A Review of the Cycle I Titans | Aeon Trespass: Odyssey (Patreon)

Another part of the puzzle in every battle alongside gear is the Titan selection that you choose to take into battle. While the Argonauts start the game with only the four Dreamwalker titans to send into battle against the Primordials, this expands as the game moves forwards and eventually there is a wide selection to pick from.

There are 6 additional titans alongside the Dreamwalkers which can be Argo-bred during the first Cycle, however two of them are locked behind killing the Hermesian Pursuer and the Skyseer requires you to achieve that in the Mnestis Theatre. This is a possible feat in Cycle I, though it is very difficult, so what I am going to do is split the difference and write about the Game Changer in this article and the Skyseer when I cover Cycle II's Titans in the future.

That means here we're going to cover the following Titans

Dreamwalker I (Herodotus, Solon, Ulyssea and Philocetra)

Earthshaker

Mazerunner

Logicbreaker

Game Changer

Dreamwalkers

Our Dreamwalker titans come in what I like to think of as four different strains in order to help explain why each sheet has a specific name rather than just “Dreamwalker”. Each of these Titans are named after a significant portion of Ancient Greek culture. Herodotus was 5th Century BC a historian and geographer from Halicarnassus (now Bodrum in Turkey), he's known as “The Father of History” in part due to his account of the Greco-Persian Wars titled “Histories”; still his critics titled him “Father of Lies”. Regardless Herodotus is a significant individual from that period of history and the titan's name reflects this.

Solon came before Herodotus as he was born in Athens somewhere near the year of 630 BC, Solon created a lot of social reforms, so many that Aristotle dubbed him “The First People's Champion” and he's been credited with igniting a golden age of Greece. He's also apparently the source for the story of Atlantis (according to Plato). Also I just have to mention that when Solon met the King Croesus, a man who proclaimed himself “The happiest man alive”, Solon told him “Count no man happy until he be dead”. In this statement Solon meant that ones fortune can turn against you at any moment. Croesus eventually lost his kingdom to King Cyrus and came to acknowledge Solon's words.

Philoctera is named for the Greek hero Philoctetes; a participant in the Trojan war and mentioned Homer's Iliad. He is a mythological figure who was marooned on Chryse, bitten by a snake, tricked by Odysseus, told by Heracles he would be healed and fought in Troy. Plus a lot more besides that.

Ulyssea is our final member of this quartet and she is named for the aforementioned Greek hero Odysseus. Odysseus/Ulysses is of course a hugely significant character in both Homer's poem “The Odyssey” and the Iliad. Odysseus is of course one of “the guys” who you think of when considering Greek heroes and so it is very appropriate that we have our final Titan strain named after such a huge character.

Dreamwalker Titans represent our baseline for which we'll compare every single other titan; no other titan strain should be strictly weaker than these because then there no good reason to play them. It is fine for Argo-breed Titans to be more specialised, thereby weaker at some things but stronger at others, but for something to be weaker than your baseline Titans it would need to evolve into something really special over time or something. So let us take a look at their Titan sheet again.

We have five elements to consider with these titans; their Titan Power die, their Speed Value, their inherent ability/abilities, Trauma table and Kratos table. We have a single Red die which is added to any power rolls such as those against AT fields and a Speed Value of 5 which means that the titan can move up to 5 spaces orthogonally during battles.

The Rush ability is available when a Dreamwalker has 2+ Danger and in exchange for gaining a fate along with both their combat action and movement action in a turn then these titans can move with +1 speed value (6 squares) and then perform a Melee/Reach attack with Auto-break 1 if they reach the target Primordial within 3 or more spaces. This is a very useful ability due to it being synergistic with Reach weapons and giving a little more oomph against higher BP cards. It also rewards good positioning play because it has tight windows where it can be used, if you're not in the Goldilocks Zone then you won't be able to use this. Considering how important positional play is in ATO it is great design to have this basic ability in order to start player education as early as possible. Auto-break 1 is also a nice little reward because it needs that break token to pay off, so players get a second layer of education in how ATO wants players to “pay it forward” by setting up each others attacks.

The Trauma Table gives us our baseline Trauma Draws of:

1-3 Minor

4-6 Major

7-9 Grave

10+ Obol

This is an even 3/3/3 split between the three sets of Trauma cards and I think it's an absolutely perfect starting set that is easy to internalise. Because ATO can become a very complicated game at times, having such a straightforward baseline gets two thumbs up from me.

