This project dares to ask the question, what if the DnD sets had been used to create figures from the Heroscape Universe rather than from the DnD Universe? In other words, what if Wizards of the Coast had used DnD models, but not as characters from their words, but as characters from the already established Heroscape worlds and races? Sacrilege, some say, but we are not those people, we are Heroscapers!
This project is pretty straight forward, convert the DnD figures/cards to be more like the original Heroscape lore, generally changing as little as possible so that most tactics players have used with them can remain the same. Some units may be changed more then others, as needed, but generally the changes should be as small as possible.
Spoiler Alert!
This thread is dedicated to the much anticipated Reclaim Valhalla Project, which has now at last brought to Heroscapers.com.
Spoiler Alert!
Reclaim Valhalla is an ongoing project to converted D&D Heroscape cards to proper Classic Heroscape (or truescape) cards to make it more compatible with the original game. As we all know, Wizards of the Coast essentially to converted Heroscape into a sort of Dungeons and Dragons "lite". Now I have nothing against D&D and have played several D&D based games and enjoyed them.
But why transform Heroscape into a min-version of D&D? The use of D&D models was explained as a way to save money. All fine and well, many companies reuse models. But what was NEVER explained is why the D&D models stayed D&D characters. In other words, why aren't the D&D elven models use to represent Heroscape Elves from Feylund? Why the D&D Sub-Game instead of simply carrying on the truescape theme with D&D models? Wizards of the Coast even repainted the models, so why not paint the orcs blue and make them from Grut? Why create a Marvel-like sub-game? Its largely suspected that Wizards of the Coast never meant to carry Heroscape on, that they always meant to cancel it and simply used it to advertise D&D with it.
True or not, the Reclaim Valhalla project aims to do what should have been done in the first place. Convert dungeonscape figure cards into truescape figure cards. The idea is not to create personal custom cards, but to change the cards AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE. To unD&Dnize it if you will. Remove the D&D bits and replace them with bits from the actual main game, as if as if Milton Bradley had still been making the game. The idea is to have person look at the card and say, "Oh, did they make a classic Heroscape version of this figure?" A process called Heroscapication, if you will.
This project will take various D&D units starting from Battle for the Underdark and Waves D1 to D3 and converted these figures into proper Heroscape characters while changing just as little as possible.
For example: Brandis Skyhunter simply needs four minor fixes to become a proper truescape card. 1: His species needs to changed from "Half-Elf" to "Elf"; 2: Since "Ranger" is not a class in Heroscape it needs to be changed to "Archer"; 3: On the basic side his homeplanet needs to changed "Feylund; 4: Finally the card style needs to be done in the Swarm of the Marro swamp-style cards, as these figures are now to be seen as further expansions of that line.
Listed on this project thread with be all the cards connected to the Reclaim Valhalla project, showing the corrected figure cards. Not every figure may be fixable (especially without changing the model) but every card that can be will eventually be done. Most of these have already been play tested by myself and my Heroscape group and we use these cards instead of the originals. But please, feel free to print and play with these classic Heroscape converted cards yourself and leave your impute in the comments below! That's why they've been posted up on there after all!
Its time to reclaim Valhalla!
Battle for the Underdark
Darrak Ambershard
Spoiler Alert!
Darrak Ambershard is the first card to undergo Heroscapication. This is a big one, since we were only given one Dwarf Hero in truescape. Now Darrak Ambershard joins Migol Ironwill alongside the ranks of the Dwarves of Feylund. We will go over the chances and why.
1. The entire card is redone in the jungle/vine/swamp style. Why? I'm so glad you asked. This is because this is suppose to be a classic Heroscape card done after Swarm of the Marro. All cards after the second master set's release were done in this style. This allegiance to Aquilla is absolutely fine, all Dwarves serve Aquilla in Heroscape.
2. Species is fine, Unique Hero is proper, "Rogue" however is not a Heroscape rank or class and further more has a completely different meaning in the Army-Based concept of Heroscape then it does in D&D. Strictly speaking, a rogue is a deserter, someone without a General to serve. Doesn't make much sense to have a figure that doesn't fight for your General does it? Essentially in D&D rouges are scouts, so we do the common sense thing and convert Darrak into a proper scout, what he should have been in the first place.
Being a scout does several things to Darrak, first he gets a boost from Aquilla's ally Ullar's unit, the Venoc Warlord. A plus two speed isn't too shabby and helps Darrak keep up with the Axegrinders if they've been using their Strategic Bonding ability. Secondly he know also gets an attack boost from Brave Arrow if he is adjacent to the Indian - which goes well with Sneak Attack too - equaling a plus three!
3. Tricky is a proper classic Heroscape personality and perfect for our sneaky dwarven scout, but the medium size of four is just bizarre. Heroscape had already well establish dwarves as small threes and its not like the D&D models are towering over them. Nor is classic Heroscape known for strictly keeping their models scaled. Deathwalker 7000 towers head-over-shoulders of humans, , yet its card lists it as the same height, medium five. So Wizards of the Coast are without excuse. Switching Darrak to a Small 3 is both natural and necessary.
4. Stats are unchanged. Remember, the idea is to change as little as possible, so far the only differences are: Card Style, Rank and Size; and Card Style is just cosmetic, it has no effect on game play. So four Life, five Move, one Range, four Attack, two Defense and ninety Points.
5. Next to last are everyone's favorite, the powers. The idea here is too keep as many of the powers as unchanged as possible. However many of the D&D abilities don't jive with classic Heroscape and are orientated to have a small group of Heroes take on a larger group of Squads and Heroes, so some tweaks are necessary.
Sneak Attack: This power is fine the way it is, no changes required.
