Boot Camp of Valhalla Draft Voting

[flameslayer93]

Voted for Scytale and Astro’s version. I like Scytale’s simple Dupuis-remake and the variois ways you can use her (including with Crypt Guardians!)., but I’m still keen to the idea of an Elven Warlord to further flesh out Ullar’s overall faction. I will note that I mistook Lazy’s design as a queen, rather than warlord.

For the others...
Kolakoski’s version:
I really don’t like the special attack or any idea of an ice spear. This is all personal opinion though, so don’t think of it as my judging the mechanics. Otherwise the unit looks fine.

Lazy Orang’s version:
Trained to Perfection is somewhat offputting to me, but I did mistake her for a Queen rather than a Warlord. Had I not already voted I would be more than happy to revisit my votes choice, even though I might keep them.

Tornado’s version:
This version is very similar to Astro’s and only lost out my vote because I felt a Warlord would be cooler. I 100% back up the use of a Snow Power. And, I really dug Scytale’s simplicity. It was a close one, man.

All Your Pie’s version:
This one just didn’t do it for me. Again, the mechanics are solid and I can see them being fun. But just didn’t do it for me. Others are more than welcome to disagree.

I look forward to testing any version though! Get those votes in people!

[Lazy Orang]

Honestly, Trained to Perfection is the least important part of mine. It could easily be replaced with another attack power or dropped in favour of an attack boost.

Sadly, I don't have time right now to give this vote the thought I'd want to (plus, honestly, I'm not really part of this group in the same way others are, I just throw my thoughts in from time to time ).

[All Your Pie]

Originally Posted by superfrog

Whatever turns out here, I hope we can all adopt the winning design as "our design" rather than whoever's name is in front of it right now.

This is certainly worth keeping in mind--this poll is not being held to decide what ideas to keep and which to throw away, but rather which ideas are most supported by the community and can be used as a template going forward. In that vein, every placement matters in this poll, as the ideas of even second or third place drafts in the votes should be things that we bring up going forward.

That being said, first place should contain the most popular core ideas. Some concerns were recently brought up in the discord, however, that the spread of drafts present represents similar core ideas on several different options, potentially placing certain ideas at an advantage for having had only one submission advocating them. To minimize this effect, a continuation of this poll with only two options--the first and second place drafts--was proposed.

Personally, I'm strongly averse to changing the stated rules after what I suspect is a good majority of the total voters we will get have already made their decision. Still, as the rules change would not affect this poll's results, I believe it is workable, and might be beneficial. Additionally, this is a community project with no deep-seated structure, so a small adjustment to the process in order to refine it is worth considering--after all, the only reason the poll is being run the way it has been is because of decisions we made a little over a week ago.

So, at risk of running another poll inside this one (which I want to be clear is NOT what is happening), I'm curious to hear the community's thoughts on this. If you were part of the initial discussion on discord, please feel free to chime in here as well to clarify anything I may not have fully explained.

[Tornado]

So you are discussing this on another server? That sounds anti-collaborative.
Is there some reason the design cannot be solely discussed here?

[All Your Pie]

Originally Posted by Tornado

So you are discussing this on another server? That sounds anti-collaborative.
Is there some reason the design cannot be solely discussed here?

The conversation was brought up by others who are mainly active on the server, rather than on the main site. For my part, I consider the discord to be a companion to the forums rather than a competitor or separate entity.

Still, now that I have raised the issue I do agree that the server folks who brought it up to me should chime in here. If not, it's hard to give their concerns much weight.

[Pumpkin_King]

I do apologize if discussing it outside this thread seems anti-collaborative. Like AYP said, it was brought up in the server and we were just discussing it, especially since this was my first time seeing the progress that had been made since the last time I looked, which was the very first thread.

I'll repeat what I said there - that some of the designs are similar enough that the vote might be being thrown off a bit, and that a second poll with the options narrowed/certain ideas combined might help. Take that with a grain of salt, since, as I mentioned, I haven't been a part of this process so far.

