The Book of X-O Manowar

[johnny139]

Might have overcorrected some if he feels like he's losing steam too fast - what do you think about maybe making it a choice between taking a wound and burning a marker?

[Ronin]

Originally Posted by johnny139

Might have overcorrected some if he feels like he's losing steam too fast - what do you think about maybe making it a choice between taking a wound and burning a marker?

You mean essentially, still roll an unblockable, but he can lose an X-O Marker to avoid the hit? I think that'd be better yeah. I could run the next game like that.

[johnny139]

Yeah, roll an unblockable, on a skull you must either place a wound or remove an X-O Marker. I think it should solve the feeling weak and not burning markers problem... in theory at least.

[Lord Pyre]

SHEER FORCE
After attacking an adjacent figure with X-O Manowar, if the defending figure rolled defense dice and did not receive any wounds, you must attack that figure again, rolling 1 additional die for each previous attack made this turn. After attacking, roll a combat die for each previous attack made this turn. If you roll a skull, you must either place a wound marker on this card, or remove an X-O Marker from this card. X-O Manowar cannot attack more than 3 times in a single turn.

So this? Obviously that would tweak the odds, before there was a 5/6 chance of something bad happening. We could make it if you roll a skull OR shield.

Otherwise I like this change a lot. A little more user-choice is cool and strategic.

[Ronin]

Yeah, I think he needs the odds tweaked. He loses effectiveness really fast.

I'll roll with that for game two tonight.

[Karat]

Still runs into the always take wounds instead of burning markers till that becomes the better option problem.

[johnny139]

That's true, but I think that's something I can live with - more than him feeling too weak, that is. It's just sort of a Green Lantern dynamic - takes wounds for as long as you can, then start burning markers, but knowing there's always a risk of taking one wound too many.

[Ronin]

Sorry I haven't hit the second game yet. Holiday prep has been keeping me busy. I'll get him soon as I can though.

[Ronin]

Originally Posted by Ronin

C3G STANDARD PLAYTEST FEEDBACK FORM

NAME OF THE PLAYTEST UNIT: X-O Manowar @380 points

Army Test
Map: Custom
Units: X-O Manowar, Blob, Angel (Warren), Atom (Ray), Ragdoll, Kid Flash, Leatherface, Robot (1200) vs Songbird, Spider-Man, Captain America, Jack Flag, Luke Cage, Speedball (1200)

Spoiler Alert!

The Hyper Mobile Cannon Fodder team got off to a strong start here. They were able to control the middle of the map, and Blob was able to contain Spider-Man and Speedball (thanks in part to Spidey dropping fast) to keep Manowar from getting frustrated by them.

Cannon Fodder team got out to an early lead, but their strategy was pretty reliant on Robot and Manowar, so the New Avengers managed to close the gap a lot once they put some significant dents in Manowar's team. For context, the Avengers lost two figures (Spidey and Jack Flag) before the Cannon Fodder team lost a single one of their cheapo losers, and they still made it super close in the end. The game still ended up a narrow win for Manowar's team after an excruciating Kid Flash vs Speedball endgame.

Manowar stayed behind his screen and let them establish control of height, then emerged to take the occasional turn and start taking potshots. Helped clean up a few key figures, then had kind of a knock-down drag-out with Luke Cage before Speedball mopped him up.

Unit Summary:

• Damage Done (Normal Attack): 3 wounds to Jack Flag in 1 attack (destroyed), 3 wounds to Captain America in 2 attacks (destroyed), 2 wounds to Luke Cage in 3 attacks
• Sheer Force: triggered 1 time against Cap, resulting in a second attack against Captain America that destroyed Cap. Aric lost an X-O Marker as a result. Triggered 2 times against Luke Cage, resulting in a second attack against Luke that inflicted a wound both times. Aric lost an X-O Marker the first time and took a wound the second.
• Righteous Rage: triggered when Songbird destroyed Ragdoll. Rolled 2 dice and dealt 2 wounds to Songbird. Triggered when Luke Cage destroyed Robot. Rolled 2 dice and dealt 1 wound to Luke Cage. Triggered when Luke Cage destroyed Atom. Rolled 1 die and dealt no wound to Luke Cage. Triggered when Speedball destroyed Leatherface. Rolled 1 die and dealt no wound to Speedball.
• Damage Taken: 3 wounds from Luke Cage in 2 attacks, 1 wound from Sheer Force, 1 wound from Speedball in 1 attack (destroyed)

Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Kid Flash with 1 Life, Angel with 3 Life

___________________________________________________________

-Sheer Force updated to slow down marker loss/self-damage-

Army Test
Map: Custom
Units: X-O Manowar, Blob, Angel, Martian Manhunter (I), Lockjaw, Oracle (1200) vs Songbird, Spider-Man, Captain America, Jack Flag, Luke Cage, Speedball (1200)

Spoiler Alert!

Manowar's screen was less all-consuming here, but he had another bruiser to count on and he was able to attack more occasionally. The Crime Fighters had godawful luck (notably Luke Cage whiffed two defense rolls in a row to go down in two attacks and take two OMs with him). Manhunter was able to take the majority of the OMs with Manowar getting the occasional attack.

