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The Streets of Khemi


Ken

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So, we didn’t realize in our previous games that the Spellbook replenishes at the start AND THE END of the heroes’ turn. That’s insane. It makes Hadrathus virtually untouchable. That plus the Battle Ace for Conan plus the reduced Javelin Throwers plus the reduced Reinforcement rate made for a very different game. That was especially the case because our game also had a HUGE dice swings away from the OL. The Dark Demon only did 3 damage on 3 red dice, my Eternal Guards kept swinging and missing rolling 1 hit on an orange and a red, and Hadrathus kept rolling double 2s with Bori’s Rage, sometimes by rerolling one of them. So in some sense it’s balanced because without that dice swing the heroes might not have won.

 

BUT we still have suggestions:

 

1) Swap the positions of the Demons and make the Stygian Artefact come from the DD not the ODD. It’s a harder kill because of Jinx (unless you have the Medallion) but it’s slow so it can’t fly away like the ODD. It’s so hard to kill the ODD because of its 8 move that the heroes never go for it, or for Shiang Mian. Put the lumbering DD on the ship with him, though, and you’ve got a real

incentive to go that way instead.

 

2) One probem with this scenario is it relies too much on minions because the Sorcerers really aren’t very good at magic. Their spells aren’t very good and at a move of 1 it’s going to take FOREVER for them to meet up. Since it’s almost impossible to go for Shuang-Mian at the moment, that means every scenario plays out in the top left corner attacking Thoth-Amon. So, two changes...

  1: Give Thoth-Amon a move of 2. It will still take him SIX activations to reach Shuang-Mian, assuming no hindering. 

  2: Change Set’s Possession to Changing Destiny or Psychic Strike. At the moment, Hadrathus uses move and Teleport to zip in and out and it’s tough to use Set’s Possession. At least with Changing Destiny (combined with a move of 2) he can stop Hadrathus’ constant pew-pew. Or with Psychic Strike, which is a really powerful spell, he can slow someone down another way. Having a more powerful spell on Thoth-Amon also makes Shuang-Mian a more appealing target. My preference would be Changing Destiny just because Psychic Strike is so powerful. Perhaps Move of 2 + Changing Destiny OR Move of 1 and Psychic Strike. But the sorcerers need to be more powerful.

 

Finally, there’s really no point in putting the Xuthal Crown on Hadrathus since you can’t the mind control event to use spells. But we think you should be able to. If Hadrathus can Bori’s Rage his friends that would be fun. Or move 2 and Teleport 2. But he wouldn’t be able to Lightning Storm because it costs 3. 

 

So, it was an outlier game because of the dice skew. But changing the Demons at the very least opens the board up much more and therefore gives more variety.

 

 

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@Neil Amswych Thanks for the feedback!

 

6 hours ago, Neil Amswych said:

So, we didn’t realize in our previous games that the Spellbook replenishes at the start AND THE END of the heroes’ turn. That’s insane. It makes Hadrathus virtually untouchable.

 

I agree, the spellbook is overpowered and makes Hadrathus virtually unkillable. My original scenario did not have it, and I had to tweak the scenario once it got added - including adding a monster that could actually hurt him (the dark demon, who was not in my original scenario). During my playtests, I had Hadrathus teleporting everywhere, killing things and opening chests in the process.

 

6 hours ago, Neil Amswych said:

1) Swap the positions of the Demons and make the Stygian Artefact come from the DD not the ODD. It’s a harder kill because of Jinx (unless you have the Medallion) but it’s slow so it can’t fly away like the ODD. It’s so hard to kill the ODD because of its 8 move that the heroes never go for it, or for Shiang Mian. Put the lumbering DD on the ship with him, though, and you’ve got a real incentive to go that way instead.

 

My concern is that this would be unbalanced in sessions that don't have Atali. During an early playtest without Atali, all 4 heroes zerged the ODD and would have killed him in round 2 if not for his movement. Even the DD will drop quickly faced against the combined firepower of the heroes...and then it is just a hop skip and a jump to kill Shuang Ming.

