Impressions of your first hero

From the Sentinels Tactics thread (not a cut, just stealing the disussion topic idea) -- who was the first hero you played in SotM, and what impression did it give you?

My first game was - rather unwisely - as Absolute Zero. I saw how things could come together at a very low level, and we won on the strength of the other players. It was first edition, so there was no "H" mechanic, so my dead weight didn't gravely cost the team. I didn't get the full awesome of AZ, but I also saw that Wraith, Haka, Ra and Legacy were able to stomp the Baron into the ground.

My first was a two player game with two heroes (like many people, I missed the section of the rules that says this isn't a good idea). I played Tempest because he looked cool, and I think my boyfriend played Ra. 

We saved Insula Primalis from the ravages of Baron Blade. Yay!

Now I've told this story multiple times now but I was really expecting not to like it at all, being a person who doesn't like comic books or superheroes and predominantly plays Eurogames. A couple of turns in and I was completely hooked - there are enough decisions and the idea of working out the effects of my different options and assessing which is the best for this particular situation was very appealing to my Eurogamer side, and getting to smash someone's face in mercilessly appeals to pretty much everyone, right?

It just goes to show that sometimes my first impressions are utterly, completely wrong. 

Played Ra the first time at the suggestion of my friends.   It seemed pretty straight forward that I needed to burninate everything.  I felt that Megaoplois was hurting my chances of burning everything.  

I played Wraith first, because I thought she looked cool (I tend to like playing as Sneaky Bastards, and she was all cloaked up, there was quite a bit of purple on her card, and she's called the Wraith - that's a cool name!). Ended up having a fun couple of games with her considering she's both pretty straightfoward and powerful. Just played two or three games that time - that was at the gaming club I used to go to. The guy who owned the game said there was a new edition or something being released that October(ish), so some months later, closer to that time, I remembered to have a look online and kept an eye out for it, then ordered it (Enhanced Edition) and Infernal Relics (which had presumably been released since I'd played it as the bloke we'd played with only had the base game and Rook City) off Games Lore. They were out of stock of Rook City but it came in a few weeks later so I grabbed that as well :).

I played Bunker alongside Ra, Legacy, Tempest, and (most importantly to this story) Tachyon in an epic battle to keep Voss from invading Megalopolis.  During that game, Tachyon (played by my sister) and I developed a great running gag of her saying something interested or curious about some of Voss' mad science, and me yelling at her ("Oooh, I see, the clamps along the back of the skull must allow for remote control - but wouldn't that arrangement result in limited range?" "I'm just glad the range is still long enough he can't hear you telling him how to improve his minions!").  It was a great first game, with a couple of tense turns where it looked like we might get overwhelmed, then a quick board clearing, an Egyptian god blowing up a space ship, and Tempest frying his nemesis.

It was about two games later that I realized Bunker is effectively unplayable, beginning my longstanding love-hate relationship with that deck, and my interest in proxies and variants for it.

I played Legacy in a 5 player game with some friends playing the other complexity 1 heroes (Ra, Haka, Wraith, and Bunker) against Omnitron in Megaopolis. I really like Legacy, as I liked being a buff character and everyone appreciated the bonus damage. I didn't under Legacy's deck very well at first, and couldn't realize why I would play cards like Heroic Intercept or Lead from the Front. I never saw Next Evolution nor the Legacy Ring until I played a couple more time.

I remeber that my friend with was playing the Wraith got out a Utility Belt early on and thought the character was just awesome, since she could use Throwing Knives and Stealth every turn.

I played Legacy first, because we just grabbed level 1's without looking at their mechanics. I actually enjoy playing as a party buff type character, so I enjoyed myself a lot. 

We got a fair bit wrong in that game, because we misread, or outright missed parts of the rules and gameplay, but we managed to figure it out by our second game, which I played as my favourite Glass Cannon, Absolute Zero.

I mention this, because both showed me how fun the game can be, but also just how much bookkeeping can be required.

My first game was with the Scholar against La Capitan in Silver Gulch a tense 3 hours game where I played a character that became one of my favorites as you can guess with my forum name. At that point i only Fleshed to Iron and kept the team standing, I had not realized how much damage I could get with that character.

I played Chrono Ranger first. I was at a board game night with my improv group the week before thanksgiving and the girl sitting next to me had sentinels sitting on the seat. And I loved the art and the theme. So about 2 hours in we were looking for a new game and I asked if we could play that one. We did and I fell in love.

Now on talking about my feelings for the space time cowboy. The girl who owned it said he was a set up heavy hero but once I got going I flew through his cards. There were several rule problems with that game, namely backlash field only going off once a round and not counting Bounties in the card that hurts you for the number of cards in play.

I played Adept, because I love bards.  I loved the way he played, although I didn't do any combos, just giving tons of card plays and powers to allies, it was awesome.

