[Pod 2] Katryn Vade (Nahiri, Fury in Stone) - Design

[Captain Stupendous]

The Book of Katryn Vade

Designers: @Zetsubo @Alexandros @Skinderella @NecroBlade @Astroking112

Pod Leaders: @flameslayer93 @Captain Stupendous

Arena of the Valkyrie Master Set



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Katryn Vade
Icarian
Unique Hero
Champion
Devout
Medium 5

LIFE 5
MOVE 5 / BASIC
RANGE 1 / BASIC
ATTACK 5 / BASIC
DEFENSE 3 / BASIC

110 POINTS

DRAGONHEART BLADE SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 1. Attack 3.
Choose a figure to attack. Any figures adjacent to the chosen figure are also affected by Dragonheart Blade Special Attack. Squad figures roll 1 less defense die against Dragonheart Blade Special Attack. Roll attack dice once for all affected figures. Each figure rolls defense dice separately. Katryn Vade cannot be affected by her own Dragonheart Blade Special Attack.

ASPECT OF THE DRAGON
After revealing an Order Marker on an Army Card you control and before taking a turn, you may either place or remove the Aspect Marker on this card. While the Aspect marker is on this card, Katryn Vade's size is Huge.

The figure used for this unit is Nahiri, Fury in Stone

Character Bio:

Spoiler Alert!

For generations, the men of the eastern Icarian clans have paid yearly tribute to the great Dragon Emperor Zelrig, offering their most prized possessions as expressions of gratitude to their lord and protector. Yet, in over a thousand years, only one most unlikely person has ever been honored with a gift in return.

When the Nhah-Scirh attacked, Zelrig’s life was saved by a young warrior, Katryn Vade. Her sacrificial choice that day inspired Zelrig to entrust her with the Dragonheart Blade, a sword forged from the blood of his own wounds. In battle, it is said that this weapon blazes with the flame of the Dragon Emperor himself, allowing Katryn to summon a column of fire which consumes her enemies.

When Katryn Vade chose to save her Emperor, she lost her family.
Now, with the Dragon Emperor's blessing, Katryn lives to avenge them.

-Rulings and Clarifications-
TBA

-Combinations and Synergies-

Synergy Benefits Received
TBA

Synergy Benefits Offered
TBA

-Strategy, Tactics and Tips-
TBA

[Owlman]

Initial thoughts:



She is fairly character-centric, like her Magic bio, and folks may wanna change that, but I'm a big fan of utilizing thos beige single space sand like tiles that come w/the set, since they are such a unique color compared to other Scape tiles. Thoughts??

[Zetsubo]

Terrain changing abilities are very fun and cool, but there isn't enough terrain from the sets to put aside for her. Unfortunately I'd have to disagree with placing tiles.

She has a very prominent glowing sword that I think would be a crime not to incorporate into an ability. Other than a magic sword, I'm not sure on what theme to go with for her mini. Perhaps she could be more of a combat focused unit, or a 'Joan of Arc' like cheerleader raising her flaming sword

[Owlman]

I think it's important to ask ourselves, what's the purpose of designing these figures for primarily? If it's for new players to mainly try to get them interested in the game, then I can see why it may not be so great to incorporate terrain into characters, but if it's for the heroscape community mostly, I don't see why not. (Especially say a person doesn't have enough sand terrain in this case, it will encourage them to go buy or trade for more, which is what we want, more heroscapers! )

Regardless, if everyone's dead set against, I'll make another card today which involves her flaming sword. (Hope no one minds, I like utilizing the card layout so we get a clear picture and feel for a character.)

[Captain Stupendous]

Based on our mission statement, our primary goals are three-fold:

1. To be compatible with Classic/Official Heroscape, and completely VC-compliant: that is, designing with C3V and SoV figures in mind, and focusing on the AOTP figures that would be acceptable to SoV (figures that are pre-painted or usable without paint).


2. To provide an affordable and user-friendly entry point to both new and returning players, that captures the feel of a true Master Set.


3. To create balanced units that are relatively simple, easy to understand, and feel at home in a self-contained set together. Units will come from a wide range of themes, and capture the diversity of theme Heroscape is beloved for.

I echo other people's concerns about Nahiri placing terrain tiles. Personally, I would love to see this figure as an Icarian of some kind. Below is a draft I came up with for an Icarian warrior who is a faithful subject of Zelrig.

