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Tara/SotV Fastball Special v2


PossiblyInsane

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Essentially, this list uses Tara, Hannah, and the Hodgepodge Emissary to bury a bunch of nasty short-range bruisers and the Scion of the Void's action lending to unbury them in the middle of the enemy crew on the first turn. Naturally, this is great to use against shooty crews (which will either have to scatter all around the board fairly quickly or get tied up in melee), but not so good against melee crews (which will thank you for closing the distance before turning most of your models into a fine paste)

I had taken a rough stab at this concept around eight months ago, wherein rules misunderstandings were sorted out and some advice on good and bad matchups was given. Since that was eight months ago, I've started a new thread for clarity and to avoid thread-necromancy (this not being that smelly Resser's thread :P). As before, thoughts/advice on the current list would be greatly appreciated.

 

50 ss Tara (Outcasts) List: Fastball Special v2

Master: Tara (Cache 4); Upgrades - Eternal Journey (1 ss), Knowledge of Eternity (2 ss), Oath Keeper (1 ss).

Henchmen: Scion of the Void (8ss), Hannah (10 ss), Montressor (9 ss); Upgrades - Ancient Tomes (2 ss, Hannah), Brick by Brick (0 ss, Montressor), Fearful Whispers (1 ss, Montressor)

Enforcers: Hodgepodge Emissary (10 ss); Upgrades - Conflux of Nothingness (0 ss)

Minions: Void Wretch (4 ss)

Total: 48 ss, the remaining 2 of which can be saved/spent on upgrades or very cheap models to better suit a given matchup/strategy/scheme.

 

Basic Play Strategy: Your crew should deploy close to the edge of your deployment zone in a nice cluster within effect range of each other. Except the Void Wretch, who finds a nice piece of cover to hide in for quite likely the remainder of the game. Tara activates first, discards Oath Keeper for Fast and either hits Hannah gently with her sword (to maximize probability of success) or uses Pull the Void (to minimize potential damage) together with a Glimpse the Void trigger to bury Hannah. Next, Tara uses Whispers from Darkness to borrow the buried Hannah's Void Record and buries Montressor. While the SotV could be buried instead at this step, there is a remote possibility that your enemy might try and snipe the SotV across the board on their activation, allowing her to bury herself and saving you a (0) action later (which will be in short supply). Next, Tara uses Pull the Void on the Hodgepodge Emissary to give him Fast. While the extra AP generated by Oath Keeper isn't strictly necessary, it acts as insurance against a Black Joker flip in Tara's activation (which would otherwise remove a model from your initial offensive) by letting you repeat a step, and lets Tara move up the board toward the action a bit quicker if you don't. Finally, Tara uses Eternal Moment to make up for her largely stationary first activation, letting her move up the board later.

Next, the Hodgepodge Emissary uses Into the Maw to bury the remaining Henchman, and moves 15" towards the enemy crew. In the unlikely event that SotV got buried during the enemy's activation in the meantime, he can get an extra 4" of movement by taking A Weary Road. Then, he borrows SotV's The Hollowing to unbury either Hannah or Montressor. I would usually recommend Montressor, as he has more mobility then Hannah for subsequent positioning, a larger threat range, and can stop the enemy crew from scattering by Tossing the Noose. That being said, if the enemy crew has a large number of models in a roughly 10" circle that are squishy enough for Montressor to survive close contact with, you may wish to save his (0) action for Fearful Whispers and mass immobilization by unburying Hannah first instead.

Montressor uses his activation to close the distance further and either trap 2-3 enemy models in base contact or secure and paralyze a key enemy model. Keep in mind Montressor's slight squishyness, and avoid entangling anything he'd be unlikely to survive a round of close combat with. Hannah (if going last), can take the opportunity to hit Montressor's trapped models with a few Horrifying Ghost Censer blasts (synergizing with Montressor's crowd control, Mocking Laughter's penalty to willpower, and Comfort in Fear if you had enough models in range to make it worthwhile) or go after stragglers. Remember to position to allow your second and third models to unbury within about 6" of the Hodgepodge Emissary, so they can get Fast from his Screaming from the Void.

