The Phantom Rift

HeroScape has 2 ghastly squads, the first one being the Shades of Bleakewoode and the second being the Phantom Knights. Most players look at the Phantom Knights as being overall a much better unit than the Shades, but its still worth considering the Shades for play every now and then. Let's take a look at their card, shall we?

There is a major difference in cost (a whopping 30 points!), and both squads have fairly similar base stats. The Shades get a move of 7, while the Phantoms get an attack rating of 3. The Shades are Devourers, so they would get the attack bonus from the Dumetef Guard. The Phantoms, being Knights get Concan's attack bonus and increase Sir Dupuis's attack rating if they're near him. Also, both squads are naturally mobile, in large part thanks to Stealth Flying. So then, they biggest difference between the two squads is their first power and their cost per figure.

Soul Devour: An offensive minded power where the Shades no doubt get much of their cost from. Like Kee-Mo-Shi and Ne-Gok-Sa, their power isn't the easiest to get to work, but because it can be used multiple times, you can increase the potential of the of the Devour. With any luck, you can devour at least one of your opponent's heroes during the game (not only damaging their forces, but reinforcing your own).

Insubstantial 3: A defensive power that makes the Shades really tough to kill from afar. Sure it only works on Normal Attacks, but the natural defense that the Phantom Knights have can protect them from the special attacks easily enough.

I happen to prefer playing the Shades, but that might just because I embrace the suck (or so the phrase has been coined). In game I like the idea of engaging both a hero and a squad figure with the same Shade (it shouldn't be too hard to get to because of their 7 movement). This lets me attack the squad figure, and try to Soul Devour on the next turn. With the chance to have 2 weaker "attacks" in the same turn, the Shades are "stronger" than the Phantoms. But that's not the general consensus. The biggest reasoning that makes the Phantoms much stronger than the Shades is the difference in cost. You can have 10 squads of Phantoms, but only 7 squads of Shades for 700 points.

What helps the Shades out though, is their incredibly high speed.They can get to their targets quickly, perhaps so fast that they don't have to even worry about ranged units? This is certainly huge in HeroScape, as range is very powerful. So powerful that if the Phantoms didn't have Insubstantial 3, they would likely be considered extremely weak.

Hopefully you enjoyed seeing the 2 Ghost units being compared to each other! 'Scape On.

Wylfred and the Plume

Let me introduce Wlyfred, the newest of my customs for Utgar! He came from Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume and in it he was able to turn his allies into demigods but at the end of the battle they died. His demigodifying power has been significantly decreased, but that doesn't mean its worthless!

Wlyfred (left) and his feather (right)

I'm going to base this off the idea that Wylfred killed his buddies and committed many acts of sin. Which would make sense for Utgar to nab him for his own army. And here's the stats (which are a work in progress):

Name: Wlyfred
General: Utgar
Race: Human
Rank: Unique Hero
Class: Swordsman (Champion perhaps?)
Personality: Bitter
Size: Medium 5
Life: 6
Move: 5
Range: 1
Attack: 3
Defense: 4
Point Value: 140 perhaps?

Abilities:
Double Attack: Allows Wylfred to attack twice.
Power of the Plume: After taking a turn with Wylfred, you may select a Unique Hero you control and place 2 Plume Markers on their Army Card and remove all Wound and Negation Markers from it. At the end of a round, remove a Plume marker from all Army Cards you control that have at least 1 on them. If a figure has its final Plume Marker removed, it is destroyed. Figures with at least 1 Plume marker add 1 to their move and 2 to their attack and defense.

Swiss Army Falchion

At a melee friendly tournament, the big red Mount could be pretty useful. He's basically a "Swiss Army Knife," capable of doing many different things but certainly not a master at any of them. In a room full of melee units, you may not regret taking him.

At the tourney, I used him alongside Grimnak, Nerak, Ornak, Marcu and 4 teams worth of Blade Gruts. Army has a real 'Nak' to it, heh.

A few of the armies featured units who Brunak was quite happy to see including Zombies of Morindan, Roman Legionnaires, Samurai, and some Greenscale Warriors backed by Zogross Hardscale. I also brought Brunak to help combat against possible "FireStorms," who would've been tough for my Orcs to fight. Overall, Brunak's Blood Hungry Special Attack had plenty of viable options.

