The Book of Sonlen

[killercactus]

I'm not sold yet on Sonlen. I've used him a couple of times now with very mediocre results. He seems to suffer from the ever-present hero problem of only being able to attack one unit. Dragon Swoop helps somewhat, but its unreliable. His heal is also unreliable and can only be counted on to remove one or two wounds a game. I need to play him differently I think, but as of right now, I'm not impressed.

[Matthias Maccabeus]

I've played with him numerous times and have been impressed every time. I try to incorporate him into armies with heroes with lots of life, Alastair, Gilbert, Drake (SotM) and try to keep him within 4 spaces of the guys up front doing the grunt work. On his turn, I attempt to heal whoever is needing it, I attempt an autowound on whoever is causing the most trouble that won't cause me to move to far ahead of everybody and then I just attack whoever is left. So far if you can keep the heavy hitters in front of him he seems to work wonders.

[ThrasherDarkrai]

I haven't tried him yet, but it seems like he is too unreliable to work past a B+ in the Power Rankings. Both his healing and autowound only have 30% chances of working, and if the autowound doesn't work, he can only attack one guy. Granted, it is a powerful attack, but if he's swarmed, Sonlen is in a bad position, especially considering he comes with the excellent Marro Stinger swarm that can rip him to shreds. He does seem like a pretty good unit for just general supporting/hero killer, though.

[ThrasherDarkrai]

Oh, trust me, there's no way in heck Sonlen will be below a B-, this lurker knows that. But I have doubts about him being above B+. Like I said though, I haven't tried him yet, so we'll see.

[ChaosChild]

B+? Sonlen is an A- at least.

Dragon healing makes him the most versatile healer in the game if not the most reliable because he doesn't have to be adjacent to the wounded figure or his target for his attack after healing. He can also heal himself if he gets cut off or he's the last figure. Kelda requires adjacency for both her healing and attack, limiting the chance of doing both in the same turn and she can't heal herself.

Dragon swoop gives him an alternate way of dealing damage in addition to attacking. Most figures are forced to choose between attack dice damage or d20 damage.

Four attack dice at range that can be modified puts him near the top of ranged attack power.

Don't just look at those abilities individually because he gets to use all them in one turn. This makes him the most versatile figure released yet.

And don't forget he has 6 life so he will last a little while even with only three defense. Which could easily be four with height since his abilities and attack are ranged.

[Fourshadow]

I used him last night with some success. I managed to get both the Healing and the Swoop more often than not (which is amazing, for me!). The Swoop is the only way he can damage Drake without closing (and no one really wants to close with Drake, right?! ), but he can be effective against many--even Cyprien! With healing and 6 life, one can honestly consider leaving an engagement and survive. He is very nice indeed.
He did not do perfectly last night--I kept rolling shields and not skulls when attacking--but he was fun and effective.

[Captain_Gerbil]

Sonlen is amazing! While I usually only get the heal rolls and not the dragon rolls, its so amazing how you can basically use a combo like Cyprien to "tank" and kill enemies while Sonlen shoots range, heals, and tosses in some extra wounds so that Cyprien can feed

Yea, sometimes getting the 15 or better can be rough, but He has 2 chances to get the roll, whether it be Dragon attack or the heal, plus he has nice range and nice attack!

[Nwojedi]

i used him yesterday and he basically killed almost 2 full squads of Samuri by himself. These were 5 def samuri too, not the weak ones.

[Jaz1597]

A hero does not need to be unique to benefit from Dragon Healing.

'Nuff said.

[Nooblar]

Originally Posted by Jaz1597

A hero does not need to be unique to benefit from Dragon Healing.

'Nuff said.

No, but I've yet to see a common hero with more than one life

[Velenne]

I give this guy a B.

I'm very sad they made Sonlen an "Archmage" instead of a "Wizard". When Ulginesh comes out, people will be wanting to create more elf armies and he'll hopefully make them viable. Unfortunately, Sonlen won't be included because of his high cost. There really aren't any two other wizards I can get exciting about moving in tandem.

[ThrasherDarkrai]

I agree with Velenne once again. Kyntella? Filler. Aclorah? Even with his strategy, no way you're going to make me add him. Morsbane? You're kidding me right? The only thing Uglinesh has going for him with the current wizards is his flying and regular attack.