The Book of Havok

[Karat]

Originally Posted by Yodaking

He didn't win a single hero or squad test. When I run those I often get at least one lucky win at a point level above the figures final cost. SI will certainly make him worth more in a team setting than when on his own, and he will be more likely to get fully charged up in a longer game, but I'd still think he will be not that far off from his solo price as neither one of those powers are game breaking. As is 190 looks like his ceiling to me rather then his floor.

Yea, that was my thoughts as well. He really needs either some really careful play or some supporting characters in order to get the most out of him.

[TrollBrute]

Given that 1v1 is not going to be where he shines, and all of the Hero tests were against 220 and 215 units that do well there, I'm not terribly surprised that he didn't win any of them.

190-200 seems fine for public playtesting. Like johnny, I wouldn't be surprised to see him edge over that line though.

[Karat]

I propose we send Havok to Public Playtesting at 200

[johnny139]

Yea

[TrollBrute]

Yea

[Viegon]

Yea

[Karat]

Down to @SirGalahad

[SirGalahad]

Yea

[Karat]

First set of tests.

Originally Posted by Aggressive Sock

C3G STANDARD PLAYTEST FEEDBACK FORM

NAME OF THE PLAYTEST UNIT: Havok

Army Test 1
Map: Country Road
Units:
Havok, Star-Lord, Darkseid, Green-Arrow (980)
vs.
Fantastic Four (1000)

Spoiler Alert!

Attack Damage:
-2 wounds on Human Torch. (+1 from SL)

Notes:
-Havok places 1 marker.
-Darkseid places 4 wounds on Human Torch.
-Torch uses Supernova, only causes 2 wounds on Darkseid.
-Havok reveals X to place 2nd marker.
-Havok reveals X after Darkseid's failed attack, takes turn with Green Arrow.
-Thing puts 3 wounds on Darkseid with 1st Clobberin' Time attack.
-Thing puts 3 more wounds on him, killing him.
-Havok kills Torch.
-Havok places 3rd marker.
-Thing kills Star-Lord.
-Havok reveals X after Star-Lord fails to cause a wound, takes turn with Green Arrow, puts 2 wounds on Mr. Fantastic.
-Mr. Fantastic rolls 5 skulls on Havok, he rolls 1 shield, kills him.
-Thing kills Green Arrow with 4 wounds after Arrow botched his defense.



Mr. Fantastic with 2 wounds, Thing and Invisible Woman with 0.

GENERAL THOUGHTS ON THE TESTED UNIT: Not sure how I feel about Havok based on this game. He offered an extra attack twice, but his markers never came into play(died the turn before he was going to expend them). The opponent was aware not to have their army adjacent, which made it difficult. A couple of botched rolls on their side, and it just wasn't their game.

___________________________________________________________

Army Test 2
Map: Country Road
Units:
Havok, Prof. X, Deadpool, Cable(985)
vs.
Flash, Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Martian Manhunter(1000)

Spoiler Alert!

Attack Damage:
-1 on Hawkman. (Using PBSA all 3 markers)
-2 on Martian Manhunter. (Using PBSA all 3 markers)
-2 wounds on Hawkman.
-1 wound on Martian Manhunter. (whiffed def.)

Notes:
-Havok places a marker.
-Havok reveals X and places marker.
-Havok places a marker.
-Deadpool kills Hawkgirl.
-Havok removes all 3 markers, attacking Hawkman and Martian Manhunter.
-Hawkman kills Deadpool.
-Havok places marker.
-Havok kills Hawkman.
-Havok places marker.
-Flash kills Prof. X.
-Havok reveals X and places marker.
-Havok uses PBSA 3 markers and it is blocked.
-Martian Manhunter kills Havok.
-Martian Manhunter kills Cable.



Martian Manhunter and Flash with 3 wounds.

GENERAL THOUGHTS ON THE TESTED UNIT: This was a better game for Havok. It was easier to put his markers on when taking turns with Prof. X., but he wasn't able to use his SI unless someone else revealed an OM on their card, thus I usually had Cable/Deadpool take 1 OM just in case. It didn't come into play unfortunately. It felt like a pretty close game. I feel it's generally easy to avoid Havok's PBSA by not placing your figures in pods, but he'll make a nice pod breaker when someone relies on them. All around, I wasn't wowed by him, but for 200 and a little luck, he isn't bad. I wouldn't mind seeing him go down to maybe 180-190, but it feels about right. Unfortunately, he lacks any defensive capability, so if he's unlucky, he can be destroyed rather easily once the heat is on him. It's not the easiest to try and play keep away with the tools he has and his movement.

I requested that he add in a round summary in the future to help with our analysis of how a unit performs.

[Yodaking]

In general terms, I'd like to see most if not all play tests done where both teams are starting with the same points worth of units. Just adding in Fire Ants x2 to technically even things out when you don't have Ant-man to make good use of them is poor form as well. The play tests are intended to help us better understand what the point value is for a undetermined unit, having the two armies then play on an uneven playing field just makes it more difficult for a proper evaluation.

In this example, the Havok team lost both games, indicating that he may be over priced, but since his teams were playing 20 points down to begin with (the X-men team is actually 980 points, not 985) it makes it more difficult to determine how much lower his cost should go. Starting with a 20 point advantage may not seem like much but it is an advantage, that is why each unit is priced the way they are. Starting with an advantage has a way of snowballing, it would be similar to letting one army start on high ground and one on low ground. It may only result in 2 or 3 extra attack die before both teams wind up on even ground but those extra attack die could lead to an extra wound, that takes a figure out a round earlier & costs a player an OM, that leads to a second figure getting taken out a round earlier, and so on and so on.

In the X-Men game, those 20 points could just as easily been spent on the 25 point Bob, Agent of Hydra as which point Havok would have technically been played at 195 points instead of 200. Could Bob's d20 roll resulted in an auto wound or two? Did Hawkman or Hawkgirl get in 3-4 attacks while playing with just 1 life? Take those attacks away and maybe Havok lives a bit longer, gets fully charged up and kills Flash or MM. Strategic Intervention would have been pretty good for moving Bob up to keep him close to Deadpool. Reveal OM on Bob, he moves up to stay close to Deadpool and his wisecracks, attacks and does no damage, Havok reveals the X and Deadpool or Cable get a double attack. Suddenly the game looks more balanced and Havok seems right on point at 195. Instead Havok was essentially played at 220 points and we already knew he wasn't going to be a 220 point figure.

[Viegon]

As someone who often playtests with a 5-15 point gap, I don't think it's an issue. One important thing with playtesting is to not just rely on the win/loss ratio, but to look at what the unit itself did. What we should be looking for here is what Havok did: how much damage did he do? How much did Strategic Intervention help? What kind of strategies did his SA force the opponent into playing, and was that an overall positive for his team? With that in mind, a small points gap between the teams has very little weight. My .

As to Havok himself, I'm not too concerned. Neither of those armies were Havok's best, and in the second game he was putting the "X" on Havok, when it should have been on Xavier (Psychic Defense X is an amazing power).

[TrollBrute]

Yeah, while it's best for armies to be as close to each other as possible, a few points doesn't make a huge difference when you're talking about 1000 points. Not all armies are created equal. It's possible when creating an army for a playtest unit that a 980 or 990 build will actually be stronger and better for the tested unit than a 1000. Not saying that was the case here, but it's true in general. Forcing a unit into sub-par armies just to fit at a 1000 point level will result in tests that are more skewed than one in an army is down 10-15 points. In general, it's best to aim for even costs, but I don't think it's something that needs to be enforced, as long as we take context into consideration when examining results and win/loss ratios.