Disarm Traps/Climb x2: Remember, this card has undergone Heroscapication. Its been converted for classic truescape, not dungeonscape. There are no Treasure Gylphs in truescape, so this power is doesn't make any sense in this context and is useless. Disarm Traps is essentially an "utility" power, it doesn't aid in combat in anyway, not for attacking, nor defending, healing, bonding or even moving. So its best replaced with another utility type power; now that Darrak is a Small 3, as is proper for a Heroscape Dwarf, he is going to have the same climbing issues that other smalls have. So its commonsense to give him the Climb x2 instead.
Hide in Darkness/Adjacent Toughness 1: Hide in Darkness is a great little ability that fun too. However we are going on the premise that there aren't any Shadow Spaces or so-called Dungeon (Cave) Spaces in classic Heroscape, so the plus three and plus six boost can't happen here. Its also not very Dwarven either, as all the other Dwarves have defensive powers that augment their defense dice roll. Adjacent Toughness ability is great because it also gives us an Aquilla allegiance power, something we lack. She is the only General not to have one, so now we can fix this and kill two Gruts with one Rock Throw. This also beautifully synergizes with Brave Arrow. Darrak gets plus one attack and an automatic shield and if Brave Arrow is adjacent to Darrak's target, Sneak Attack kicks in too. There is a little concern that this changes makes Darrak too dependent on friendly adjacent figures. Although since he'll spend most of his time bonding with the Axegrinders this probably won't be a big problem, unless he is the last man standing in your army . . . well last dwarf standing anyway. More play testing is needed.
6. Lastly, but not leastly, his homeplant. Changed to Feylund, as is proper for classic Heroscape Dwarves.
Ana Karithon/Durnipia
Spoiler Alert!
I simply love the model, perhaps the one great D&D model Wizards of the Coast gave us. The figure just oozes a sort of elegant sensual appeal in very classic Einar colors. However her card is chockfull of problems.
One of the problems right away with this card was the name. It has no effect on game play, true, but its unremarkable, unpronounceable and unrememberable; and I keep confusing it with Kaemon Awa's name since Ana and Awa are so close. Plus Einar already has a healer firmly established in Heroscape Lore: Durnipia. Now I had always thought that Durnipia was a reptilian alien, but this was only because the card bio that first mentioned her was Valguard, which says Durnipia gave him a alien lizard arm. Re-reading it, it doesn't actually say what Durnipia's species was and even mentioned that it was done by magic, not a very alien thing. On the Heroscaper.com forum, I read an interesting theory that Durnipia is a Kyrie, this makes sense in the context of Kelda, despite the very un-Kyrie sounding name of Durnipia. We will probably never know what species Durnipia was, however all we have to work with is the model Wizards of the Coast gave us. A female Einar healer. The solution to the name couldn't be more obvious.
Durnipia has several problems with her card. First she is a human and she wielded magic. In Heroscape, humans are summoned from Earth, a real life historical Earth, which as we all know, magic doesn't exist. In Heroscape there are only three "magical" worlds, Feylund, Icaria and Valhalla itself. Therefore while humans can wield enchanted artifacts made from these worlds, no human as any innate magical powers or abilities. The simplest solution is to change her into an elf, a species which can have innate magic powers; however, Durnipia cannot be converted into an elf as you can clearly see one of her ears on her model, which is definitely non-elven.
A second issue is the color Wizards of the Coast chose to give her skin. Its a pale-ish tone, not at all like the normal human skin tone on Heroscape human figures. In fact one is tempted to think that perhaps she is an undead, such a revenant. However, there are no undead humans in the classic game for the same reason there are no magical humans, there is no particular explanation why an undead human would sudden gain magical powers either, plus an undead healer just seems wrong. An undead also doesn't fit very well into Einar's Army theme either.
Interestingly enough, the fix from this card is inspired from Guri-Onii's card (a card with ironically its own host of issues). Short version, Guri-Onii is a Cyclops with a Japanese theme overlaid on it. A sort of oriental Cyclops if you will. Taking a cue from that, we go convert Durnipia's species into a "Tennin". Now none of you have probably ever heard of a "Tennin", they are roughly the Japanese equivalent of Greek Nymphs. Nymphs were minor-demi goddess associated with nature, either trees, or streams or mountains or the like. Tennin, which come from Japanese Buddhism, are unnaturally beautiful nymph-like females associate with Heaven and are often found on high mountain tops.
Thus in one stroke we have fixed both her species and her magical powers problem and given her a Japanese theme to boot, perfectly meshing her into Einar's theme. I dislike giving her a species not found in the original game, but considering the model, there doesn't seem to be a way around this.
Her status as a Unique Hero is fine and proper.
Her rank of "cleric" is an obvious problem. Heroscape makes no mention of gods or other divine beings, not even Norse gods like Thor and Odin. So having a D&D-style cleric in Heroscape just seems wrong and its not a rank one will find in classic Heroscape either. So out it must go. I toyed with the idea of "Empress" to fit Einar's Imperialistic theme, but settled on "Lady" instead, which just seem to really fit the figure well, especially given its new heavenly-associated Tennin species.
Merciful is an actual Heroscape personality and really fits a Lady Healer well, so that stays, obviously.
Medium 4 status is actually common for normal sized humanoid females in Heroscape and is roughly the model's size as well. All good.
No change is made to her stats, again, ideally we want to change as little as possible, so: Life: 5, Move: 5, Range: 4, Attack: 2, Defense: 3 and Point Value: 100. All stay exactly the same.
Powers is next on the list:
Healing Word: Her healing ability is simply awesome and may stay exactly the way it is.
