AOA: Playing The New Factions

[ThrasherDarkrai]

So, since a new video just dropped showcasing a whole slew of units, there's probably no better time to bump this thread than right now. We've finally received a good look at the set's pirate squads - probably the most important ingredient in the Dawn Raider "faction" - and the Eisenek (otherwise known as the Ironclad Collective in promotional materials), so we've got a far better idea as to what two of the set's more prominent unit groups have going for them now.

Let's start with the pirates, who are now much easier to discuss with the reveal of two of their unique squads and the Crimson Widow, the faction's de-facto leader. As far as I can tell, the faction is predominantly melee-oriented despite the presence of a few token guns, with much of the muscle deriving from unique squads with the "Captain's Way" power (pretty much identical to the variation showed off by Encarmine in the second or third daily Age of Annihilation reveal), which grants these squads additional protection against ranged attacks. The "Captain's Way" seems designed to help the unique pirate squads close the gap so they can unleash their melee barrage, though the requirement for the captain to be within 4 spaces of their squads seems like it could potentially be debilitating considering the captains' slightly underwhelming defensive statistics (especially the newly-revealed Crimson Widow, essentially a very expensive cheerleader who bears all the fragility of Mimring and Ulginesh without any of their ranged attack options). These pirates might wield guns, but they're largely for show; swordplay is the name of the game here.

To my mind, the Crimson Widow and the Dreadnauts seem to be the "core" units of the pirates for a whole slew of reasons; more than any other units, these two seem to best highlight the faction's design. The Dreadnauts are simple: they're huge melee beat-sticks. Having two life and the Captain's Way gives them a surprising amount of bulk for their price, and four attack is kind of nuts for a 100 point melee squad with an ability like Mortal Blow that enables each individual Dreadnaut to quickly pile wounds onto heroes. From everything we've seen so far, the Dreadnauts are really the pirates' primary offensive muscle - I'm rather unimpressed by the Knaves of the Silver Scimitar - and the currently-revealed Captains mostly function to maximize their potential damage output, the Crimson Widow most obviously. Directly, she grants an essentially unconditional melee attack buff; indirectly, her movement ability can catapult pirate squads into melee range. A single order marker with the Dreadnauts can move two of the Dreadnauts nine total spaces - bond with The Crimson Widow, move two Dreadnauts three spaces, and then move the entire squad six - which is rather scary considering the Dreadnauts' offensive power. Of course, the Crimson Widow can also move other pirate heroes into position with her power as well, which might prove to be a more common use case; we'll have to see.

Overall, while I cannot say the pirates are my favorite faction, I do think these reveals have given me a much better appreciation for their unit dynamics. The Dreadnauts at the very least seem to be a good "payoff" for the pirates' internal synergy webs; they'll be very fun to smash into things with alongside Bor-Bok-Na. The Exiles and EJ-1M have some of my favorite sculpts in the set, so I'm really interested in seeing what they're going to bring to the table.

As for the Eisenek, my immediate impression - breaking from the thread's focus on the different factions for a second - is that the Necrotech Wrathriders seem really, really useful. Chaingrab is already a pretty nifty ability (judging from the recent Delta OHS tournament), but is handicapped by the fact that the Drow Chainfighter is the only figure who has it. Putting it on a three-person squad - each individual member of whom can attempt to Chaingrab in a single turn - however, changes the calculus pretty dramatically. Have all three Necrotech Wrathriders attempt to Chaingrab Raelin in a single turn! Move eight spaces and yank each member of the Krav into melee range! Yank three separate figures into molten lava! Needless to say, I'm incredibly excited to roll these metallic... cyborg... ball-things?... out onto the battlefield; pretty impressive for a squad I felt basically nothing for prior to today.

[chas]

"Gotta catch 'em all!"
--Pokemon


Yes, as these play videos come out, I become more interested in the characters I was not originally into. If I owned the set I backed, there is so much I could try, before even adding Classic or Custom Scape to it!

