From reading the rulebook, it seems to me like there's really no downside to losing all your health (ok, aside from losing a card(s)). You regain all of your health, get your one-shots back, and you stand right up as soon as your turn starts again. I'm surprised you wouldn't lose your turn as you stand back up or something.
Have you found in your games that it far benefits you to get hit that final time so that you are able to come back with quick and sudden vengeance? I mean, you still get ONE card down as you begin your turn, and many could use these effeciently and effectively.
If you have no ongoings I can see how it isn't much of a hit. But as Skirmish rules are fast and loose and more or less agreed upon by the players we've been playing elimination style. In wither case it is the score. And outside of a scenario you don't want your opponent to score.
The only benefit from being incapped is you lose the -1 attack/defense tokens you may have. Disadvantages for being incapped are; you lose +1 attack/defense tokens, lose Dodge token, may be pushed into an awkward position (like inside a Volcano), only have one power card in play for the first turn back, and/or the opponent scored a point.
Skirmishes can be fun, but I generally find it boring when the only objective is to score a point by incapping, because incapping has such little negative too it. But then further negatives (like loss of a turn) lead to a steam roll where you stand up and don't do anything before you get incapped.
I enjoyed creating variant skirmishes, like Capture the flag, King of the Volcano (not using laval rules) and Team wipe skirmishes, where you stay down until your whole team is out, which even works well with tag in players that come into the board at designated spots when an incapped team members turn would start.
I should write up some rules and make a post, because they were a lot of fun.
I complained a bit during playtesting that incapacitation didn't feel like much of a penalty and that in a skirmish, the characters tended to drop unsatisfyingly fast (it wasn't uncommon for characters to get focused on right out of the gate and get incapped before they'd even had a chance to take their turn). We even talked about finding a different name for it besides "incapacitation", since that implied, you know... being incapacitated. But we couldn't find a good term for "knocked off your feet for a second", and I think the way it is fits Christopher's plan for how he wants scenarios to work, so it stayed as is.
I'll probably try to find a house rule which adds just enough of a "death penalty" to keep players from just rushing characters into the maw, because without that, using actual strategy in a skirmish is less important.
Spiff's SotM site: www.spiffworld.com/sotm
Luckily, we are using tactics and not strategy. :)
Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.
-Robert E. Howard, "The Tower of the Elephant"
Well I am curious what "tournament rules" will be instituted that will induce more of a penalty for that sort of play.
Alas we will have to wait until September!
I hadn't even thought to create any house rules or different styles of skirmishes. That would defintely be a great doc to get up and running!
I can definitely see the strategy (err...tactic?) in keeping a couple of folks alive at really low health, so as to incap both at once and feel like you've actually done some damage. It still seems like not much happens, though. Your team is down a point, but that can come back quickly since you are now at full health and probably still close enough to counterattack. I might play that teammates also lose something (maybe a hit point, but those are so much more valuable in this game) because of the emotional distress (psychic damage?) that it would cause to know you failed your fellow hero, haha.
phantaskippy already started one.
Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.
-Robert E. Howard, "The Tower of the Elephant"
Perfect! I guess it would help to read ALL of the new forum posts before responding
I think if you think of incapping differently, the weirdness of being able to pop right back up lessens. For example, if health were called "stamina" and you were "stunned" momentarily when you ran out of stamina, that'd feel more natural, I think.
One of the changes I'd considered to add more of a "death penalty" was to have you pop back up but with one less health counter than you had before. That way, a four-hp hero could get "stunned" once (comes back w/3), twice (comes back w/2), thrice (comes back w/1), then he stays down. Haven't played it that way yet though (I'm in Calif, so my GtG shipments take a long time to get here) so I don't know if it's the right way to go or not.
Spiff's SotM site: www.spiffworld.com/sotm
That would be reasonable, I think. I guess my admittedly small gaming group will decide on something if we all feel it necessary.
I'm in CA, too...the waiting game is intense. I'm a little surprised that they didn't add an Incapped side, as in the card game. Would give those characters something to do during their 'Standing Back Up' turn, but would still feel like something happened to them. I guess that is yet another option if I were to houserule it, but would be more intensive.
Pittsburgh here, I'm at home, waiting for my Tactics.
Atlanta for me. Im just in that "I didnt get a tracking number so its not coming" mode
I was in this same place, until an extremely awesome jimeni7 told me how to set up an account on Fedex.com
You won't get an e-mail or tracking number, but you can track all packages being shipped to your address. It's a breath of relief for the anxiety-ridden.
Great tip. Mine's in Champaign, IL, which makes no sense. I'm not even thirsty.
Spiff's SotM site: www.spiffworld.com/sotm
Great...well, now I'm freaking out because it doesn't show any shipments heading my way....
EDIT: Unless, of course...it's already sitting at my door, and therefore wouldn't be heading my way anyway. I find that unlikely but would be awesome...
Maybe your house moved.
Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.
-Robert E. Howard, "The Tower of the Elephant"
I'm glad it worked for you. :) Sounds like it wasn't working for everyone on Kickstarter. But at least it has helped ease some people's worries.
I can't wait to get mine tomorrow and try it out. Looks like it's already in the state ... will just take until tomorrow to get to me. :)
I like the "limited recoveries" option. Each team is limited to X recoveries from incapacitation, and once those are gone your dead guys stay dead. Last team standing wins.
Discourages you from killing your own guys to prevent the other team from scoring, without significantly skewing the balance.
McBehrer is the sole winner of this game... And McBehrer, I would step carefully should you find your way down dark alleys. More than one vote said simply, "McBehrer must die."
McBehrer confirmed to be Biomancer!
-- Trajector
Ok, phew. I have a game now. Everyone can stop the search! All's well!
We played a 2 vs 2 game last night. Each hero could be incapped twice, then they were out.