Protection from Evil Aura: Her protection ability fits well with her heavenly-associated Tennin status and so may also remain exactly the way it is.
Turn Undead Special Attack/Arcane Riposte: But her last power is the so-called "Turn Undead Special Attack". This is not a very useful power, undead attackers or not and no player is going to send their healer into combat if they can at all avoid it, especially a healer who you DON'T HAVE TO PUT ORDER MARKERS ON TO HEAL OTHER UNITS! The extremely short range of four also means the undead is going to be right on top of her before she can attack it, which easily puts it in range of the hero that is right there adjacent to her being healed. "Turn Undead" is also just simply one of those horrible D&D misnomers as well, it sound like the ability should transform Durnipia into an undead, "to turn undead". The power ought to be called: "Turn Away Undead" or better yet: "Repulse Undead." To fix this, we are going to steal a power from Wildborn and give it to Durnipia instead: Arcane Riposte. This ability is passive, which means you don't need to put Order Markers on Durnipia's card to use it, which is good, because, as we've said, unlike other healers, Durnipia doesn't need Order Markers to heal other units. Arcane Riposte essentially gives her Counter Strike and Evil Eye combined together. An extremely Einar themed ability.
Lastly we do her card over in an Swarm of the Marro jungle/vine style card that she ought to have as a truescape figure released after the second master set. And establish her planet of origin on the basic side as "Feylund", one of the magical worlds of Heroscape.
Erevan Sunshadow/Erevan
Spoiler Alert!
Oh boy, what's not wrong with Erevan Sunshadow? First there is the model itself. He's too thin and too short and what is with the ugly shiny/plastic paint job? Even the Rise of Valkyrie early models don't have such a plastic shiny paint tone. And his skin is really, really pale, which is probably fine for an Eladrin, but kind of clashes with other Heroscape Elves. Wait, you don't know what an Eladrin is? Neither did I before this character came out. Let's break Erevan down and see what we can do. We can't fix the model and I was tempted to just pass over him, but his card is simply screaming to be fixed.
1. His name is fine. Even sort of cool. Erevan reminds me of Darth Revan and Sunshadow is a cool last name, even if Heroscape Elves don't HAVE last names . . . okay so the last name has to go. Sunshadow isn't very Heroscapish anyway, no one else has a similar style name like Starkiller or anything.
2. The BIG one. Elves don't serve Jandar, they serve Ullar. Why ruin a good thing? This change goes hand-in-hand with the species thing. Few people probably know off the top of their heads what an "Eladrin" is. If he had been called an "Altmer" (from the Elder Scroll games) more people would probably recognize it. They both mean "High Elf" (although admittedly Altmer sounds more "elvish" in that Tolkin kind of way then "Eladrin" does) and the reason they are called "Eladrin" instead of High Elf is presumably so there's no confusion if Elf powers work for High Elves or not. Just like Drow aren't called Dark Elves. However the only reason I can see why Wizards of the Coast made him a High Elf to begin with, is to deliberately disrupt elven synergy. Its as if they didn't want us to use classic Heroscape units anymore, because now there wouldn't be a point. Perhaps if they had kept the High Elves separate and Jandar only, it would have worked. Just like there are different races of Soulborgs and Kyrie after all, there could have been different races of Elves. Regular (wood) Elves serve Ullar, Dark Elves serve Utgar, High Elves serve Jandar. I would have bought that. But no, Wizards of the Coast compound their error by releasing a Ullar High Elf (Sharwin Wildborn) in the VERY NEXT set! So we fix this whole mess by converting Erevan into an Ullar unit and into an proper Elf. Ta da.
Changing allegiance is mostly cosmetic, but it does have a few effects on game play that might not occur to you right away. First off, the second version of Drake (''Swarm of the Marro'') can now shoot at Erevan with his pistol attack. Second, Erevan now can get a speed boost from starting off next to Acolarh. Thirdly, Dishonorable Attack no longer gives the Red Ninja a bonus when attacking Erevan. And . . . that's about it!
3. Species, see above. As a proper Elf, Erevan now interacts with other elf powers, such as Acolarh's Leaf of the Home Tree Aura, Arkmer's Staff of Lerkintin, Emirroon's Elven Summoning Spell and Kyntela Gwyn's Strength of Oak Aura 1.
4. Erevan is already a Wizard, a real Heroscape rank, which nicely makes him the missing Ninth Elven Wizard and is the primary reason we converted him in the first place. Stays as is. Obviously. As an proper Elf Wizard, Erevan can now integrate with: Chardris' Fire Strike Special Attack, Jorhdawn's Rain of Flame Special Attack and Ulginesh's Mind Link.
5. Precise, an odd personality of a Wizard to have perhaps, but typical of Heroscape range units and a classic personality. Stays.
6. Medium 5. His model is too short for a five, however, as we've already observed, even truescape didn't follow model scale with any kind of serious strictness, so we might as well leave that as it is.
7. Stats. Life: 5, Move: 6, Range: 1, Attack: 2, Defense: 2 and Points Value: 80. As you can see, no change. Personally I've always thought it odd that spell casting wizards have no normal range in Heroscape (with the exception of Ulginesh and the Arch-Mage Sonlen), but I'm not about to go converting them all because of it.
8. Powers, no change. Fire Blast Special Attack is fine, a sort of range version of Sir Hawthrone with an element of Major Q9 thrown in. Feystep has slight issues, its obviously intended for that small-band-of-hero-units-VS-a-group-of-squads-and-heroes. Tul-Bak-Ra's version of this power has double the range, can be use on every turn and even gives him disengage when he uses it. Erevan can use his once per game. But he can teleport to any height while the Overlord can't. Of course because Erevan doesn't have normal range but a special attack, height doesn't really mean all that much to him. But I'm concerned altering it would break the game balance, so its left as it. Besides, other units have once per game powers too, the Airborne Elite, Atlaga, Deathwalker 7000 and such.
