Price of Freedom Wraith, Omnitron-U, Darkwatch Mr. Fixer, and Unity Classic vs The Chairman at Pike Industrial Complex
Whoo boy, this one was a doozy. I managed to mint it, but barely. Everyone was in single digits by the end of it.
[table][row color=#FFFFFF]The first play is a Broker, followed by both Prison Breaks, then The Muscle. Operative pulls out Crooked Cop, The Contract, then The Fence. All five Underbosses WILL be in play before you can flip the Chairman. At that point, it's just damage mitigation. I very quickly realized that I needed to solve this with a Hasty Augmented Defensive Blast, so I was kicking myself when I didn't grab a Plating with Omnitron's Technological Advancement. Wraith and Fixer are purely on Thug control, and are you main nethod for clearing Underbosses with Omnitron-U's base power, which you should be spamming every turn. Pike is actually pretty helpful, giving a Chemical Explosion right off the bat, then a Trisolvent Cooling Vat, a Biomemetic Plasma Vat, a Rat, then another Explosion, and another Plasma Vat. Wraith gets her Grappling Hooks early, so take advantage of them to clear the vats before they cause too much damage. Fixer should be detonating Omnitron-U's components each turn to get that free damage in, and Unity should be making her Bots. Fixer has Overdrive and two Salvage Yards in his first draws, so you can dish out a LOT of damage rather quickly. Unity starts with a Supply Crate and Cryo Bot, and will draw a Platform Bot and Raptor Bot early. Her next bot isn't until Stealth Bot, however. Cryo Bot is a champ, though.[/row][/table]
Sorry about the blatant spoilers, those who've already seen it. I've got them edited out now. You can highlight if you want to read them.
This game wasn't too challenging. O-X grabbed his Ablative Coating, and with all the major damage types mitigated O-X makes a great tank. Throw in his Reactive Plating Subroutine, and O-X is dealing way more damage than he takes. The reaction damage (and Cryo's too) can help deal with thugs on the Chairman's turn as well, making things especially easy. And there's no danger of Prison Breaks.
Wraith dealt with the Vats, O-X reacted, and played equipment for Fixer to smash, and Unity got some damage dealers out, and hastily augmented O-X for some Rocket Punches and Defensive Blasts. Everyone was in double digits at the end.
For the sake of people who want to avoid "spoilers" perhaps it would be nice to not list out the order of the villain and environment decks in the first post of these threads. Just a thought =)
I can't beat the Chairman without significant amounts of damage mitigation, and there's nary a Grease Gun to be had. I at least appreciate the early-game Prison Breaks so things aren't too terrible, but the Chairman is pretty terrible. My first game ended after maybe three turns, thanks to a lot of Rook City Is Mine! leading to copious vat explosions. :(
If you want damage mitigation then look no further than Omnitron-U's opening hand. Use the Technological Advancement to get Ablative Coating out. Team that up with Reactive Plating Subroutine and you'll be doing much better.
I managed to squeak by with everyone in the low single digits. Here's how I pulled it off, and a few of the mistakes I made.
Omnitron's Ablative Coating is fantastic. I made the mistake of destroying it with Bitter Strike to kill off a thug, which led to a lot of damage that could have been avoided.
The Hoist Chain is a great way to keep the Operative's retaliation damage under control.
Sedative Flechettes are great for clearing out (or at least putting the hurt on) a field of minions, as is defensive blast. Just... Be careful. I did it before I really had any damage mitigation in place, because I was a bit intimidated by the prospect of dual hitmen boosted by the contract... But I'm pretty sure the Operative's retaliation did more damage than they would have, since I hadn't planned ahead on how to tank it.
Seriously-Omnitron U's Ablative coating makes everything much easier.
The Vats are nasty, but you can occasionally turn them to your advantage- make sure that when you are choosing damage orders to get rid of people like the contract first, to reduce retaliation a crucial point.
Unity wont be cranking out a ton of damage, but her hasty Augmentations really turned the tide. Letting Fixer use that Hoist chain as often as possible went a long way.
I tended to sacrifice the Wraith and Unity's gear over O-u's components. The damage from breaking them is nice, but healing a few HP from the Innervation Rays were definitely worth losing a few knives or supply crates.
Typical game against The Chairman. Panic when you take loads of damage in the first couple of rounds, then hope to find a way of mitigating The Chairman's reaction damage. Just about managed that with everyone around 5 HP at the end.
