Collection of Norbayne Combat Tests

[Clockwork]

I am invested.


You tried asking your local games shop if they want to run a session?

[Phoenixguard09]

Two problems:

1. Not in a position to provide a full document yet.

2. No local gamestore here, and hasn't been for about ten years.

[Phoenixguard09]

We played out the Combat Test, and it went for approximately two hours.

TEAM ONE:
Dorien:
- Dev: Held him back too much and made fundamental mistakes. Mismanaged, just about everything about the character in my opinion.
- Ladyhawk: Bound Sword is cool and Shadow Fields is a really good spell, but we didn't get to see that today.

Gryffynn:
- Dev: Badly overextended him and put him in Corbulo's way. Did have a moment to shine, charging in on a Wild-formed Dayne/horse, but was bogged down and put down pretty easily.
- Ladyhawk: To be honest, barely noticed him.

Varrik:
- Dev: Great at range, but was essentially shut down by Caelwulf's Flame Curtain. Also unlucky with rolls to hit. (Probably hit with 6 shots out of 20)
- Ladyhawk: My biggest problem. Heaviest hitter on Dev's team, if I had to nerf anyone it would be him. Big trade-off in terms of the 5 shots a round and then 2 rounds of reloading. My first priority if I faced them again. Dev was unlucky to not hit more often, and rolled reasonably poorly for damage, but on another day he'd be a massive problem.

Dayne:
- Dev: Unfortunate spell-choices from PG here, many of his skills and spells were lacking in utility. I thought turning him into a horse wasn't a bad idea, but in execution, it went poorly. I definitely should have used him more as a distraction than I did. (I overcompensated slightly for Team One's lack of casters by giving Dayne some high-utility spells, but didn't keep in mind how much he'd struggle casting them)
- Ladyhawk: The horse idea was a good one, and if they had gone for the squishy characters rather than Corbulo I would have been in trouble.

Briala:
- Dev: Fireloques are terrifying if they bloody hit.
- Ladyhawk: Agreed, thankfully they weren't too accurate.

TEAM TWO:
Corbulo:
- Ladyhawk: Really tough and heavy hitter. Just as I would want from a Warrior. I would expect a Beserker to do more damage, but be squishier, and a Guardian to be harder to hurt but inflict less himself. A Duelist should emphasise quickness, but a Warrior should strike a good balance.
- Dev: Overpowered, scary as portugal. I demand a nerf.

Jagoda:
- Ladyhawk: Perfect battle-field control Warlock.
- Dev: I didn't realise how overpowered Warlocks might be. I think there may be a need to limit how the Warlock produces power.
- Ladyhawk: I don't think they really are that overpowered, they're balanced through potential danger. I got lucky and rolled well, so Jagoda didn't get hit in the face by a daemon, but if I had rolled poorly, she's probably going down.

Caelwulf:
- Ladyhawk: Pretty good. Good battlefield control once again. The Flame Curtain in the end game shut down the battle completely, preventing Dev's ranged attacks from having much impact, while ensuring that I could get through without hassle, but force Dev's characters to walk through the fire to get there. (Kindleflame was a little lackluster)
- Dev: Yeah, it's a Mage.

Roberre:
- Ladyhawk: Not too bad, better than I thought. Thought Duelists were a bit armadilloty, but he actually did pretty well.
- Dev: Not fantastically optimised but definitely 'made his points back' so to speak. In taking Gryffynn down, he managed to put both Gryffynn and Dayne out of the fight.

Lilliana:
- Ladyhawk: If Lullaby had gone off I could have tabled him. Really strong battlefield control.
- Dev: Very useful. Possibly OP'd having the Mage and the Bard on one team. Too much battlefield control on one team between them and the Warlock.

FINAL THOUGHTS:
Ladyhawk: I was quite concerned when Dev kept his force together, but then he split the party, and I was able to pick them apart one by one.

[Phoenixguard09]

Unfortunately I was unable to keep a detailed play by play of what occurred, but I can provide the basic overview.

Dev put Dayne in the centre of his line, with Dorien and Gryffynn flanking him. Varrik took the right flank and Briala the left.

Opposing this, Ladyhawk positioned Corbulo foremost to anchor the centre of her line, with Roberre in his back pocket. Behind and on the right flank were Lilliana and Caelwulf, while Jagoda was a little wider on the left.

The first two rounds saw some preliminary jostling for position as neither side seemed keen to engage closely, wary of being cut off from their fellows. Ranged attacks were traded early as Varrik was able to land some shots on Corbulo and Jagoda successfully inflicted Agony on Briala. Lilliana successfully cast Inspiring Melody in the second round, strumming her lute and inspiring her compatriots.

(I'll take a moment to talk about this period of the match. Both players were hesitant to make the first move, and rather than being a bit boring, both players suggested the tension was a positive for their experience.)

Concerned that the spells available for Dayne to cast would take too long to come into effect, Dev decided to Wildform him into a horse and have Gryffynn mount up. Dorien also attempted an Arcane Disruption, but was unable to get the spell off and blew a fair chunk of Soulfire in the process.