[Master Roshi]

I'm interested in using the Crimson Widow's Hire Crew ability with the ROTV unique squads. Might be fun to synergize her with the Tarn Vikings

[tom]

Originally Posted by Master Roshi

I'm interested in using the Crimson Widow's Hire Crew ability with the ROTV unique squads. Might be fun to synergize her with the Tarn Vikings

I think Pirate Bear Paladins will be a heck of a lot of fun to unleash on your adversaries!

[Myriadite]

The "Hire Crew" power is very thematic and fun. Crimson Widow could give the hired unique squad an extra attack die with "Pirate Commander" (melee only) and move them with "Midnight Raid", and Bok-Bur-Na could help their attacks with the "Intimidate" power.

[tom]

So if you use the Iron Lich to juice up (vile injection) Scavorith before he takes his turn you can move Scavorith 7 spaces, attack an enemy with 7 dice, reveal the X marker on Scavorith and do it all again?!?! That has to be my favorite combo so far. I am really loving these new units!

[Good Pig]

Originally Posted by Master Roshi

I'm interested in using the Crimson Widow's Hire Crew ability with the ROTV unique squads. Might be fun to synergize her with the Tarn Vikings

Awesome

Also, Tagawa Samurai, Ninjas of the Northern Wind, Elite Onyx Vipers... a lot of fun combos to explore with this card.

[Dad_Scaper]

Originally Posted by Myriadite

The "Hire Crew" power is very thematic and fun. Crimson Widow could give the hired unique squad an extra attack die with "Pirate Commander" (melee only) and move them with "Midnight Raid", and Bok-Bur-Na could help their attacks with the "Intimidate" power.

I was working on that concept and trying to come up with a good name for it. "Pressgang" didn't seem right, because that was used to add poor folks to the *navies*, and not to pirate crews.

So I did some research, to figure out how pirate captains actually added crew to their ships. It turned out, the answer was as old as recorded history: they paid them. Sailors wanted to be pirates because it was the best way to make a living on the open seas.

Hence the power name: Hire Crew.

[S1R_ART0R1US]

Originally Posted by Good Pig

Awesome

Also, Tagawa Samurai, Ninjas of the Northern Wind, Elite Onyx Vipers... a lot of fun combos to explore with this card.

Samurai seem interesting in general - move them into melee range to tie up with counterstrike. Izumi don't hit hard with 2A but buffed to 3A they could be decent. Some soft Einar synergy there. Nakitas are also a great pick for their smoke powder and engagement strike where they can move along with the bonding squad and provide cover.

Really like all these designs so far.

[chas]

Since that recent second play through video, there are now 19 cards in the Haslab Offering Card Compendium. That's almost half of the AOA cards. It certainly is a strange development if they're not planning on keeping the offering viable somehow, one way or another.

These cards show the great flexibility you have when playing many of the characters in various clever types of bonding. One of the female pirate captains can even turn nonPirates into Pirates! The newer video shows how chain bonding can take place among certain cards, to give the player a very long multi action turn on a single Order Marker. Great stuff!

Factions we haven't seen in a play through video yet: Dryan Lifeborn Order, the flying components of Clockwork Combine.

[Dad_Scaper]

Originally Posted by S1R_ART0R1US

Samurai seem interesting in general - move them into melee range to tie up with counterstrike. Izumi don't hit hard with 2A but buffed to 3A they could be decent. Some soft Einar synergy there. Nakitas are also a great pick for their smoke powder and engagement strike where they can move along with the bonding squad and provide cover.

Really like all these designs so far.

Thanks, old timer. I'm very happy with our body of work.

[Myriadite]

Originally Posted by Dad_Scaper

I was working on that concept and trying to come up with a good name for it. "Pressgang" didn't seem right, because that was used to add poor folks to the *navies*, and not to pirate crews.

So I did some research, to figure out how pirate captains actually added crew to their ships. It turned out, the answer was as old as recorded history: they paid them. Sailors wanted to be pirates because it was the best way to make a living on the open seas.

Hence the power name: Hire Crew.

I love this. To add pirates to Heroscape, it could have just been a squad with the right aesthetic and armed with knives / flintlock pistols. Instead, we have a whole faction of units who really feel like pirates. Hiring crews, starting a mutiny, intimidating enemies - the drama of it all is spot on.