2021 C3V Playtest Tournament (Congrats dok)

[Vydar_XLIII]

And just for fun; statistics for each playtest unit after Round 1.

[Sir Heroscape]

Originally Posted by Vydar_XLIII

And just for fun; statistics for each playtest unit after Round 1.

Thanks for this

Post it every round? seems like a useful way to look at it.

[Vydar_XLIII]

Originally Posted by Sir Heroscape

Thanks for this

Post it every round? seems like a useful way to look at it.

Sure, I'll do per round and cumulative.

[Knight of Scape]

Originally Posted by kevindola

The Knight of Scape (1-0) v. Sir Heroscape (1-0) pool of armies is:

* The Guild of 90ish Point Heroes (+Ninjas): Janos, C'Rik, Rygarn, Etiana, Wastewalker Gage, Byrikon the Hiveless, Isamu, Otonashi
* Skeletons in Space: Skeletons of Annellintia x3, Ataraxis the Starlich, Marcu Esenwein, Iskra Esenwein
* Come at me Bro: Goblin Slashers x5, Bugbear Basher x3, Ziggo
* Alien Abduction: Children of the Dark Star x4, Gräbermund, Raelin (RotV), Swaysil, Marcu Esenwein

Sir Heroscape chooses which army to play first or may defer. After armies are picked, Knight of Scape chooses who places first.

Happening tomorrow at 7 PM MDT.

~KoS, hoping that the undefeated record for Janos armies will continue.

[superfrog]

Map: Jabberwock (Valda, Wannok)

superfrog's army: Children x4, Z'Thoth, Grover
AgentWard's army: Slashers x3, Brigand x4, Caylus, Ziggo, Elaria, Arthur

AW opened with Brigand/Goblins/Goblins (Arthur grabbed Valda on that first turn). I went with Children/Grover/Children/X on Z'Thoth for 5 squad figure activations. I repeated that OM set for most of the game.

Very generally, I think I was losing the war of attrition for most of the game, but my army had more cohesion overall. The one piece that tied everything together was Ziggo, and he got Swallowed Whole decently early on (had one wound, G-man rolled 1/2, Ziggo on height rolled 1/4, d20 hits 19 for a swallow).

Grabermund tried several times to swallow Elaria but didn't have much luck. He had chances to swallow some Goblins but I decided that I didn't want to risk the Elaria vs. Children matchup if I didn't have to. He even burned through several spirits trying to get the d20 to cooperate, but to no avail.

When Grabermund went down the remaining matchup was 7 Dark Stars and Z'Thoth vs. 9 Slashers, 2 Brigands, 3-life Elaria, and 4-life Caylus. Dark Stars got quite a few kills at this point in the game against 0- and 1-defense Slashers and Brigands.

My last CotDS died to his own Wannok glyph (press F to pay respects), but Z'Thoth tanked his way through a 1-life Elaria and a 4-life Caylus (despite lots of enfeeblement) for the win. At the end of the game Z'Thoth had 4 life remaining.

PT Unit thoughts:
Grabermund was fine. Took a lot of fire, got a key swallow and a few other peripheral kills. Not a mindblowing performance but a solid one with only one good d20 roll. I don't have any suggested changes.

Ziggo's Taunt is wasted in this matchup and the fishbowl space suit doesn't protect against insta-death so RIP Ziggo. I definitely felt threatened by Ziggo and went out of my way to address that threat. I don't have any suggested changes.

Caylus was a solid endgame hero. Enfeeblement prevented lots of my Shatter Minds plans from coming to fruition. I think AW was rolling 1 extra attack die (probably a misread of Brutal Taskmaster), but he did do some damage to Z'Thoth in the relatively extended endgame. I think Caylus needs to come down to 4L or go up in points slightly, and I like his current point cost so I think 4L is the way to go.

