[Pod 0] Honored Soul-Guides - Editing

[flameslayer93]

Originally Posted by Pumpkin_King

IS there an available token that they could place on another card?

We have “Sunburst” tokens (4 or 5), 2 different round markers (one of the planeswalker hand like thing and one thats the innistrad symbol), and Sword/Shield Markers.

I kind of want to keep 1 of the round markers reserved for scenario use, because official scape scenarios were timed by rounds.

[Astroking112]

I just checked the Mind Flayer Mastermind's Book to see if we had any rulings dealing with this, and it looks like we do have a good answer for some of this wonkiness already:

Originally Posted by The Book of the Mind Flayer Mastermind

Q. I Enslaved my opponents Viking Hero and during my turn with it, it dies (due to lava, Counterstike, Falling, Disengagement, Overextending Eldgrimm, ect.) Do I get to place the Spirit on one of my cards or does it go back to the controlling player?

A. Short answer: No.
You have only gained temporary control of the figure, when it dies, your turn is immediately over and you must give it back to the person you Enslaved it from. (Nice try though )

So the issue of temporary control should be resolved here. I'd argue that this ruling also implies that when the turn is interrupted by a factor other than death, the "end of the turn" power still applies as well, given that Enslave uses the same "At the end of that turn" wording, but that's not a hill that I'm going to die on (and it should be clarified in any case).

We'll still need a R&C to address this, of course, but I think that it's also the logical solution. If this is the direction that we want to proceed with, I'll let some of my less experienced groups on my campus test this unit out without any supervision and see what answer they come to.

Originally Posted by All Your Pie

If we want to keep the Revenant’s Tome powerset, can we make it work without having the “placing figures on their card” aspect?

That's an interesting proposal. There is still some wonkiness with spirit powers and being able to revive a dead Finn and then place him somewhere else, but overall I think that this is considerably cleaner rules-wise.

Unfortunately, it does come at the cost of making these guys all but guaranteed to sit in your starting zone the whole game. If the heroes don't have to die within a certain range of them, then it becomes an easy investment to give yourself a potential Q9 or Ozuul turn if the opponent comes close to your starting zone. It might pose a significant problem to how they play.

Originally Posted by flameslayer93

We have “Sunburst” tokens (4 or 5), 2 different round markers (one of the planeswalker hand like thing and one thats the innistrad symbol), and Sword/Shield Markers.

I kind of want to keep 1 of the round markers reserved for scenario use, because official scape scenarios were timed by rounds.

I was under the impression that the "Sunburst" tokens were being used by Pod 1 for the Ukushia Pride.

I absolutely agree that we need a round marker for scenarios. It'd be very limiting if we didn't have access to any time limits.

A mixture of this with AYP's idea could be viable. Something along the lines of "When a Unique Hero that you control within 4 clear sight spaces of an Honored Soul-Guide is destroyed, you may place a Spooky Spirit Supreme Marker on that Army Card..." and then change Last Will to only be able to revive figures with Spooky Spirit Supreme Markers on their card. It's not very smooth, but I think that it at least poses less confusion.

EDIT: I think that we should also page @NecroBlade and @capsocrates to see how they feel about the level of complexity. If they're fine with going back to design as well, then we could go ahead and pull the trigger instead of debating the implementation for a power set that so far most of us on have said we're fine with dropping.

[caps]

What if we just negate all powers on the army card for the bonus turn? Does that resolve enough issues?

[Pumpkin_King]

Would take away some of the oomph both thematically and mechanically, but it's an option.

[Scytale]

Originally Posted by capsocrates

What if we just negate all powers on the army card for the bonus turn? Does that resolve enough issues?

It would solve the bonding chain issue, at least.

[NecroBlade]

Sorry it's been a minute since I've logged on. Thanks very much @Scytale for running the checklist. I'll add my thoughts...