The first model to unbury then uses their (0) action to use The Hollowing and unbury the SotV, who will have taken 4 wounds from lending actions. While Returning Home lets her avoid any enemy action targeting her, you still want to get some use from her this activation and a clever opponent might be able to finish her off with enough indirect damage, so be careful where you put her. Once actually activated, however, she can move with relative impunity (thanks to her aforementioned Returning Home) with a wide range of good possible actions: finishing off weak models trapped by Montressor, tailing stragglers to stop them from scattering too much, drawing cards with The True Path trigger (which, given the potentially resource intensive first few activations, you may be in sore need of), marking a dangerous model with Forgotten to Time for burying later, or even running the objective (should the enemy crew be sufficiently disrupted). Just remember to use The Hollowing to unbury your last Henchman in a good position before going too far out of the way.

The lonesome Void Wretch is mostly there as a safety net for the SotV, healing her, removing adverse conditions, and unburying her so she doesn't get sacrificed at the end of the turn. As such, he'll likely want to stay as far away from trouble as possible, though he could run objectives if the SotV hasn't needed to bury herself and the enemy crew lack the range or mobility to deal with him.

Finally, Tara reactivates and either moves up the board or runs objectives, depending on how well the alpha strike went (While 'Alpha Strike' is a fair bit cooler sounding as a list name, it lacks the cheesy connotations appropriate to this list). Come turn two, the enemy crew has either been largely contained, scattered as much as they can in the course of five activations, and either they or you are in serious trouble, depending on how well they can handle three fairly nasty models appearing in their midst.

 

List Variations and Matchups: This list has been primarily designed with Guild and Gremlin matchups in mind, due to the likelihood of facing ranged crews and their range of Living models vulnerable to horror duels. While this list can play like a regular-ish Tara crew if the fastball special maneuver would probably get your models stuck out of position or killed, it may not fair quite as well as regular lists.

A respectable portion of Montressor's defense comes from his Terrifying (Living) and his crowd control abilities. If a matchup would likely limit the effectiveness of either of those (fairly likely with Arcanists, Neverborn, or Ressurectionists), substituting another relatively mobile and durable Outcast Henchman (such as Taelor) would probably be a good idea.

While the listed alpha strike ideally has a 31"-35" threat range (3 Emissary moves [3x5"] + large Montressor base [2"] + Montressor's Nimble [4"] + optional Montressor move [4"] + Toss the Noose range [10"]), enough severe or blocking terrain on the table might prevent the Emissary from getting close enough to the enemy deployment zone. In such cases a Freikorps Trapper could be exchanged for every upgrade except Eternal Journey and Ancient Tomes (needed to bury the models efficiently) to deploy up the board and unbury the Henchmen, but doing so makes the list extremely tight on soul stones, vulnerable to an unlucky Black Joker during set up, and much less versatile.

Karina could also be substituted for most of the upgrades to add more Bury/Fast synergy and some more sustainability from summons, but to do so one has to sacrifice 5" of fastball threat range, Tara's Knowledge of Eternity, and either insurance against the Black Joker or Montressor's Fearful Whispers.

A similar list could probably be made for the Ressers (for example, using a buried mercenary Killjoy, Bete Noir, and a suicidal Crooligan. Or just a mercenary Hannah and a not-as suicidal Crooligan), but, again, the Resser's thread would probably be the better place for that.

 

If you've had the patience to read through that respectably sized wall of text, then again, thoughts/advice would be greatly appreciated.

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Sounds nice, I play resser Tara and miss Hannah burying action. Maybe Im wrong but the emissary casting into the maw and borrowing the unburying action from the sotv would make two 0ap actions? Also theres a weak point in this. Unburing montressor after your second activation so close to the enemy without companion or acomplice (maybe im wrong) gives the enemy the oportunity to retaliate with his heavy beater or master. 

Well thought anyway, I'll see if something similar can be done in resser faction ;)

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1 hour ago, mojopin said:

Sounds nice, I play resser Tara and miss Hannah burying action. Maybe Im wrong but the emissary casting into the maw and borrowing the unburying action from the sotv would make two 0ap actions?

You are correct, there. However, the Hodgepodge Emissary has Instinctual by default, which lets him take two (0) actions during his Activation (provided they're both different), giving him quite a bit of versatility.

 

1 hour ago, mojopin said:

Also theres a weak point in this. Unburing montressor after your second activation so close to the enemy without companion or acomplice (maybe im wrong) gives the enemy the oportunity to retaliate with his heavy beater or master.

