The New York City Gang Of Four

[kolakoski]

Well met!

The Gang had a fun day playing chas' reimagining of Sherman's last scenario yesterday. The matchups were as in the previous post.

Thrasher, sitting to my right, made a mockery of the first game, with ridiculously good die rolling. It was not a real test for Captain Xue as a result, but it was clear that her Special Attack was way too strong (and her Edge was useless), and chas strongly objected to her previous concept (17th century pirate) being jettisoned in favor of her being an armed spaceship captain. For the second game, Sherman sat on my right, and began with so much luck that he decided that it must be the chair, and I was again on the winning side of a slaughter. Meanwhile, a revised Captain Xue (with a stronger Edge that actually had some effect, and Double Attack reinserted in place of her Special Attack) played well, and will be tested further in Thrasher's pod draft scenario in February. For now, she looks like this:

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

DOUBLE ATTACK
When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

CAPTAIN XUE’S EDGE
When a figure you control rolls attack or defense dice for or against a normal attack against an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, that figure adds 1 automatic skull or shield to whatever is rolled. Add 3 to the roll if that figure is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue.

125 points

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Captain Xue's Edge has turned out to be the leadership power I was looking for. But Double Attack isn't enough to reflect the uniqueness of her pistols. Borrowing the mechanic of Captain Xue's Edge, I've come up with the following:

PLASMA POWDER SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 7, Attack 3
When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever is rolled. When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, she may attack one additional time.

[chas]

The power looks fine, but I don't like the name--its like saying "Flintlock Laser Gun" which makes no sense any way you look at it.

[chas]

We had two exciting games, although I was on the losing team both times. Teamed up with Sherman Davies, My Fliers in Game One got taken out pretty easily, although not as quickly as last time in the previous December game against Taeblewalker. I have to say that I thought we both played well on our team, but both had amazingly bad dice rolls! That's Heroscape for ya. SD did a great job supporting me with his squad members, and my shooters took out some figures that were holding up his advance on my board side. Unfortunately, where in the past I had had incredible luck with Bolt of Witherwood when Atlaga first came out some years ago, especially against Kolakoski, memorably taking out The Varja among several others in various games, this time it failed. I had planned to hit either the Star Lich or Captain Xue with it, but ended up missing against Eltahale, when she got in my way.

Thrasher Darkrai has collected a number of newer figures or 3D renderings of them, including the Star Lich, unofficial Age of Annihilation figures, and others we'll be using in future games, such as the Buccaneers of Tortuga. His Star Lich picked up a number of Skeletons of Annilinta on her card! She had only appeared once on our table previously when I used her, but couldn't get her into the action. So this time she shone on the battlefield!

My Agents, Assassins and Martial Artists (Including Ninjas) did better again and were more interesting to run in Game Two, when I was teamed up with Thraser Darkrai. I split my characters and order markers onto all three "fronts" on the map, the two ridges on the sides and the central shadow/foliage valley. We bravely advanced on the left against Sherman's two dragons, which I think surprised him. His Nilfheim took hits and SD pulled him back. Then my teammate TD sent Eltahale against Charos, and that fight went on for a long time. Sherm managed to nullify my Mika Connor in the center, whose Shadow powers should have worked well on this map to help TD out, with Greenscales, although they had to leave their power position next to Charos, and I also had deployed Agent Carr on that flank, but he was also held up.

Meanwhile, Thrasher threw Axentia onto the enemy quickly on the right flank, my primary position, but she died before taking out more than a few of them. Then flank, my two ninjas Kumiko and Moriko went to town, powered by Kanto Dashai's double bonding power, but couldn't get decent die rolls to take down the Roman screen protecting Captain Xue (now somewhat depowered down to a more reasonable card) whose super awesome power had made her my prime target in Game One. I think I only got one attack in against her after several rounds of battling.

Sherman Davies took some photos of Game Two, and they should be showing up here for your viewing pleasure.

***

We had a question about the new Agent Nora: could she fire past one figure in her straight line attacks to hit another? We said yes. However, then Sherman Davies, our C3V Alumni, discovered that there is no place to ask that question, because no one ever made a book for her! Hopefully this will be remedied, so we can get an official answer to that question.

I also noted, and everyone agreed, that even if one enemy figures is adjacent to her, and she has to attack that person, she still gets to fire off her bullet barrage in all other directions where she has a target, since its worded as a simultaneous spread!

