I haven’t gone through all the flavor text on all the cards, but I don’t see the connection between these two. Tachyon is all science-y and Matriarch gets her powers from a thrift store magic mask. Tachyon doesn’t have any connection to Rook City as far as I know. I don’t remember seeing anything that suggested they know each other, much less that they’re arch rivals. Is there a connection I’m missing?
Cousins, if I’m not mistaken.
Tachyon gained much success in her life, The Matriarch was always compared to Tachyon, setting high expectations.
Relationship: they are cousins. TheJayMann is spot on.
Powers: Tachyon’s abilities are based on science and knowledge. The Matriarch’s abilities are based on magic and . . . poetry.
Mechanics: Tachyon and The Matriarch both spam through their decks as fast as they can. They have similar play mechanics - well, as similar as villain play and hero play can be.
Huh, I never even noticed the similarity in the way they play, but that actually makes total sense. I knew about the cousin thing for a while, but that was it. And hey, the contrast between science and magic makes sense too. Applause for complexity. Still haven’t beaten Matriarch though.
So could another comparison be that Wraith uses tech (gadgets) to boost herself whereas Spite uses organic compounds (drugs) to boost himself?
I can’t really think of any other comparisons from the other rivalries we have so far though. In terms of play style, I mean.
Legacy is a team-booster. Baron Blade prefers to not fight his own fights.
Tempest has lots of area attacks that do damage to multiple targets. Grand Warlord Voss supplies plenty of targets.
Mr. Fixer is one man against the world. The Chairman is that world.
Citizen Dawn uses waves of powerful Citizens. Expatriette uses powerful waves of bullets.
Oh, well, that’s handy. Those all make sense. And congrats, that last one made me laugh pretty well. I give that a genuine “LOL”. Or at least, I stifled some giggles since I’m in a public computer lab.
Are you gonna try and do them all like that, like Plague Rat’s cowboy will attach cards to other heroes, or whoever Haka’s nemesis is will charge up before doing things? Well, I’m assuming the answer is “duh”, so, neat!
And yeah, I imagine Baron Blade isn’t much of a team player, especially since in the flavor text for one of Exp’s cards, I’m pretty sure he just tells his soldiers “Yeah, she’s gonna shoot a ton of you, but you can just use the guys who get shot in the front as meat shields!” I think I’d start looking for a new boss right around then…
It appears I have a new signature now. Though, I just noticed, my previous signature was somehow removed…
Bringing up an old topic.
The website is updated and new character bios are up for Rook City characters.
But still... The relationship between Matriarch and Tachyon is really weak.
Is there more that we should know about Matriarch? Did she rain birds on Tachyon's lab and threatened to kill Unity?
As I was going through her bio to add to my PDF, I was struck by how tongue-in-cheek bits of her biography were (she was born next to a mall, her occupation is "angsty teenager"), but (thankfully) that same proto-silliness didn't translate over to her cards and abilities. She plays just like any other deadly serious villain, although maybe it's there in her flavor text. I don't spend a lot of time reading that.
It could have been worse. She could have had "teenage tantrum" one-shots and "no one understands me" ongoing cards.
I kept forgetting to ask at Gen Con, so I guess I'll just ask here since this is the right place, but how are Ambuscade and Haka similar? I've thought about it, but I can't quite put my finger on it.
Ambuscade likes hunting, and he thinks "wild" Haka is his ultimate game.
No no, I mean like, how are their decks similar? Since all the nemeses are supposed to be reflections of each others' decks, Haka and Ambuscade should play similarly. But as far as I can tell, I can't really see the similarities. Haka's main mechanic is his charge-up moves, like "Haka of Shielding/Battle/Restoration" and "Savage Mana". But Ambuscade doesn't really have those. Ambuscade has a bunch of different weapons, but Haka only really has two. So how are they similar?
They... aren't? Most of them aren't really similar at all. They are mostly thematically complimentary, rather than mechanically. They often are exact opposites, in fact. Legacy sacrifices himself for his team; Blade sacrifices his team for himself. Tempest and ExPat are great at AoE, and Voss and Dawn have lots of targets to hit. Since ExPat is better at high damage across low amounts of targets, Dawn has fewer, higher-health minions, while Voss has a bunch of weak ones. Fixer has versitile damage, to counter the Chairman's wide variety of thugs. Spite has victims that you have to save, some drugs that deal and prevent damage, and a bunch of one-shots, and Wraith has lots of equipments that overcome DR and reduce damage dealt. Akash'Bhuta has a bunch of targets, and Argent has lots of ongoing and equipments.
The only ones that are similar mechanically at all are Matriarch and Tachyon, which makes up for their weak thematic bond.
Yeah, not sure where you got the idea that nemeses had to have similar deck mechanics.
We were talking about it literally in this same thread. Like, just scroll up a little more.
Tempest can damage a lot of things, and Voss has a lot of targets for him to damage.
ExPat has guns that do various ammounts of damage, and Dawn has her Citizens that do various ammounts of everything.
