Custom Terrain for the HelmAverse and other Super-scapes

[Matt Helm]

Thanks to my nephew with the 3D Printer and the willingness to give us time for Heroscape projects we finally have the Toxic Liquid tile that goes with the Alien Flora.



Toxic Liquid Rules:

Moving onto toxic liquid: Unlike moving onto water, when you move onto a toxic liquid space from any other space, you may continue moving if you have move left. However, at the end of the round, all figures still on toxic liquid spaces must roll to see if they take toxic liquid damage.

Rolling for toxic liquid damage: In turn order, all players must roll for all their figures on toxic liquid spaces. To do this, roll one attack die. If you roll a skull, that figure takes a wound. Otherwise it is safe. Players may choose in what order to roll for their own figures.

Falling: All falling rules apply if a figure falls onto a toxic water space.

Misty Swamp (optional rule): When a small or medium figure on a toxic liquid space is defending against a non-adjacent attack, the defending figure receives one additional defense die.

[Tornado]

Nice

[A3n]

Very cool.

I was thinking that a different optional rule could be: Any figure in combat, attacker or defender, that is on a toxic space at the end of combat rolls one combat die. If a skull is rolled that figure receives one wound.

This would be to simulate the exertion of battle weakening their ability to stave of the toxic gases, or instead of holding their breath to avoid inhalation they inadvertently gasp after the fight to catch their breath & get a lung full of the stuff.

[Sherman Davies]

Great work, Mr. Helm - just like Van Ness and the Gang would've done it.

[Matt Helm]

Well the holiday season is now over but the Helm family has some great memories thanks to our two annual HelmAverse tournaments.

The first one is our HelmsGiving Tournament held every Thanksgiving weekend. I'm going to have to go back and look for pics of prior years because I want to say it was our 5th annual but I lose track in my old age. As always, we build multiple one-v-one maps and have all players engaged in round robin battles against different opponents on different maps. All HelmAverse cards are laid out for a snake draft for all 8 participants. The main rule is, any card destroyed in a battle is now off limits for the rest of the tournament. Since it's a battle to the death, all losing players have to redraft a new team after every match and winners get to back fill for any suffered loses. This system allows us to get a vast majority of our cards on to the table.

This year's battles took place on the following four battlefields:





Then, just after New Years (I think we were a week late due to scheduling) we held the 3rd Annual Betty White HelmAverse Tournament. The Tourney is named after the late actress Betty White who passed away just shy of 100 on the day we held the first tournament two years ago. In the Betty White Tourney we build a very large map of various terrain elements and then play a team match. Although we don't utilize nearly as many cards, we do see how the cards that are used react in much larger scale battles.

This year's battlefield was an attempt at a city with busy roads and canals:



Both days were great fun for all, both winners and losers.

[A3n]

very cool!

[IAmBatman]

That highway design looks great

[Tornado]

Cool map. Hard to beat a good city map.

[Spidey'tilIDie]

I really like that map, Matt, well done! I really want to try it out!

[Matt Helm]

Thanks, Spidey, I wish you could have played with us.

[Matt Helm]

Took a pic of a recent playtest session as the map included some custom vehicle terrain. The box trucks are nice because they are all plastic (no die cast alloy) making them very light, they fit perfect over a row of single hexes, and even have space to add some stickers or sharpie marks to allow battles on top of them.

They are found on Amazon or Walmart (usually through third party sellers from China) but the listings never reveal the actual company name that produces them. The box says "Sino" which I never seem to be able to find anything on when I try to google it. Anyway, they are usually relatively cheap and can be found with the "long head" cab that I prefer or a "short head" design that also looks good. They make a garbage truck, a cement mixer, the water truck in my photo, the dump truck in the photo, a car transporter, an oil tanker (again in the photo) and a car carrier.

[Tornado]

Good stuff. Always used to use a lot vehicles on our maps. School bus was a good one.
Dig the hexes on the trailer.