You are right Gywnn. That was not clearly stated, and should have been. I'm glad I was able to answer your question.

You know, writing these Raids gives me a very sympathic eye for UDE R&D. There are just soooo many little things that appear to be tied down. Then, when the ship hits the first small storm, so many ropes, small boxes and loose words start flopping around. :-)

Steelwing, :-D you aren't allowed to "complain" about me getting a Raid out once-ish per month, especially when set 3 is taking forever and a week. But yeah, now you have to choose between two Raids: soon three. I tried to build them differnetly, so based on the number of players you had during a given night, there would be a fairly obvious Raid to play.

1        --Hastur
2        --Crystalline Devourer
3        --Lamia (Shivan Sisters)

-Corle

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http://myworld.ebay.com/corle2/

Hi, I was the other poor sap trying to beat this raid today with Steve.

I had some questions/comments.

Why did you decide to change the core mechanics of the system instead of buffing out the boss with higher stats? I'm referring to ABC's nor recharging normally and giving characters very specific third cards.

I really like the raid, but I feel like there are so many limitations that this is almost built like a chess puzzle rather than a raid.

I am going to start trying to build my own raid and wanted to know your reasoning for the very specific choices you made for party size, point cost total and rules modifications.

This is so hard that it almost feels there are no choices to be made (if you don't bring a warrior with mortal strike to cancel out the two 20 point heals you are LOST) and I'm sorry, but I don'[t see HOW you can ever use fog of war effectively without doing a large amount of damage to yourself (Ticking up the boss) I'm going to look for the answer, it must be in there.

We used mind-numbing poison to slow him down and it was STILL a huge beating! :D

One of the main things I love about WoW minis raid format is being able to try out all the weird combination of characters. With the point cost total and especially the NUMBER of characters, this limits people to a pool of 3/4 4 point cost minis and either (2) 5 point or one 6 point mini.

Were there specific reasons for doing what you did?

I love to hear about the development process and think this is a really fun raid, I'm just nit-picking and curious.

Thanks for your hard work!

-Mike

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"Forget the Sunwell, it wasn't that important."

Defending a creative process is always dangerous because it becomes a slippy slope into "I disagree."

But, let me try to give some answers, even if they are overly-simplistic.

I changed the core mechanics of the ABCs to reflect a tone of Hastur--willpower, mind control, limitation. Also, with less focus on what ABCs you can play, it should help to turn a player's attention away, toward somewhere else it needs to be to defeat Hastur: carefully controlling your ticks.

In a normal game of WoW minis, you have a lot of things to choose from: Which minis you will use, which ABCs, when to engage the enemy, how to control your ticks, how to control the enemy's ticks, how you control your movement, how you control the enemies movement, etc.

In a Raid environemnt, you are right: one can just up the volumne on the Raid Boss and give him crazy high stats/powers. One can also tweak other aspects of the game to create a unique environment--in Hastur's case: clock control. There are other models. Sadly, not everybody is going to like each model. Crystalline Devourer was an example of being ready to deal with each threat as it arises--mostly, in picking the right character/abc combinations to handle those threats. For Hastur, the characters themselves aren't super critical. Two ABCs are critical. Something to increase your movement, and something to shut down healing (a pet helps, too, for the Blight Tokens). I think your metaphor of a chess puzzle is mostly correct. Some players like that; other's can be frustrated by it.

Raid 1 and Raid 3 play very little like a chess puzzle. Each player will have their own favorite Raid. 

Something else came up with another player which also bears mentioning. Beating a Raid is fun in Minis or Online--but it is fun because it is an accomplishment. If it is too easy--if it is beatable on a first try--there is little accomplisment involved. This is my personal belief, and I can see how others might disagree. As I said, "slippery-slope." :-D

With three factions to choose from and about 1/3 of the total minis being 4 or 5 honor, there are lots of choices to make. Your example of Mortal Strike is almost right, but there is at least one other option. The core of what you said is true though--if you are fighting a Raid Boss that heals significant amounts of damage, you have to bring a way to shut that down.

All in all you are right: Hastur is tough, tricky, a puzzle, unforgiving. His soul is bent around Willpower, Limitation, Mind Control.

PM if you'd like some hints if you find yourself getting repeatedly stuck. I think though, that you will find a way.

-c

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http://myworld.ebay.com/corle2/

Thanks a lot for your thoughtful answer... I enjoy the challenge as well and didn't mean to sound over critical.

I look forward to trying the crystal raid as well.

I understand your design decisions and am glad they were very deliberate. I like the puzzle aspect, I hope others will as well.

I don't own an entire set of minis, but will try again with a horde group. we were missing the 4 cost priest from set 2 we wanted, we may proxy her for our next try.

Thanks again! :)

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"Forget the Sunwell, it wasn't that important."

899489:

Your example of Mortal Strike is almost right, but there is at least one other option. The core of what you said is true though--if you are fighting a Raid Boss that heals significant amounts of damage, you have to bring a way to shut that down.

I haven't checked if this will work, but could you tick him past the healing ticks and just eat the damage he would do to you?

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Master Tactician and Rexxar...

:-D

I don't think you sounded critical. Concerned maybe. Your post had that careful thinking process of somebody trying to figure out how to take Hastur down. :-)

Both 4 honor priests whom can use Holy Nova are pretty rocking.  

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And, nope, :-) you can't tick Hastur past his PW:Resurgence since the Start of Turn and End of Turn triggers happen regarless of what tick Hastur is on.

-c

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http://myworld.ebay.com/corle2/

I think the hardest part of this is the Ebb and Flow keywords. Since you can only gain aggro tokens when you actually damage him these 4 cost characters sometimes go more than one attack before gaining a token. That means Hastur is swinging for 8 dice most of the time. That's ridiculous. Add to that the Nullify on key turns twice in a row and you're looking at a wiped party by the time you are allowed to damage him again... Otherwise, I like it. It's fun to have an automatic opponent so I can play by myself.

You are right--controling Ebb and Flow is extremely critical.

:-D

Everybody can bring a healing pot as their 3rd ABC... this could be used to heal ...

...or you can use it in a more sneaky sense to gain 1 aggro token. Hastur throwing 5 dice at, say, Boris in a forest isn't so bad. Basically, you are right, your whole team needs to be ready to tank.

-c

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http://myworld.ebay.com/corle2/

Si basically, Cthylla isn't a pet but a character and thus blocks LOs and you can't move through him.

Right?

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If the Flinstones happened before christ, how come they celebrate christmas?

Correct, Cthylla is a character. She cannot be moved off of the Blight Token and characters cannot move through her.

In essense, she must be destroyed before you can "turn off" her Blight Token.

-c

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http://myworld.ebay.com/corle2/