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  #241  
Old February 28th, 2020, 04:54 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

I'm not particularly interested in making an Enslave-type effect much more likely to occur than it is for the Mindflayer. In that sense, I think we're in a good place here. Mind Jack being a cool, swingy ability is precisely the reason why it shouldn't be triggering all the time. Mindshackle isn't any less memorable or cool because it only has a 5% chance of working.

That said, I can understand that spending a turn on Tetsuo, wounding him to buff his attack, dealing damage, and then failing on the role is a frustrating play experience. I'm willing to hear suggestions on how to change that loop. A possibility would be to eliminate Overclock entirely, and allow Tetsuo to automatically Mind Jack any unit he wounds without destroying.

The probabilities for that do spook me a little, though. 50% chance of wounding a 3D figure, around 62% chance of wounding a 2D one. This change wound give Mind Jack a better chance of working than Enslave's 20% all the way up through attacks on 6D targets (25% chance).

If we reduce it to 2 attack, that puts it at around a 44% against 2D, 33% against 3, and 25% against 4, with worse chances than Enslave at all higher defense values. This I'm a lot more comfortable with, especially since it's much easier to boost an attack value than it is to boost Enslave and the odds rise much more in your favor from 2 to 3 A than from a +1 on the D20.

Could still use some input from other pod members on if they want changes here, or if they have any other suggestions on how to tweak these dials. I would still be happy to leave the design mostly as is, personally.
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  #242  
Old February 28th, 2020, 05:12 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

I'll say that - and it's been very obvious so far - I'm mainly the one bringing up concerns about Mind Jack. If I'm alone in that, I'll accept that I'm outvoted, but as AYP mentioned I think two distinct, unrelated rolls (and thus two chances for failure) is the core of my concerns with him. I'm interested to hear what others have to say.
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  #243  
Old February 28th, 2020, 05:52 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

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Originally Posted by All Your Pie View Post
I say we take a chisel to this before reaching for a hammer.

If we're changing something, let's start at 5 range. I'm perfectly happy to do that now rather than getting more tests at 4 range.
I completely agree. It's unfortunate that bumping up to 5 range loses the 6-5-4-3-2-1 aesthetic on the card, but everything that I've seen so far implies that the extra range will help a lot. If there aren't any major complaints, then I'd be good with us moving to 5 range for the next few tests, at least.

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I'm not particularly interested in making an Enslave-type effect much more likely to occur than it is for the Mindflayer. In that sense, I think we're in a good place here. Mind Jack being a cool, swingy ability is precisely the reason why it shouldn't be triggering all the time. Mindshackle isn't any less memorable or cool because it only has a 5% chance of working.

That said, I can understand that spending a turn on Tetsuo, wounding him to buff his attack, dealing damage, and then failing on the role is a frustrating play experience. I'm willing to hear suggestions on how to change that loop. A possibility would be to eliminate Overclock entirely, and allow Tetsuo to automatically Mind Jack any unit he wounds without destroying.

The probabilities for that do spook me a little, though. 50% chance of wounding a 3D figure, around 62% chance of wounding a 2D one. This change wound give Mind Jack a better chance of working than Enslave's 20% all the way up through attacks on 6D targets (25% chance).
I could see us redesigning Mind Jack to activate on destroyed heroes, but letting it activate after any wound seems absolutely bonkers to me. It makes him more one-dimensional by removing the decision behind Overclocking, it makes him even swingier than he is, and it'd necessitate a large price bump to account for how many ways there are to exploit turn stealing, especially if it's somewhat reliable. That's not even taking into consideration how he can essentially turn certain match-ups on lava maps into an automatic win, or how well he'll fit in with a good screen to keep him safe.

One of the balancing factors so far is that the stolen turn isn't guaranteed, and it requires placing him in a lot of danger to get that chance (both with Overclock and his short range). There's simply too much potential in stealing turns for me to feel comfortable at all with making the chances so high. Let's try smoothing him out a bit with 5 range to ease his bad situations first before making such a drastic change.

Quote:
If we reduce it to 2 attack, that puts it at around a 44% against 2D, 33% against 3, and 25% against 4, with worse chances than Enslave at all higher defense values. This I'm a lot more comfortable with, especially since it's much easier to boost an attack value than it is to boost Enslave and the odds rise much more in your favor from 2 to 3 A than from a +1 on the D20.

Could still use some input from other pod members on if they want changes here, or if they have any other suggestions on how to tweak these dials. I would still be happy to leave the design mostly as is, personally.
Reducing it to 2 attack only exacerbates the problem, IMO. As it stands, Tetsuo still has neat potential in that he can throw 5 dice from range and deal a good amount of damage, even if he's inconsistent. If all he has is a single attack of 2, then he becomes completely reliant on Mind Jack to find any value, more frustrating to play given how easy it is to whiff, and generally more frustrating. It reminds me of Deadeye Dan, which is an extreme of swinginess that I don't particularly care to revisit.