The primary reason to bring a Swiss Army Knife is to have the ability to cover a lot of different bases at once, and Brunak does that to some extent in my Orcs build. He does give a small advantage against the units mentioned above, but perhaps there is another reason to bring this Mount into combat? The Orcs Build as is already takes many of the advantages that Brunak normally offers (outside of Lava Resistance), but can usually perish to powerful ranged builds or units with higher stats and equal attrition levels. I chose Brunak, as opposed to another Orc Champion Tornak to both hide a few weaknesses and to power up the capabilities of the Gruts. Without Brunak, my army would only have 1 way to fight off evil things like massed commons in the form of an only average endurance unit, Grimnak. I'm not saying that Brunak is more survivable than Grimnak (in fact, he was killed in turn of Minions of Utgar strikes), but he does give the army a longer time for power-attacks. Tornak couldn't have done that, and Tornak's Orc Warrior Enhancement would've been a bit too unwieldy to try to use along with Grimnak's as I imagine Ornak would've been moving both at the same via Red Flag of Fury.

Speaking of Ornak, Brunak can actually Carry Brunak closer to the battlefield so that Red Flag of Fury is much easier to pull off. Sure 8 spaces is a long range, but once the battle starts, you don't want to lose turns with Grimnak just so you can move your flag-boy up a few spaces. I can understand moving Nerak with the Gruts (3 attack with a 9 space threat-range isn't too bad, especially if the rest of your Gruts benefit from the move), but Ornak is just too wimpy. His meager attack boost is nice to have, but as the Blade Gruts only feature a basic 2 attack dice, I don't see the Utgar Symbols helping much.

If you don't feel like moving Ornak (perhaps you don't see Red Flag of Fury being worth a damn this game...), I had the option to move up Marcu or a Blade Grut so that I could get a Glyph in a single turn (or in the Blade Grut's case 2 turns). Depending on the Glyph, this is actually a viable move. I used this to somewhat decent effect in the first game I played at the tournament, but because I lost that game I'm not sure you need to be taking my advice... Yeah, that was my attempt at humor.

When using Brunak, your going to have to remember that his big muscles only give him 3 hit points. He does have a nice 7 defense though, so let's focus on that for a second. Focused on it? Great. When using Brunak as a big hammer (his other role, the main one being a giant pony), its O.K. to charge him into a bunch of low attack squad figures. Bonus points if said figures have low defense for Blood Hungry Special Attack to kick in a few times. The goal for this is to paint a big red 'X' on Brunak so that your other heroes (Grimnak mainly), don't get swarmed so quickly. That 7 defense should give Brunak a turn or two to take out as much as he can, and if you can get him on height, he becomes a massive 8 Defense hero who's lost life won't ultimately make you lose. But, if you've been using Ornak to move Grimnak and Bruank on every single Turn 1, then your opponent might think otherwise. Of course, if your Power attacks do what they are supposed to (that is, eliminate all enemies ASAP), then you won't have to worry about trying to pull out tricky tactics with unsophisticated orcs.

Hopefully, this Swiss Army Falchion can serve you well in the future if you play him with Gruts anyways. 'Scape On

The Mercenary Samurai

As some folks know, I happen to love the board game Shogun (or Samurai Swords depending on when you've gotten the game). I also hold the belief that Shogun helped to "design" a few of 'Scape's units. As we know though, HeroScape never had any Ronin.

Thus,

The custom uses 3 Samurai figures (I like using the Tagawa Samurai for this purpose).

The Kokugura Ronin take many of the mechanics from Shogun's Ronin and implements them into 'Scape in a powerful way. In Shogun, players had to hire Ronin and could place them anywhere on the board which is a powerful force. At the same time, there was the chance that all of the Ronin would be "sold out", thus players would bid on use of them. That is basically incorporated into Payment Delivered.

Now let's look at the parts of the card that is all HeroScape. Among the first things you'll notice is that this squad doesn't have 6+ move like the other Unique Samurai Squads. Sure the Kozuke only have a base move of 5, but they still have their Charging Assault, and yes the Ronin are technically not Samurai (the class states Ronin), but Ronin are still as Samurai (in fact, they were Samurai before they became Ronin!). The question is why are they only moving at average speed? Well, that is because they are already able to move excessively fast thanks to their primary Payment Delivered Special Power. When used in sync with The Job Is Done, these guys can move all over the place in a few rounds. I'm not going to get too involved with strategy here (this isn't the main design post after all), so all of this can easily change in time. And of course, as they have training as Samurai, they know how to use the infamous CounterStrike.

'Scape On.

Terrain Throwdown!

The Map, the Board, the Battlefield... All these things could be used to effectively describe the in-game area for when we play some HeroScape. Some folks just build according to the idea of competitive play, others because a map looks nice, and some try to combine both theories into one.

But, is there any value to simply having two people randomly toss terrain together for a quick game or two? Maybe. This thread of mine, on heroscapers.com suggests the idea of having two preset piles of terrain to make a map with. After trying this with a rookie, I found out that it doesn't work very well. I think that a few more limitations are needed, perhaps the builders need to be a bit more equal in skill?