With Gryffynn mounted, Dev decided to attempt a ride-past attack on Corbulo, which was his first major error. His attack was never going to do enough to trigger the Ride Down extra move (dropping Corbulo was very unlikely, even with a full Mounted Charge, but Dev attempted a Ride-By, which is resolved as a Quick Attack. As discussed later, he would have been better served by declaring a Mounted Charge on Roberre, who was also in range and would likely have been brought down, triggering the Ride Down free movement)

Key points in that round include Roberre charging Gryffynn, triggering a free Quick Attack due to Gryffynn's Spear Mastery, which Roberre duly Parried, triggering a Riposte straight back at Gryffynn. That exchange to me personally felt very fluffy, and Roberre proceeded to put Gryffynn down. Dayne immediately took his natural form and raised his hands in a gesture of peace and was allowed to patch up his fallen and bleeding comrade.

Briala opened up with both fireloques. One missed but the other almost dropped Jagoda in one shot. Jagoda gritted her teeth and inflicted Agony on Varrik, making it significantly more difficult for him to hit anything with his crossbow. Caelwulf also hit the dwarf with Kindleflame, which the artificer calmly shrugged off initially.

Caelwulf proceeded to block one half of the field from the other by placing a Flame Curtain between both halves of the field, providing significant cover against ranged attacks for Ladyhawk's characters. 

To cut a long story short, Ladyhawk had Briala attempt Lullaby, trusting to the protection afforded by the Flame Curtain, but was unsuccessful casting it. Dev and Ladyhawk both came to a sporting agreement that Dayne would not be targeted as he assisted Gryffynn off the field as long as he did not strike from behind.

In the end, Ladyhawk had Caelwulf drop the flames momentarily when ready, allowing Corbulo through to charge Dorien, who had finally summoned a sabre, but never used Shadow Fields. She also had Roberre charge through to an unsuspecting Briala, who was in the middle of reloading her fireloques. To top it off, Jagoda was able to ensnare Dorien in a Malefic Grasp, making it a simple matter for Corbulo to bring the Roanfaille down.

In the end, despite still having three characters practically untouched and Jagoda and Corbulo having a total of 5 Health between them, Dev called a surrender. With his two tanks down and Briala locked in close against a reasonably competent opponent, Dev had definite reasons for this.

AFTERWORD:
I was very proud of how Ladyhawk played today. She went in with a plan, used some spells and abilities I would not have expected of her and made good tactical decisions.

Team Two is triumphant! Next time either both players will have selected their own teams, or alternatively, Dev would like someone to take the idea I put forward as the context and turn it into an actual campaign. Not sure what we will do just yet.

[Phoenixguard09]

So we have a few more mechanics that I'd like to try and showcase if at all possible, with perhaps a little bit of party-composition theory I guess.

PART 1: Party Composition Theory.

I believe I have narrowed things down to four in-combat roles and four out-of-combat roles which should ideally be covered by various members of a party.

In-Combat Roles:
Tank: The tank is primarily about defending the rest of the party, normally by ensuring that the enemy attacks the tank first. The tank must be able to both draw enemies in and take a hefty amount of punishment.

Striker: The striker is the group's primary damage dealer, and will normally sacrifice durability for damage potential. Strikers are usually split between ranged and close combat variations, but both types want to cause a lot of damage and not take any damage in return.

Support: This would be where your combat healer comes in, but Norbayne has none, so this is focused on improving your allies, through various means. The support role is generally dominated by caster classes.

Control: The other side of the support role, control is all about negating the enemies' strengths and weakening them. This can be done in a multitude of ways, from lowering stats and inflicting nasty effects, to dominating the foe, or even just the threat of massive area of effect damage, cordoning off parts of the battlefield.

Out-of-Combat Roles:
Face: The face should be the character the players turn to when someone needs to be persuaded. This isn't to say that the face is the only character allowed to role-play, but every group tends to have one character built to succeed in social situations.

Library: The library's main stock in trade, at least in Norbayne, is knowledge checks.

Bull: Many obstacles can only be passed with the skilled application of brute strength, which is where the bull comes in.

Scout: Someone sneaky who can pass by obstacles unseen. Can also be handy finding resources in unfamiliar locations.

As you can see, most character will fulfil a few roles to varying degrees each, and that is the intention. The idea is merely that a party should have at least one character that can do each role pretty well.

PART 2: A Sample Party
Ezra Peirson (Midlander Bard) - Support, Control, Face, Library
Ciara Ceonach (Leathe Mesmer) - Control, Face, Scout
Bardr Hawkonsson (Northmann Warrior) - Tank, Striker, Bull
Leofflaed Cild-Mildgyn (Dunscarth Warlock) - Striker, Control, Library

So as we can see here, we've got a nice mix of abilities across the four characters, with each role covered at least once.

PART 3: In which we'll see this party try and get through a dungeon, showcasing some of the new mechanics.