ameritrasher said:

All of those except the Prophetess I can agree with, Assassin if you play the nutter RAW version of him. Prophetess' abilities don't help her gain stats, they help her to avoid bad stuff. Okay, you can draw bad Adventure card, discard and redraw a stat-boost, but just as easy you can draw another bad card or one that is meaningless toward stats. Currently around here, the Prophetess is barely hanging on to her mid-level status (11 games, 3-8).

Dam said:

The best part about the prophetess is that you can avoid the really bad stuff like being cursed by the hag and ghost. The bad part about her is that if you draw good cards you don't want to use her ability anyway.

My question was aimed at JC's post about why he thought the ogre overpowered when several characters in the base game have much better special abilities.

ameritrasher said:

But Prophetess's ability doesn't really help her win more quickly, unlike the OC, which is the main point regarding the OC I think. OC + Dungeon route looks very tempting at this point. Whether he'll draw and beat monsters is another matter of course.

I am not allowed to use mechanics from another expansion to counteract a character from another expansion? I do not see why I am not allowed to use the expansions available to me. Besides, if you don't have the reaper expansion maybe you should buy it before you buy frostmash. I was simply pointing out that the way my group plays the game, everyone is very competative, one fate is a real drawback, in short you usally die from having zero fate unless it is very late game. A common strategy is to always have one fate no matter what, as a death protector.

Regarding the prophetess; her best ability by far is the ability to cycle spells even during an opponents turn. She has, like most cycle spellcasters, the ability to turn a late game death and a sure loss into a win due to spell cycling.

I think, personally that the most dangerous characters are to be found in the core game, appearing in no particular order; the assassin, the troll, the warrior, the prophetess, the wizard, the dwarf. What makes these characters good is their all solidness. They are not really dependant on that much luck in order to work. Take the gladiator, from the dungeon, or the gypsy they are both very powerful if things go right. The gladiator is heavily dependant on getting followers to be powerful and the gypsy needs someone to feed her spells in order to work. Well I guess you know what I'm getting at so I'll stop ranting now.

PluTT said:

I haven't found having 1 Fate a big weakness really. And I play with BI board using only the Village errata, so no Fate replenish at Graveyard (or gaining at Temple if you roll 11). Only thing that can auto-kill you is the Reaper. If you die from it, you've probably gotten yourself in the wrong place (with 6 spaces of him) anyway. Otherwise, you death doesn't come in one blow, so 1 Fate or 2 Fate, not a big difference IMO.

PluTT said:

Thing is, there are quite a few Followers in the Adventure deck and even 4 just waiting for Market Day/Market. Gladiator has even lost all his Followers to the Dungeon Keeper once and still owned the game, collecting another horde of normally "useless" (Prince, Princess, Guide, etc.) Followers. Gladiator with Colossus + Warhorse doesn't even need much more, he's good.

Yea my point was that he, the gladiator, is good but is dependant on other circumstances which may bite him in the ass, you might not get any followers for example.

It is hard not to be in range of the reaper if you are in the outer and middle region, which is my point, since he can move from all locations on the LoD to the LoD and from the LoD to all those locations, except the inner ones. Which means he can move around a lot, it also means that you are not very dependant on him rolling the exact amount of moves needed in order to land on character. I'll explain: let's say the reaper is on the cursed glade and another character is on the square next to the crags that means you need to roll three or or five in order to land on that specific character (LoD -> Crags -> player or LoD -> Crags -> LoD -> Crags -> player). The reaper is therefore very good at landing on other players since he can get rid of excess moves and teleport around. In our games it is rare for him not to land on anyone during his move, although ofcourse that does happen. Since the reaper is more active he only has to land on a charcter six times for a garranteed one hence a low fate can really mess you up specially if all players are targeting you with the reaper.

A quick appendix to my previous post about the Ogre Cheif: The reason why people think he is overpowered is because he could plow through the dungeon and teleport to the crown of command immedietly, and the dungeon is yet another expansion, which I was not allowed to use in my arguing unfair is it not it?