Originally Posted by Scytale

6. Do any of the powers unintentionally synergize with other players' units? Could Last Will be used on a figure you have temporary control of, such as Eternal Hatred or Enslave? It may die during the turn you have temporary control, so can you place it on the Honored Soul-Guides army card and take a turn with it again later? Adding complication to that is mirror matches. Last Will destroys that hero at the end of the turn, so I think it would be destroyed prior to control returning to its original owner, so the original owner could not use Last Will to put it on their own Honored Soul-Guides army card.

I think precedent has been presented for this one.

12. Are any powers expected to work after all figures have been destroyed? Unique Heroes placed on the Honored Soul-Guides army card will be stranded there. I assume this is intentional.

16. Do any powers place other figures on this card? Yes If so, how does it interact with other place-on-card powers (Animated Materiel, Cling, Dwarven Gunners, Warriors Armor Spirit, Warriors Attack Spirit, Warrior's Swiftness Spirit, Necromancy)? There are a number of others powers that can place dead figures on other army cards. How is Last Will supposed to interact with them?

Stranded how? Like Azazel couldn't use Rejected by Death? I'd disagree with that. Powers like that only care that the figure is previously destroyed, which it is.

19. How do the powers interact with the Marro Hive? If the Marro Hive is taken by Last Will, and the Honored Soul-Guides give up their turn to bring it back and take a turn, can it use Hive Mind to take more turns beforehand?

I don't see why not.

2. How does it interact with Mind Shackle/Soul Devour? If the Honored Soul-Guides have one or more Unique Heroes on their army card when they are Mind Shackled, can the new owner take turns with those Unique Heroes which belong to the other player?

You can't have two of the same Unique figure in your army, and if you Last Will something you already have you would have two. So no.

1. Does it create bonding chains/loops? For a power like Hive Mind, can the Marro Hive take a turn with a Marro squad before taking it turn when taking a turn with Last Will? How about other "instead of taking a turn" powers like Kato Katsuro's Command?

1. How does it interact with various forms of bonding? Can the Unique Hero taking a turn due to Last Will use bonding?

2. How does it interact with powers that allow other units to take turns instead of the unit with the order marker? Can the Unique Hero taking a turn due to Last Will use an "instead of taking a turn" power?

See above.

7. How does it interact with Rejected by Death? Rejected by Death would happen at the start of the Unique Hero's turn that is going via Last Will. Could Rejected by Death be used to remove the figure from the Honored Soul-Guides army card? If so, can it be placed back on the card after it dies again?

I don't see why not/see above.

12. How does it interact with EMP Response? If the Unique Hero taking a turn with Last Will is a Soulborg, and it gets hit with EMP Response, it's turn ends immediately. There is no "end of turn" phase, so the auto-destruct that Last Will tacks on would not happen. Changing to be "after taking that turn" is needed to fix that, though that will clash with some other effects.

Not sure what "after taking a turn" breaks, but would "after attacking" be any better/worse?

2. How does it interact with Zombies Rise Again/Zombie Rises Again/Bloodborn Rising? Could a Zombie Hulk on the Honored Soul-Guides army card Rise Again? If so, could it be put back on the Honored Soul-Guides army card due to Last Will?

See above.

3. How does it interact with Engagement Strike/Ice Spikes/Braced Spear? Placing the Unique Hero on the turn due to Last Will could trigger these powers, and could be killed by them before taking a turn. In which case, the Unique Hero never gets a turn, which implies you would not need to destroy an Honored Soul-Guide at the end of that figure's turn. Is that how it's intended?

I suppose this would still defeat the "after attacking" suggestion, but I would be OK with that.

25. How does it interact with Bloodlust/Demonblade? If a Tagawa destroys a Unique Hero taking a turn due to Last Will with Counter Strike, it would get a Bloodlust marker. Is this ok?

Don't see why it wouldn't be.