9. Lastly, on the basic side we make him come from the same planet all the other elves do, Feylund.
Tandros Kreel
Spoiler Alert!
Kreel as a tactical combat character I like. Kreel as a model I hate. If he looked like he does on the box, he would have been cool. Instead they painted him in bronze and brown armor, then painted his skin the exact same brown color and his beard the exact same bronze color! I explain it away as that he is an Arab mercenary (works for skin but not for beard). But bottom line I just don't like the paint job and frankly I'm at a loss what to do about his card.
1. 7 Life. Ability balancing-wise I understand why he has this, however in truescape, human heroes never go above the 6 mark. With the sole exception of Valguard. So Valguard's First Assault 3 (without disengage) is the balancing reason and is synonymous with Kreel's Combat Challenge giving him the need for more life. However Valguard as an in-game explanation to his abnormal life increment. His alien lizard arm that was magical attached by Durnipia (Ana), so he isn't exactly fully "human" anymore. Visually you can see this on the model, yep, he's got a lizard arm. No explanation is given for Kreel's abnormal life and nothing can be see on the model . . . unless he's some kind of "leather" golem . . .
2. +2 Broadsword. I get where this comes from, its a reference to D&D jargon and its cute in its own way. Its also a lazy cop out for not having to actually NAME the power. And lots of figure in Heroscape have broadswords or broadsword equivalents. If a broadsword is all you need how come they don't have the same ability?
3. Fighter is kind of lame, but the Dwarves have this rank too, which is also kind of lame. "Fighter" is too generic. What kind of fighter? A warrior? A soldier? A mercenary? A protector? A knight?
Ultimately I really don't know what to do with this guy. If there is a lot of interest and some good suggestions, I might do something with him later, but for now, pass.
Deepwyrm Drow
Spoiler Alert!
A very cool squad. I really like how the Poison Weapons give another advantage to being Huge. However, like Kreel, there are a bunch of problems with the models that just can't easily be resolved.
1. They are thin, like paper clip thin. We COULD explain it away as Dark Elves just aren't as healthy living underground and so are smaller and thinner than their light elf counterparts. But I dislike the lower quality models when placed sided by side regular Heroscape figures.
2. They have spiders painted on their shields. Makes perfect sense for Drow in a D&D setting. But why on God's green Valhalla would Utgar serving Dark Elves have Aquilla spiders on their shields? One doesn't typically put pictures of one's enemy on one's shield.
3. We are going on the premise of no shadow hexes here, but Dark Elves without Hide in Darkness just wouldn't be Dark Elves.
I'm open to suggests or ideas on how to overcome these issues, but for now, pass.
Pelloth
Spoiler Alert!
General Pelloth if you please. I really like this model, he much more dynamic than his fellow Dark Elves and is of much higher quality too. But without the Deepwyrm Drow being converted, is there any point to converting Pelloth?
1. Arachnomancer. Why is he an Arachnomancer? None of his powers have anything to do with arachnids.
2. Devout. I'm sure he is a faithful worshiper of Lolth, but she doesn't exist in the Heroscape Universe and its not a classic Heroscape Personality.
3. Lolth's Wrath Special Attack. Again, if Lolth isn't in the Heroscape Universe, then where is this power coming from? If he has been summoned from out of the D&D Mutiverse, arguably he has been cut off from Lolth. Her demonic/divine power can't reach him on Valhalla. Secondly, this power depends on there being other Drow, No Drow, no power.
4. Lurk in Shadows. I really like this power and its cool to have another figure with a Drake-type ability. But it depends on there being shadow hexes.
5. Finally, from a totally D&D Heroscape point of view (yes, I'm open minded) if the Drow aided Valkrill in his ascension, shouldn't they be Valkrill units?
I'm tempted to do the opposite here and further D&Dify this card. But for now, pass.
Feral Troll
Spoiler Alert!
The Feral Troll is perhaps the most infamous of all the early D&D figures. The problems with this figure are manifold and obvious. First off he's obstinately a troll, despite the fact that the model doesn't look very trollish at all. More like a giant goblin crossed with the Wicked Witch of the West. He doesn't even resemble Krug, yet Wizards of the Coast but him in the game and declared him a troll, like a slap in the face, leaving many players asking: Why bring in a new type of Troll into the game when Heroscape already has an established one?
Uncommon Hero. This is perhaps the most annoying feature D&D Heroscape brought. Forcing players to keep track of which Uncommon Hero is which or marring their figures with some sort of identification. There are no Uncommon Heroes in classic Heroscape. So the Feral Troll would either have to be converted into a Unique Hero or a Common Hero. Considering its Regenerate power, unique is the most obvious.
It being a Hunter, Ferocious and a Large 7 are fine enough. Its stats are fine as well.
It is highly expected that this figures too powers were lifted straight off the unreleased Wolverine Card from the other Heroscape sub-game. But the powers are fine.
Since there is no way to fix this model, I'm at a loss at how to fix the card.
Othkurik
Champions of the Forgotten Realms
Mogrim Forgehammer
Spoiler Alert!
This little guy turned out to be surprising popular. Most of the problems with Forgehammer are the same ones Darrak had. He's a good dwarf figure, just not a HEROSCAPE dwarf.
A simple fix really. First his card was changed to the swamp style so that he fits in with the rest of the post-Swarm of the Marro line. Then his size is lowered to the "Small 3" to match the other dwarves.