When looking at the balance of characters, one looks at the base game first as a measure. Any consideration of mechanics and influences beyond that are... well, beyond that. The Reaper isn't always used by all groups that have that expansion; some just use the cards alone. Then there's the dungeon where to use any of it you have to pretty much use all of it. Frostmarch will add in additional subchoices of how the expansion is used from game to game, which endgame, how many quest cards, etc., etc. Again, the point is, when looking at how a character balances out, its strengths vs its weaknesses, one looks to the components of the original base game. One does not look a "counterbalance" in what could be used to hobble a character IF an additional expansion is used and IF a particular option of the expansion is used. That is not the way to estimate balance.

O.C. definitely has minor weakness but nothing serious... nothing at all. Low Fate isn't one of them the way Fate is set up in the game; Fate just isn't that potent if you take the time to calculate the probabilities corretly.

The O.C.'s Craft is moderate, his Strength nearly exceptional, and his total attribute count is 7, which is rare compared to the base set of original characters that came with the base game. Now add the ability to take Enemy-Monsters (the most plentiful classificatiion of Enemy) and use the monster's full Strength as a bonus; now make that cumulative instead being limited to 1 such "Follower" at a time as some characters have to do. Yes, you sacrifice getting S tokens for that monster, but still... If I run into an E-M of Str. 3 or less, then defeat it... I'll keep it for a +3 when it really counts.

That is seriously potent on top of an attribute total of 7.

This is not say that other base characters aren't potent, or that other expansion characters aren't also beyond the median, whether they're duplicates of 3E and 2E versions or altered for 4ER. That there are other overgunned characters doesn't make the O.C. balanced... it just makes more characters that aren't balanced.

And indeed, just running a few numbers off the cuff, I still think the O.C. with a couple of monster followers can hit that Dungeon and become a juggernaut. That's second level of consideration. And those who've played since 2E can probably remember a few old characters who had some annoying advantages pop up when certain expansions were added into a game. Being able to see one ahead of time with the O.C. just makes me wonder about the way it was put together.

On the other side, I've already heard some ugly rumblings from my crew abroad concerning the Leprechaun; I fear for his safety if he shows his face in the Land. I don't remember him well from the 2E days, but I can sit here and think easily how he can gear up to the max in less than 10 moves by pure probability and his special abilities.

About the alternate endings.

There has been more or less a consensus that the endings (or rather scenarios) are drawn or chosen at the start of the game. I'm wondering if we know this for sure?

It would be neat if you draw at the end, and I think it could work. each player would start with four quest cards, but you could play it safe and complete all four, or take a risk and hope you don't draw that ending.

I wasn't able to make out the writing on the ending cards. Does anyone have better insight than I do?

crimhead said:

I think you only start with 4 Warlock's Quest cards IF you use the Warlock Quests ending. At least, the text giving each char 4 at the start is on the ending card.

I agree with Dam

I think that the ending cards will be chosen from the beginning.

It would be a problem if you land on the crown space and you draw the warlock ending card, and you have the quests not completed.

Then you are stuck forever there

i am still wondering what the Ice Queen will do. I hope she will do some nasty things across the board from his inner region space..

i can't wait to try out the Leprechaun

Velhart said:

You already know his abilities, play as him and as OC. Eventually Warlcok Yesterday I had a Zelda Talisman game, I played as Kotake and Koume (Twinrova) and Captain Stalfos, my friend as Link and as Nayru (Oracle of Ages). All Characters are my custom cards and are based on characters from The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages games. You can play using custom versions of Leprechaun too

Actually, now that Leprechaun and OC have been fully shown, all the abilities for the characters for Frostmarch are known (Necromancer takes a bit of squinting, but it's doable).

Nemomon said:

Wow

I did not know that you are also a Legend of Zelda freak !

