Are there any plans for future class deck characters to come with cohorts?
I assume when they get to Summoner, Hunter and Shamans, most likely they will. How about any others (i.e. druid's come out soon)
I've seen that Balazar etc. being played in earlier APs get their cohorts - so will cohorts start making appearance in class decks?
Nice idea but... the already existing class decks will be jalous.
Unless they find a way to give back a familiar to the sorcerer, a companion to the ranger and so on...
Are there any plans for future class deck characters to come with cohorts?
I'm sure they're considering it, when the character has a companion that's central to their character.
One concern is that the Cohort rules are part of WotR; including one probably means including a rules card for it (much like how Ranzak comes with a card describing Plunder) and so lowers the number of cards in the deck by one. I doubt that will stop them if they want to do it, though. :)
My guesses:
Cavaliers, Hunters, Samurai, Shamans, Spiritualists, and Summoners seem likely to have their companions represented as Cohorts.
Druids (much like Rangers) are a case-by-case basis; their Animal Companion isn't always that important to the character to have them as a Cohort. Lini's companion Droogami (pre-Cohort rules) is already represented as an Ally.
Witches pose a problem: their Familiars are too essential to their character! I'd lean towards not representing them at all and letting them just be a part of the Witch, but we know Feiya's Familiar Daji is planned to be in Iconic Heroes 6. I guess we'll see.
Nice idea but... the already existing class decks will be jalous.
Unless they find a way to give back a familiar to the sorcerer, a companion to the ranger and so on...
Always-there Cohorts should really be ones that are central to the character. Otherwise the companion should either be ignored or represented in other ways, like an Ally. The existing characters that have companions are just versions who didn't focus on their companion.
Besides, not all the RPG classes with Class Decks from before the Cohort rules normally have some kind of companion:
Bard, Cleric, Fighter, Rogue: Normally don't have a companion.
Ranger: Can have an Animal Companion or give partial favored enemy bonuses to other party members. Biter, Harsk's Animal Companion, is represented as an Ally.
Sorcerer: Normally don't have a companion; only ones with the Arcane Bloodline get Familiars. Seoni has a Familiar, a lizard named Dragon, but she's rarely shown with it.
Wizard: Can have a Familiar or a bonded item. Ezren's cane is his bonded item.
Stuff to think about.
I think the cohort mechanic is a really interesting one, and I'd like to see more of it, but as Frencois says, there's a question of how they'd balance it with existing decks.
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I wouldn't be surprised to see a cohort or two in the Druid deck, but when the Cavalier, Summoner, and Hunter decks come out they'll be essentially mandatory, because they're a central part of the class's powers. A Cavalier can't charge on a mount without a mount, after all. Though... Raz in the Paladin deck has powers that use mounts but doesn't have a cohort card. Hmm... I suppose it depends how the character is written.
For existing decks, all they'd need to do is when they use that character in a future adventure path, give them a cohort. For example, they could put Lini in whatever adventure path 5 will be with a cohort. And then you have a way to play Lini with a cohort if you want.
I really like cohorts too and hope they stick around beyond WotR. I don't want everyone to have one, but it is a nice change of pace kind of thing for some characters to have.
I was very surprised when I opened the Paladin deck to see that none of them had cohorts. Especially Raz, since so many of her powers play off her having a Mount. :-/
Just as long as having a cohort is balanced in some way. Balazar is great in that Padrig gives him a combat and non-combat strength boost, but then he can only use attack spells once. There's an upside and a downside.
Yeah, the thing is, for the characters that have cohorts that I have played with (Balazar & Adowyn) it isn't really a bonus. It is a necessary card. If you take away Padrig, pre-role Balazar is fairly crap. He gets to banish attack spells, has no weapons in his deck and if (by some miracle) he defeats a monster, he can discard it to draw a card. Not exactly a superstar.
Adowyn fairs better without her cohort (though her ability to search for a cohort is completely useless), but she really is just a weaker Ranger (she has a decent ranged skill and can evade summoned monsters). The reason she is great is because of Leryn.
Shardra seems to not need Kolo quite as much as the other two, but I haven't actually played her so I can't say.
So the characters that don't have cohorts don't really need cohorts. Their powers were balanced around them without cohorts.
What I'm really interested in is seeing new versions of the iconic's cohorts and the possibility of mixing and matching different Balazars with different Padrigs.
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Alain actually doesn't really need his cohort, at all, as any ally with the Mount trait can be used in place of him. So you have character-specific cohorts that sort of run the gamete from "absolutely necessary for the character to function" (Balazar) to "useful but not at all necessary" (Alain).
Having a few mix-and-match cohorts for new cohort-using characters would be delightfully modular, and greatly expand customizability-out-of-the-box in a way that's usually not possible pre-role. If the class deck summoners have the option for any cohort with the 'eidolon' trait, or the class deck hunters have the option for any cohort with an appropriate trait, then it becomes very simple to add new lateral options for the appropriate classes. Would love for there to be (for instance) 3 x 3 ways a starting class deck summoner could look, rather than just 3.
