Played Sentinel Tactics at GenCon. Anyone else?

So I made it to the Greater Than Games booth at GenCon and tried a round of Sentinel Tactics. I didn't love it. It's very different from Sentinels in a lot of ways. The characters are limited, with a bunch of fixed stats and a very small deck; only a few cards can be in play at a time. I did a short writeup of the game for The Gameological Society, and took a picture of one of the temp character cards. It seemed to be a hex-based tactical warfare simulator without Sentinels' character flexibility and game balance. That said, we played a very basic 3-on-3 duel scenario, as opposed to the many scenarios the co-designer and playtest leader talked about. Those sound like potentially a lot more fun — like the ability to have multiple players take on one person playing a villain, or a co-op version with the players against an environmental hazard.

Did anyone else here get to try it at GenCon? I'm curious to hear other takes. I tested it out on Saturday when they were doing the battling-heroes scenario, but I was told that on Sunday, they were going to try out the heroes-vs.-villain scenario. I'm curious how that went. Looking forward to the Kickstarter.

(“A competitive scenario is one of the things people keep telling us they miss inSentinels,” he said)

From your article (Luther Hendricks said that)

Really? I have heard people ask about it when describing the game ("So no one plays the villain?!") but never after the first play, and no complaints about it.

(Apologies for the first post in this thread being a derail)

There are some house rules people implement to allow a sixth player to control the villain.

The most common comments I've had regarding Sentinels are how amazingly thematic it is, and how refreshing it is to have a cooperative game.

While I didn't get to play, I did get to watch a demo session:   the heroes were fighting Baron Blade in some environment (I wasn't sure which).  Heroes I saw included Tachyon, Bunker, Ra, and Legacy and (I think) Absolute Zero.  The fellow running the demo was playing as Blade, moving around both the Baron himself and several minions.  The infamous TerraLunar Impulsion Beam was in play and he had a wonderful delivery as the heroes were apparently only scant rounds away from being smooshed by the moon.

I did enjoy how simple the character sheets are:  each Hero only has two "powers" out at a given time, though each turn you could swap out one of your powers with another from your hand, giving each Hero a full suite of abilities.  Every attack is a contested series of d6s, a la Risk, though each attack has certain numbers that act as automatic misses.  Generally speaking, you want to roll high, but avoid the "miss" numbers:  i.e. if your miss number is a 4, you're better off rolling a 3, because that's still a potential hit.  

I'm interested to see how the theme of SotM comes to the minis arena--the interview Christopher gave on The Spiel made it sound like both companies are really on the same page in trying to bring the comic book feel to the game, so that's a big plus for me.  I do wonder exactly "how far" they're going to go in terms of expansions--as in, are we going to see Fixer/Expatriette, Nightmist/Argent Adept, and Chrono-Ranger/Omnitron X?  Or, are we going to be sticking with the "core" Heroes?

Ooh, speaking of?!  Are we going to see a massive CosmiTron drop-ship?!  That'd be pretty awesome on its own!

I played in a heroes vs. villains scenario, and I loved it. It felt super thematic to me, and I thought the mechanics were actually pretty tight.

I've been lucky enough to play it a couple times, now. My thoughts:

• I think it's more thematic than the card game, as the heroes get to pick from everything - what powers/abilities you have isn't defined by a random card draw, but by what you choose. You get to pick from all your cards.
• Some heroes work better against villains than against heroes. AZ, for example (who I've played in most of my games) does really poorly against heroes, but put him up against villains and he can really shine.
• Each hero has a specific role, but is very versatile in how that role can be filled. They're doing a good job of fleshing that out.
• The scenarios are interesting and entertaining, to me.
• I think they've really captured the personalities of the heroes and villains.
• Personally, I prefer all coop games, so having someone play the villain is actually a (very small) strike against it for me, but I still enjoy the game a great deal.
• They're still balancing the game - that's why it's in playtesting status. :wink:

Does a player have to control the villain? Is there any fully coop component to it or will it be all PvP in some regard?

The majority of scenarios will be one person playing the villain and everyone else playing heroes.

The hero-vs-hero scenario (AKA "Bunker's Battle School", if I remember correctly) is sort of an intro scenario to let folks get used to how the game plays, etc.

Having said that, it will be easy enough for us to come up with our own scenarios - even villain vs villain!

And FYI, I did get to play a bit in an Omnitron scenario. He takes up three hexes!

