Heroclix: My initial Heroclix experience

Ive only been playing HC for about 4 months now, and not really even that heavily til last couple weeks, it was something silly I could play with my girl friend in the evenings and was super easy to learn and sets up fast for a game which is handy when you have a 1 year old running around. I started my collection by buying a few starter packs also known as 'fast forces' as I knew nothing about the game, so I grabbed the Street Fighter pack and the Watchmen pack as I used to be mad about Ryu and the gang when I was younger and my girl friend loves the Watchmen movie.

The SF sculpts were awesome and the small little character maps brought back childhood memories, the Watchmen sculpts although not as good (as I learnt later these are quite a bit older) but still quite cool and the massive map soon saw team based skirmishes across them, the lab map is probably my favourite map that Ive played to date. Even though I loved my little SF army they were ultimately no match for The Watchmen, as I then learnt of the 3 different exp levels of the characters and the sculpts they represented.

50pt Blanka and 95pt Blanka.

Experience is reflected in the points it costs to play them at the start of a fight. As it turns out the SF starter is made up of six 50 point 'rookie' level characters (like when Ryu was a dragon punch virgin and Guile just sat around all day combing his hair) and the Watchmens' only rookie was Dr Manhattan who was 150 points alone and killing entire squads of Street Fighters on his own! (on a side note even to this day he is still tearing my teams apart as my girlfriend loves him and is often her go to attacker). Although using higher pointed versions of a character does help with giving you more powers to use and bigger life bars for taking damage, the cheaper characters can fill a hole in your team when you have a couple of points going spare in the bigger games.

Super Dungeon Explore

I saw this a few months back on a youtube vid and it stood out as its a lot different from other miniature games doing the rounds, it seems to be getting a lot of good buzz and is sold out virtually every where you look, which makes me think it lives up to the hype. I'm gonna try to acquire a copy eventually as this looks like an amazing game and a serious project for me to sink my teeth into as it comes un-assembled and unpainted. It will be my first building/painting minis experience which I'm not too frilled about, but I might surprise myself and actually have some degree of skill in that field?

Thematic wise it sounds awesome, its based on old-skool RPG games from the 8-bit and 16-bit Sega Megadrive and Nintendo Snes eras looks  and plays like an arcade hack and slash grinder like Gauntlet, with some D&D style game play. Hero players choose a hero type (mage, fighter or even a druid that levels up in to a massive bear!) and they fight against the dungeon master player who controls all the spawning hordes, each turn more enemies spawn from totems placed around the map in an effort to swarm and wipe the hero players out.

Heroes have different moves available to them which comes in the form of rolling varying amount of coloured dice. Like all cool dungeon grinding games its all about the 'loot' and after dealing out killing blows heroes draw a card from the loot deck set to the side of the game, which can be anything from a healing potion to a new bigger and better weapon that can be equipped resulting in them being able to roll extra dice on future attack rolls.

After slaying and destroying a waves of enemy skirmishers and taking out spawning locations a big-boss type enemy spawns for the final showdown to determine what team wins the game.

SDE modular style dungeon map

This is a modular style game where the dungeon layout can change from game to game, and also has multiple visual styles, there are planned expansion sets which will add a lot of versatility to the game, hopefully with new game modes an extra things to do within a game as usually the case with module style games.

3D SDE

Many of the online sales demos are played on 3D terrain, which I am very interested in as I'm about to undertake making a HC terrain for my home games as the flat maps don't do the game justice, but ill post on this soon enough. But if my initial attempt at at creating a 3D map are successful I would be very interested in trying modular dungeons that can change shape for each game for SDE.

Heroclix: Lord of the rings epic battle campaign rules.

At the time of this post I can not find the new LOTR heroclix epic rules sheet anywhere online like in the 'print n play' section of the heroclix website, and after losing my copy for a while I thought Im going to blog the entire rules sheet from the LOTR starter set just incase I lose it again or other players have, or even if they never brought the starter set and aquired the characters through the booster packs and wanted to try the 'epic campaign' out. So not a post post, but a handy way of storing some data that may come in usefull later?

RULES SHEET

Epic battles.
An epic battle is a battle with a build total between 300 and 1000 points.

Epic actions and epic traits.
In an epic battle each player is granted and epic action each turn. An epic action is a special type of power action that can only be used to activate an epic trait ability (indicated by the book symbol on a character card). Unlike a power action, an epic action does not count against your action total and you can not activate more then one epic trait ability each turn. A character can not be given an epic action to activate any game effects that require a power action. in this release, most epic trait abilities scale with the build total of the game.

Horde tokens.
Horde tokens are bystander tokens marked with the 'M' symbol. Unlike other characters, identical horde tokens (those with the same set symbol and collector number) can share a single square on the battlefield by being stacked, and when stacked they can use special powers called horde powers. In this release, most horde powers scale with the number of tokens in the stack.

