Happy Wednesday all! Today we will take a look at the new tree-hugger rules (note: not individuals that hug trees, but trees that hug back).
Army Special Rules:
One of the first stipulations of the Sylvaneth is that you get to pick your “Season of War” before every battle, rather than writing on the the roster. After you complete a battle in each season, you can upgrade your Wyldwood so don’t over-tune your army for one type. Your Wyldwood acts as a normal stronghold, but has the other special upgrades which we will cover later. They start at 15 Glory Points and double at each level.
Quests:
The Sylvaneth get four quests to choose from. All quests require the same condition: playing one battle in each of the four seasons. Gifts of Gyran is one of the best options. It gives a unit a veteran ability, even if it hadn’t leveled up. A Sprouting Victory is similar awarding you a unit with a points value less than 250. The Everqueen’s Chorus resets all casualty scores to “0”, and the final quest sets up the custom mission.
Custom Mission:
The custom mission for the Sylvaneth revolves around awakening soul pods.There are three pods spread out over the board in no-ma’s land. You awaken them by rolling a 7+ on a d6 (adding 2″ for each friendly unit wholly within 6″), you can’t roll if there are any enemy units within 6″. The Sylvaneth get the ability to revive D3 models of a Tree or Spite Revenant or Dryad unit. The other player gets the very powerful ability to give a unit +1 to wound if a unit is wholly within 12″ of a designated hero. A novel aspect of this scenario is that it gives the Sylvaneth player different rewards depending on the season of war they are in.
Veteran Abilities:
The Sylvaneth get a bevy of useful options to pick from. One of the best allows you to set up a free Wylwood once per game! Other options grant you +1 save or even an extra attack when receiving the “All Out Attack” command. One option I am scratching my head at is an ability that inflicts 1 mortal wound on every enemy unit that piles into the designated Sylvaneth unit. It’s decent against hordes and swarms of heroes but just 1 wound is quite mediocre (especially just once per game)
Territories:
There are six custom territories to choose between. One territory is useless, and four are tied to specific seasons for the Sylvaneth. These bonuses are pretty standard, getting to nominate two units as favored warriors, reinforcements cost 1 fewer glory point to reinforce or add to your roster, or subtracting 1 from every casualty score. The last option activates after a complete cycle through the seasons (ending at Evendusk) and allows you to make two exploration rolls rather than one. While I like the idea of a different territory for each season I wish they had come up with different abilities for each territory based on the battle played rather than freezing the benefit on one season. I feel like every other ability is based on moving you through seasons except this one.
Conclusion:
Overall I think these rules are creative. The seasons system is a great way to encourage players to diversify their rosters and play creatively. I think the territories could have been better, although having each territory give one of four different bonuses would be hard to balance. I like the veteran table, and think it plays in a way that is true to the army. Finally I think the custom mission is fluffy, and decently easy for the Sylvaneth player to win.
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