HQ25 monster stats and abilities #2 the Beastman

[knightkrawler]

I think I have four different Reaper bones beastmen, plus a couple of minotaurs that could reasonably be used as large beastmen. They all look pretty standard, decent enough sculpts.

That's true. I have some of them, too. Woodcutters as I recall, for example. Nice sculpts.

[Goblin-King]

Goblin-King recommends:
This classic guy is plastic. Fits the scale and style well enough and is pretty easy to get at a decent price on ebay.


Also look at that beautiful paintjob!

[cynthialee]

I have one of those sheep dudes. Came in a big lot of Bestigors I got on the 'bay. He is my commander of 'Gor forces.

[knightkrawler]

They are quite available, too. Definitely the best choice to be combined with the original playing pieces stylewise. Plus the Minotaurs from Warhammer Quest.

[cynthialee]

Well I have found most WH miniatures to be compatible with both HQ and RPG's.
My big issue with WH (other than their money before the game ideals) is that I only need a few miniatures of any given type, not an army unit worth.
When I bought a batch of Gors on the bay it was so many miniatures. After painting them, I sold half of them, gave away a 1/4 of them to my brother and I still have more than I will likely use in any one game. WH don't sell just one mini of the base soldier type dudes, so even when you resell them there is a massive pile being transferred.

[Daedalus]

I get that Fimir and Beastmen will appear in different styled maps like undead and orc in the original.

A Beastman which is too strong will be a match up for a highly equipped group. Where does the Minotaur fit if we have already something for the well equipped? As Boss Monster only?

I want the Beastman and Minotaur to be sufficiently differentiated. See below for a possible nerf. I'll get to work on the Minotaur poll next to get a better idea where we stand between the two.

The Fimir like statline, give or take a defense die, makes the Beastman a highly versatile Monster. He can be the Boss Monster for a beginner's group, the strong Monster for a medium group, and even for the endgame equipped Heroes he is still not ignorable, so he can be used there as common Monster.

The Fimir fails to do that because of the lack of models. There are just not enough of them in the Box.

I would hope the Beastman would be more dangerous than a Fimir. Our grunt story arc first features Orcs and Goblins, then Kobolds and Fimir. After that, Beastmen are introduced. I don't recall where Cultists come in, but I believe they will mainly be encoutered in the final Chaos chapter with the Chaos Dwarves.

A couple of Beastmen placed earlier in a Kobold and Fimir Quest would work fine as tough elites. When they are featured in the middle Quests as dangerous grunts and re-purposed in the later Quests as fodder I think 6 models should work fine.

A Beastman with 4 Attack dice can be an instant kill for a injured beginner Hero or the Wizard. More so if he gets to attack twice because of the counter attack ability.

This is the scary reality of a dangerous Beastman. Beginning Quests should avoid using Beastmen without careful consideration, and then only in minimal numbers. Quest makers should treat their placement almost as conservatively as Chaos Warriors.

If you give him four attack dice, he won't be useable too much against beginner groups, whereas strong groups will instant kill him so there the 4 dice don't make a difference.

The counter attack skill is a lot stronger than the additional die, but again, only against beginner groups. The high level groups will likely skip by the one BP threshold and instant kill him. So this skill would make him unusable with beginners groups and against strong groups it is useless, therefore reducing the usability of this beautiful model to medium groups only.

Most strong groups will have Heroes with battle axes or longswords, plus a Wizard's spells. I don't know the numbers as well as you, but shouldn't it be likely only 1 BP of damage will be done about a third of the time with a strong group? This will certainly reduce their threat to grunts for kitted-out Heroes. At that point I think increasing their numbers in a room will keep them useful but different when they are no longer the featured Quest monster in our story arc.

If you want him stronger than a Fimir, give him an AT die more. That reduces his use in the low end, but at least not in the high end.

But the special ability for counter attack should be reserved for Beastman Characters only. It is too restrictive.

If you perceive the counter attack as too strong, how about this nerf:

When a Beastman's Body Points are reduced to 1, it may immediately apply any skulls from its defend roll as hits against the Hero. These hits are defended normally.

This could optionally be extended to any damage against a Beastman as well, evening out its threat against differently equipped Heroes.

[Count Mohawk]

Most strong groups will have Heroes with battle axes or longswords, plus a Wizard's spells. I don't know the numbers as well as you, but shouldn't it be likely only 1 BP of damage will be done about a third of the time with a strong group? This will certainly reduce their threat to grunts for kitted-out Heroes. At that point I think increasing their numbers in a room will keep them useful but different when they are no longer the featured Quest monster in our story arc.

Here's the full range of possibilities for damage if the Minotaur has 4 Attack:

	Average Damage	P(0 Damage)	P(1 Damage)	P(2 Damage)	P(3 Damage)	P(4 Damage)
vs 2 Defense	1.40	24.3%	30.6%	28.5%	13.9%	2.8%
vs 3 Defense	1.15	34.5%	29.9%	23.6%	10.2%	1.9%
vs 4 Defense	0.93	44.4%	27.8%	19.1%	7.4%	1.2%
vs 5 Defense	0.75	53.7%	24.9%	15.2%	5.3%	0.8%
vs 6 Defense	0.59	62.0%	21.7%	11.9%	3.8%	0.5%

If you perceive the counter attack as too strong, how about this nerf:

When a Beastman's Body Points are reduced to 1, it may immediately apply any skulls from its defend roll as hits against the Hero. These hits are defended normally.

This could optionally be extended to any damage against a Beastman as well, evening out its threat against differently equipped Heroes.

Our prospective Beastman is likely to have 2 Defense, so the counter-attack in this case is basically a 2-dice attack back, or slightly better since the Beastman is less likely to take damage if his defense roll includes any Walruses. Without going into specifics (because the table function in BBcode is terribad), the range of average damage from such an attack would be between 0.6 and 0.2, depending on how much defense the Heroes have. I'm not a big fan of using defense rolls to attack, though; I'd just as soon word it as "Beastmen counter with 2 dice / with half of their Attack strength, rounded up".

One thought: What happens if a Beastman is wounded at range? Do we want to word the ability such that he can take a free crack at another Hero who happens to be adjacent, or limit it only to direct counters against Heroes attacking in melee?

[cynthialee]

I would limit it to only a melee reaction. Got wacked at range? Tough luck.

[Anderas]

So we're arriving at 4 Dice Attack; and 2 Dice counterattack in case of 1BP left; 2 Body Points?

If you want to see him more or less like a Chaos Warrior, why not 3 Body Points? I change my voting according to this post now.

[Daedalus]

I should clarify. My comments regarding a Beastman with a counter attack (against adjacent attacker only) or defense attack were meant to be combined with 3 Attack Dice. I consider that combination as an option seperate from a straight 4 Attack Dice with no other ability. I think both options could get the job done, but I'd rather have this monster between a Fimir and a Chaos Warrior. I'm not looking for a Chaos Warrior substitute.

My concern is to not have a Beastman and Minotaur be too similar. If a Beastman has 4 Attack Dice, then a Minotaur will need 5 Attack Dice. That's a lot of threat, up there with Ogres (too samey?). Maybe it's too much for combat Heroes geared up from only 16-25 Quests with 4 or 5 Defend Dice. [12-15 Quests with 4 Defend Dice -edit] I'd rather keep a Beastman at 3 Attack Dice to be conservative. However, it also appears counter attack needs reduction to 2 Attack Dice, or even just 1 Attack Dice to keep their power down.