Astro's Custom Units [Update 5/26/21: WWII Medic]

[quozl]

Originally Posted by Astroking112

Much appreciated. This does let a Seishin Samurai that is already on the board be teleported to another killed Human Samurai, though, does it not? Would saying "...that has not been placed yet..." work, or is that unfeasible?

Also worth noting is this kind of a revision, which was suggested to me privately. I'm no Editor, but if this direction is more workable for a single-spawning Seishin Samurai then I would have no qualms with adopting it.

I kind of just winged that wording, but hopefully it's at least good enough to get the idea across.

You're right about the teleporting thing, which I think is kind of cool for a spirit but if you don't want that you will need to add "not on the battlefield" to the list of criteria. Placing them on other Samurai cards does make it a lot easier. Wording would then be:

HONOR BEYOND DEATH
Seishin Samurai do not start the game on the battlefield. Instead, place them on Samurai Army Cards you control. When a Human Samurai that you control is destroyed by a normal or special attack or a leaving engagement attack by an opponent's figure, you may replace it with a Seishin Samurai from that figure's Army Card, if possible, and then move that Seishin Samurai up to 4 spaces.

[Astroking112]

The teleport not making much thematic sense doesn't bother me too much; I'm more concerned about the potential gameplay ramifications of making it too easy to reposition the screen for the TSA. Forcing the other player to place the Seishin in suboptimal places is one of the ways to counter them, so I'm hesitant to let them easily move again without an OM.

It sounds like the placing on cards mechanic is tenable and might be nicer on the rules, so I'll proceed with that direction. Thanks for improving the wording for it, @quozl !

[Astroking112]

So while I tinker around with a way to make the Seishin spawn once each but still not be worth taking more than 2 or 3 copies of, Masha Shingai needs some tweaks to get further in the SoV process after his second downvote today.

Submission for Context
Review 1 - YEA
Review 2 - NAY
Review 3 - YEA
Review 4 - NAY

A brief summary of some of the critiques of him:

• He doesn't really tie the Samurai faction together or fix their weaknesses.
• An Einar Demon feels jarring.
• Losing initiative really sucks for Masha when he can't activate Awakened Terror and encourages you to place OM1 on him.
• He doesn't really work with Tagawa Samurai Archers.
• There's a lot of OM management trouble when juggling him, Tomoe Gozen, and the Unique Samurai.
• He is outclassed by Tomoe Gozen.
• His powers conflict with each other a little bit.

Some of the suggestions for how to change this have included bumping up the life to 6, dropping the adjacency requirement on Fiery Retribution (or otherwise boosting it), or lowering his point cost.

As for him not tying together the Samurai faction that well on his own, I'd have to agree with that statement. I didn't want to create a unit that felt like a bandaid for the faction, and I really like how he adds a twist to them without necessarily making them go up a tier. I was also pretty concerned about the attack reduction aura, of course, so I may have veered a bit too much towards the weaker side here.

I feel like I can't do much about the concern over an Einar Demon. It may be evil, but so was Einar at the beginning, and he hasn't shied away from summoning some dark stuff since. Valkrill doesn't feel like the right general here.

For the Tagawa Samurai Archers... yeah, he doesn't work with them. I couldn't figure out an elegant way to exclude them from the terror without loosening some of the heavy restrictions on Masha. It doesn't particularly bother me because I don't think that he really adds a lot to their playstyle, and it led me to work on the Seishin Samurai instead (who do make them more fun to play).
Plus, if he doesn't affect your own Commons, then how will we be able to take him with Deathstalkers?

Similarly, I don't really want to ease the OM management difficulty here. Some of the most fun that I've had with Masha has been from him, Tomoe Gozen, and the unique squads all in the same army. It's a tough army to play, but I liked how different it felt from other armies that provide ways to ease that stress. Kato Katsuro already exists as a (poor) replacement for OMs in the army, or Rygarn does a lot to ease that tension on his own.