Also a good point. Montressor's durability has been buffed a bit recently with his free Brick by Brick upgrade (+1 Hard to Wound) and an extra two wounds from errata, but his low defence puts him at quite the risk. Fortunately he can actually get Companion with this list; the Hodgepodge Emissary can take a (1) action to give a friendly non-leader a Trinket upgrade (ignoring the usual restrictions), one of which (Memento) grants Companion. The initial threat range would have to be reduced by 5" to do it, but that might be worth it for the added protection of a chain-activation. And of course, if the enemy crew drafts enough beaters or a dangerous enough master to seriously threaten him after he's had a chance to do his pulling shenanigans, then it might be a decent idea to forget the alpha strike and just play like a regular Tara crew.

 

1 hour ago, mojopin said:

Well thought anyway, I'll see if something similar can be done in resser faction ;)

Thank you! I shall look forward to it!

 

1 hour ago, Freman said:

Remember that Hannah can copy a Death Marshal's bury ability.

This is true. Since the Death Marshall ability specifies that the target is unburied after the ability-using model is removed from play, it does mean Hannah would have to either stick around the deployment zone or walk for a while if she did so, otherwise the model she buried would pop out again. This could be mitigated by unburying her target model on the other side before being buried herself for the teleport trick (maybe on turn two), though another beater is required in her place to give the alpha strike its punch.

Mind you, taking a Death Marshall instead of the Hodgepodge Emissary for the final bury action definitely saves on points, allowing the possibility of taking another strong Minion or Henchman for the alpha strike, and would give Hannah some extra bury-synergy when she does get into the action. All that would also make him a good candidate for the Resser version of the list, since the Carrion Emissary doesn't get Instinctual (limiting it's effectiveness as a bury and delivery device).

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My version involves just the SotV and your beater henchman of choice. I works fine with rezzer Tara too and gives a huge threat range.

Bury SotV with Pull the Void and move up the board  (or ping your beater for fast too - especially something like the Valadictorian, Archie, Taelor or the NB)

Bury beater henchman with a Death Marshal (or wait with this until after the next step)

Move all your other stuff - the more the better. Bombs work better when they can't be reacted to.

Reactivate Tara and move her into position using her last (0) to drop the Scion.

Scion can then move if needed and still drop the beater where it needs to be.

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2 hours ago, Manxfaux said:

My version involves just the SotV and your beater henchman of choice. I works fine with rezzer Tara too and gives a huge threat range.

Bury SotV with Pull the Void and move up the board  (or ping your beater for fast too - especially something like the Valadictorian, Archie, Taelor or the NB)

Bury beater henchman with a Death Marshal (or wait with this until after the next step)

Move all your other stuff - the more the better. Bombs work better when they can't be reacted to.

Reactivate Tara and move her into position using her last (0) to drop the Scion.

Scion can then move if needed and still drop the beater where it needs to be.

Do you mean something like this?

Tara (4ss cache)
+Knowledge of Eternity (2)
+Obliteration Symbiote (2)

The Nothing Beast (10)
+Void Shield (0)
+Oath Keeper (1)

Scion of the Void (8)
+Oath Keeper (1)

Death Marshal (6)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)

I am still waiting for my pieces to show up in the mail, but I think the upgrades make sense. Unless you would suggest something else.

 

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2 hours ago, farmoar said:

Do you mean something like this?

Tara (4ss cache)
+Knowledge of Eternity (2)
+Obliteration Symbiote (2)

The Nothing Beast (10)
+Void Shield (0)
+Oath Keeper (1)

Scion of the Void (8)
+Oath Keeper (1)

Death Marshal (6)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)
Void Wretch (4)

I am still waiting for my pieces to show up in the mail, but I think the upgrades make sense. Unless you would suggest something else.

 

That's pretty much what I have run before, yes.

Personally I leave out Obliteration Symbiote and put in Dead of Winter to save a SS and allow you to dump some cards to prevent damage to your crew (win/win). Most of the unburying is via the SotV anyway. I can then drop Oathkeeper from the Scion for the Malifaux child as an extra cheap activation and an extra way to hand out slow/fast.

I've had it alpha so hard the game was all but over half way through turn 2 - and the opposite; where my black joker screwed my first NB focussed attack and his red blocked my second. Lost 2nd turn initiative despite plus flips and SS. Once the NB goes down without taking out a few things it's a real struggle.

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