The Book of Beetle

[Splash]

Splash's THOUGHTS:
First game saw heavy losses on my side, with a strong win for the Sinister Six, MVP was probably Freeze for blocking a lot of my movement, which hurt since I had no bonding. Beetle performed solidly and was probably a close second. Flying gives him easy access to height and his Power Armor ability gives him an auto-skull, paired with a boost from Ock or Waller means his attack is something to worry about. His defense feels solid as well, I really think he's in a good spot. I don't know why I even brought up Stealth Flying earlier, cause you can basically move him around wherever with his SA most of the time anyway. Another tough decision the first game was how much you should go after him, I had decided to save him for last since he has two powers with negative parts, especially the initiative, but since I could hardly sink any of the Six, he kept giving out great initiative rolls. Second game he did pretty good too, really I would have lost if Waller hadn't of killed him, cause he had height and Joker and Harley just weren't getting through his defense while Wizard was shooting at them.

I really like this Beetle, he provides a lot of utility and I think he'll see a lot of play when he releases (from me anyway XD)
I'd also definitely recommend a game with Kingpin II, if he does well there or continues to in general I'd suggest a bump to 190

edit: Right now I'm really thinking he's worth 190, he did real good these two, won Ronin's games, and still dealt some wounds in Skinderella's games despite losing those. I might suggest either bumping to 190 or bumping attack from 3 to 4 and dropping the auto-skull as Ronin suggested and staying at 180. I thought it seemed fun deciding between his SA and the auto-skull normal attack, but what amounts to essentially 7 attack dice under good conditions essentially leads to me not having a strong preference.

[Splash]

I will also echo Skinderella and Yodaking about the Faulty Targeting, it's a good thing toy played those armies, cause I had forgotten about it affecting his SA the whole time until we were done with both games.

So my final thought here is I would highly recommend either:
Remove the auto skull and bump attack to 4 and 180 cost
OR
specify normal attack so that Faulty Targeting is like the ranged normal attack power at 190 cost.

[japes]

Originally Posted by Splash

Splash's THOUGHTS:
Right now I'm really thinking he's worth 190, he did real good these two, won Ronin's games, and still dealt some wounds in Skinderella's games despite losing those. I might suggest either bumping to 190 or bumping attack from 3 to 4 and dropping the auto-skull as Ronin suggested and staying at 180. I thought it seemed fun deciding between his SA and the auto-skull normal attack, but what amounts to essentially 7 attack dice under good conditions essentially leads to me not having a strong preference.

See this is the part I thought would be interesting. MACH-I to me seems like you use the SA to move up the teammates until you don't have a choice but to use his normal attack. Beetle having a choice made him more interesting with the slight risk in there.

As to the confusion on the risk...would reordering the wording like such help..

POWER ARMOR: FAULTY TARGETING
Any time Beetle attacks a non-adjacent figure, if you roll more shields than skulls, your opponent must choose another adjacent figure to the defending figure and you must roll an unblockable attack die against that figure. When attacking a non-adjacent figure with his normal attack Add 1 automatic skull to whatever is rolled.

[Splash]

Works for me!
Question: does the auto-skull count towards the skulls rolled? If so, it adds another layer of strategy too, as youd want to use the normal when you have friendlies adjacent, but the SA if you're going after a pod.

[Ronin]

Originally Posted by Splash

Works for me!
Question: does the auto-skull count towards the skulls rolled?

Nope, never does in C3G.

[Kid Arachnid]

I'm not attached to 180 points, just as long as he is below 190. I will play a few test games with different options.

[Kid Arachnid]

C3G STANDARD PLAYTEST FEEDBACK FORM
NAME OF THE PLAYTEST UNIT: Beetle
VERSION TESTED

Spoiler Alert!

NAME = BEETLE
SECRET IDENTITY = ABNER JENKINS

SPECIES = HUMAN
UNIQUENESS = UNIQUE HERO
CLASS = CRIMINAL
PERSONALITY = OPPORTUNISTIC

SIZE/HEIGHT = MEDIUM 5

LIFE= 4
MOVE= 5
RANGE= 5
ATTACK= 3
DEFENSE= 5

POINTS= ~180

SINISTER SYNDICATE
When rolling for initiative, add 1 to your roll for each Assassin, Criminal, or Thief Unique Hero you control and subtract 1 from your roll for each Unique Hero you controlled at the start of the game that you do not currently control.

DIVERSIONARY FIRE SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 5. Attack 3.
Immediately after rolling attack dice for this special attack against an opponent's figure, if Beetle rolls at least one skull, you may move Beetle or another figure you control within 5 spaces of Beetle up to 2 spaces. Figures moved by this special attack never take leaving engagement attacks from the defending figure. After attacking with this special attack, Beetle may attack 1 additional time.

POWER ARMOR: FAULTY TARGETING
Add 1 automatic skull to whatever is rolled when Beetle attacks a non-adjacent figure with his normal attack. Any time Beetle attacks a non-adjacent figure, if you roll more shields than skulls, your opponent must choose another adjacent figure to the defending figure and you must roll an unblockable attack die against that figure.

SUPER STRENGTH

FLYING

Army Test
Map: Dad's custom Icy road but with Swamp and rock
Units: SINISTER SYNDICATE (1000) - Doc Oc, Beetle (185), Electro, Rhino, Sand Man
vs Fantastic 4 (1000)

Spoiler Alert!