I'm still all for the idea that if there are more than just 2 people playing, then we can build any ol' board and hope for the best.

'Scape On.

Superheroes and redcoats and skinless space aliens!

A tournament report from the Mad Titan IV

The rules for this tournament were a little different; armies start at 600 points, and after each game, you drop 50 points from your army. Starting at 600, going to 550, then 500, etc., ending at 350.I decided to build my army around a core of 350, and add 250 points of units from there. Since Marvel was allowed, I decided to use one of those heroes.....Captain America. Raelin makes everything better, and Marro Warriors are decent shooters for 50 points.

Then, I needed 250 points to drop over the course of the day. After going over the available options, I decided on the 10th Regiment of Foot, because they're awesome. (Also, I don't have enough 4th to be able to use them instead.) My army for the event: Captain America, Raelin, Marro Warriors, 3 squads of 10th Regiment, and a Drow Chainfighter.

Game 1

The first game of the day, I was playing against fellow HS-er Hsskor (who happens to be my brother). He was using Braxas, 4 squads of Greenscales, and Cyprien at 600 points. The map was Hellsgate.

Braxas, Cyprien, Grimnak, Silver Surfer.....those were some of the figures I was really worried about. And here were two of them in the same army. Which was actually fortunate, because order markers were poorly split between the two.

My favorite opening for most games is with Raelin, placing her on height. I used the same move here, because even if the big heroes on the other side weren't going to roll dice, the Greenscales certainly would. I sent the 10th out next, hoping to eliminate Braxas before her chronic bad breath eliminated Captain America. Cyprien moved forward and used chilling touch on Raelin, rolled a 20, and moved on to Captain America. I used the 10th to take both glyphs, which were Attack +1 and Kelda.

Since I had my 10th on height while holding the attack glyph, the rest of the game was mostly a cleanup operation. Cyprien was attempting Chilling Touch on Cap, but had little success with it. My 10th brought down Braxas and Cyprien, and the remaining Greenscales didn't have much of a chance against my 10th.Dropping one squad of 10th to attrition.

Game 2

My next game was against Shedim Kabal on a map (built from SotM and FotA) that I don't remember the name of. I've met him once before, at a tournament in IL. Last time, we pulled a map that heavily favored my army; it happened again this tournament. His army had Tor-Kul-Na, 2 squads of Stingers, 2 squads of Nagrub, and 3 squads of Dividers. The map we were playing on neutralized Tor-Kul-Na, and the Stingers were the largest threat to my army. If I killed them and then held the high ground, I'd win the game with little trouble.

I opened like last game, placing Raelin on height; it may have not worked very well last time, but this game the extra defense would help. My 10th took both glyphs, (a dud and Wind,) then started to climb the towers. 10th are already favored to win against Stingers, and me beating him to the high ground kept this game from being very exciting.

I'm hoping that the map is a little more balanced next time I play Shedim Kabal.

Dropping the Chainfighter to attrition.

Game 3

This time I was paired up against vegetarian18 on a BftU/TT map, who was running 2x Black Wyrmlings, 3x Red Wyrmlings, and #x Phantom Knights. The only part I was worried about was the pair of Black Wyrmlings, the only units that really pose a threat to Captain America here.

I moved my 10th out first, hoping to take the wyrmlings out. The Phantom Knights wouldn't be very useful here, especially against the Captain. My 10th land on the nearest glyph to me, which is the glyph of Wind (no flying). This game, it's actually helpful, making his Phantom Knights a little slower. Until, of course, he lands on the glyph of Move +2, boosting his PKs to move 8. At least they don't get Disengage.

I try to hold down the Wind glyph, but his PKs are too darn fast, and always get height on the glyph. He makes a couple of attacks against Cap, but counterstrike pulls through both times. After those two attacks, he doesn't try for Cap again the rest of the game. He does manage to bring down Raelin and quite a few of my 10th.

I end up winning this game after a few more round. Captain America is probably the worst matchup for Phantom Knights; if he brought more Black Wyrmlings, he'd have had better chances against Marvel figures.

Dropping a squad of 10th to attrition.

Game 4

Up against Eternalthanos86, with 2x 10th, Marcus Decimus Gallus, Raelin, and Kaemon Awa. The map is Stygian Rift.

This army should make for an interesting match; my army really close to his, sort of. Captain America does a lot of the things that Kaemon and Marcus do, and if I don't do something stupid, it should be pretty close.

