[Pod 2] Katryn Vade (Nahiri, Fury in Stone) - Design

[Captain Stupendous]

from me for moving to Public Feedback.

[Pumpkin_King]

public review.

[Captain Stupendous]

With 3/5 members voting yes for public review, does that officially move Katryn forward through the process?

Also, I know it was just a draft, but I quite like the bio I wrote for Katryn and, while I think the design stands on its own very well, I think the bio further helps to flesh out her backstory, especially her relationship to Zelrig. It might be helpful for new eyes to see it in conjunction with the current design to give a greater sense of thematic context to her powerset. Do you think it would be worth adding to the OP at this point, or would that be a bit premature?

For generations, the men of the eastern Icarian clans have paid yearly tribute to the great Dragon Emperor Zelrig, offering their most prized possessions as expressions of gratitude to their lord and protector. Yet, in over a thousand years, only one most unlikely person has ever been honored with a gift in return.

When the Nhah-Scirh attacked, Zelrig’s life was saved by a young warrior, Katryn Vade. Her sacrificial choice that day inspired Zelrig to entrust her with the Dragonheart Blade, a sword forged from the blood of his own wounds. In battle, it is said that this weapon blazes with the flame of the Dragon Emperor himself, allowing Katryn to summon a column of fire which consumes her enemies.

When Katryn Vade chose to save her Emperor, she lost her family.
Now, with the Dragon Emperor's blessing, Katryn lives to avenge them.

[Pumpkin_King]

It is time to welcome public feedback on this thread! We're always open to feedback, but this is when we specifically are asking you for your opinion on a unit! We're interested in getting outsider thoughts on the unit in the main post of this thread so that we can catch any potential errors and make the most polished units possible.

We do ask that all commenters keep in mind the core goals of the AotV project when giving their feedback. For reference, they are:

1. To be compatible with Classic/Official Heroscape, and completely VC-compliant: that is, designing with C3V and SoV figures in mind, and focusing on the AOTP figures that would be acceptable to SoV (figures that are pre-painted or usable without paint).

2. To provide an affordable and user-friendly entry point to both new and returning players, that captures the feel of a true Master Set.

3. To create balanced units that are relatively simple, easy to understand, and feel at home in a self-contained set together. Units will come from a wide range of themes, and capture the diversity of theme Heroscape is beloved for.

These tenants of the project are important cornerstones for each design. Although other units can be very complex or otherwise rely on other units that they were not packaged with, that is not within the scope of this project.

Each unit should be interesting when compared only against the rest of AotV; they should still be exciting when taken out of the box, but we are assuming that this is an entry-level product for the game. Think of the original Rise of the Valkyrie Master Set, before any expansions were added, and when all of the units were just standalone unique characters.

That said, we welcome your feedback now, and we'd love to hear what you think about this unit! The Public Feedback Phase in this thread will end on 11/22/20, unless otherwise noted.

[Shiftrex]

OK! Let's start in on Katryn, I've not played with her or seen her played yet but I've watched her develop a bit.

Starting with the left box, I think it is in a good place. I'm glad she didn't turn out to be a human champion, she has some distinction and isn't just another "Knights of Weston" option. Contributes to having her own identity. I think it would be fun to place her in a Devout army with Count Raymond and see if that leads to any interesting plays alongside the Cathar. I also think the Devout personality fits with the story that her character is trying to play, though Champion is a class I'm still mulling over a bit. Given the nature of her story I understand that we could consider her the "dragon's champion" but given her circumstances and the fact that she has no synergy with Zelrig specifically... I think I'd like to see it as Avenger a bit more than Champion.

At first I thought her point value was weird but given that her role is... a bit interesting to say the least, I think I understand why it is at 140. I'd be curious to try her and see if she is actually worth that much. The statline is pretty basic, nothing too crazy or exciting in it but it doesn't detract from the figure. Defines a more offensively oriented warrior which is nice.