Chairman's thugs do a variety of things, much like Mr. Fixer's tools.
Matriarch and Tachyon burn through their decks quickly.
Wraith uses equipment where Spite uses drugs.
Ra and The Ennead are just pure damage dealers.
Argent Adept has his instruments, Akash'Bhuta has her limbs.
And so on. Christopher himself said they're supposed to be similar.
Haka uses his signature weapons in combat, and has a nifty "Haka" mechanic for spikes of damage/healing/defense.
Ambuscade uses his signature devices in combat, and has a nifty "Trap" mechanic for spikes of damage to 1/all heroes.
Also, Ambuscade is looking for the most dangerous prey. Can you think of a more terrifying person to hunt than Haka?
Well, I guess the traps are technically a "charge up" for Ambuscade since they take a while to appear. Since there's like four of them, you've got about a 1/10 chance of hitting an active trap (assuming they're all active).
Would it be safe to guess that Fanatic, Nightmist, Apostate, and Gloomweaver all use relics to there advantage (making both pairs similar)?
Of course, Fanatic and Apostate also share the ability to wipe the field clean with "End of Days" and "Apocalypse".
And swords! Plus, the "nope, I don't die - I destroy a Relic instead" mechanic.
So I see... The new inclusion of Relics in End of Days affect these guys, plus Matriarch.
After playtesting Ambuscade a bunch, we started playing that he starts with all of his traps face up. It made him more challenging.
I like that idea. Seemed weird to me that you could draw a trap, shuffle it back into the deck face-up, and if it ends up close to the bottom, never see it again during the fight.
It will certainly make him more challenging and entertaining to play against! 
Or maybe you could play that if you draw a trap, rather than shuffling it randomly back into the deck, you could always place it face-up a certain number of spaces down in the deck, i.e. a trap will always go off three (for example) draws after it's first encountered.
This is an interesting topic. It's basically different for all of the villain/hero pairs, but I think for the most part that each of them do a fine job of playing off each other. Sometimes you have to look at things differently in order to appreciate it, but it's there for all of them.
For some of them, the link is more thematic in nature. I don't know how you could fight Voss and NOT want to play Tempest, from a thematic standpoint. To be there spouting off angry dialogue about vengeance for destroying your planet is probably a good part of why we play this game.
Expatriette has the mechanical link others have described, but she also has great thematic links that I don't think I've seen pointed out here. Citizen Dawn has all sorts of Communist imagery, not least of all the card back and the freaking name. Expatriette is clearly a Republican member of the NRA.
Matriarch/Tachyon feels like more of the mechanical link, and I find that works just fine for me.
There's other fun dichotomies. I'm sure I'm not the only one to notice that Haka, the hero with the most hit points, is opposed by Ambuscade, the villain with the least. Inversely, Argent Adept has the fewest hit points among heroes, and Akash'Bhuta has the most among the villains, at 100% more than the closest contenders.
One more, and I'll shut up. The relationship between Apostate and Fanatic is perfect. Aside from the ironclad thematic link, there are a bunch of cards that are mirror images of each other, and they're both extremely good against the other. Fanatic can tear into Apostate like no other, but she can't win the game on her own. This is how it's done.
One thing between Haka and Ambuscade, if Haka keeps taking his devices with Savage Mana, he'll have more chances to combo where he shuffles the trash and plays the top card and will make the traps come up more often. I remember shuffling his deck like 5 times or so in a single turn once, and that was without Haka stealing his toys. And I believe one card reveals until a device is revealed, if less devices are in there, the better chance a trap that's been armed becomes the top card.
That's true. When we played Ambuscade a few days ago at Gen Con, he got a ton of combos, but that was without absorbing his gadgets. He got "Run 'n' Gun", we reshuffled, and he got it again. And this happened in two different turns. Then he got a "Run 'n' Gun" and "Quick Stim-Patch" combo, so he was pretty much playing three cards every turn.
Good lord. Ambuscade "Run 'n' Gun'd" every turn we played. I could've killed his fictional being.
Yeah, but I guess it makes sense that Ambuscade can do that, since he's got the lowest health of any villain (not counting individual members of The Ennead). He's easy to kill, but he's got an equal chance of winning since he hits pretty hard. He's like the sabre cats in Skyrim. Don't worry, Dakota; you'll understand what I mean once I let you have our copy of the game.
Awh, man! I just spit Dr. Pepper all over my keyboard.
So what would Unity's nemisis' deck do? Destroy hero cards to bring out minoins?
Perhaps an old school mate that instead of technomancy used biomancy for similar effect. Plus she ended up on the freedom five despite not being able to pay enough attention in college, but he worked hard and graduated top of his class and still didnt get in. Thus he turns into her bitter rival and a super villain to boot.
Yeah, I've got a feeling Unity's nemesis will be very biological-based. I really can't wait to see her nemesis. Since she's my favorite character, I want to see her really fighting hardcore against someone.