From the Raging Heart of a Swirling Sandstorm Comes... the Mummy's Mask Preview

I'm hoping for traders to perhaps be something along the lines of "random, but at least the lowest AD# of what you traded in." So you could trade in 2 AD5 boons and be guaranteed at least an AD5 back; conversely, if you trade in junk, like a B and a 1, you could end up with anything.

You're correct. In fact, I don't know anything about the Sandstorm, I just *assumed* it will be "encounter, then advance the blessings deck" deal. Of course, with MM, it seems assumptions are the wrong way to go altogether.

This is what I was assuming too. Assumptions can be wrong! But I'm sure people who play in 6 person parties are pretty skittish, after Wrath.

For me, who only plays in 2s, I'm more excited about the changes to scouting than I am against them. Scouting is bar none my favorite thing to do in the game, and the scariness of the proto-Trigger banes in Wrath, like that one demon who makes you bury whatever boon you scouted it with, went away when we realized Leryn wasn't technically a boon. With the difficulty margins still trending towards "extremely easy" in two player games, I'm pumped for the spice of Triggers, especially since the involve the mechanic that most trivializes the difficulty.

I'm also super pumped that Disable barriers appear to be coming back into style AND that there's a Rogue-type character who can add her not-too-shabby Perception skill to her already substantial Disable skill right from the jump. I haven't seen the rest of the characters yet, but something's telling me I won't need to! :D

And then there's traders~ Plunder in S&S felt like a good patch to the RNG whims of getting the proper boons in RotR (still have played exactly one RotR where I'm so much as SEEN a Sihedron Ring--still have yet to see, let alone acquire, an Icy Frost Spear of Whatever The Name Is Because I've Never Actually Encountered It) After more than a year with Wrath, I'd started subconsciously missing plunder without realizing it. From this hint of what traders are, they look like a good method of giving you better odds of getting the stuff you need, if not what you want.

First World Bard wrote:

Joshua Birk 898 wrote:

Longshot11 wrote:

In particular, I'll point a finger to the Agash henchmen. In a typical 6-player game, this gives you the unique opportunity to trash 7 player turns, just for playing a hero like Alahazra.

It doesn't just discard a blessing, it discards a blessing AND replaces it with a sandstorm card. That doesn't cause you to miss a turn (unless you know something about the sandstorm card that I dont), instead it throws an obstacle in your way.

It's also possible that the Agash henchman is a one-off henchman, and not a henchman that is in up to 7 locations. In this case, you might even get away with only having one Sandstorm villain in the box. If for some reason you Trigger the Agash a second time while the Sandstorm is in the deck, you ignore the impossible thing and just discard the blessing. Who knows, maybe you'd get lucky and discard the Sandstorm.

The scenario listed says to replace 4 blessings with sandstorm villains. So there have to be at least 4...

Technically it doesn't - it says to replace four blessings with the villain Sandstorm. Which quite possibly means, as I interpreted it, put four fewer blessings in and put in the Sandstorm (not four Sandstorms) instead

Here's a sidebar from the MM rulebook:

NEW: TOKENS IN LOCATION DECKS

Some cards require you to shuffle your character token into a location deck. You shouldn’t know where your token card is while you are shuffling. When your token is examined, encountered, or would be returned to the box or removed from the game, remove it from the location deck and place it at that location. While your token is in a location deck, you may explore, encounter cards, and play cards; you cannot move, and you must evade any banes you encounter.

I'm not spilling all the beans on traders just yet!

NEW: TOKENS IN LOCATION DECKS

Some cards require you to shuffle your character token into a location deck. You shouldn’t know where your token card is while you are shuffling. When your token is examined, encountered, or would be returned to the box or removed from the game, remove it from the location deck and place it at that location. While your token is in a location deck, you may explore, encounter cards, and play cards; you cannot move, and you must evade any banes you encounter.

The "must evade any banes you encounter" bit is fascinating, especially when it runs into banes that cannot be evaded. Unless "must" is a word that overrules "cannot".

NEW: ...When your token is examined, encountered, or would be returned to the box or removed from the game,

That's ... odd. I notice the conspicuous absence of "banish" up there, which would be what normally happens when closing a location. I kinda hope this doesn't mean we don't banish cards from closed locations anymore...

...Although, on the other hand, if that means we get to banish the cards traded to Traders - that's also cool. At least, I won't have mini-seizure anytime I feel compelled to acquire a Basic ally, instead of removing it from the game...

