The Book of Demogorgon Stalker

[Karat]

Remind me and I'll take a look at this versus other precedents we have.

[IAmBatman]

Originally Posted by Lord Pyre

I don't know, feels a bit cheesy yet. What's the issue with someone getting knocked out of it once they receive a wound, or have it on a timer?

You'd need a timer. The wound thing doesn't work since the Demo's ignore wounds and people with Environmental Suits also don't take wounds from it.

[Splash]

This could be a possible update
Portal Escape
If any figure in the Upside Down ends its movement on an Exit Space or if at the end of a round any figure without The Upside Down special power is in the Upside Down battlefield, the player that controls that figure must place it on any empty space on any other battlefield in this game.

They'd only being taking a possible max of three wounds from being pulled there though, with an average of like one maybe. With the timer we could change unblockable to just "receives a wound". So, it keeps a reason to use the powers involved and the design healthy.

Or are we thinking more this (no exit space?):
Portal Escape
If at the end of a round any figure without The Upside Down special power is in the Upside Down battlefield, the player that controls that figure must place it on any empty space on any other battlefield in this game.

[dok]

tl;dr I think the upside down should be a full figure 8 so that you can more reliably run away from Demogorgons if they are not getting OMs. Maybe other things, but definitely that.

Originally Posted by Lord Pyre

I don't know, feels a bit cheesy yet. What's the issue with someone getting knocked out of it once they receive a wound, or have it on a timer? Overcomplicating this might just create more edge cases and issues. I'm just speaking from experience from Angstrom. It took a LOT of work to make him work, and we cut out all the alt reality battling on purpose because it was extremely cumbersome and intensive to tool.

I don't want to comment on complexity, because I think this is a really cool mechanic and if y'all want to roll with it I'm not one to stop you.

But purely from a balance perspective, I agree with LP. Angstrom was a favorite of mine when playing competitive C3G because sidelining an opponent's OM hub or key hero for a while could be so strong. The Demogorgon seems even better at this.

The huge caveat to the Demogorgon's power is that you need to score a wound on the opponent's figure before you can drag them. However, there are plenty of other ways to try to land a single wound while the Demo waits in the wings, and moreover the Deomogorgon itself can drop Hellicarrier-style right next to its target and attack it to set things up. On OM3 you can put the Demogorgon anywhere, and drop an attack. Then snatch on OM1. With a little luck your opponent doesn't even have a chance to respond. This seems like an easier prospect than using Angstrom, where I often had to pair him with Hawkeye2 in order to get him in dangerous positions.

And the actual banishment is far more harsh. With Angstrom I didn't need to invest OMs in a trapped figure to get them out; I just had to roll and hope. It usually took about a round, and did about a wound. With the Upside Down, you can place the Demo 5 spaces from the portal with the opponent stuck on the far side of it. Due to the layout, non-flying figures have to use turns to kill the Demogorgon to get by, they are taking autowounds the whole time, and once the Demogorgon is dead it's still two turns to move out for many figures. That's often a death sentence because you can't afford to invest that many OMs, even if they could make it out theoretically.

Basically, rather than seeing the Demogorgon as part of a Tormentor build, I see it as a utility piece that allows me disruption of the opponent's army by snatching a key hero. Once it does the deed I just leave it there, pinning the enemy hero in the very back of the upside down. Rinse and repeat after that figure dies, if needed.

Some thoughts I have on possible adjustments:

• Adjust the Upside-down layout. Make it a full figure 8 so that a walking figure can run away from an inactive Demogorgon to get to the portal, instead of trying to kill the Demogorgon. This seems pretty thematic and it solves some of the bigger issues.
• The Portal allowing you to place into engagement seems worrying, particularly since it also allows you to attack that turn. I might change one or the other of those two things (i.e. either placement can't be adjacent to other figures, or portal use is at the end of the turn). I'm less confident in these suggestions because this makes the Demogorgon a lot weaker in general, not just when it's being used in a degenerate way to sideline key heroes.

[IAmBatman]

There seem to be some good changes in there. For the debate between letting someone turtle with a resurrection team versus letting them zip someone off into the Upside Down and effectively end the game (if it's not part of the battlefield), I think we already have a solution available that won't require any changes to the Demogorgon cards!

The Upside Down should be considered a separate battlefield in the same game, making it subject to divided battlefield rules (established by Galactus):

Battlefields Divided

Finally, we understand that in your exuberance of removing pieces, a battlefield could be split into more than one battlefield. In this circumstance, the following procedures apply:
Each battlefield is considered a separate battlefield for the purpose of any special powers. For instance, if a special power allows a player to place a figure on any space on the battlefield, it only applies to the specific battlefield that figure currently occupies, not any of the other separated battlefields.
Figures, Glyphs, Army Cards, special powers, etc. cannot interact with anything on a separate battlefield.
If a battlefield exists at the end of any figure's turn without any figures occupying it, that battlefield is no longer considered part of the game.
If a figure has an ability that allows it to be removed from the battlefield and then be returned to it later, that figure can be returned to any battlefield that is still in play.
Whatever victory conditions were laid out at the start of the battle now apply to all battlefields created by any and all divisions of the original battlefield and determine the winner on each separate battlefield.
Each winner of each battlefield is awarded a victory point. The player with the most victory points is deemed to be the winner of the game. The game is drawn if two or more players have equally the highest amount of victory points.

So if Demos try the Jason trick, it just triggers the end of the game, and it ends in a tie as each figure "wins" on one of the two battlefields.

[Splash]

Whew, it's nice to have that solved (*sigh of relief*). I actually remember reading over that, wish I had thought of it during this design. Thanks for the catch Bats!

So basically just remove this from the SP and we're good again?

Otherworldly
If only figures with The Upside Down special power are in The Upside Down battlefield, The Upside Down is not considered part of the battlefield for win conditions.

[Karat]

I would also seriously consider dok's recommendations.

[IAmBatman]

Originally Posted by Splash

Whew, it's nice to have that solved (*sigh of relief*). I actually remember reading over that, wish I had thought of it during this design. Thanks for the catch Bats!

So basically just remove this from the SP and we're good again?

Maybe just put that it's considered a separate battlefield? Not sure the best way to word that. Probably want to link those rules from Galactus to the OP of any Upside Down thread we end up having.

[Karat]

I'd probably just FAQ that and link to the rules in the FAQ

[Splash]

I put a clarification in the Setup for now.

Figure 8 type is fine with me.

If we're trying to avoid further changes, I'm not sure I'd wanna mess with the portal stuff, but I'll leave that for y'all to discuss.

[IAmBatman]

Looks great. Well done on that. Glad we could shut down the Jason exploit without screwing over win conditions. Now if the Demos steal your last piece you can at least try to defeat them on the Upside Down, which is pretty cool.

[Karat]

Good changes