Alternatively, you could make it an upgrade option, e.g. "[]At the start of the scenario, you may start with any cohort with the x trait, instead of Sally". You could even potentially have higher-level options that way (upgrade your wolf companion to a dire bear, etc.), with the higher-level options either in the class box, or adventure-path-specific (for characters printed in those paths), possibly as loot to allow OP characters to play with them.
I forgot about Alain. I feel he's like Adowyn without his cohort. He's a fighter with an ok Melee and the ability to discard to add another 1 to 5 to his roll if nobody else helps him and it isn't a villain. I'd take any version of Valeros over that. Or, from the WotR melee characters, Seelah or Crowe. Donavan gives you an extra d8 or the ability to move and avoid negative start of turn consequences.
From my point of view, Balazar's power is like 20% character card, 80% cohort card. Adowyn is maybe 40%-50% charcter card and 50-60% cohort. I think Alain is like 80% character card, 20% cohort. Shardra's cohort has a really good synergy with her character powers, like Balazar, but is not terrible without it. Probably closer to an Adown 40/60 or 50/50 split, but I haven't played her (or Alain) so take my analysis with a grain of salt.
I will mention that my analysis is entirely based on pre-role card powers since that is where 57% of your game time will be spent (if you play the B adventure) and that is generally where the game is the most challenging as you slowly build your deck and get feats. Lancer Alain doesn't need his cohort much at all, but he's ridiculously over-powered.
Yeah, cohorts definitely run the full range of "desperately needed to this character to function" to "a very nice but not vital bonus" approach. Which is nice. It would be boring if they were all like Balazar where the cohort is just displayed and static. Don't get me wrong, I love Balazar and thematically that makes sense, but I'm glad there are variations.
...It would be boring if they were all like Balazar where the cohort is just displayed and static. Don't get me wrong, I love Balazar and thematically that makes sense, but I'm glad there are variations.
+1
I'm guessing the Witch deck doesn't interact with the Witch's cohort much. I haven't seen the final deck, though.
When you play a character from the Witch deck, you start the game with your chosen cohort in your hand. You then immediately display it (why not?). While it is displayed (not while in your hand) you have the Arcane skill & whatever other benefit it gives you (the example here adds the Survival skill).
You can apparently use a different power on your cohort which puts your cohort on top of your deck. It'd be risky to do anything other than end your turn and draw and display your cohort, but it's up to you.
We intend to keep cohort rules in the rulebooks for all sets, even those without cohorts of their own. Since the class decks have cohorts, the main rulebook needs to support them.
If you're not proficient with Wrath of the Righteous Base Set Rulebook, roll 1d4 for your Arcane or Divine check.
That was why I was using d4 and any spell's roll. Example: "Display this card. While this card is displayed, for your combat check, you may use your Arcane skill [1d4] + 1d6+1; you may additionally discard this card to add another 2d6+2. This counts as playing a spell. At the end of your turn, or when you would discard this card when playing it, if you do not have the Arcane skill [Feiya doesn't],banish this card...."
It made many spells seem particularly useless until I saw that for some of her B-Basic rods and staves I needed to "discard a spell." I figured that must be the reason she had most spells in her Class Deck.
I guess this gets off-topic, and it seems I read the answer to this somewhere, that Cohorts either are or aren't a beginning hand "16th" card for Class Witch. I'll try to look it up. Since Cohorts aren't mentioned in Rise of the Runelords Base Set Rulebook, which is the Base Set we were using, I figured cohorts must be relative to another Base Set.
EDIT: To regain the discarded spells for rods and staves, she would use her Spell Cure.
Your cohorts get added to your starting hand, and are in excess of your hand size.
On her first turn, the witch usually displays the cohort and thus gets the Arcane skill.
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To appease those such as Houstonian who would like to use the Witch characters without necessarily owning the Witch deck, and also just to add some variety to witch familiars for home games, I have created the following public cards on drivethrucards.com:
Tentaskull
Ugly Carp
Pygmy Orca
Wild Cat
Pet Rock
Poison Spider
Squirrel
Check them out, order them, have fun!
Hah!
Like the cards Cartmanbeck! :)
Very fun.
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As I posted in another one of the threads (where you've asked about cohorts), Vic and Mike have stated that you should always use the latest rulebook (which is the one for Wrath of the Righteous) as well as the most current version of the base set's rulebook when playing.
The rules card in the Witch deck specifically says "These cards use some concepts introduced in the Wrath of the Righteous set. Please visit paizo.com/PACG to download a PDF of the latest version of the rulebook."
I love the pet rock!
Hah!
Like the cards Cartmanbeck! :)
Very fun.
Pygmy Orca is an A++ job. :D