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DISCLAIMER: Transmortis received a hefty nerf in M3E GG2 und many more specific gameplays do not work anymore, so this guide got trimmed down/changed accordingly. Welcome everybody to your first Introduction Lecture here at Transmortis University! Sadly, Prof. von Schtook won't be able to hold this lecture, but do not fret! This course was expertly designed to follow his teaching. Those that excel here, might even get the chance for some individual tutoring with him personally! Work hard and you can become a distinguished Student of Transmortis University as well! For now, lets start with a general overview of the crews models and some common versatile and only he most important OOK picks, so you have a general idea what you've got to work with. I expect you have done your mandatory reading, studied the crew's cards and gained a basic understanding of their rules. Transmortis General Transmortis Crew Generally speaking, Transmortis is a mid-range crew of diverse abilities, falling in the "jack of all trades" category. They are tough for a Resser crew, but much softer than specialists like Hoffman. They have reasonable mobility, but can't jump around the board without serious investment. They have a good damage track, but rely on high flips and min. 3 attacks aren't common. Piloting the crew means picking when and where you apply their (de)buffs to make the most impact. They largely rely on triggers for that, so you should watch out for any "Stunned" conditions from your opponent. They also have access to a lot of specific counter-picks. This makes list-building even more important than usual: If you know what your opponent is weak to, you can tool your list to exploit this. Studied Opponent The common ability all Transmortis models have and their main source for card draw. It can be a bit swingy, as it's somewhat luck based, don't expect to get a bunch of cards out of it. In my experience, you get about 1-2 card on the low end, and 3-4 cards on the high end per turn. Never forget you can draw one card per *activation*, this mean friendly as well as enemy activations, so duels instigated by your opponent count as well! Remember your opponent to anounce all their suits each and every time! You can slightly modify your "luck". Look out for build-in suits. Also, you cheat in low cards, if a duel is lost anyway, to at least cycle one card. Model Overview Prof. von Schtook roles: support, blast damage What is his most important aspect? Not any singular action he can take, all of them have their place. Imho it is: you have base 3 action per turn. This is the limit within you have to make him work. More often than not, you have to decide which kind of support Schtook should provide his crew, though the lines might blur sometimes. Offensive mode: Select a single priority target to get rid of. This means, even if you do not get moderate/severe and therefore no blast effects, Schtook will apply Injured to his target. If you want to spread Injured (e.g. for AOE from Assisstent or Anna), you likely will need to cheat some cards in. Look at the boardstate and what hand cards you can spare. Usually it's better to save up and kill one target, than failing to remove two targets. If your target makes use of high counts of shielded, focused, etc.: Use Administrative Review first, with the True Disappointment trigger, strip their buffs away and soften them up at the same time. Try to push, not move, him into position beforehand. You cannot reliably count on coming through with 2-3 blast attacks, so you need every action you can get. Focus on the same models to actually get rid of something. Low flips on your side or high flips from your opponent can really mess with you here, so there should be a model in position to clean up afterwards. Support mode: So Schtook shall support? First action usually goes to Academic Broadcast, pick either AOE Focus or free pushes as necessary. For buff support and dealing with conditions on your crew, Administrative Review comes next with Positive Results trigger, e.g. for a Viscera. Do not forget to drop schemes beforehand, usually with Necropunks and/or Undergrads. Academic Superiority/ Disarming: Do not rely on those for your safety. Superiority can soften some blows, but since Schtook prefers not to be closer than mid-range, it's usually a bad sign if his aura comes into play. Disarming protects reasonably well against basic minions (often ranged ones), but when opponents really go for his throat, it's usually with masters/henchman/enforcers who have enough different triggers or can stone for them. Peer Review: It requires either a lucky draw or a 9+ and a stone. Consider if you can actually spend these resources and if you do, how to make use of something, that might give you a summon or it might not. It requires a lot of hoops to jump through, so the only safe result you'll get is the pressure on your opponent that you *could* get a summon. That's what you're planning for, not an actually successful summon. If you're summoning, it's very likely Schtook won't be within 6”, so expect to take the 2 damage on your new model. You can remove slow and maybe replace it with fast thanks to Administrative Review. But, to kill the juiciest targets, you often need to activate Schtook first, to apply buffs on your beater and/or Injured. That's very dependent on the situation, so look out for what's the best move at the moment. My recommendation would be: a slow summon is still better than a failed kill/summon attempt. Upgrades The Whisper: It's my most played Upgrade for him and usually saves me 2+ stones during the game and card draw is always good. While I have played without this upgrade, I regard it as a high priority pick. Checking and sorting cards back, also gives you a small trick: If you don't need to apply a Lecture Upgrade or use Grade Assignment, you can use your bonus action to get rid of a low card. Killer Instinct: Similar reason to GST not to take this Upgrade. Schtook wants to stay further away than 2", so Loot their corpses doesn't do anything most of the time. But Ruthless could be helpful against crews who rely on Terrifying for their defense, only then it can be a serious consideration for him. Grave Spirit's Touch: Meh. Blasphemous Ritual is unnecessary on him. Regen +2 is a nice ability, but Schtook prefers to hang a bit back and stay out of the worst trouble, so you won't have much need for it. Better save those stones for during the game. Prof. von Schtook, Stargazer roles: support, disruption (under construction) Research Assisstent roles: blast damage, support That's a strong totem, a true glass cannon. His Mv buff is passive and therefore doesn't need actions, this ability alone can be worth double moving him into position, if necessary. He is the reason why Transmortis tends to bubble up during deployment, even if they fan out turn #1. It gets scary, especially for a 2 cost model, when you manage to move him into position without activating him. Double Alchemical Vial for up to 5 damage (including poison) on a shockwave is really good. His balancing factor is his low health stat. So what I try to do is pushing him into close proximity, but with blocking terrain between him and potential threats. Schtook goes before him and spends 1 activation to broadcast, so the Assisstent moves 2" to draw LOS and needs to weather only a single activation (make sure he can't be easily enganged), before he activates himself. You can use his bonus action before shocking away, but never rely on it. It doesn't help the Assistent's own AOE, has a low stat and the difference between 6" and 8" distance to the enemy is significant. Stargazer Under Stargazer, the Assisstent is mostly his usual self, but not quite. You lose access to AOE 2" push to apply a double Alchemical Vial. Stargazers single target is much better with 3"/single move and additional Shielded 2, but most of the time it's too valuable and the Assisstent not a priority. Unless you get a real juicy pack of targets for the vial, the Assistent tends to hang back a little bit more. But keep an eye out for any 6+ tomes in your hand! Placing a scheme marker 8" away, without spending a master action for Light of Illios, to set up Shade of Delios, can be worth cheating in a card! Valedictorian roles: threat, (semi) beater It's important to realize Valedictorian is your usual high damage beater. Decent for her cost, the moderate dmg is fine, the severe even good, but the 2 dmg on weak can make you a bit sad. Her beater role she fulfills not with a great damage track but by generating attacks, e.g. Flurry. A drawback of this: it eats a lot into your resources, both stones and handcards. Also, as soon as she comes up against e.g. armour this approach falls flat quickly. This is why you need to know the opponent's crew before the game, so you pick the correct counters, like the Student of Steel against armour. Within the crew she belongs to the tougher models but for a high priority target she's firmly in the "killable" range. What makes her strong are her mobility tricks. She is a scalpel and works very well when you pick targets she can deal with quickly (roaming schemers, many flankers) or which you softened up beforehand with blasts and made the better parts of her damage tracks more likely. She is a hefty investment though, if she dies turn #1 or #2 and hasn't done something game changing, you've wasted her potential. If she made it to turn #3-4, in my experience, you're usually on the right track. So, how do you do that? That's why I picked "threat" as her primary role. Even if you don't mindlessly slingshot her behind enemy lines, she still *can* rocket across the board. She still *can* kill important models (given you have a hand and enough stones left). She still *can* transmortify models to your side. So your opponents have to keep playing around that fact. If they don't, go ahead and pick off those cocky schemers who moved to far away from the rest of their crew. If not, your opponent moves with constraints and probably can't move into perfect position and often they will turtle up, to deter you from going in. That's the moment when you wip out your previously mentioned blasting abilities to punish them for it. If you're sure before the game this will happen, you can include a Student of Sinew and allow your Valedictorian to go into bubbles even with all their retaliation potential. Read more about that in the tactics section. Valedictory is an odd one. Up-cycling of cards is good, but for me it often conflicts with turning corpses into scheme marker. But if you don't need that where the battle is located, go for it, it's a bonus action. If nothing else, it's more corpse/scrap hate, if your opponent utilizes those markers. It can be cornercase useful though, if you need to recycle low TN suits, e.g. for an additional Necropunk Leap or an Assistent's Not a Bomb? trigger. Upgrades After the errata I tend to skip upgrades. If you want to use her as an alpha-striker, you already need to invest into Sloth. Both together is too much investment for my taste. If I plan to use her more conservatively, I add an upgrade only if I need to counter-tech. Killer Instinct: Tech piece to gain access to Ruthless. Wouldn't take it in any other case, as she will often move out of Loot their Corpses distance. Whisper: Valid choice and the more offensive alternative to GST. Might be an option if you include multiple versatiles to generate a bit more card draw, but otherwise not necessary. GST: This formerly was her basic loud-out, but isn't necessary anymore. It was taken for the regen, but since you combine her with Sloth now, when you plan to dive her into enemy lines, he already provides healing. Stargazer Under Stargazer she gets some of her previous capability back to strike hard, but either be able to do it at huge threat ranges or move back to safety and all of that can be done even easier than with a Student of Sinew. Thanks to the 3" place you can get her out of engagement range and then let her move to a safe spot. Anna Lovelace roles: support, special Oh Anna, you big toolbox! I sometimes was reluctant to include her in my lists during GG0-1, since I preferred Valedictorian for my "expensive Henchman" slot and still wanted to use a good portion for minions. While she also was hit by the nerf and cannot gain fast from Schtook anymore (and Sloth can't give it as well!), she still appears more often on the table now. One thing has not changed: Include her instantly, as soon as you see summoning or prevalent flight/teleports on the other side of the table. Gravity Well is so unique, she gets included even in other crews. Hostile Work Environment can work against nearly every crew, it's rare in Malifaux not have some kind of targeted buff. The more they come to you, the better of course. As a 10 health Henchman with Armor +1 and solid Df/Wp she may not be a tank, but she still can take a hit here or there. This is necessary, because the 6” range on her auras, which goes a long way to make her cost worth it, requires her to move far enough forward but likely will put her in harms way. Accept that you'll lose her sooner or later. Her own target priority conflicts with the Valedictorian. Since the zombie bird play less aggressive now, they can be used in tandem to increase their footprint and to perform a one-two punch against very tough targets. Her offensive capabilities can be tricky. The melee is fine, as long as she's able to trigger, she's a rare Transmortis model with effectivly min. 3 melee damage. Glimpse the Void can be game winning in the right circumstances and it always helps against pesky tanks, who just won't die. Send them away from the board for a bit and mess up their positioning. Also nice against models, who got slingshoted into your lines, with this you can make all the activations go to waste. Definitly worth stoning/cheating for. Her gun poses a few questions for you though. While it's great to kill anything with less than 5 cost, as those do not matter for your summoning, you might fail your summoning run with Vale, do you now finish the target off and only get a Zombie instead of a full fledged Transmortis model? While this situation is to be avoided, it will happen. I cannot give a general answer to this, it's to dependent on the specific game. Instead, look at the board: Can you kill-summon next turn without losing models? Can the target get away somehow? Can the target accomplish VP (or other goals) while still alive? Consider these aspects and decide for yourself, just don't get greedy. If you don't know *exactly* how to gain a better summon, a dead enemy model plus Zombie is still better than nothing. In theory Spirit Barage is intended to fuel Remote Detonator, but in practice it's unreliable. For that Anna needs a constant source of expendable models, with the Emissary as the prime choice. Asura also works, but I think the Emissary is usually the better pick. Toshiro would be possible as well, but Ashigaru are to good and expensive to detonate them regularly. Those models need to bring a bit more to the table, as all of them have high costs. If you can't find another reason to play them, other than cannon fodder creation, maybe skip on regular Remote Detonator AOEs. Upgrades Generally speaking, Anna doesn't need upgrades but can get them, if the situation calls for it. GST makes her a bit more resistant, if you need her to stay around as long as possible - e.g. vs summoners or Obey masters. As usual, Killer Instinkt can be useful against Terrifying crews, to bring her effectively min. 3 melee attack to bear. Stargazer The main reasons to take her (Gravity Well, Hostile Work Environment, min 3 attack) stay the same as with Schtook Original. Stargazer has the benefit that he can give her an additional (General) action per turn. If you get some Zombies out of Protect Me depends very much on your opponent, but all in all it's still more likely to use her Remote Detonator with Stargazer than with Schtook Original. Backup Assistent roles: support tldr: Not worth its SS cost. (under construction) Upgrades None. Stargazer No need to pick him here either. Undergraduates roles: support, allround Undergrads are your average, resonably priced minions. Their most game-defining ability is to push your other models up the board with Lead the way. When we come to the tactics section, you will see how to apply it. Other than this movement support, they have decent stats with a solid damage track for their cost. Study won't happen every round/game, but it can be very valuable for your schemes and anything with the potential to score would be missed. If nothing else, it's always valuable corpse/scrap hate in Ressers mirror or specific Arcanists. Patronize is easy to forget and can slow down games, so I usually just ask what suit an enemy models doesn't have and pick it. If they can make use of all or I'm playing with clocks, I usually just skip it. Of course, if you're familiar with the enemy crew, you can make more informed picks. Lead the way is worth including at least one Undergraduate in each list, at least Schtook and the Assistent will benefit. Wedge is the one deployment where this isn't necessarily true, since you're already very close to your opponent, though you still can use Undergrads for lateral movement and to avoid/set up charges, if that fits your gameplan. A second Undergrad is a reasonable investment, if you want to conquer boardspace asap, but most of the time not necessary. The third one only comes into the game, if it's the best summoning option. Previously, Made to Kill was one of their most important abilities. That's not the case anymore, because they hardly ever get placed. Their native placement effect requires both enemies and friendlies close-by, but most importantly it costs a mask. Not many models need them, but those who do, require them desperatly - low masks for Necropunks, high masks for Valedictorian. Unless you include Dead Rider (Ride with me) you won't be able to use Made to Kill in a reliable fashion. Upgrades Not necessary to put any on them. While they are the model most likely to have actions to spare for GST's focus pulse, I think the benefits of all upgrades are better suited elsewhere. Stargazer With Stargazer, their Made to Kill becomes relevant again! They might not be the prime choice to be targeted by Study of Anatomy, but I often find Undergrads to survive into the late-game, when other, stronger targets already have gone the way of the Dodo and they become legit targets for Study. You also don't always need to deal damage, pushing opponents 4" away often is a great way to deny late-game VPs. Necropunks roles: scheming They are a cheap and resilient with an expensive leap, the TN is low but it needs a mask. Solid scheme runners, they're good targets for fast/ focus/ etc., if it helps earning VP. The amount of effective leaps is limited, as you either don't have a mask available or you need to overpay significantly. A single Necropunk, generally speaking, is still a solid inclusion into your list. Using the GST on them became even more important now, as you need to make their survival more likely with only one in your list. Your opponents still have to play around their movement potential, as long as you have hand cards left. If they have nothing better to do, they are a cheap option to get schemes on the board, even if you only use them to give out fast with Schtook. They are the lowest cost Transmortis minion model, so they often are the only choice for summoning available. Upgrades GST for Terrifying or none. Stargazer If you need scoring, Necropunks get a good portion of their old glory back with Stargazer. When you can spend the mask, they even get a bit crazy and can zoom up to 21" across the board or double, possibly even triple, scheme. Student of Steel roles: support, anti-armor tech Pretty straight forward: If you expect armor, take a Student of Steel. Personally, I think one usually should be enough to include directly into your list, since Transmortis is good with picking their fights. But if you get the chance to summon, a second one wouldn't hurt. Be aware, they only have Mv4 and therefore need help to get up the board with the rest of the crew. They have one of the few light heals in the crew but only for constructs, therefore limited to your undead models (and Anna). On the one hand, the Steel moves with the bulk of your crew, on the other it's far less mobile and the range limited. I wouldn't count on it to much, but apply whenever possible, as a bonus action it doesn't take away from what you're doing otherwise. Upgrades None. Stargazer With Stargazer, all his mobility drawbacks can be solved, even without utilizing an Undergrad. Their roles as armour-hate doesn't change, though. Take one, if you're up against armour, otherwise you can still skip them. It's neat though to get access to a bonus action heal for anybody, as long as you have a scheme marker nearby. Student