Round one: F4 won initiative
Beetle used diversionary fire and moved doc oc out of sight

Round two: SS won, via beetle’s sinister syndicate
Human Torch wounds doc oc for 1 wound
Rhino charges Mr. F and deals 3 wounds

Round 3: F4
Thing Clobbers rhino for 4 wounds
Everyone tries to beat up rhino… Mr F deals three, Rhino whiffs and rolls none
Rhino dead

Round 4: F4
Thing deals four wounds to sandman
Doc oc deals four 4 wounds on human torch… The thing is very angry
Sandman deals 3 wounds on Thing
Beetle deals 1 to Mr. F

Round 5: F4
Thing pulverized Sand Man
Johnny Supernovas and rolls all skulls and one-shots Doc Oc who rolled only one shield out of his six dice
Electro electric skins Thing
Thing one-shots Electro
Thing one-shots Beetle… is it too late to nerf Thing???

Unit Summary: I like the way Beetle works especially with Doc Oc... a not really an even match because of a lot of lucky and unlucky dice rolls. I feel 185-190 works great for him.
[/LIST] Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Mr. Fantatic (1 Life Left, Human Torch (1), Thing (2), IW (4)

___________________________________________________________

Army Test
Map: Same as first
Units: Sinister Six: DOC OC, BEETLE (185), WIZARD, SANDMAN, ELECTRO, VULTURE (1010) vs TITANS: NIGHTWING, STARFIRE, RAVEN, IMPULSE, BLUE BEETLE (1010)

Spoiler Alert!

BATTLE REPORT SUMMARY

Unit Summary: ROUND 1: SINISTER 6
Just a bunch of moving

ROUND 2: Sinister 6 via beetle
Impulse wounds Doc Oc for 2and wounds himself
Vulture grabs impulse sets hum next to electro, doesn’t wound him
Impulse wounds Doc Oc for 1
Blue Beetle wounds Sandman
Blue Beetle rolls a 1 and wounds Starfire

Round 3: SS rolls a 2, + 5=7 wins initiative
Doc Oc wounds Impulse for 1
Sandman rounds Blue Beetle for 2
Starfire wounds Sandman for 2
Beetle wounds Blue Beetle for 2 with DF
Blue Beetle rolls two skulls… Sandman rolls six friggin skulls (all skulls btw)

Round 4: Titans
Starfire kills vulture in two shots
Starfire gives Wizard two wounds
Raven soul selfs electro
Beetle wounds Starfire for three!!
Impulse attacks Beetle and Impulse received two wounds then Impulse attacks again and dies to Beetle. Impulse was too Impulsive
Electro leaves engament… takes no wounds, electrostatic shock special attacks Starfire and Nightwing and Nightwing takes three wounds
Starfire attacks Electro, it takes three attacks for her to kill him
Beetle SP Attack and moves Doc Oc adjacent to Starfire
Doc Oc rolls five skulls and Starfire dies
Wizard kills Blue Beetle

Round 5: Titans
Doc Oc kills Nightwing
Raven kills Doc Oc… everyone has no more turns

Round 6: Titans
Raven wounds Beetle for 2
Beetle SP Attacks Raven for 1, does it again
Raven soul selfs Wizard ending the round

Round 7: Sinister six (more like Sinister One)
Raven wounds Beetle
Raven soul selfs Beetle, killing him

• Damage Done (Normal Attack): Inflicted (3-Starfire) wounds on (unit A (x), unit B (x))
• POWER 1: Sinister Syndicate turned initiative three times.
• POWER 2: Diversionary Fire SP, four wounds total- blue beetle2, raven 2.
• POWER 3: Power Armour: Did not fail me.

Who won? List figures remaining in the winning army (include life remaining for heroes): Raven with four life left.

___________________________________________________________

THOUGHTS ON THE TESTED UNIT'S COST, BALANCE, & DRAFTABILITY: I believe he should be 180, he got destroyed in the first game.


GENERAL THOUGHTS ON THE TESTED UNIT: I like all the powers, he is fun to play. I really like how he works with the Sinister 6 and with Wizard for the amount of movement as a whole.

japes notes:
Though the wound count looks lopsided a bit it really came down to a couple of bad breaks for the S6. He very cleverly got Doc Oc on Human Torch and was set up to use Beetle's SA the next OM to Leave Engagement and grab Sue. Only Johnny took him out before he had the chance and all the OM were of course on him.
The other bad break was Sandman not managing to get the last wound on Mr. F and having to face down a fully powered up double attack from Thing. This didn't end well for Sandman.
I don't think I've ever rolled this well with the F4 in my life. I rolled 20s twice in key times including the round where Doc Oc went down. So it was pretty much clean up with no resistance and Think was rolling hot for attack.
Mr. Fantastic took three wounds right off the bat and then hung around the rest of the game...which ended up being great for Thing.

[IAmBatman]

Please use the official playtest formatting for these.

[japes]

Originally Posted by IAmBatman

Please use the official playtest formatting for these.

He will when he gets the second test typed up. He just didn't want to lose what he typed up so I guess he pasted it here.

[IAmBatman]

[japes]

Tests are posted. The last game looked closer than it probably was. Starfire and Nightwing essentially got one shot towards the end and that made it a lot closer. S6 with Doc Oc and Wizards move bonus along with Beetles Diversion attack made this a very fast and swarmy army. I had two slow play the Titans more than I wanted to keep the trio safe for when I was ready. KA eventually broke through and then used his SA on Starfire so Doc Oc and Electro could get free from Raven and get to Starfire. Electro hit Starfire and NW with his SA and SF blocked it all but NW wiffed and took three wounds. Raven never got a chance to soak any of the wounds from SF because SF was taken out shortly after.

That was a fun one for sure. I had him on the ropes for most of the second half but he started chipping away. BB and Impulse and Starfire with their multiple attacks really did some damage. Unfortunately Impule hurt himself a lot as well and BB went rogue once and hit Star. But I played ultra aggressive with BB and Impulse.

[Kid Arachnid]

Beetle went 4-6 total, so I feel 180 is good. I would prefer 175 for army building but 180 is probably right. I propose we move on to the Final Edit