He wins first initiative, moving Raelin to a perch on height. I put my Raelin on the mirror perch, and he moves his 10th up for the glyphs. I stick Cap into shadow within Raelin's aura, and he puts his 10th onto the glyph on the far side from Cap. He pulls....the Attack +1 glyph. Right after I comment about how I'm hope that's not what he's going to get. Now the game is looking nasty for me; 2 squads of 10th having height on my units AND an attack glyph? I already saw this today, and now I'm on the receiving end of it. Ouch.

Well, my lone squad of 10th can't do much against the much much scarier 10th on height with glyph support, and my OM placement is less than optimal here. I move my 10th onto the other glyph, landing....a dud.

Between me having a poor position and making it worse with a few blunders, my chances of winning weren't so great. I do end up losing, but only after making him haul out Kaemon. (That counts for something, right?)

Dropping the last squad of 10th to attrition. My army is now down to 350.

Game 5

I'm fighting on a C3G map this time; Grundy's Grave. I'm up against Jaslow, who's wielding Charos, 2x 4th, and Eldgrim. I know that Captain America and Charos are close to evenly matched, and if I can fire on his Charos from height with Marro adjacent to Cap, he won't last a whole long time. Shield Throw & high defense will keep Cap around against the 4th, unless they land a glyph of Attack +1. My luck can't be THAT bad, right?

The starting zones are close enough to the high ground that I don't have to move Raelin at all, so I open by moving my Marro towards the two glyphs closest to me. Charos lands on the glyph opposite me, getting +8 initiative. My Marro get....a dud. His 4th move towards the middle of the map, shooting at Raelin from height. She manages to hang around long enough to gain even ground with the 4th, dying soon after. The 4th grab the glyph of Defense +1, putting their defense up to 4.

The 4th manage to put 3 wounds onto Cap before having their numbers reduced to ineffectiveness. Then Charos moves in and takes height on the good Captain. Disengaging with Captain America and moving over to height on the other end of the middle, Cap takes a fourth wound. Charos flies over, engages Cap, and takes a shot at him, finishing off the Captain. Without Cap, my remaining Marro Warrior doesn't last long.

Losing no units to attrition.

Game 6

Mohicans! I love these dudes. I've never been very good with them, though. Lord Pyre has Cyprien, Marcu, and 3x Mohican River Tribesmen. We're playing on Shrine of Mo-Ne-Ka, a really, really, really cool map. I wasn't hoping to run into Cyprien a second time. Cap can't kill him fast enough to stay safe from Chilling Touch, and I don't have any 10th here to save the day.

He wins initiative and moves his MRT along the back of the ruin. I move Raelin in the same direction, followed by Cap and the Marro Warriors. He rolled his Concealment once against my combined assault of Shield Throw/Marro gun-thingamabobs, losing all of his Mohicans. I, of course, lose Raelin. As usual. Of course, now the trouble is taking Cyprien out. I've got Cap on top of the ruin, some Marro hiding behind it, and Cyprien is circling around below. I send Cap up, Shield Throw Cyprien, and......fail miserably. Cyprien swoops in, rolls Chilling Touch, and puts two wounds on Cap; then, attacking, Cap manages to counterstrike a wound on the Vampire. Of course, Cap falls to Cyprien after a few more OMs, and the remaining Marro warriors can't keep enough wounds on to matter.I lose this game, while my opponent still has Cyprien and Marcu alive.

Thoughts

I won the first three games, and lost the last three. The difference in my army between those two points was having 2 or more squads of 10th. Cap is much too vulnerable to Cyprien and Black Wyrmlings, and needs squaddies around to save the day. The attack/defense bonus is handy, letting the 10th throw out some crazy rolls, but Marcus and Raelin can do that job better than Cap for fewer points. A special attack is a handy thing to have, though.

What If Tarn Viking Warriors Were a 5 Man Squad?

The little fantasy game "What if?" can bring out many diverse thoughts and opinions...



The Non-Ranged Jandar Squad from Rise of the Valkyrie was once tested as a 5 man squad. For some reason or another, the game designers felt that the Tarns would be better off as a 4-man squad. But, what if they were released as a 5 man squad? Here's a few "ripples" that could happen.

1. One of the Viking Heroes may not exist. I highly doubt RotV would have 31 figures in it, after all. Finn's Blue sword might mean that he could have had Thorgrim's abilities, while Thorgrim's sculpt acts as the 5th Viking.

2. There may have been 5 men common squads. Although it seems overpowered, I'm sure the metagame (in an alternate universe) would adjust. The 4th Massachusetts Line is considered excessively powerful, after all. Strong enough to take these guys down, at least.

3. Range would take a hit. Even if the above never happened, 5 Vikings running at you is not something to be ignored. Even worse if they land a Berserker Charge.

