Since March I’ve gone from reading the Start-up guide with a slightly confused expression on my face to quoting the rule book to experienced players. And I’ve learned to love this game more than any other I’ve played.

This is not the regular tactical article I publish. Most of what I have to say tactically will be swept under the rug in about a month. With Hasten and Blue Cloak hitting the field, Privateer Press apparently heard my discouraging remarks about Brawling armies and decided to give me what-for. So, this week, I’m going to confess my love for this game. And explain why I think it has the potential to be one of the most long-lived games out there.

First of all, what do I know about games? Well, honestly, only as much as I read. But I’ve read a lot because I’m fascinated by the history of the gaming industry. I’ve come to appreciate the commercial juggernaut behind Magic and D&D. While I don’t particularly appreciate their gouging tactics, I do enjoy the games, or have in the past. But what makes these games so successful?

A game has to have a large amount of room for imagination. MonPoc has that in spades. I used to build Lego cities to destroy with my $0.99 Godzilla toy. This game lets me do that with beautifully sculpted cities on amazing maps with vastly superior Monster figures.

Successful games allow their players to identify with their force. Five Rings, World of Warcraft, Hordes, Warmachine, and Warhammer are all extremely successful with rabid players that identify themselves by which team they play for. How about that… Privateer Press publishes two of those games. And now a third.

Also, truly successful games keep things balanced. I’ve voiced my opinion on this minor negative aspect of MonPoc in the past. But after speaking with every PP rep that would hold still at GenCon, they’ve reassured me that I don’t need to worry. Just because I haven’t seen the solution yet doesn’t mean it isn’t there. And now I’m beginning to understand.

For instance – Hasten?? What exactly it does, I’m not sure. But I have a feeling that units in a Hastened force will move quite a bit faster. I, for one, am tentatively asking my Carnidons if they are hungry. Their resounding answer is “Hell YEAH!” Then I take a look at Mantacon. I’ve been excited to get Kamakuras ever since I heard the name “Savage Swarm.” And I was not disappointed. Again and again, PP overwhelms my expectations. I’ve learned to just sit back and enjoy the ride. But geez, this guy is fast, nasty, and he has blue cloak on his Ultra. I can’t even begin to stutter out an explanation of how much that will change the format. I already get frustrated against the new Tower of Corruption incarnation of the Lords of Cthul. Those Shadows shut down my blasting plan. And now a whole force will spend roughly half the game cloaked. Disgusting.

So, what does this game have that is going to push it into the fore for years to come? First of all, its comparatively inexpensive. I remember spending well over $300 on a single top tier deck of cards. And I had plenty of friends that played miniature games where the total investment was well over $1000. I think that all of my friends and I put together have almost that much invested, and we all have complete armies for two factions.

Secondly, it has character and class. I have yet to attend an event where the atmosphere was anything less than familial. MonPoc players love smashing buildings, love thrashing monsters, but most of all, love the game and everyone else that plays it. I can’t recall how many figures I’ve handed to complete strangers, but I know it’s less than what I or my friends have received. In fact, my play partner’s SSS force was composed entirely of donations at one point.

Finally, this game has love in each and every miniature. I had the privilege of speaking with Matt Wilson, David Carl, Will Schick, and Chris Walton at GenCon, and I’ve never been more impressed with the people behind a product I love. Some other booths seemed like they had just hired public relations specialists to hock their products. Privateer had a team of people that loved what they were doing. And I heard a lot of things I wasn’t supposed to (but I was sworn to secrecy) and I’m super stoked about the next set. More excited than I’ve been since I got my acceptance to the academy early. But I have a feeling that my relationship with Privateer is only going to get better.

So, what I’m really trying to say is, Thank You. Thank you for reading my articles, for visiting Team Covenant, but most of all, for being part of the Monsterpocalypse family. Because that’s what it is. As much as we Radicals may not get along with you Martians, we can still stand Claw in Manipulator and announce, “We are Monsters, Hear us Roar.”