The "must evade any banes you encounter" bit is fascinating, especially when it runs into banes that cannot be evaded. Unless "must" is a word that overrules "cannot".

See the Golden Rule. Which, by the way, is now "The Golden Rules" in MM...

(Man, I would really hate to have to say that you must "never not evade any banes you encounter...")

Mummy's Mask Rulebook wrote:

NEW: ...When your token is examined, encountered, or would be returned to the box or removed from the game,

That's ... odd. I notice the conspicuous absence of "banish" up there...

The quoted rule cares only that your card would be returned to the box; it does not care why.

...Although, on the other hand, if that means we get to banish the cards traded to Traders - that's also cool.

Nice try, but I still ain't talkin'.

I'm hoping for traders to perhaps be something along the lines of "random, but at least the lowest AD# of what you traded in." So you could trade in 2 AD5 boons and be guaranteed at least an AD5 back; conversely, if you trade in junk, like a B and a 1, you could end up with anything.

If it stays one card type per trader, we might also get a pool of cards instead. The trader could draw a fixed number (or the scenarios AD number) of cards from his specified card type and then you'd be able to choose which one you want to trade for.

You shouldn’t know where your token card is while you are shuffling.

In case you're wondering about the presence of that weird statement, since the token card doesn't have a standard back, you could technically comply with the instruction "shuffle it into the deck" and just continue shuffling until your token was on top again. So we added this "no peeking" rule. (As Mike would say, "this is why we can't have nice things.")

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat. I guess she is just adding her first power (recharge a blessing to add fortitude and fire to combat check) to strength or dexterity rolls? I feel like I'm not getting the whole story on this character

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat. I guess she is just adding her first power (recharge a blessing to add fortitude and fire to combat check) to strength or dexterity rolls? I feel like I'm not getting the whole story on this character

If she has something like a Light Crossbow, she can reveal it to use her Dexterity plus a d8. Then recharge a Blessing and she gets another d10 + 2. So 2d8 + d10 + 2. Not too shabby, especially since it adds the Fire trait which could get you even more dice against some monsters. And if she needs to, she can even discard more cards to get more oomph.

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat. I guess she is just adding her first power (recharge a blessing to add fortitude and fire to combat check) to strength or dexterity rolls? I feel like I'm not getting the whole story on this character

In the RPG, Kineticists are pseudo-spellcasters that use their innate power to channel elemental energy for various effects. Their main combat utility at early levels comes in the form of their Kinetic Blast ability. Kineticists are Constitution-based in the RPG, meaning their power is keyed into their Constitution stat (both in terms of how potent it is, as well as how much burn they can accept; burn being a side effect of unleashing their more potent powers or supercharging their less potent ones). You can see this reflected in Yoon by having Fortitude be her main combat ability, and burn represented by discarding additional cards to supercharge the blast by 1d6 per card (the first power in general representing the entire Kinetic Blast ability).

Also, this has more info on Yoon.

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat.

Yeah, this had me make a double take on Yoon too, but then I did the same math as Jones314, and she is indeed shaping up to be one of the heavy hitters in this set. Also, since I got the feeling she'll have a Favored Card: Blessing, make note that dissimilar to many other characters that don't start with a Weapon/Spell, she has a perfectly decent built-in combat option, for 0 net card loss, without having to burn through her deck for that weapon.

Incidentally, is it just me, or Zadim is the first character with such ridiculous number of 'practical' Skills? Even Paladins got nothing on him. For the first time ever, I literally don't know where to put his first Skill Feat, and I love that fact!

mlvanbie wrote:

Scouting location decks was already too powerful (gone are the days of multiple Augury and Scrying spells), so there is no need to compensate for the much-needed additional risk.

I respect your opinion, but it is the sort of opinion that brought WotR on our heads, so...yeah. I'll guess we'll have to see how player enjoyment is affected.

I don't know about player enjoyment (there's a lot of fun in defeating the game as opposed to the adventure path), but it is right for the challenge level. Pretty much everything that made WotR hard is reasonable with sufficient scouting. Try Adowyn with a role card and cycle through her deck by recharging one card for every two scouted. Don't forget that you can do this on other players' turns, and do get mounts that change your location.* (I only used the ability to improve ranged attacks for the last combat in a session.)

*: Aargh, forced blind explores! Imrijka scoffs at anyone who thinks this is a problem. The downside of heavy scouting is that you become shy of actions that some people do several times a turn.

