V Great Bats

[Thorsten the Traveller]

Great Bats V - ally 1 MP
Playable at any Shadow-hold or Dark-hold. May not be attacked. Discard if controlling character is wounded. Discard if you move through a free- domain.
Tap Great Bats to take Swarm of Bats into hand from discard pile or playdeck (shuffle). Additionally, any orc attack against opponent's companies keyed by name or type to the region or adjacent regions where Great Bats is present receives +1 prowess and +1 body (4 body for attacks without body), and any strike by orcs in the company receives +1 prowess and +1 body during CvCC. Cannot be duplicated on a company.

Pretty straight forward way to combine orc attack resource strategy with orc hazards. Take your Bats with you to your opponent, and you are a bit safer from hazards, your orc hazards will hit a bit harder, and you yourself will hit harder too. Drawback is that it takes more investment, since you can't play it at tapped sites, so basically it's a 1 mp turn and that's not that good, and it makes it useless for squatters. Trolls don't benefit either. Also I though opponent should have places to hide, and decided that free-domains are off limit.
questionable: is +1 strike too much for the Lieutenants? or is that compensated for by the limited range of the booster?

edit: changed +1 strike to +1 body (4body if no body).

[Bandobras Took]

The most brutal hazard strategy of the Virtual Cards right now is already Orcs, in my opinion. I'd hate to see Minion Resource helpers added to that mix.

Now, a minion resource helper for Pukel-Creatures . . .

[Nerdmeetsyou]

I also thought orcs were already one of the best hazard stragtegies in the game,...
maybe we should push other thing?

[Thorsten the Traveller]

well, yeah that's kind of true, orcs are always tough, though it was still considered the smaller ones needed a boost, hence Great Goblin V, and truth to say there was no card in V 1 intended for orcs, it's just that they're upped through TNaA Scimitars/Iron Crown. So if you don't play that strategy, there is no boost for orcs at all except a single unique card, so this would diversify it more.
We'll work on the puckel creature resource hazard booster then, nevertheless it can be deemed worthy to comment on the idea/content also, if only as a thought experiment.

[Jambo]

I really like the idea of retrieving Swarm of Bats. Maybe you just remove the bonuses to orcs and think of something else, if something else is really required.

For instance, what about the hazard Host of Bats?

[marcos]

Great Bats V - ally 1 MP
Playable at any Shadow-hold or Dark-hold. May not be attacked. Discard if controlling character is wounded. Discard if you move through a free- domain.
Tap Great Bats to take Swarm of Bats into hand from discard pile or playdeck (shuffle). Additionally, any orc attack against opponent's companies keyed by name or type to the region or adjacent regions where Great Bats is present receives +1 prowess and +1 body (4 body for attacks without body), and any strike by orcs in the company receives +1 prowess and +1 body during CvCC. Cannot be duplicated on a company.

i like the effect of taking swarm of bats. Very neat idea! the rest... b_took is right, orcs don't need more helpers. What about, instead of prowess booster, make a keyability improvement? make the region they are at or moving to, to change into a shadow land or dark domains if already a shadow land? That will help not only orcs, but trolls, undead, nazgul and maybe some other stuff playable there? Improve keyability a bit

For instance, what about the hazard Host of Bats?

i also thought about this

[Bandobras Took]

How about "Tap this ally during the site phase to change the site type of its company's current site (all applicable versions) from a free-hold to a border-hold or from a border-hold to a ruins & lairs until the start of your next turn."

Would allow you to modify creature keyability of a site where you expect your opponent to go.

[marcos]

but then, why would a company move there if that company knows that something ugly awaits for them there? I think that idea will work only for last turn desperate runs...

[Thorsten the Traveller]

Well, sometimes you need to go somewhere (white tree), and sometimes you are already there but need or want to stay there...

It's funny, I had thought of changing region/site type and Host of Bats, but actually I considered the effects of extra body checks/free hazard or a permanent Morgul Night much worse than just some +1 prowess

And also I like the CvCC part, because that resembles the book closest. So I'd like to keep that at least, but the orc boost can go, no problem.

But I like the mentioned ideas also, they all have a nice touch. Another idea would be to consider Doors of Night to be in play in that region...I'll brood on it a bit more.

[Jambo]

For example:

Great Bats V - ally 1 MP
Playable at any Shadow-hold or Dark-hold. May not be attacked. Discard if controlling character is wounded. Discard if you move through a free- domain.
Tap Great Bats to take Swarm of Bats into your hand from your discard pile or playdeck (shuffle). You may also tap Great Bats during your opponent's movement/hazard phase to play Host of Bats from your discard pile (counts one against the hazard limit). If your opponent's company is in the same or adjacent region as Great Bats, then this does not count against the hazard limit and Host of Bats may alternatively be taken from your sideboard or play deck (reshuffle).

[marcos]

[joke mode: ON]

Batman V
13/10




Hazard creature
Unique. Manifestation of the dark knight. Man. 1 strike, chooses defending characters. Can only be playable if either swarm of bats, host of bats or great bats is in play. If you are wearing a belt, show it to your opponent and Batman displays his super bat-belt receiving +5 strikes/ +5 prowess/ +5 body. If doors of night is in play, Batman spots the bat signal and he can be played from sideboard, hand, playdeck or out of game and can be keyed to any site or region.

[joke mode: OFF]
lol

[Jambo]

lolz

V Crebain for Robin?

[Leon]

Usually the Great Bats were only at shadowholds, why now suddenly at darkholds as well? The fact that it is no longer playable at a tapped site probably balances that though. Still it would be very useful together with the Nazgul homesite UEP to fill a ally hole in a deck with a sitting ringwraith.

[Thorsten the Traveller]

okay, new version

Great Bats V - ally 1 MP
Playable at any . May not be attacked. Cannot be duplicated on a company. Discard if controlling character is wounded. Doors of Night is considered to be in play only for the region where Great Bats is present. Tap Great Bats to take Swarm of Bats or Host of Bats into hand from discard pile or playdeck (shuffle).
Alternatively, tap Great Bats during opponents movement hazard phase to change the site where Great Bats is present from to until the end of the turn.

changed:
-playability only shadowholds. Thematically I thought darkholds would fit, and since ally taps site there's no problem, but as Leon says in combo with RW at home UEP that would be no good. Also bit more dificult to play, which is okay since ability is good.
-no more orc boost, I guess Host of Bats is cool alternative.
-no more CvCC boost, I think is pitty, had thought to make it: if only orcs in comp during CvCC you always choose characters. That really reflects the situation during War of Five Armies. But card has enough stuff already.

-change site type. I like it better than change region, even though changing region has lot more uses pro-actively. But I think Bats should stick to site,they don't swarm the whole region. Bandobras suggested change Freehold, which is cool, but it's main use would then be what? to annoy opponent, or to use a full chain of site type changers, or to key Man hazards? Goblin Faces? I think this should remain about orcs.

-Added Doors of Night local ability, not sure how that would hold rules wise, but I think it's something new, and can be nice, so we can start discussion about it. This way you can still play your Morgul Night or Chocking Shadows to change region if you want on a leaving opponent, and you don't need Doors for it (one less hazard). If you key a Lieutenant with Minion Stirr by type to the region where Bats is, will it get the extra strike/prowess? not sure.

[marcos]

i really like it. The only thing that bothers me is, will swarm of bats will be too powerful if you are able to take it from deck?