of Sinew roles: support Sinew can extend your threat range with their Command Corpse action, but in my opinion it is better utilized as a life insurance for your expensive models. Read more in the tactics section. Later it can be used for whatever purpose, may it be generating additional attacks (which can have further benefits other than damage) or scheming. Therefore the Sinew functions like an additional action for any undead model. Their Dissector attack is insofar of note, as the Sinew is the only crew model able to make reliable use of Transmortis typical 2/4/5 damage track, if cheated. Keeping the Peace might feel a bit lackluster, but it's also relevant to remember: If it works, you won't see much of it, unless your opponent explicitly complains about getting fever attacks on your model. With the changes to the crew, they tend to stay closer together, so it's more likely now you gain something from it. As far as I read about Sinews they're not very well liked. They are a bit expensive, but that's not uncommon with allrounder models. Their biggest issue is their reliance on high cards you propably need elsewhere. Check your crew for TN requirements, if you think about playing Yo-Yo with them. Upgrades None. Stargazer With Stargazer I feel like the Sinew doesn't offer enough, which the crew still needs. A 3" place and General Action should be more than enough to get any model out of harms way or set up any alpha strike. You could combine Command Corpse and Study of Anatomy, but imho that's overkill and not worth the Sinew's points. Student of Viscera roles: threat, scheming Visceras combine the reasonable tough body and Transmortis damage track with speed and all-terrain mobility, making them the crew's premium flankers. In my opinion the best minion model and the only non-support one that's a regular pick. They work a bit like a poor man's Valedictorian, making them a legit choice in most situations. Similar to the zombie bird, their price tag is an issue though and you need to make sure they survive for a couple of rounds to make it worthwhile. Depending on the table, they might need some help to get around terrain they can not move over, but in this crew that's no big issue. Deadly Pursuit from the Killer Instinct upgrade looks nice to have there as well, but it increases the target on their head even more. Unless it helps scoring, I prefer to invest those SS into more bodies. Upgrades None necessary, but they can be utilized. GST for Terrifying and making them a pain to deal with for your opponent, Killer Instinct for Ruthless and even more mobility. Stargazer Visceras were good before Stargazer, with him they are even better. I feel like the mobility benefits are a bit overkill for them, tempting the player to overcommit them, Shielded is very handy for them though. I find Stargazer's Studies to be of more value elsewhere most of the time, but if you know what you're doing, they can pull some crazy stunts. Bone Pile roles: support Another versatile model that finds a place in many crews, if the circumstances are good. They offer a light heal for any friendly model, have a Ruthless gun and offer condition removal, while being immune themselves. Especially Stunned is bothersome for Transmortis, since they heavily rely on their triggers and Staggered, since they utilize their mobility to pick their fights. While Schtook already has strong condition-hate, using a Minion's actions has a much lower opportunity cost. Overall they are as flexible as the Transmortis crew and a good pick for them. When playing Corrupted Ley Lines, they even become a near mandatory pick for me. If you have the points, you can add a GST to the pile and don't worry anymore about their self-inflicted damage. Carrion Emissary roles: support The Emissary is often mentioned when people talk about maximizing threat ranges. Its Mv buff is passive and combines well with the Assisstent and Undergraduates, but investing into mobility alone isn't enough, you also need to capitalize on your positioning. Luckily there is more! While the Emissary doesn't need much input from your crew, it is in line with Transmortis' concept of mutual cooperation. Obvious is the synergy with Anna. Transmortis itself cannot afford to sacrifice its normal picks for Remote Detonator, but Zombies are ideal for that. They also work as corpse markers to create an emergency scheme marker. As always, you even don't have to summon the Zombie and instead use the two coffins as roadblocks, to deny LOS to your smaller models and make charges difficult. The Injured condition on its gun meshes well with Transmortis and brings a min. 3 attack into the crew, which doesn't rely on its triggers. All in all one of Ressers favourite versatile picks for a reason. A very solid, especially when combined with Anna, even though it gets a bit expensive. Carrion Effigy roles: support It happens only rarely, but if you have few points left to spend, but already covered your scheming, the Effigy is a cheap significant model with a small heal. Only for undead though. I include it when I don't know what else to do with my points, but with one exception: against masters, who want to get into your face quickly (Lady J e.g.), the Effigy's aura is a cheaper deterrent than the Emissary's equivalent. Dead Rider role: beater All around great beater model and your best pick if you need a min. 3 beater in your crew. It gives you another option to move your crew without spending actions and Revel in Death combines really well with Schtook's/Assisstent's blasting, though it tends to be more flashy than effective. The real money lies with his Scythe attack. Ride with me is an evergreen ability as in any crew and can substitute for an Undergraduate. The Rider's mobility also means you have another model that can keep up without Undergrad support. When using the Dead Rider, Sloth is (similar to Transmortis own expensive models) a pick to consider, as only he can give the Rider fast. All in all, the Dead Rider not only is his usual good self-sufficient model, but also synergizes well with what the crew wants to do anyway – if you can afford his cost. Stargazer The Rider doesn't get Schtook's Injured support under Stargazer, but Study of Anatomy is easily worth it. He's even stronger and more flexible with the title master! Gravedigger role: support Not much to say here, they do what they always do. Transmortis needs corpses only when they want to create more scheme markers and Study/ Grade Assignment makes Field of Corpses a bit redundant, same with Academic Broadcast and Blasphemous Ritual. This model isn't bad, but simply not as needed as in other crews. It can be an option if you pick marker-heavy schemes and a more interesting pick if you include corpse-dependent OOK models, like e.g. Toshiro. Check for the mobility and scheming potential Killer Instinct can give the Digger in your scheme pool. Stargazer (under construction) Sloth While he has been good before, with GG2's changes, Sloth became the most important versatile pick for Transmortis. He is the only option to give fast to your non-minions. Sadly, this doesn't include Anna, but Valedictorian, Dead Rider, etc. all are happy to have him at their side. Sadly, his heal is best only on minions, because Administrative Review as condition removal doesn't help non-minions much, but survival of your expensive models can still be worth it. Stargazer Sadly, Sloth doesn't benefit from Shade of Delios, but that doesn't mean he's bad! Fixing the slow conditions from Sloth's heal is better with Stargazer. Different to Administrative Review, you can reap all possible effect from Study of Anatomy on any of your models and not be limited to Minions for anything but the condition removal. Manos Your Demise hate on a stick. Superior to Datsu Bae, Manos is much more crew independant and can bequeath the main reason to take him should he die. He's mobile, with a solid gun and melee attack and also can avoid burdening your SS pool. Not much discussion here, he is a very good model, take him when you need his tech. Nurse Nurses are good tech pieces for the whole faction. I assume this as being obvious, even when they don't get included in every list. Most of the time I prefer Bones Piles for their flexibility. If I need condition removal and nothing else, then Nurses are my go-to though. Bedside Manner is also as strong as always. Stargazer Since Stargazer likes to play a bit more forward than Schtook Original, the Nurse is a higher contender when compared to Bone Piles. While you skip some scheming potential, the title should be able to handle most schemes anyway and Bedside Manner is way too good as a defensive emergency measure to skip it, if you already consider an additional source of healing/condition removal. Toshiro Excluding Valedictorian, Transmortis can depend largely on minions for their battle prowess. If you need killing power, Toshiro can dial up the effectiveness of Undergraduates and Students a lot. He generates Focused, additional attacks and has a light heal, with the potential for Shielded - buffs well aligned with Transmortis. He can be a bit card hungry though, so take care not to include too many other high TNs in your list. Battle Strategy, Tactic & Combos Common turn #1 actions Transmortis tends to bubble up during deployment, so as many models as possible can benefit from Academic Broadcast. Schtooks first activation is essential and follows this pattern: Academic Broadcast Peer Review, on Valedictorian, Anna or Viscera - if you have the card to spare Administrative Review on a minion (beware you need a scheme marker) free to use, either movement or another Review Because Schtook needs as many models within 6” for the Broadcast, he activates early in this turn. It's of note that you don't necessary want to activate Schtook before Valedictorian, because quite often it's not a good idea to slingshot her into enemy lines turn #1 (assuming you also have Sloth). In this case, it's better to activate her first, so Fast will carry over into turn #2. Push It Early-game is all about getting into position and a good portion of Transmortis models either need a speed bump or prefer not to spend their actions on walking in general. This is where Undergraduates come into play. During deployment you position two models close to each other, so an Undergraduate is less than 2” of both. When you activate the Undergraduate, use Lead The Way to push your first model forward and follow as far as you can, to still be within 2” of the second model. With another Lead The Way you let it follow by push. You can repeat the process with a second Undergrad, if you have a Dead Rider or something similar to get it into range, but usually the investment isn't really worth it. I prefer to push two other models forward with a second Undergrad and keep pushing turn #2 as well, if you need the extra movement. Valedictorian Alpha Strike & retrieval Using the Assistant and Emissary or the Push It combo, Valedictorian has a HUGE threat range. If maxed out, you could reach the opponents table edge, if you wanted. Not that this would be useful, I mention this to prove a point: you can get anywhere, if you invest the resources. Usually a threat of a bit over 20” is more than enough. Do not forget: Transmortis is not so resistent to be able to weather a whole crew pounding on them and you don't want to pay a bunch of SS and sacrifice multiple of your own models, just to get one of theirs. If there is no somewhat safe landing spot, better refrain from using this alpha strike or at least better make sure the target is worth the sacrifice, because most models aren't. After you've buffed your beaters (mostly Sloth's task) and made sure you're within +Mv buff range, you double move + charge + charge attack + flurry attack your target. As long as your opponent doesn't make the mistake to give you a lone model somewhere, but instead covers his crew's models with each other, you have to think about how not to lose Valedictorian too fast. At least during turn #1 it's often easy enough not to rush forward into certain doom, but there are corner cases and you also can't avoid engagement the whole game. So, what do you do to still capitalize on her offensive potential but return her back into safer locations? First, on your last attack, you spend a stone/card to ensure her Shove Aside trigger. The additional attack might seduce you to go in even deeper, but you have to resist! A surviving Valedictorian is worth so much more than a single attack. Just use your own push to move her back into the direction of your own crew. Your opponent will get another activation, before she can be safe, consider this before you go in with her in the first place. Use activated enemy models, terrain, etc. to hinder anything that can reach her. Also, the further you hunted on the fringes of the opponent's crew, the fewer models they might have for that. Your next activation will be the Student of Sinew, moving forward and then using Command Corpse, they get her another 5” out of threat range. Naturally you have to save a fitting card in your hand for this action. It's important to calculate the max. threat range beforehand, within which the Sinew will still be able to retrieve Vale. In case Valedictorian charged more into the center of the enemy crew, there might be a model on a close flank, outside of the threat range of the remaining crew. Then, after using the 4” Shove aside trigger, Vale might to able to use Lecture Notes with its On Your Heels trigger, to jump another 6”. Even if the flanker hasn't activated yet, weathering the attacks from a single model often is much more survivable than staying within weapon range of the core of a crew. List Building This is the part, where you have to apply everything you've learned until now. For Transmortis, it's hard to give general list building advice, as it is a crew that needs tailoring in every match-up. The crew's core list is rather small for this reason: Leader: Prof. Von Schtook Totem(s): Research Assistant Hires: Undergraduate Schtook and Assistant are natural parts. Valedictorian is still the crew's main mobile beater, but to utilize her fully, you also need to include Sloth. Next, you want more models that can punch: Anna, Visceras, Dead Rider. After that you take your counter-picks, usually one or two models. At this point, make sure you take a good look at the opponent's crew and the scheme pool. Don't be afraid to ask questions, most information in Malifaux is open. Expect good armor? Take the Student of Steel. Need a lot of scheme markers, either for scoring or for giving fast to your minions, include a Necropunk. The strat is mobility based, like Corrupted Ley Lines? Include more Visceras and/or Bone Piles. You're up against a summoner? Pick Anna Lovelace. If you still have points left, include a second Undergraduate. The recommended size of your Soulstone pool varies with the models you include. Valedictorian eats stone for breakfast, so 6 stones are a solid amount, if you want to utilize her for an alpha-strike. When she is not part of the crew you can easily afford to go down to 3-4 stones. Strats & Schemes GG3 (under construction) GG2 GG2 is very scheme focused, which would be a huge plus for Transmortis, but their nerfs hold that back. Most often you want to good mixture of schemy and killy strats/schemes, not going to far in either direction, to capitalize on their flexibility. Never forget: Points mean prizes! Transmortis can accomplish a lot by killing stuff, but you still have to focus first and foremost on gaining VP! Corrupted Ley Lines: This is a movement and position based strat. While Transmortis lost a lot of their mobility, they still are a mid-range crew and with the right choices can suffiecently move from point A to B, as required by this strat. Symbols of Authority: Depending on the deployment and opponent's choices, this schemes likely requires a lot of mobility for you to score. Transmortis likely will struggle more here than with Ley Lines, depending where your opponent places their markers. Since the crew has a couple of anker models, you can reasonable defend your own markers though. You can guide the opponent by placing your own markers in specific fashions. Most often, I tend to clump 2-3 markers as close as possible to funnel a portion of my opponent between terrain pieces, where I can blast into them efficiently. 1-2 markers are spaced out very far, so a flanker might catch one or two schemers running around on their own. Turf War: This is more of a kill strategy. With its mid-range capabilities, Transmortis is decently set up to deal with this scheme as necessary, but it will likely need to tailor its list. Compared to other Ressers, Transmortis is a bit tougher, which helps here. You also can play with a low model count, which denies your opponent chances to flip markers, as long as you have enough models to not just get bypassed. Break the Line: This can be tricky, depending on the marker positioning and type of enemy crew. Same as with Turf War, Transmortis likes to have a solid presence in the center of the board, but same as with Symbols, it can get difficult to defend your center and Interact on both flanks. On average, the crew still has the tools necessary though. As a jack of all trades crew, Transmortis can play into all strategies in my opinion, though some are harder to accomplish now. Both Lines and Turf are solid, Symbols can be difficult, if deployment allows your opponent to spread markers out very far. Breakthrough: Not as good as in GG1, but if deployments aren't too far from each other, still a scheme for Necropunks. Viscera can also assist, though I wouldn't let them do it alone, due to their cost. But be aware it eats a lot of actions, both for getting there and dropping schemes. A better choice with Wedge, less so with Corners. Vendetta: Good pick and many choices for your own model. Visceras are fast on their own and if the have room to move, can rush their target. Making sure they survive is the hard part here, don't pick this scheme if your opponent can hunt down your model easily. Assassinate: If you know, you'll have to deal with the enemy master anyway, you can pick Assassinate. Otherwise, I prefer to kill softer targets. Claim Jump: A strong Necropunk scheme. They have the ability to move into the scoring zone and quickly draw back into safety until the game is over and shouldn't need to leap more than once. While staying in safety they can busy themselves dropping markers for fast minions. A resilient mid-ranger like Anna also can work, if you play her carefully. Hidden Martyrs: I like Bone Piles as one of the models, as they can bury into safety. The second model can be anything that fits within the 13 cost limit. Catch and Release: Not a big fan. It needs more cooperation from your opponent than other schemes. The first VP is no issue, the second one is harder though. Let Them Bleed: Transmortis blast abilities can work well here, but this scheme is a bit to chaotic for my taste. To many avenues your opponent can stop you from scoring. I also prefer getting rid of models completly instead leaving them damaged on the table, as this doesn't hinder them. Research Mission: Weird one imho. Our Undead are also Constructs, therefore we can pick if we want to drop corpses or scraps, which can help out nicely here. But Transmortis likes to do stuff with markers, which runs contrary to this scheme. I would say Research Mission is... optional. Spread Them Out: Became much more difficult, now that Transmortis needs to be close to Schtook to drop markers from killing enemies. But I think it's still in their ball-park and therefore a legit choice. Detonate Charges: Transmortis accidental marker drops work well, though I don't like it need your opponent's cooperation. The more the table enforces specific lanes to move through, mitigating your opponent's ability to avoid this scheme, the better. It also works quite well with some strategies. Death Beds: This is easy enough, thanks to Recruitment Drive. Just pick your non-scheme marker according to your opponent (scrap for constructs, corpse living/undead). Look out for a chance to kill two models close to each other or drop the right marker type when they catch one mod of yours and counter-kill. Outflank: Possible to do, if you tailor your list, but the mobility nerf makes it difficult now. Against slow and/or bubble crews it can be worth the risk, but I would look out for more beneficial factors (other schemes, strats, etc.) to pick this one. Bait and Switch: Should work fine with Turf War or Break the line, but can end up both in a win-more or lose-more situation. Be careful not to telegraph the picked model, as Transmortis needs them to come to you to a degree, until you can push them to be where you need them to be. Dead Rider makes the first point easy, just pick something that can't be killed with one swing. OOK you can include Lures and similar abilities, to move them past the centerline.

