I like the new holoecho design. On reflection, "A" and "B" aren't needed and it's good that you left them out. The left- vs right-solid markers is sufficient. Reason: the only purpose of differentiating between a unit's two holoecho markers is so that the owning player can privately write down which is real. So he can just write "model," "left solid," or "right solid". At the table, the opponent may not notice the subtle visual difference between the two markers, but that doesn't matter because to the opponent, they're identical in every way. When it comes time to reveal the real one, owning player just says "see, this one is solid on the left and this one on the right, and I wrote 'left solid' so that's the real one."
But, I would suggest an option with matching numbers, i.e. one number "1" that's left-solid and a matching number "1" that's right-solid. So that a player can use the number to indicate the associated troop and the solid-polarity to differentiate between that troop's two echoes. Likewise, an option without numbers, for players who want to use colour for associated troop and solid-polarity for intra-troop differentiation. Though I guess then you'd be looking at a full page of just holoechoes....
I have to say though, I liked the solid color + white figures for Holoecho, Imp, etc, better than white with colored figures. In this, blue with the sole gray border (omission of white) indicates to me "it's some kind of a model substitution token!". The icon tells me whether it's an Impersonator or a Holoecho. Then the tertiary color tells me which set. With the latest "varying colors on white" most of that information is lost. Gray border against white is lost. The whole information on the token is colored with "model identity", unnecessarily so. I was also considering suggesting keeping them solid blue for uniformity and adding a small dot of color to mark "sets". This way, below, we have markers 1 & 3 from the red set and 2 & 4 from the green one. Red and green being two different models, etc. Color coding the whole area vs white background is too much of a mishmash IMO. Dots of green, blue, orange or whatever else you consider appropriate from the same palette, would work better IMO. Excuse my butchering your work in Paint :P
Alternatively (more butchery, sorry!), color code just the "model" on the icon itself, not even it's "shadows / copies" on the info, just the model. Or even just its head?
@Lawson awesome work, I really like most of the design choices, but not all: Gradient makes for a slightly more interesting graphic design than solid colour, and it'd be awesome to see it back Original Supportware colours were looking better than the generic blue ones Deployable versions with a white edge looked better than the updated, full-colour ones Null tokens (Unconscious, Disconnected, Spawn-Embryo) could use some colour on them, to catch the eye, as the grey on grey ones will get easily overlooked. The little Prone symbol might be red, for example I'm not fully sold on the Decoy, Dazer, and Repeater symbols, though I understand the rationale behind the change. Camo (-6) tokens' colours as well Greyed-out Spearhead for Peripheral (Control) is less clear than the others; using different colours for Spearheads than for the rest of the tokens would help them stand out more In general, I feel that this version is slightly better in some aspects than the later revisions:
I'd love to make more designs, though I figured a player could actually just have a number of mine tokens next to their board equal to the quantity they are carrying as a personal reminder - for D-Charges I dunno; maybe at some point I'll add the option but since the original design doesn't even have anything but the Unloaded token, I figure people can get by in the meantime. I've got some versions of these I'm working on - haven't liked any of them enough to show yet but maybe I'll put some up here.
Yes, in fact the aesthetic of the colored markers being lost with a switch to white is the biggest drawback to me - it does make some stuff look weird... part of it is that there are a lot of these tokens now to accommodate the options, which actually makes it look like more white space than would actually appear on the table - I tried some color field options that I didn't love but I may circle back to them. Another trade-off of trying to create consistency - I agree I liked the previous aesthetic better. Maybe I can find a border option that will work better for Marker States
Oh, people can certainly get by, they've been doing that for years: the situation is nothing new :) Personally, I always remember who has how many charges left. But having a token for that would be a neat option, and obviously more clear (thus - more fair) for the opponent. I don't think having spare mines aside of the board is a solution, though: it could get confused with mines already deployed and detonated / destroyed. It is quite easy to have a couple of models with the same kind of mines, too. In short, I think placing a token next to a model would be far superior.
I see a lot of Icons show secondary information, like -3, targetable, dodge -3 etc. but the tinbots have no such infos. That would be quite usful. There are -3, -6 (Hacking), a -6 Guided (very rare, I guess), +3 discover, albedo and neurocinetics as far as I can see.