Very interesting

Later I might translate them for You Rest Zelda Character cards as well as rest of my Talisman Expansion Sets are there: gamekeeper.offnet.pl/forum/viewtopic.php At least most, because ImageShack don't want to show few of my cards . Generally I like all old Zeldas, from NES, SNES, GB, GBC and GBA. My fave ones are Oracle of Ages, and Link's Awakening DX. And of course Ballad of the Windfish (I have 8 different versions of this song on my playlist). And SNES version of ALttP is better than GBA version

As for Characters, now we can test almost of of them. Somehow they are strong, but I still think that Lepre will use his Teleport ability only few times. It's not common to roll 6 for movement. As for his gold, for now there is nothing to buy. 3, max 5 gold is very enough for the whole game. Warlock, hmm.. depends of the Spells in Frostmarch, he can easily block himself with his spells, and since now all Spells must have valid target, not like in 2nd Edition, when we were able to cast spells even if there was no legal target. That's a very stupid part of Talisman IMO. Yes, previously spell cycling was great and a little annoying for characters who weren't able to cycle spell deck, but now they went to the dark corner of other side - we even cannot cast Summon Storm, if there is no Animals and Monsters in our Region, there must be at least one Monster/Animal in it, and we are forced to cast that spell on that space. Or die with it...

The second lot of pics from the Frostmarch are now up on Talisman Island...

Nemomon said:

Just hit the Dungeon and get a Torch. While in there, you can roll 2 dice and choose from those. Of course, the more common way is Amazon + Flying Carpet, which works anywhere but the Inner Region.

Nemomon said:

Each visit to Woods = auto-stat gain at Academy. And there is the Sorcerer. But generally speaking, Gold is pretty under-used. There have been quite a few rich winners of late (finish with 10+ Gold).

Nemomon said:

Warlock is still a better spell-cycler than anybody else. Starting off, he has to get stuck with 2 Spells he can't use to be unable to spell-cycle. If he gets +1 Craft, then he needs 3 Spells he can't use to be unable to cycle. Even if he has 1 Spell he can't cast, he can still cycle 1-2 Spells, whereas other cyclers would be stuck with the uncastable Spell. As he starts on the Middle Region, Temple is one easy option for +1 Craft. Teleport + Twist of Fate as starting Spells, his next turn he'll get 3 Spells (unless he rolls a natural 7 at the Temple).

Hmm... this is interesting (from FFG's Twitter feed) -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6waBSsAe7E

Not sure it is anything to do with Frostmarch, but it would be cool to have a fancy video for it!

Dam said:

But from what I know, and many users here pointed, that we cannot mix objects/followers/abilities that affect movement, so or we are rolling 1 die normally (and if 6, we can teleport) or we are using 1 abilitiy and then we cannot use another ones (so, if we will roll two 6 on Riding Horse, we are moving 12 spaces, we are not teleporting).

Dam said:

Exactly, we don't have many options to spend money. We have a lot of gaining them, but not spend. Other cards, like Instructor or Academy must be drawn first.

Dam said:

Yes, he is the best spell-cycler until now, and with Totem Staff he can have even 4 spells each turn, but Spell deck is growing and there is more spells that we can use in given time, like battle/psychic combat or when another spell just being cast. He always may gain Summon Stormcrow, then commit suicide (probably using that stormcrow against him himself) or any other Reflections or Alchemy or few other spells that he might not use them even once.

talismanisland said:

"Video removed by user" before I could peek at it.

Nemomon said:

Riding Horse is pretty clear cut, but others are IMO less so.

Take the Amazon. She rolls a 3 and a 6, picks the 6. What did she roll for her movement? There are six blips looking up from the die, but it's not a 6? Is it a 5 ? Or is she rolls a 1 and a 5 and picks the 1, Reaper doesn't move?

Might as well bring the Sage in to this. Rerolling movement is clearly affecting movement, so if he rolls X, decides to reroll and rolls a 6, it's not a 6? Sage's ability is basically a free-Fate on the movement, same as with the Cloak of Feathers, will no-mix be applied to Fate use on movement?

JCHendee said:

Hmmm... sneaky...

They've removed the Twitter post too. The video was just a short thing with the FFG logo and name, like most other FFG videos, but it was surrounded by swirling snow....

...just as an aside - The Upcoming page here at FFG lists the Frostmarch as October and Shipping!!!

Hurray ! One box for France will be quite enough, thank you very much !

talismanisland said:

Just to confirm, I actually meant "On The Boat"... I confused my ships!! I meant shipping from the factory. Sorry if I got someone's hopes up too much!

IGUK has Expected Release Date as 27th Nov:

http://www.iguk.co.uk/products/frostmarch-the-talisman-expansion-8842.aspx