About the Oranda region
The Oranda region is a custum region that I'm currently designing. There are 4 large villages in this region. The village that the player will encounter first is inhabited by the Buki clan. This is a clan that specializes in armed combat. After unlocking his first character from the Buki clan, they player will have a choice between doing more missions in the Buki village or exploring the two new villages that have appeared on his map. One of those villages is inhabited by the Tainai clan, who have knowledge of every joint and muscle in the human body and specialize in using that knowledge in battle. The other village is inhabited by the Kinshi clan, who practice dark arts like voodoo and necromancy. The fourth village, which will only appear on his map after unlocking the first characters from the Tainai clan and the Kinshi clan, is inhabited by the Josho clan: a religious people, some of who have become so enlightened by their meditation that their minds have developed beyond what's comprehensible by other people. The player will find out that all clans are suffering from their own problems. The player will have to beat a sub-boss as the last mission in both the Tainai village and the Kinshi village. The White Guardian in this region will be involved in the storyline revolving the Tainai and the Kinshi clan. He will have skills of both the Kinshi and the Josho clan. The player will encounter the final boss of the region in the Josho village.


Tainai Hato
Speciality: Disruption

Man in his early 50s. Hato was once a prodigy of the Tainai clan, but vanity and greed corrupted him. He still has a number of followers, but he has become unable to put faith in anyone but himself. Joshu Oshoku, the Demon Lord of the Oranda region, took advantage of Hato's fears and paranoia and convinced him to stage a setup that would allow him to take over leadership of the Tainai village from the current Daimyo, Tainai Zoki. With Oshoku's help, Hato successfully faked his own death to frame the Tainai Daimyo for murder. When his deception is seen through by Rengoku, the White Guardian of the Oranda region, Hato demonstrates that his skills of controlling the blood flow in his body are not only useful for faking his death, but can also be used to enhance his muscle power and turn him into a one-man army. Hato usually walks with his back bent forward, in order to appear old and frail. However, when he exposes himself he turns out to be in surprisingly good shape for an old man. His head is largely bald, but still has some short grey hair on the sides. He has no facial hair. He wears a ragged kimono with pants underneath. When he engages in battle, he discards his kimono to show a muscular upper body.


AI Boss

Health Points: 500 HP

Numbing Kick: Hato attacks his opponent with powerful low kicks, numbing their legs. Hato deals 25 melee damage to all enemies, disabling items infinitely and stunning their melee skills for 2 turns.
Classes: melee, instant

Head Squash: Hato uses two hands to strike the opponent's head at both sides. Hato deals 40 melee damage to one enemy with the lowest health points and affects the target with a Ki affliction dealing 25 affliction damage each turn for the following 2 turns.
Classes: melee, instant

Blood Flow Control: Hato pumps blood through his body at triple the normal speed, granting him extraordinary strength and speed. Hato gains one Blood Flow Control charge, increasing melee damage dealt by Hato by 10 infinitely.
Classes: melee, instant

Scroll of Anatomy: A scroll bestowing the Tainai's most advanced knowledge of the human body on the holder. Hato ignores stuns and bypasses counters. Melee damage dealt by Numbing Kick and Head Squash cannot be decreased.
Classes: passive, aura

Skill sequence:
1) Numbing Kick
2) Head Squash
3) Blood Flow Control
repeat

Tainai Hato stands alone in this boss battle (i.e. the other two opponent character slots are empty). After defeating him, the player will be able to unlock Hato as a playable character in the Market and will also receive the Tainai's Clan Item: Scroll of Anatomy.

(I am finding that AI bosses are very hard to balance. Before judging whether this boss is balanced or not, why not try coming up with a team and strategy that beats him? Anyone who posts an original solution will receive a thumbs up!)


Playable character

Health Points: 80 HP

Blood Flow Control: Hato pumps blood through his body at triple the normal speed, granting him extraordinary strength and speed. Numbing Kick and Head Squash are altered infinitely. This skill ends at the end of the turn when Fake Death is triggered.
Energy required:
Cooldown: 1 turn
Classes: melee, instant

Numbing Kick: Hato attacks his opponent with powerful low kicks, numbing their legs. Hato deals 10 melee damage to one enemy, stunning the target. During Blood Flow Control, this skill targets all enemies, but only stuns melee and ranged skills.
Energy required:
Cooldown: 1 turn
Classes: melee, instant

Head Squash: Hato uses two hands to strike the opponent's head at both sides. Hato deals 20 damage to one enemy, affecting the target with a Ki affliction that reduces melee and ranged damage dealt by the target by 5 infinitely. This skill stacks. During Blood Flow Control, this skill deals 40 damage to one enemy, stunning the target's mental and tactic skills.
Energy required:
Cooldown: 1 turn
Classes: melee, instant

Fake Death: Hato slows the blood flow through his heart to trick his enemies into thinking he's been killed. Each turn, whenever Hato is first targeted by a melee, ranged or mental skill, he will ignore all damage dealt to him by other enemy skills that turn. During Blood Flow Control, Hato will instead ignore all damage dealt to him by the first melee, ranged or mental skill targeting him each turn, but Blood Flow Control will end at the end of any turn where he was targeted by a melee, ranged or mental skill.
Energy required: No costs
Cooldown: 0 turns
Classes: passive, aura



I'm not looking for ratings, instead please comment on why you think this characters and these items are underpowered/balanced/overpowered and what you think of the designs all together.

EDIT 27/02: During BFC, Hato will only ignore damage from the first skill targeting him, instead of ignoring damage from all skills.