This powers are unchanged. This one was a little bit of a toughie. Heroscape cards can only have three abilities. Now some people may kick and scream and cry and howl pointing at Sonya Esenwein. However Sonya DOESN'T have four abilities. She has three abilities and one penalty. A power is an ability that strengths or positively the character. A penalty (or whatever you want to call it) is something that negatively effects the character. Heroscape figures never seem to have more then one penalty at a time, just as they never have more then three positive abilities. Sonya is the only card to have all this put together.
Now the trouble is that Forgehammer actually has some really decent powers that were well thought out. (Well Commander's Strike is admittedly a little screwy, why exactly does he need someone to stand next to his target to shoot at it? Sudema doesn't. Oh well, its a balancing thing) but they don't leave any room for Forgehammer to have the "Climb x2" power. Almost all small figures have this power. Only the Repulsors don't, but they have range which presumably makes up for it. We considered for a while removing one of Forgehammer's abilities to make room for Climb x2, but like I said, this card is actually well put together ability-wise. Commander's Strike does technically give Forgehammer range (although not normal range) so in the end it was decided to not give him Climb x2. More play testing is needed if this works for him.
Inspiring makes sense giving that he is a "Combat Leader" but its not a personality in the classic game, so its changed to Resolute, seeing as there are only two other characters in the classic game with this personality, it needs a little love. Rank, type and species are fine.
Stats and points left the same.
On the basic side, his home planet is changed to "Feylund" where Heroscape Dwarves come from. Forgotten Realms is presumably trademarked by Wizards of the Coast, but as a name its generic enough not to be a problem. The continent that the Ticalla Jungle is on could easily be described as a "forgotten realm".
A quick fix, little is actually changed and he's ready to play!
Brandis Skyhunter
Spoiler Alert!
Skyhunter is a very cool thematical unit, but he does have several well known issues. First, Skyhunter is a Half-Elf, a not an uncommon type of character in Dungeon and Dragons, however many players found his species frustrating - since even though the character is essentially an Elf, his is incompatible with any Elf augmenting abilities (such as Acolarh's) because these powers only work on full Elves. So that was the first thing to be changed. As a full blooded Elf, Skyhunter now benefits from all the Elf powers that he should have benefited from in the first place.
◾Acolarh: Leaf of the Home Tree Aura
When any Elf you control within 8 clear sight spaces of Acolarh receives enough wounds to be destroyed, you may roll 10 Ullar Valkyrie dice before removing the figure. If you roll at least 3 Ullar symbols, ignore any wounds that figure just received. Acolarh’s Leaf of the Home Tree Aura does not affect Acolarh.
◾Arkmer: Staff of Lerkintin
When defending with Arkmer, add as many defense dice as the number of Elves you control adjacent to Arkmer.
◾Emirroon: Elven Summoning Spell
After moving and before attacking, you may roll the 20-sided die. Add the number of Elves you control adjacent to Emirroon to your die roll.
• If you roll 1-4, nothing happens.
• If you roll 5-11, you may place 1 Elf you control adjacent to Emirroon.
• If you roll 12-17, you may place up to 2 Elves you control adjacent to Emirroon.
• If you roll 18-20, you may place up to 3 Elves you control adjacent to Emirroon.
If the summoned Elves are engaged, they will not take any leaving engagement attacks. Emirroon cannot summon an Elf that he is already adjacent to.
◾Kyntela Gwyn: Strength of Oak Aura 1
All friendly Elves adjacent to Kyntela Gwyn add 1 to their defense dice.
Ranger is also a common class in D&D, but it doesn't make sense in the larger army concept of Heroscape, especially in that essentially this guy's job is to shoot flyers down. Archer is a classic Heroscape rank and is more befitting the character's function.
Just about everything else on the Master side is fine. No need to change his personality, unit type or size. His stats and points are fine. I know some players find his powers a bit limiting, he's "good against flyers and nothing else" and that's fine if you feel that way. But he fulfills his niche well and the goal is to keep the character as true to the original card as possible.
Elves come from Feylund. This obvious but it bears repeating.
Finally the entire card was redone in the "Swamp" style that followed the Swarm of the Marro, so now this card is simply a continuation of that line.
A nice quick little fix that makes this character much more versatile without significantly changing him and leaving him no more powerful or weaker then before.
Fen Hydra
Spoiler Alert!
With the Fen Hydra it was very early on established that it would be a Ullar unit. There are actually three different Generals with who the hydra would easily fit in with. As a monster that devours people, it does fit well into Utgar's monster theme. As a savage wild feral creature (jungle/swamp at that) it actually would fit well into Aquilla's primal theme. And as a magical green reptilian it fits well into Ullar's fantasy forest theme. Ultimately because it is a green reptile (with a yellow underbelly), just like the Venoc Vipers, the Armoc Vipers, the Venoc Warlord, Charos and even the D&D Greenscales, it was decided that this unit fit best in an Ullar Army. You can easily see the visual synergy if you place the Fen Hydra among a group of Utgar units and then amongst a group of Ullar units. When in an Utgar set up, the hydra stands out like a sore thumb, there isn't any green in Utgar's army and hardly any reptiles outside his red dragon (classic only here). While the hydra really fits in well in an Ullar set up, perfectly meshing with Ullar's Vipers and other green reptilians. So in addition to a proper jungle vine card, the Fen Hydra gets changed to Ullar.
Species stays the same. We considered briefly making this beast a viper. But vipers have arms and hands and even with multiple heads, a hydra viper should have arms too. But as a classic monster, like trolls and giants, a hydra isn't out of place among classic Heroscape's fantasy monsters.
Type is changed to a proper unique hero.