Okay @QueensGambit @Stiopa @Nuada Airgetlam brace yourselves... this is gonna get a bit nuts: One of the big problems of the previous iteration is that the dark gray border was reserved for Unconscious states... because it is color-neutral, like white, using it specifically for the few unconscious states makes it unusable as an alternative to white on other tokens. @Stiopa mentioned that more color on the Unconscious token would make it read better, so I hit upon the idea of actually doing an orange border for these states. This creates some very vivid colors that makes them really pop. That allowed the dark gray border to shift over to Marker states and figure stand-ins like so: (white bordered items provided for reference... I switched spearhead to sort-of a teal color to reflect the similarity to Fireteams) So this results in some kind-of wacky colors, but I don't necessarily dislike it. Here's the explanation: Null States = Orange Bod Unconscious, Shasvastii Embryo, and Disconnected represent states that are Null (and the player no longer has control over their figure), so they include both the orange border and an orange coloration to the icon on a dark gray background (Unconscious State + "Loss of Control" = Null) NWI and Dogged are special forms of Unconscious state, so they include the orange border, but there is no loss of figure control and the figure is not null, hence the white icon and colored (red) inner field. Possessed and Sepsitorized represent a loss of control but are not an Unconscious state, since the opponent gets control of the figure. So they have a white border BUT they have the dark gray center and orange icon. This leaves the dark gray border specifically for markers/figure stand-ins/equipment. Marker states get a dual-color center for the field/icon, and the color doesn't really matter anymore vs the coloration for the other tokens (referenced on the right) because the dark gray ring is the major visual differentiating factor. Deployables like mines still get a white icon (since they aren't color coded per-item)
I thought about doing this since the Tinbot token as it currently exists seems kinda useless to me (?) and it seems like the only benefit of even having such a token would be have the actual Tinbot bonuses listed... but I imagined going down a rabbit hole of half a dozen different versions of a token again. Maybe someone can clarify for me why token exists at all. It's a stand-in for a figure (I presume some minis actually come with a physical Tinbot, since I think I've seen them). But it's just a piece of equipment... you can't shoot at it. It doesn't move in any particular way or need to make any effort to stay in coherency because it just 'sticks' to its owner. It doesn't do anything for being engaged. Is it just fluff?
You mean Tinbot-Tokens? Not every model that has access to a tinbot has a physical model (but I could be wrong here, like toadchild said, some turned to skills). As nice and cute the tinbots are, they act only as a reminder - this model has a tinbot - so a marker with the actual mod on it will be useful. Practicaly you have to carry a model and a token with you for full information and this will mess up your table, a lot of tokens for a model that has a tinbot, is the link leader, the datatracker (ah more tokens!), has a wound and is in the stunned state ... but hey if we can got tinbot tokens, its better to have at least a useful info on it . Maybe concentrating on the most used ones - Firewall -3 / -6. PS: I love the black/orange for the null state tokens. They catch attention and act a little bit like a warning.
I like those, they pop really well. The black on orange screams "out of play" effectively. Yeah, it just shows that the unit has that piece of equipment. Nanoscreen is the same. There may be other equipment that uses a marker that I'm forgetting. I assume that CB just thought it was particularly important to the opponent to have a visual reminded of that equipment. Like, I plan my attack and spend some orders moving to catch your Rasail out of cover, only to discover too late that I forgot he had a nanoscreen. Or, I move up a hacker to attack your HI, then realize that someone else in her fireteam has a tinbot. It doesn't really make a lot of sense consistency-wise; like, I can get just as screwed if I move to attack someone forgetting they had mimetism or arm 6 or whatever. But I assume the rules team decided that nanoscreen and tinbot were the equipment that most needed reminders. (Also it sells Tinbot models.) Honestly, I've never seen anyone actually use the nanoscreen token, they just tell me the dude has a nanoscreen. Most of the time I'm thinking out loud anyway, "hmm I could go after that Rasail, he's your datatracker, if I move over here I can get him out of cover, that would be cool..." and my opponent will just jump in and remind me he has a nanoscreen. Tinbots are similar, I've seen the models/tokens used sometimes but not consistently, and it doesn't bother me if an opponent doesn't use one as long as they remind me of the tinbot same as they would any other relevant equipment.
@Lawson great, they're near perfect now. As others said, the orange/grey combination works really well for Null states. I'm also a fan of consistent coloring rules between different token types. Speaking of consistency: wouldn't Seed-Embryo and Decoy fall into the same category as Holoecho, mandating a white/gray border? Not a criticism, just asking. Spearhead sharing color with fireteam tokens works great One more suggestion: three-color rule could work well for most tokens. Note how Possessed, Sepsitorized, Dogged and NWI - as well as AP mine - tokens pop out more, and have better contrast than tokens where the symbol shares color with the background. How would Decoy, Seed-Embryo, and Impersonation look with the same background color, but white or grey symbol? Speaking of Impersonation: shouldn't the (-6) modifier go on the right? Or was that intentional, so as not to confuse it with a BS modifier? Maybe it could share the form, but have a different background colour (red for BS modifiers, blue, green or orange for Discover?)