4. Valguard might not enhance Berserker Charge. From the above "ripple", helping the Vikings move a total of 40 spaces (and that's just if you landed 1 15!) is simply absurd.

5. Players might prefer Tarns as screens over Marro Warriors. Sadly self explanatory.

6. Eldgrim, with no purpose other than to act as the last Spirit, wouldn't exist. It's always been my initial assumption (and little else), that Eldgrim was designed to "complete" the theme of Viking Spirit Bonuses. If Finn's stats didn't exist, I don't see Eldgrim existing either.

7. Their power rating would likely receive a bump. This is of course assuming the other ripples didn't really happen, at least. If they did, well that'd be a whole other ballgame!
"Tarn Viking Warriors- A decent filler squad, the Tarns give you good stats for a low cost, but there are often better options. C+"
-Taken from heroscapers.com

8. With Finn removed from the table, defensive units would be a bit better. One less sword means one more shield.

'Scape On

Building a Map...

So, Saturday night I got a call from one of my 'Scape buddies. He wanted to come over for the night, and when he got here, I was set with an opportunity. I had just asked to do a few playtests for the C3V, and with a real player, I'm sure at least one of the tests will work nicely.

We decided to play 1Mmring's "Flooded Temple".

The board looked like it had a cool aesthetic, so we set off to work. With my random terrain collection, we took 1 and a half hours to build this damn thing!! After it was complete, we played the playtest game, where we took pictures of our armies (not displayed to protect your monitors). We also got to play another 3 hours of  'Scaping after this match.

Simple: Airborne Elite dominate on this map. All they gotta do is land that 13...Can you say 4 attack (5 if someone gets Astrid...which I did)? Sweet stuff. Well, not for your opponent.

Also, Double-spaced figures are just way too bulky and even units like Swog Riders have movement issues on this map. A cheap Double-spaced figure (like the Swog Rider) could be used to grab a glyph off to the side, but unless they are incredibly durable, then they will only like hold a glyph for a turn.

Speaking of Glyphs, I think this may be one of the few maps the Glyph of Thorian could feasibly work with, because melee or 4-5 range units are going to get leveled unless they have a good resistance to range. Otherwise, glyphs are basically useless as any glyph holders will likely be blasted apart.

The Water Elemental has the chance to pull a sneaky move. As the "temple" is rather high up, and because there is water around it, the Water Elemental can hide behind the temple "wall" and try to sneak an strong attack on your guys. This trick is negated if a player remembers the elemental is there though...Or is tall enough to see over the walls...

The ladders provide lots of humorous play on this board, but there wasn't enough incentive to climb them during our time with the board. To put it simply, the only figures who even need the ladders are the Omnicron Repulsors, as the board is littered with 3 level jumps.

'Scape on.

Bolts Away!!!!

This is big, bad, and well...big. Siege weaponry has been tried in HeroScape many times, and its always had the issue of said weapons not being manned. And thus, they are left most often as Destructible Objects. The rules for Destructible Objects are typically fairly simple, but a Destructible Object with an attack really makes for goofy and overly customy rules and abilities. It's even worse when there are rules to move these weapons... Although it is above and beyond awesome to envision catapults firing down boulders onto castle walls, a scenario like this is the only way a catapult could really work as a destructible object.

Although I'm not claiming to have found a manned siege weapon (that is usable in HeroScape), I do have a simple custom to accompany one...or 3.

Steambow Engineers.....Einar
3 Troops....................Human
4 Move........Common Squad
8 Range..................Engineers
4 Attack................Disciplined
5 Defense.................Large 7?
100 points..................2-hexes

Thunder-Bolts
When attacking a Large or Huge figure normally,  you may roll additional attack die.

Shrug Off
When a Steambow Engineer leaves engagement, it doesn't receive any leaving engagement attacks.

'Scape On.

Starting from Scratch

Anytime a new player hears about customs around here, they seem to want to make their own. The latest addition to the Scape crowd has found a HeroClix figure (Nick Fury I think?), and decided to model it off of the Terminator.

Overpowered? Yup. Is that fine? Yup. I'll teach him more as time wears on, but at least his appetite has been whetted. Even if nothing else, when you Mindshackle him, you effectively win. Fortunately, I had Ne-Gok-Sa.

'Scape On.

Earning my Geek

Today I went into a gaming store...a board gaming store. The store had a fairly small walkway, not something I'm comfortable in, but oh well. Although I wouldn't let this from keeping me from enjoying my time there, the crowd of folks in there were trying it seemed. We walked into the back of the store and worked our way up.

All told I purchased over $80 in figures for one purpose. Making lots of HeroScape customs.