Marauder never made any sense, a Marauder is a bandit. To be a Marauder is to rove and raid in search of plunder, to raid or pillage for spoils. This makes absolutely no sense for a animal monster. Several classes were debated: Warlord, Beast and Devourer. Warlord was considered because it would be really nice to have a second warlord option for Ullar, but as Warlord the hydra would bond not only with the Armoc Vipers but also the Roman Legionaries. Combined with Hydra Heads, this means a potential eight attacks in a single turn. This seemed a little game breaking. Technically you can do the same thing with two different squads of Ashigaru combined with the Shogun-type hero - for 300 points. Romans plus hydra would be 170 and the hydra can hit harder then any of the others. So in the end warlord was discarded. Beast was considered for awhile, after all Beast is a perfect description of this figure, but bonding with the Arrow Gruts does mean 7 attacks, all technically at range too. Ultimately it was decided that Devourer would work best for this figure. Hydra are devourers after all in mythology and its a nice nod back to the hydra's Utgar origins in that the Dumutef Guard enhances Devourers. The only slight thing here is that Ullar is suppose to be one of the Good Generals and having a devourer does seem slightly dark.
Ferocious as a personality is fine for a hydra.
For size, he was left as a Huge 8. His model is actually a little small for a huge and it was considered for quite a while that he should be converted into a Large 7. However he is bigger then a Dumutef Guard.
Abilities, stats and point cost are all fine and don't need to be tweaked or changed.
Finally on the Basic side his home planet is made to be one of the original Heroscape Worlds, Feylund.
Warriors of Valhalla
Spoiler Alert!
Shurrak's conversion was much like Skyhunter's, very little was actually changed.
Card Style: Jungle-Vine (remember, no D&D Master set means no D&D style cards)
Name: Stays the same
Allegiance: Stays the same (Utgar)
Species: Stays the same (Giant)
Type: Stays the same (Unique Hero)
Class: Stays the same (Warrior)
Personality: This gets converted. "Militaristic" is the D&D personality of fire giants, but its not used in any classic heroscape card and this is the only time its even used in D&D Heroscape. Its not a bad personality, but its random and serves no point. Plus there is an already exiting personality that sums up the militaristic mind-set well: Disciplined. As an added bonus, Shurrak is now compatible with a Greek Army as well.
Size: Stays the same ( Huge 8 )
Stats: Stays the same (Life: 6; Move: 6; Range: 1; Attack: 5; Defense: 4)
Abilities: Stays the same - no tweaks
Points: Stays the same (160)
On the basic side, Shurrak now comes from Feylund, just like Jotun. I imagine that Jotun is probably a mountain giant, while Shurrak is a fire giant.
The set's name was changed to "Warriors of Valhalla" as Eberron is a D&D world/land and is probably trade marked.
Interesting concept, and I like the changes you've made to Darrak. I look forward to seeing the rest of the cards. If they are as reasonable, it is likely that the Gang of Four, at least, will view them favorably.
Thanks for the welcome and your kind comments. I really look forward to hearing opinions, both good and bad, about my ideas.
Ana now also uploaded!
Ana Karithon/Durnipia
Spoiler Alert!
I simply love the model, perhaps the one great D&D model Wizards of the Coast gave us. The figure just oozes a sort of elegant sensual appeal in very classic Einar colors. However her card is chockfull of problems.
One of the problems right away with this card was the name. It has no effect on game play, true, but its unremarkable, unpronounceable and unrememberable; and I keep confusing it with Kaemon Awa's name since Ana and Awa are so close. Plus Einar already has a healer firmly established in Heroscape Lore: Durnipia. Now I had always thought that Durnipia was a reptilian alien, but this was only because the card bio that first mentioned her was Valguard, which says Durnipia gave him a alien lizard arm. Re-reading it, it doesn't actually say what Durnipia's species was and even mentioned that it was done by magic, not a very alien thing. On the Heroscaper.com forum, I read an interesting theory that Durnipia is a Kyrie, this makes sense in the context of Kelda, despite the very un-Kyrie sounding name of Durnipia. We will probably never know what species Durnipia was, however all we have to work with is the model Wizards of the Coast gave us. A female Einar healer. The solution to the name couldn't be more obvious.
Durnipia has several problems with her card. First she is a human and she wielded magic. In Heroscape, humans are summoned from Earth, a real life historical Earth, which as we all know, magic doesn't exist. In Heroscape there are only three "magical" worlds, Feylund, Icaria and Valhalla itself. Therefore while humans can wield enchanted artifacts made from these worlds, no human as any innate magical powers or abilities. The simplest solution is to change her into an elf, a species which can have innate magic powers; however, Durnipia cannot be converted into an elf as you can clearly see one of her ears on her model, which is definitely non-elven.
A second issue is the color Wizards of the Coast chose to give her skin. Its a pale-ish tone, not at all like the normal human skin tone on Heroscape human figures. In fact one is tempted to think that perhaps she is an undead, such a revenant. However, there are no undead humans in the classic game for the same reason there are no magical humans, there is no particular explanation why an undead human would sudden gain magical powers either, plus an undead healer just seems wrong. An undead also doesn't fit very well into Einar's Army theme either.
Interestingly enough, the fix from this card is inspired from Guri-Onii's card (a card with ironically its own host of issues). Short version, Guri-Onii is a Cyclops with a Japanese theme overlaid on it. A sort of oriental Cyclops if you will. Taking a cue from that, we go convert Durnipia's species into a "Tennin". Now none of you have probably ever heard of a "Tennin", they are roughly the Japanese equivalent of Greek Nymphs. Nymphs were minor-demi goddess associated with nature, either trees, or streams or mountains or the like. Tennin, which come from Japanese Buddhism, are unnaturally beautiful nymph-like females associate with Heaven and are often found on high mountain tops.