This is what it says about Seed-Embryo in the N4 rulebook p.111: If the adversary is successful in Discovering the camouflaged Seed-Embryo, the Camouflage Marker is replaced by a Seed-Embryo Token (SEED-EMBRYO). ► If the user’s Seed-Embryo profile has the Combat Jump Special Skill, it will be deployed as a Seed-Embryo (SEED-EMBRYO) Token instead of a Model, applying the Combat Jump rule as usual. ► The player will replace the Camouflage Marker or Seed-Embryo Token (SEEDEMBRYO) with the corresponding Model when: ► They perform any Skill with the Movement Label as the first Short Skill of the Order, or Entire Order. The new Developed Form profile is applied for the entire Order Sequence. ► They perform a successful Dodge ARO. The new Developed Form Troop Profile is applied before making any Dodge movement. Bolded emphasis, mine: I couldn't understand if Seed Embryo was functionally a Marker State or not, but the rule I've set has been that all 'markers' or 'tokens-that-otherwise-represent-figures-or-physical-interactable-objects' get the same visual/border treatment as camo. That means. Decoy, Shasvastii Embryo, and Holoecho all get the dark gray inner border because they all are stand-ins for a figure... in the case of the Holoecho and Decoy, it's a theoretical figure depending on which one the figure is 'hidden' under, but they represent figures nonetheless. If anything, maybe I should just change Tinbot to have a white border, because even though it stands in for a figure, it functionally is just a skill/buff and doesn't actually exist as a physical object on the battlefield for the purposes of gameplay. With the change to the border, this should be possible without causing too much confusion. The big upside of the full-color coding of the face is that it's very clear that it differentiates from similarly colored tokens, but I could at least brighten the contrasting color inside the field to make it pop more. Yeah the point is that the -6 on the standard N4 token was clarified to me as NOT equivalent to mimetism... just a Discovery mod. I had thought at one point about putting actual icons representing each. e.g. an EYE for discover mods, BRICK WALL for firewall, SILHOUETTE for mimetism, etc. I could still consider doing it as long as it doesn't get too messy.
Thanks a lot for the replies. I'm really looking forward to the final version! (Still silently hoping for a gradient treatment after all the color coding gets locked in :P)
Alright, here's the update: Here's a summary of the changes: - changed all the variations on Unconscious states, as well as the states Sepsitorized and Possessed, based on a new color scheme (explained in a previous message). This makes these states really pop, which is useful both aesthetically and for having information on which figures are 'in trouble' - added dark gray border to all all tokens representing deployables, Marker States, and/or that are figure stand-ins (or represent the potential of figure, such as Holoecho). This replaces the previous borderless aesthetic. - Marker states reverted to more vibrant colors on the face, with a brighter rendition of the same color for the icon. This makes them readable but also distinctive from other 'color coded' tokens. Between the dark gray border and this coloration, markers are visually unique from States. - Objectives are the only exception to the above - I felt I could keep the lack of border for these as they are distinct from most other markers, aside from being interactable. I've added lettering to the Supply Boxes. Even though it isn't necessary in any of the existing scenarios, I see no downside to identifying specific boxes and other objectives in case someone comes up with a game mode or scenario that benefits from this. - Switched Tinbots back to having a white border, since the token itself is essentially just a reminder of a particular buff. I've also, per @archon gone ahead and added all the buffs provided by Tinbots that seem to be in N4 as far as I can tell (Firewall -3, -6, Albedo, Discover +3). There's no point in color-coding the Tinbots like I did with the other markers because they essentially stay 'attached' to whoever owns them. I looked through Army 7 and couldn't find a Tinbot with Guided off the top of my head. If someone can point out that it does in fact exist, I will correct my Tinbot list to include it and anything else Tinbots might offer in N4. - @Daixomaku suggested a 40mm non-mimetism camo token - added - @Errhile wanted another type of Loaded/Unloaded token, and I had the mine icon already so I figured it would be easy enough to make. It doesn't cover every possibility or type of equipment, but it's something. - @Errhile also wanted some additional Combat Group Orders. I'm unfamiliar with how 'high' combat groups can go. Is having a few 2s and 3s good enough. Since Irregular Orders are owned by individual figures anyway, do those need to be numbered for additional combat groups as well? I'm feeling like this is pretty much complete. Thoughts?
