Goblin Mischief

Commonwealth humans have been a presence in the game and story from the very beginning. Today they continue to influence Tauber and play as a brutally hard-hitting and tough troupe on the tabletop. Among Tauber's common races, humans stand as some of the biggest and strongest. In-game, this is often reflected by above-average melee and wound count, in some cases as high as 9! This wound count is supplemented by an average amount of energy, usually 3, with most of it generally skewed to the left. Whilst it's not as extreme as the gnome's energy skew it is enough for the humans to take a few hits before their energy starts suffering. In addition, their large frames and affinity for larger weapons often bestow them with great melee ranges. There are however some disadvantages to being so large, meaning humans often have poor evade, usually 0 or +1. This can make them very easy to hit with ranged weapons and other arcane abilities. Damage-dealing arcane abilities usually aren...

Normally for troupes built around a keyword, several characters have auras and abilities that target said keyword. The treefolk however are not like these traditional keyword focussed troupes. Instead, they focus on how they and their opponents interact with wooded patches. As well as bringing a new terrain focussed playstyle to the Leshavult they also bring some very durable models by Leshavult standards. Gump in particular has the incredibly rare ability in Leshavult to reduce damage suffered. It isn't just one type of damage like the Jackalope either, Gump reduces TWO types of damage! This in combination with a few treefolk abilities and some more traditional Leshavult healing tricks can lead to some incredibly tough trees! The Growers Firstly, the treefolk need to get their wooded patches on the board. For this vital task, Ruwt will happily lend their expertise. They bring the familiar 'Verdant Growth' and a base energy of 3 allowing them to use it once per turn off the...

You can ring my bell, ring my bell Most support models in Moonstone generally do one or two things pretty well. Daniel however does not and instead opts to do a lot of things well! Furthermore, Daniel supports characters irrespective of keywords so he will happily slot into any troupe with ease. There are however some troupes that appreciate his bonuses slightly more than others. With some careful positioning and planning, Daniel can really bring out the best in all of the characters he's playing alongside. Troupes that really appreciate his buffs, in general, are the ones that like to huddle together making use of multiple auras. Daniel can therefore feel right at home with gnome, noble and cultist troupes, which generally stick together around one or two models and methodically advance up the board. To this end, Brother Daniel carries the excellent 'Plant the Placard'. In the early turns of the game, this can be used to simply move your troupe up the board. At only 2 of D...

In Melee we T(h)rust Coming in at a whopping 6 melee, the Fencer immediately secures her place as the highest melee stat model in the game. This is also supplemented by a fantastic arcane 5 and a superb evade of -2. As for her other stats, the Fencer has the traditional faeries melee range of 1", 6 wounds, and an incredible 5 energy. As great as these numbers are, it's from the Fencer's horde of passive abilities that we see how this faerie designed for melee will operate. Firstly, she has the standard 'Weakling' as is common with most faeries. As normal this can be removed by Wasp's 'Rage' ability, but weakling isn't usually an issue for this faeries as we'll see when we look at her signature later. Unusually for a faerie, the Fencer has some damage reduction, specifically an excellent -2 against all piercing damage received. Although this seems oddly specific it is very useful in tangent with her signature. On the damage-dealing front, the Fen...

Zzz... Huh? L ike many goblins, Portly Pete has an underwhelming stat line at first appearance. Unlike most goblins though, Portly Pete is slightly less evasive and has slightly more wounds than the rest of his goblin comrades. Although, as is typical with most goblins, these stats are a little misleading initially. This is where 'Asleep on the Job' comes in! Despite being a skillful goblin soldier, Portly Pete is often a little aloof, which leaves him in an awkward position at the start of the turn. Firstly, he can't be the first activation in a turn. However, when he finally wakes up, he gets a boost to his melee and evade stats which puts him more in line with the other goblin soldiers. This can be even more effective if the Goblin King is around since Pete gets this boost every time he activates! Once he’s in combat, Pete can make use of +1 piercing and Impact damage to his melee damage. In turn, he can reduce all non-magical damage he suffers by -1. In practice, it mea...

The three inevitable things in Tauber: Death, Taxes and Moonstones M oonstones are the win condition for a standard game - if you have more than your opponent by the end, you win. Now with the Tax Collector, they're also great for buffing your troupe's movement and toughness as well as sapping the opponent's troupe of energy. 'Rebate' and 'Income Tax' are the Tax Collectors' active abilities that accomplish this. As these are active abilities, they don’t need any cards drawn from the arcane deck and go off automatically. This is always a nice bonus for active abilities but it’s especially useful for the Tax Collector, as she is likely to be targeting moonstone carriers (who are often hiding behind cover), enemies who have good evade, or both. 'Income Tax' is something the Tax Collector will likely use every time she activates. For no cost, she can target an enemy character that has a moonstone and get them to pay an energy tax or forgo all their ...