I had actually been researching SotM and ordered the Core and IR (but they hadn't arrived) when I got to play for the first time at my local meetup with someone who had been playing a while.  I was Tachyon and Ra and he was AA and AbZero against Voss.  My best moment was definately a Sonic Vortex that took out 8 minions.  I mainly remember being fascinated with AA from watching the other guy play him and to this day he's my favorite hero.

My first game -- way back before Rook City was even announced -- was as Tachyon, against... Voss, I think. I like to feel like I'm being helpful and productive, so Tachyon -- with her multitude of "play a card, play 2 cards, everyone draws a card and you play a card, you can play extra cards each turn, deal damage and draw cards, draw and discard cards, and THEN get to use her power" turns -- made me feel like I was really being an active asset to the team.

I was Absolute Zero vs Omnitron on Insula Prismalis. I flopped around, accomplished nothing, and watched as Primalis + Flesh of the Sun God wrecked Omnitron. I have not enjoyed Absolute Zero much since.

I played Tempest in my first game and really loved how much diversity there was in his effects.  Multiple damage types, DR, damage buffs, card removal, ongoing/environment destruction, and card accelleration.  I've consistently had excellent games with Tempest.

My first hero was Mr. Fixer, and I loved it. The game was Fixer, Ra, Tempest vs Plague Rat... I think in Rook City. Some friends of mine had just gotten Rook City and introduced me to the game. I got dual crowbars, some style (I think grease monkey), and harmony and just laid a beatdown on the rat for most of the game (I think we were misreading crowbars and allowing me to hit the same target twice). I felt awesome, even if I wasn't able to change things up much, but building a 1 point hit into a 8 pt hit every turn was so much fun.

This game was also were I first saw Ra burn himself to a crisp with Flame Shield, and I went down not long after, leaving Tempest with the Cleansing Downpour barely hangning on long enough to pull a lightning slash and a victory.

Loved the game enough that I eventually scoured the webs and my bank to buy "all the things" and now play solo (stupid work schedule)

First hero(es) were Haka and Tempest after buying the game following reviews and a recommendation stumbled upon somewhere.  (Went to BGG after that point.)  First solo attempt was two heroes vs Omnitron and a bunch of rules played wrong.

Got things straightened out since then and am having a blast.  Can't say I have an absolute favorite hero since I mainly play random hero solo games, or am picking out a hero last to round out a team when introducing the game to others.

As I have mentioned my first hero was Absolute Zero, as soon as I opened the box and had a quick look at the decks he was the one who instantly leapt out at me as the one I really wanted to try first; everything about him just seemed more interesting at first glance than the others both visually/thematically and in gameplay with the clear damage redirection and strange base power.
The game was with one other friend, and I can't remember who else was played, against Baron Blade in Megalopolis (even though thematically Omnitron was my favourite villain from the base game but the high hit points and potential to hang around made me wary to try for the first game). I didn't find him too tricky, I was perhaps lucky to get through some decent card draws, and setting off his damage rebounding combos was great fun, he is still easily my favourite to play when he goes well.

After that I tried playing as him against Omnitron on Wagner Mars Base and realised the utter pain of how badly his deck can be shut down with what felt like constant red dust and technological singularities.
But I still love the guy.

1st Edition Ra.

The other players were on their second or third games, each using the same Heroes each game (Bunker, Ab Z, and Legacy).

I and the Ab Z player quickly saw their combo and started pumping damage out at a tremendous rate.

We kicked the Baron to the curb pretty fast and then had a long nearly-fatal battle with Dawn.

But I was hooked before Baron even flipped.

First game was with friends who had been playing for awhile and had all the expansions available at the time (shortly before Vengeance came out.)  I asked for a character that could heal, so they gave me Tempest.  I don't remember who we faced, but it was an easy win.  The second game that night, we tried The Dreamer with all five of us that were there...and two hours later, never having flipped her...we conceded.

I was a little iffy on the game but kept with it, and have now gotten well and truly hooked.

I played Fanatic my first game. Sorta. Christopher and Paul were playing so fast that I was almost completely at a loss as to what was going on. It was still super fun.

Pwatson1974 ran the first Sentinels game I ever played in, and forever shall I remain grateful for it. This was back in the 1st Edition days, about a month before Rook City came out. The game was Citizen Dawn in Atlantis. I believe we had Tempest, Visionary and Ra already at the table, and I chose Fanatic, because she looked so very badass with her wings armour and sword and all that.

I had the obligatory 'Why am I hitting myself?' moment, but then I understood that, while Fanatic may go down (in flames!), she will make damn sure that the villains go down with her! From that point onwards I had so much fun that she became my go-to character for a while.

As for my first game, I believe we all got our butts kicked by the Kraken in the end, but I didn't mind at all. I spent the next two weeks tracking down my own copy of the game, and the rest is history (and I can't believe that it has only been two years!).

My first game was with EvanDan55 and it was just before rook city came out. I used Legacy because he was the guy in front so why not go with what i though was the main character. I imediatly fell in love with the game though i couldnt afford my own copy till much later. Now I have my own copy of the game a large group of friends who love to play it, and legacy is still my favorite. 

