The Book of Black Bolt (II)

[Tornado]

Yea

[Yodaking]

yea

[toyhandle]

This passes.

Thanks guys!

[Ericth74]

C3G STANDARD PLAYTEST FEEDBACK FORM

NAME OF THE PLAYTEST UNIT: Black Bolt II

Version tested:

Spoiler Alert!

NAME = BLACK BOLT
SECRET IDENTITY = BLACKAGAR BOLTAGON

SPECIES = INHUMAN
UNIQUENESS = UNIQUE HERO
CLASS = KING
PERSONALITY = RESOLUTE

SIZE/HEIGHT = MEDIUM 5

LIFE = 6

MOVE = 7
RANGE = 1
ATTACK = 6
DEFENSE = 6

POINTS = 330

TACITURN TACTICIAN
Immediately after you win initiative, you may move a figure you control. If you lose initiative this round and you roll the 20-sided die for a figure within 4 spaces of Black Bolt, you may add 2 to your roll.

BROKEN SILENCE SPECIAL ATTACK
Range Special. Attack 8.
Choose 3 spaces in a straight line from Black Bolt. All figures on the chosen spaces, and all figures other than Black Bolt within 1 space of the chosen spaces, are affected by this special attack. Roll 8 attack dice once for all affected figures. Each figure rolls defense dice separately. You may only use this special attack once per round, and only if a friendly Unique Hero has been destroyed this round.

MASTER BLOW
If Black Bolt has at least 4 wounds, he adds 1 to his attack for each wound he has. If Black Bolt attacks and destroys a figure while adding to his attack this way he is destroyed.

SUPERSTRENGTH

FLYING

Army Test
Map: Turtle Training Dojo
Units: 1200pts – Black Bolt 330, Iron Man 270, Namor 280, Dr Strange 320 VS 1200 pts – Thor 430, Beta Ray Bill 420, Valkyrie 350

Spoiler Alert!

Damage Dealt: R3T3 Thor 4 wounds – SA
R3T3 Beta Ray Bill 2 wounds – SA
R4T2 Valkyrie 3 wounds


TACITURN TACTICIAN: Used a few times to move figures.

BROKEN SILENCE SPECIAL ATTACK: Used once doing 6 wounds

Master Blow: Not used.

R1 – Movement.
R2 – Thor hits Black Bolt for 3 wounds. Namor hits Thor for a wound. Valkyrie attacks Dr Strange doing a wound.
R3 – Illuminati win initiative, Dr Strange heals a wound on Black Bolt and moves Black bolt and Iron Man adjacent to him. Namor tries Imperious Rex but fails. Iron Man attacks down on Valkyrie, she blocks it. Thor attacks Namor doing 2 wounds. Black Bolt attacks Valkyrie but rolls no skulls on 6 dice. Namor gets attacked and by Thor and takes 4 wounds and is defeated. Black Bolt flies over to Thor and Beta Ray Bill and attacks them with his SA, and rolls 7 skulls, doing 4 wounds to Thor and 2 wounds to bill. Valkyrie attacks Dr Strange doing 2 wounds to him.
R4 – Iron Man hits Valkyrie for 2 wounds. Beta Ray attacks Strange who blocks it. Black Bolt attacks Valkyrie doing 3 wounds. Thor attacks Strange doing 1 wound. Black bolt attacks Valkyrie who blocks it. Valkyrie attacks Dr Strange doing a wound and killing him.
R5 – Beta attacks Black Blot who blocks it. Iron Man attacks down on Valkyrie who blocks it. Thor attacks Black Bolt doing a wound. Beta Ray Bill attacks Black Bolt who blocks it. Black Bolt attacks Valkyrie, its blocked. Thor and Beta again both attack Black Bolt who blocks them both. Black Bolt attacks Valkyrie and finally takes her out.
R5 – Iron Man attacks down on Thor doing a wound. Thor attacks Black Bolt doing 3 wounds and taking him out. Dead OM2 on Black Bolt. Thor attacks Iron Man doing 3 wounds. Iron Man attacks Thor, its blocked. Beta Ray Bill attacks and kills Iron Man

Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Thor 6 wounds/2 life left, Beta Ray Bill 2 wounds/5 life left

___________________________________________________________

Army Test
Map: Conflict Chernobyl
Units: 1000 pts – Black Bolt 330, Iron Man 270, Black Panther 210, Professor X 190 VS 1000 pts – Luke Cage 190, The Thing II 340, Jessica Jones 220, Spider-Man 250

Spoiler Alert!

