SDE Monsters 03 - Kobolds 03

The last two Kobold types I want to review here are the most powerful of the Kobolds. They are the Dragon Priests and the Kobold Ogres.

Dragon Priests are Kobold Minions and the boxed set of Super Dungeon Explore comes with two of them. To help differentiate between them I have painted one with red skin and the other with grey skin. I have also given them different coloured clothing.

Often leaders of warbands in the deep dark, Dragon Priests are granted arcane powers by their close communion with the dragon, Starfire. Once bestowed these gifts they never hesitate to use their favour to bully and cajole the lesser Kobolds into fighting for them.

Dragon Priests come with a good set of stats. Their four main stats (Attack, Armour, Will and Dex) all use two dice, usually 1 blue and 1 red, although Attack only uses 2 blue dice, which isn't as good. Still, these are not meant to be front line fighters. They work best supporting their colleagues from afar. In addition they have 3 actions per Turn and 3 Wounds. Not bad at all!

As you might expect, their main offence comes from Magic, and with a range of 8 squares that makes them as good as most Magic-wielding Heroes. If they do get close in, they also have the Mob ability, which is common to all Kobolds. They have two Augment spells that can help their comrades - Dragon Rage and Shadow Breath. Dragon Rage affects all allies within 3 squares and grants them a +1 blue die to their Attack rolls. Shadow Breath has an even larger range of 5 squares and grants all allies within range the Stealth ability. Stealth works like this - when a model with Stealth is targeted by a ranged effect they may immediately make a DEX roll. Subtract the number of stars rolled from the attacker's range. If the  roll causes the attacker to be out of range the attack is considered to have failed.

The Kobold Ogre is a Mini-Boss, second in command of the Dungeon Boss. The game comes with two of these fearsome monsters. The game designers have named him Rex, but I thought they can't both be called Rex, so Rex is the red skinned Kobold Ogre and I have named the grey skinned Kobold Ogre, Reg. Rex and Reg are twins, despite their different colouration.

Rex and Reg have collected more than a few new friends since going to work in the Consul's dungeons. Most are unwary adventurers not quite quick enough to get out of the reach of their enthusiastic hugs.

Mini-Bosses are very tough!  Rex and Reg have 5 Wounds, 3 Actions per Turn and excellent Attack and Armour stats - 2 blue dice and 2 red dice for Attack and 2 red dice for Armour.  Because of their huge size they have a Reach of 2, allowing them to attack targets up to 2 squares away. Also, because they are part Kobold, they have the Mob ability.

Rex and Reg come with three offensive abilities, which in order of power are Rex/Reg Smash, Rex/Reg Cuddle and Thwomp. Rex/Reg Smash costs 3 Actions to use but causes Massive Damage, which grants him a +1 green die to his Attack rolls. Ouch! Rex/Reg Cuddle costs 2 Actions to use and if successful causes the target to be Immobile and Weak. Finally, Thwomp, which costs just 1 Action, can push a target up to 5 squares away if successful. Most times this won't be very useful but if there is a lava pit, for example, behind the Hero then it might be worthwhile using.

As promised here is a group shot of all of my SDE Kobolds with the grey-skinned Kobolds to the left and the red-skinned Kobolds to the right. You can see from this photo just how tall the Kobold Ogres are. Rex and Reg should be in the second row from the front, along with the Gougers, as they all have Reach 2 abilities. The Ironscales and Knuckleheads should always be at the front of any attack. Keep the Flingers and Dragon Mages to the rear if you can as they work best from a distance.
Next time I'll be reviewing the last of my Monsters from the basic SDE boxed set - Dragons! Yes, I'm keeping the best to last.