman Davies Ascendant*

Game One

My first army was called Talingul's Revenge, because running mostly Ice Elementals, he was slaughtered in the last scenario designed by Kolakoski. So I discovered more interesting Constructs for him to run. But it was the wrong army in the wrong sector against the wrong enemy. Swinging around the far flank to get Wall protection from shooters, I ran into K.'s Izumi Samurai on that limited area, and they stopped me cold. Finally TD side swiped me at the top near the central pool with his Brute Gruts against Lilja, but although they took her out, I got them back. But it was too late for me to score much, except for the samurai I finally finished off.

Using my rules for Illusory Walls, which I'd come up with while Haslab was offering the Age of Annihilation for the first time in its later failed offering, we rolled D20s and some proved to be Real Walls, some only Illusory (you couldn't see through them but you could move through them).

SD ended up with over 500 points of kills, with none of the rest of us went over 200. That was one of the biggest wins we'd ever seen in a Free For All, where the scores tend to be more even. We also only brought in our AOA units to replace badly wounded units.

Game Two

My second army was The Gray Ghosts, being all figures in blue gray/black of some type. They really looked cool climbing together in adjacent hexes up to the ruins on the hill! A special ops team, but I'd gone to lengths not to use the Krav Maga.
In this game, Thrasher Darkrai pulled a sudden and amazing maneuver which took the other three of us off guard completely, and dominated the whole first half of the game. We switched start zones using the same four corner ones, so now I was opposite TD and next to SD.

As my army crossed the river and headed up one side of the central hill, TD got the flying Tyrian up more quickly, and suddenly switched unwounded to his Ordo Borealis, who then took up positions high up on the central pool edges, all the way up on level five. Meanwhile they were all next to Concan who had also flown up quickly, and bonused them up! From that superior position, which the much slower bears reached by Tagging In, they dominated the entire central part of the hill. Eventually I snuck around with Calibrax and Skahan to fire at Concan and eventually one of the bears. It took all of us attacking TD at once to break up the Bears position.

The second most dramatic part of the game for me was taggin my Sgt. Drake III in fairly early for Calibrax, who had two of his four wounds from the Bears. Then he charged Concan and hurt him badly, finishing him off with a second order marker soon afterwards. Then, although I'd been Allied with SD next to me, our two Sgt. Drake III's clashed in heavy hand to hand combat on the top of the pool's raised edge! Now we rarely have two of the same figure(s) in the same game, and they almost never fight each other directly, so this was a very unusual occurrance! Unfortunately, the fight went against me quickly.

When I moved my Agent Carr back down to get a healing wound, it was the first and only time when anyone even had time to make a Wellspring Water healing roll, and luckily it worked for me. Meanwhile Skahan did well against the Marro Stingers coming up the Hill at her, since she had Stealth Dodge and it worked very well.

Not having had Dund on the table for many years, he actually made one Paralyzing Stare roll against the Stingers, even when it was too late to affect them much as they were mostly dead by now. His attack roll worked too. That was the most damage I could ever remember getting out of the old Doggin!

This time when we were finished we tallied the points, and we were all in spaced out ranks, but at least, even if Sherman Davies won again, it was a closer score:

Sherman Davies: 485
Thrasher Darkrai: 320
Chas: 265
Kolakoski: 120


Congrats to Sherman Davies, for unaccountably putting so much hurt on the rest of us in both games! After I offered the absent Taeblewaker's army to him, he decided to retool it, which he did and then pulled it onto the table.

Kolakoski also got to playtest his two new prototype insect people spearcarriers ("Shi-Tarkas"), who were advantaged if positioned near the same enemy target figure.

***

*Further Thoughts on AOA Play*

Everybody agreed that the map was fun, and it was great to introduce the three new types of terrain all together. And the scenario worked, an analogous way of welcoming the gradual reveal of the Renegade Revival of Heroscape Age of Annihilation. My idea had been to mirror the gradual introduction of the new AOA cards, only some of which had tweaks to them in Wave 1, and the brand new ones for the SOTM Heroes and two of the new Kyrie, only recently revealed, the Wave 2, to be revealed in June, and Wave 3 to be shown in the Fall. In the same way we had a few AOAs in the scenario, but only a few at a time.

Of course, we've been playing Age Of Annihilation since Haslab, thanks to my "AOA Revival Project" during the previous Haslab offering which eventually failed. The cards were designed by our pals on this fan site, and not changed much so far by Renegade. But we introduced the new Official Wave 1 cards here for the first time, as well as the new terrain as we know it so far.

We're looking forward to more finalized AOA cards, and the new AOA Wall terrain set and rules for them later this year. If April is here, can June be far behind?

Thanks to all the players, and Anitar for her new classic style cards, which embrace the new Renegade changes with a more familiar card format. Since I already have one proxy figure for each AOA character, and the only duplicate AOA figures fielded was Sgt. Drake III, you'll soon see some photos of his two proxies: Sgt. Drake I fighting Sgt. Drake II!


***

(Edit): For my longer post on using the new Wellspring Water, see here (Post 14):

https://www.heroscapers.com/communit...t=63512&page=2

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Great map; interesting scenario. Only Thrasher thought to use Tag-In strategically. Afterwards, he immediately broke our 1 Round truce, and was a wound away from killing Krug when I was able to Tag-In Fia for him.
A great move!