[kevindola]

550 Points
Jabberwock (Valda, Wannok)
Kevindola: Acolytes x6, Corvor, Caylus, Marcu
Muskie: Ataraxis, Specters x4, Iskra, Rechets, Bol, Isamu, Marcu

Survivors: Covor (6 life), Marcu, Caylus (1 life), 5 Acolytes


Gameplay

Covor didn't come out until Round 6, so the first 5 rounds included an attempt by Muskie's Marcu to take Valda (beaten down by Acolytes before he use it), and a lot of setup of slow rolling acolytes vs. Specters. With Ataraxis and Iskra moving up.

I was ok trading specters for Acolytes in the early going and took my chances. I also used on order marker on Caylus in the third round which helped my setup and attack boosts and to take Wannok.

Muskie decided to go aggressive and leave Ataraxis' aura in order to try and knock out Caylus, but his 5 life held up and Caylus hung on with 1 life (although he did not receive another order marker). The acolytes went cold for a round only getting 1 kill in 9 attacks, some with height while Caylus was being attacked.

Finally in Round 5, Iskra summoned the rechets, but he kept two on the height on the hill and the other one was blocked by Caylus.

I won initiative and round 6 and it was huge. I summoned Corvor and between Avatar of Corruption and Acolyte attacks I knocked out the Rechets and got Corvor up on the height.

By that time the specters were really thinned out and I still had a lot of acolytes left. I was able to systematically eliminate the filler heroes and had the luxury of saving Ataraxis for last to prevent any Phylactery. gg Muskie!




Powers and Abilities

Ataraxis
-Terror Field: 5 times, really played into how and when I summoned Corvor though, as Corvor really wants the ability to disengage to maximize Avatar

-Phylactery - not used, killed as the last figure

-Wormhole - used once in the endgame to switch places with Iskra while engaged to Corvor


Caylus - received 1 OM, but drew a lot of fire

Enfeeble: Not used.
Moves boosted: 5
Attacks boosted: 4

Comments
Caylus
For 55 points, Caylus needs a life reduction to 4. I'm warming up to the idea of a possible ranged attack and attack reduction, but his single order marker was useful for getting good charges in with Acolytes

Ataraxis
-I was able to play around Phylactery this game pretty easily since I still had a healthy number of Acolytes left when the specters were eliminated, and in any of my games it hasn't been an issue with multiple respawns although I am sympathetic with those who have

-Wormhole, does feel like a little much to use and then move, especially with free disengage.

-Terror field. The lockdown is really problematic for a lot of large/huge figures I've seen, and I'm not sure I'm a fan. I'm wondering if large/huge should be immune, or certain personalities (like Demonic Terrifying Corvor). There were some concerns that the movement restriction part of this power wasn't that useful, and i think that's true against squads or small/medium heroes. But it has proved crippling potential against large/huge heroes and I'm not sure that's the intention.

[Knight of Scape]

550 Points
Jabberwock (Valda, Wannok)

Knight of Scape's Army: Janos, C'Rik, Rygarn, Etiana, Wastewalker Gage, Byrikon the Hiveless, Isamu, Otonashi
Sir Heroscape's Army: Skeletons of Annellintia x3, Ataraxis the Starlich, Marcu Esenwein, Iskra Esenwein

Survivors: Rygarn w/3 life, Janos w/2 Life, Etiana w/2 life, Byrikon w/2 life, Isamu


Battle Report:
Sir H placed first and put almost his whole army on the wound glyph side of the map, so I focused my army in that direction as well, leaving only Etiana to guard the move glyph. Since Sir H had Marcu and my army was mostly ranged, neither glyph was going to be very helpful for me, but they would both be quite useful for him, so I wanted to deny him access to them. Byrikon chose Janos as his hive link, and my usual OM placement for the whole game was OM 1 on Janos, OM 2 on Byrikon, moved to Janos with Chrono Key, OM3 on Etiana, OM X on Byrikon. This would allow me to get +6 to initiative while getting 2 expedition turns and 1 support fire turn every round. Since my army outranged Sir H's, and there was height available within 6 spaces of the start zone, I was able to keep Janos in Chrono Key range by just putting Rygarn at the front of my start zone and never moving him.

