[Pod 0] Honored Soul-Guides - Editing

[Astroking112]

Originally Posted by Pumpkin_King

Oof, I'm much more concerned now with those points, Astro.

For what it's worth, I'm willing to playtest these changes. I just wanted to make sure that we're all aware of the potential for many problematic interactions--this version would require a lot of playtesting before I'd be comfortable with sticking to it.

Kelda is hopefully bad enough that using her to bring heroes back up to full health won't be feasible, but it'd need a lot of tests to make sure (especially since the revived hero can be placed directly adjacent to her in the starting zone). I'm mostly uncomfortable with how it can theoretically work for any character.

Originally Posted by flameslayer93

I certainly view it as a concern, but that is ultimately what playtesting is for. If we do feel it is too much, we could always destroy the figure at the end of the round in addition to only having one wound, but I think we should test these guys out first with Scytale's suggested wording (maybe with the normal attack restriction, but I get if I'm the only one who is leaning that way).

This was actually what I was coming back to suggest. Something along these lines effectively removes any potential for heroes extending their second life.

It complicates the power more for sure, but I'm thinking that it's probably worth the complexity to avoid any healing shenanigans.

I'd think 50 will be a hair too low, so eyeballing it, I'm gonna say 60 points to start. They are still gonna be endgame things, and opponents are probably going to deliberately wait to kill these guys. That's gonna help keep their price down, especially because 2 attacks of 2 isn't going to be all that effective.

I'm not comfortable with this draft below 75 points. There are simply too many unfun interactions that I can see for it to be a cheap addition to an army. It's possible that these could prove to be non-issues in testing and that the price could drop, but I'd rather start high if we're using this draft.

Originally Posted by capsocrates

I don't see why an opponent would want to attack an honored soul guide unless they hadn't destroyed any heroes yet. Are they now reserved for cleanup? Where they are a dicey proposition? This is everything you just said but is that the gameplay you want? I liked that before the player could choose when to trigger the power. Now their opponent chooses it

I agree that it's more interesting if the player who controls them chooses when to activate Last Will (which they could theoretically still do, but that encourages attacking your own units, which feels like the wrong theme here). Letting them revive on any normal or special attack feels like it leaves less room for counterplay by killing the ghosts early, too.

Combining all of what I said above, this is what I'd personally prefer (plus some stat changes to make them stand out more and get us some more variation in the set):

JHonored Soul-Guides
Species Undead
Unique Squad
Class Psychopomps
Personality Stoic
SIZE HEIGHT Medium 5

LIFE 1 (2 figures)
MOVE 5 / BASIC 7
RANGE 1 / BASIC 1
ATTACK 1 / BASIC 3
DEFENSE 5 / BASIC 7

50 POINTS

LAST WILL
After revealing an Order Marker on this card, instead of taking a turn with the Honored Soul-Guides, you may place one of them on the Army Card of a previously destroyed Unique Hero. At the start of any round, before placing Order Markers, you may remove enough wounds for that Hero to have 1 Life remaining and place it adjacent to any figure that you control. At the end of the round, remove the Honored Soul-Guide from that Army Card and destroy the Unique Hero.

STEALTH FLYING
When counting spaces for an Honored Soul-Guide's movement, ignore elevations. An Honored Soul-Guide may fly over water without stopping, pass over figures without becoming engaged, and fly over obstacles such as ruins. If an Honored Soul-Guide is engaged when it starts to fly, it will not take any leaving engagement attacks.

I'm a little concerned about the feasibility of forcing the player to waste an OM to set up a future revival, though. It feels like it'll likely lead to some frustration and them feeling underwhelming outside of their best scenarios.

[Pumpkin_King]

Can we allow them to destroy and rez at the beginning of the round before OMs are placed, or is that too much happening in one round?

Also, think about setting up OMs that round. How many are you going to put on the newly-rezzed hero? if you lose initiative, it’s very likely that all those OMs go in the toilet.

Is this really any less complex than the single-turn revival we were discussing earlier?

[flameslayer93]

Its only as complex as we make it. Simplify. Even if some mechanics are frustrating, its better if they are simple.

[caps]

I think we need to break Last Will up in to two powers. One power defines how they make their way to an army card. The other power defines how you take them off that army card to use the other figure. Can we do that and go from there?

[Pumpkin_King]

I don't see the need to break it up unless having a spirit on a card does something before you take it off.

I really don't think the previous power as we had it was too complex.

[caps]

Can you humor me and throw it together?

[Pumpkin_King]

I'm trying to work one up, but any version of the power that has you putting the figure on their card and then letting them rez still runs into the troubles of getting nuked immediately because they have one life left.

SPIRITUAL GUIDE
When an HSG is destroyed, you may place that figure on the Army Card of any Unique Hero you control.

LAST WILL
After revealing an Order Marker on this Army Card, instead of taking a turn with the Honored Soul-Guides, you may choose a previously destroyed small or medium Unique Hero you control with an Honored Soul Guide figure on its Army Card. At the start of any round, before placing order markers, you may remove that Honored Soul Guide from that Army Card and remove enough wounds for the Hero to have 1 Life remaining. Then place that Hero adjacent to any figure you control.

This has taken one line from Last Will and shuffled it to a new power.

[flameslayer93]

Why toss the Soulguide on the Army Card, exactly? So what if you get to pick what hero comes back to life with a single click?

[caps]

Yes, but now we can put "after revealing an order marker on this card" into Spirits Guide. The player with the card gets to choose when both things happen, and now we don't have the clause repeated twice.

I guess we could also do it as an OR with a bullet list

[Pumpkin_King]

Wait, I'm not following something. Why do we need an "or" or a bullet list?

[Scytale]

Originally Posted by flameslayer93

Why toss the Soulguide on the Army Card, exactly? So what if you get to pick what hero comes back to life with a single click?

To know if you've used that Soulguide yet or not.

[caps]

I'm on a computer so I can spell it out better now.


SPIRITUAL GUIDE
After revealing an order marker on this Army Card, you may place an Honored Soul Guide figure on the Army Card of any Unique Hero you control.

LAST WILL
After revealing an Order Marker on this Army Card, instead of taking a turn with the Honored Soul-Guides, you may choose a previously destroyed small or medium Unique Hero you control with an Honored Soul Guide figure on its Army Card. Remove that Honored Soul Guide from that Army Card, place that Hero adjacent to any figure you control, take a turn with it, and then destroy it.


vs.


something like this:

LAST WILL
After revealing an Order Marker on this Army Card you may

• place an Honored Soul Guide figure on the Army Card of any Unique Hero you control.
• or instead of taking a turn with the Honored Soul-Guides, you may choose a previously destroyed small or medium Unique Hero you control with an Honored Soul Guide figure on its Army Card. Remove that Honored Soul Guide from that Army Card, place that Hero adjacent to any figure you control, take a turn with it, and then destroy it.