So, for avenues that I'm currently considering on how to change the design:

• Bump up the life to 6 and decrease the points to 100.
• Drop the roll for Fiery Retribution to 11 to make it a bit more intimidating against range.
• Decrease the points back to their original 90, now that others have tested him and verified that he didn't break the game.
• Drop the adjacency requirement on Fiery Retribution to let it work on Samurai within X spaces.

Most of these are relatively minor tweaks, but they come with some caveats. I don't think that the first three changes really address the fundamental issue that some reviewers had, instead just bumping back up his power level a little bit to make him more enticing.

6 life makes him feel more intimidating and a bit easier to play, but I don't want melee squads to feel overwhelmed by him.
The decreased roll threshold for Fiery Retribution is a more balanced way of strengthening him by evening back out his bad match-ups. On the other hand, I don't want it to be too low when the entire faction is known for Counter Strike.
90 points always felt reasonable for him to me, albeit I'm not sure if the other judges who voted yes would agree. The biggest difference the bump had was that it made Raelin a bit harder to squeeze in, which I don't mind too much.

Dropping the adjacency requirement for Fiery Retribution, on the other hand, is something that deeply concerns me. Range has always been the Samurai's biggest weakness, and creating a unit that so clearly helps against that without heavy restrictions like the current design has feels like it might foster a dominant way of playing the Samurai. I enjoy playing Masha a lot, but he was never intended to become a "must-draft" for the Samurai. It also makes all of the Samurai pods much easier to maintain.

That said, I was also very staunchly against excluding Unique Squads from Awakened Terror for a long time. I'm generally just against trying to make him too strong, I think, and it's perfectly possible that like his terror only affecting enemies, this is something that I'm too concerned about and would find to be fine in practice.

I'm pinging @Scytale , @superfrog , @Soundwarp SG-1 , and @wriggz as the judges who have reviewed the current iteration of Masha. I know that @All Your Pie has also completed some testing as well. Any feedback on these ideas would be greatly appreciated.

[Soundwarp SG-1]

I'd probably go with one of the first two bullet points I guess. Hard for me to judge, since I thought he was fine as is personally.

[wriggz]

My 2 cents:

1. don't worry about an einar demon if you like it. I would never down vote for this alone. however to avoid getting mixed up in deming webs, Oni might be a better species.
2. Awakened terror could work on squad figures and exclude samurai (the way counter strike does) then the archers get to play.
3. At 6 life his survivability increases and he feels a bit more stand alone then cheerleader. This lessens the order marker management concerns.

Balance for points and profit.

[Pumpkin_King]

"Oni" definitely conserves the theme, and probably seems more appropriate given the japanese nature of it.

[Scytale]

I dunno. Adjusting points and/or stats does not address most of the points from the negative reviews. If superfrog's and wriggz's main concern is value for the cost, then yes, a simple adjustment is needed. If their main concern is order marker value, then that's an entirely different problem that a stat adjustment will not solve.

[Astroking112]

Originally Posted by Soundwarp SG-1

I'd probably go with one of the first two bullet points I guess. Hard for me to judge, since I thought he was fine as is personally.

Thanks for the input. I know that you and Scytale were fine with him, so I'd like to make sure that neither of you feel like any of these changes are going to break the bank, either.

Originally Posted by wriggz

My 2 cents:

1. don't worry about an einar demon if you like it. I would never down vote for this alone. however to avoid getting mixed up in deming webs, Oni might be a better species.
2. Awakened terror could work on squad figures and exclude samurai (the way counter strike does) then the archers get to play.
3. At 6 life his survivability increases and he feels a bit more stand alone then cheerleader. This lessens the order marker management concerns.

Balance for points and profit.

Yeah, I don't think that Einar Demon is something that I can change here. I'm glad to know that you wouldn't vote him down only for that reason.

