Call for submissions: SotM Strategy Guide

General GTG General Discussion
1

Someone here (not me) needs to buckle down and write an actual SotM strategy guide, don’t you think? We’ve got all the parts here on the forum already: discussions of hero turn order, discussions of particularly good card combos, discussions of how to teach SotM to new players, etc. It just needs to be wrapped up by someone who’s into that kind of thing and written in a way that someone new to the game could read it to get a deeper understanding of the game than they might get by poking around on their own. The SotM guys are way too busy to write it themselves, so it’s up to us. I imagine it should answer questions like these:

What is each hero good at and what are they bad at? If I play Visionary and discover that she doesn’t have the pew pew I’d hoped for, why should I ever play her again? Which heroes work well together and which don’t? What are good combinations of cards I should be trying to get during a game for each hero? Why would Tachyon want to discard cards to her trash rather than have them in her hand? Why on Earth would Absolute Zero want to deal damage to himself? I keep getting murdered by Matriarch and Chairman but I have no idea how to change that. Are they completely unbeatable?

The guide could include info about which heroes are slow-builders so that noobs know to expect that and not think they’re doing something wrong if they’re not firing rockets on the very first turn. It could also include the suggestion to play around with the value of “H” as an option to reduce the deadliness of some encounters when new people are still learning the game.

Anyone interested in stepping up and writing this vital literary work? I’d be happy to host it online next to the rest of my accessories if necessary.

2

I’d certainly be willing to do my part, but if we’re going to do a strategy guide for each hero, thats a lot of stuff to be done, especially if we want to include team-building and general strategies in there.

It might be easiest to do this in piecemeal, perhaps anyone who was interested could make a post tagged as “strategy guide: Hero name” or replace ‘hero name’ with team selection or whatever. Then someone could compile them all into one mega-guide, rather than having someone write the whole thing. I feel you’d get a lot more detail that way.

The other advantage is that if board posters have dissenting opinions or even things that should be added, they could be posted and then the original guide could be edited/modified to include these new considerations.

3

If nothing else, an FAQ with more detail on certain aspects of the game would be great. For instance, effect resolution or playing multiple cards off of the villain deck due to effects from the environment, cards, etc. Shall we start discussing character by character?

Perhaps we can start with Legacy?

With his Galvanize effect, it usually helps having him near the front in my experience (but it really only affects the first turn). Cards like Take Down and Enduring Intercession are magnificent to help the rest of the team, and Lead From the Front combined with Fortitude can really help against those small AoE effects. His Galvanize effect can be dangerous with certain other cards (Haka’s Rampage, for instance, or Plague Rat’s Infection cards), but generally it helps more than it hurts. He does well in a large party consisting of at least two or three characters that have many damage dealing effects. For smaller parties, he isn’t as useful (Try Young Legacy for parties less than four if you want some good ol’ fashioned American justice). Of particular note is his synergy with Absolute Zero. Due to his Galvanize effect, AZ can deal himself two Fire damage (one increased by one due to Galvanize), which in turn deals three Cold damage to a target (Two Cold Damage increased by one due to Galvanize). Combine this with Focused Apertures, and AZ can four damage for the price of two. There are of course more combos and tactics that can be used, but this is a basic combo with no more than two cards and two heroes.

This is not much, I know, but it’s a start. Any other perspectives on Legacy, or shall we move on to another Hero? Perhaps a Villain? Environment?

4

I’ve been working on in-depth strategy guides for each of the heroes, but I work awfully slowly. I have Tachyon and Visionary mostly done, so I’ll post them sometime today. Haka, Bunker, and Legacy are in the works. I also have typed up my guide to beating Spite, and was considering one for some of the other villains.

I guess I’ll see what I can do as a generalized guide as well. I’m on board with this project.

5

I suppose I can take one for the team here.

I’ll appreciate input, of course, but I am (being modest here) really good at writing. I would have been a Journalism major, if I hadn’t changed to Radio and also not gone to any of my classes. Put simply, you can’t beat me at an informative-writing-off. I’m simply the best there is.

If you have anything you want in it specifically (you being anyone and everyone) just send me a PM with what you want in it, and I’ll try and work it in if I haven’t already included it. I’ll even attribute specific strategies to people who suggest them (as if you can own a combo lol) and such.

Stay tuned for my basic formatting.

6

So, I’m thinking it will work something like this:

I’ll start out with basics of the game, clarification on certain rules, etc. I’ll also include a link to Spiff’s errata, since it is chock-full of helpful tidbits and stuff.

Then I’ll move into general strategies. Which targets are priorities (based off of what they do damage to, how much, what type, other effects, etc.), etc.