I played Wraith along with one other person who didn't know how to play, taught by a third person who appeared very knowledgeable but, it later turned out, had never played before. We stomped on Omnitron in Silver Gulch, only to figure out later that Omnitron probably should have flipped over at some point (i.e. every round). We followed it up with two two-player games against Apostate with heroes who had little chance at getting through the DR once his relics were set up (I don't remember them all, but Scholar and Expat were in the mix).

Then I immediately grabbed up everything I could and actually learned how to play.

My first character was Tachyon.  We had Ra, Absolute Zero, Legacy, and Visionary.  I thought Tachyon was awesome, moving so fast.  And when I later switched to Haka, I felt so slow....  That game was pretty epic.  Baron Blade at Megalopolis.  Visionary was getting beat down (was at 16 health) and Baron Blade had 16 cards in his discard on his Impulsion side.  Then Visionary sacrificed herself to save the world (Brain Burn!).  We then beat the Baron handily before he could recoup.  We still talk about that save by Visionary.

The first hero I was given to play was The Wraith v Blade, followed by Fanatic v Voss in the second game. To be honest I really struggled to see the point of it all in those first two games. With The Wraith I had a ton of cards in hand and everything seemed a bit too easy, then with Fanatic not much happened and it didn't feel like I was being effective (particularly since one of my friends was having a whale of a time with Ra!) But I could see potential, particularly with how the game owner was wielding Tachyon. That, and a strong recommendation from someone whose opinion I really trust, was enough to encourage me to get the base game, and since the first two expansions were going cheap at the same seller I plumped for those as well. It's odd that Sentinels is one of my most favourite games ever when I didn't really enjoy those first games very much, but I am so glad that I trusted my instincts!

When teaching the game myself I usually give newbies an overview of what it's like to play some of the decks and then encourage them to go with whatever hero they like the idea of the most. There are a couple of Maths teachers in our game group and one of them took to Absolute Zero straight off the bat so you never can tell what the 'right fit' hero is for a first time player!

When I first played the guy who owned the game (everything including promos up to Vengance at that point) had laid out all the heroes, villains and environments to let us have a look and I instantly noticed Unity, mostly due to her being a brunette with what I thought would be some type of engineering/technical skills. We ended up playing a five player game against Dawn (Owner as Ra, me as Unity, other completely new player as eternal Haka, someone else I can't remember what they played and then Ab Zero)

I enjoyed Unity throughout the game (I think her art and flavour text is what made me fall in love with the game) and we did end up winning although I think our team work left a little to be desired (me playing mr chomps the round before Haka did a rampage, a player who killed off one of the citizens when we were trying to get Dawn to flip back. Also a first round quote from the owner of the game: "Wait, you three ALL picked the version of your heroes who can't deal damage?! Hmmm, ok...") I didn't quite get a chance to set up a huge amount of damage but did contribute consistently throughout the game.

Unity is my weakness character, right now. I would play her way out of proportion. The quotes + the huge damage you can do if you have your army of bots together + Mr. Chomps just works for me.

My first character was Legacy, reminiscent of Superman, I loved the character and how easy it was to learn and play this game.  Yet challenging and fun to play over and over.

My first game was a teamup with Reckless where I was Bunks, and we were fighitng the Baron in Megalopolis. I’ve loved Bunks ever since. He can be a tank or a damage dealer. I loved his versatility when I first played him.

My first game was with Reckless, Nielzabub, and Rapscalion back in original edition. They had played a couple games already so I asked what hero they didn't like because I was used to playing games with people who alway played the same characters or same group position.  I figured that way I wouldn't have to compete with people for heroes in future games.  They told me Visionary wasn't very good.  I took her, and shuffled her deck, as we prepared to square off with Omnitron.  I quickly came to like her deck control and then an "Electro Pulse Explosive" happened.  Everyone dropped what they had planned for their turns and started discussing what they could do to get DR or damage it.  I just looked down at my hand and see this card called "Wrest the Mind" that I had been reading for half the game trying to figure out what a target was and why I would ever want to take that much damage of my own for anything.  (When we first started we were really conservative with hit points and almost revered DR as the holy grail of effects.)  I just said, "Guys, I got this."  I throw it on the "Electro Pulse."  Reckless pulls out his Kindle and jumps on the forums to check that it was a legal move.  Then we go through the round and when the villian turn comes up he asks, "Alright so you want to redirect it the explosive and blow it up."  To which I respond with, "No, I want to hit Omnitron."  I hit Omnitron. Then he explains to me how the damage on "Wrest the Mind" works like an interupt and asks me if I want to redirect the next hit to the "Expolsive" and he tells me I will take some total amount of damage that I can't actually remember off the top of my head (I can't remember how many heroes we were using.)  I respond with, "It's a three to one damage exchange rate!  I will gladly take that."  And from then on she has always been one of or depending on the day my favorite character.