KS_brkfst wrote:

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat. I guess she is just adding her first power (recharge a blessing to add fortitude and fire to combat check) to strength or dexterity rolls? I feel like I'm not getting the whole story on this character

In the RPG, Kineticists are pseudo-spellcasters that use their innate power to channel elemental energy for various effects. Their main combat utility at early levels comes in the form of their Kinetic Blast ability. Kineticists are Constitution-based in the RPG, meaning their power is keyed into their Constitution stat (both in terms of how potent it is, as well as how much burn they can accept; burn being a side effect of unleashing their more potent powers or supercharging their less potent ones). You can see this reflected in Yoon by having Fortitude be her main combat ability, and burn represented by discarding additional cards to supercharge the blast by 1d6 per card (the first power in general representing the entire Kinetic Blast ability).

Also, this has more info on Yoon.

It says that that d6 is additional, so you first have to use blessing and after that you may discard cards to ad d6? Or Are those completely separate powers? I think the previois because of wording. So you have to have a plessings before Yoon can really do fighting.

Can't wait to see Yoon's deck list. Depending on how many Blessings she has, she could be amazing or terrible.

I'm more curious about how Yoon's elemental damage mitigation power will work. She doesn't have Arcane or Divine, so if she gets spells they are banish to use unless you just keep them to use this one power. Are there going to be a lot of items or blessings or what have you with elemental traits? I vaguely recall an elemental Basic blessing from the demo but I can't remember its traits.

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat. I guess she is just adding her first power (recharge a blessing to add fortitude and fire to combat check) to strength or dexterity rolls? I feel like I'm not getting the whole story on this character

I believe at least some of the weapons from the Monk Class Deck will be included in this set, which allow you to use Acrobatics as a combat skill. That's why Class Deck Sajan is a killing machine... I RARELY used his Melee skill all throughout SotRi.

If she has something like a Light Crossbow, she can reveal it to use her Dexterity plus a d8. Then recharge a Blessing and she gets another d10 + 2. So 2d8 + d10 + 2. Not too shabby, especially since it adds the Fire trait which could get you even more dice against some monsters. And if she needs to, she can even discard more cards to get more oomph.

To be fair, that's going to make Fire Elementals seriously unpleasant... Better hope she gets a Kama to start.

I'm more curious about how Yoon's elemental damage mitigation power will work. She doesn't have Arcane or Divine, so if she gets spells they are banish to use unless you just keep them to use this one power. Are there going to be a lot of items or blessings or what have you with elemental traits? I vaguely recall an elemental Basic blessing from the demo but I can't remember its traits.

We know about the basic elemental blessing - it's Blessing of the Elements, and it's in a couple class decks. It doesn't have any elemental traits - you just get the benefit that if it is used on a check with the Acid, Cold, Electricity, Fire, or Poison traits you can recharge it instead of discarding it.

That being said, IIRC there's an Egyptian God blessing in class decks with the Acid trait, so presumably there will be non-basic blessings that Yoon will really want. I have to imagine that a significant portion of her deck list is blessings.

I also have to imagine that I will be playing a lot of Yoon. You know, for some reason...

I don't think the monk weapons would make thematically sense in this setting, being distinctively asian instead of arabic (also, there is hoping jade regent will be the next AP after MM).

Judging from the cards in the alchemist deck (and the cards previewed here), I'd think there will be a lot of cards that interact with the elements.
Armor there had a lot of elemental reduction (in particular compared to earlier sets), one of the basic blessings is the blessing of the elements (I think they mentioned two basic blessings for this set, but I can't recall the other one), and I'm sure there will be some elemental potions that can be used for combat checks.

Since damiel is in the base set and they designed so many potions for the alchemist deck, I would be surprised if none of those elemental potions made it here.

I'm sure yoon will have plenty of opportunities to use her ability if you build a deck around it, even without spells. In general, she reminds me more of RotR sajan than a caster and I think they will play quite similiar, at least pre-role.

#triggered

I want to take Tukanem-Hanam home with me and snuggle him/her.

#triggered

I want to take Tukanem-Hanam home with me and snuggle him/her.

S/he seem a bit... bony for snuggling.

Incidentally, 'hanam' appears to mean "going to sleep" which seem tragically ironic for an Undead...

Tup will be included in the first shipment for this set, right? Will that be the promo card or is there another one along with Tup?