Wow, dramatic close aside, I really do appreciate everyone out there playing this game, introducing their friends and helping it grow. So, until I have something tactical to obsess over into the late hours driven by my overly competitive spirit…

Have a Smashing Good Time.

-KenMonster

The words themselves hold no power, but the trepidation they create in a seasoned Monsterpocalypse player is immense.

THE Blasting powerhouse, and what a record he has. This year at GenCon, in case you hadn’t heard, he took 4 of the 5 undefeated (3-0) finalists to day two. With that kind of presence, MZM is undeniably the monster to beat. If you’ve read my articles, you’ll see that I don’t even rank him in my top three.

Why, you ask? Because I do not fear MZM. I don’t even worry about him much. “How is that even possible??” Because I carry kryptonite around in the form of a small, winged reptile with the best action in the game. Tow is the answer to dealing with MZM.

At this point, you should be saying, “That’s great for you Ken, you play Terrasaurs like a rabid Tasmanian devil and you can drop those things on the map willy-nilly.” In that, you would be correct. But Privateer Press has very conveniently and graciously provided every other faction with an elegant and efficient solution to cross-spawning. The Privateer Press Building provides you with an Indestructible unit spawning HQ that allows you to answer those pesky problems of removing crucial units.

When testing out the PP Building, I came to realize that I couldn’t really utilize it. T-Saurs already run something on the order of three actions per unit turn, and one of those is Nest, effectively a forerunner to R&D. But when testing a Sky Sentinel army, I fell in love with the ability to R&D a Shadow Pteradactix to bring Tow to my force. In most circumstances, that is to say, most maps, at least one combination of foundations offers a pair of buildings that can be secured with four units. By sending that one extra unit into the fray, you can grab another P-Die, but more importantly, R&D.

So, what does this mean for those forces struggling with MZM? You now have access to the one ability that can utterly change the game. With the low movement stat on Shadow Gates, Towing them 7 spaces (5 range, plus placing them on the opposite side of your Dactix) can spell serious trouble for old MZM’s game plan of hide-and-snipe. Don’t discount the added functionality of Towing Sun Drones as well. This is also a good way to generate P-Die on the unit turn, by Towing units into hazards.

How else should you go about disrupting that game plan, you ask? I’ll tell you. While it’s not the only factor, building placement and map choice play a big role in how a game against MZM will go. So, it’s important to be prepared for MZM with a good familiarity with a map that disrupts MZM’s game plan of using Beat Back to rock you down a form. My favorite choice for this tactic is Boardwalk Brawl, because of the very low building population and wide open spaces. It is also advisable to concentrate hazardous buildings on your opponent’s side of the map, making sure that, if the throw-down is going to happen, it’ll be on his side. And of course, practice practice practice. MZM scares a lot of people because they only ever see him at a tournament, smashing their face in. This guy is not a magical win stick. He’s very good, and backed up by very good units. But a few key plays will shut him down until you want to deal with him.

First, Alpha Zor-Maxim is awful. That is the long and the short of it. He is a 7defense, 5 health meatshield, and he brings nothing to the table. Keep him in Alpha for as long as possible. Counter SSS armies have the easiest access to this technique in C-Type Shinobis combining with Katanas to Disrupt, but ANY monster can Head-Butt, effectively setting MZM back by 6 P-Dice.

Second, disrupt early and often. SSS gained a huge advantage in P-Die production with Sun Drones, but taking out a unit to cancel the secure is absolutely one of the best moves on your first unit activation. You will NOT keep up with the P-Die production of a well piloted SSS force, but with the right combination of tactics, you can slow them down enough that it won’t matter. Towers of Corruption, Blast Attacks, and Tow are the three methods I’ll suggest. The Lords have the easiest time of Summon+Move to shut down a securing force, but that will simply be an every turn investment, as will blasting. Tow is the one action that will move a unit across the map and cancel its utility for the next couple of unit turns. By leaving Towed units on the map, you deny access to re-spawning them. Keep that in mind when you’re tempted to Tow a shadow gate into some flames.

