Godtear Community Playtest Packet: Raith'Marid & Rattlebone

Hello Champions!  As I’m sure you all know, the community is working on a balance pass for Godtear.  In these playtest packets, we’ll be presenting proposed changes for two champions.  One will get nerfs, one will get buffs.  First, we’ll give you the changes themselves.  Then we’ll explain why we chose these champions, how we have interpreted the community's perspective on their issues, and how we arrived at the change proposal.

Raith’Marid Experimental Nerfs

Here are the proposed nerfs for Raith:

• Tsunami: Range 3 → 2

• Tide: Accuracy 5/6/7 → 4/5/6

Rattlebone Experimental Buffs

Here are the proposed buffs for Rattlebone:

• Hex Bolt: Accuracy 2/4/6 → 4/5/6

• Roll the Bones: New wording "Once per phase during Rattlebone's activation, roll one die.  You may move that many boons or blights from any model within 2 hexes of Rattlebone to any other model within 2 hexes of Rattlebone."

• Cursed Ground: New wording: "Place up to two objective hexes on empty non-objective hexes within range. Whenever an enemy champion enters one of these hexes, they gain 1 wound. Remove these hexes at the end of the clash phase."

Why these champions?

We chose to start with these two crews because Rattlebone is one of the least played warbands while Raith is one of the most played. Furthermore, there is a common sentiment that the Shaper lineup is divided by the largest gap in power compared to the other classes. By making proposed changes to these two warbands, we hope to validate the practice of pulling outliers closer to the average power level.

What were their issues?

Raith is a powerhouse in most people's hands and his ultimate single handedly wins games for even new players. Added to that, the Splashlings provide a reliable push in both phases while being spread out due to easy access to an accuracy boon. We propose that these changes help to reduce Raith’s ceiling without impacting his playstyle or identity.  

Rattlebone on the other hand, often feels clunky for most and underperforms. Only the most skillful players can play her effectively and keep up with other warbands. The majority seem to agree that Cursed Ground feels lacking, and that the hexlings needed to group up to use Hex Bolt, leaving them vulnerable to Maelstroms. The timing of Roll the Bones often feels unnecessarily limiting, and we hope more player agency helps provide a more consistently interesting decision making process. 

Why’d we make the change proposals we did?

The changes to Raith’s ultimate were made (reduce the range from 3 to 2) so there was a chance to guard yourself against it. Having range 3 gives Raith 37 hexes to land on, whereas range 2 only provides 19 options. These numbers put the change in some perspective and hopefully provide a change such  that the ultimate is extremely impactful, but still allows for some counterplay.

Reducing the accuracy of Tide simply makes it so you can’t reliably push Dodge 4 or 5 around with a single Splashling, making for some more interesting decisions between pushing the opponent by grouping Splashlings or giving Raith maneuverability through Ker-Splalsh.

–

We felt that there was an opportunity to make Cursed Ground more consistent, but also recognised that it can be very impactful blocking for followers etc. in the hands of skillful players. Other suggestions were on the table but felt too powerful or too much of the same thing (more blights), whereas the 1 damage can make for interesting choices, especially if you can lure or push other champions onto the cursed hexes. It also helps a bit to address the fact that Rattlebone’s warband uniquely only has 1 attack.

The change to Hex Bolt frees up the hexlings from grouping, and thereby makes them less vulnerable as maelstrom fodder.  This helps to keep them on par with other followers.

The last change, Roll the Bones, was made so the trait felt useful in more situations, and so that you could reliably move boons and blights around based on your roll.  We also cemented the range to 2 hexes because the variable range was confusing and weird for newer players.

How to playtest these changes?

If you want to playtest these changes, simply play a game with one or more of the champions being playtested. Make sure that your opponent agrees on which version (original or community balance pass) of the champions you are using. If you play on TTS, use the changed cards provided by MightyFinePants. The Godtear Community page will also have an online version of the cards that you can use as a reference or if you are playing a live game:

How to contribute to the project?

To provide feedback, which is essential to the success of this project, you can submit THIS FORM (note, if you are new to playing online, you can learn more from this article).  

If you want to discuss these changes with the community at large, please post in the #playtest-feedback channel of the unofficial community discord server.

If you want to help brainstorm directions for balance changes, please post your ideas in the #homebrew channel of the unofficial community discord server.

—

That’s it for this playtest packet.  Check out Objective Hex in two weeks when we publish the playtest packet for Morrigan and Rangosh!

Wooloolool,

The Council of Eldritch Judgement