Thus in one stroke we have fixed both her species and her magical powers problem and given her a Japanese theme to boot, perfectly meshing her into Einar's theme. I dislike giving her a species not found in the original game, but considering the model, there doesn't seem to be a way around this.
Her status as a Unique Hero is fine and proper.
Her rank of "cleric" is an obvious problem. Heroscape makes no mention of gods or other divine beings, not even Norse gods like Thor and Odin. So having a D&D-style cleric in Heroscape just seems wrong and its not a rank one will find in classic Heroscape either. So out it must go. I toyed with the idea of "Empress" to fit Einar's Imperialistic theme, but settled on "Lady" instead, which just seem to really fit the figure well, especially given its new heavenly-associated Tennin species.
Merciful is an actual Heroscape personality and really fits a Lady Healer well, so that stays, obviously.
Medium 4 status is actually common for normal sized humanoid females in Heroscape and is roughly the model's size as well. All good.
No change is made to her stats, again, ideally we want to change as little as possible, so: Life: 5, Move: 5, Range: 4, Attack: 2, Defense: 3 and Point Value: 100. All stay exactly the same.
Powers is next on the list:
Healing Word: Her healing ability is simply awesome and may stay exactly the way it is.
Protection from Evil Aura: Her protection ability fits well with her heavenly-associated Tennin status and so may also remain exactly the way it is.
Turn Undead Special Attack/Arcane Riposte: But her last power is the so-called "Turn Undead Special Attack". This is not a very useful power, undead attackers or not and no player is going to send their healer into combat if they can at all avoid it, especially a healer who you DON'T HAVE TO PUT ORDER MARKERS ON TO HEAL OTHER UNITS! The extremely short range of four also means the undead is going to be right on top of her before she can attack it, which easily puts it in range of the hero that is right there adjacent to her being healed. "Turn Undead" is also just simply one of those horrible D&D misnomers as well, it sound like the ability should transform Durnipia into an undead, "to turn undead". The power ought to be called: "Turn Away Undead" or better yet: "Repulse Undead." To fix this, we are going to steal a power from Wildborn and give it to Durnipia instead: Arcane Riposte. This ability is passive, which means you don't need to put Order Markers on Durnipia's card to use it, which is good, because, as we've said, unlike other healers, Durnipia doesn't need Order Markers to heal other units. Arcane Riposte essentially gives her Counter Strike and Evil Eye combined together. An extremely Einar themed ability.
Lastly we do her card over in an Swarm of the Marro jungle/vine style card that she ought to have as a truescape figure released after the second master set. And establish her planet of origin on the basic side as "Feylund", one of the magical worlds of Heroscape.
There were non-SotM cards after SoTM, specially Wave 10.
You are half right.
If you look at Wave 10 boxes, you'll note that the Wizards of the Coast logo is on the box. I've always felt that Wave 10 ("Special Release") was a test by Wizards of the Coast to see if anybody would still buy Heroscape. Kind of "if nobody buys it then we don't have to make any" sort of thing. They also took advantage of it to trial run Dungeon style cards. I actually thought of fixing the Granite Guardians and Quasatch Hunters, but as the only thing I would change is the Card Style, it seem unnecessary. Plus its nice that Aquilla isn't the only general without non-jungle style cards, even if they aren't in the original style.
Quote:
Originally Posted by obfuscatedhippo
One request would be - that if you are going to modify Ana - please have her Protection from Evil also work against Valkrill units : )
I've thought of that! But remember, this is Heroscapication, converting D&D Heroscape cards into Classic Heroscape cards. Valkrill doesn't exist in regular Heroscape, just the D&D subgame.
I like the D&D characters, but for those that don't this seems like a pretty good alternate version.
However, rouge is a cosmetic. Darrak is a rogue.
Quote:
Originally Posted by IshMEL
I like these new cards! It's always annoyed me that Darrak wasn't useful outside of a dungeon.
Quote:
Strictly speaking, a rouge is a deserter
Well, strictly speaking, a rouge is a type of makeup.
As for Valkrill... are you going to make The Death Knights of Valkrill into The Death Knights of He Who Shall Not Be Named? Just curious...
Looking forward to seeing the next cards!
Good catch, lol.
Except technically he is a scout now
Erevan Sunshadow/Erevan released!
Spoiler Alert!
Oh boy, what's not wrong with Erevan Sunshadow? First there is the model itself. He's too thin and too short and what is with the ugly shiny/plastic paint job? Even the Rise of Valkyrie early models don't have such a plastic shiny paint tone. And his skin is really, really pale, which is probably fine for an Eladrin, but kind of clashes with other Heroscape Elves. Wait, you don't know what an Eladrin is? Neither did I before this character came out. Let's break Erevan down and see what we can do. We can't fix the model and I was tempted to just pass over him, but his card is simply screaming to be fixed.
1. His name is fine. Even sort of cool. Erevan reminds me of Darth Revan and Sunshadow is a cool last name, even if Heroscape Elves don't HAVE last names . . . okay so the last name has to go. Sunshadow isn't very Heroscapish anyway, no one else has a similar style name like Starkiller or anything.