Playing a Free for All is tough for me. I generally play too conservatively. My Deathwalker was overrun by attacks early in both games, which I could have prevented. Shi-Tarkas retaliation was too little too late. They show potential, though. It was suggested that there attack bonding be triggered by destroying a figure rather than inflicting a wound, as they seemed very strong initially. Whatever testing I do in the future will be in team games.

P.S.: Unable to get pics off my phone as of yet . . .

[Sherman Davies]

Originally Posted by chas

Then, although I'd been Allied with SD next to me, our two Sgt. Drake III's clashed in heavy hand to hand combat on the top of the pool's raided edge! Now we rarely have two of the same figure(s) in the same game, and they almost never fight each other directly, so this was a very unusual occurrance!

[kolakoski]

Well met!

My play has sucked lately. Going to have What's in an Order Marker? open in front of me next time . . .

[chas]

NEW TERRAIN AVAILABLE FOR ALL AND THE HEROSCAPE FUTURE

Just a note to all of my fellow group members that the newproxy Renegade terrain we first used in our last game is now available for their custom scenarios in the future:

Jungle Trees and Bushes: we already have these.

Wellspring Water: Its easily made up, and I can do more than 7 hexes if more are needed. I started out with that number because that's how many you get in one of the new Renegade Battle Box sets.

Walls: TD has generously left his set of 3D printed proxy walls that are quite close to the old Haslab ones. Until Renegade publishes the official rules for Illusory Walls if any (probably coming up in June when Wave 2 will be revealed), we can continue to use mine or no special rules at all. The ones we have now may have more flexible building possibilities according to a discussion we had about them last time. So you should be able to choose between buying either type once we see the price and availability of the Official Renegade ones. We expect that they will be made available in the new Terrain Pack that is coming in Renegade Wave 2 or 3.

In addition, anyone can come up with Scenario Specific Special Rules for any of them as they wish!

***

Its becoming increasingly obvious that for us older folks who own plenty of the old Heroscape stuff, Renegade will become only one arrow in our new Age of Annihilation era Scape games bow. VC will continue putting out their cards and characters, and we will continue with our own custom scenarios, maps, and figures/cards as usual here.

I expect most of us will not be big time participants in the Renegade Store/Tournament campaign, but the future will tell about that. Also about how long the Renegade production will last. We wish them success of course, but at some point the economic factor may limit what Renegade chooses to do with Scape.

Some site members are making predictions about that already...

[kolakoski]

Well met!

From The Pre-SoV Workshop:

Originally Posted by Shiftrex

From someone that likes DnD so much that's almost funny, because it sounds EXACTLY like a DnD backstory lol.

Originally Posted by Scytale

Taking away bonding removes the balance concern, but I just can't see a half-elf gunslinger as an Empress of historical Asian figures.

The pale, delicate features of the face of the sculpt could easily pass for Chinese. Half-Elf, Half-Human Chinese. A back story for Xue being "an Empress of historical Asian figures" in the context of Valhalla would be easy to write.

Ready for testing . . .

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Scytale won't buy it after all. So . . .

Pathfinder Battles Iconic Heroes #4,
Lirianne, Half-Elf Gunslinger

CARAN CREBAIN, THE RED RAVEN
General: Utgar
Race: Half-Elf
Uniqueness: Unique Hero
Class: Corsair
Personality: Ruthless
Size: Medium 5
Life: 5
Move: 5
Range: 5
Attack: 3
Defense: 3
Points: 120

HAND CANNON
When Caran Crebain attacks an opponent's figure, you may choose an opponent's Common figure adjacent to that figure. If the defending figure receives any wounds from Caran Crebain, the chosen Common figure receives 1 wound. When Caran Crebain attacks, she may attack 1 additional time.

THE SEA RAVENS
Instead of their normal move, Caran Crebain, and any Elf, Drow or Human figure you control that follows Utgar within 4 spaces of Caran Crebain, may Leap. Leap has a move 3. When counting spaces for such figure's leaping movement, ignore elevations. Such figure may leap over water without stopping, pass over figures without becoming engaged, and leap over obstacles such as ruins. Such figure may not leap more than 12 levels up or down in a single leap. If such figure is engaged when starting to leap, that figure takes any leaving engagement attacks. If, immediately after Leaping, such figure rolls attack dice for a normal attack against an adjacent figure, you may reroll 1 die that was not a Skull.

P.S.: It has been suggested that there may not be enough available figures of this sculpt.

[chas]

You can find the postCovid revival of our local annual Islandscape Convention by Warbanner for next July here:

https://www.heroscapers.com/communit...32#post2625332

We'll be looking for more players for that, although the date has not been set yet. If you're in or near NYC you may want to look into it!

Meanwhile we're thinking of holding a "Practice Islandscape" here in June, which we've done before. I put up two or three tournament sized maps, smaller than we usually build, and we'll do a round robin on them with the Pod Draft format, scoring, and some of the maps he'll be using for that event.

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Originally Posted by kolakoski

Thank you; thank you very much!

P.S.: Ever find my Deathcommander?

Originally Posted by WarBanner

I do think I have it, yeah.

So cool! I'll have to create new pods that include it - once WarBanner has finalized the format.