If tup is included, they will at least add his cohort 'deliverance'.

If tup is included, they will at least add his cohort 'deliverance'.

Deliverance isn't a separate card. He comes with Tup (in a sealed pack.)

October will also feature at least the gen con promo, as Vic explains.

Am I missing something about Yoon? No melee, ranged, arcane, or divine skill that helps her in combat. I guess she is just adding her first power (recharge a blessing to add fortitude and fire to combat check) to strength or dexterity rolls? I feel like I'm not getting the whole story on this character

Are you people missing it adds the Fortitude skill not trait (well trait as well)?

That's d6+d10+2 at the cost of a recharged blessing, plus the extra traits, and the potential for boosting. And that's only if you're kinetic punching with strength.

She's better than Balazar and his attack chicken (forgive me), because she can be using attack spells or weapons for her base combat check too!

She's better than Balazar and his attack chicken (forgive me), because she can be using attack spells or weapons for her base combat check too!

Not to mention, when you build her as an archer (and why wouldn't you?), she also upgrades against a bunch of barriers...

Of course, it remains to be seen how many (if at all) weapons she'll have in her deck. This can really make or break her for me.

Of course, it remains to be seen how many (if at all) weapons she'll have in her deck. This can really make or break her for me.

She has a skill feat to add weapons proficiency, so at worst she will start with none but have card feats to add them.

She has a skill feat to add weapons proficiency, so at worst she will start with none but have card feats to add them.

[PEDANT]^skill^power[/PEDANT]

Longshot11 wrote:

Of course, it remains to be seen how many (if at all) weapons she'll have in her deck. This can really make or break her for me.

She has a skill feat to add weapons proficiency, so at worst she will start with none but have card feats to add them.

That's what I mean - this is a very big "at worst" for me. If she starts with anything less than 3 weapons (and this number seems a bit unlikely) - then she'll have to primarily depend on her Blast power for combat (if I can draw on my experience with RotR Merisiel), and as discussed earlier - those recharged Blessings are cards that I need for explores in my 6-player game.

There is one crucial difference with RotR Sajan - he could cycle through his whole deck in a couple of turns to get to that one ranged weapon; where Yoon is limited to one recharged blessing per combat check - this means not only she'll have a harder time getting to her weapons, but also that she may never again see her blessings until the end of game.

Vic Wertz wrote:

You shouldn’t know where your token card is while you are shuffling.

In case you're wondering about the presence of that weird statement, since the token card doesn't have a standard back, you could technically comply with the instruction "shuffle it into the deck" and just continue shuffling until your token was on top again. So we added this "no peeking" rule. (As Mike would say, "this is why we can't have nice things.")

Took us 2 minutes to decide to do tokens with standard back on drivethru!

There is one crucial difference with RotR Sajan - he could cycle through his whole deck in a couple of turns to get to that one ranged weapon; where Yoon is limited to one recharged blessing per combat check - this means not only she'll have a harder time getting to her weapons, but also that she may never again see her blessings until the end of game.

I don't think the difference with RotR Sajan is that big if you just want to cycle through your deck to a certain card fast.

If you don't like her card distribution, that's fine as well of course, but I think she won't play that differently from sajan, at least pre role.

The difference is, if Yoon is fighting with her hands, the second blessing only adds a d6, vs a d10 for Sajan. Also you probably won't want to put Yoon's skill feats in Strength (Constitution and Dexterity seem more likely.)

At first glance, Yoon looks like one of the weaker fighters in the set.

While that's true, you're missing the constant bonus of fortitude, which brings her to the exact same expected value as sajan for recharging one blessing when not using any weapon (d6+2+d10 vs 2d10).

For strength, the second d6 turns into a d8 once she adds a power feat and then, she only looses 1 point per additional die (d8 vs d10). She has to discard, but has more choice (so she can throw away cards she doesn't need, which always dilutes my sajans deck when cycling through staffs of minor healing). Due to her power, a second blessing is also free for her as well).

Regardless of using a weapon or not, yoon will also be able to add two different kinds of skill-feats to her check, compared to only dexterity of sajan. Assuming normal progression, she can thus end up at +6 vs +4 of sajan at AD6, which can balance out the 1 point per die she is loosing for the first two additional cards on her power, so that she ends up with with a higher expected value at low number of dice vs slightly lower expected value for more than 3 cards recharged/discarded.

