Class Decks Update

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

I wanted to give you an update on the Class Decks distribution schedule, since it's gotten a little wonky. We hit some unfortunate delays in the product chain, such that our Druid Class Deck came out in December instead of October, and the Barbarian Class Deck is coming out in February instead of January. We're very sorry about the delays, but we think you'll be happy with the results. To keep your appetite whetted, I'll talk a little about characters from a range of upcoming Class Decks, as well as their associated Iconic Heroes promo cards.

Barbarian

As you might know from our excellent Meet the Iconics blog series, Amiri is a bad-ass chick with a big-ass sword from the Realm of the Mammoth Lords, complete with Paizo Tragic Backstory™. We did a version of her giant-forged sword for Iconic Heroes #2, and we gave her some comfy armor in the Barbarian Class Deck.

Smashing in style!

The characters in this deck were designed with the Pathfinder Unchained version of the barbarian's mechanics in mind, so expect to see a bit more variety and utility in their rage powers. As a clue, let me reveal that Amiri's new roles are called Immovable Object and Unstoppable Force.

Oracle

The next deck in the release schedule is for all you scouting fans out there: the Oracle Class Deck. To kick off the design process, the design team spent a delightful afternoon learning about the different and fascinating methods of divination used throughout human history. These include armomancy, or divining by examining one's shoulders, labiomancy, or divination by lip reading (which seemed a bit cheaty to us,) and kephalomancy, or divination by using a baked ass's head. We recommend setting your oven to 425° for that last one.

Technically we didn't use any of those divinatory methods in the final design, but you've gotta break a few eggs to make an omelet. (Talk to Chad about oomancy sometime.) We did, however, come up with Ramexes, a pitborn oracle who specializes in haruspication, or the reading of entrails, and we gave Alahazra a fancy hat in Iconic Heroes #1.

Oracles dress for the weather—there's actually another hat under this hat.

Alchemist

To close out this week's column, we've got a sneak peek at the Alchemist Class Deck. Designers Liz Spain and Paul Peterson took point on this deck, which should terrify anyone who knows them. In addition to Damiel and his portable alchemy lab from Iconic Heroes #3, we're introducing the archetypal gnome alchemist. Meet Cogsnap:

Tell me he's not exactly what you expected.

Cogsnap is fond of cards that have the Automaton trait, and you'll see a few new ones in his deck.

That's it for this week—until next time, Pathfinders!

Tanis O'Connor
Adventure Card Game Designer

PS: Be sure to check out the latest Iconic Heroes releases here!