2. The BIG one. Elves don't serve Jandar, they serve Ullar. Why ruin a good thing? This change goes hand-in-hand with the species thing. Few people probably know off the top of their heads what an "Eladrin" is. If he had been called an "Altmer" (from the Elder Scroll games) more people would probably recognize it. They both mean "High Elf" (although admittedly Altmer sounds more "elvish" in that Tolkin kind of way then "Eladrin" does) and the reason they are called "Eladrin" instead of High Elf is presumably so there's no confusion if Elf powers work for High Elves or not. Just like Drow aren't called Dark Elves. However the only reason I can see why Wizards of the Coast made him a High Elf to begin with, is to deliberately disrupt elven synergy. Its as if they didn't want us to use classic Heroscape units anymore, because now there wouldn't be a point. Perhaps if they had kept the High Elves separate and Jandar only, it would have worked. Just like there are different races of Soulborgs and Kyrie after all, there could have been different races of Elves. Regular (wood) Elves serve Ullar, Dark Elves serve Utgar, High Elves serve Jandar. I would have bought that. But no, Wizards of the Coast compound their error by releasing a Ullar High Elf (Sharwin Wildborn) in the VERY NEXT set! So we fix this whole mess by converting Erevan into an Ullar unit and into an proper Elf. Ta da.
Changing allegiance is mostly cosmetic, but it does have a few effects on game play that might not occur to you right away. First off, the second version of Drake (''Swarm of the Marro'') can now shoot at Erevan with his pistol attack. Second, Erevan now can get a speed boost from starting off next to Acolarh. Thirdly, Dishonorable Attack no longer gives the Red Ninja a bonus when attacking Erevan. And . . . that's about it!
3. Species, see above. As a proper Elf, Erevan now interacts with other elf powers, such as Acolarh's Leaf of the Home Tree Aura, Arkmer's Staff of Lerkintin, Emirroon's Elven Summoning Spell and Kyntela Gwyn's Strength of Oak Aura 1.
4. Erevan is already a Wizard, a real Heroscape rank, which nicely makes him the missing Ninth Elven Wizard and is the primary reason we converted him in the first place. Stays as is. Obviously. As an proper Elf Wizard, Erevan can now integrate with: Chardris' Fire Strike Special Attack, Jorhdawn's Rain of Flame Special Attack and Ulginesh's Mind Link.
5. Precise, an odd personality of a Wizard to have perhaps, but typical of Heroscape range units and a classic personality. Stays.
6. Medium 5. His model is too short for a five, however, as we've already observed, even truescape didn't follow model scale with any kind of serious strictness, so we might as well leave that as it is.
7. Stats. Life: 5, Move: 6, Range: 1, Attack: 2, Defense: 2 and Points Value: 80. As you can see, no change. Personally I've always thought it odd that spell casting wizards have no normal range in Heroscape (with the exception of Ulginesh and the Arch-Mage Sonlen), but I'm not about to go converting them all because of it.
8. Powers, no change. Fire Blast Special Attack is fine, a sort of range version of Sir Hawthrone with an element of Major Q9 thrown in. Feystep has slight issues, its obviously intended for that small-band-of-hero-units-VS-a-group-of-squads-and-heroes. Tul-Bak-Ra's version of this power has double the range, can be use on every turn and even gives him disengage when he uses it. Erevan can use his once per game. But he can teleport to any height while the Overlord can't. Of course because Erevan doesn't have normal range but a special attack, height doesn't really mean all that much to him. But I'm concerned altering it would break the game balance, so its left as it. Besides, other units have once per game powers too, the Airborne Elite, Atlaga, Deathwalker 7000 and such.
9. Lastly, on the basic side we make him come from the same planet all the other elves do, Feylund.
As for the Death Knights, I might have some surprising ideas for them . . . cue evil laugh . . .
First, I must say that I like the idea behind this project. It is true that many D&D heroes (especially from the MS3) was made with the idea of Dunjon Crawl, and they don't see a lot of play out of that. I may print this cards and use them as a possible alternative to the official ones.
There is a point I don't really like in your project, throught :
- You negate the existence of shadow. I understand for donjon tiles, no others type of terrain that come in 24hex tiles are refered to on powers, so I understand why you would change all power refering to donjon tiles. But shadow is a fine addition to Heroscape. It follow nicely the water, ice and molten lava tiles, each having rules of their one, each having powers refering to them.
Also, I don't know how I stand for Valkrill. It was introduced with D&D waves, but it is a Kyrie, not a D&D god. Truescape already introduced new general, with Aquila, right ?
Now, on the card already made :
I think Darrak is too strong as you made him. He will be played with the dwarves, so the player can always keep it adjacent to another dwarf (it also help a lot for his attack). 2 def + 1 auto shield, 4 life, a normal attack of 6 (7 with height), and bonding with a very solid 4 figure squad, all that for only 60 points ? It's too much.
Also, you removed a power that worked with a dice roll and replaced it with an automatic shield. I would have prefered if instead of 1 auto shield, the power granted additionnal defense die (2 or 3). This way, like the official card's power, the power can fail to help Darrak.
Erevan could have stayed with Jandar. From the bio, for instance, we know the existence of Tyrian, a former Protector of Ullar, that switched side and then served under Jandar. Erevan could have done the same. (Jokingly, pehaps he is an albino and was segregated by the others elves, making him eager to leave them)
As for Ana. You changed Erevan race because it doesn't exist in truescape, yet you add a new race just for Ana. I understand your concern about the origin of figures, but perhaps, like Kelda, Ana drank the water of a Wellspring after being summoned, and it awaken in her dormant magical healing powers (Perhaps Kiova took a liking to her and allowed her to drink it). As for her skin tone, especially as she now is a Lady, it was fashion during lot a era on earth that women try their best to keep their skin as white as possible.
all in one, I like the changes you made, but I think you overlooked another thing that can be changed for a card : the bio. You said you wanted to make as little change as possible to cards. By creating a bio for Erevan and Ana, you could have let Erevan on Jandar's side, and let Ana be a Human. This way, you change less of the card, and it is still coherent with truescape.