Antihero - Qt3 League

gg, One of these days I’m going to get the hang of it.

Group 2: otthegreat (5) > @tgb123 (2).

GG! I managed to pull a Left_Empty in this one and bottle tgb up in his base.

Sounds like people are often using this tactic (I haven’t). Personally, I think it needs to be addressed by @Goatgoatgoat. Here’s my post on the itch.io forum. Not giving the player a means to counter this tactic isn’t good design.

EDIT: And I know Assassins can be used, but at 8 gold a pop and always having to spend one Master Thief action on killing a 3-HP Thug, they aren’t an efficient way of dealing with 2-HP Gangs.

I agree. I’m actually finding that the orphanage and pub are the two most powerful buildings. Both allow you to spam upgraded orphans and/or thugs across the city. It’s tough to counter, since the other player only has a single eviction, fairly easily countered by sabateurs, or a single powerful attack every turn. I’d imagine it’s not easy to balance, since you don’t want to make those buildings useless. I don’t know what you do really, but, like you say, an upgrade to allow your master thief around thugs could help.

Perhaps an option where you can either stun (no damage but can pass around) or attack (as it currently is).

I concurr: it is simply broken.
I experimented doing it without gang money support: it is doable (with the +Coin upgrade) until you run the ressources on the map dry.
By that point, you’ll have had plenty of time to go with the double gang upgrade. This tactic is just an exploit: the gangs are unkillable (unless to a spies, but what an investment!) and rack enough money for the thug spam to be effective.
I think the thug blocking of the other players is simply wrong: a simple work-around would be for the thiefs’ lair to have what any lair should be fitted with: a backdoor. The master thief and troops should be able to exit from either side, once revealed.
Blocking 2 points is doable; blocking 4? not at all (unless I am mistaken).

For the record: while it was a very intriguing (and arguably, smart) way to turn over the table of nearly locked match the first time around against @Otthegreat, this time I used it as last resort against @Mysterio as I was in serious difficulties. I ran the map dry and didn’t expect the thug trick to be this effective, this early. I have been stalling the game for at least 6 turns this way, even my playing ineptly didn’t put me in jeopardy - I was running into Mysterio’s coin trap every single turn with my gang. This is definitively wrong.

I love the thematic fit of your suggestion!

@Goatgoatgoat:

Have you tested the gameplay with Charity being 2 Coins/1 Lantern (as opposed to 4C/2L) with one research (excluding Bribes) allowed (as opposed to being locked out for the remainder of the turn) if Charity is taken? So the gain is identical to scouting a building for the first time, but one also receives the added benefit of still being able to research one upgrade. Charity, IHMO, is currently just too powerful and attractive.

EDIT: Researching an upgrade first would still lock out Charity for the remainder of the turn.

Or what if Charity’s benefits decayed the more you use it?

That’s a very interesting suggestion.

For info, about the thug spam and my experiments: as buildings depleted, it became paradoxically easier for it to work. The reason is that early on, burglaries were a gamble (2 coins or 1 lantern? if that was the lantern, that was quite hurtful).
As the map got scouted and coins were guaranteed (with the bonus coin from the upgrade that was activated by then), the revenues became steadier. So yeah, more proof that it is indeed an exploit - but who doubted it.

Concerning the Thug block by enemy HQ:
Maybe there needs to be a safe zone around each players HQ, that would make thematic sense. No way would a gang let another gang member so close to their territory. Or maybe a lookout piece that would stop a thug from being planted in the lookout’s ZOC, the lookouts can not be attacked they just sit there here the rest of the game.

“Protected tiles” is an idea we’ve tossed around a bunch. Some form of protected tiles will almost certainly make it into the game soon, since it’s an ongoing issue. I really like the idea of a lookout unit! (One of the issues we’ve had with protected tiles is that they would be a strange game element to explain to new players, whereas a lookout makes intuitive sense.)

Maybe I’m not completely understanding, but wouldn’t that mean that you’d simply always take charity? (I.e. it wouldn’t be a meaningful choice? Why would you ever research an upgrade first?)

@Dave_Perkins

I am missing what you did to get rid of my Thug (near the Queenslace Trading House) on two separate occasions.
What is your technique? Not apparently an Assassin or your Gang. No visible evidence. So … ??

They only guard for two turns, and then they disappear.

The player can research only one non-Bribe upgrade after claiming Charity. Researching an upgrade first, though, locks out Charity and also allows the player to research additional upgrades that turn. This is just a suggestion, but I do think the current 4C/2L Charity is too generous and easily abused.

Perhaps, as @Dave_Perkins suggested, Charity benefits decay as they’re claimed. So, for example, if a player takes 4C Charity, the Charity changes to 3C/2L. Player then takes 2L next turn, Charity changes to 3C/1L. Coins and Lanterns don’t reset individually until 1C or 1L Charity is claimed. But Dave might be suggesting that both values decrement whenever Charity is claimed and they never reset. Granted, individually decrementing the values may confuse the player, but I’m just spitballing here! :-)

Ah, thank you. In an earlier game I thought they became available for redeployment after their “permanent” two-turn guard had expired. I must have been confused (in a different way) in that game.

Edit: Also I only just realised (by watching you) that an eviction by a Gang counts as a kill. Before that … I wonder where I thought the Urchins went? Those were rough times.

I think it counts as a kill only if the Gang evicts the last Urchin in the Business, which makes me wonder if this is working as intended. @Goatgoatgoat, should Gangs ever receive an upgrade from evicting, since its tooltip does mention killing to receive an upgrade?

Losing the chance to claim an upgrade does make taking the charity a difficult choice already. I also think if it is too low it defeats the purpose of getting added funds for that special case. Also could we call it something different? Like extortion makes more sense than charity.

Mysterio (0) > Left Empty (0) on Big City due to him graciously conceding

gg, @Left_Empty!

Mysterio (5) > Otthegreat (2) on The Wharf

gg, @Otthegreat!