Katryn Vade, Emperor’s Chosen
Einar
Icarian / Unique Hero / Warrior / Devoted / Medium 5

5 Life / 5 Move / 1 Range / 6 Attack / 3 Defense

MAJESTIC INFERNO SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 1. Attack 3.
All figures adjacent to Katryn are affected by Majestic Inferno Special Attack. Roll attack dice once for all affected figures. Squad figures roll 1 less defence dice against Majestic Inferno Special Attack.

DRAGONHEART BLADE
Whenever Katryn would be affected by a special ability or special attack, you may choose to treat her size as Huge instead of Medium.

I've also drafted a short unpolished bio for her to further explain her theme. Note that this figure draws heavily upon the lore surrounding the classic Heroscape dragons, especially the bios for Nilfheim and Zelrig.

For generations, the men of the eastern Icarian clans have paid yearly tribute to the great Dragon Emperor Zelrig, offering their most prized possessions as expressions of gratitude to their lord and protector. Yet, in over a thousand years, only one most unlikely person has ever been honored with a gift in return.

When the Nhah-Scirh attacked, Zelrig’s life was saved by a young warrior, Katryn Vade. Her sacrificial choice that day inspired Zelrig to entrust her with the Dragonheart Blade, a sword forged from the blood of his own wounds. In battle, it is said that this weapon blazes with the flame of the Dragon Emperor himself, allowing Katryn to summon a column of fire which consumes her enemies.

When Katryn Vade chose to save her Emperor, she lost her family.
Now, with the Dragon Emperor's blessing, Katryn lives to avenge them.

Of course this is just one of many possible directions we could go with her. At this point I think just discussing a lot of potential ideas is good as we get a feel for where we want to take this figure.

[NecroBlade]

That's a neat way to incorporate the her into the lore and the lore into her sword. Kinda cool, actually, to have a non-Valkrill Icarian, too.

I, too, would love to see more terrain-manipulating powers, but unfortunately I agree this probably isn't the place for it. Maybe one single sand hex that a figure can place and get back every round or something like that, but this might also not even end up being the figure for such a design. While it's fine to draw inspiration from the AotP units, they are by no means a guiding light.

[All Your Pie]

I think the powerset could use tweaking, but I’m very excited by the Icarian angle for Nahiri. The majestic fires connection is tough, though, because it’s going to be odd that it works against unique squads when Zelrig’s doesn’t. Still, I think it’s on a very good track.

[Owlman]

Originally Posted by All Your Pie

I think the powerset could use tweaking, but I’m very excited by the Icarian angle for Nahiri. The majestic fires connection is tough, though, because it’s going to be odd that it works against unique squads when Zelrig’s doesn’t. Still, I think it’s on a very good track.

Same here, the Icarian angle is cool!

Still not sure why incorporating the natural hexes into her powerset is a bad idea, since lets be honest, the vast majority of people using these customs will more than likely have plenty of terrain to work with, IMO. The 2 single space beige hexes shouldn't be an issue.

Is everyone deadset against it tho? If so I won't bring it up again.


I'm all for using her flaming sword special tho! Makes sense

Like this:

Karina Vade, Emperor’s Chosen
Einar
Icarian / Unique Hero / Warrior / Devoted /Medium 5

5 Life / 5 Move / 1 Range / 5 Attack / 3 Defense

MAJESTIC INFERNO SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 1. Attack 3.
All figures adjacent to Katryn are affected by Majestic Inferno Special Attack. Roll attack dice once for all affected figures. Squad figures roll 1 less defense dice against Majestic Inferno Special Attack.

Wielder of theDRAGONHEART BLADE
Whenever Karina Vade would be affected by a special ability or special attack, you may choose to treat her size as Huge instead of Medium.

Suggested changes in bold!

[Confred]

The two things that stand out to me are her white skin and her large blade. I wonder what she would look like as a Vampire figure

[Owlman]

Originally Posted by Confred

The two things that stand out to me are her white skin and her large blade. I wonder what she would look like as a Vampire figure

Oooh, don't get my hopes up! (I'm a huge vampire fan if you couldn't tell lol)



I'm down for either a vampire or Icarian, Icarian for her seems pretty neat tho.

[Zetsubo]

I think making her an Icarian servent to Zelrig is a great idea! What about instead of reducing defense rolled, Majestic Inferno SA prevented those affected from gaining any defensive buffs from special abilities?

MAJESTIC INFERNO SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 1. Attack 3.
All figures adjacent to Katryn are affected by Majestic Inferno Special Attack. Roll attack dice once for all affected figures. (Squad) figures may not roll additional defense dice due to any special power or add automatic shields to their roll when affected by Majestic Inferno Special Attack.