I'm surprised more people don't do hero vs. hero in teh regular game, it's rather easy and a lot of fun (esp. 2v2 or 1v1v1).  I'm super excited for Tactics, card games don't lend themselves to as much theme as miniatures.  Custom scenarios are going to be great fun as well.

I can't wait for a scenario that is villain vs villain with the Heroes trying to stop them from destroying the city.

It is going to be fun having all the people on these forums to design new scenarios with.

I only got to watch pieces of demos, I wasn't able to play.  But I did talk to Rabit breifly about it, and I think I've got the general idea.

  I'm a sucker for miniatures.   Sentinel minis?  Yes please.    I also think this game is going shine a lot more once its out of playtesting because,   like me, most people are suckers for miniatures too.   Imagine a nice lush green hex grid, with carnivorous plants set up at LoS terrain peices, maybe a volcano or river of lava running through the map.   Sprinkled in you've got wraiths mini hiding behind a tree,  a Legacy figure all shiny and new standing in the front backed up by Bunker and Tachyon..  and then a giant robot, 3 times the size of them all crawling over the field.   I'd probably buy that even if the game was terrible.

 I personally like Team vs 1 games,  I enjoy Mansions of Madness, but I rarely play it because it takes quite some time.  The idea has merit though.   It's co-op,  but it's not.   If you prefer co-op games, then that's cool, you're on the hero team.   If you've got a competitive edge,  play the villain.

I really want a Heroes vs. Zombies Gloomweaver scenario.  I love Last Night on Earth, and I always want a superheroes vs. Zombies version.  I'll make my own if I have to, it will be glorious.

Heroes overwhelmed trying to contain a horde of Zombies, keep them out of buildings and away from innocent civilians while trying to stop the source of the whole mess.

I just want GloomWeaver to be in ST, so I can play the dashing Cursed Acolyte!

I love the location aspect of Sentinel Tactics. I love the dice rolling. I like that the number of options at any given time is relatively constrained. I like that one's entire set of abilities are potentially available at all times (to Rabit's point about being more thematic).

I am reserving judgement on game play and balance because I have played only one, limited scenario of an unfinished game, but I am cautiously optimistic.

The thing I am most excited about, however, is tournaments. I look forward to enjoying grand tournaments of Sentinel Tactics and hopefully seeing hordes of people coming to local, regional, and international tournaments to test their mettle.

On a tangent, I just finished watching the third Gamers Movie (highly recommend, available for free until Sep 1st, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zp9h_6g1Ik0&feature=share) in which the annual winner of a tournament can actually effect the ongoing storyline for the collectible card game featured in the move. Now, I don't want Sentinels or Sentinels:Tactics to become collectible, but I love that idea of having the outcome of play and tournaments actually affect the storylline of the Multiverse.

I think La Capitan would make a great villain for Tactics. I have absolutely no ulterior motives for that suggestion. Nope. None whatsoever.

I'm pretty sure GloomWeaver would be the better option. After all Cursed Acolute > Seige Breaker.

Gloomweaver the better option? Zombies have been done to death and are quite boring. A time travelling pirate with a crew from everywhen is much more interesting.

You two should just make custom decks centered around your cameos and duel it out Yugioh style. The winner gets to dream of being in Sentinels Tactics, or like 5 bucks I guess.

This would be fun, but I'd want to board the ship, and from the scale of Omnitron being three hexes the ship wouldn't be too big.

Chasing her through different environments in time would be fun though.

I want the Zombies because Zombies are fun to burn through.

Dawn has been confirmed, right? That might mean every game will come with a mini-Christopher and a mini-Adam.

I'm surprised more people don't do hero vs. hero in teh regular game, it's rather easy and a lot of fun (esp. 2v2 or 1v1v1).

That had never never occurred to me, and now I'm instantly dying to try it, if only to see how balanced the characters are in an average faceoff. It'd be brutal, though, given how well my group knows all the characters and their particular weaknesses and strengths.

Spoilers: they aren't. Characters with reliable AoE, DR, redirection, and the like dominate the board. NightMist is just about game-breaking, and a well-timed Powered Shockwave will wipe everyone. Also, the Scholar.

It's definitely news to me that these characters are in the game–were they playable at GenCon?

He was responding to the point about PvP in the card game. In the card game, they would not be balanced in a straight up fight.

It occurs to me that if this is set years after the card game certain characters will not be around to play in Tactics, and possibly some characters in Tactics will never be seen in the card game.

Ah, thanks for the clarification.

And really?  I can't imagine doing true hero vs hero matches in the card game.  Could you really expect Argent Adept to actually go up against a damage dealer like Ra or Expatriette with a realistic chance of winning?  Not going to happen.

