For ages now, I've been wanting to write up my son's favourite Supreme. Birdboy, a.k.a. Billy Burns, is a young boy who grew wings at an early age. His progressive, forward-thinking parents enrolled him with Dr. Helpanto's School for the Gifted Young, and he has been working on his skills and powers ever since. Recently, he's been seen on the streets of Pulp City, or rather, above them, helping those in distress. He is accompanied into the fray by his pet ravens, Huginn and Muninn, named for Odin's ravens of old. These act as his eyes and ears, as well as assisting him in battle. He was also gifted with a magical feather, rumored to be from the mythical Firebird, which shines as a beacon of hope to all who see it.

(For a miniature, I'll be using Billy Burns and the Pegasus foal wings from the fantastic Armorcast line, and I'm not sure what to use for Huginn and Muninn.)

Let me know if you think anything is overpowered, underpowered, etc.

First, I think it's a pretty cool character.

The only thing that got me worried is



So, he has 3, trump and he'll be flying, so consider that 4 trump. If he chooses to move first (to better line up the attack), you're looking at a trumped 7 attack. If he's already lined up, he can skip the move action and power up the attack which means you're looking at a trumped 8- 10 attack.

That seems a little high for a level 1. Basically, the way he'd work woud be that Turn 1 you'd kick in Evasive Manoeuvers and advance towards support supremes. Add in his team power and he'd be surprisingly resilient. Turn two, he'd smack a support supreme and with that kind of power he'd have an effect. Contrast this with Harrier, who fills a very similar niche, and this seems a little much...

Very cool concept though.

I like this guy. I've always loved the winged people. He should be a lot of fun on the table. Here are a couple little points to consider for balance though:


Yup exactly what Cardboardvapire said. Look at the way Super Zed's Crash Landing works. He too can gain a bonus = to his flight counters, but he also take 2 damage for each. The price of this isn't high enough. a +3 Bonus is significant

Also Innocence seems a tad powerful as well. You've basically given him Lurk. A Lurk that is always active, doesn't turn off when he attacks etc... Not a bad idea but I might model it more off of Acorn's Team power where by he gets a +1 Defense. Or maybe unless he's the closes target he may not be targeted by enemy Actions. Something along those lines.

Thanks for the critique, guys. It was just what I was looking for.

Re: Innocence, perhaps "When attacking Birdboy, if there are other valid targets within range, the attacker takes a -2 penalty to the attack roll."

OR "when attack Birdboy, if there are any other enemy models within LOS, the attacker takes a -2 penalty to the attack roll."

Re: Stoop, perhaps "Movement Action. Birdboy makes an attack against a single model within 2", with a bonus equal to the current amount of flight tokens he has. If The attack is unsuccessful, Birdboy is considered Shot Down. He may only make this attack if he is Up, Up and Away."

I think those sound like good changes. I think though that Innocence should be only -1. He's plenty rugged enough to not need such a large boost. Other than that it seem fine to me.

Thanks. I've updated the original post to reflect the discussion, and I'll be making up cards soon!

I think the new changes look good. That said, I had a few thoughts.

The first things I saw is that he still has the ability to do a 7 attack with stoop... Not game breaking but pretty powerful for a level 1. Why not decrease the damage slightly but give it an additional effect?

How about instead of adding the flight counters as a bonus, just say that it doubles the attribute bonuses gained by flight for that round, and that a successful attack allows him to move a target a number of inches equal to his flight counters?

This way, he'll be hitting at 5, trump, which is quite respectable AND you'd get to swoop down and move the target, which adds some tactical flexibility to the character AND he'd have some additional defensive bonuses after swooping so he's even safer?

Oh, and as the rules stand now, a flying target must decrease it's flight counters to 1 to make a melee attack against a ground target. If you keep the current Stoop rules, you should add a note that this is an exception to the "reduce to 1 counter before attacking rule" and that in this case, the counters are only reduced after the attack is made.

Let us know how he actually does on the table!

Well, perhaps that's the downside... A falcon, which uses the stoop, wouldn't be using it on a ground-based target. The danger of the stoop is in its incredible speed. So, attacking a flying target, use up to three counters, but in attacking grounded targets, it's a max of +1. It then maxes the power out at 5 and a trump against most targets in the game, but with a situational bonus occasionally.

And the cards are done.

You know, if you keep it that way, I actually think it's rather well balanced.

Against ground targets it's good, against flying targets it's great so Birdboy now has his own niche, he's the guy who takes out flyers in melee.

I'd be tempted to field him myself, just to see what happens. Nice model to have around to keep Zed from crash landing too easily.

One final note... the cards look great, but shouldn't the bird minions have not ? I know... I'm nitpicking...