Ozuul already has a SA that affects all figures adjacent to him. Should we change the affected area to figures adjacent to the attacked figure, or only 2/3 figures adjacent to the attacked figure?

Dragonheart Blade is pretty cool mechanically, but I'm not sure how that would work thematically. It would make her a interesting counter to Ozuul's gravity pull.

[Astroking112]

Originally Posted by Captain Stupendous

Katryn Vade, Emperor’s Chosen
Einar
Icarian / Unique Hero / Warrior / Devoted / Medium 5

5 Life / 5 Move / 1 Range / 6 Attack / 3 Defense

MAJESTIC INFERNO SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 1. Attack 3.
All figures adjacent to Katryn are affected by Majestic Inferno Special Attack. Roll attack dice once for all affected figures. Squad figures roll 1 less defence dice against Majestic Inferno Special Attack.

DRAGONHEART BLADE
Whenever Katryn would be affected by a special ability or special attack, you may choose to treat her size as Huge instead of Medium.

I love the Icarian angle for her, and Zelrig is the coolest dragon out there anyway.

A couple of things to note with the current design:

Dragonheart Blade is very thematic, but it doesn't have a ton of use in the set currently. Here's the current list of powers that reference sizes:

• Ozuul's Gravity Pull
• Dienekes' Tether of Logos
• Honored Soul-Guides' Last Will (but they'd never actualy interact)

Now, that list could always change since we still have a good number of units left to develop, but the vast majority of these boxes are medium-sized units, so deeper interactions based on the size are somewhat unlikely.

That's not to say that I don't like the power. It adds some great theme, already has more use in the set than Lava Resistance, doesn't define her playstyle, and is much more interesting when players expand their collection to include other HeroScape units (think how Grimnak boosted Orc Warriors from the expansions). I just wanted to bring this up so that everyone is aware.

As for Majestic Inferno, while it's a fantastic homage to Zelrig and the story of an Icarian channeling his powers is super neat, I do worry about a couple of things. Firstly, the power should thematically be weaker than Majestic Fires Special Attack.

The lack of range and reduction of the defense penalty to -1 defense both convey this, but Majestic Inferno affecting Unique Squads when Zelrig can't does stand out thematically. It also kind of contradicts the main theme from Zelrig--that all of the nameless common warriors are so far beneath him that they're just wiped out. It's somewhat necessary when we only have Unique Squads in the box, of course, but it's a minor thematic oddity nonetheless.

I'd also like to see the Special Attack differentiated more from Ozuul, if possible. Both already affect all adjacent figures, but she trades +1 attack for a conditional -1 defense. Something along these lines helps them remain more distinct:

MAJESTIC INFERNO SPECIAL ATTACK
Range 1. Attack 3.
Choose a figure to attack. Any figures adjacent to the chosen figure are also affected by Majestic Inferno Special Attack. Squad figures roll 1 less defense die against Majestic Inferno Special Attack. Roll attack dice once for all affected figures. Each figure rolls defense dice separately. Katryn Vade cannot be affected by her own Majestic Inferno Special Attack.

That's still an explosion SA, but moving it to 1 range makes it play differently and is a bit harder to set up. It also has precedent in Jotun's Wild Swing SA, but it hasn't really been explored much outside of that.

Originally Posted by Owlman

Still not sure why incorporating the natural hexes into her powerset is a bad idea, since lets be honest, the vast majority of people using these customs will more than likely have plenty of terrain to work with, IMO. The 2 single space beige hexes shouldn't be an issue.

Is everyone deadset against it tho? If so I won't bring it up again.

Our hope is specifically that this set will expand the community, which means that players who are interested in HeroScape but don't have the funds to buy a large collection/more terrain are one of our core audiences.

In reality, of course, it's likely that many of our players will own at least some other HeroScape terrain (especially the ones that we'll see, who are posting on these forums), but we have to assume that some players want to get their toes wet before jumping into HeroScape proper. We are already committed to creating several scenarios using only the AotP boxes and creating a set that is fully enjoyable on its own. Anything that places tiles is going to take out of those scenarios for all units.

Now, that's not to say that I'm deadset against it (or even just strongly opposed), but it is an uphill battle. Placing terrain could be a very interesting mechanic, but I'm not sure that it's right for this box, and any design that uses it would need to be extremely strong to justify limiting our options for maps and scenarios.