Guide for a guide This time, I’ll handle guide writing a bit differently than my previous one. Instead of dumping all at once, I’ll add to it step-by-step, allowing for discussion in between. Since the crew has quite a few synergy effects, some themes will span multiple posts and aren’t immediately fully understandable when I first mention them. If you’re interested in playing Tormented (or have to play against him), I recommend coming back here from time to time and read future posts as well. I expect readers to have studied and understood the cards. I will cover the basics, but only go into stats and available actions when necessary. There are other guides on this forum for such. I’ll focus more on what isn't necessarily immediatly obvious and what you actually do with your models on the board. General Playstile Tormented is Ressurectionists’ premier bubble crew and has three legs to stand on: killing power, debuffs and card manipulation. While Tormented always includes all three aspects to a degree, trying to maximize each isn’t very viable. Both your stones and the AP are limited resources, which put a cap on that. Instead, look what works best for the scheme pool and opponent in question, focus on two aspects and do those well. While Tormented certainly is a bubble crew and gobbles up anything that’s getting to close to their circle of death, if you picked the right models, the crew can be surprisingly mobile. Schemes requiring a lot of movement are much more achievable than it is often claimed imho. This is my preferred playstyle, so you can expect the most information on that here. But they can only use common Interact to get markers down, so schemes which require a lot of those are better avoided with this crew. Aspect #1 - Curses Models: Jack Daw, Hanged, Guilty Curses are a huge part of Tormented’s toolkit, always part of their game plan and play into the two other aspects. The different curses are not created equal though. Let us take a look at them first. Curse of Injustice (Jack Daw): This is a solid curse. While Staggered debuff on positioning comes to shine in a melee crew only when combined with other deterrents (e.g. terrain), it unlocks multiple triggers for the crew and makes attacks against Mv easier. This is very nice, but imho what really makes this curse shine is “plentiful (5)” and the fact it is applied by a 3AP model that can survive being 8” close to multiple enemy models. Quantity can be quality. Punish the Wicked (Guilty): In my opinion, the strongest curse Tormented has. A bigger hand size and therefore card draw is good for anybody. Tormented is very card hungry. But, early in a turn, they often run in the situation to draw more cards than they have room for, though this might be a luxury problem. Sadly, it also has its downsides. First, it is the hardest to apply, because you need your opponent to play along and kill your Guilty. Second, the more card advantage you want, the longer you play down 5pts and one activation per upgrade in play. Forbidden Knowledge (Hanged): It is a great curse against models who need to be positioned correctly end of turn to score. Otherwise, it most often allows Hanged to cause more damage and usually does not stick around for long, because it's the only curse your opponent can get rid off without dying. Card manipulation Tormented always utilize is card draw and it is based upon curses. First, there is the crew’s signature ability, which lets you draw a card whenever one of your models damages an enemy with a curse upgrade. Second is Daw’s bonus ability to draw a card for every cursed enemy within range. This is hugely important for the crew. Tormented is uniquely able to use any card you draw, be it moderates/severes to win duels/inflict damage (like anyone else), weak cards are also handy to have for your own discard effect and even black jokers become great if you play Hanged. But though your card efficiency is great, you need a lot of them! Quantity means quality for Tormented. The question resulting from this is: How much is enough? In my personal experience, drawing at least a 2nd full hand is what you should get out of these abilities most turns. If plans go well, it will usually exceed this, but below that you will run into problems operating at max. capacity. One issue you will run into, especially in turn #2, is order of activation. Commonly, you want to active Jack Daw asap to hand out as many curses as you can, but then you won’t have room in your hand. Most crews do not care much about that since they can afford to just throw away their low cards. Tormented does not like that – quantity is key for them. Try to activate a model with (high) TN or a necessary duel first, so you make room for at least some new cards. After that initial push, you can space out your card usage as usual. Once you have enough curses out, you can activate Daw later in a turn. Aspect #2 - Discard/Execute Execute models: Jack Daw, Montresor Discard models: Guilty, Dead Outlaw, Hanged In my opinion, to go execute as a main mechanic, is a high risk/high reward approach. For obvious reasons it is great to just delete models from the board. But you must chew through resources, before you even get to do that. Assuming an average hand for your opponent, your first two discards won’t even matter much, as weak cards will be dropped first, only after that you start to apply hand pressure, and you start from scratch each turn. Soulstones at least do not come back once spend (unless, you know, Arcanists…), but the amount your opponent starts the game with is relevant here. If they have only 2 or 3 available, that is great for you! But I rarely encounter that and even less so once opponents know they will face Daw. It will take some turns to chew through 7 to 9 stones. The last drawback: It enforces an obvious activation order. You want Daw and Montresor to go late and your opponent will know it. With Daw, that is usually okay, but often enough the game state requires to go against that. With Montresor I struggle to save him that long most of the time anyway. This sounds pretty negative and to a certain degree it is, but the point I want to drive home: Do not expect execute to go off, unless the game is in your favour anyway. You might ask now: “But discarding and spending SS is already beneficial, right?” Yes and no. As already mentioned, the first few discard effects will not hinder your opponent much. To stay within the Ressers perspective: Reva, with high card usage and hardly any card draw, suffers quickly from discards. Against her, discard is a serious consideration. But Molly will laugh at you, for her it is more a nuisance instead of a hindrance, thanks to her strong draw abilities. Therefore, you must take your opponent’s capabilities into consideration if you decide to make strong use of Tormented’s discard abilities or not. It is not a decision you can make in a vacuum, only at the table. Lucky for me, I like the models with discard abilities anyway and often take them for other reasons. This give me the potential to use them, even if I plan something completely different. This is a good situation for nasty mind games: “You really want to stone for an extra card? Neat.” “How big is your stone pool? This low already? Good to know.” “How many hand cards do you have left? Why do I ask? Because I want to know how soon I can execute your models.” I try not to be a butthead about it, but bluffing is part of Malifaux for me. The more experienced your opponent is, the less impact it will have of course. But most of the time I get at least some reaction out of them. Even if it is just them getting nervous or staying relaxed when being forced to consider hand destruction. With my favourite model picks it also is no lie, I could go this route if I wanted to. But I try to motivate my opponent to hold back and play it safe and instead plan to use different triggers/abilities, that benefit from my opponents being careful with their resources. I call that benefit without resource investment. tldr: Use discard is a threat, even if you never do it. Aspect #3 - Debuffs Models: Lady Ligeia, Drowned, Guilty Staggered is the most important debuff for Tormented. It is the most common one and, similar to curses, the crew can use many triggers, if the enemy suffers from it. In addition, slow is sprinkled in as another condition. Your range to apply Staggered is rather limited. This means, your opponent will be quite close to you when you can put it on. This puts limits on how much you can slow them down during early game, but at least it means they won’t get away easily. This is also why I noted only three models above, even though more models apply the condition regularly. Those can do it at range and therefore are the most attractive choices. Other than during list building, this aspect is simple but effective, so there is not much to say about it. Just keep in mind, which models need Staggered on enemy models to use triggers/bonus effects and which attacks are resisted by movement. Quick Notes “Torment” Crew Ability One of two main reasons, why curses are so important to Tormented: They generate a huge portion of your card advantage with this ability. It also often dictates your order of activation, so sometimes you must decide to skip the card draw to get rid of a model asap. But do not blindly rush to attack, instead always consider how to get more out of it. This is a general truth, but especially true here. For example, since Tormented tends to stick close to each other, you likely will have the option to attack with another model instead of pushing a kill with cheating a damage flip. Terrifying Models: Jack Daw, Hanged, Montresor Only a few models have this rule natively, but they are crew favourites. Check your opponent’s capabilities to pick models and upgrades with Ruthless. It is very likely they will use it to tech against Daw and there is not much you can do about that, except killing them before they can kill you. If you are confident, they cannot take many, consider running a terrifying list with investing into Grave Spirit’s Touch for your minions without terryfing. Conditions & Healing This is the most pronounced weakness of Tormented imho. Jack Daw can heal life on himself, but otherwise the crew does not have any heals. Same goes for conditions, which can make you struggle a lot against some crews. This can be solved by taking versatile/OOK options. In-keyword models Jack Daw Role: killer, curses, card draw His first card is pretty straight forward. It may be just me, but I often forget Disturbing Whispers, be better than that! Also remember: Due to Ghost of Malifaux, Jack Daw cannot body block, but if they move through him normally, they still need to disengage. A question you will encounter with him is: Do I use my Slow AOE or do I just kill one model? There is no easy answer, both can be a strong play. My general guideline is: killing a model takes at least 2 actions (per turn) away from your opponent and might give you last activation. But Slow can take away 1 action per model in range. TN13 is good, but will not go through with every model, therefore I take extra time to consider Whispered Truth once he catches at least 4 models and/or needs to slow down multiple models. Daw’s first turn usually consist of rushing forward and dragging something along with Drawn to Betrayal, to establish dominance over the middle of the board as soon as possible. Turn #1 (if possible) and turn #2 is used to apply as many curses as possible. Do not hold back and spend all his actions, if you have targets, you will need those curses going forward. If your opponent was nice enough to give you enough (now cursed) models close-by, you can start drawing cards. Luckily, Suppressed Memories both applies a curse and lets you teleport to your enemy – do not hesitate to spend stones! You better start drawing a considerable amount now, if you start turn #3 it might be still okay, but you will feel the difference. Upgrades Grave Spirit’s Touch: After getting a few games in, I was under the impression that you need this upgrade less, the more experienced you are with Daw. Blasphemous Ritual is wasted on Daw and after turn #1 he has other things to do with his bonus action. I returned more and more to GST though, the longer I played Tormented. The thought is true regarding his survivability, but if you can gauge his toughness better, it also means you can afford to be more aggressive with him, if necessary. Regen +2 also means you save up to two hand cards you could use well somewhere else. In short: While it is not mandatory, if you can take GST, do it! Killer Instinct: A worthy upgrade for Daw’s offensive, but I take it only if I require Ruthless, but then I do it gladly. Wasting a master’s action or cards for a failed terrifying check is rather bothersome. Loot their corpses is solid, if you do not need these markers for something else. Daw is deadly and can collect a few stones over the course of a game. The Whisper: It is well known how good Intuition is on a master and being the killer he is, Daw can even draw you a few additional cards. Despite this, Whisper is the upgrade I take the least. All three are good options, but I have found that GST ito be the better pick and Killer Instinct is mandatory against certain crews. If I take Whisper, it is usually because I do not need KI and both Hanged already get GST. Lady Ligeia Role: aura and debuff support Ligeia’s debuff aura is the strongest reason, why it is dangerous to go into the Tormented bubble. Even when it combines with only occasional discard, it gets expensive for your opponent very fast. A single, strong model can get some cheats through, but if you have to deal with only one model, it generally is to your benefit as long as they cannot teleport out. Sadly, she also is not very survivable. Measure well how far she needs to be to cover your models and keep an eye out for models with longer (melee) ranges. Her Projected Voice attack is what she usually spends her action for other than moving. The damage is surprisingly solid for a Totem, but the important part is guaranteed Stagger trigger on blast. Her stat is rather low though, if you really need to debuff something with her, better plan to cheat for the attack. Since she prefers not to be in direct contact with the enemy, Talons is largely irrelevant – except when used on your own Guiltys. Montressor Role: utility, tank Montressor will always have things to do, since he can obey any non-master Tormented model. There is not much finesse to him, just look which models need an extra action. His attacks are solid and their triggers fit well to Tormented with the possibility for min. 3 and Execute. Noteworthy, he is a great roadblock with Terrifying, HtW, 10 Health and his Demise ability. I have found Suffocation and Hanging Ropes are nice to have, but usually not worth playing into them. My biggest “problem” with Montressor is keeping up with the rest of the crew. He has no native mobility option and therefore requires being pulled by other models, if he wants to make use of Cured To Watch until you established a good position for your bubble. Guilty Role: utility support Guilty decouple many of Tormented’s janky movement abilities from enemy models and their positioning because you may count them as enemy models. With this, they are an absolute cornerstone for the crew’s mobility and counteract the crew’s common Mv4. You will find examples of such plays with Daw or Hanged later in this guide. Whenever your opponent does not give you enough good target to curse and draw cards from with Daw, you can employ Guilty instead. As long as they keep 1 life, it does not have any drawback. What do you do with Guilty other than taking hits? They are usually the first models I activate during early game. They are one of the few who do not ignore terrain, so they need a good position to go straight forward during deployment. A perfect position for them is within 8-10” to the enemy’s line, so they can serve as jumping off points or retrieval targets, while they themselves are in range to apply Staggered themselves and/or can drop scheme markers. After you are done with your Hanged and Daw, Ligeia comes in and removes the curse from them with her Take It All trigger. Likely you will have to cheat a ram in, so you will not have more cards, but it can help with cycling through your deck. How many Guilty do you need? Sadly, I cannot answer that clearly. One is absolutely mandatory and you should not let it die quickly without being very sure you get one back asap with their demise/curse. If you play 2 Hanged, it is sensible to go up to two Guilty if you can afford it. It massively increases your ability to jump from one flank to another within a single turn and gives you the option to leave one of their curses on your opponent without suffering unnecessary control loss over your teleport capabilities. Hanged Role: mobile beater, occasional schemer I lovingly call my Hanged 10SS Henchman, as they operate similarly once you give them an upgrade. For me, they are the most important pick for Tormented, even though they are quite an investment. They give Tormented much needed mobility and I rarely leave without 2 of them. With them and Daw you can make use of every card in your hand, even the Black Joker. With a bonus action attack, they are a pseudo-3AP model and their usual attack pattern look as following: Safe approach: Toss the Noose + On your heel trigger on enemy, 1-2x Dead Man's Collar on enemy, Horrifying Whisper on Guilty (tactical retreat) Aggressive approach: Toss the Noose on enemy, Horrifying Whipser + On your heel trigger on enemy, 1-2x Dead Man's Collar The combination of Hanged, Guilty and Dead Outlaws is potent. Guilty provide a scheme marker, Outlaws hand out Fast and Hanged therefore become AP4 models with a huge threat range (up to >20” with 3 attacks). It is one thing to read about it and another to see how much ground they can cover. I will cover their movement shenanigans more in a later post. It is of note, that Hanged require either Guilty and/or enemies for their mobility. This means, the more models you kill, the less teleport options you will have. This means success in your killing game can lead to trouble with scoring during late game. Be aware of this and try not to avoid scheming until then. Upgrades While Hanged are good models without any upgrades, they turn them up to 11. Definitely take them, all of them are legit choices. GST: Hanged have solid defensive capabilities, but their Df4 will be felt sooner or later. GST helps you twice: Increased Terrifying means your opponent will have to dedicate a serious amount of resources to get rid of them within a single turn, as long as you do not run in front of a ruthless beatstick. If they do not, they will start to heal back up with Regen. My biggest reason not to always give both of my Hanged GST, is that they compete with Daw over it and I like to play my Hanged redundant with the same upgrade. Same as with Daw, Ritual is largely wasted on them, but the other two abilities are worth it already. KI: Prime models to give Ruthless if necessary, since Hanged can pick their target more freely than most Tormented models. Due to Plentiful 2, I prefer KI on Hanged and something else on Daw. Other than Daw they also benefit from the minion-only ability, which eases the necessity to stone for their teleports and often makes them double up as a schemer. TW: Similar to Daw, the other upgrades usually have a higher priority. But occasionally I take Whisper on them, if my opponent forces many Wp duels. Dead Outlaw Role: (anti) schemer, support It honestly baffles me, why Outlaws are rarely recommended. I guess a circular logic lies at the bottom. People assume Tormented is a pure killer and bubble crew, without any scheming potential and therefore do not take Daw when the pool involves anything other than murdering – which is not when Outlaws reach their full potential and therefore get branded as underperforming models and are not testes in more scheme heavy pools, strengthening the first assumption. Outlaws are what I consider the crew’s scheme runners. They are not great when compared to dedicated runners, but Run & Gun at least gives them the ability to move while they use their attacks at the same time. Their abilities also make them very flexible, and I usually try to squeeze at least one into my list and often take two, if the pool demands it. While Hanged can also drop schemes with their attacks, catching an enemy model at a suitable location is much more likely, when it comes on a 12” gun. Staggered and Slow also are much more useful at that range. Outlaws are the only in-crew source for Fast. They are the reason, why Guilty will always have productive activations, they can drop a marker to provide the cost. Naturally, it is better to destroy an enemy marker and get Fast on top of it! Even if Outlaws move away from the bubble, they can remove one marker for free each turn, putting Fast on themselves (it is not an attack action). Crooked Man I have never seriously played them, even do not own them. That might be due to them being hard/expensive to obtain in my area, but I have not missed them much. Their min. 3 trigger and blast Staggered looks appealing, but they are a bit too expensive when I could take cheaper options for the similar capabilities. In theory they combine well with Drowned, Jakuuna and Montresor, but this pronounces their price tag even more. While Malifaux Mining Law is unique and may be helpful in certain situations, I prefer to simply not pick schemes which would require their protection. But I would be happy to hear any success stories about them and which factors lead to it! Jaakuna Ubume Role: utility She is a control piece. Lure on stat 7 is great, especially when the enemy is already close to Daw and suffers -1 Wp. It has two main functions: Scoring control and pulling enemy models into your death bubble. This is especially important for a bubble crew, because scheme runners can potentially sneak past on your flanks. With her, you do not need to run after them to hunt them down. Be aware, while she has okay defensive capabilities, she is a bit squishy for a Tormented model. Do not leave her alone, she likes to stick to your bubble. This is also where you can benefit most from her bonus action aura, stacking with the other auras from Daw/Ligeia. Drowned Role: utility While Kirai can summon them wherever they are needed, Tormented have to actually move them across the board, to make use of their min. 3 trigger attack. Since all your mobility abilities for other models are single target, there is a built-in limit, which can leave Drowned behind. On the plus side they apply Staggered with a ranged bonus action and Projectile Vomit can both Debuff beaters who are brave enough to come close to your bubble or mess with your opponent’s positioning – a footprint of 6”+50mm covers a lot of ground, though it requires a suit. All in all one could say they are more of a control model for Tormented, instead of a beater minion, which is another reason why I usually take only one, as more are not needed for this task. Versatile & OOK models I have often read that Tormented plays in-keyword only. I beg to differ. Spending 25% of your points for non-keyword models might not always be necessary but is absolutely normal for Tormented. You can go up to 50% without running into major trouble. You just need to look out to include enough curses and draw sufficient cards. Bone Pile Role: heal/condition support, teleporting schemer Who played against me more than once knows, I am a fan of Bone Piles. Personal preference aside, there are very good reason to take them with Tormented, since they cover two of their main weaknesses: lack of healing and lack of condition removal. Against condition crews (e.g. Pandora) I like to take two of them. Even if their Throw ‘Em A Bone ability is not needed in a given turn, they still can shoot stuff from the safety of your bubble. In Corrupted Ley Lines they are my turn#1 Lodestone bearer. Move to the first strategy marker turn #1/2 and bring a 2nd model into position. Turn #3 you bury and therefore throw the Lodestone any distance to the closest model – the one you positioned to be in range to go to the next marker. Turn #4 you unbury at marker 3, all you need until then is a close corpse token. Break the line might also benefit from them, though it needs a few more resources. Shoot a scheme runner shoving a strategy marker, cheat for Dismember and bury. Next turn, you pop up next to them and, if necessary, kill them with the Pick the Bones trigger. Those are a few loops to jump through, so it will not always work, but keep it in the back of your mind. Gravedigger Role: utility/support I would like to include a Gravedigger more often, especially in combination with Bone Piles. Commonly, I cannot find enough free point for them though. In my opinion they should be central to scoring at least two of your strategy/schemes (e.g. Leylines + Research Mission) to take them in your list. Dead Rider Role: beater, utility I still have to find a crew, which does not benefit from including the rider. Its damage potential is not as needed as in other crews, but a mobile beatstick like him will nearly always find usage. Tormented specifically like to have another taxi and love to get enemy models pushed into their bubble. This combines very well with Jaakuna’s lure. Divide both on your flanks and your opponent will think twice to try to sneak around your bubble. Manos Role: utility, debuff As usual, Manos is a mobile schemer with Demise hate, who can also hurt stuff if necessary. But with Tormented, his Spirit Barrage is especially noteworthy. An 12” AOE Staggered trigger without TN once you have hit your original target is easily worth stoning and cheating for in this crew. The whole package he brings makes him a serious consideration, even when you do not need his Demise hate. Nurse Role: heal/condition support Usually, I prefer Bone Piles for healing/condition hate due to their offensive and scoring capabilities. Bedside manner is not as needed as with other crews, your models are quite tough on their own or your opponent is hesitant to get close to your bubble anyway. But it would be foolish to ignore their capabilities completely. Upcycling cards is never bad, multiple of her triggers work well with Tormented and if your primary need is condition removal and healing, they are your go-to model. Mourner Role: utility They are the only model to counter ruthless. Sadly, this great rule sticks to a bad model and only helps against melee based ruthless. The corpse can assist with an early-game corpse, e.g. for a Bone Pile teleport or focus pulse, but overall I cannot give them a recommendation. Usually, it would be better to simply safe SS for stoning to avoid damage. There might be niche cases though, so I regard them as a rare option. Necropunk Role: schemer As scheme runner, they were so good, they could be taken in any crew. This changed with GG2 and their new requirement for masks on their leap. But Tormented is one of the crews with enough card draw to still include them. While you want to avoid duels, their crews ability can draw you cards, in contrast to most other OOK options. Sloth Role: heal/buff support Sloth will always be a solid in an (mostly) undead crew! He might not be a priority pick for Tormented. Handing out fast is always great and might be worth the stones already, but it does not work on a few models (Jakuuna, Hanged, Drowned, Ligeia) and his heal drawback requires you to take another model to get rid of slow or limit it to tarpit models like Jakuuna (which you might be fine with). He can be a niche tech pick if you have trouble against strong healing. Together with Hanged, it becomes quite unappealing with a big footprint, but I have never run in such a situation. Student of Steel Role: offensive support Armour hate on a stick. Not a high priority pick, even against high armour lists, but it might make dealing with them easier. You can run into trouble getting the student into position, most your mobility abilities do not work on non-Tormented friendly models, unless you curse the Student. Jakuuna is the exception here, she can lure him along. Anna Lovelave Role: utility She is solid without any support and gets taken as a tech piece against summoners and flyers for her Gravity Well ability alone. She fits quite well into Daw's playstile, with two (!) debuffs auras, the chance to draw cards, reasonable toughness and offensive. Personally, I am a big fan of her Glimpse trigger, as it can send anything, that even Tormented might have trouble getting rid of, back to wherever your opponent has to spend actions to return them into a proper position.