Stacking and unstacking horde tokens.
Two or more friendly horde tokens in the same square become a stack. A stack can contain up to the maximum number of horde tokens indicated on the token next to the 'M' symbol (i.e 'M' = 4). Horde tokens may be stacked during their placement in the starting area at the beginning of the game.

Stacks break away automatically. Stacks may add additional tokens to the stack while moving by moving through a square containing an identical horde token. Two stacks can also merge, but are still limited by the maximum stack size; any remaining tokens are places in last square the stack moved through before merging. When a single horde token moves into a stack, if the stack is already marked with an action token, it does not get an additional action token.

You can move a horde token or stack to merge with another stack that already has two action tokens, even though no action token will be assigned.

If a stack has not yet been assign an action token during a turn, an individual horde token in the stack may be given an action normally to unstack and move away.

Stacks on the battlefield.
A stack of horde tokens is considered a single character for the purposes of movement, taking actions, making an attack and being attacked. When a stack takes damage, reguardless of the amount of damage taken, remove only one token from the stack. The token removed from the stack is defeated.

Horde powers.
Horde powers are explained on the back of horde tokens. A horde token only possesses its horde power when it is the top tokenof a stack. When the 'S' symbol appears in the text of a horde power, it refers to the current number of tokens in the stack. When the 'M' symbol appears in the text of a horde power , it refers to the maximum number of tokens the stack can have. When the phrase "when 'M' appears in the text of a horde power, it refers to a power that can only be used if the current number of tokens in the stack is the maximum allowed.

Epic hordes.
In epic battles, defeated tokens are removed from the battlefield as normal but have a chance to return. At the beginning of each players turn, that player may place horde tokens previously removed from battle back on to the battlefield in that players starting area. For each 100 points of the build total a player can return two horde tokens to the battlefield, to a maximum of 50 total points of tokens. You may return them directly into a stack, if that stack occupies an area they could be placed. In an epic battle, if a player has only horde tokens remaining on the battlefield at the end of any turn, all horde tokens are immediatly defeated and that player loses the game.

Campaign Rules.

Setting up a campaign battle.
The setup section for each campaign battle specifies what what maps should be used for the battle, and the point value of the battle. Before setting up the first battle in a campaign, players should determine who will play force A and who will play force B for the duration of the campaign; during each battle, each force is required to include a particular character in their force, as explained in the setup section, and the rest of the force can be made up of other characters from the lord of the rings set or personal heroclix collections. The setup section also contains any special rules that apply to the battle.

Treasures and reinforcements.
The aftermath section of each campaign battle explains treasure and reinforcements a player can earn based on the out come of a battle. Treasures are awarded to the winner of a battle if the qualify, and can be used in any subsequent battle in the campaign, but only one treasure can be used per battle. Reinforcements are awarded to the loser of a battle if they qualify, and must be used in the next battle they play in the campaign.

The Campaign.

Campaign Battle #1 ~ The road to Rivendell.

Setup.
Map: Battlefield
Point value: 300
Force A: Aragon (or Strider), Frodo (or Ringbearer), at least one other character with the 'hobbit' keyword.
Force b: Witch King (or two characters with the 'Nazgul' keyword

Aftermath.
Treasure ~ If you won and scored 200+ victory points.
Barrow Blade: once per battle, before dealing damage with a close combat attack, roll a d6; if the result is greater than the damage being dealt, that damage is penertrating damage.

Reinforcements ~ If you lost and the winner scored 50+ more victory points than you.
Slowed by the river: before the beginning of the next battles first turn, give three opposing characters an action token.

Campaign Battle #2 ~ The mines of Moria.

Setup.
Map: Moria.
Point value: 300
Force A: Only characters with the 'fellowship' keyword
Force B: 8 Orc horde tokens

Aftermath.
Treasure ~ If you won and scored 75+ victory points more then other plasyer.
Mithrill shirt: once per battle when one of your characters would be dealt penertating damage, the damage is not penertrating.

Reinforcements ~ If you lost and the winner scored 50+ more victory points than you
Fly, you fools: during your first turn of the next battle, up to three friendly characters may be given a move action as a free action.

Campaign Battle #3 ~ Betrayal at Amon Hen.

Setup.
Battlefield.
Point value: 400
Force A: Merry (or Esquire of rohan), Pippin (or Guard of the Citidel), Frodo (or Ringbearer)
Force B: Lurtz (or Captain Lurtz), 4 Uruk-hai horde tokens.
Special rule: Before beginning of the first turn, place boromir in square J-12 as part of neither force. Any player may give Boromir a free action and roll a d6 (even if hes not on your force). On a roll of 4/5/6 he becomes freindly to your force. Victory points for Boromir are given to the player who causes hime to be defeated.