The Kratos Table is the most complicated bit of the Titan Sheet, but when compared to later Titans this is also as simple as it possibly can be. When I write about the Kratos tables, it is always going to be simplest to use an image of that table directly as there is a wealth of information squeezed into a space the size of a small game card.

This gives us a baseline of gaining break/opening tokens on 1, 3 and 6 Rage, a reroll on 2 and 4 plus an extra Red Power dice at 5+. That 5+ in particular is a real power boost as it can represent up to 2 extra breaks on an attack, it's also a bit earlier than some Argo-breed Titans who reach it at 6 Rage.

While Dreamwalker I Titans are ultimately our most disposable titans, and tend to suffer the brunt of losses, especially outside of battles where you can lose them through adventures, exploration cards or similar, they are not terrible at all and can carve out a useful space within a team for a fair amount of the Cycle. I've only tended to start running battles without Dreamwalkers in Cycle II and even then I still bring them in a times because the Argo-Breeds quite often work all as “headliners” and tend to need Dreamwalkers to function in set up roles, especially the dirty job of being the specific “set up titan” and all the punishment that can sometimes entail.

This means we now have our baseline for all other titans to compare against and honestly, they're not bad at all for starting units, there's interesting elements to their play and they do get upgrades during the later cycles to keep them interesting and viable.

Earthshaker Titan (Hekaton)

Our Hekaton/Centimane strain Titan is an absolute beast and for my money is one of the best titans in the entire roster of Base box (Cycles I to III) titans. While its power and speed are the same as the Dreamwalkers, it really carves out a unique slot for itself with its Six-Armed ability. This gives it either three hand slots for weapons or less interesting three slots for support gear. This means that the Earthshaker can wield the three handed weapons, which is very powerful, especially when you consider that one of the strongest weapons in the first two Cycles is a three-handed weapon. However, there are multiple Titans further down the line who can wield a three-handed weapon, so that in itself isn't a stand out ability. Instead the stand out element is that the Earthshaker can wield a two-handed weapon and another one-handed weapon or even three one handed weapons.

This unique position in the Titan roster means that the Earthshaker remains relevant and powerful because having a two-handed weapon and a shield is an incredible frontline. This Titan is an absolute beast in Cycle I and remains relevant all the way through to the end of Cycle III (I can't comment on Cycles IV and V yet), once I had this Titan it dominated the battlefield in Cycle I and remained a staple for all of my remaining battles. If I had an Earthshaker available, it was almost certainly going to get onto the battlefield. Also to dip into Cycle II a bit here, the Earthshaker is such a champ in battles there due to how the Combo ability wants you to field a variety of weapons. Here you can get two or three different types all on one unit.

Our second ability is one that I appreciated at certain points during battles; having a Titan that can set itself up with 1 opening and 1 break when there are none in the pool (something that can happen if you have an Argonaut with the Selfishness Fated Mnemos) is such a useful little clutch ability that really makes a difference.

While our Trauma Table is bog standard (to match the bog standard base power and speed values) the Kratos Table is markedly different.

The Earthshaker isn't great at setting up other titans, but very rapidly it outpaces the Dreamwalkers due to giving a Break plus Opening at 2 and 4 Rage. The really interesting elements though are at Rage 3 and 6 where we get the option to Provoke the Primordial (Gain Priority Target and turn the Primordial to face the Earthshaker) and that Diversion token which allows an attacking titan to ignore Fail responses until the end of their attack. It'll be a while until we see that token on other Titans and it's a really cool one to have because it's amazing for the set up or DPS titans.

Due to this Titan's power and versatility I think that one should push your Cycle I Tech Tree towards its unlock which is located in the Hekaton Autopsy technology. This is unlocked via the L3 Hekaton battle, so I'd recommend your first Cycle I L3 Battle is always against a Hekaton and you get all the prerequisite technologies set up before hand. There are some clean tech tree pdfs on BGG which can help, but if you want just the list of Combat Technologies that gets you there fastest it is:

Excursion Propylon

Trireme Armor

Trireme Weapons

Trireme Ranged Weapons

Arrow Barrage

Siren Armor

Advanced Trireme Weapons

Basic Support Equipment

Forced Kratos Reaction

Hekaton Sighting

Trireme Reach Weapons

Fate Sink

Specialised Trireme Weapons

It looks like a lot, but you start with some of these and also many of these Combat Technologies are staples anyway.