Finally, I want to say that I’m basing this on having played against MZM for probably one of every three games since I picked up MonPoc. This is one of the few things I’ve tested more than I care to talk about, and I’ve had my fair share of ugly losses to MZM when I didn’t have access to Mega Pteradax. But, disregarding the doom-and-gloom some people have brought up, MZM is a balanced, if extremely good, Monster. Lords of Cthul have a good answer, Terrasaurs have a good answer, SSS has a great answer, and even Martians and GUARD can bring a degree of competition. Try out Privateer Press and tell me what kind of results you get, I have a feeling that you will be pleased.

Until next we meet, Have a Smashing Good Time.

-KenMonster

I hope to impart some knowledge on choosing and losing units for the best army you can create. I started off pretty shaky in my army building, taking what looked cool, or what I thought would buff my monster. A lot of it was extremely situational…

For example, if you find yourself contemplating how cool it will be when you have Xaxor up against an enemy monster with a Chomper adjacent to them both and a Destructomite nearby, you’re really reaching for the stars. Plan your army to be maximally effective in the worst possible circumstances. Like when you have no Flank, no Weaken, and no Leadership. Then play it and see what units spend the whole game sitting in your reserves. That will tell you a lot about what is effective and what is dead weight.

As a Terrasaur player myself, I feel like I have access to a “toolbox” assortment of units. My army does a lot of things, but each Unit has a clearly defined job. They are definitely not jacks-of-all trades, but whatever they specialize in, they are fantastic at. On the other hand, my play partner rocks Shadow Sun Syndicate, and his units seem to do anything well. They’re more multi-faceted and less constrained. This extends even further in a Martian Menace or Planet Eater force, where units are doing all sorts of things. Are they weakening the opponent, generating power die, attacking, or doing all three??

So, let’s take a look at what I feel are some of the units that define superlative ability. From T-Saurs: I’m in love with Pteradactix, Spikodon, and the new Spikasaur. Each one has a niche role to fill, but they fill it very well! Pteradactix is my answer to Cloak and Decoy, Towing Shadow Gates and Meat Slaves to the middle-of-map nowhere land, making them wholly ineffectual. Spikodon is my ranged bruiser. No other unit in the game boasts Explosion with a 2B-dice long range Blast, nor offers it in shadow flavor to boot. And finally, Spikasaur. This little guy is good for protecting your infrastructure from a devastating Rampage, but with A/M Pteradax, he is a nightmare. Now, all these units are very conditional, but I use them almost every game for one application or another, and so they stay in my army.

The same holds true with any faction. SSS Shadow Gates are indispensable for screening and Cloaking. They really take the cake for this application, especially with Cargo. Repair Trucks in GUARD are immensely important, but it’s just as vital to keep them well back from Towing and Blasting units and monsters. Meat Slaves perform incredibly well when used properly in LoC; the same is true for Power Pods in an MM force. Any unit with Explosion or Chain Reaction is a worthwhile addition, as these two triggers are quite possibly the best a unit can bring. A final word; make sure that you know what your units should be doing. A Crawler doesn’t do a good job of attacking and a Chomper is not a good securing unit. I’ve seen a lot of opponents utilize their units poorly and lose because of it. Get your units into the thick of things, or throw the opponent’s monster into range for them. The players that excel are the ones that are equally happy doing damage on unit turns as well as monster turns.

Personally, I don’t care much for units with Weaken, Flank, or Distract. Two square range on these abilities makes them far too inconsistent for my tastes. I love playing against Lords of Cthul because my opponent will often spend more time trying to set up the right conditions to catch me in a Weakened, Distracted spot. I let them waste their action dice and then move my force. It’s much easier to evade an obvious trap than to try and disable it. I also avoid units with red abilities. They often seem amazing (Feeding Frenzy on Chompers?!?) but in practice are far too situational to be employed since the units and monsters move on different turns, and there is almost always disruption during the opponent’s intervening turn.