***

We have some new and creative scenarios coming up in the next two months:

February: Thrasher Darkrai is hosting a Pod Draft, inspired by on the new thread by Sir Dendrick "Does Anybody Draft Any More?" This original drafting discussion is here:
https://www.heroscapers.com/communit...ad.php?t=63359

March: Kolakosi will run a game where each army has to have a certain number of figures, (and also take up a certain number of spaces with them). Edit: this last parenthesized clause is incorrect, as noted by K. below. Its mostly meant for heroes rather than squads.

These games will feature K.'s newest version of his Captain Xue custom for playtesting.

Look for those scenarios here soon!

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Originally Posted by kolakoski

Captain Xue's Edge has turned out to be the leadership power I was looking for. But Double Attack isn't enough to reflect the uniqueness of her pistols. Borrowing the mechanic of Captain Xue's Edge, I've come up with the following:

PLASMA POWDER SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 7, Attack 3
When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever is rolled. When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, she may attack one additional time.

Originally Posted by chas

The power looks fine, but I don't like the name--its like saying "Flintlock Laser Gun" which makes no sense any way you look at it.

I thought quite a while about what to call it. I considered using Plasma, Pulse, Projectile, and Pistol in the name. I decided that, given that the pistol would use some sort of gunpowder, a special gunpowder would give it an extra kick. What would you call it?

Originally Posted by chas

March: Kolakoski will run a game where each army has to have a certain number of figures, and also take up a certain number of spaces with them.

Actually, it's 12 figures with no space requirement. Theoretically, an army could have 12 2-space figures, filling up a normal 24 space Start Zone. Victory will be determined by the number of figures destroyed.

[chas]

How about something like High Grain Ammo which is a real thing?

https://everydaycarryconcealed.com/w...in-ammunition/

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Originally Posted by SkyWhale

I think something like this might be neat:

PLASMA POWDER SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 7, Attack 2
When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add two automatic skulls to whatever is rolled. When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, she may attack one additional time.

I picture "Plasma Powder" being a fairly volatile and experimental compound, which isn't always 100% accurate. So if it doesn't work as intended, that's still two attacks of 2 dice. But there's a 25% chance for 2 automatic skulls! Fairly swingy, but I think it can be balanced.

And then Xue's Edge would be a different power, preferably one that requires less dice rolling.

I hear you. Interesting, but I'm inclined to leave the Special Attack as is. I've been wondering, given earlier comments about Double Attack's ambiguity when I had both a special and normal attack occurring in the same turn, whether I could do the following:

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

DOUBLE ATTACK
When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

PLASMA POWDER SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 7, Attack 3
When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever is rolled. [When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, she may attack one additional time.]

CAPTAIN XUE’S EDGE
When a figure you control rolls defense dice for or against a normal attack against an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, that figure adds 1 automatic shield to whatever is rolled. Add 3 to the roll if that figure is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue.

Would this be an OK way for both her normal and special attacks to happen twice, or do I still need the bracketed language? In any event, this will establish the usual type of choice between normal and special attacks by a figure. Also, limiting Edge to defense rolls eliminates the problems with normal versus special adjacent attacks by Captain Xue.

[kolakoski]

Well met!

This is better:

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

CAPTAIN XUE’S PISTOLS
When Captain Xue attacks, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever was rolled. If Captain Xue is attacking an adjacent figure, add two automatic skulls to whatever is rolled. When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

CAPTAIN XUE’S EDGE
When a figure you control rolls defense dice against a normal attack from an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic shield to whatever is rolled. Add two automatic shields to the roll if that figure is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue.

P.S.: Modifying her normal attack is easier and cleaner than giving her a special attack, and solves most of her problems. Having Edge affect only defense dice rolls solves the rest, and might keep her reasonably priced at 125 points.

P.P.S.: CAPTAIN XUE’S PISTOLS and CAPTAIN XUE’S EDGE even more recently revised.

[chas]

Kolakoski,

Thanks for responding to my comments on Captain Xue. I like this much better than the "spaceship" version! Its great that you can stay active in Scape even without your physical collection!

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Thanks to the Gang for helping with this. And to @SkyWhale, whose advice I haven't always taken, but whose influence on this last iteration of Captain Xue is clear.

Originally Posted by SkyWhale

I think something like this might be neat:

PLASMA POWDER SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 7, Attack 2
When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add two automatic skulls to whatever is rolled. When Captain Xue attacks with Plasma Powder Special Attack, she may attack one additional time.

I picture "Plasma Powder" being a fairly volatile and experimental compound, which isn't always 100% accurate. So if it doesn't work as intended, that's still two attacks of 2 dice. But there's a 25% chance for 2 automatic skulls! Fairly swingy, but I think it can be balanced.

