New Easterlings

[Floydor]

When i watched Movie TT and saw Easterlings marched into the Black Gate, in perfect collumn, well equipped…in golden armor and with loong poleaxes…hmm i though, thats a pretty army so i then google it and look…Easterlings are Elite of the Elite, hates Gondor for looooong time so i have idea about that.
So idea is this: Easterlings "commanders"…using "tactics" support area conditions (i will explain how it works later)…and Easterlings supporting each other…twilight cost/power about Uruk-hai from 1st E…but rarely DMG+1 or Fierce by nature.
Here are explanation of tactics:

Tactics – unique support are condition playable in shadow phase (of course secret tricks by minions will be aviable), you can have only 1 tactics condition in the play. When you have already tactics on the table, playing other tactics condition will discard previous one. Each tactics condition will be discarded at the end of the turn.
So lets take look on some card ideas:

Name: •Tight Formation
cost: 3
Support area • condition • tactics
To play spot an Easterling
Easterlings cannot take more than 1 wound in the skirmishes.


Name: •Shield Wall
cost: 2
Support area • condition • tactics
To play spot an Easterling
Easterlings cannot take archery wounds.



Name: •Easterling Taskmaster
cost: 3
Str: 8
Vitality: 2
Minion • Easterling
Regroup: Spot another Easterling and exert this minion to play tactic condition from discard pile.




Name: Easterling Conscript
cost: 3
str: 9
Vitality: 2
Minion • Easterling
To play spot an Easterling



Name: Easterling Axeman
cost: 2
str: 6
Vit: 2
Minion Easterling
While you can spot tactics condition in your support area, this minion is str +2 and fierce.


Name: Easterling Sergeant
cost: 3
Str: 8
vita: 2
Minion • Easterling
While you can spot 3 Easterlings, this minion is dmg+1


Name: Men from the East
cost: 0
Condition • Support area
Each time is an Easterling killed, place a token here.
Regroup: Discard this condition to shuffle X minions from discard pile into the draw deck, where X is number of tokens here. (limit 3)



Name: Easterling Banner
cost: 0
Possession • Support Area
Each time an Easterling win skirmish, you may discard that minion to make another Easterling str +2 untill the regroup phase.



Name: Easterling Polearm
Cost: 1
str: +2
Possession • Hand Weapon
Bearer must be an Easterling.
While you can spot 6 or more companions, bearer is str +2 and dmg+1.



Name: Easterling Tactican
Cost: 3
Str: 8
vit: 2
Minion Easterling
Manuevers: Spot tactic condition, exert this minion and remove 1 to make another Easterling str +2 and fierce untill the regroup phase.



Easterling Spearman
cost: 2
Str: 6
vit: 2
While this minion bearing Easterling Polearm it is fierce.



Discipline
cost: 2
event
skirmish: Make an Easterling str +2 (+4 when you can spot Tactics condition)



Easterling Armourer
Cost: 2
Str: 7
vitality: 2
Manuever: Exert this minion and spot another Easterling to play Hand Weapon from the discard pile.




Men of Rhun
cost: 1
event
Response: If Easterling win skirmish, exert that minion to discard FP condition.



•Easterling Captain
cost: 5
Str: 9
Vitality: 4
Minion • Easterling
Enduring
Skirmish: Exert this minion and spot tactics condition in your support arrea, make another Easterling str +2.


Pavise
cost: 1
vitality : +1
Possession • shield
Each time an Easterling is about taking wound, exert bearer to prevent that wound.



•Overrun
cost: 3
Condition • Support Area •Tactics
To play spot an Easterling
When you can spot 6 and more companions, each  Easterling is str +2.


Chain of Command
cost: 1
Event • Shadow
Exert an Easterling, to play tactics condition from hand.

[dmaz]

Altogether, I think it's a cool idea!

The Tactics conditions are not overpowered (maybe make the no archery one cost 3), and since you can only have one in play at a time, they don't pile up and get too overpowered.

For the other cards, they all look very well balanced and add more interesting elements to Easterlings. I like the Easterling banner. Adds in more thought process in the FP player's timing of skirmishes. You actually could make that card make ALL Easterlings str +1 until the regroup, as you are discarding him for an effect. Winning the skirmish sometimes is a task itself, if you then discard him, the reward could be a little bigger

Fun cards!

[BigRedMF]

Sounds really cool! Nothing appears too strong (at first glance) and it keeps Easterlings separate from other Men in that they have tactics to make use of. Nice work!

[Prince_of_Ithilien]

Wow, I like it - nice going!  Perhaps this would be fun to play-test as a "virtual set," a print-and-play insert like what the SWCCG community did with their virtual blocks.


<Can of worms open:
P.S.-The only beef I ever had with playing against Easterlings is that I didn't think they should be able to use the distinctively "Southronesque" Raider Bow from the towers set - the shiny gold Easterling Captain using the hand-hewn Southron Raider Bow just seems out of place, and the ambush 5 is a pain with him (if they have ranged weapons, perhaps they should get their own).
Can closed, all worms returned and accounted for>

[dmaz]

<Can of worms open:
P.S.-The only beef I ever had with playing against Easterlings is that I didn't thing they should be able to use the distinctively "Southronesque" Raider Bow from the towers set - the shiny gold Easterling Captain using the hand-hewn Southron Raider Bow just seems out of place, and the ambush 5 is a pain with him (if they have ranged weapons, perhaps they should get their own).
Can closed, all worms returned and accounted for>

I really agree with you here. It's not only out of place, it really makes for an NPE experience when playing against it. All they need to do is get two burdens out (easy with small hope), throw a polearm and bow on him, and you are dealing with some serious crap, haha.

[Floydor]

I think "merging" Southrons and Easterlings into the 1 culture without propper decide who can use what - Beasterlings became too boring...nonstop cycle of the Capitain, Bow, Poleaxe... and same with the southrons, why the #$&*@! southrons have Rapid Fire (+1 for each burden archery), Fearless event, Desert Legion what spots Burdens....when they dont have any cards or ways how to atleast corrupt.

[dmaz]

That and they don't really have effective site control to use their minions that gain bonuses from controlling sites. Lots of loopholes there hehe

EDIT - Sorry, kind of running off-topic here. This belongs in existing card discussion

[daisukeman]

Looks pretty cool..
I may be wrong, but I just have this comment:

The "When you can spot an Easterling, each Easterling..." wording seems unecessary.


It could be shortened to just "Each easterling..".
Or, unless you want these to be possibly combined with a raider mix, you could use:
"While you can spot an Easterling, each minion..."

[Floydor]

Looks pretty cool..
I may be wrong, but I just have this comment:

The "When you can spot an Easterling, each Easterling..." wording seems unecessary.


It could be shortened to just "Each easterling..".
Or, unless you want these to be possibly combined with a raider mix, you could use:
"While you can spot an Easterling, each minion..."

Ok, will remake gametexts a little bit... and no, Easterlings cannot be mixed with other "evil" men... Easterlings will work only with other Easterlings...same for Southrons.