Bathysphere

Auras and pulses are the same height as the model that creates them, but extend downwards infinitely. With a lot of vertical terrain, this can be a big thing to keep in mind.

There are a few ways to play Tara. The two most common are Beast Bomb and Aggressive Bury. Death Marshals, Karina summons (Guild Autopsies especially), and Scion fit well in any of those. Killjoy and/or Bishop are staples of the Beast Bomb strat, as they're big beaters she can bury/unbury into the enemy's face. Aggressive Bury really likes Hannah, and Aionus on occasion. Additionally anything that really wants Fast is gold in Tara, like Taelor and Convict Gunslingers. Finally, Johan and Sue are faction staples, so you can never got wrong with either one. On a budget, I would get Sue at the very least. He's good in every single game, no matter the schemes or strats. Then I'd decide which idea you like more, throwing giant Fast beaters into your opponents turn one and tearing them apart, or burying your foes and grinding them down in a game of attrition. I'd get Killjoy for the former, and Hannah for the latter. Then, as you can, pick up a Death Marshal and Johan. Have fun Heralding Obliteration!

This is absolutely my most badass Malifaux story. To set the scene: Bottom of Turn 2 vs Sonia. Guard the Stash. Eliminate the Leadership and Undercover Entourage in the pool. Red Joker and 12 in hand, deck almost empty. Vik of Blood, equipped with Mark and Oathkeeper, gets placed into position by Ashes, fully buffed by Sisters in Battle and Sisters in Furry. Accomplice activation, pops Oathkeeper, walks, and charges Frank, who is sitting next to Sonia, a Stalker, and a Witchling Thrall. Flip a high mask on the attack lets me whirlwind into all four enemies. Moderate on Frank drops him to half. Spin to win, killing the Stalker and setting everyone on fire. Cheat the RJ on damage vs Sonnia, she gets a lucky stone and lives with 4 wounds left. Score 1 on Eliminate. Move on to the Thrall, but my deck is empty, so I reshuffle. Blood lands the hit on the Thrall, flips Black Joker on damage. I start worrying if I can kill it. Second hit on Frank I cheat in my 12 to match the 13 he flipped. After damaging and a stone Frank has 1 wound left. Sonia catches the business end of the Paired Masamune and, and she can't cheat high enough. My to damage nets me a severe and the remaining 2 points from Eliminate. My final attack of the activation is vs the almost full health Thrall. We match totals again, leaving me at a to damage thanks to Impossible to Wound. First card - weak. Second - weak again. He starts marking down his 5 damage. Third card - RED JOKER! A whopping 11 damage puts the poor guys out of his misery. The turn ends, Frank dies from the burning +1 thanks to the Stalker, and Viktoria of Blood of left in a circle of corpses. My opponent promptly concedes, revealing that Frank was his Entourage target, and we start another game that I promptly lose 1-9.

I rarely have too much of a problem with it. Hannah is a fairly common take for me, and Sue is a staple of my model pool, so they both help, but generally I just don't rely on using abilities with TNs like that too much. I try to make sure that one use of one ability won't make or break a game, so if I whiff a Twist and Turn I'm usually still okay. That being said I'm often fine with cheating high cards to torment things turn 1, since it's such an important piece of the Jack Daw puzzle. I also rarely, if ever, target my opponents models with those abilities, so all I need is a 7 most of the time. Not the easiest thing in the world, but not terribly hard either. Finally, I try to judge when exactly I need to cheat and how little I can get away with cheating. I often let non-lethal hits go through that I *could* cheat to avoid so that I have that high card for killing something or saving a model from actually dying. The Nurse, and the Librarian to a lesser extent, are key to this because I can heal a model back up after a couple of hits. Johan once stared down Perdita in melee for three turns because I was able to heal him up from HtK repeatedly.

Right you are! I'm not sure how I missed that one...

I usually take Writhing Torment, Twist and Turn, and all three curses. The shenanigan bubble that Jack provides is simply too good to not utilize, especially since it's big enough to cover a large swath of the table. I like The Bigger They Are on other beatstick models over Jack, simply because I tend to use him as a support piece more than a beater. I'd rather use 3 AP to hand out curses, copy Tormented abilities, and position for maximum pain than pretend I'm playing a tankier Vik. Beater Daw is great, I just value his other abilities more. I usually take a mix of Tormented and other models, depending on the game. A Nurse and a Guilty are really my only auto-takes with Jack, but Jaakuna, A&D, Johan, the Malifaux Child, Lady Legia, and the Hanged all regularly see play. Giving out the Nurse's Meds 3-4 times a turn can be absolutely devastating, especially when the (0) off Twist and Turn can make her heal Jack to full at the end of his activation and thereby avoid the drawback of paralysis.