Hi all, hope that this is useful for anyone looking to pick up the game!

Hello Puppet-Lovers! This is going to be my first attempt at writing a Tactica for use with my favourite Master: Collodi. I used Collodi a lot in the Wave 2 Beta and think I have a good grasp of the tactics and abilities you can make use of in a Collodi crew, which I would like to share with New Players and old alike, as well as maybe give Collodi's Opponents a leg up if they are finding him a difficult Master to go up against in their local group. Let's begin with where we came from: In M1E Collodi's tactics involved spinning a small ball of marionettes into anything and having that thing die rather brutally, from just about anywhere on the board. While maintaining a lot of the same flavour in 2E Collodi is not going to fly across the board with his entire crew, that said he has never felt more like a PuppetMaster in my opinion, and I'd like to show people why, especially if theyre having trouble transitioning. StatBlock First off Collodi is a Low-Wound Master. His Df is average at 5, with good WP at 6. 5Wk makes him a little faster than average, but is going to leave some players missing his old 40" moves. However, he can push 3" after any Df targeting attack, so if youve got some low cards to toss you can attack him with your own models to push him up the board. We've also got Accomplice so he can always have a friend go after him and Puppet Friends, which gives him access to any out of faction Puppet model, which is currently Mannequins, Coryphee and the Effigies. The 6" Bubble Collodi's abilities and buffs all center around a 6" bubble around him. This makes him more vulnerable to blast-heavy crews, but also makes it much easier to buff your entire crew at once. Of note is that Collodi's buffs do not require you to STAY in this bubble. Learning when to venture from the bubble is going to be an important skill for 2e Collodi players. Personal Puppet This is one of Collodi's (0) actions and marks a friendly Minion as the Personal Puppet until he uses the ability again. This grants the PP a (1) action any time Collodi suffers damage from an enemy model while within THE BUBBLE, so long as they take 1 damage themselves. It also grants Collodi the ability to kill (not sacrifice, so it will drop Corpse/Scrap) the Personal Puppet to negate all damage from whatever just hit him. This gives us 2 courses of action with PP. 1) We can throw it on something menacing, like an Illuminated, Young Neph or Ronin, and furiously punish things for hitting Collodi (or stalk the PP closer to priority targets and mark something else PP on out next turn. Nothing says dont hit my Master like a magical crack addict clawing your opponent's Master's face off.) 2) We throw it on something throw away, most notable the Marionette totem, and kill them when a Seamus Flintlock RJ dmg flip appears. The nice thing about the Marionettes is that when they die they may transfer positive conditions off to other minions. So you can face-tank a number of hit equal to your marionettes +1 before taking any damage. Assuming they are all in THE BUBBLE. Ideally you will get a chance to gauge your opponent and pick a tactic that most messes up their gameplan. I usually start off now by putting it on something big unless I guess my opponent is a "kill the master at all costs!!!" kind of player. Beater tends to deter pot shots, chaff tends to deter people from concentrated efforts. Collodi Hates Mind Bullets Ok, so Collodi has Df 5 and WP 6, why does he hate WP duels more? Well, first off you'll only usually only be taking one hit from a Df duel due to the auto-triggered Run Away Home; letting you push 3" in any direction, usually good enough to push out of melee or into cover/out of LoS against shooting attacks. Against WP? He's a sitting duck if the attack makes it past his WP6. So prioritize those nasty WP targets, or just avoid them if you can. But Hates His Opponents More Lets talk about what Collodi does to your Opponent's crew before we get into what he can do for his own. Collodi's lone offensive skill is Pull The Strings. It is highly accurate, extending 4" past THE BUBBLE and best of all, isnt actually a ranged attack, so does not scatter and does not care about cover. The attack itself has a... poor damage profile for a master: 2/3/4, but comes with a positive twist to damage, so you can cheat in those middle of the road cards if you want the 3 damage. But no, where this attack shines is in its triggers. SO first of all we have a build in Mask. That Mask gives the opponent slow. A crow lets us damage AND obey the opponent's non-Leader model, as many times a turn as we have AP and fancy crows to throw at them. The last trigger; Idle Hands, requires a second maske. On that model's activation, you control one of it's AP, and spend it. Now, that on its own is great, but you can shut down nearly any model in the game with 2AP and some good cards. Slapping a model once for slow and then a second time for Idle Hands means they are Paralyzed, without being able to Frozen Heart Immunity their way out of it. They lose 1 AP and you're spending the other. Even models with specific AP like Nekima can be forced to move out of position so they can't make use of their extra AP. Or just stab away with them, your pick. Nasty Ability. Collodi Loves His Children Collodi has two more actions on his -base- card, both of which are for helping his wonderful friends out. Collodi has a deep affinity, like many buffing masters, for Minion and -Keyword- models. His keyword characteristic is of course, Puppets. The first, My Will, allows him to transfer some AP out to his minions/puppets giving them a positive twist to any DUEL they make during the action. So this allows for more easily passed Horror/Manipulative duels, as well as just flatly being more likely to hit. Often you'll be better off attacking with your own strings, but this ability should not be overlooked. It doesnt work on Collodi so dont try. Second, he can summon back his totem, the marionette, or wicked dolls from scrap left lying around from killing all your decoy personal puppets or killing whatever mechanical beasties your opponent brought. This requires a 9 of Masks, making it one of the worst return-on-investment summoning powers in the game. But only by a TN difference of 1 so, its not the end of the world. This ability is one of the reasons you might pause on taking some of the NB minions I mentioned because they will all be dropping corpses, save the Coryphee. But you should have plenty of scrap from marionettes dying and effigies getting taken out. Fated VS Props Collodi's two Limited upgrades are going to change how you're playing with him. Both provide Creep, a handy little 3" push (0) action, good for getting out of engagements and moving up the board. What they differ on is key though: Do you want to Buff Your Crew or do you want to Buff Your Master? Fated was my go-to during the playtest. Effigy buffs are very powerful and will be covered in more detail in their own section. But suffice to say, being able to grant your Puppinions healing on causing damage, burning on every attack unless your opponent discards, etc and being able to do so -without activating Collodi- is very powerful indeed. When Collodi activates he can also grant a second buff to the crew by taking an action. This is usually defensive stance or more notably: Focus. If you have been reading game dev Justin's blog, you'll know how valuable AP is as a resource and I found myself on average granting it to 4-7 Puppinions, which is a heck of a lot of AP saved. Props is the contrast. It allows Collodi to sap off Defensive Stances and Focus conditions from friendlies as required. Now on the surface this seems much less useful, but having Out of Position models ending their turn on a Defensive Stance or Focus can free up a LOT of Collodi's AP, let him stand a higher chance of drawing suits he needs and just generally let him be more effective while chaff models secure you activations and are no less effective at being in your opponents way. If you find yourself thinking Marionettes are not useful, this may be the upgrade to try. Especially with Avatar Collodi's attacks (covered in the third post) You'll also get the option to summon Effigies! You dont get their buff across your whole Puppinion base, but if there's scrap around they can be more useful than a Wicked Doll and Collodi certainly does still get to benefit from the Effigy buffs! I Heard There Are Other Upgrades? Right you are title! My favourite/always taking of the remaining upgrades is Strum The Threads. This allows Puppinions Puppets-Only in THE BUBBLE to take 2 unavoidable damage to gain fast. Now Puppets tend to have low wounds high defences, so if you dont have a way of healing (which you do! See: Effigies) you can quickly wipe yourself off the board, but Illuminated could heal that back same turn. And now they are FAST magical crack addicts. It should be noted this is NOT an action, its just an ability so you cant spread Fast to your Puppinions with Fated. Stop doing so, take your 2 damage like a... man puppet? Like a muppet. Breathe Life exists! Its another option for a (0), letting you toss 2 wounds back on a model, but it can't be you, so probably pass? Pushing Puppinions 2" is actually more useful than it sounds. You can unlock a lot of models from combat or manage some extra distance. If you're hitting 8 models with it, it is 16" of free movement? I dunno, I still haven't got it to be as useful as I think it COULD be. Threads of Fate. Not to be confused with Fated, this makes Collodi immune to forced movement, which is pretty dang super. You also get a (1) to give yourself Armor. Now, aside from the obvious interaction with Fated and giving that armor to your Puppinions, did you consider making yourself Fast with Strum, giving yourself Armor +4 and then not caring so much about the Beatstick in your face? Especially since that 1 minimum damage still lets your PP get free AP. Im sure I can do more with the Collodadillo. Next we'll be discussing Collodi's best pals the doll friends, followed by some Avatar Collodi pondering!