Argent Adept needs at least one other hero on the team, but I could see him being quite powerful in a 2v2 game.

1v1 it is Omnitron-X and Legacy stomp RA, Ra stomps everyone else.  There are a few decent matchups, but the real fun is in 2v2 or 1v1v1, or in the F4 vs. Wardens fight, that was fun but long.

In multi hero games Argent dies fast, because you want him dead before he gets going.  Wraith and Smoke Bombs really helps him, unity and AZ stay alive.

There are so far two baic rule differences which change the game significantly:

If you use an Environment deck (I prefer this way) then any card that destroys ongoing also destroys equipment.  Play that the choice of what gets destroyed is the hero who played the destruction's choice.

If you don't use an environment deck then change environment to be Equipment.

I put my rules and a bit of what I've found out here: https://greaterthangames.com/forum/topic/pvp-training-room-fun-3859

I think Visionary would stomp Ra, all she needs is Demoralizition and Tekekinectic Cocoon. Since Ra has now Ongoing Destruction, there is nothing he can do about it.

Should put her in there as well, I've 1v1 her and Ra but I never got Cocoon, also Wrest the mind is game over if they can't destroy it.  Cocoon was big in a 1v1v1 though, and Wrest the Mind is major fun.  Legacy should be in that category too, but then I always seem to get Evolution before I die and then it is over.

2v2 is my favorite by far, so many great combos.

I'm interested to see how the theme of SotM comes to the minis arena--the interview Christopher gave on The Spiel made it sound like both companies are really on the same page in trying to bring the comic book feel to the game, so that's a big plus for me.  I do wonder exactly "how far" they're going to go in terms of expansions--as in, are we going to see Fixer/Expatriette, Nightmist/Argent Adept, and Chrono-Ranger/Omnitron X?  Or, are we going to be sticking with the "core" Heroes?

I imagine some heroes will be very hard to translate to the tactics game, and even if they do, they won't be nearly as cool to play.

Imagine Argent Adept in a tactics game, they aren't likely to have chains of powers, Adept isn't going to be enarly as awesome as he can be in a card game.

I'd go with th Scholar, Visionary and Nightmist too, no way they can be like they are in the card game and maintain Balance in a tactical game.

On the same note though, how cool is Bunker going to be?  He'll probably be much more powerful in the tactical game than he is in the card game.  I hope they have a turret mode where he gives up movement to use an extra power.

Unity would be amazing in a tactical game, adding turrets to a hex map, and little Chompers running about biting people's kneecaps off.  Don't even know what they'd do with the F5 bots.

What would you do with Mr. Fixer, or Expat to make them different from other heroes and still good?

I don't see them being able to make them all in the tactics game, and a good number of the heroes are going to have a very different feel from the card game.  Not just the obvious difference in cards vs. map play either, I imagine Legacy isn't going to be as much of a tank as a melee fighter in Tactics.

I could see Fixer as a sort of skirmish-style fighter, almost similar to Tachyon in the sense that he'd be able to hit and run.  I could see him doing a bit more damage and being slightly less mobile.  I could also see him as a master of manipulating his foes:  maybe after he deals damage, he can move a foe to a different adjacent hex or push them away from him.  Since the tactics game only allows two Powers, Fixer's deck could almost be ported in as is:  one Style, one Tool allowed.  

Expatriette is a bit of a different story, I think.  Obviously, her schtick is ranged attacking, but diversity in the card game comes through her weapons.  Perhaps something like this:

• Pride and Prejudice:  Moderate Range, target two separate foes with a bonus die for accuracy (since they are her signature weapons)
• RPG Launcher:  Long distance, cannot be used on foes within X hexes.  Choose 1 hex: attacks all foes in or adjacent to that hex.
• Shotgun: Very short range (maybe only adjacent); Heavy damage and pushes foe 1 hex away.
• Hairtrigger Reflexes: any foe that enters Expatriette's LoS, she gets a free attack against. (This would make her into a stealthy sort of character, who ducks behind terrain only to blow you away each time you try to follow)
• Napalm Launcher:  Leaves behind a trail of fire in X hexes for one turn, damaging any who enter it. (Good for battlefield control)
• Taser:  Moderate distance with low damage.  If used to target a minion-type creature, that creature cannot act next round.

Just a few ideas off the top of my head.

@phantaskippy

You are correct; Bunker and Unity are both *awesome* and *super fun* in Tactics. :)

Yeah!

I want little miniature Chompers.  They will be involved in the card game even.