Team Manowar's movement shenanigans were able to keep Speedball and Spider-Man from pinning him down and getting him to waste attacks that could trigger self wounds.

The game turned into a real lopsided win with the Crime Fighters just failing to capitalize on their (limited) opportunities.

Ended the game with the majority of Team 1 hale and hearty, and Blob having a healthy Speedball pinned down at height disadvantage. Didn't feel like playing that one out, so called the game there.

Unit Summary:

• Damage Done (Normal Attack): 4 wounds to Jack Flag in 1 attack (1 from Oracle) (destroyed), 4 wounds to Captain America in 3 attacks (1 due to Oracle) (destroyed), 1 wound to Songbird in 1 attack
• Sheer Force: triggered 1 time after failing to wound Captain America. Resulted in a second attack that dealt 2 wounds to Cap. Manowar took a wound.
• Righteous Rage: rolled 3 unblockables 1 time against Songbird (when Lockjaw was destroyed), dealt 2 wounds.
• Damage Taken: 1 wound from Sheer Force, 2 wounds from Spider-Man in 3 attacks, 0 wounds from Luke Cage in 1 attack, 0 wounds from Captain America in 1 normal attack, 1 wound from Songbird in 2 attacks

Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Speedball with 5 Life cedes to X-O Manowar with 1 Life, Angel with 3 Life, Martian Manhunter unwounded, Blob unwounded, and Oracle unwounded

THOUGHTS ON THE TESTED UNIT'S COST, BALANCE, & DRAFTABILITY: One game in so far. First game just took six years to play out, so I'm stopping for today. Not sure about 380 after the first game. The penalties against him in Sheer Force are super harsh; I never whiffed the second attack, but doing that either time would have been a death knell and I was dreading the possibility.

It feels thematically weird to me too. The general dynamic is cool and had me immediately thinking about getting him some Visigoth generics to be his screen, but he lost steam so fast that the mid-level guys started stunting on him after he took two (admittedly very good) turns. It didn't feel particularly Manowar-y.

UPDATED: Manowar's team just kinda crushed it in that one; the Crime Fighter team should have been defensively pretty alright, but uh, that didn't quite pan out.

Notably, the change to Sheer Force between games 1 and 2 made no difference at all in how things played out. The one time it triggered and he had to roll against himself he came up with a skull and chose to take a wound, so same end result as if he had been played with the old version.

Updated the post with game two.

[johnny139]

Hmm, was hoping for a rousing confirmation there, but yeah, pretty lopsided.

Looking at the results for that second test, I do feel he, at least, was performing on a good level. One good Righteous Rage roll, one extra swing with Sheer Force... a lot of damage to mid-level heroes, probably a slight overperformance, but a lot of that is due to Oracle and Blob and other heroes supporting him. Army did better than expected, I think Aric was on par.

Looking at results overall now:

Version A (unblockable on second attack, X-O Marker on third)
Karat: two slight losses with a good performance (~7 wounds dealt in the first, ~13 in the second)
Arkham: one big loss with poor performance (~4 wounds dealt), one big win with good performance (~7 wounds dealt)

Version B (unblockable die, you choose wound/marker)
Ronin: one slight win with good performance (~11 wounds dealt), one big win with good performance (~11 wounds dealt)

The Sheer Force changes seem to be pretty minor, but I think giving you more control will at least mitigate "feel bad" games like Ronin's first, where he just ends up wimpy too soon. So, taking the results in one go, we have an even W/L record, with generally solid performance from him, though maybe a bit overcosted at 380.

Reading those games, once you "get it," he seems fun to me. Arkham's strategy - stay back and blast at the opponent, occasionally fly in to either finish off a key figure or get in a knock-down, drag-out fight with a big guy... that feels like a good place for him, just going secondhand here.

@Ronin , did the second game feel more "Aric" to you? You're the only person other than myself to know the character pretty well and test him, so that's a priority here. Not sure if the tweaks were sufficient (or there's more tweaks we could do) with the basic shape of the design in place.

[Ronin]

Originally Posted by johnny139

@Ronin , did the second game feel more "Aric" to you? You're the only person other than myself to know the character pretty well and test him, so that's a priority here. Not sure if the tweaks were sufficient (or there's more tweaks we could do) with the basic shape of the design in place.

I mean, it did, but a lot of that was that he was just lucky enough not to trigger Sheer Force as much.

I think the change between games 1 and 2 would be more something to level out a poor performance a bit so he wouldn't destroy himself for whiffing a couple attacks, but he didn't happen in game 2.

[johnny139]

Okay, good, that was essentially my goal - to make Sheer Force still feel like a punishing, risk/reward type decision, but not enough to be a "feel bad" power that completely neuters him with some bad rolls.

I think I'm good to go with him here - personally I'm hoping to get in a couple games with Livewire soon, and I'll make sure to include Aric in one of those to get a feel for him myself. But for now, looking at his results, I'm going to drop his points slightly to 370 and PROPOSE WE MOVE TO FINAL EDITING!