The abilities are interesting and it immediately makes me wish she had some sort of unique bonding option so that she could trigger her Guardian thing more often. Though it shouldn't be hard for her to try and play bodyguard to a single figure with the way she lights a small group of enemies aflame with Zelrig's fire. She won't be affected by it which is nice, can still affect friendlies though which makes it so that her fire ability doesn't trip over instances where her Guardian ability will be more favorable. The "size" ability is nice, gives her protection against a few things in the game to include being repositioned and auto killed by stuff. Very hardy towards a few powers that usually troll the medium sized heroes.

Overall, I like where she is at. The 140 for a hero that is going to be stand alone (no planned synergy) puts her in a weird spot because that means that she is technically peers with figures like Racheim, DW9K, Frost Giant of Moth. I don't see figures at this point range (aside from Sudema) get played very often unless they have some sort of synergy going on. I think this unit could be an exception if she fares well... meaning that she could turn out like Eltahale.

[Skinderella]

Katryn has an interesting design. On paper, she looks to be very strong in this master set, with a large number of unique heroes planned and squads being mostly melee. Her kit is versatile and simple, but with twists to make it all unique. And the lore really pulls it all together. You can see Zelrig’s influence, and I really enjoy the flavour it brings to the design. I also like the nod to that one character in Zelrig’s story, I take it they must be related. She’s rich in story and character!

I do wonder if her points are too high. Whilst she does have high attack and a conditional double attack, outside of the master set this will likely be a lot harder to pull off. And that’s combined with no bonding and average durability. I honestly can’t see her being on the same level as Eltahale (although certainly not far off either), but only testing will tell just how powerful her combo is and what her points should be. I almost want to see something like what the Greenscales have, but slightly different: choose a unique Hero at the start of the game, and if Katryn is within a number of clear sight spaces of that hero, she can attack again with her normal. I understand that the goals of the project means this is probably pushing it for a more simple and memorable design though. Aspect of the Dragon is a strong skill and I love the potential it could bring for her, immunities are a powerful tool.

One thing to note, she could easily hurt anyone that would trigger her oathsworn ability and slightly breaks immersion of the design. Certainly not a deal breaker, but it bothers me a little that she could hurt those she’s wanting to protect/avenge.

Left box seems good to me, I have suggestions but even then where it’s at now is fine. Champion works but I think Guardian or Chosen could work just as well, if not better. I’m unsure about Devoted personality since we already have Devout, but I couldn’t say if Devoted has been used before. Vengeful could also work for her given her backstory.

This is a solid design, I’m absolutely loving the flavour! I can visualise the pillar of fire she brings down on a horde, or the spirit of the dragon shrugging off Grimnak’s maw. Really fun design, I can definitely see her wreaking havoc against swarming armies whilst protecting a key figure.

[Captain Stupendous]

Thanks for the feedback @Skinderella ! I do share your concern about her potential to hurt allies with her special attack when she's themed as a protector/avenger style figure. I think its something to keep an eye on in playtesting. If she is hurting her allies too often, one potential change I've thought of would be to lower the base attack of her special to 2 dice, and increase the debuff against squad figures to -2 dice. I don't think that would much change her chances to kill squad figures (although I haven't worked out the math), but make her much less likely to hurt unique figures with her special. Personally I'd prefer to keep her special the way it is currently as it is slightly stronger and more widely useful, but its worth mentioning this alternate version in case the current one doesn't work out.

Oathsworn Guardian also went through quite a few iterations before we settled on the current version. You assumed correctly that in the end we decided to go with the version that was the most simple and memorable, since she already had two other powers and we were trying to limit the complexity of the master set.

The "Devoted" personality is actually an error; thanks for catching it! I definitely intended that to be "Devout" when I came up with the leftbox stats as there's no need to create a new personality so similar to an existing one. @Pumpkin_King , do you think you could update the OP with "Devout" as the personality? As far as the class goes, I don't think its a good idea for "Guardian" to ever exist as a class, since then Granite Guardians and Crypt Guardians would stand out as very strange as Guards instead of Guardians. Chosen could work, but I'd prefer to stick with an existing class rather than create a new one, especially when I think the design and backstory convey the idea of Katryn acting as Zelrig's champion pretty well.