In the first round, Janos, C'Rik, Wastewalker Gage, and Byrikon moved up onto the height near my startzone on the Wannok side, while Etiana climbed up on the Valda side. Meanwhile Sir H led out with Ataraxis, placing her on a shadow space next to jungle so that she'd be hard to shoot down, while also setting up her terror field to cover much of the height that I'd like to claim with my heroes. He was then able to leave her there without an OM for most of the game, letting her terror field do work passively, while she repeatedly respawned skeletons within striking distance of my heroes.

Over the next several rounds, the explorer mercs gradually wore down the skeletons, despite decent necromany rolls. Wastewalker Gage was the first hero to fall, but he took out several skeletons with his chainsaw before crumpling. C'Rik had a couple turns where he was able to kill two skeletons with his quadruple attack, and his holographic projector was working in overdrive to keep him and Janos safe. Projector got Janos out of a tight spot where he was tied down by skeletons and their terror field (the fact that it doesn't cause LEAs, and therefore gets around terror field was quite convenient), and saved C'Rik from some attacks that would almost certainly have been lethal otherwise.

Sir H was able to control Valda for a single turn before Etiana blasted down the skeleton holding it (forgoing support fire to do so, since she the requirement to attack figures engaged to my heroes would have prevented me from going after him), and he was able to hold Wannok twice, killing Otonashi and putting a wound on Rygarn.

The last few skeletons were able to take out C'Rik after his holographic projector finally failed him. Eventually, the skeletons on the field ran out, although there were still five left sitting on Ataraxis's card. My heroes closed in on Ataraxis, killing the skeletons as she revived them one by one, and then taking her out. Unfortunately for Sir H, Ataraxis fell at the start of a round, causing him to lose several OMs, and there were still 3 skeletons sitting uselessly on her card. She nanobotted over to Iskara, so I used my free turns to take out Marcu, ensuring she wouldn't get to nanobot a second time. The remaining heroes finished off Iskara and Ataraxis in short order.


Powers and Abilities:
Ataraxis: Terror field affected 14 defense rolls, leading to quite a few extra wounds on my heroes. It also gave Sir H the ability to lock Janos down with a single skeleton, forcing me to be more careful with his placement, and at least once it prevented me from projectoring C'Rik to a position where he would have been able to attack 3 skeletons next turn, because Sir H could have been able to use his Undead Legion move to tie C'Rik down, forcing him to just attack a single skeleton.

Nanobot Phylactery was used once, but by then it was too late for the second life to really do anything, since the skeletons were all dead and I had my heroes in position to kill Ataraxis as soon as she respawned, before she could summon any more.

Overall terror field definitely enhanced the power of the skeletons and made me think more carefully about my positioning, but didn't feel overpowering.

Janos: Double expedition once again proved incredibly powerful. Not only is getting 3 hero turns for the price of one amazing, having the flexibility to pick which two non-Janos heroes to activate each turn is really useful. My melee heroes (C'Rik and Wastewalker) were able to lie in wait near Janos, ready to spring into action as soon as there was an option for them to attack multiple skeletons, while I could just attack at range with Byrikon and Etiana if such an opportunity didn't appear. Janos's special attack was also very useful for improving his reliability (it never killed 2 skeletons but there were several times where the attack of 3 failed to kill but the attack of 4 succeeded). He used the special every turn except for the first one when only his normal attack had the range to be able to attack anyone.

C'Rik: He succeeded on 4/12 holographic projector rolls overall, but he succeeded on 4/6 in the first couple of rounds, including a time where he was able to teleport Janos out of engagement with 3 skeletons, wasting several of their attacks. With good die rolls, projector provides a huge survivability boost, and with his quadruple attack his offensive potential is also quite strong against melee squads like the skeletons, where it's generally not to hard to engage multiple figures. He was definitely a key figure to this victory.

