Acronym Man is back with another edition of "Pick a party from the hat at random!"
Today's three random alliance figs, selected by a process many Roarks suspect involves a hat and slips of paper, features 20 honor worth of toolbox fun and selective offense.
RIP - Alliance 20 Honor (Base)
Ryno the Short
Ixamos the Redeemeed
Parvink
Caught on to the theme and synergy yet? Searing Pain and Despair are both 4 dice attacks for 2 ticks, each with a meta-significant crit and dealing out magic and physical damage, respectively.
Ixamos, a dude many consider Phadalus' uglier cousin, boasts standard stats for a shammy and brings all the best cards a player could love, but Heroism is a note-worthy ability when your team is out to play with the clock.
Parvink really wants to run around with a Jhuroon beside her, and with cards like Heroic Leap and Mocking Blow, Parvink can wreak havoc on opposing characters whose owners have worked out several ticks ahead in their heads. I'd be remiss were I to leave out Sunder Armour and Breakthrough, so given the Realms map ahead, I'd drop Heroic Leap to make room for both.
Ixamos packs an interesting attack with his Gladiator's Cleaver, but he comes packed with an even better attacking weapon--Sulfuras, Hand of Ragnaros. He wont need the hand in ever match, but I'd certainly pack it against pesky high-armour parties to go over the pallies' ridiculous armour. I really want to make room for two heals for Ixy, but there's potential available to abuse Ryno and some healing thanks to Wrath of Air Totem. You know that a lot of damage will be spread around, so Chain Heal feels like an efficient option. Still, is there a time you can think of when you would want Sulf and Wrath of Air Totem? Probably not, but not necessarily out of the question. I'd have to play a few games with various shammy variations, but I think RIP settles on Sulf, Chain Heal, and Healing Wave. For matches where you do expect to need both healing cards, maybe Parvink would be willing to carry Ixy's hammer for a while. Personally? I like that.
Ryno's cards might seem straight forward, right? Death Coil and Jhuroon, yeah? Afterall, we are talking King of the Hill in a few weeks, so we might as well hedge our bets. Conversely, Fear is highly appealing to me, particularly against those upstart bands that try to crusader aura their way to the hill early. For some matches, Fear will be less than appealing, and for others Jhuroon may seem a Liability. Hedging our bets with Corruption throws out stable damage at a rate you can plan on in matches where you may need that late game push from auto damage to break a tie or finish off a character that tries to run from the fray.
ABC's I'd pencil in for RIP:
Mocking Blow
Breakthrough
Sunder Armor
Sulfuras, Hand of Ragnaros
Chain Heal
Healing Wave
Summon Jhuroon
Fear
Corruption
You know, I almost packed a second Parvink instead of Ryno, but feared the lack of efficient magic damage could spell disaster for the party. Still, one thing I loved about early versions of GoFeR was packing 4 Pally ABCs for Graccus and 5 Warrior ABCs for Roria and Fillet to share. The versatility was a key feature of the band. If I felt confident about Ryno's ABCs enough to cut one, I'd certainly reconsider a Shammy card.
Well, that's it for this edition of "Pick a party from the hat at random." Tune in next time when we once again pull out some whacked-out crazy party configuration, seemingly at random.
Cheers!
-teh Sig
Christopher "Siggie teh Sig" Nugent
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email me at teh_Sig @yahoo dot com