Damage Dealt: R2T2 Thing 3 wounds – SA
R2T2 Jessica Jones 5 wounds – SA
R3T1 Thing 3 wounds – Master Blow

TACITURN TACTICIAN: Used in Rounds 1 and 3 to move figures forward.

BROKEN SILENCE SPECIAL ATTACK: Used once when Iron Man went down doing a total of 8 wounds between Thing and Jones

Master Blow: Used when he had 4 wounds before Thing could take him out. Rolled 10 dice doing 3 wounds to take Thing down.

R1 – Movement. Professor X Mind Blasts Cage. Black Bolt Attacks Jones, she blocks it. Prof X Mind Blast Cage for 2 more wounds. Thing engages Black Bolt and takes a wound from Panther. Thing attacks Black bolt who blocks it. Cage attacks Iron Man doing 1 wound.
R2 – Thing attacks Black Bolt doing 4 wounds. Cage attacks Iron Man doing 2 wounds. Iron Man attacks Cage doing a wound. Thing attacks Black Bolt doing 1 wound. Cage attacks and kills Iron Man. Black Bolt attacks Thing and Jones with Broken Silence SA(Iron Man killed triggered it), it does 3 wounds to Thing and 5 wounds to Jones, taking her out. Spider-Man moves forward. Black Panther attacks and misses Cage.
R3 – Black Bolt uses Master Blow and attacks Thing rolling 10 dice and does 3 wounds taking Thing out and removing Black Bolt from the game. Spider-Man attacks down on Black Panther doing 1 wound. Cage engages Panther, Daggers miss, and attacks him doing 3 wounds taking Panther out. Dead OM2 on each team. Prof X rolls for Mind Blast doing 1 wound to Cage killing him. Spider-Man engages and attacks Prof X doing a wound.
R4 – Prof X exchange attacks with Spider-Man with Spider-Man taking him out on turn 3 to end the game.

Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Spider-Man 2 wounds/3 life left

___________________________________________________________

Army Test
Map: City Park
Units: 1000 pts – Iron Man 270, Black Bolt 330, Beast 200, Reed Richards 200 VS 1000 pts – Grim Reaper 260, Klaw 240, Wizard 140, Wonder Man 360

Spoiler Alert!

Damage Dealt: R2T3 Wonder Man 1 wound(was 3, got reduced)
R2T3 Wonder Man 1 wound


TACITURN TACTICIAN: Used the free movement every round.

BROKEN SILENCE SPECIAL ATTACK: Not used

Master Blow: Not used

R1 – Black Bolt gets the Web Pistol. Movement.
R2 – Reed gets a free move from Black Bolt. Reed gives Beast the Anti Grav Glyph. Iron Man hits Grim for 2 wounds. Wonder Man hits Iron Man for 1 wound. Beast attacks Grim who blocks it. Klaw attacks down on Beast doing 2 wounds. Grim Attacks Beast its blocked. Black Bolt hits Wonder Man for a wound, it was 3 but Wonder Man's Ionic Imbalance reduces it. Wonder Man hits Iron Man for 3 wounds, taking him out(Klaw removes a shield). Grim attacks Beast but blanks the attack.
R3 – Reed gets a free move and gives himself the Shield Belt. Black Bolt attacks Wonder Man doing a wound. Wonder Man attacks Black Bolt who blocks it. Grim attacks Beast who blocks it. Beast attacks Grim who blocks it. Wonder Man hits Black Bolt for 3 wounds. Grim again attacks Beast and blanks. Black Bolt puts 1 wound on Wonder Man. Wonder Man attacks Black Bolt who blocks it.
R4 – Reed moves to the center height on the water via Black Bolts free move. Beast leaps to height and attacks down on Grim Reaper doing 2 wounds. Wonder Man attacks and kills Black Bolt. Reed moves 2 Order Markers off of Black Bolt. Grim hits Beast for a wound and removes an OM. Wonder Man hits Beast for 2 wounds. Grim attacks Beast doing a wound and heals a wound. Reed attacks down on Grim reaper killing him. Wonder Man kills Beast.
R5 and 6 – Reed takes out Wonder Man but can't get around Klaw and Wizard's attack negation and they take him out.

Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Wizard full 4 life, Klaw 2 wounds/3 life left

GENERAL THOUGHTS ON THE TESTED UNIT: Black Bolt went 0-3 in my games. I think he's currently designed to work best when all the Illuminati are together. He can get help with all the different members of the group. With bits and pieces it makes him a little harder to get full value out of. In game one and three I didn't get to use Mortal Blow, which can happen. He's the biggest attacker on the team and usually get targeted by the opponents big gun. In both those games he was killed before he could ever fire it off. That's okay though and is very similar to Human Torch's Supernova SA, sometimes there just isn't need or opportunity to use it. But in Torch's case you don't have any restrictions about when you can use it and it's also a very big attack except it doesn't kill Johnny. Black Bolt's second power, his special attack, can be really strong but again you have a limitation on when you can use it. I did fire it off in games 1 and 2 but only once each. You need to have either an Order Marker on Black Bolt at the right time, or have Black Panther and win Initiative or have Reed on your team to move a marker to Black Bolt at the right time to trigger the SA. It's a great power but challenging to use. If he had some type of marker to add to his card once an ally died that he could burn to use his SA it might be better or certainly will make it easier to use if a ally dies at the end of a round. Currently if that happens you're out of luck. Something else for Mortal Blow to allow you to fire it off easier would help it too. Maybe the ability to use it at the end of the round? Maybe something like this:

MASTER BLOW
If Black Bolt takes enough wounds to be destroyed you may instead place wounds until he has 1 life remaining. If you do so, at the end of that round he may roll up to a total of 4 unblockable attack dice targeting opponent's figures within 2 spaces of Black Bolt. Destroy Black Bolt after using this power.

I think something like that could work, or a tweak of that anyways.

Black Bolt is a good design but in my opinion, isn't quite there yet to work reliably for 330 points. His free movement was great but the lack of 2 out of 3 powers being consistent, he was mostly just a normal melee attacker who can be awesome but only in really specific situations. My recommendation is a rework of at least one of the 2 powers to make them more accessible.

[toyhandle]

Was away for a bit, but finally getting around to saying thanks for the playtests and feedback!

Talked about it with Ericth and Bats. I'm happy with Master Blow so far, and we came up with this for the Special Attack, since that was the most difficult to set up.

Always available once per round, but no longer requires a friendly to have been destroyed. It'll be stronger if a figure was destroyed, but with a not-too-swingy difference of two extra dice.

BROKEN SILENCE SPECIAL ATTACK
Range Special. Attack Special.
Choose 3 spaces in a straight line from Black Bolt. All figures on the chosen spaces, and all figures other than Black Bolt within 1 space of the chosen spaces, are affected by this special attack. Roll 6 attack dice once for all affected figures, or 8 attack dice if a friendly Unique Hero was destroyed this round. Each figure rolls defense dice separately. You may only use this special attack once per round, and only if a friendly Unique Hero has been destroyed this round.

[IAmBatman]

[Ericth74]

I like it.

[toyhandle]

I propose a vote to move to Public Playtesting.
@Arkham - ;
@Ericth74 - ;
@IAmBatman - ;
@MrNobody - ;
@Tornado - ;
@Yodaking - ;

[MrNobody]

Yea

[IAmBatman]

Yea. No tags needed until vote for release. This just needs any 5 Heroes or Legends.

[toyhandle]

Ah, thanks!

[Ericth74]

yea