Notably, Pariah of Bone Levi can take Effigies out of faction, since they're all constructs. I've seen the Arcane Effigy used to great effect in Levi.

Things that ignore Armor or Hard to wound are really the only way to consistently remove A&D from the board for good. Dust Storm only has 4 wounds and no armor, but a good player won't let him sit on the board once A&D splits. Packing things that bypass armor is generally good when playing into outcasts, since we have a number of "value" models that pack it (Freikorps, primarily). Your other option is to hit the core 6 times. It can't stone and it's Def 1, so you can throw AP at it until it crumples. You'll have to consider it it's worth doing, since it would likely be 3 models pouring their whole activation into the task, but depending on the board state it could be the right choice. Your third option is playing around not killing it. A&D can't bypass armor or HtK, nor can it easily push out of engagement. Throwing 2 minions with either ability in its face can lock it up for a couple turns, which is often enough. And if your opponent doesn't take A&D those resilient minions probably won't go to waste.

Yeah that's what I was thinking. I generally play Bone Levi, so I don't have any of the Iron pieces to try it out. I suppose I could proxy a game or two for the sake of SCIENCE! Levi with Pariah, Desolate, and Scout would also enable the turn 1 Alpha Strike I'm generally fond of. It usually relies on a Doxie usually to move Levi up out of activation, keeping him in range to (0) into base contact with A&D and have 3-4AP of hurt to put out for a total of 28" threat range.

My recommendation is to go very slowly and dry-fit EVERYTHING. The arms are a bitch, but closely examining them first was what got them together for me. I hate all ropes and cables in this game, so I just removed them on mine and will be putting on actual string once I finally get around to painting the damn thing. Hope this helps!

The point of the warrior is to re-attach Oathkeeper twice by cycling Pariah of Iron and whatever else you have, giving Levi 3 turns of Fast. He could also let you be a bit more aggressive with the Mech Rider turn 2 by applying his protection. He could also cycle something like Scout the Field for Oathkeeper or Return Fire to speed up low WK models turn 1. Like I said I haven't tried it, but it seems worth a shot.

How do you feel errata and wave 4 have effected your consideration of Bone vs Iron Levi? I feel like Iron has spiked in usefulness thanks to the fact that we can get away with not using our bury (0) every turn. Eating a Mech Rider summon for 2 cards at the beginning of an activation feels like it would be huge. But what really attracts me is the Terracotta Warrior flipping whatever upgrades we take into Oathkeeper, since 2-3 activations with 5 AP (counting Channel as an effective +1 AP) is almost back to the effective 6AP/activation we used to have. Has anyone tried this? I own neither the Rider nor the Warrior, or I would try it myself...

My standard is Hannah (Survivalist, I Pay Better) Johan (Oathkeeper) Convict Gunslinger Void Wretch The list has solid damage and durability, with the ability to hand out slow with the Gunslinger triggers and Void Wretch. I Pay Better and 3 mercs amplifies the amount of AP you have, and since Hannah has Arcane Reservoir you have plenty of cards to discard. Johan's Condition removal is extremely relevant when a lot of crews like using Slow and Defensive, and Hannah can copy it.

I've always found that spamming any model, unless you're summoning them ala Hamelin and Ramos, is bad. You can't cover all your bases in a game with one card worth of abilities, no matter how many you have. Void wretches in particular are interesting for sure, but they're melee only, not all that tough, and don't hit very hard. Sure, you can pump their def up, but even at Def 7 it only takes 2 hits from a 3/X/X damage track to drop them even after incorporeal. They make good scheme runners and have great synergy with Tara, but I can't think of a reason I'd ever hire more than 2. Taking a crew full of low-cost models can work depending on schemes, strats, and masters, but 6-8 of the same model won't get you as far as diversifying will.

I've founds that it can be easy to block if the taker isn't careful. But other than that it's fairly easy to find models that can do it on their own, i.e. Necropunks, Hodgepodge Emissary, any showgirl with Colette, etc. As a Hamelin player, my opponents rarely get to score it