Spitballing a rewrite that may or may not improve some interactions:
LAST WILL
When a Unique Hero you control within 4 clear sight spaces of an Honored Soul-Guide is destroyed, you may destroy that Honored Soul-Guide and place its figure on that Unique Hero's Army Card. Instead of taking a turn with Honored Soul-Guides, even if both are destroyed, you may remove an Honored Soul-Guide from a Unique Hero Army Card you control and place that Honored Soul-Guide on this card. Remove all wound markers from that Hero's card, place that figure adjacent to any figure you control, and immediately take a turn with that Hero. At the end of that turn, you must destroy the chosen Hero.

[Pumpkin_King]

Oh, I do like that. My instinct is that it makes them easier to use but I’m not sure how. Maybe reduces the chance that they’d be destroyed after a hero is put on their card but before they get used.

[Scytale]

Originally Posted by NecroBlade

LAST WILL
When a Unique Hero you control within 4 clear sight spaces of an Honored Soul-Guide is destroyed, you may destroy that Honored Soul-Guide and place its figure on that Unique Hero's Army Card. Instead of taking a turn with Honored Soul-Guides, even if both are destroyed, you may remove an Honored Soul-Guide from a Unique Hero Army Card you control and place that Honored Soul-Guide on this card. Remove all wound markers from that Hero's card, place that figure adjacent to any figure you control, and immediately take a turn with that Hero. At the end of that turn, you must destroy the chosen Hero.

I think it would improve some things, yes.

[Astroking112]

Looking at Pod 0 as a whole, I'm of the impression that we shouldn't be making such a complicated design as this when the other three units we're bundling in involve temporary control with Mind Jack, a placement mechanic that isn't immediately intuitive such as Gravity Pull, and the weird playstyle of Project Velnesh.

The most recent suggestion for Last Will does a good job of removing some of the rules issues, but it makes the process of activating the power even less straightforward and more confusing to a new player. Remembering to destroy your Guide so that you can then take a turn with the destroyed Soul-Guides to instead take a turn with the revived hero doesn't feel immediately intuitive to me--ideally, I'd like for our players to not need to read a power multiple times to get a clear idea of how it works.

We do have some leeway with creating a complex design in this set, of course. Revenant's Tome exists as a very similar mechanic from D&DScape. On the other hand, Revenant's Tome is a random temporary power-up from an expansion in Wave D3, not the Master Set, and this is one of the first 4-8 designs out of 22 in AotV: should we really be designing something so implementation-heavy this early, especially when the other designs already come bundled with their own complexities? I think that Scytale had a great point when he said that this feels like a future expansion unit, not one that gets bundled into the base game.

My impression right now is that we'd be well-served to take this one back to Design and figure out a simpler yet still thematic unit.

[caps]

Hmm. I would like to see us play around with this same idea some more. Maybe it is better to do it in design, but then again I might prefer Scytale's input on rules variants. Necroblade's suggested wording definitely tips us into territory that is difficult to navigate.

[flameslayer93]

After asking @LoveElemental to review Last Will, she had to read the power a few times to fully process how it works. I think at the very least, we need to scale this back somewhat. While it seems fairly simple to us, it’s evident (at least from one case) that it’s just too much. Although she isn’t a complete newbie, the fact that part of the target audience (newbies and people with limited scape knowledge) had troubles understanding the power means we did something wrong.

I’ve got a few ideas kickin’ around in my head.

1) Simplify the heck out Last Will. I would drop the range and figure-on-card requirements, and just let them skip their turn in exhange for a destroyed Unique Hero turn. The process of bringing them back remains the same, and I assume we’ll cut out a ton of words.

2) Make them into little Grim Reaperlings. Maybe they have a 5% chance of auto-destroyed an adjacent figure? Maybe they reduce targetted enemy’s defense dice?

3) Make their only ability Stealth Flying. Give them a ranged attack and a bunch of speed and let players get creative.

[Pumpkin_King]

I think we should really try to simplify Last Will first - if we can’t get something satisfactory we spitballed some ideas in discord that we can bring here once we kick them back to Design.

I like flameslayer’s list here, and I think we could add some options to it when/if we officially kick it back.