[EE] To Fight the Dawn

Hi all. Citizen Dawn has been proving to be a really tough villain for my gaming group. Her deck has so much damage, card-destruction, discards, healing, DR, and flat-out immunity, that our win ratio against her has been fairly low. I know she’s not one of the hardest Villains (cough, Chairman, Matriarch, cough), but my group seems determined to get more wins against her.

So, I’m here asking for any advice against Citizen Dawn. Specifically, what Heroes and Environment are most effective against her?

With Savage Mana Haka can eat the minions
Visionary can Brain Burn the trash so she potentially doesn’t flip
Stuntman can play In Media Res during resolution of Devastating Aurora to cancel it
Legacy is always good to help beat up villains quicker
Parse is great at manipulating the villain deck so you don’t see nastier cards.

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Get her flip out of the way early unless you can avoid it completely, kill Anvil on sight, kill Return With the Dawn and Channel the Eclipse on sight unless she’s flipped currently, don’t play a lot of Ongoings unless the Devastating Auroras have gone by, and focus fire on Dawn herself rather than killing the less dangerous citizens.

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The main strategy I go with is just knowing which Citizens you can deal with. Blood, for instance, doesn’t deal a ton of damage and might even help you if you have certain low-HP targets in play. Spring does barely anything, and even Assault’s damage isn’t too bad, so long as Battery doesn’t come out. (He’s another I’ll usually leave in play.)

Controlling when she flips and getting her to flip back as soon as possible really is key to mastering her fight.

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Likewise, Citizen Autumn is either awful or does nothing, Citizens Sweat and Tears should both be annihilated, and depending on how much damage you can absorb, you can make the call on whether to destroy or leave Citizens Hammer and Summer. Eliminate Citizen Truth unless Dawn is flipped.

Tachyon is often a good hero to bring for Hypersonic Assault, Blinding Speed, and Sucker Punch (not to mention the always-excellent Lightspeed Barrage). Writhe’s damage mitigation, irreducible damage, and Umbral Siphon can be a huge help. Stuntman and Mainstay can be good to help eat Ongoing destruction. La Comodora has a number of tools that can be helpful, including Rudder in the Timestream to put citizens back from Dawn’s trash to under her deck. Wraith’s Infrared Eyepiece, or better yet, double eyepieces, can really help. And don’t forget that the Aurora doesn’t hurt Golems, Constructs, or Devices.

In summary: it’s good to bring high damage or penetrating damage heroes, ongoing destruction is very helpful, deck manipulation is extremely helpful though not required. Trash manipulation can be an exploit. Most importantly, choose whether to flip her early or try to avoid a flip, and choose which Citizens to destroy based on game state.

I think it’s no surprise your group wants to get the hang of her. Of all the EE villains, I think she’s the one with exactly the right mix of stuff in her deck to be both fun to battle and to feel like there’s an AI behind her. Those auroras always come at the darnedest times!

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I always kill Hammer unless Anvil is standing by to raise him; 3 damage to everyone is too much to ignore unless Ra is around to use Flesh of the Sun God. But I don’t always consider Sweat a must kill, since avoiding Ongoings is frequently wise anyway. And between Assault and Battery, Assault is easier to kill, and usually I’d rather take 3-5 damage on the highest HP rather than 3-10 damage spread across the whole party.

I agree with @Trajector. Kill priority goes something like:

  1. Truth, obviously
  2. Anvil, damage reduction sucks when it’s not heroes
  3. Tears, cause you want to have cards to play
  4. Sweat/Autumn, unless you only want to make it with One-Shots
  5. Hammer/Winter + Dare, too much damage to the whole team
  6. Others not usually so bad unless their partner(s) are out
  7. Spring, can stay all game for all I care

Now if you want hero/environment combos you could try:
• Final Wasteland with Naturalist so the cryptids can eat Citizens permanently but not bother heroes
• Mobile Defense Platform, specifically Sky Bridge level, add Chrono-Ranger (maybe Best of Times) and No Executions bounty + Adamant Writhe power

Both options will keep her trash from filling. Or, if you do want to fill the trash / manipulate her deck:
Omnitron-X, Dark Conductor Argent Adept, La Comodora Black Spot, and Dark Visionary are all good with base powers. Add Parse and Wraith in some combination if you want to use Ongoings/Equipment.

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I don’t think avoiding Ongoing cards is necessary. Dawn does have a lot of Ongoing destruction, but it occurs in three forms, one of which (Autumn) is avoidable with planning and another of which (Aurora) is almost never avoidable and takes Equipment out with it for good measure, but is infrequent. I generally feel that the Ongoing card you have in play is more valuable to the heroes than the one in your hand. That’s why I usually put Sweat on the kill list: she’s a guaranteed Ongoing destruction each turn, rather than one I can avoid by planning or one that comes infrequently.

The Devastating Aurora gets a lot of complaining, and rightly so, because the heroes always feel so much more powerful the more stuff they have out and it resets them to zero. But I don’t avoid playing Ongoing/Equipment cards until I see the Auroras, because there’s a good chance that I would have to wait half the game before getting use out of those cards. Instead, I try to use what I can while I can, and perhaps hold a little in reserve. This is also a good reason to try and destroy anything that gives Dawn extra card plays.

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Thanks for all the great advice, everyone!

So, to summarise what I’ve gathered the main points to be:

  • Know which Citizens to destroy and which not to
  • Know how to handle Dawn’s flip side

I think, the next time I play against her, I’ll bring the Adamant Sentinels, for Adamant Writhe’s Shroud Power, and Young Legacy, for Atomic Glare’s base Power damage.

Shroud is definitely strong, but if the initial citizens include at least two of Hammer, Winter, or Assault with Battery, you’re likely to find yourself really wishing for Block. Of course, if you’re on tabletop instead of the app, you can just have 90s Mainstay team up with 2000s Writhe…

The app can do this too by the way. On the hero selection screen, double-click on the character card and you can cycle through the Sentinels and individually change them to their Adamant counterparts and back.

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Huh. If the app allows that, why not go all the way and let me play Legacy, Young Legacy and Grandpa?

I am. I own the physical game, and don’t have the digital one.

I know that I can, of course. No one would stop me. But I am curious what the official ruling on this is. (I searched the Wiki, but came up with nothing.)*

Well, I suppose that this is a pretty official ruling.

Well, that’s pretty different: it’s playing with three copies of the same deck. And if they allowed that, wouldn’t they also have to allow e.g. all three Ra variants in one game?

*P.S.: The Southwest Sentinels debuted in 2011.

Lol, Legacy trifecta. They’re all arguing over who gets to catch the missile and save everyone. Really though, it would get boring with multiple copies of the same deck IMO. Think that’s part of why people are pushing for a separate Young Legacy deck, if they can make it feel distinct enough.

Man, now I feel like I need a late 80s/early 90s hair metal Mainstay from some disparate universe. :thinking: I would settle for an Xtremiverse one, though. :metal::boom:

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