 

That being said, I like some of your suggestions (especially beefing up the sorcerers), but I will need to break out the game and have another design session in order to be comfortable making those changes. (Which is tough for me right now with my schedule.)

Edited by Ken
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9 hours ago, Neil Amswych said:

One probem with this scenario is it relies too much on minions because the Sorcerers really aren’t very good at magic. Their spells aren’t very good and at a move of 1 it’s going to take FOREVER for them to meet up. Since it’s almost impossible to go for Shuang-Mian at the moment, that means every scenario plays out in the top left corner attacking Thoth-Amon. So, two changes...

  1: Give Thoth-Amon a move of 2. It will still take him SIX activations to reach Shuang-Mian, assuming no hindering. 

 

 

 

@Neil Amswych @Ken

FYI

Thoth Amon's base move is already 2. He is allowed to move his base move, just can't add gems according to Ken's magic aura rules.

Screenshot_20180716-112356_Drive.jpg

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1 hour ago, Neil Amswych said:

Dammit how did I get that wrong? Ignore our test

 

I know how: Overturn Rising Sands has your head spinning! 🙂

 

(BTW - I backed that game on day 1 and dropped on day 2 because of their weaselly behavior and comments.)

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I just spent the last two hours solo playtesting this scenario. It was a total nail-biter. Conan killed Atali turn 1 while Hadrathus went for chests and Bori’s Rage on Thoth-Amon. Meanwhile, Niord and Ikhmet gunned for the Outer Dark Demon. They killed it but both died. Conan did the largest Circular Strike attack I’ve ever seen, with 14 damage from the Halberd (check the spelling on that btw), killing 4 minions in one swing. The key for the heroes is attacking the ODD and Thoth amon at the same time because the OL burns through gems stopping the heroes from getting either kill. In the end, Hadrathus opened all 4 chests on the mainland and then picked up the Stygian Artefact left by the dead ODD, opened a chest on the boat, found the Scepter and eventually killed Shuang Mian with the third Lightning Storm attack. Was genuinely the most enjoyable game of Conan I’ve played in a while. It’s an excellent campaign end, and it’s ready to go. Sorry for my bad tests earlier.

Edited by Neil Amswych
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7 hours ago, Neil Amswych said:

Let’s say on turn one, Shuang Mian activates and throws down a lot of gems to move Conan. Knowing that Conan has to move towards Atali, SM moves Conan further away, meaning it’ll take him longer to get there. Does that contravene the enthrallment rule that Conan must move towards her?

 

Good catch. Poor Conan has so many things controlling his mind.

 

I will need to clarify in the rules that Atali's enthrallment is not actually mind control like the other spells.

 

This means that:

A) Conan CAN be moved away from Atali via possession/mind control.

B) Xuthal's Crown does NOT protect Conan from Atali's enthrallment.

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5 hours ago, Neil Amswych said:

Was genuinely the most enjoyable game of Conan I’ve played in a while. It’s an excellent campaign end, and it’s ready to go. Sorry for my bad tests earlier.

 

Glad to hear this. I was getting worried.

 

@Neil Amswych By the way, how would beefing up the sorcerers have affected your playtest? I am still toying with the idea of giving them better spells.

Edited by Ken
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OK, so I updated the Streets of Khemi. Here are the changes:

 

1. Reduced Shuan Mings life points to 4.

2. Removed one of the Bossonian Guards.

3. Updated Mind Control to allow the Overlord to also use a Hero's spells. (Thanks for the idea Neil!) And I wrote it so the limit of 2 only applies to action spaces.

 

Unfortunately, all of the really cool offensive spells are not in the Core game, so Thoth is stuck with Set's leftovers. 😞

 

I also clarified how Atali interacts with Heroes, other OL units, and Xuthal's Crown.

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