Fully Grounded #7: Sinkhole (Patreon)

This is part of the terrain series, other entries can be found at the contents page here.  Terrain from Emporium Miniatures. 

Link: https://www.etsy.com/shop/EmporiumMiniatures 

• Number: 1 
• Size: 3x3
• Passive: Yes
• Activate: Only during Lion God showdowns
• Obstacle: No
• Classification: Hazard/resource

This absolutely terrifying piece of terrain comes with the Lion God expansion, and it is one of a select few hazards that require constant vigilance and careful positioning. Just one small misstep and a survivor could find themselves being knocked back, grabbed or collided into the sinkhole and suffering an automatic death.

To put it simply, any time you end your turn 5 spaces in a direct line from the sinkhole, you are taking a large risk. To highlight this, here is a picture of the peak "danger zone" that surrounds the Sinkhole.

Now, it's important to note that the threat zone isn't always like this, factors like higher knockbacks (some monsters knockback 7 or more), grab (which is a variable distance depending on the monster's stats) and things like Materialize or other forms of collision can vary things a great deal. But these squares highlighted above are the spots where you can be yeeted into the sinkhole via knockback 5 - which is the most common form of displacement. 

Therefore, the safest way to play is to be very cautious and avoid being on any square that is orthogonal to the Sinkhole at all times. This will remove most of the situations where you are at a risk of being punted into the abyss. That looks like this.

As a consequence, the best way to handle the Sinkhole is to place it as far up and into one corner as possible (remembering that it needs to be adjacent to monster); and then you lure the monster over to the opposite corner.

Also; do not forget that you can 'screen' the Sinkhole with obstacle terrain, providing a safe barrier that will stop survivors being punted or yeeted into the darkness. Terrain such as the Stone Columns, Toppled Pillar and Nightmare Tree are examples of this, but anything which has the Obstacle ability works, especially ones which are not destructable.

When fighting the Lion God, you have less control over where it is going to appear, this is because the Sinkhole doesn't start the showdown on the board. Instead it is spawned when the Lion God 'hefts' or destroys a piece of terrain. So you will have to figure out how to position once it arrives, then raid the Sinkhole as quickly as possible alongside dealing with the other challenges that the Lion God presents.

You can read about the Lion God in the following links:

• A Post Mortem of the Lion God 
• The Educated Hunter: Lion God Showdown 
• The Lion God III: The Carrot