So then, onto a few of the customs! First off I picked up 20 goblin figures for 17 bucks. There's a nice faction right there. I also got a bugbear thingy which I decided to help Gobbos too!

For reference, the Gobbo faction belongs to General Myvra, where you can learn more about here.

The Night Goblin Infantry is a squad of 4 who is a fairly expendable unit. Each unit only costs 45 points and have a movement of a pathetic attack of 2. They have Disengage and Climb x2, but other wise nothing is special.

They have a flag-bearer called Fligg who grants an initiative bonus for all the Gobbos near him. I even used to great effect against my opponent! Considering there's no limit, most players will try to take advantage of getting a very high boost, but the low attack power of the Gobbo faction will help to keep players from actually winning the game. He also has a power called Gobbo Warcry, which grants Gobbos the extra +1 move that is so popular. His base stats are about as great as one would expect, with only 4 life and 3 defense...

Sylvano (named after one of my favorite bloggers on heroscapers.com), is the bugbear I mentioned. Simple, straight forward and really the only heavy hitter that the Gobbo Faction has. His Double Attack of 4 might make some players thinking he is overpowered, but he doesn't have any synergies with the exception of Ornak's Flag and the different types of Goblins in HeroScape.

There are also 3 more heroes who fit into the Gobbo faction, aside from Fligg (and Sylvano, to a degree). One is a Goblin Shaman, one is a Goblin Spearmen (there's an odd one in the pack...), and a Goblin Swordsman. They haven't been designed yet, but I've got ideas.

'Scape On.

A First Look at Nilfy

I've recently acquired the ice cold dragon, Chew-Toy...er...Nilfheim. Now that I've played a purely BS game with him, and have chatted with him I will give my first thoughts.

SCULPT
First thing first, I'm going to point out that many people seem to be under the belief that Nilfy's sculpt is fairly obstrusive. Although I'm not certain of this, but I don't think that the dog who previously owned the figure did much to help Nilfy's issues. Of course, this huge size can be quite terrifying in combat. At least the chew toy is on a double hexed base, and not a triple hexed base. His wings really make it seems as though Nilfheim could have been on a triangle.

MOBILITY
Aside from his hugeness, Nilfheim is fairly mobile. I'm not sure if the dog's owner spilled Red Bull on Nilfy or what, but Nilfy's wings can somehow carry him 6 spaces. I say the somehow because his wings are tattered and partially shredded...by dog teeth.

ENDURANCE
Nilfheim's tooth-torn body can get 4 dice against attacks made by everything except dogs. Versus those, he stands no chance. 6 HPs means that he's capable of dying before the enemy. Greenscales can alleviate this though, except against disengaging units.

ATTACK POWER
Despite a few missing and clipped claws and horns, Nilfheim will get to bum-rush his foes with 6 attack dice. If he's behind a wall of meat (aka the Greenscale Warriors), he can try using an ice breath on 3 targets. I wonder if he tried this against the dog. That might have been the only reason he's still alive...

'Scape On.

Why Drafting is "Da Bomb"

In other strategy games I've played, a strategy that hinges on masses of a single type of unit generally don't work too well. I even experimented with with in Ages of Empires: Age of Kings (or something along those lines). I tried taking tons of cavalry units and a few archers. My enemy (the nefarious computer!) countered me with pikemen (who get several boosts against horseback units). Simply said, I was fighting a losing battle. Then, I brought up some siege units to lay waste to the pikemen. After much fighting, I eventually won.

There is one key difference between HeroScape and that game. Army crafting. In HeroScape, you usually have to pick your army somewhat blindly, as you don't know what your opponent is playing. In that game, you can turn the "Fog of War" off so that you see what your opponent is using and you can try to counter. HeroScape has a similar function, though many people (and the metagame tournaments) don't use it. It is drafting. Not only is it in the rulebook, it's also said to be the fairest way of making an army.

So then, here's a theory. Maybe drafting isn't common in metagame play because it's unwieldy and time consuming (assuming both players don't know all of the cards by heart). Plus, there are over 200 units to sift through as is, only adding to the problem. So, why not take a predetermined pool of units, say only characters from a Master Set are viable, and go with that? Even just taking a single Master Set and a single Wave and making a draft pool from that can lead to interesting armies.

The designers made HeroScape units to be fun, so I imagine they may have tested units by drafting. How else will units like Repulsors be of value? [/sarcasm]

Scape On.

Slayer Vs Left

Today I got to play HeroScape with a person who isn't under the age of 13. A big shock there. And, no, it wasn't me. I played against a certain LeftOn4Ya not once, but 3 times. That's more HeroScape than I get in most months! But, why am I wasting time introducing this blog? On with the show!