Links to the four clans I created for the Oranda region: Buki clan, Josho clan, Tainai clan and Kinshi clan. I also created the White Guardian and clan items. Look forward to the other 2 bosses coming up next - both AI and playable - which will conclude the Oranda region.

Well Hato is quite strong, but seeing as how he spikes, I would just stun his Melee skills with Mental stuns. A basic Mental stunner period would be great against him, and maybe mix em up with a spiker or affliction whore. Personally I would use Niwa, Jyouzu, and Jun.

On the playable version, Fake Death is epic and although I fail at balance, its pretty strong. Does Head Squash's reduction stack?

Well Hato is quite strong, but seeing as how he spikes, I would just stun his Melee skills with Mental stuns. A basic Mental stunner period would be great against him, and maybe mix em up with a spiker or affliction whore. Personally I would use Niwa, Jyouzu, and Jun.

On the playable version, Fake Death is epic and although I fail at balance, its pretty strong. Does Head Squash's reduction stack?

On the AI Boss: by "ignores melee stuns" I meant that his melee skills cannot be stunned, not that he only ignores stuns by melee skills. To avoid confusion, I'll just make him ignore all stuns.

On the playable version: yes that reduction stacks. I'll mention it in the skill description.

team:

jinsei-sake
jun-woo
takeko- battle armor/flute


first turn we use sake on jun, and go invulnerable with takeko. that way jun's attacks wont be stunned, and takeko can still have her BA on her.

2.we attack with jun, use summon Ootake and combat stims on takeko.
3.Go invul with jun, so that he dosnt get stunned. and also attack with jinsei and takeko.
4.keep spamming attacks like that, till he reaches low hp.

Version 2.

use saigai, takeko, and another char.


simply spam enroaching doom, until he dies. takeko and the other char will absorb the damage, leaving saigai un-scratched.

Misinterpreted that wrong. He is really formidable from that point.

team:

jinsei-sake
jun-woo
takeko- battle armor/flute


first turn we use sake on jun, and go invulnerable with takeko. that way jun's attacks wont be stunned, and takeko can still have her BA on her.

2.we attack with jun, use summon Ootake and combat stims on takeko.
3.Go invul with jun, so that he dosnt get stunned. and also attack with jinsei and takeko.
4.keep spamming attacks like that, till he reaches low hp.

Version 2.

use saigai, takeko, and another char.


simply spam enroaching doom, until he dies. takeko and the other char will absorb the damage, leaving saigai un-scratched.

He disables items though, and lets say he doesn't use his Numb Kick the turn after Takeko goes invulnerable, that would be a waste of energy. I like version 2 as Saigai is an affliction abuser.

Numbing Kick: Hato attacks his opponent with powerful low kicks, numbing their legs. Hato deals 25 melee damage to all enemies, disabling items infinitely and stunning their melee skills for 2 turns.
Classes: melee, instant

Your first idea has some flaws, because (I think) you forgot that Hato will disable Sake and WoO after your first turn. You'll be able to use Sake once, but not twice. Still, I know Jinsei + Jun + Takeko can actually beat him, because that's the team I wrote a strategy for myself when I was balancing him. I used Poison Darts on Jinsei (although what item I used for her didn't really matter), Smokebomb on Jun and Pipe of Wisdom on Takeko.

Your second idea looks more solid. Saigai would be very effective against Hato indeed. I would've liked to see you work out the strategy in more detail, but I'll give you the thumbs nonetheless.

Tadao GotW
Hana Poisonous Darts/Tanto
Yuurin SB

this tactic only works if you start with a red energy (or alternately use VI for Hana)

Turn 1: Hana uses Intercept on Tadao
Turn 2: SB
Turn 3: Nature's Embrace
Turn 4: Desperation
Turn 5: Intercept
Turn 6: Desperation
Turn 7+ rinse and repeat Turn 3~6 + use damaging skills


On a sidenote: Fake Death is kinda OP

EDIT: I think ignoring damage after one hit is kinda OP especially if he has some kind of boost XD like for example Kame's protector... I suggest that it only lets him ignore melee (or melee + ranged) and maybe make it only trigger after being hit by melee or ranged skills since I highly doubt an affliction would stop working after he's hit by something ^^
Well a total rework suggestion would be that you make it an active skill which is invis and has an infinite cooldown or a rather long cooldown: something like "Last 1 turn. Revert all damage and remove all hostile effects on Hato if he is killed this turn"

Tadao GotW
Hana Poisonous Darts/Tanto
Yuurin SB

this tactic only works if you start with a red energy (or alternately use VI for Hana)

Turn 1: Hana uses Intercept on Tadao
Turn 2: SB
Turn 3: Nature's Embrace
Turn 4: Desperation
Turn 5: Intercept
Turn 6: Desperation
Turn 7+ rinse and repeat Turn 3~6 + use damaging skills


On a sidenote: Fake Death is kinda OP

Excellent solution! I hadn't thought of that. I don't think I'll give Hato skills that ignore invulnerability, because every boss should have some weakness. Instead, I'd rather see GotW nerfed to disable invulnerability on its holder or make it holder invulnerable to friendly skills. Thumbs up well earned! :)

On Fake Death, why do you think it's overpowered and how would you suggest nerfing/reworking the skill?

I have decided to give Fake Death a significant nerf. During Blood Flow Control, it will only make Hato ignore damage from the first skill targeting him instead of making him ignore all damage. This means that without BFC he will ignore all damage except that of the first skill targeting him, and during BFC he will ignore all damage only from the first skill targeting him.

Any more feedback on him, either on the AI boss or the playable char?