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Originally Posted by Pumpkin_King View Post
I'll say that - and it's been very obvious so far - I'm mainly the one bringing up concerns about Mind Jack. If I'm alone in that, I'll accept that I'm outvoted, but as AYP mentioned I think two distinct, unrelated rolls (and thus two chances for failure) is the core of my concerns with him. I'm interested to hear what others have to say.
What bothers you about it? They are two distinct powers/mechanics that have a nice interplay between them. I couldn't see rolling them into the same power (essentially just reusing Enslave) conveying the same theme or playstyle without feeling hackneyed, and it feels very much like a classic HeroScape design from my experiences (albeit one of the swingy ones, which VC generally strays away from).

If it's just the two chances for failure baked into Mind Jack that bothers you, then I'm a bit confused. You've advocated changing Overclock to a wound chance over an automatic wound for a while, which I think exacerbates the problem significantly (it suddenly becomes "take a chance to boost my chance to take a chance"). Two separate types of rolls (an attack and a power effect), however, isn't anything that special from what we've seen before.

In fact, having a conditional effect on a successful wound is fairly common in HeroScape: Poison Weapons, Sujoah's Special Attack, Mortal Strike, and more have all displayed similar mechanics building on top of attack rolls before. If it's thematically appropriate and is a mechanic that's too powerful to activate on any wound but still needs a wound to work, then I don't see any problem with it.
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  #244  
Old February 28th, 2020, 06:11 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

Hacking up your post a little here AK, hope you don't mind.


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Originally Posted by Astroking112 View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pumpkin_King View Post
I'll say that - and it's been very obvious so far - I'm mainly the one bringing up concerns about Mind Jack. If I'm alone in that, I'll accept that I'm outvoted, but as AYP mentioned I think two distinct, unrelated rolls (and thus two chances for failure) is the core of my concerns with him. I'm interested to hear what others have to say.
What bothers you about it? They are two distinct powers/mechanics that have a nice interplay between them. I couldn't see rolling them into the same power (essentially just reusing Enslave) conveying the same theme or playstyle without feeling hackneyed, and it feels very much like a classic HeroScape design from my experiences (albeit one of the swingy ones, which VC generally strays away from).


In fact, having a conditional effect on a successful wound is fairly common in HeroScape: Poison Weapons, Sujoah's Special Attack, Mortal Strike, and more have all displayed similar mechanics building on top of attack rolls before. If it's thematically appropriate and is a mechanic that's too powerful to activate on any wound but still needs a wound to work, then I don't see any problem with it.

I think it's the two chances for failure. Bringing up abilities like that does make me pause, but only for a moment - "d20 to cause extra wounds" feels fundamentally different than temporary control. I guess because it's "a chance an extra good thing happens" rather than "two rolls to have the main draw and mechanic of the unit even activate." It'd be like Mindshackle being on an 18-20 but NGS has to wound first. It feels wrong.



Quote:
If it's just the two chances for failure baked into Mind Jack that bothers you, then I'm a bit confused. You've advocated changing Overclock to a wound chance over an automatic wound for a while, which I think exacerbates the problem significantly (it suddenly becomes "take a chance to boost my chance to take a chance"). Two separate types of rolls (an attack and a power effect), however, isn't anything that special from what we've seen before.

You're right, and I've gone back and forth on it myself. I think I drifted from believing that the autowound would make him too risky to believing that the core issue was the chance of Mind Jack activating at all, or accurately, the feeling/perception that it was unlikely due to two failure chances.

I have no doubts that, right now, against a 3D unit, the change for Jack is the same or higher than Enslave. I trust you guys did the math. I just think it's a clunky and inferior option to just one success/failure check.


Again, if I'm outvoted, I'll accept it and move on. This is me dying on the hill, so to speak.
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  #245  
Old February 29th, 2020, 02:09 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

Turn stealing is strong in general. Relative infrequency is not a bad thing, especially on someone this swingy. And besides, Mindjack isn’t his only schtick. I can reasonably see the OG designers making this guy with just overclock. Throwing 5 dice at range is a neat perk.

At 2A its closer to acceptable for guarenteed jacks, but 3A will be an automatic no vote for me.

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  #246  
Old February 29th, 2020, 11:43 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

We honestly haven't had that many playtests yet. Let's get a few more from a few people before we go looking to overhaul the design

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  #247  
Old March 1st, 2020, 10:59 AM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

I'd also prefer to do a little more testing and also not lose the 6-5-4-3-2-1 aesthetic. I think a great solution would be allowing Overclock to also add Range. Maybe 2R/2A or 3R/1A (since it'd also be more likely he could apply height). This would allow him to play a little safer, like attempting the Mind Jack from behind a screen, which should help his chances at being successful every now and then.


