Hotaru - Flame on

The rules for Fire and On Fire.

She may have just earned that rice value;)

just to check I'm getting this-

Hotaru casts the feat, giving her both offensive and defensive triggers of Zero, and engages a model in melee, if she both successfully attacks and defends in the subsequent melee does my model gain 2 Fire(2) counters? so then takes 2 damage that end phase, and an additional 2 the following end phase?

secondly- how do armour and tough affect fire? 

@Henrix has the right understanding and (X/Y) added to the LIving Rules, good spot Henrix.

thanks, I got the X/Y the wrong way round, (doh) although if it is affected by armour and tough the Temple players may wish I was right, as it stands she's as much use as a chocolate katana against a Kairai/Oni/any member of the prefecture:),

Does this also mean the most wounds she can cause on a single model ever is 6, (if she flames someone at the start of the game) regardless of how many tokens she places?

Greeny wrote:

She may have just earned that rice value;)

just to check I'm getting this-

Hotaru casts the feat, giving her both offensive and defensive triggers of Zero, and engages a model in melee, if she both successfully attacks and defends in the subsequent melee does my model gain 2 Fire(2) counters? so then takes 2 damage that end phase, and an additional 2 the following end phase?

secondly- how do armour and tough affect fire? 

 

No quite, as shes active we'll assume she has the iniaitive. So she hits the target gets 2, Fire (1) tokens. She then successfully defends and so the target gets another 2, Fire (1) tokens. During the end phase remove one of the tokens and mark a wound, leaving the model with 3 Fire (1) Tokens.

Fire ignores Armour and Toughness traits.   

You mean she's back at the top of the shopping list, right? 

GCT Master T wrote:

Fire ignores Armour and Toughness traits. 

 

So its basically poison with possibility to rid of it?

A model with Fire markers on its Profile card, or a friendly model in BtB which is unenaged and not in an enemy ZoC, may spend a Simple action to remove all Fire markers from a models Profile card.

 

Just for clarification, both models (btw the burning model) must be free to put the fire out or only the helping model?

Edited for detail:

Does this term: which is unenaged and not in an enemy ZoC refers to both? So can a model with burning tokens in close combat put the fire out itself?

No only the model performing the simple action. Has to be not in BtB

Unless the fire markers are removed then during the end phase and she will recieve a wound equal to its value. In hotarus case 1.

Additionnal question:
Where is the point in putting someone on flames then?
Regarding the low cost of removing the markers, and the low damage they deliver, i dont see the use for the girl.
Am i missing something?

Except that, for one damage, are you sure that you will waist an activation? Not sure i would

Tks anyway

Ok, your convincing!
Tks for the detailed answer

Mertaal has lots of good points, he's pretty much nailed how to use her,  I would also add she particularly excels against low wound creatures like bakemono, rats and children, where (if lucky) she can put enough flame markers on them in one combat round to kill them (eventually) if they don't put them out.

Well, tks to all for your answers, even if i wont actually be playing her, but suffering her on the other side.... :-(

It's one of those things. Sure, you could have gone with a much harder way to get rid of the flame tokens like, "Models on Fire take the sum of their Fire Tokens amounts every turn unless they spend a complex action and are placed prone to remove them (aka - stop, drop, and roll)" But then she'd be a 10-point+ model. It's all about game balance and the rice-point that GTS wanted for Hotaru. I wouldn't be surprised if originally there were higher-point-cost versions (or equivalents) in the playtest notes. I bet there were discussions of "Hmm... if we keep the ability like that, we'll have to up her cost. But since we don't want to do that, let's look at toning down the fire."

It's also a difference in our mental pictures of what the fire tokens represent. I'm sure, like most people (myself included), when one thinks "fire tokens" you think of some guy fully engulfed in flames that stretch up another 3' into the air above their heads as they burn. Instead, Hotarus as she is is a bit more like you've got a bit of a small burning patch on your shirt sleeve or pants leg or something that you just need to smack a little bit and put out.