As for the topic of Oni, I have several issues with that species directly that hold it back:
- Gurei-Oni used Ogre as his species, despite having Oni in his name. For whatever reason, the original designers used an English species to describe him.
- Gurei-Oni also has Oni in his name, and him and Masha are pretty visually not the same species.
- Originally, Morgoloth also had very few demons to boost with his Demon Leadership, so I thought that was a neat synergy.
- I understand the concern with Masha being able to bond with the Acolytes of Vorganund, but once I saw them, I don't think that it'll be a problem. He has some very heavy restrictions, even with bonding armies, that I think will make him pretty outclassed as a Bound Demon. Of course, now that they're in Public Playtesting, I'm willing to run a few tests to make sure that's true.

Making Awakened Terror work on all squad figures and just excluding Samurai would work for giving the TSA some love, but I feel like that's a bit thematically weaker. Perhaps it's just because the power serves as a reverse-inspiration for Akumaken's Mask of Terror that I feel that way, but I still just haven't found the TSA to be very fun to play with Masha. They still want Raelin to help against range and she's a lot easier to play, so juggling two auras feels kind of like a waste when you could've taken something else instead. They also don't have the same OM tension that the Unique Squads do, so it just felt a little underwhelming in comparison. I can run a test with him excluding them from the terror to see if that changes my mind, though.

That's largely my thoughts on the 6 life as well. It doesn't serve as a boost to his cheerleading capabilities outside of letting him perhaps tank an extra attack when he's drawing fire, but it does make him a little more terrifying. It also buys him more time with setting up his terror before you get down to the tension of a 2-life Masha when placing Order Markers.

Originally Posted by Pumpkin_King

"Oni" definitely conserves the theme, and probably seems more appropriate given the japanese nature of it.

Back when there was concern over Acolyte bonding, I know that Oni was one of the alternate species suggestions. I don't think that it works thematically, personally, largely because it clashes pretty heavily with the other foreign mythological Feylundian units. Sudema's an Undead, Khosumet's a Wolf, Gurei-Oni's an Ogre, etc.

Something thrown around behind the scenes that might work better was Akuma, which is essentially a Fire Demon. I still don't like how it doesn't fit the established styles, though, and if the Acolytes really aren't a problem here, then I'd rather just go with Demon.

Originally Posted by Scytale

I dunno. Adjusting points and/or stats does not address most of the points from the negative reviews. If superfrog's and wriggz's main concern is value for the cost, then yes, a simple adjustment is needed. If their main concern is order marker value, then that's an entirely different problem that a stat adjustment will not solve.

This is my main concern as well. Pretty much all of the directions that I've been considering were suggested in some capacity, but I'm concerned that they don't fundamentally address any of the criticisms here. Masha will still have heavy costs built in, hog OM1, die to range, and be terrifying to play against but difficult to play. Whether he can do his stuff slightly better and more consistently or not doesn't drastically change the unit.

[Astroking112]

I've been revising Masha Shingai for a bit now, and I'm nearing the point of a resubmission. Not much has changed since the last time that I posted him to Pre-SoV, but here's a quick list:

• Awakened Terror is now called Terror of the Honorless, to convey a better theme for excluding Samurai.
  
• Fiery Retribution is now Fiery Retribution 13. This is simply to make it easier to remember the roll cutoff.
  
• He has 6 move instead of 5.

Of these changes, 6 move is the big one. I've been testing Masha out with the post-submission buffs (letting him work with Tagawa Samurai Archers and increasing the range on his Retribution by 1 space), and I feel like he's still not quite making the impact necessary to gain traction.

The TSA are actually pretty bad with him still (at least until you add in Raelin), but it's a fun enough option that it doesn't terribly matter. They're certainly usable against melee, but they struggle even more offensively when there's a giant demon hoarding turns and denying them critical time to gain board control. Including them in Masha's synergy web is really just making his possible armies more flexible.

Fiery Retribution is now much easier to set up and get value out of, but it is also still pretty difficult to maintain. In a Unique build where you're devoting a third of your turns to Masha and probably juggling either Tomoe Gozen or Raelin in there, keeping your Samurai within his protection becomes a hefty task indeed. Considering how often Masha gets OM1, you really don't want him to just be sitting around to maintain a pod very often.