[Astroking112]

Originally Posted by All Your Pie

This is certainly worth keeping in mind--this poll is not being held to decide what ideas to keep and which to throw away, but rather which ideas are most supported by the community and can be used as a template going forward. In that vein, every placement matters in this poll, as the ideas of even second or third place drafts in the votes should be things that we bring up going forward.

I agree. I was treating all of these submissions as drafts that would be further refined by the community after this poll. Despite me not being fond of Trained to Perfection, for example, I still really liked Lazy Orang's submission and thought it was worthy of a vote.

Originally Posted by All Your Pie

That being said, first place should contain the most popular core ideas. Some concerns were recently brought up in the discord, however, that the spread of drafts present represents similar core ideas on several different options, potentially placing certain ideas at an advantage for having had only one submission advocating them. To minimize this effect, a continuation of this poll with only two options--the first and second place drafts--was proposed.

Personally, I'm strongly averse to changing the stated rules after what I suspect is a good majority of the total voters we will get have already made their decision. Still, as the rules change would not affect this poll's results, I believe it is workable, and might be beneficial. Additionally, this is a community project with no deep-seated structure, so a small adjustment to the process in order to refine it is worth considering--after all, the only reason the poll is being run the way it has been is because of decisions we made a little over a week ago.

So, at risk of running another poll inside this one (which I want to be clear is NOT what is happening), I'm curious to hear the community's thoughts on this. If you were part of the initial discussion on discord, please feel free to chime in here as well to clarify anything I may not have fully explained.

It's pretty reasonable to say that mine and Tornado's drafts have a fair degree of overlap that could split the vote for that direction a little bit, but there's no clear way to quantify any impact that it might've had. We can't really tell if someone voted for both entries, or if they would've still voted for the other one if their choice wasn't there in the first place. If only one was there, it's not like it would've gotten the combined total of the votes by any stretch of the imagination.

On top of that, it's not like our entries are the same, either. The Warlord/non-bonding class schism is pretty big, and I think that each design is distinctly different despite sharing most of the powers. The two designs are probably the most similar amongst the voting options, but they aren't the same, and I think that they're equally worth consideration.

Could things have been different if I didn't submit my draft? Sure. I'm sure that there was at least some overlap. Is it worth changing the plan or making a big fuss over it? I'm not convinced so. If the support for those ideas is stronger than the support for other ones, then I'd imagine we'd see it during continued development anyway.

Originally Posted by Tornado

So you are discussing this on another server? That sounds anti-collaborative.
Is there some reason the design cannot be solely discussed here?

I believe that the Discord server is open, but I agree that discussion around this unit should be centered in its own threads so that everyone engaged can easily participate.

I didn't follow the discussion in the Discord too heavily, so perhaps I'm mistaken, but I think that any discussion there was mostly around the poll itself rather than the drafts.

[Pumpkin_King]

Originally Posted by Astroking112

I didn't follow the discussion in the Discord too heavily, so perhaps I'm mistaken, but I think that any discussion there was mostly around the poll itself rather than the drafts.

Correct on both accounts. There's a link in my signature, and the discussion was mostly about the poll itself.

[kolakoski]

Well met!

On the leadership side, there appears to be a consensus in favor of Ullar’s Battle Dance or something similar. On the fighter side, consensus is not so clear to me.

I’m guessing basic stats will be 7-8 Move, 5 Life, 4-5 Attack, 4-5 Defense, and little if any special combat powers, but perhaps we could have a discussion about this side.

[Lazy Orang]

Voted

[Scytale]

Originally Posted by kolakoski

On the leadership side, there appears to be a consensus in favor of Ullar’s Battle Dance or something similar.

C3V tried to do a power similar to Ullar's Battle Dance, and we in Editing couldn't get it to work. Too many problems with too many special attacks. It would have to be limited to normal attacks only.

[Astroking112]

Originally Posted by Scytale

C3V tried to do a power similar to Ullar's Battle Dance, and we in Editing couldn't get it to work. Too many problems with too many special attacks. It would have to be limited to normal attacks only.

Do you mind sharing what kinds of Special Attacks cause issues? I believe you that some might, but I'm having trouble thinking of them if it only triggers after rolling defense dice and only allows movement, like Isamu's Vanish.