While she has to discard cards for her power compared to recharging, she is also able to use junk she just acquired, so that's fairly balanced.

She is certainly stronger than simoun.

We also don't know if there will Acrobatics (or maybe even Stealth) based weapons in this set / how common they might be. Those would give Yoon an extra +1 (or +2 ), which will help at lower ADs. Also, depending on how many item slots she has, she could do well with just stocking up on Alchemists Fire and other banish-for-combat items. Damiel is in the set, so we'll probably have some of those; they would also serve to activate her elemental damage mitigation.

Yeah. It is cool to see the characters, but without knowing their deck lists and what boons (and banes) are in the set, it is way to hard to judge them. If the adventure path is full of barriers with the Trap trait, Simoun might be the most powerful one of them all. I don't think she is much of a slouch though either way. Her Ranged skill is very good. And depending on her deck list and what weapons with the knife trait we might see, not to mention how often you take Electricity damage, she might surprise you.

Her Ranged skill is very good. And depending on her deck list and what weapons with the knife trait we might see, not to mention how often you take Electricity damage, she might surprise you.

I suspect she will want *all* the daggers. D12+d4+2 + an additional 1d4 per dagger you recharge. That's enough to make Merisiel jealous, I'm sure.

Oh, don't get me wrong - i'm not claiming she is useless, just that the other characters seem more potent with regards to combat checks.
There is more than combat to the game, of course.

If the adventure path is full of barriers with the Trap trait, Simoun might be the most powerful one of them all. I don't think she is much of a slouch though either way. Her Ranged skill is very good. And depending on her deck list and what weapons with the knife trait we might see, not to mention how often you take Electricity damage, she might surprise you.

I was really excited when I first read her card, but then I realized *none* of her powers require any decision-making, and while that doesn't mean they're not powerful (they're certainly better than if they had the "recharge a card to-" price attached), that makes them a little... boring, I guess. I also have to wander how many non-Trap barriers are there that have the Obstacle trait - I can only guess there'll be like a bunch of weather effects and desert obstacles or somesuch.

Regardless, unless the Knives have undergone a radical change in design philosophy, her last power is dead to me. We'll have to see what weapons MM brings to the table, but "recharge instead of discard for 1d4" is no reason at all to hold to daggers, instead of any kind of Bow at all.

Regardless, unless the Knives have undergone a radical change in design philosophy, her last power is dead to me. We'll have to see what weapons MM brings to the table, but "recharge instead of discard for 1d4" is no reason at all to hold to daggers, instead of any kind of Bow at all.

I wouldn't be surprised if there are a few things Simoun can do with a knife. There are some examples already of knives that do more. Isn't there a knife in the Alchemist class deck that has a few discard powers? One for extra dice on combat and one for ingnoring BYA powers? Or what if she gets her hands on a Dagger of Doubling like in the Goblins Fight deck? That would be interesting.

But, we'll have to wait and see.

If the adventure path is full of barriers with the Trap trait, Simoun might be the most powerful one of them all.

Nope—hardly any traps in Mummy's Mask. You just go right on ahead and explore that tomb, confident in the knowledge that its builders would never even think to set up traps for those who enter. No sir, no worries there at all. Head on in—I'll be right behind you.

What's that you say? Two out of three barriers in the preview have the Trap trait? Boy, THAT sure is statistically unlikely, isn't it?

Well, that is a relief. I'm glad tomb builders finally came to their senses and stopped making thing so hard on us treasure hunters. Hey wait, why did this floor tile just sink into the ground? And what is that whooshing sou....

There has to be Laws that tomb builder has to obey. In USA you can not sell hot coffey because customer can be hurt. Ofcourse there Are low against using leathy traps. So no worry at all...
and to those two examples above has nothing to do with statics. Everybody know the saying. Lie, very big lie, statictic!

October will also feature at least the gen con promo, as Vic explains.

four promos!

Hawkmoon269 wrote:

October will also feature at least the gen con promo, as Vic explains.

four promos!

My order email (EEEEEEE!!!) says Goblin Golem of Obsidian, Tup, Rita Bigbad, and Miau Pakhet.

Awesome. Anyone have any idea what a Miau Pakhet would be?

Pakhet is a minor egyptian lioness deity of war. Miau is onomatopoetic for the sound cats make in languages such as German or Spanish. Maybe there's a connection there.

Awesome. Anyone have any idea what a Miau Pakhet would be?

It's not ringing any bells from the RPG.