I think that the Earthshaker is the single best Titan in Cycle I and is in the running for one of the top 5 titans across the entire first three Cycles. It is versatile, powerful, durable and looks really cool. I do hope that we get another true multi-armed Titan in the future because this one is such a joy to use.

Mazerunner (Labyrinthauros)

Our Bull themed Titan is the swift and agile Mazerunner. This titan still shares the same power dice, but moves up to six speed which makes for easier Out of Reach (OOR) Evades. However only having a 1-2 for Minor Trauma means that using the Mazerunner as a primary tank is very difficult unless you are also able to take advantage of stacking Evasion. When you have a solid selection of evasion gear in combination with the Maze Awareness ability providing both temporary Evasion tokens on Major/Grave Trauma (3 to 8 danger) and an extra evasion when standing on terrain tiles there is a solid evasion tank build you can utilise against some opponents. However this titan is definitely frail, on top of reaching major trauma faster we start drawing Obols at 9+ instead of 10+ and that really does mean the Mazerunner falls behind if you're not able to be elusive.

The Improved Rush is interesting to see, it increases the speed value to 8 and gives +1 precision, which I do think is solid, but it also doesn't really fit well with the Mazerunner's strengths because this Titan isn't what you want for a set up or main DPS Titan.

I think ultimately that the Mazerunner is a little too restrained in its design and in particular struggles early on in Cycle I because Evasion is not common and it's key to making the Mazerunner click in a satisfying manner. In Cycle II battles I found myself using the Mazerunner less and less because there's so many better options, even when you're looking for an Evasion tank the Mazerunner isn't best in class. There's a few areas where she's great, especially if you have Cities she can defend in (due to Cities giving another +1 evasion) but most of the time other titans are going to be better choices. This means I end up using the Mazerunner as a specialist if the battlefield provides the option, and the rest of the time I'll keep her on the bench.

Before we do close out however I would like to point out that the main issues with the Mazerunner are the Trauma and Kratos tables, both of which can be replaced with strain cards. If you can do that, the Mazerunner improves a great deal because the main issues with this titan are those two poor tables. This isn't something one can easily do early on, but in later Cycles it becomes an option and that has helped keep the Mazerunner viable, though when one dies it takes a fair while to get a second one up to standard due to needing a replacement of both tables.

Logicbreaker Titan (Alpha Temenos)

This weirdo Titan goes BONK!

The Logicbreaker is usually gained quite late in Cycle I, though there is an adventure that offers an early gain and what we have is honestly a really unique Titan that's a lot of fun to play with. At the base profile we have a slight increase in power over the Dreamwalkers, same Speed Value, but power goes up with that bonus Auto-break I being quite an improvement. It almost turns the faces on the Red die from:

???

Potential

Power

Power + Potential

Power + Potential

Power + Power

To:

???

Power

Power

Power + Power

Power + Power

Power + Power

It is of course not exactly that because of other break tokens being in the pool etc etc, but as a shorthand it can help empathise the strength of gaining Auto-break 1 alongside a red power dice. This is part of why love having a DPS titan with + Auto-break 1, I need 1 less maximum break token in the pool and I can instead choose an extra opening token to try and secure as many hits as possible. I just wanted to write a bit about this here as it's the first time I'm covering an Auto-break bonus on the Titan's base power. It's good, but obviously not as good as an automatic +power or a dice upgrade.

Loggy's first ability is Theseus Logic, which for a Fate lets us ignore an obstacle or chasm as long as we do not end our move on it, but only during our voluntary Movement. This is decent because it gives us extra mobility in situations where we might be blocked, but it's not going to protect the Titan from going over the edge when a Primordial gives them a backhand.

The really interesting ability is the second one, Logicbreak, we have to survive Obol's for this, but if we do we get an extra Combat Action up to the maximum of three times per round. This is just one piece of the entire puzzle, so we'll come back to it later after we look at the other parts.

The Trauma table is also wonderfully weird, with 1 danger representing an Obol draw and the rest divided between 2-4/5-7/8-9/10+. I think it's so wonderfully fun and exciting to have a Titan who draws an Obol when they get to exactly 1 danger from an attack, especially when that is designed as something to leverage rather than just a disadvantage.