Hello everyone! This is my first attempt at writing a Tacitca for use. I'm writing it for a master which I played a lot (and influenced) during the Beta, so I know a few of his tricks. The main idea is to share these with new players attempting to start him or old players trying some new tricks out. I speak, of course, of Hamelin. To make things easier, first blocks will describe the master without any upgrades. Improvents on certain things will be noted under the respective upgrade section. Stats First thing to see are his stats, which are pretty decent, yet average, across the board. A good wound pool and great wp, his other stats are among the average mold. He however, lacks any station characterstics (living, undead, etc) which means there are quite a few abilities that don't work on him, wheter good or bad. Lastly, he starts with a meager cache of 1. Remember this when construction your crews. Defenses Hamelin has two abilities toward defense: Nihilism, and Lure of Emptiness. He doesn't have any damage migation abilities, such as Armor, or Hard to Wound. Lure of Emptiness grants backup lives with nearby stolen. When Hamelin is killed or sacrificed, he may sacrifice a nearby stolen instead and heal some wounds. An useful ability that migates a bit Hamelin's innate squishiness. However, watch out for having a lack of stolen in a critical moment, as Hamelin is easily hit and takes the full brunt of an onslaught. Nihilism, on the other hand, is one of the most powerful defensive abilities in the game. It allows you to ignore any conditions as you see fit. This is entirely optional, and allows you to still gain the condition if you like it. Perfect if your opponent is handing positives mixed with negatives, as you get to ignore the negative conditions while keeping the postive ones. Don't forget to thank your opponent after that. Another thing to note is the Tyrant characterstic. This grants weaknesses towards the infamous Relic Hammers. Keep them away from Hamelin's face! (Relic Hammer bearers are Johann, The Captain, and Taelor) Blighted Blighted is the condition that Hamelin and his friends spreads out like candy. What does it do, you ask? Absolutely nothing. Don't let this discourage you! While I am saying that it does nothing, it does have important tricks to consider. The most important and deadly to remember is Bleeding Disease. This nasty spell deals damage equal to the current blighted stack to an enemy. It does not remove the stack, so you can freely fire away, racking huge damage for only a few AP spend. There are also other tricks with certain models, but we'll leave that for later. Blighted increases on it's own at the end of turn. Nifty right? Rats Hamelin wouldn't be Hamelin without his little rats. One rat is an unintersting sight, but there are far more hiding right out there. Rats spawn for free when an enemy within 6 of Hamelin dies. Other models can also spawn them. Rats are weak, cheap, small, and pathetic. They think so too, so they swarm together when there are four of them close to each other. (friendly or enemy) The resulting Rat Kings are more intimidating, providing a nasty way of getting rid of scheme markers, as well as improved damage output. (it's a little better) Due to the free rats, expect to always being able to out activate enemies. Actions Hamelin has several actions open to him. First of all, the Black Staff is his basic melee attack. It has a unimpressive damage track of 1/2/4, but ml 6 is nothing to scoff at. It has always access to two basic triggers, one which hand out blighted and another which increases damage by the blighted on the target, to a maxium of +3. His second action, are the Pipes, which is basically a lure. It has an auto trigger that deals damage and moves the target further if it has blighted. Lastly, bleeding disease has been covered already. Under tactical actions, he has a Lure Malifaux Citizen, a (0) that allows him to summon a Stolen in base contact. Stolen are jeleous and murder all non-stolen totems summoned this way. If you spend a soulstone, you are capable of hitting a trigger that allows him to do it all again. (sans trigger) Upgrades Of course, there are always upgrades, and Hamelin is no exception. The Plague First of his upgrades, Virulent denies any removal of Blighted within 6 of Hamelin. Prefect for letting enemies build larger stacks of blighted. Secondly, it allows the usage of two triggers, both which trigger automaticly. The first hands out blighted, which is handy for putting blighted on ranged. The second only goes of on blighted+4, but grants the target a condition that forces the enemy to discard two cards for each interact action... Or it simpely fails. Putting blighted on range is The Piper Hamelin's near-auto-take limited upgrade grants two powerful abilities. Irresistable Dance, and Obey. Ireresistable Dance forbids enemies from ending charges within 6 of Hamelin. Protecting him and his crew from charges, it negates one of the weaknesses Hamelin has. Obey with a build in suit is a very powerful tool in any master's crew, and Hamelin is no different. Tools of the Tyrant This upgrade grants triggers to the Black Staff, as well providing even more interact denial. Unhealty pallor allows Hamelin to heal for each blighted model within 3. Blight your friends first, and then use them as health packages! Remember that blighted doesn't do anything when not forced upon you.... The second trigger puts blighted on a single target within 3" of the damaged model. It allows you to put blighted on certain elusive models hiding away from your ranges. It has it's usages whithin certain combo's, such as setting up the 1 AP charges using Drawn to Contagation. The main selling point of Tools, however, is Face The Inevitable, a 6 that let's interact actions of enemies fail unless they discard a card. Suddely delivering messages, or distracting becomes a lot harder to do. Sewer King Last of the four Hamelin restricted upgrades, Sewer King grants Infiltration (Lost) allowing you to hire up to four out of faction Lost models. Currently they are Crooligans, Baby Kade, Iggy, and Candy. More on them later. It also grants Useless Toy, a (0) that let's you sacrifice any model of choice to draw two cards. If a stolen is sacrificed, enemy models within 3 of the stolen get blighted. Of course, you wouldn't want to kill stolen off all the time, as sometimes it's better to get rid of a near-dead model that has already activated. Or you could just kill rats. Infectious Melody A Nihilist option, infectious melody allows Peons and Minions to gain fast at the start of their activation. They die at the end of that activation, going out in a blaze of glory. Sometimes you just need that 1 additional AP. Survialist Not Hamelin exclusive, but deserved a special metion here. Most importantly, it grants him ridicilous levels of defense in the form of Hard to Kill. Hard to Kill works hand in hand with Lure of Emptiness, soaking attacks in tandem. First, hard to kill goes off, reducing you to 1 wound. Then, lure of emptiness goes off, healing you above Hard to Kill thresshold.. It's certainly worth the ss if you find that you die too often. Oh, it also grants on healing flips. Spreading & Utilizing Blighted Decided to make a list of sources & blighted utilities. Spreading Blighted For all intents and purposed, Rats & Rat Kings are immune to Blighted. Diseased gives blighted to enemies that activate within 3. Source: Obedient Wretch & The Stolen, ability. The Taint trigger gives Blighted +1 for each in the final duel total. Source: Hamelin, Black Staff. The Decaying trigger gives Blighted +1. Source: Hamelin, Pipes. Requires The Plague upgrade. The Contagious Touch trigger gives Blighted +1 to a model within 3" and LOS of the target when damaging. Source: Hamelin, Black Staff. Requires Tools of the Tyrant upgrade. Useless Toy, when you sacrifice a Stolen with this action, all enemy models within 3 of the sacrificed Stolen gain Blighted +1. Source: Hamelin. Requires Sewer King upgrade. Feed On Anima gives Blighted +1 on a hit. Source: Nix Rusty Trap gives Blighted +1 on a hit. Source: Rat Catcher Swarm of Yellow Teeth gives Blighted +1 on a hit. Source: Rat King. The Spray of Filth trigger gives Blighted +1 to all models 6 when the target is killed. Source: Rat King. Yellow Teeth gives Blighted +1/+2/+3 depending on the damage flip. Source: Malifaux Rat Drink Spirit gives blighted to all within 4 unless a Wp test is passed. Nihilist models are immune Source: Nix Using Blighted Bleeding Disease deals damage equal to the Blighted condition of the target. Source: Hamelin, Nix, Stolen & Obedient Wretch. The Black Death deals damage equal to the Blighted condition of the target, to a maxium of 3. This is a seperate damage source. Source: Hamelin. Voracious Rats summons a Malifaux Rat when a model with Blighted is killed within 6. Source: Hamelin & Rat Catcher Pipes moves the target equal to it's Cg when the target is blighted. Source: Hamelin The Sick In Bed trigger gives the target the Sick In Bed condition if it's blighted condition is 4 or greater. Source: Hamelin, Pipes. Requires The Plague upgrade. The Unhealthy Pallor trigger heals Hamelin for each model with Blighted within 3. Source: Hamelin, Black Staff. Requires Tools of the Tyrant upgrade. Models with Blighted +4 within 6 of an activated Plague Pit can't take interact actions. Source: Nix The Quarantine trigger increases the attack damage by 2 if the target has Blighted +3 before the action is declared. Source: Rat Catcher, Rusty Trap. Models with Drawn to Contagion can charge models with Blighted as a (1) action. Source: Rat King & Nix, Hollow