From there I’ll move onto Hero descriptions. I’ll give a quick theme description, a one-word description of their role within the team (buffs, damage, AoE, etc.) as well as x/5 ratings of various aspects (environment control, misc. support, damage influence, damage output (possibly divided between AoE and single-target), tanking, and overall). Also included will be good combinations of partners and cards to play, villains they are good against, and general play style.

Also, I want each hero to have a note or 2 (no more, plz. I’ll pick the best if multiple are submitted. You can put in notes for multiple heroes, but I don’t necessarily want one person dominating all the notes.) from someone on the forums, either as a recommendation in general, an alternate strategy, a second opinion on quality or whatever, etc. If anyone recommends a specific hero, I’ll be sure to put that in as a [username’s] CHOICE label thing.

I’ll do the same kind of thing for villains; ranking in difficulty, which ones are good or bad against which heroes, general tactics they use, strategies to defeat them, etc. I’ll also have notes here from users.

And again for environments; ranked in order of difficulty, with general themes, what to look out for, what can help you, which heroes excel there, which don’t, and which villains are particularly effective/weak there. Also with notes and user’s choice logos.

Sound good? anyone have any questions, objections, or anything? Anyone have an issue with me writing it?

I’ll put it on Google Docs once I get a basic framework, and will gladly accept suggestions and revisions and stuff.

7

That sounds pretty good. I like the idea of x/5 ratings for aspects since that would help a newbie be able to tell at a glance how the heroes compare.

Also might be good to include info on how the hero’s strategy changes when playing one of their alt versions.

Keep in mind that the Extended Edition is coming out, so it could be tough to figure out what to spend time on first. For example, if the first thing you write up is a detailed guide on Baron Blade strategy and then in August we find that the EE changes how he plays significantly, you may have to scrap half your BB guide, which would be sad.

I’m dying to read this thing now, seeing as how unbelievably great a writer you are. :slight_smile:

8

with all due respect to clearly the best writer on the internet. If I’m going to write a strategy guide -or part of one-, I’d prefer to do it myself. Maybe it will have some mistakes, I tend to comma splice, but I don’t expect those reading are looking for a literary masterpiece. They’ll be looking for advice, suggestions, or insights on the game, and that I can provide.

9

Ooh, dueling strat guides, me likee.

10

Such intense comma splice… Must resist… 8)

11

Well, with all due respect to he who is obviously far more important than anyone else, and therefore was the only one anyone was talking to, Spiff never asked you specifically. He asked the forum as a whole.

I also never asked you specifically. You don’t have to help if you don’t want to. I figured that it would be more helpful to have ONE strategy guide that everyone has weighed in on than several differing, conflicting, and possibly incomplete guides, but if you would rather have the recognition of being the one to make the guide than actually be helpful, that’s your prerogative.

Also, I didn’t think to include alt-forms. Duly noted.

12

With all due respect McBehrer but I dismiss any of the strategy tips that you post on these forums because of the ‘undeclared’ house rules in your first few posts.

On topic, I’m happy to read over other’s submissions as a proof reader (or similar) but I am not the guy to write a guide, I’m more reactive in my play than planning ahead.

13

I can’t imagine how having fewer strategy guides would be better than having more, so I welcome McBehrer’s along with anyone else who has the creative itch to write something that might help a newcomer to the game.

Weren’t there two guides posted here last night (Tachyon and someone else) that are now gone? I’d swear I read, enjoyed, and even replied to them but I don’t see them anymore.

14

You’re looking in the wrong section of the forum Spiff, they’re in the Rules & Gameplay section
Tachyon
Visionary

15

I figured the Rules and Gameplay section was the appropriate forum for the strategy guides proper. If that’s not the case, should we move them here?

16

I don’t see why, it is a Gameplay issue in this case.

(I edited my post to make it clearer I was referring to the confusion in the searching, not the posting; I don’t think anyone has broken any unwritten forum rules and done anything ‘wrong’ in their posting)

17

Undeclared house rules? Do tell. I don’t have any that I know of that would impact strategies at all.

18

Well, it wasn’t that having fewer was automatically better than having more, but rather that having everyone contribute to the same one would make sure that it hit all the points and didn’t miss anything. Having several people make their own would scatter all the information out into several guides, whereas having the same info in the same guide would be more concise and easy to read.

19
20

you said ruleS.

And that was less of a house rule and more of a faulty understanding of how the game worked. Since joining the forum and talking with everyone (also spending more time with the game) I have developed a much more complete and accurate understanding of the game and its rules.