In total, units are a personal choice that bring a lot of flavor to your army. They often determine how your monster will play, how much damage you can deal, what you can secure, and how much fun you have tearing up the town. So keep those goals in mind when working with your army to cut the chaff and keep the cream. There are a lot of good indicators in what a unit has on its base as well as how often it touches down in a Spawn Zone.

Have a Smashing Good Time

-KenMonster

First of all, how shall we differentiate between resilience versus survivability? Resilience is resistance to attacks (armor and high health) while survivability is the capacity to mitigate or recover from damage (through Repair, Munch, etc). While one or the other is important to have, monsters that have access to both characteristics are the ones that really shine in competitive play.

So, on the topic of resilience, what really determines a tough monster? By using the values provided in the “Kaiju Conundrums” in the strategy guides, we can delineate a point of defense as a “5” and each A-die as “3”, B-die as “4”, and P-die as “5”. Personally, I am unwilling to play monsters with a defense of 5 on either form. After much experimentation, 5 defense is far, far too easy to hit with both units and monsters. As an example, one grunt and one elite unit have a very high likelihood of hitting a 5 defense monster. When that’s the case, 1 elite and 3 grunts in range of a monster can deal two points of damage. In combination with monsters that can make successive attacks with Lightning Attack, Follow Through, Chain Attack, or Following Fire you will feel the hurt. If you absolutely love a monster with low defense, just remember that they will get hit very quickly, and it’s crucial to provide screening.

Secondarily, and I do present it second for a reason, a monster’s health determines how much punishment they can endure. If armor stops the attack in the first place, your health never takes a hit and that’s why it’s a secondary concern. Monsters don’t deviate much as far as health goes; 5-6 is pretty standard. The exception to this rule is the immensely resilient Alpha and Mega Gorghadra, with a total of 16 health. “Wow” is all I can say about that. Get really familiar with how much health your monster has and learn to predict how much will be lost in big attacks. Be prepared to power up to, or down from, Hyper if it will allow your total monster form to stay on the field longer.

Next, let’s discuss survivability, and its implication for tough play against tough opponents. There are a lot of monsters that have access to regenerative abilities. GUARD has Repair Vehicles, Terrasuars have Munch, and Lords of Cthul have Bleed and Vampirism; while Martians and ‘Saurs can both brawl buildings for health. But pay close attention to employing these skills. You may only use one action per unit activation, so there’s no chance to use abilities like Beacon on Statue of Liberty if you need to regenerate. Also, most monsters don’t have the ability to brawl a building or unit for health and then, secondarily, deal damage to the opponent’s monster. Making a choice between damaging the opponent and healing your monster is tough under the best circumstances. Practice with a friend and take notes of when you make one decision over the other for guidance in the future.

There are also monsters that mitigate damage. Armored and Negation are two of the most impressive mitigating abilities available to monsters due to the complete negation of some of the highest amounts of damage in the game. Similar, but not as powerful abilities such as Massive, Steady, and Solid can also really improve the survivability of monsters by canceling some of the most damaging attacks in the game.

When deciding on a monster, remember that you have to survive to stay in the fight. Monsters with medium to low defense (6 or 5) and low health ( 5) are going to go down like lightning. Choose a monster that has tough armor, plenty of health, and a way to mitigate or recover from damage.

Have a Smashing Good time

-Kenmonster

]]> http://teamcovenant.com/07/28/2009/monster-defense/feed/ 14 http://teamcovenant.com/07/15/2009/range-exchange/ http://teamcovenant.com/07/15/2009/range-exchange/#comments Wed, 15 Jul 2009 17:50:57 +0000 Kenneth Jenkins http://teamcovenant.com/?p=1251

Let’s take a little trip back. Further back. Almost there.