Thanks again for the feedback! I'm really happy that her theme is landing so strongly, and am hopeful that her mechanics will play out similarly well, although I could definitely see playtesting prove that her points need to come down a bit.

[Pumpkin_King]

Right, I'll change Devoted.

[NecroBlade]

Re: hurting allies with the special attack. Could go the Heirloom Force Orb route of only affecting enemy figures. Not sure how that strikes everyone thematically, though.

Please also update the thread title to "Katryn Vade (Nahiri, Fuy in Stone).

[Pumpkin_King]

If the inspiration is Majestic Fires, we can sorta lean on that and just leave it be. IMO.


Hm, but then again as a protector themed figure.....yeah, might be good to Force Orb it.

[Captain Stupendous]

At this point are we good to move Katryn onto editing? I'm guessing it might take scytale a little while to work out all the implications of Aspect of the Dragon.

[Astroking112]

I love this design thematically. An Icarian Champion is a wonderful contrast to the Nhah Scirh Cultists, and I like how Katryn evokes Zelrig so strongly. I even wouldn't mind namedropping Zelrig in the SA (something like "Zelrig's Fury SA") to make the connection more apparent to newer players. We already have "Aspect of the Dragon" in the last power to hint at her relation to dragons, so also namedropping her sword doesn't feel super worthwhile to me.

I also really like Aspect of the Dragon: it's a simple but surprisingly effective defensive power, and it's unique from what we saw in the official releases. It still feels very much like an official power, though, and I'm excited for its implications.

That said, I do have some gripes with the rest of the design here.

I think that overall this is a really cool and compelling design... but with some baggage that should be cut. Dragonheart Blade Special Attack and Aspect of the Dragon already paint a thematic and unique picture. Oathsworn Guardian feels like it was tacked on to have a third power.

I think that the design would very much benefit from focusing on just two of these three powers, or from a more cohesive power selection. Simply having 5 normal attack already presents a compelling decision point for when to use Katryn's SA, and it will definitely find use when figures are less likely to clump together and our box is full of heroes. The main thing that it adds to this design right now is an incentive to stand closer to friendly Unique Heroes, which is only applicable when she is near either a tougher target or two figures that she would prefer +2 attack over -1 defense for. It removes a lot of the appeal of the SA and places the emphasis back on the normal attack, unless your opponent is specifically trying to bait out a fire blast.

If the goal is to keep her near wounded Unique Heroes like her bio and powers suggest, then I would propose a simpler defensive alternative. As a rough example:

OATHSWORN GUARDIAN
All friendly wounded Unique Heroes adjacent to Katryn Vade add 1 to their defense.

This emphasizes her role as a protector, incentivizes her to stick near wounded figures without stealing Thorgrim's thunder, and avoids creating another figure with conditional stat bonuses in our set. It also creates some fun synergy with Dienekes, which is always nice for players to discover.

To be clear, I think that this power still doesn't gel particularly well with the other two (since she'll still want to run out into the fray to try and use her SA, but this power encourages her to play defensively), but it at least doesn't feel like it actively works against one of them.

I don't think that a third power is actually required here at all, though. Plenty of units (even most of them in this set) are still distinct and fun with just two powers, and I think that Katryn will still have a fun niche if she just focuses on two of her powers here. Unless the third one is adding a compelling piece to the design, I think that it's better aligned with our project's goals to not include it at all. That would also make it easier to drop her points a little bit, which lets her fit into more armies as a standalone hero.

EDIT: Throwing in my thoughts on limiting her SA to opposing figures only: I don't like it if the idea behind the power is that she's channeling Zelrig's fire. It's already a bit strange that the power works against Unique Squads when Zelrig's doesn't, but I think that's a necessary distinction for the design to work within our box. For similar reasons, I would personally avoid increasing the debuff to -2 against squad figures, since even if Zelrig's breath is ranged, that still begs the question of why Katryn's version has a stronger debuff.