Either way, she's a model I plan on getting, for looks alone. I'm just saving up a couple releases worth of models so I can get them all at once for Temple and Prefecture.

Jason Koepp wrote:

It's also a difference in our mental pictures of what the fire tokens represent. I'm sure, like most people (myself included), when one thinks "fire tokens" you think of some guy fully engulfed in flames that stretch up another 3' into the air above their heads as they burn. Instead, Hotarus as she is is a bit more like you've got a bit of a small burning patch on your shirt sleeve or pants leg or something that you just need to smack a little bit and put out.

Well actually, the mini is not quite reflecting this. Or maybe the 3m flame trail she is leaving behind her is someone else's? :-)

Hotaru is a bit hard to deduce in her effectiveness, but there is something a few people aren't quite catching onto here. She has a (0) defense trigger that causes damage-over-time!

Here's an example:

Hotaru engages a target. Before she attacks, she spends 3-Ki to use "Flame On" (as its a free action she can take on either her turn or the opponent's turn). She then commits 1 dice to attack, and 2 dice to defense.

Now her opponent is in a predicament. They can choose to commit all their dice to defense to prevent Hotaru hitting them (sensible in many cases), but in doing so they will have commited no dice to attack meaning Hotaru is likely going to win her defense, which in turn will trigger her (0) "Flame On" and cause the target to gain 2-Flame Tokens. As they have just been attacked, the target is now Tired (at the least) and will have to decide if they spend their last action dousing their flames or suffer an unblockable burn in the end phase.

Thus, if Hotaru is successful in defending against her foe - SHE DAMAGES THEM!!

Alternatively lets consider the opposite. The opponent commits dice to attack Hotaru, loosing some edge in defense. As Hotaru has attacked first, should she successfully hit and the target has no Armor/ Toughness, they will suffer at least 1 Wound from the attack (unless Hotaru had a SL of 0) PLUS 2-Fire Tokens. Should the target not get those flames out, they will have taken 3 wounds by the end of the following turn. Given most humanoids only have 6-wounds, thats half the model's life gone in two turns and from only one attack!

And then there is the worst case scenario. Hotaru wins both her attack AND defense. The target now has 4-Fire tokens on them, and has taken some damage from the attack Hotaru has hit them with, AND is Tired from dealing with the attack. With that level of an inferno, the target would very much like to put those flames out but that will use up its other action.

Lets also consider the target on fire as well. Should they give up an action to put out the flames, they will go from being Tired (since Hotaru has attacked them) to Exhausted. They won't want to do that as Hotaru has only attacked once, meaning she can attack again (and this time it will be on an Exhausted target). And given "Flame On" remains active until the end phase, if she DOES hit the target again, they will be ignited again. Meaning their action to douse the flames will have been wasted.

So the enemy is forced instead to try and attack Hotaru. Thats also not exactly a good idea because she can commit her dice-ppol to defense and place ANOTHER 2 Fire tokens on the attacker if she parries the attack.

So the enemy can then choose to try and run. But even THIS isn't the best of ideas because (again) Hotaru is still "Flamed On" and she can commit her dice pool completely to attack. If she hits, the target has not only just failed to run away, but it has still gained +2 Fire Tokens, AND taken physical damage from  Hotaru hitting them.

Then there is the case where she is attacked by multiple foes. Hotaru commits all her dice to defense. For each successfull attack she avoids, she puts 2-Fire tokens on the enemy that attacked her. In the end phase of that turn, those enemies will each take 1 Wound.

Agreeably Hotaru isn't a powerful damage dealer. But the Monks are not about dealing damage so much as they are about keeping their foes occupied and exhausted. Hotaru's job isn't to take enemies down, but to set them on fire and force them to either take damage or give up their activation to avoid the damage. She's an aggressive tar-pit designed to occupy your enemy while your other models complete their objectives.

Personally at 7-rice, I think she does her job just fine!

No he is correct, Hotaru gain the offensive and Defensive triggers (0), meaing if she successfully Defends and/or Attacks the Enemy model will get 2 Fire (1) Markers.

Yes