Ok, right here. At the Battle of Agincourt in 1415. This famous English victory is the focus of Shakespeare’s Henry V. Why so grandiose? Because English soldiers were outnumbered by the French by at least 4 to 1. How could the English, exhausted by retreat and lack of food, defeat four times as many Frenchman, mostly noble-born with full stomachs? Two factors decided this battle. Terrain and Range. Coincidentally, the focus of this month’s installment of Monsterpocalypse strategy!

MonPoc simplifies the grotesquely arduous task of traversing 300 yards of muddy, tilled soil with clean, well laid-out maps, but the lesson here is still true. Using terrain to force a melee based army to approach your entrenched position, and then firing on them with a superior and accurate ranged force has proven time and again to be one of the most effective tactics in battle. Genghis Khan developed a pan-Asian empire through the use of highly mobile archers on horseback. The US Air Force played a pivotal role in WWII, decimating German factories. Heavy hitting, highly mobile ranged firepower wins battles.

So how can we adapt this stratagem to the world of Monsterpocalypse. It’s easy to rest on preference as a method of army construction, but if you’re getting serious about crushing your foes, its time to take a serious look at a ranged army.

First of all, I must admit my love for melee based forces. They’re fun. Its that simple for me. A pack of Chompers or Raptices evokes mental images of a pack of ravening fiends, all harassing a behemoth striding through the city. Tactically, this is just not true. If (generally) slow-moving melee units ever make it to my opponents monster, they just don’t hit as hard as the ranged units in the game, and it often takes much longer term planning to have the units arrive in the right place. So, all you Brawlers out there keep brawling. Just don’t be surprised if you can’t get to my monster.

Now its time to discuss how to utilize the Blasting strategy with your army. Step one is to make sure that your Monster supports blasting as much as is possible. Some great examples are Zor-Voltis, Sky Sentinel, and Rogzor. Of the three, Rogzor probably grants the best abilities to the worst shooters in the game. Planet Eaters’ slow moving Belchers don’t fill the Mobility requirement we’re establishing, and short range on Scorchers make’s them touch and go to use. Sky Sentinel presents a wonderfully straight forward, dynamically mobile army chock full of G1 Strike Fighters. This army is hamstringed by a lack of Explosion or Chain Reaction, two of the most potent unit triggers in the game. This brings me to Zor-Voltis. Quite possibly the best choice for a terrifyingly mobile, wickedly powerful ranged army!

Shadow Sun Syndicate absolutely has some of the best ranged units in the game in the form of Katanas and Sun Fighters. Anti-Air trumps monsters like Sky Sentinel, Ares, Mega Yasheth, and Pteradax, just to name some of the more vicious flyers. Red High Impact is tricky to utilize properly, but immensely powers up this force. The real beauty of this force lies in its ability to avoid the huge momentum swings caused by four-unit-destroying Explosion attacks by utilizing the blue Hit-and-Run from Zor-Voltis. Remember, though, that only the leading unit gets the trigger, so make sure you lead with a central unit to break up a big group into smaller ones. An Interceptor, maybe one shadow gate, and one Elite C-Type round out this type of list quite nicely, giving you answers to threats like Mega Zor-Maxim and Sky Sentinel. In fact, any monster with a high hyper cost is worth disrupting if you’re going to shoot them anyway. Even Interceptors can get in on the fun next to a Katana, netting you an extra boost die.

It’s also critically important to make sure you understand how to format a map for this type of army. Learn to create firing lanes that deny your opponent a chance to sneak to your side of the board, and scatter Bank HQs across the map to use as waypoints on the way to his side. Don’t forget that Blasters also excel at destroying an opponent’s infrastructure, denying precious P-Dice.

With this type of outlook on blasting, you should be able to apply the techniques I’ve outlined to just about any force. After much brutal experimentation, I’ve learned that a melee army just can’t keep up with a blasting army if skill is comparable on both sides of the map. So, outfit your force to lay down the long-range beats and watch your opponent shudder.

-KenMonster