Custom Hero Ideas! Are they balanced?

[alderdust]

Hi all kindly Blakeb has offered to make me some custom hero cards of my game group. Below are my ideas. I want everyone to be critical and crucial of what I put. If someone is too over powered tell me and how you recommend fixing it. If someone is too weak tell me and how you would fix it. I want to get this right before submitting to Blakeb. No photos yet so sorry about that. Obviously some of the heroes are identical to other heroes already in the game. The one thing I did was the ladies only got 2 health but since they had a couple extra abilities I didnt put a healing ability like youth on them. I would like opinions on if this is too weak or what you think?




















Jeremiah
Grocery File Maintenance Clerk
"Hail to the king baby...the grocery king!"
Graduate Student - Holy - Male
3 Wounds
Starts: Super Market
• Clean Up on Aisle 7 - May take a wound or discard an Item to Kill any Zombie beaten in a fight, even if no doubles were rolled.


Jesse
"I'll leave the lights on for ya."
Electronic Assembler
Professional - Male
3 Wounds
Starts: The Plant
• Handy – May add or subtract one to any roll when testing to see if a Hand Weapon Breaks.
• Rework - Once per turn, while inside of a Lights Out building may attempt to roll a 4+, if successful it cancels the Lights Out effect on the building.


Jonathan
"These are the days of out lives."
Small Town Law Man
Law Enforcement – Male
3 Wounds
Starts: Police Station
• County Officer – Starts the game with a Revolver.
• Man of Action – Instead of searching, may take a Revolver from the discard pile.


A.J.
Geologist
"f you and all yo mutha fuckin' friends!"
Professional – Science – Male
3 Wounds
Starts: Diner
• Rock Expert – Starts the game with the Pick Axe.
• Nice Stride – When entering a space with a Zombie, may immediately fight the Zombie and continue moving.


EDIT MAY 8TH 2013 - UPDATED the Character Cards to the ones that Blakeb has made so far I should have them all soon I finally got all my friends to send me there pics.

[friskers96]

First off, I like the characters. If you want them mounted on chipboard I'd be happy to get em printed and mounted up for ya. I should have a corner cutter able to round em out in a week. One thing your missing is the quotes.. Flavor text is where it's at. Also, and I'm probably thinking of "taken over" but can a hero enter a building with a lights out marker on it?

[alderdust]

They can enter the lights out building but it immediately ends there move but it doesnt effect searching you cannot enter taken over and if you are already there you may not search except if you are Stacy I believe and thanks fiskers I may have you do that! Ill get more quotes and photos to come.

[friskers96]

I always get that mixed up with the lights out and taken over... Every time... Now I am a little concerned about Jesse. He has the abilities to pull scenarios search items and negate a remains in play card. I know I'm noob and all but that seems to be a lot of power. Although canceling a lights out isn't too powerful I guess. My thought was there are only so many cards in the deck that remove a remains in play card, then for that specific card certain items work. H,mm I don't know, just thinking out loud.

[alderdust]

How would you suggest changing it? I'm open to all suggestions even new abilities to replace the present ones. Even adding negatives.

[friskers96]

Maybe rework man of action for him with "starts game with a flashlight and instead of searching can retrieve a flashlight from the hero discard pile". That way it's not a global hero effect.

[alderdust]

Yeah something like that may work id prob be more inclined to somehow make the repair ability changed since it is not as personal to the heroes real life job ya know.

[blakeb]

I think Jesse's Rework ability is fine. I don't think it'll come into play all that often and its only a 20% chance. However, I think Repair may be too powerful. I experimented with an ability like that myself, but ultimately decided against it. I mean it would rarely work with a 6, so maybe that evens it out. Might I suggest something like Jenny's Handy ability: "May add or subtract one to any roll when testing to see if a Hand Weapon Breaks."

[alderdust]

Yeah I like that ill change it to handy

[Twilight_Sonata]

Why do the Females all only have two wounds? Are they supposed to be Students or something? 'Cause if they have two wounds rather than three just 'cause they're girls... Well, we have Becky, Rachelle, Stacy, and Nikki that would like a word with you. And speaking of gender stereotypes, the "Married" feature is pretty questionable.

You might want to work on the wording for Sprinter. That makes it seem like the character loses the bonus even if he's in a building and wouldn't be affected by Heavy Rain? Why not just word it identically to Billy's ability?

Rework might also use some rewording, and it's quite a bit under-powered. How about instead of any time he enter a building with Lights Out, it can be activated any time he enters a space of a building with Lights Out? Heck, I'd even say let it succeed on a roll or 4+.

Regarding total power...
- Crystal seems very under-powered to me, could be remedied by removing Delicate and Married and giving her 3 wounds.
- Same solution for Jamie; this would make her identical mechanically to Becky, but I figure you don't care 'cause Jonathan is already identical mechanically to Sheriff Anderson.
- Lucas's "Catch!"-duplicating feature could use a bit more limitation, in my opinion. For example, only let him use it during his Exchange Items phase, or maybe make him do it in place of a Ranged Attack. If you did that, I think you'd be able to safely get rid of Lightweight (which doesn't make much thematic sense considering how much of an Athlete he apparently is).
- I don't think Austin needs that penalty. It just makes him pretty much objectively worse than Ed Baker. Maybe if he didn't have the Upgrade itself but rather the text of the Upgrade you could keep the penalty if you really want it? Like how Sally doesn't have the Upgrade Lucky but starts with its text. The distinction is that actually having the Upgrade card itself means that the Hero's subsequent earned upgrades cost more, which is a penalty itself.
- Jeremiah looks overpowered. Clean Up On Aisle 7 is a great ability all on its own. That's why Kenny gets just that and Youth (but only has 2 health boxes). Especially combined with being able to lower a Zombie's Fight Die, it's way too good, in my opinion.