So this thread keeps popping up, I thought I'd try to write up something to help you getting started with Nicodem. At this point you have probably bought the Open Graves boxset. So you have Nicodem, Mortimer, 3x Punk Zombies and the Vulture. Let's start with that assumption. Good buy, Nicodem is absolutely the boss and you are within the righteous faction of Malifaux, good for you. Nicodem is a toolbox to no end. What you need you get. Nicodem can be played in different ways, the most obvious being the Summoner he is. Do remember though, that you have the option to summon, it's not mandatory for you to summon all the time. Giving out Fast is a superb ability. To heal your models is also amazing. Slow your enemies? That is golden. He recycles cards like no one's business. Gives out to attack, defense and to damage (with an upgrade). So simply put: he's the King for a reason. You are probably wondering where to go next? What to get for him? Well let's start breaking that apart. You might want a big beatstick? That you can support, give flips to, make it even better than it is. Very solid options are: Beatsticks: Izamu (my personal favourite). Very solid Enforcer and a good carrier for Decaying Aura in a Nicodem list. Give him fast and he goes up to 4 attacks a turn with to attack and to damage built in with ml6 that are unpreventable, that will make some seriously dead models. Rogue Necromancy. Has already built in to attack and damage. Nicodem can give even more of those for him. Also Fast for this monstrosity is quite terrifying. Also Nicodem can heal him to keep him with his Three Headed rule so he keeps on getting those flips. The Valedictorian. Our beatstick henchwoman. Sold in the University of Transmortiis boxset, which is a very solid buy for Nicodem because then you can choose to summon the exact weapon you need as all the students are tailored to counter Constructs, Living or Undead threats, so you can wait to see what your opponent brings to the table and then summon a counter, beautiful. Valedictorian hits hard, is very durable, fast on it's own. Just make it worse for your opponent by giving her Fast and keep her even longer on the table with the healing. Everybody loves flips too. These are 3 solid options for a beatstick role. You want and can afford to bring one from the get go. Remember Decaying Aura to make things worse for your opponent. Support: Then the Support models. Nicodem can afford to bring more of these than others, so let's start with a few options on this department. Nurses. I rate these models as one of the best models in the game and my Nicodem always has one. Two? Some people use two, I never use more than one. What they do is make your beaters even worse than they are with +2 to damage, they can paralyze enemies from leaders to peons, everything with a very solid ca6. They also make everyone a scheme runner when in need. Or make your opponents on :-fate on all duels. Just solid gold for 5ss. (Sold separately but they also come in the McMourning boxset, a very good buy as you get a Flesh Construct, two of these, a Canine Remains and Sebastian. Plus one of the most fun masters in the game, McMourning.) Chiaki. Removes conditions, heals, pushes enemies, is durable. Synergizes very well with Nurses as you can Full Heal and Paralyze your own models. Say Nicodem or Izamu is at very low wounds. You full heal it with a Nurse and paralyze it. Then you take Chiaki and remove that Paralyze. Voila. Full wounds. (Sold in the Yan Lo boxset. You also get Ashigarus which are good minions.) Rotten Belles. Depending on schemes and points you have to spare these are solid gold. They cost 5ss so you can hire one from the get go or summon it in game if you see fit. You should get these though, they are another model that is among the very best in the game. (Sold separately but you find these in the Seamus boxset, where you get 3 of these, Sybelle who is a very very good Henchwoman too, as well as Seamus who is one of the most fun masters again in the game). Henchmen: Well you get Mortimer with Nico and he is just solid gold, one of the best movement tricks in the game for you whole crew basically with right positioning! Chatty to prevent and disrupt enemy schemes and Corpses to fuel the Summoning engine. Corpse bloat is a great upgrade for him to get even more out of him. Sybelle is a cheap and a very solid Henchwoman. She has amazing triggers with her upgrade and she becomes even worse with Fast which Nicodem as mentioned gives out like Candy. (sold in the Seamus box set) Toshiro for even more Fast, flips and support for minions. He is quite durable too, he hits quite hard and brings even more support. A solid consideration. (sold separately) Summonable minions: Now we get to where Nicodem shines. He just brings a solid list to the game from the get go and from there he builds it even better. Good go to minions that you will most likely like to summon is: Hanged. Seriously these are absolute monsters on their own, with Fast even worse for your opponent. You won't be making friends with these bad boys but you will be wrecking face. I wouldn't ever hire these with Nicodem, ever, they cost 9ss and you can summon them very easily, solid buy. (sold separately) Punk Zombies. I wouldn't hire these either. They cost 7ss which is a lot and they are quite easy for Nicodem to summon. Also they have Hard to Kill so they won't suffer from low wounds all that much. Solid solid summons. They hit hard as well. The Students. I mentioned these already but they are very solid to counter what you see on the other side of the table. Very good. I wouldn't hire them again either, because you never know what you will be facing and they are quite easy summons again. (Sold in University of Transmortiis) Mindless Zombies. These guys will be doing a lot card cycling and activation control. You take Maniacal Laugh and Undertaker upgrade, laugh up the corpses to Zombies and then start summoning out of those Zombies, so while you summon you also draw cards. Yeah. (sold separately in a 5 box.) Flesh Constructs. They have a ton of wounds, they hit quite okay but the best thing here is Devour. Which synergizes very well with Nurses Paralyze trick as they can insta kill models with Paralyze with a Ca6 and a (sold separately, but recommend getting the McMourning boxset) Rotten Belles. Board control. Get the enemy where you want and dispose of it. Just solid minions really. I can't speak highly enough of these. (sold in a 3 pack, recommend getting the Seamus box though) Scheme runners: Now we get to one more section I'd like bring out. You can bring these from the get go if you feel like it or summon them in game. Another good thing with Nicodem. Do note that the runners you summon can not interact the turn they are summoned in. Summoning sickness and all that. Canine remains. These are solid little critters with Nicodem. They can dig up corpses, do schemes, harass the enemy and when they die, you summon something even more worse out of them. Just very solid. (sold in a 3 pack) Necropunks. These are amazing. Among the very best of scheme runners in the game. With leap and 2 AP naturally that go to 3 AP with Nicodem giving them Fast. Well they do schemes like no one's business. (sold in a 3 pack, not available in plastic atm) Crooligans. Very good scheme runners too. (Sold in a 3 pack as well as the Molly boxset, good consideration to get the boxset again) Totems: Here we have 3 options really. Vulture. Nicodem's own little totem who is very solid indeed. I don't use it that much myself actually. But he is solid. Also a fun trick is to use the Vulture as a mobile pod for Undead Crowning to have the to damage where you need it. The Eyes and Ears that the Vulture has is a really potent and cool ability. Also for fun you can use the Vulture to carry around Mindless Zombies and drop them to enemies. Graveyard Spirit. This little bugger is very good with Izamu giving it armor 4. Armor 4 is no joke on a model such as Izamu. Haven't tried this one yet with other beatsticks but I've seen it used with a Rogue Necro and it was pretty annoying to face. (sold separately) Malifaux Child. Even more Fast for your models. (sold separately) There we have it a start of a Nicodem crew what you might want to consider and get. I will be updating this a long the way and I'd appreciate feedback and thoughts how to better this. Nicodem might be a bit expensive to start with as he likes to have a lot of models. But he is an absolute blast and well worth the money and time you put into him. You can always PM me for more info and if you want to talk tactics or ask questions or post them here. Cheers for reading, it was a long read but I hope it helped a bit with your struggle!