And then Xue's Edge would be a different power, preferably one that requires less dice rolling.

And thanks to everyone else who has commented and helped, not only with this design, but with my efforts over the years.

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

CAPTAIN XUE’S PISTOLS
When Captain Xue attacks, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever was rolled. If Captain Xue is attacking an adjacent figure, add two automatic skulls to whatever is rolled. When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

CAPTAIN XUE’S EDGE
When a figure you control rolls defense dice against a normal attack from an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic shield to whatever is rolled. Add two automatic shields to the roll if that figure is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue.

I believe there is a certain elegant symmetry between these special powers, and I am eager to see how Captain Xue fares in next month's game.

Again, thanks everyone!

[kolakoski]

Well met!

Sent some PMs to Thrasher about this, but wanted to clarify. I've made significant revisions to Captain Xue while revising her bio. Thrasher, took out final sentence of version of Captain Xue's Spirit that I sent you. Now we have:

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

CAPTAIN XUE’S PISTOLS
When Captain Xue attacks, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever was rolled. When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

CAPTAIN XUE’S SPIRIT
When a figure you control that is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue rolls defense dice against a normal attack from an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic shield to whatever is rolled.

125 Points

Seems pretty clean and elegant as is.

About what I sent to Thrasher, this was added to, and then deleted from, Captain Xue's Spirit:

If Captain Xue is attacked with a normal attack and receives enough wounds to be destroyed, she may immediately attack with Captain Xue's Pistols. After attacking with Captain Xue's Pistols, remove Captain Xue from the battlefield.

Then:

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

This is a fine design for your games with the Gang, but an "attack" during your opponent's turn will be a non-starter with the SoV, I suspect.

He also said:

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

The Frost Giant of Morh does not "attack" during its opponent's turn.

I don't think you're adding to the theme with that part of the power. I'd drop it before I'd turn it into 5 (or whatever) lines of text like Dying Swipe.

What do you all think?

P.S.: From ThrasherDarkrai:

"Mechanically, the figure looks basically fine to me at first glance.
Formatting-wise, though, I think you should strike the last line from Captain Xue's Pistols and give her Double Attack. It's not clear to me why Double Attack is essentially being rolled into Captain Xue's Pistols; it should really be two separate powers.

"Thematically, I think the names of Captain Xue's powers are quite vague; neither really evoke any kind of fantasy to me. What, exactly, is "Captain Xue's Pistols" supposed to convey? Why are her shots occasionally but inconsistently more powerful? Retitling the power to put more emphasis on WHAT the Pistols are - rather than who owns them - would better convey what the power is doing (and by extension, who Captain Xue is). I'd suggest something like "Black Powder Pistols," except that the AoA Pirates already used that for a power name. I'd make a similar comment for Captain's Xue's Spirit, but it's less egregious there since I still get a rough sense as to what the power is trying to accomplish."

No problem doing as he asks with Double Attack. As to naming the powers, as you may have gathered, I've been looking for the right names for some time. Plasma Powder Pistols was the name of Captain Xue's Pistols when it was a special attack. We could go with that. As to Captain's Xue's Spirit, did you thing Captain's Xue's Edge was better? Captain's Inspiration? Long ago, we posited Protect the Captain as the name for a power. Could go with Defend the Captain. Maybe something with "Tough" in it? Captain's Courageous? Any suggestions from the peanut gallery? How's this for now?

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

DOUBLE ATTACK
When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

WARFORGED PISTOLS
When Captain Xue attacks, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever was rolled.

CAPTAIN'S COURAGEOUS
When a figure you control that is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue rolls defense dice against a normal attack from an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic shield to whatever is rolled.

125 Points

[kolakoski]

Well met!

How do you you like these latest names for powers?

CAPTAIN XUE
General: Vydar
Human, Unique Hero, Captain, Tricky, Medium 5
Life 5, Move 5, Range 7, Attack 3, Defense 3

DOUBLE ATTACK
When Captain Xue attacks, she may attack one additional time.

WARFORGED PISTOLS
When Captain Xue attacks, roll the 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic skull to whatever was rolled.

CAPTAIN'S COURAGEOUS
When a figure you control that is Captain Xue or within 6 clear sight spaces of Captain Xue rolls defense dice against a normal attack from an adjacent figure, roll a 20-sided die. On a roll of 15 or higher, add one automatic shield to whatever is rolled.

125 Points