Byrikon: His Hive Mind Integration swung 2 initiative rolls, which was definitely helpful. In this army the +6 init is basically free. OM 1 wants to go on Janos anyway, OM2 is getting chrono-keyed, so it can go on Byrikon for free, and OM X doesn't matter, so it might as well go on Byrikon as well. (my OMs were predictable, but to me it was the clear best option, so there wasn't much point in trying to be sneaky). Other than that, his additional ranged attack was useful as an option for Janos to activate, and there were several times later in the game where he ran into melee to set up support fire attacks for Etiana after Wastewalker Gage went down. He seemed to provide very solid value for his points in this army.

Etiana: Acrobatics saved her from one wound, but she wasn't attacked very much this game. Her 9 range allowed her to deploy to the Valda side of the map while still being able to attack skeletons over on the Wannok side. Support fire was used almost every round to take turns with Gage or Byrikon while still shooting with Etiana. After the first round the requirements to not move and to only target figures engaged to my heroes were not that big a deal (since my whole army was heroes and my opponent's army was mostly melee).


Any additional comments (theme, balance, fun factor with and against)?
I continue to enjoy playing the merc explorers. They have a high offensive output and offer interesting choices. Playing against Ataraxis and skelles didn't feel too different from playing against any other melee squad with a cheerleader.

[Sir Heroscape]

KoS did a great job summarizing the battle report, so just quoting him on that front...

Jabberwock (Valda, Wannok)

Knight of Scape's Army: Janos, C'Rik, Rygarn, Etiana, Wastewalker Gage, Byrikon the Hiveless, Isamu, Otonashi
Sir Heroscape's Army: Skeletons of Annellintia x3, Ataraxis the Starlich, Marcu Esenwein, Iskra Esenwein

Survivors: Rygarn w/3 life, Janos w/2 Life, Etiana w/2 life, Byrikon w/2 life, Isamu

Originally Posted by Knight of Scape

Battle Report:
Sir H placed first and put almost his whole army on the wound glyph side of the map, so I focused my army in that direction as well, leaving only Etiana to guard the move glyph. Since Sir H had Marcu and my army was mostly ranged, neither glyph was going to be very helpful for me, but they would both be quite useful for him, so I wanted to deny him access to them. Byrikon chose Janos as his hive link, and my usual OM placement for the whole game was OM 1 on Janos, OM 2 on Byrikon, moved to Janos with Chrono Key, OM3 on Etiana, OM X on Byrikon. This would allow me to get +6 to initiative while getting 2 expedition turns and 1 support fire turn every round. Since my army outranged Sir H's, and there was height available within 6 spaces of the start zone, I was able to keep Janos in Chrono Key range by just putting Rygarn at the front of my start zone and never moving him.

In the first round, Janos, C'Rik, Wastewalker Gage, and Byrikon moved up onto the height near my startzone on the Wannok side, while Etiana climbed up on the Valda side. Meanwhile Sir H led out with Ataraxis, placing her on a shadow space next to jungle so that she'd be hard to shoot down, while also setting up her terror field to cover much of the height that I'd like to claim with my heroes. He was then able to leave her there without an OM for most of the game, letting her terror field do work passively, while she repeatedly respawned skeletons within striking distance of my heroes.

Over the next several rounds, the explorer mercs gradually wore down the skeletons, despite decent necromany rolls. Wastewalker Gage was the first hero to fall, but he took out several skeletons with his chainsaw before crumpling. C'Rik had a couple turns where he was able to kill two skeletons with his quadruple attack, and his holographic projector was working in overdrive to keep him and Janos safe. Projector got Janos out of a tight spot where he was tied down by skeletons and their terror field (the fact that it doesn't cause LEAs, and therefore gets around terror field was quite convenient), and saved C'Rik from some attacks that would almost certainly have been lethal otherwise.

Sir H was able to control Valda for a single turn before Etiana blasted down the skeleton holding it (forgoing support fire to do so, since she the requirement to attack figures engaged to my heroes would have prevented me from going after him), and he was able to hold Wannok twice, killing Otonashi and putting a wound on Rygarn.