Hello! I am a long time Warmachine player and talked a friend of mine to give this game a try. I'm not sure his opinion but I love the setup of this game from the extra soul gems, the on-the-fly list build, the strategies and schemes, and the low model count. It was tough for me to decide what faction to try first, but went with Outcasts cause the Viks, cause, you know, girls with swords, and the whole Sister theme sounds cool. Listened to a lot of the Schemes and Stones podcast at work, though I understand its outdated, confirmed that I was going with the Outcasts (was debating Guild). Local store had the Von Schill box, which I bought, then the Levi box, and just got in the Viks box, plus Vanessa. Next pick probably is going to be Tara or Misaki. I know this isn't the best way to learn stuff, but everything sounds so cool! No charge Misaki, or time warping Tara! I guess what I'm looking for is the thing I'm guessing is going to be the hardest to grasp from Warmachine/Hordes. I saw the thread about what Master into which GG2018 Strat. But would it be possible to get a quick run down on each master and what they are good at? Nothing more than a sentence or two is good. And then what to expect out of each faction overall. I know that could be a lot to ask, but hoping to travel to some competitive stuff after NOVA depending on situation. This is my guess to make this easier: Viks - Two fisted cruise missile. Generally sounds like you send Vik of Blood in, then follow up with Vik of Ash and murder town everything they get close to. Do they kinda stick together as a pair? (Love them so much btw, if you know the Twins from Legion of Everblight, I would of loved if they worked like this instead) Von Schill (The Hulkamania) - I feel like he supports his Freikorps with a few abilities, but goes in with his Jack Knife? I read that he's more of a area control master, which is making more sense to me, granted I only played him once. Leveticus - Unkillable killer? I don't know much into him and picked the set up cause name drops, and Rusty Alice. Misaki - One fisted cruise missile, but I really like the idea of a full disguised/snare list and throw the opponent off by having to walk to each person. Is this a pipe dream of a list? - Misaki, Rusty Alice, Ronin, Oiran, Hans. Tara - I wanted to avoid spamming with this game, since Warmachine/Hordes is going through a rough patch of spam lists meta in my opinion, but seems like that's the way to play her? Beast bomb as a side strategy to get The Nothing Beast in there to hassle the opponent up. Jack Daw - put Curses on models and pull Tormented models around Hamelin and Parker Barrows - No idea. Solo models I'm looking into also since its not all about the box sets - Scion of the Void, Hannah, Hans, Lazarus, and the Midnight Stalker. As for the other factions, got no clue. I have some general ideas and some not a single thing. Thanks for any addition information! PSA - feel free to plug stores and events near SW Virginia to keep an eye on for events in the near future. Thanks!

Hello there New Players and Old Players alike! I've noticed this coming up in a lot of different threads on different forums and in game store discussions and thought it could use some additional discussion and reference: TERRAIN IS A BIG DEAL IN MALIFAUX The amount, placement and type of terrain will affect your game. And not in a small way either. Now most people will realize quite quickly that if they use a traditional Warmahordes board of 2 trees and a small hillock Masters like Perdita get muchmuch stronger as their shooting attacks dont have to worry about pesky LoS or Cover, so we have to cover the board in a lot more stuff to make things fair. Great guide Shine, seeya next time. But wait, picture the following scenario: Edonil and Mako are having a game. Edonil wants to try out his Seamus crew and Mako just finished building an entire Western town-themed board so they decide to play on that. The board has a moderate density of cool looking buildings and they start their game. Since each building has the blocking trait because of its solid walls Edonil has an easy time using Seamus' Back Alley action, which allows him to move massive distances when out of LoS, and snipes out large portions of Mako's crew, costing him the game. Both agree that Seamus felt a bit Overpowered and wonder how he got through Playtesting like this. However, in this scenario the board density might be fine but the terrain type is not. This board is nearly 100% terrain with the "Blocking" type. And while it looks awesome it gives Masters like Seamus a huge advantage and Masters like Perdita a huge disadvantage. Think of it another way, a board full of buildings is going to wind up as fair as a board full of rivers. Great for one type of crew (ones that can shoot over water) but less good for the type of crew that needs to Oregon Trail right over the river. This is Your crew on the Unbalanced Board Ok, so how do we handle this? Well locally we use a rough rule of thirds. For density squish all your terrain into 1/3 of the board. Fill that third right up. That terrain should look like this: 1/3 of the terrain should be blocking. Buildings, walls, Piles of crates, etc. 1/3 of the terrain should be obscuring. Vegetation, Walls with holes in them, an area of Mysterious Fog, etc 1/3 of the terrain should be Difficult. Rivers or water, uneven or rough flooring, snow, mud, blood, disco flooring, etc Then we want to spread that terrain out from the third we've bundled it into. This is an area that requires a bit more finese and less quick and easy to remember rules. I spread it out and make it look like a cohesive board then consult my opponent to make changes or perhaps notice things like the inacessible sniper's nest I accidently made for models with "From the Shadows" (an ability that lets models set up outside their deployment zone, like in the clocktower that would take 3 turns to get into normally). More experience with different models will help you in figuring out placement and what to avoid. In general though you want to have a roughly even dispersement of terrain types (So as not to start the melee walking master behind three rivers). Experience will help with figuring out the benefits of specific terrain setups So lets go back to Mako and Edonil. In their game they were missing a lot of the terrain types, but Mako still wants to use the board he worked so hard on. Well, he still can. Look closely at your terrain elements. Mako's Saloon has windows so he and Edonil both agree that it will be Obscuring to shoot through the windows of it and angle it so that the blocking wall wouldn't be blocking Mako's LoS to Seamus from most angles. They say that the main "roads" between the buildings have become muddy from over use and are difficult open terrain. The abandoned church has enough holes in the walls that its considered Obscuring now and the floors inside are going to be difficult as well. Their next game finds Seamus having a lot more trouble Back Alleying and Mako able to more accurately predict where Seamus is going to try to go and how to counter him. Mako still loses, but the game is much more enjoyable. This is a rough guideline of what to do for terrain. You can most certainly have more or less terrain, change the percents, but this guide will help you in experiencing Crews and Masters in a setting they were designed for, giving more meaning to how you set up your crew initially and just generally ensuring a more balanced and fun gameplay setting.

Hello everyone! This is my first post so bear with me here. I have been playing Predita for a while and have been having quite a bit of success but when I go on the forums the lists are very different from what I bring. Let's work together to create an amazing Predita list. Obviously we can't be prepared for all schemes but we are trying to create a balanced list for many schemes. Anyways here is my current list: 1.Predita -Trick shooting 2.Fransisco -Wade in 3.Niño 4.Brutal Emisary -Confluence of the Hunt 5.Death Marshal 6.Lone Marshal 7.Austringer 8. 3 Soulstones (Total of 5) I use this lists in most games sometimes bringing in Santiago with Hermanos De Armas instead of the Lone Marshel if I need more range or offense (Make Them Suffer) and the Marshel for defense (Body Guard) That is the long and the short of it! But that is just me. What do you think? Leave a comment on how you would change the list. All ideas are great to here! Thanks for your support!

Is there a good/comprehensive guide for playing Leveticus, including match ups, crew compositions and the like? I am already familiar with the content on PullMyFinger.

I was a little surprised that there wasn’t already a Leveticus tactica on the forums here. I figured I would take a shot at one. I'd also like to link to an essay I wrote a few months back, Why I Love M2E Leveticus. Much props out to all the badass Leveticus players I’ve learned from. Especially drool_bucket and Lucidicide, who are premier players who really know their stuff. Leveticus is a steampunk necromancer, a scavenger who recovers stray parts both dead and mechanical and salvages them into horrible new creations. He’s quite a departure from most Masters, in that his mechanics revolve around the fact that he’ll probably die several times and keep coming back. He also has the dubious pleasure of having the absolute largest possible hiring pool of any master in the game. Playing against Leveticus the first time can be a shock: he’s easy to kill but keeps coming back. His attacks almost always hit, do decent to huge damage, and bypass most defenses. He jumps around the board. He summons by killing you, and his Core Crew models all have unusual mechanics of dying, being reborn, being created, and combining together. Once you get used to him, he’s still very dangerous and potent. His resilience and his mobility all rely on odd crew mechanics: to come back from the dead, he needs a Hollow Waif, plus another model to anchor the Hollow Waif.