Still, I'm hesitant to buff Fiery Retribution further by increasing it to 3 spaces (mostly because there should be tension in how much he demands Order Markers), so I'm toying around with bumping up the move instead. This still eases the frustration of playing him quite a bit by letting each turn have more value, along with thematically matching how most of the Samurai are faster than average. At 6 move, he has more possibilities to choose from each turn, and developing the army along with him becomes ever so slightly more manageable.

Any thoughts or feedback are appreciated, especially from the judges who have played with him before. I'm still paranoid about making him too strong, so if the 6 move is setting off major warning flags, then let me know.

[NecroBlade]

Samurai are all fast, so 6 Move doesn't seem unreasonable.

[Astroking112]

Originally Posted by NecroBlade

Samurai are all fast, so 6 Move doesn't seem unreasonable.

I agree. I was initially eyeing 5 move to ensure that his options are limited (plus, the other Samurai heroes have 5 move as well), but it really stands out in hindsight in comparison to the Unique Squads. All of the "slower" Samurai were either ranged or Hatamoto Taro before Tomoe Gozen was released, so it feels pretty reasonable to have Masha be a little quicker. It's also much more fun to play with, too, given how often he demands turns.

[Astroking112]

DRAFT HORSES
Quick Mounts

Valkrill's Vengeance - Horses and Kyrie (2/2)



The figures used are the Draft Horse and Riding Horse from Pathfinder's Rusty Dragon Inn set, along with the Horse from Monster Menagerie 2: Adventurer's Campsite - Case Incentives. The Draft Horses are double-spaced figures.

CHARACTER BIO:

Spoiler Alert!

As the war slowly expands across all of Valhalla, Ullar has realized that his allies need faster ways to reach the battle. With the aid of these draft horses, more units can be carried directly to the frontlines!

CARD TEXT:

Spoiler Alert!

GENERAL = ULLAR
PLANET = FEYLUND
SPECIES = HORSES
UNIQUENESS = COMMON SQUAD
CLASS = MOUNTS
PERSONALITY = DISCIPLINED
SIZE/HEIGHT = LARGE 5

LIFE = 1 (3 figures)

MOVE = 7
RANGE = 1
ATTACK = 3
DEFENSE = 4
POINTS = 140

CARRY
Before moving a Draft Horse, choose an unengaged friendly small or medium figure adjacent to that Draft Horse. After moving that Draft Horse, you may place the chosen figure adjacent to it.

DESIGN NOTES:

Spoiler Alert!

These guys are a very basic and very dangerous design. I've toyed around with them at two squad members and various point totals, but there's just a certain appeal to the classic double-spaced three-member cavalry units that I couldn't resist.

These guys are intentionally priced very high because carrying three units allows for all sorts of shenanigans, especially since you can reposition several auras (and even those of your teammates!). The only other Common Squad this expensive is the Einar Imperium, which is... yikes. That said, the double-spaced squads have a history of being very expensive and generally not-good with a couple of exceptions, so it feels very fitting.

They're not very feasible in 500-point play, especially in multiples like most Common Squads, but I'm perfectly okay with that. I'd rather have some horses to carry the heroes around in those 700+ point games that take place on huge maps. They're intentionally designed around larger point totals and aren't really meant for competitive play (where I'm sure that the triple-carry would quickly be abused and broken).

-Combinations and Synergies-

Synergy Benefits Received

• ACOLARH : ULLAR'S AMULET
  As units that follow Ullar, Draft Horses may benefit from Acolarh's ULLAR'S AMULET movement bonus.

Synergy Benefits Offered

• SACRED BAND : DISCIPLINED ARMY DEFENSE BONUS
  Having a Disciplined personality, Draft Horses may aid the Sacred Band with their DISCIPLINED ARMY DEFENSE BONUS.

As always, any comments or feedback are appreciated.