The last few skeletons were able to take out C'Rik after his holographic projector finally failed him. Eventually, the skeletons on the field ran out, although there were still five left sitting on Ataraxis's card. My heroes closed in on Ataraxis, killing the skeletons as she revived them one by one, and then taking her out. Unfortunately for Sir H, Ataraxis fell at the start of a round, causing him to lose several OMs, and there were still 3 skeletons sitting uselessly on her card. She nanobotted over to Iskara, so I used my free turns to take out Marcu, ensuring she wouldn't get to nanobot a second time. The remaining heroes finished off Iskara and Ataraxis in short order.

Performance:
Terror Field - wounded on 7/14 attacks
assisted in wound to:
2W Cage
4W CRik
3W Janos
1W Byrikron

Dealt Damage Directly:
1W Janos

Nanobot X1 (onto Iskra in the endgame)


Thoughts:
Necrotizing Wormhole never came into play, but I can see how it might be used to "jump out" of a bad situation, but I never felt like it was going to be a useful ability this game.

Terror Field was definitely useful for the Skeles when they were attacking, but I'm still unconvinced on the 2nd clause of that power. It's useful in that you can "gaurentee" engagements, but I've always felt like it's tacked on and extra and really doesn't offer that much. I prefer simplicity and I've always felt that 2nd clause is unnecessary.

Nanobot I have mixed feeling about. It definitely encourages bringing at least 2 filler heroes just get the revive...I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not yet...but it's worth noting. Additionally, I realized at the end of this game that KoS could have won this game in a very "unfun" fashion if he'd wanted to. I'll explain: During the round where I had just Iskra left I put OM1 on her and OM2 and OM3 on Ataraxis expecting Iskra to die and for me to get 2 turns. Rather than Killing Iskra, KoS could have just not taken his turns, let me lose my turns on Ataraxis (because she wouldn't have come back yet) and just take Wannok and kill Iskra that way to win the game and deny me getting Ataraxis back. While that didn't happen, the fact that that's possible, is a no-no for me. I don't understand the gameplay or thematic reason for limiting Nanobot to activate only on attacks or LEAs. I think it should activate whenever the hero is destroyed in order to avoid a potentially un-fun scenario like I pointed out.

I hate to be on the poo-poo party, but I also felt mixed feelings about Ataraxis being the first Lich figure we have for the undead/skeletons who've always wanted a proper Lich figure, and it being a space Lich. I'm sure I'll come around, but I feel like it's going to be hard to design or create a more "traditional" fantasy Lich after Ataraxis because she already fills that role. But that's more personal preference than anything.

[BodaciousBlood]

Dysole and I will be playing this evening at approximately 8:15 pm MT.

I have the Mohicans/Kolbjorn army. Dysole has my Ataraxis/Cyprien army.

[Vydar_XLIII]

Knight of Light and I will be playing tomorrow evening 7:00pm Eastern/4:00pm Pacific.

I'm playing Have you ever heard the wolf cry to the Kolbjorn moon?: Mohican River Tribe x3, Teeth of the Makwa x 3, Brave Arrow, Kolbjorn.

KoL is playing Marcus Decimus Antus: Red Ants of Aunstrum x4, Kaemon Awa, Amberhive Queen, Marcus Decimus Gallus, Gen. Simon Fraser, Marcu Esenwein.



Vegie and my GF are playing some time Monday evening, time TBD.

Vegie is playing Why do the stars take so long to die?: Zombies x4, Zombie Hulk x2, Ataraxis the Star Lich, Marcu, Isamu.

Bre is playing Expeditious: Greenscales Warriors x2, Maekor, Bambina, Janos, Rygarn

[BodaciousBlood]

550 Points
Jabberwock (Valda, Wannok)
BodaciousBlood: Mohicans x3, Teeth of Makwa x3, Kolbjorn, Brave Arrow
Dysole: Ataraxis, Skeletons x2, Cyprien, Isamu, Marcu

Survivors: 4 Teeth of Makwa, 1 Mohican, Full life Kolbjorn


Thoughts: 

This game was fun. Unfortunately for the purposes of this tournament, Ataraxis and Kolbjorn were relative non-factors in this game. At the end of it all, I still say that Kolbjorn is a perfect match for the Mohicans simply because of his ranged attack. The rest of his abilities are kind of niche. Cool when you need them, not cool when you don’t. I really like the design a lot. 
I will say, Call to the Hunt seems like it is more effective with a Hunter hero than the hunter squads. I didn’t use it in either game, but I feel much more likely to use it with Kevindola’s Van Nessing than Dysole’s Teeth. I will state that taking a turn with Mohicans, using War Cry to take a turn with Kolbjorn, THEN to move 6 Teeth of Makwa with Hunting Party on the same OM was really quite fun.