Any resemblance to any real developers (in play or slain) is purely coincidental G oblins have had an affinity with being able to move moonstones around for a while now, with models like the Goblin King and Crusty Balboa being two examples. Jobie is the latest of this type of goblin, though he specialises in stealing stones from right under the noses of the opposing troupe instead. From here he can then throw them around the board, getting them further away from the enemy and closer to your own troupe! This he accomplishes with his two active abilities 'A Cunning Plan' and 'That's Mine... This is Mine...'. The first is a rare ability in Moonstone which allows Jobie to voluntarily give up his Moonstone and chuck it 2" away from himself. This comes at the cost of 1 energy and, perhaps more steeply, Jobie being slain. From his base energy, this means Jobie will be able to harvest a moonstone of depth 2, then throw it to his allies.  This is perfect for moonstones ...

A Piercing Boar Sir Hogswash is a classic Commonwealth melee model with no frills attached. Of his four abilities on the front of his card, three are specifically to help him in combat. The other one is to help him against troupes with lots of arcane which he is often used to counter.  As well as these abilities, Hogswash also has some great melee stats, keywords, and signature move.  All of this combined leads to a melee stat 4 model with a 2" melee zone, some boosts for melee damage, and some damage reduction. The 'Hunting Spear' gives +1 piercing and slicing damage which means you'll always get +1 damage in melee as all melee cards have options for either slicing or piercing! More interestingly it also gives a further +1 damage against animals, making Hogswash an excellent choice if your opponent's troupe contains many animals. Similarly, 'Sun Shield' also plays very well against specific troupes notably cultists and faeries with their focusses on impact...

A while ago I did an article on some in-depth game mechanics, namely: Activation Control and it proved quite popular. So today we'll look at some more core game mechanics and something which is very much related and expands on the previous article. This is one of the first decisions of the game, do you choose initiative or early bird? As mentioned a lot in the activation control article, the initiative gives the player with it great control over the flow of every turn by making them more likely to choose who activates first. Specifically, it lets the player with initiative choose which player activates first turn 1. Following this, it then gives them a diminishing bonus as the turns go on to win the roll-off as to who decides who activates first. This is a massive advantage and so to give it up you'd need another equally powerful bonus, early bird. This simply allows the player to choose which side of the board they will play on. Most importantly, this is done after the drop of...

Ice Cream for All! Eric has made his choice and his future now belongs in the hands of Leshavit! As a previous Commonwealth knight in training Eric will be able to help his new friends with some excellent combat abilities. Hogswashes lessons in particular must have been useful giving Eric a Melee 4, Range 2" and some wonderful skill with a javelin and shield. Unlike Commonwealth though, none of these pieces of equipment are traditional and all have a Leshavult twist. The shield for example can only be used once per game, but being a Leshavult shield it reduces all the damage to nil! As for the javelin, it increases piercing damage by +2 as expected. Unlike a normal javelin though, it can convert any piercing damage dealt into the same amount of magical damage instead! Against certain types of armour, like many Commonwealth nobles 'Plate Armour', the ability to convert damage into magical can be extremely potent. It also doesn't specify that it can only convert melee da...

The other Grassy Knoll Traditionally trolls, giants and other monstrous models are known for their colossal combat capabilities. Knoll however is not a traditional troll and has instead set his talents on healing and not harming. Despite this, he does still have some very recognisable troll traits of high wounds and a passive bonus to his melee damage with 'Old Staff'. The extended reach of his weapon also has the added bonus of elevating his melee range above that of a standard troll to 3". As is traditional with Leshavult though, he does not have a passive damage reduction ability typical of most trolls. What he does have instead though is 'Tough as Old Boots' and when using his arcane abilities, other characters can also potentially gain 'Tough as Old Boots'... Knoll's first arcane ability is 'Healing', the standard for a traditional healer and something that can be used with his base energy. More interestingly though is Knoll's second a...

VALHALLA! Unlike Olim and Liv, Bj ø rn offers no support options and instead opts for an all-out damage and combat policy! The first and simplest such ability is bearskin, reducing all non-Piercing damage he suffers. To supplement this, Bj ø rn also has a healthy complement of 8 wounds, as well as three energy, shifted as far to the left as possible. The main advantage of energy shifted all the way to the left is as normal, he doesn't lose energy as easily the more wounded he becomes. Whilst this is obviously a great advantage for gnomes in general it is even greater of an advantage to Bj ø rn due to how his melee damage bonus works. 'Berserk Fury' is a unique melee damage bonus, it gets better the more the Berserker is wounded. It can vary from no bonus damage for a healthy Bj ø rn to a +4 to all damage types for a Bj ø rn who's suffered 7 wounds! When Bj ø rn has suffered 7 wounds though he is likely to die from the next melee attack courtesy of the opponent a...