Really loved that this game was all about showing off Omnitron-U. I hadn't played him yet even though I spent the weekend failing to find his unlock. I didn't realise that his innate power forces you to play a card if you don't have equipment in the trash, caused me to swap my plating when I didn't want to.
Mint. Made a few misplays without properly realizing the reaction effects, but it was fun. Nice to have both Prison Breaks out early (though had I known both were coming out, I'd have induced more Informant plays, and had I known the first environment play was a Chemical Explosion, I'd have dealt damage more effectively).
I'll replay this one to see how it goes with playing Reactive Plating instead of Automatic or whatever Deployment with Technological Advancement. I got blown up badly by a vat explosion, leaving me down to barely-there Wraith and Omnitron-U. Luckily, dual innervations kept me in it, and Fixer's third disabled power froze the Chairman's deck into an endless run of healing on its final card. Wraith shut down the environment with a pair of Mega Computers, and it was just a waiting game after that.
Honest Mint. Sometimes I settle for spoilered Mint or Near Mint, but not this week. :)
I earned the "That was Close!" achievement and a Mint on this one with Omnitron only having 1 health and everyone else dead. I got pretty lucky but on the last turn, I had Wraith do a sacrificial attack of 5 damage to bring Chairman down to 15. The other two died from the Vat explosion on the last environment turn. Was able to set up 3 components with Omnitron and then did Singularity card to destroy his components on Unity's turn. Couldn't get closer.
Ooh, that one was fun. Definitely gave a good idea of how to get the most out of O-U, not just with DW Fixer, but with Unity's base power. One of the biggest issues I find against the Chairman is you need to do so much damage to keep his goons in check. I usually have to default to using Legacy, but that extra 2 HP each turn really added up. I was able to get rid of each Underboss within a turn or two of them coming out, so it wasn't overwhelming (even though he started with two out). Fixer was the only casualty, giving the Chairman a suicidal, Bloody Knuckles-fueled punch in the nose to put him where the Impromtu Invention + Defensive Blast (with the Temporal Shielding switched in so he got 4 hits in) could take him out.
(There was also a neat little moment where Undivided Attention had Pike hitting Wraith, which triggered Combat Stance, which triggered the retaliation, so it was like they had a nice little brawl going)
That was a fun one! I failed miserably in my first game, which seemed to be at least in part from blowing up too much equipment with Fixer. Second go-round I used him sparingly, relying on Wraith and Unity’s bots to deal damage for the most part.
Ablative Plating and Reactive Plating Subroutine were amazing. O-U the tank. Wraith’s retaliation card dished out plenty of damage, too.
Cryo-Bot was definitely MVP, and poor Stealth Bot didn’t even last a turn due to a vat explosion but she took two hits for the team.
Fixer dealt a whopping 14 damage in the second last turn, with a Bloody Knuckles Bitter Strike followed by a Hasty Augmented of the same (it was pointed out to me immediately afterwards that I should have used that on O-U for Defensive Blast. Oops.) This knocked him out from Chairman’s retaliation, leaving the Chairman at 1. The environment played another damage reducing vat, but O-U managed to Self Sabotage his lone component for the last point of damage. He and Unity were the only heroes still standing.
I don’t really like the Chairman, but this one wasn’t bad at all. Nobody incapped, all health between 12 and 14. I didn’t use the Combat Stance, and unlike most folks Reactive Plating Subroutine was just Fixer fodder to me. In fact, when I read the comments here I thought that would be better so I tried again… And failed… Twice.
It was great teamwork that saved the day, Omnitron-U putting out cards to fuel Fixer and Unity (and the thief,) which of course let U do added damage. Cryobot was very handy, and Wraith rangled the vats and did key strikes.
My usual strategy with Chairman is to take out the Cop ASAP but this time whittling down the Underbosses actually cleared the board much faster.
Now I really feel the need to unlock Omnitron-U.
Is the environment deck shuffled/random order? I got a series of vat explosions that killed all my heroes, and there wasn't a darn thing I could do about it. If that's not the case, how did you manage to avoid the damage with no grease gun in sight?
You can’t avoid the damage. The best you can do is take out a couple vats with the Wraith’s Grappling Hooks to reduce it a bit.
On the plus side, Thugs don’t like chemicals any more than the heroes do.