Kolbjorn attacked 3 times, killing only a single skeleton. I opted to not use his Fearsome Stalker ability this game. I did not use Giant Slayer. I did not use Call to the Hunt. I only activated Kolbjorn with War Cry.

Ataraxis was kind of out before the game got going as well. She quickly took two wounds in the first round and then the 6-range Mohicans stayed out of her Terror radius. I wasn’t too worried about her. She was eventually finished off by the Mohicans and was placed on Kolbjorn rather than her ally, Cyprien. This forced me to want to be very defensive with Kolbjorn. I did not want to allow Cyprien an optimal position on Kolbjorn and podded my Teeth of Makwa around him. This slowed my offensive push a bit. Cool tactic there from Dysole. 

I like her with the Skeltons a lot! Having a hero that actually benefits the skeletons AND is typically closer to the fight when they reanimate. Great utility there, getting the skeletons back into the action right away. 



[KnightOfLight]

Had a fun game with Vydar last night. I was playing my "Marcus Decimus Antus" army, he was using his "Have you ever head the wolf cry to the Kolbjorn Moon?" army. The first round I opted to send out Kaemon and some ants while Vydar pushed forwards with the river tribe. Vydar scored a nice two wounds on Kaemon with his third attack on turn two, but did not score too many wounds elsewhere. After the first round, I put only one order marker on Kaemon as I felt moving ants into position was better then two attacks of four. Kaemon held off lots of attacks from the river tribe as well as Brave Arrow who bravely (pun intended) charged up the Valda side hill to engage and hopefully take out Kaemon. Rounds 2 and 3 were essentially a war of attrition where we both ran our ants and mohicans into engagement trying to proc war cry and cutting mandibles. We traded casualties, but the sheer number of ants was giving me the edge. Disaster struck Vydar as he rolled very poorly in offence and defense in round four. This led to a lot of the well developed makwa to be taken out with the ants before really getting to activate them. By the end of round four, he was left with just one life on both Kolbjorn and Brave Arrow. He conceded the match there. Due mainly to poor rolling for Vydar, (38% of skulls) I pulled out the win. I had 5 ants remaining, one life left on Kaemon, four lives left on Marcu, full life Amberhive Queen, full life Marcus, and a full life Gen Simon. Vydar played really well in my opinion, he used war cry exceptionally well, only making a risky move when he was losing. Unfortunately, the play testing units were....well, not used. Essentially, my Amberhive Queen sat in the start zone and did nothing, while Kolbjorn activated his fearsome stalker ability 3-4 times. Kolbjorn attacked 4-5 times, all through war cry, but I believed he killed only 1-2 ants. Here are my thought on the play testing units for this game.

Amberhive Queen:
Although she did nothing this game, that was mainly due to my choice to lead Kaemon rather then her. If I had been aware that one space of shadow gives two spaced figures defense boosts, I might have brought her out turn one, but I was convinced that was not the case. Regardless, Kaemon was a stud this game. Throughout the middle of the game I never wanted to use an order marker on the queen to bring her up as I was worried that the river tribe would kill all of my developed ants, putting me in a bad situation. I'm still wanting to see what the queen is capable, but time will tell.

Kolbjorn:
He seems like a fantastic hero for the river tribe. A ranged bonder that can move between rounds, and has potent offense against large and huge figures? Sign me up! I really like his design and feel. He felt good, not to strong, not to weak. I am a little intrigued by the call to the hunt ability, as it does not come into play really. It seems like it could be really good, and I feel it would come in handy with a more hero-centric build, but with the two native american squads, it does not come into play that I have seen.