The Kratos Table also builds into the entire gimmick for the Logicbreaker. We've got multiple new abilities including Overbreak, Elation and Tireless. Overbreak allows for excess power (over the AT field number) to transform into break tokens, Elation allows the “conversion” of Despair or Ambrosia tokens on the Titan into Opening tokens and tireless allows the titan to ignore cumbersome.

If we put this all together what we get is, well, I wrote it at the start of this section. Logicbreaker go BONK! We want to put Second Chance gear (which will allow some limited avoidance of Death in an obol draw) in combination with big hitting cumbersome gear. You can do some rather fun, dumb things where you position the logicbreaker against the primordial in a giant slap fight.

This in combination with the ability to shed despair or ambrosia means that the Logicbreaker is a heck of a damage dealing workhorse and it can bring something to most battles, even if that thing is the equivalent of something like the Monty Python Fish Slapping Dance. It's a unique and awesome little Titan and while it's not perfect for every battle, there's a lot of places where it can excel in dealing damage in a fashion that few other titans can match. If you are fortunate enough to get one of these early via an adventure, slapping a Naval Ram on it and going

Gamechanger Titan (Hermesian Pursuer)

As mentioned in the opening section, this is more likely to be a Cycle II titan, however you can with experience kill the Hermesian Pursuer in Cycle I and for the purpose of splitting up the amount of writing I'll cover this one here even if it's more common to get it in Cycle II. Also, the Skyseer is crossover content and that means its supply is limited unless ITU give us a generic version of the same Titan in the future (which I hope they do).

The Gamechanger is a titan that wears its name on its (missing) sleeves. Even just the basic power dice is a whole step up from the other titans in this selection. We also get the capability to wield a three-handed weapon as a two hander, a built in 2 space reflex and the ability to generate an opening token upon survival of a Major/Grave/Obol. The negative here is each Crit miss generates and Adversary icon, bringing the Pursuer (Burden) closer and forcing earlier conflicts with it.

Our trauma table is absolutely fantastic, 1-4/5-8/9/10+ is a tough and durable spread that keeps the titan away from Grave traumas most of the time. Quite often the Gamechanger will go from Major to Obol without drawing any Graves if things are going rough. Sounds bad, but it's actually because more Majors are drawn.

The Kratos table is another excellent element of this Titan. Rank 1 is frankly incredible, giving us the first two rage levels of the Earthshaker rolled into one and at Rank 2 we get a Elation 1. Elation is an ability that lets you discard Despair or Ambrosia tokens and turn them into Opening Tokens. This is a super useful ability not just for fighting various Ambrosia based Primordials but there are also gear cards that place Ambrosia on your titan for various effects. With Elation X in the Kratos table the risk of being eliminated by exceeding the limit of those tokens is greatly reduced and often eliminated entirely.

This titan is a beast of a damage dealer and will function as your primary DPS for a good long while if you want it to. However, that written there's a bunch of other excellent options for DPS titans with the ability to wield three-handed weapons as two-handers later on in the campaign so the Gamechanger is not an essential piece of the titan arsenal. That's something I actually appreciate a great deal. As amazing as the Earthshaker Titan is for example, it's also one of those titans that's hard to exclude from battles and that does squeeze your options in a way this one doesn't. It turns up, smashes face with big bonk for a while and then retires gracefully when better options arrive.

Final Thoughts

There are some sweet titans in this selection, but the Earthshaker and Logicbreaker are my favourite two. I have a lot of fondness for the Mazerunner, but given that you want to replace both its Trauma and Kratos tables and there are also battles where it doesn't have suitable terrain to stand on; well it's absolutely the weakest Argobred titan in this selection and if I'm honest it is one of the weakest titans out there.

Also, even though I am not reviewing it here, it is worth noting that with an early Mnestis Theater one should put in the effort of unlocking the Skyseer (sadly the shop supplies are gon eexcept for a few in the Asia store. See here ). The Skyseer is always in the running for being one of the best titans in the game and I really want to see it reprinted in some fashion, but crossover licenses are complicated.

With all that written I'd love to read about your experiences with titans in Cycle I, what worked for you, when did you get the relevant titans, how many of you unlock the Skyseer ahead of the Gamechanger? Let me know below!