Hi all, just finished my second big tactics article, this time on Mei. Starting off... In keeping with aggressive pose, Mei Feng is a powerhouse and anchor of her crew, which I quite enjoy, as I tend towards support commanders, so I'm very much in to the idea of a strong commander who can still run support a little. She's got a bit of an odd character because, while she's a bouncing death ball and has some useful defensive support, it's her Henchman, Kang, who brings more of the power and offensive support to the crew. Link to the main article

Hi all, just finished my second big tactics article, this time on Mei. Starting off... In keeping with aggressive pose, Mei Feng is a powerhouse and anchor of her crew, which I quite enjoy, as I tend towards support commanders, so I'm very much in to the idea of a strong commander who can still run support a little. She's got a bit of an odd character because, while she's a bouncing death ball and has some useful defensive support, it's her Henchman, Kang, who brings more of the power and offensive support to the crew. Link to the main article

I've been hosting a lot of game nights and I've noticed something coming up a lot: New Players don't (1)Focus. It's understandable, its not a specific action on your model's card, its not cool like slapping someone in a Pine Box, but it is what's going to start winning you more games. (1) Focus, as mentioned, is a general action so any model in the game can take it. Some are built around it, being able to gain the benefits for less AP or through other means, but it can be very worthwhile to spend your precious AP on using it for its regular cost. Focus is going to net you a on your attack flips and a on your damage flips. Most commonly people start venturing into Focused attacks when they have a shooting crew. The you suffer from shooting into cover gets canceled out by your to attack. Which is awesome, you're far more likely to hit someone when you can cheat your attack flip and arent taking the worst of two flips. Even when you aren't suffering a penalty, the highest of two cards flipped is pretty nice. But the real power of Focus is in that to damage. So we all know the table: Ties are :-fate, 1-5 is , 6-10 is neutral and if by some Black Jokered twist of fate you beat your opponent by 11+ you can have a . Now 6-10 points above your opponent is tricky. You can do it sure, but more likely with something whimpy. If you have Nekima or a Coryphee Duet on the table, your opponent is going to be saving some cards to try and keep those beater models from beating you by a wide margin. But if you focused, you're now going to be on a neutral flip AND be able to cheat against most models (reducing the bite of Hard to Wound on others) so long as you beat them by more than a tie. This in particular is great for models with higher than average moderate damage. Coryphee for example have a 2/4/5 damage range, so having them able to cheat damage means you can double your damage for a 6. Now you are giving up an AP to focus in most cases. I think a lot of players can fall into "well, I hit for 2/3/4 so if I hit them twice for min damage, thats 4, which is better than 3". Or simply just having more opportunities TO hit your opponent, which IS true. You shouldnt be focusing every model every activation. But you should be focusing models you want to hit for max damage. A 1/2/4 profile is not going to get that 4 very often without focus, but a lucky flip from Neutral is going to quadruple your damage. And dont think of it as a wasted high card on lowly minions, that high card was going to be a lot more wasted when it was discarded in favour of the Ace beneath it. Anyway, play around with Focus. Its a very powerful ability and you're really going to like cheating Red Jokers in for damage more often.

I'm Dirial, and welcome to Malifaux! If you are reading this, chances are you are a beginning Malifaux player. You have probably picked up a Crew Box because you liked the look of. Someone in your play group did the same thing. You started your first match and you were utterly destroyed by turn 2. And now you worry about the game's balance and/or if you picked a sub-par crew. Alternatively, you are an experienced player with a few matches under your belt. And now this greenhorn marches in, with his new unpainted crew no one in your group plays. And that greenhorn blasted you from the table and you doubt your sanity or something. Alternatively, you are a veteran player coming in here to give your nod of approval or hark on me. If so, feel free to correct me or chime in with more advice. This is a small guide on how to deal with ranged crews. Since similar questions were asked repeatedly in the forums, I thought collecting the answers in one place might make for a useful resource for new players. Normally, these questions are about a single Master that gives people grieve. Often, it's Perdita Ortega. Also often, it's Rasputina. Sometimes, it's other Masters, too. And almost always, the problems would have been similar if one of the other ranged Masters would have been on the other side of the table. So, I'll first talk about ranged crews in general, and then about some specific Masters. This is not a guide on how to beat ranged crews handily. I give in to the wishful thinking that the game is perfectly balanced and that winning doesn't come down to ranged or not ranged but gaining victory points. This guide should turn the game into a tactically challenging experience for both players. So, first, some short things about me, so that you can evaluate my pointers. Earthside, my name is Florian and I'm a psychologist from central Germany. (I'm no native speaker, obviously, so if some error disturbs your reading experience, please PM me and I will correct it.) I played Warhammer in my youth and I'm an avid Hordes player. I started Malifaux just when the beta for 2nd Edition started. I don't have that much gaming experience since our group is small and spread out, but I make it my pleasure to read as much as possible. In that regard, I thank all the more experienced players and forum users whose ideas I have shamelessly copied and pasted. Also, I play Guild, so if you have problems with ranged crews you will usually find me on the trouble making side of the table. Now, what to do if you get riddled with lead in an absolutely unfun way: Step 1: Be a good sport about it. This is my inner psychologist talking but especially if your opponent is learning the game, he doesn't want to hear how overpowered his crew is and that his victories are tainted by insufferable cheese. Furthermore, don't rant at him for bringing such a crew in the first place. Hurt feelings don't help anyone. Instead, talk about it and ask him for his opinion. Most people don't like winning too easily any more than losing that way. Now, if you ask yourself „What is the condescending git talking about? Who would do such a thing?“, you didn't need this first step. Which is an admirable trait. Step 2: Check your terrain. If you come from other games like Warhammer or Warmachine, chances are you are used to way too little terrain. Read the following articles by Ratty and Mister Shine: How much terrain do I need What terrain do I need and why This is the most important step for bringing your games up to balance. Too much terrain and the ranged crew will be at a disadvantage, to little and it's the other way around. Step 3: Now that the terrain is properly placed you should have a good look at it. Watch for fire corridors. For sniper positions. Regard the table from all sides so you aren't surprised by some window you didn't see. Most ranged crews will let you deploy your models first, either for From the Shadows, or just to see where you will go. Choose the side that will grant good cover or where the ranged crew will have to move before the get good lines of sight. In short, know your battle field and don't walk into a shooting range. Step 4: Be prepared to lose stuff. Ranged crews do their damage before the melee starts. It's only natural. Often, your opponent will play a mind game where he tries to kill an important model Turn 1 so you are too scared to come for him. If this brings him another turn of shooting it's worth the investment. Don't fall into this trap. Keeping your distance will not keep you safe. Clinging to your models will make you vulnerable to this psychological warfare. Many ranged models are severely hampered if they are in melee. Double walking into melee can be worth it even if you can't attack. It will keep the shooters busy and your other models can come out of cover to line up charges. Be prepared to lose that tar pit model, as well. Step 5: Identify lynchpin models and take them out. In short, know your enemy. Read his cards. If you get beaten, call for a rematch. In most crews, some models are keeping the crew together. The have an important bonus or guard the sniper or can get others out of melee. These have to die. The faster the better. Step 6: Don't bring a knife to a gun fight. If you know the opponent will shoot (if he declared Gremlins or Guild, and probably Outcasts, as well, or if you know him and he just prefers shooting) bring some anti-shooting tech. Many factions have some models who can generate cover or block line of sight. The latter thing is generally best, but cover or similar abilities seriously hamper the damage potential of shooters. Step 7: Okay, now comes the obligatory, but ultimately best advice: Play your Strategy and Schemes. Malifaux is a game about victory conditions. Theoretically, you should choose your crew for the victory conditions and the faction of your opponent. This is skewed normally for beginners, as they only have one or two crews and normally know what their opponent has, as well. But the game is not won by killing the most models or the enemy Master. It's won by keeping your goals and the goals of the opponent in mind all time. Deny your opponent his victory points while playing for yours. If the opponent has to come to your half of the table, wait for them to do so, for example. It will save you walking into the gun line. I hope some of these pointers can help you on your way to the tactically challenging game you deserve. For their (unknowing) contributions to this first part and the second below, I'd like to thank all veteran forumites who give advice to new players, and especially dgraz, Fetid Strumpet, Mister Shine and Ratty. Now, I will get into some of the crews the play the ranged game with some more specific advice. Since I haven't played that many of these, I would greatly appreciate someone chiming in. I will gladly edit such advice into my post later.

I actually posted this as a response to someone asking for help on how to learn the game in a month before moving to college. This is a few things I picked up when I started playing, and things I really wish I had known when I started. Feel free to add to what I’ve said, and correct me where I’m wrong. I hope this helps a few people out at least! I can tell you that it will be more than helpful to go over the downloadables here. Read all the stat cards a few times. You don't need to memorize them all, but it helps to have seen the abilities that are common and that you can expect to see in games. Try to pick out some of them and note that you need to cross-reference the effect a certain rule has ie: "What does poison do?". Those are the things that I really found I needed to know when playing my first games as they weren't necessarily written on the cards in every case and I would have to ask or open my rules book (don't be afraid to do this!). That being said, it's a little bit irritating now to see someone searching through the original rules book. Grab the new-compact version. Buy 2 copies, keep one in your car and read it whenever you have downtime instead of playing a cell-phone game. Also, be sure to go on your local store’s forum if they have one, introduce yourself, let them know that you’d like to start playing there, and I’m sure you’ll be welcomed into the group, if not forced into the store by gamers anxious to have new models to fight against! A List of Recommended Items to Purchase to Begin Malifaux: · Two Decks of Malifaux Cards, One Puppet, one normal colored deck of your choice · At least 2 Box Sets of the same Faction (ie: Arcanists: Rasputina and Marcus) · The Totems for each of the masters you purchased. (ie: Essence of Power and Jackalope) Thanks to Sephiroa for this description of Totems: a totem is a small minion connected to a master, every master has a specific totem for him/her rasputina = wendigo justice = scales of justice mcmourning = zombie chihuahua etc... In addition to Master Specific Totems, there are also faction totems: arcanists = essence of power ressers = grave spirit etc... if the master dies, so does the totem · Glass Beads to use as Soulstones (really helps with the feel of the game, and there is no question about what they are on the table for) · The Rules Manual (compact version) Some Nice Things to Have if You Can Afford Them: · A Carrying Case of some sort. I use a Pack-Mini from BattleFoam. It holds 2 full crews plus some extra models for variance, my cards, and beads no problem. · A second copy of the rules manual to keep in your car or backpack all the time. · I recommend buying the 2 core rulebooks, however it isn’t essential, but if you can afford it, these are great things to have for so many reasons. Here are a few things I would really recommend doing out of the gate to make learning the actual game easier: · Keep a copy of the short rules with you at every game. · Study your own cards to the point where you have them memorized completely. · Have your cards laminated – removes the need for HP counters · Have some form of carrying bag or tray – don’t want to stress over transporting stuff · Keep laminated copies of the common talents download with you for quick reference · Keep 2 decks of malifaux cards with you and be acquainted with the artwork so you aren’t distracted by the gorgeous artwork on them. And be sure you can identify what card is what. I struggled with the puppet cards for a bit, they aren’t too clear what they are at first glance. · If the models aren’t standing up really sturdy, add weights (coins) to the underside of the bases to avoid models falling over on terrain and possibly snapping staves or arms off during the game. · Following the last point, keep a small tube of model glue with you that you’ve used before and are familiar with for field repairs ·Be sure to go into a game with an open mind and humble attitude. You will encounter rules you do not know, and see abilities that seem OP and wreck your face. That said, most people are generally nice and helpful if you’re willing to accept their help and not be argumentative. · With the above being said, do not be afraid to question a rule or ability. Ask to see your opponents’ cards if you aren’t sure, or even just are curious of their abilities before the game starts, or even mid-game. It’s totally acceptable. Refer to your rules book as you need. Don’t be embarrassed, none of us have every rule memorized (excluding some OCD players I’m sure). Players won’t fault you for being sure you’re playing by the rules. · Shuffle your cards very, very well, and always offer your opponent the chance to cut your deck every shuffle. Cut theirs every time. This removes any question of counting or cheating in any fashion with the cards. · Keep obvious markers for special abilities. It’s paramount to know what status effects are out, what counters are on the table, etc.… If you play a Ressurectionist, you probably want to keep a few corpse counters. That sort of thing.