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  #248  
Old March 5th, 2020, 07:39 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

I love his design so far!

I was encouraged to throw out some idea's for figures being designed, so I was thinking, has anyone thought about using the Illusion figures with him? It'd be super cool to give him a once-per-game ability to cast 1-3 illusions within 3 spaces or something, making figures who are adjacent to them have to attack only them or something along those lines...?

Or better yet, give him the ability to switch places with an Illusion within 3-4 spaces, and not take a leaving engagement attack while doing so? Like a mini Tul-Bak-Ra?

Granted it may not be a good idea to make him too complicated, but still...thoughts?

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  #249  
Old March 5th, 2020, 07:53 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

Great minds think alike - I'm almost certain that was the direction we were going with the more mage-like Jace figure, an archmage who specializes in the illusions, and a squad of illusions who can back up any archmage (but of course work better with "Jace")

This one here looks a little "cyberpunk" so we were going to a sci-fi angle where we could.
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  #250  
Old March 6th, 2020, 10:22 AM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

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Great minds think alike - I'm almost certain that was the direction we were going with the more mage-like Jace figure, an archmage who specializes in the illusions, and a squad of illusions who can back up any archmage (but of course work better with "Jace")

This one here looks a little "cyberpunk" so we were going to a sci-fi angle where we could.
Cool. I guess he will be in a future pod. I'll do some designing today and see if I can make him work with the Illusions.

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  #251  
Old April 3rd, 2020, 01:55 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

Had a game yesterday where Tetsuo came up as clutch

500 Point Armies, Random Draft Pool

Map: Stygian Rift

Army 1 (Me):
Su-Bak-Na
Sgt Alexander Drake (Sotm)
1x Marrden Nagrubs
2 Obsidean Guards
Guilty Mccreech

Army 2 (Kevin):
Morsbane
Brunak
Sgt Alexander Drake (Rotv)
Raelin (Rotv)
Tetsuo

Game Started with Kevin getting the initiative he moved Drake, towards the glyph to my left, and I in turn Advanced my Guards on both glyphs, He activated Drake again to take what turned out to be a Range +4 Glyph. Nagrubs and Su-bak-Na Advanced up the middle to allow my hivelord to fly pretty much anywhere relevant. Brunak Goes to start pushing up the Middle. Then Su-bak-na flys up to brunak attacking for 1 wound, Nagrubs close behind.

Winning Initiative, I start by moving my guards to attack Drake, scoring 2 wounds total, a third Guard Moves to take Unique +1 attack Glyph. He move Raelin to a more Central position to cover both brunak and Drake. Su-bak-na and friends Beat on Brunak managing to kill him. Tetsuo overdrives and attack Su-bak-na Mind jacking him. Kevin asks me how molten lava works since its never come up.... Su-bak-na Flies into lava and dies. rip. I move up Sgt Drake into shadow. His Drake Kills a Guard.

Back to Top I lose Initiative. He moves his drake towards map center taking no damage from the passing swipe. I run my Drake to his Drake, and Slice him in twain (****ing 7 skulls yikes) He dies making this battle report less confusing. I'm also 80% sure this creates a time paradox but eh its probably fine. His next order was Drake so back to me. My Drake Cleaves Raelin in half I am running hot now. He Runs Tetsuo back to lava. I advance Guilty Mccreech and take two shots at Tetsuo which miss.

Win initiative and move Drake closer to tetsuo and take a pistol shot, 1 wound. All his order markers are on Tetsuo not even hiding it, He Overdrives and wounds Drake for 2, Mind jacks him and grapples him back to Guilty, Drakes hot rolls go both ways Guilty just dies. Move Drake just out of range of Tetsuo Pistol shot again, 1 wound. Tetsuo once again overdrives and wounds for one, Mindjack successful Drake take a spicy hot swim and dies.

The game continues for a few rounds as I try to kill tetsuo with molten guards but he just kites them.

Overall I think it was a super fun game, and Honestly just the map to show probably the peak of Mindjack. Next time Ill first pick him if lava is involved.
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  #252  
Old April 20th, 2020, 02:42 PM
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Re: [Pod 0] Tetsuo Tyrell (Jace, Investigator) - Testing

Played a game on one of the master set maps. I used the Soulguides and my wife used Tetsuo.


Tetsuo was strong this match, putting wounds on Finn and Syvarris. He was able to mind jack Syv once and use him to kill one of my Soulguides - I used the Soulguide to bring Syv back and kill Tetsuo. Of Tetsuo's 6 life, 4 wounds were self-inflicted. My plan to send a melee army up first wasn't a good one, allowing Tetsuo to get into a good position to throw 6 dice several times.


I still feel that Mind Jack shouldn't have a wound requirement, but it doesn't feel as bad as I thought it would.
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