Aftermath.
Treasure ~ If you won and scored 300+ victory points.
Ringbearers Inspiration: Once per battle, as a free action remove an action token from up to two characters that have exactly on action token.

Reinforcements ~ If you lost and the winner scored 100+ more victory points than you.
Slowed by the pursuit: Before the beginning of the next battles first turn choose three opposing characters and deal each of them 1 unavoidable damage.

Campaign Battle #4 ~ The battle of Hornburg.

Setup.
Map: Helms Deep and Helms Dike.
Point value: 500
Force A: Aragon (or strider), Legolas or Gimli, 4 Haldirs archer horde tokens, 8 riders of Rohan horde tokens.
Force B: Saruman, 4 Uruk-hai horde tokens, 8 Orc horde tokens.

Aftermath.
Treasure ~ If you won and scored over 100 more victory points the other player.
Hammerhands Horn: Once per battle, give one of your characters a power action; they can use 'Incapacitate' as a free action as if they had a range value of 8 and could target 3 targets.

Reinforcements ~ If you lost and the winner scored 350+ more victory points than you.
Reinforcements at dawn: During the first turn of the next battle, each horde token can be given a free action.

Campaign Battle #5 ~ The battle of Pelennor Fields.

Setup.
Map: Minas tirith and Pelennor fields
Point vaue: 600
Force A: Gandalf, Merry (or Esquire of Rohan), Legolas, Gimli
Force B: Witch King

Aftermath.
Treasure ~ If you won and score 500+ victory points.
Inspired by the King: Once per battle, roll a d6 for each friendly character on the battlefield with a point value of 50+ points, on a result of 1 or 2 heal the character of damage equal to the result.

Reinforcements ~ If you lost and the winner score 300+ more than you.
Army of the dead: During the next battle, each time you would return up to two horde tokens to the map, may may return them to the map in any square within 5 squares of any starting area, instead of your starting area.

Campaign Battle #6 ~ The battle of the Black Gate.

Setup.
Map: Helms Dike and Battlefield.
Point value: 1000
Force A: Aragon (or strider), Gandalf
Force B: Mouth of Sauron, Olog hai

Aftermath.

Campaign end; total your victory points from each campaign battle and compare to determine the winner of the campaign.

Resident Evil DBG: A rundown, and Nightmare set previews

So not many people know of or play Resi, but I love it. Its a DBG (deck building game) I think these are relatively new still, Id never heard of it before I played Resi. Unlike MTG where you pre-build a deck out of a back catalogue of probably 18'000+ cards to then take out and play with, a DBG is basically the reverse.

When you buy Resident evil DBG you get a complete set of cards, these cards are everything a group of 4 players will need to play. You basically start from scratch every time you sit down and play (no one keeps anything from previous games) after picking a scenario, characters and your 10 card starting deck your ready to play. The deck building part then starts, where each turn you get to buy in a card from the rest of the cards in the box, these are usually 3 types (weapons/items/actions) which are then shuffled into your library ready to be picked up during your next couple of turns.

The premise of the game is that your fighting your way out of the 'mansion' from Resident evil 1 and each go you equipt a weapon, load it with ammo, open a door and hopefully kill what evers lurking on the other side or it tries to kill you before its the next players turn. Different 'infected' creatures net you different amounts of points and when the pre-determined 'boss' is revealed and killed the game ends.

There are orignally 3 different ways of playing any fans of the series will reconise, 'story mode' 'mercenaries mode' and 'vs mode' all have different ways of scoring and different shop items availible to you to help you escape the mansion first. Its a game of taking educated risks, like when you draw a magnum and enough ammo and your pretty certain your gonna cut whatevers on the other side of the door in to two as the creatures imaginary guts spray in faces of your opponents sitting accross the table only to kick the door in shooting blindly into the unknown and then finding a green herb and wasting your magnum.

Resident Evil: Nightmare.

So the fourth set has been announced. Hopefully bringing with it more cards that will help round out the older sets game modes and scenarios, such as Outbreaks 'infection mode' I was a bit disapointed with the fact that there were only 3 possible zombies you could turn into, even 2 more would of really added life (unlife?). More cards that add options into 'partner mode' and even niche ones that give bonuses in mercaneries would rock. But Bandai have promised more player to player interaction like with this sets new 'single shot rifle' so fingers crossed, and new ways to speed gameplay like ramping gold .

Characters have to be one of my favorite cards and the Nightmare Ada is instantly insane giving you card advantage for actually taking damage (mad) and after enough kills becomes near immortal (no marbles crazy), I say near because like in Magic 10 infection counters and shes gonna have some serious cravings for some brains. Also preveiwed was this sets new 'boss type' the crazy East European from Resident Evil 4 whos idea of a good time is kidnapping 12 year old girls(?) which is not a difinitive sign of being a bio enginered weapon but is genrally frowned apon in even if your not a mutant parasite.