As the time to meet came closer and closer, I had more and more of the preparations complete, only to be be replaced by excitement. I built a mountain range-esque map, with a little dungeon and shadows mixed in to add color and help Drow and melee. Snow capped off some of the best positions, noting that snow spaces count for 2 movement points.

Once he arrived, we unloaded his car of a giant blue storage bin. I'm not kidding when I say it's gotta be 4-5 feet long. How he got the thing into his car is shocking! It was also heavy, and the real snow was slowing us down. We got the mammoth into the dining room, where he took a quick look at the map. The map didn't seem to impress, but it would get the job done. We chatted for a bit, he showed me why he needed a monster sized storage bin (this guy has tons of figures!), and then we began the main part of the day.

Game 1:
Flameslayer (me):
Sgt. Drake (Swarm of the Marro Version)
Capt. John Varan (C3V)
Raelin (Rise of the Valkyrie Version)
Tactical Combat Unit x3

LeftOn4Ya:
Zaeus (C3V)
Otonashi
Black Wyrmlings x2
Nakita Agents
Gorillanators x3 (CUC Version)

(We didn't go for a General Wars match, but that's how it turned out)

The game opened with LeftOn4Ya advancing his Monkeys and Agents. Having never seen Gorillanators, I was in awe of their 7 movement. These apes were fast on their feet! My first turn involved us learning of an error in the map. Raelin grabbed a glyph first turn. Simply put, oops. Anyways, using the glyph of Erland, I pulled Zaeus into adjacency with Raelin. Though the kyrie did no damage, Drake came up and in a few turns, put Zaeus to shame, having not only dealt no damage, but even losing the first Order Marker in a round. Raelin was gunned down quickly, but she served her purpose well enough. Drake and the toy soldiers slowly cleared out the Nakitas, then proceeded to work their way into the Gorillas. Lefty had to change his strategy from "take Drake down" (because Drake is impervious to ranged normal attacks and engaging him seemed to lead to death) to "Take out the Dollar Store figures". Once he took this route, he slowly cut a bloody swath into my TCUs. Once he was down to his ninja, the game was over.

Slayer: 1 Left: 0

Game 2:
Flameslayer:
Zombie Hulk x2 (SoV)
Zombies of Morindan x8

LeftOn4Ya:
Trogladyte Bonecrusher (Left's Custom)
Wyvern
White Wyrmling
Trogladyte Brutes x4 (Left's Custom)

To make up for the lack of starting hexes for my massive Zombie Army, I threw a 7 hexer behind my Start Zone and called it good. I tried to chage my Zombies, but the map and the overpowered Trog+White Wyrmling combo slowed me down. This being the first time I played the Zombie Hulks, I was also playing like a rookie. We cut the game off at the halfway point, as his Trogs were just too much. Both of my Hulks were killed and I was down to about 4 squads of Zombies while I had killed 1 Trog. We theorized a few ways to make the Trogs much more balanced, including dropping them back to 3 men. Rather than waste the rest of the time we had talking about a single custom, we called it a draw.

Slayer: 1.5 Left: 0.5

Game 3:
Flameslayer:
Ornak
Estivara
Fen Hydra

LeftOn4Ya:
Siege
Havechmech Incinerators (C3V)

(Ok, so I'm not sure about the name of the C3V thing, oh well)

We figured a no glyph, 300 point, speed round would serve our best interests for our last round. I moved out the Hydra early on and the robots killed it just as effectively as Hercules himself! Down to Ornak and Estivara, I didn't give up, but I knew I'd be at a disadvantage. Estivar couldn't pierce Siege's defense, and rather than blocking, she rolled nothing but blanks on defense. Ornak basically became suicidal and got burned and shot to death. And here I though those robots were weak...

Slayer: 1.5 Left: 1.5


Once we completed our games and he got his figures put away, Lefty became a plasticrack dealer. I purchased a NIB Orm's Return, a Marvel Set (yup, I took the plunge), a Nilfy who got used as a Chew toy, a "squad" of knights with the only desirable one being a modified one with a staff, 6 Ashigaru Gun-users and 2 Ashigaru Broken-Spear-users, Finn with a hammer, 2 of the Roman Archers (the third must not have died) Taelord, Kelda, Tornak, and a Marcus whose arm looks shockingly like an Izumi's. Overall, from a lot of used figs, it seems like super glue surgery only needs to be applied to 2 figures. The Broken Spear wielders will be accompanied by 2 of the Gun-wielders.

The review of the day in a word: Fun

'Scape On.

Expendable Warriors

Marro Warriors are often written as MWs...