MTG: My Commander choice part 2 ~ Restless spirits

So there might be other directions I can take my deck construction but sticking with my choice of bouncing creatures and spirits and if you like even cycles, I remember another spirit cycle this time from the Ravanica block, the 'eidolon' cycle.

These ghostly sisters fit right in with the theme Im building on, all at 4 mana you can sacrifice them for various gains. early on into the game verdant eidolon will net me back 3 of any colour mana for 1 green making her net cost 5 (2G and 3) to activate and then use that mana to cast maybe a second eidolon for 3 if my commander Animar is in play (as he would have gained +1+1 from the verdant casting reducing the cost of other creatures) and then also gaining an another +1+1 for the potentially free second creature.

So on to how Im planning to bounce my eidolons, well playing an eidolon will bounce my onnas just for being a spirit, but to return these creatures to my hand I need to cast a multicolored spell (note this dont have to be a creature, but can be) and these will return from the grave (also making them ideal blockers).

For this task Ive chosen the bouncing multicolored creatures from Planeshift, there in every colour combo you can think but im playing in red/green which gives me 3 results, all coming in at different costs from 2 to 5 which hopefully I will only ever pay 2 for (1R 1G) using Animars abilitiy.

Sparkcaster is ideal a 5/3 body which deals 1 damage to an opponent face on entry, he will effectively make eidolond return to your hand from the graveyard and if you dont have a red or green creature to return to your hand as part of his first ability just target himself bouncing him back to recast for another 1 damage.

The combo Im looking to pull off is cast verdant and sac' use the mana to cast sparkcaster (after adding red or green to the verdant mana) returning verdant to your hand, dealing 1 damage out and returning sparkcaster to your hand, netting animar +1+1 twice making the higher cost creatures that will win you the game cheaper.

With 3 eidolons, 3 onnas, and 3 multicolored bouncers making up 10% of the deck the chances of seeing different variations of this combo are high in my opinion.

And if netting myself counters is my goal by adding a 'doubling season' into my deck will give me options too. basically giving my commander a free counter every time I cast a creature making my deck work twice as fast making my mana go further. It also has an added bonus that I can also build on, it doubles up tokens that are made by other effects.



There are a few things I can use with doubling season but if I wanted to add another spirit into the mix giving my onnas more reuse and abusing the hell outta doubling seasons ability it has to be the legendary Sekki.

His "enters with 8 counters" will now be "enters with 16". While preventing up to 16 damage from attackers he would spawn 32 spirit tokens. using just 8 of those tokens I can sac them to revive Sekki again (as is the theme of reuse/recycling were working towards). He would once again enter as 16/16 spawning another 32 tokens hopefully by the time of his death, and this is another fun repeatable combo each cycle gaining 32 tokens and sacing 8 tokens. Maybe I should find away to beef up their stats making them more dangerous? Also being able to damage Sekki for 16 on my own turn spawning 32 tokens and recasting him via sac' 8 tokens which would leave me with a 16/16 body and 24 1/1 tokens waiting to throw themselves infront of any threats my opponents may swing at me with.

MTG: My Commander choice part 1

MTG: So this is my commander for the game Im putting together, dont know why just really love this guy, cheap casting cost, 3 colour wedge creature with alot of abilities, and the potentual to get massive and stomp face, and has protection from 2 of the 5 colours cant ask for more the that.

The idea Im running with for this deck is getting maximum re-usability out of the 99 other cards in the deck, the first creature I thought of when I decided to make this was kiri-onna from saviors of kamigawa. By casting her and targeting herself with her ability I can bounce her back to my hand giving Animar a +1+1 and basically reducing the costs of all other creature spells I play onwards.

Kiri onna is part of the onna cycle of cards from saviors (there is an 'onna' in each colour all with the same ability but reflecting the colours own slant on things) which means I can also have the red and green onnas which will also help my bounce mechanic via the second ability of casting a spirit (they are all spirits).





This brings me to the second part of squeezing as much juice out of the cards as possible, playing with dead things when not playing black. Who says necromancers get to have all the fun digging in the graveyard.

For all my useful spirits that I want to keep in play/hand I need a way of fishing them back from the grave, Kamigawa has a lot of spirits with 'soulshift' which are essentually 1 trick ponies as you can only 'soulshift' downwards, like a creature with a cmc (converted mana cost) of 9 will net you a cmc spirit of 8 or less.

This isnt too much of a problem as I dont plan on paying 9 for our friend 'Body' here, by time I want to play him I should only be payin 2 green as Animar will hopefully have 7 counters on him. so losing an 8/5 beat stick with trample wont be too painful when I only paid 2 for it in the first place, and maybe pull him out of the grave using another reanimation spell creating a second round of soulshifting netting me more reusable creatures.

My next task is to find ways in which I can get use of lands cards in and out of the graveyard. But I guess thats what Ill do for the next post maybe?