The Marro Warriors originally come out in the original master set, Rise of the Valkyrie. Even back then, this unique squad had many uses! A cheap unique squad that has the ability to revive themselves, and the chances only get better in water, can find its way into 2 common army roles. Shock-troops, otherwise known as units who greet your enemies first and are going to die rather quickly, or Janitors, otherwise known as units who finish the game for you, wiping out the remnants of the enemy force.










Similar to "strategy blogs" written by me in the past, it would be wise to remember many of the ideas listed here are situational and likely irrational.

Unique Marro Screen
If you have at least 1 destroyed Marro Warrior, and you need to keep your enemies from advancing but your Marro Warriors can't handle that task, have a Marro engage a figure and try to clone. With 2 figures engaged to a targetted unit, that figure is effectively locked down, at least for a little while. Even if you don't get the Clone roll, you should still at least 1 more Marro to try cloning from. This can work to OK effect versus Roman Leginnaires, or any other Horde army. Of course, units who can get 6 figures moving at once (I'm looking at you Zmobies of Morindan) won't be bothered by this tactic.

(Potentially) Endless Marro Cannon!
For this trick, you should advance your Marro Warriors within movement range of melee units and into shooting range of heroes or ranged squad figures. Clone or attack according to your opponents response to this maneuver. Meshing the Unique Marro Screen with this power could be nasty.

Rush and Retreat
This tactic begins by using 3 of your Marro Warriors as shocktroops. Do anything you can to get damage done; take height, glyphs, etc. Leave your 4th Marro Warrior near-ish to your main force and once the 3 shocktrooping Marro Warriors have gone down, hopefully your other units will have begun mobilizing. Anytime you have the free turn, have your lone Marro clone itself. By the time endgame hits, all of your Marro Warriors should have returned to life. This takes the Shocktrooper or Janitor gameplay to a new level. Now, you can have your cake and eat it.

Marveling at Marvel

Recently, I've been in a dilema. As I've stated earlier, I was never much of a comic book guy (video games stole my heart at an early age). But, as it appears that HeroScape stuff is running quite low, I must begin to ponder whether or not the Marvel Master Set (Marvel: The Conflict Begins), would be worth acquiring.

On the plus side, there are 2 Super Heroes who I like. The Incredible Hulk, and The Amazing Spiderman.

But between these two heroes lies some other heroes and villians...







Captian America, for example, isn't a bad bonus, but I don't like him that much. And, who the heck is Thanos? I'm not comic book guy, so I don't know these things...

How about looking at the terrain? I like the snow in HeroScape, but it the lighter asphalt light enough to be considered snow? Or is it gray enough to be road? The black asphalt won't be used much though, I find it ugly...

The broken down building also won't find much play here...

The other stuff (dice, Order Markers, etc.) aren't too big of a concern. I'm not worried about that stuff.

So, I merely have to wonder: Is buying the Marvel Master Set even worth it for 2 heroes, and 2 more I might like and then some possible snow or road? This isn't very easy, I'm afraid.

'Scape On.

HeroSkyping

After Therion and I have played a few times using the interesting HeroSkype system via facebook, I have a few comments about the...experience.


Our first game was slow, but steady. Getting over the learning curve of just using the grid and trying to relay the movements was a daunting task. We worked it all out...after 3 hours. That's about 3 times as long as normal game of 'Scape would've taken.

The second was a bit smoother (Therion came up with the idea of taping off the board so that he wouldn't need a grid). It was a slaughter, making game time only about 1.5 hours, but all of our chatting made the game last...a long time.

Our third, and at the time of this writing, final game took a little over 3 hours, despite using 350 point armies. Although the game itself didn't take too long, Therion had the board built wrong. And then upon fixing it, he made it wrong...again.


With the extra time allotted for having to relay and ensure the grid and board are correct upon each move, I think this system is a good and relatively quick way of playing Scape over the web.

An Insult to the Internet!

This SOPA and PIPA have reached my ears. Although I don't generally follow in the footsteps of the mass media, I will however say that the thought that potential censorship of the internet is not a good thing.

I, Michael "flameslayer93" Groves, urge all readers to do their part in protesting. Obviously Google will give you more information that I will about the issues at hand, but pretty much a phone call to your state representative will help out. Of course, if your a member of a forum or two, feel free to change your Avatar/Signature/whatever to help spread the word and protest!

Good Luck internet!

('Scape On)

A Secret Project

So, word on the street is that flameslayer93 is starting to work on a big project. If you ask him about it he seems to ignore the thought. Maybe it's something important? It could be what people have been looking for...

Looking through his computer files suggested little evidence of anything, but our expert investigators found these images.

What could this mean for HeroScape?

'Scape On.