Best outcast minions

[Rachet]

Hello! 

I'm fairly new to the game, I play Viks and I'm having a blast. I'm experimenting with various henchmen and enforcers (Hannah, Vanessa, Taylor, Strongarm so far) however I run into the same problem over and over. Given how heavy Viks tend to go on upgrades and that most henchmen and enforcers in Outcasts are 10 SS models those 6 SS Ronins, awesome as they are, seem way too expensive, to the point where I cut one of them recently and just ran with two. 

So I'm wondering. What in your opinion are the best minions Outcasts have and why, for which role etc. 

Share your thoughts, pretty please!

[Adran]

I would say the best outcast minion is 

The hodgepodge effigy. Its a generalist, in that it provides some support and a relatively durable doby for its cost.

I would split 2nd between the Ronin for combat and the Ratcatcher for schemes

 

[Freman]

Trapper.

Winged Plague.

Others are situational I think.

[DXXXVIII]

By minion you mean cheap minion? when Ronin  are allready too expensive.
We have hodgpodge effigy, void wretches and Winged Plague.
Abominations are ok as card draw.

[Rachet]

10 minutes ago, DXXXVIII said:

By minion you mean cheap minion? when Ronin  are allready too expensive.

Ye, exactly, ronins cost too much while being mediocre in what i want them to do: schemes.

[DXXXVIII]

For  scheming,
Winged plague or void wretch.

Winged plague: Defensivve through Armor.  Ignore terrain through flight, walk 6. (can get cheap reactivates from rat catchers)
Void wretch: Defensive through incorporeal. Ignore terrain through incorporeal. Walk 5.  (0)-Action to slow schemer-hunters.

Best schemer combo to my taste are rat catcher and winged plague. you get 3 activations out  of 10SS, winged plague  with reactivate gets you a lot ddone and rat catchers have "dont mind me"

Best cheap solo schemer probably big jake. Very good for his points counts as 2 models and has dont mind me.

[FinalForm]

7 hours ago, Adran said:

I would split 2nd between the Ronin for combat 

 

With all my respect- this sounds like a trolling of some sort, can you explain this?
In my experience ronins are as useful as Desperate Mercs. I never succeded with em and they never did enough with their 5MI, puny damage and 1".
Maybe(this is totaly possible) I just did it wrong.


As for my opinion-
Trapper is one of the best shooty models anywhere.
Void wretches are good shemerunners and can dodge some beating in second half of the turn.
Effigy is really good wel lrounded model.

Honorable mention goes to Bandidos and Dead outlaws.
Both models are good in Parker and pretty useful in number of schemes.

[CapnBloodbeard]

With others - Ronin's seem highly overrated.  Maybe it's because I'm combat oriented, and Ronins you really want to be avoiding combat.  Just run their schemes and do nothing else.  You never want 3 Ronin.  Even 2 Ronin, unlikely unless you want to make advantage of their no-charge.

 

Wyrd are funny like that - they tend to put 3 models in a box when you don't want 3 of the darn things

 

Isn't Wokou Raider a minion?  expensive but useful....well, looks useful.  I don't have any. 

I usually prefer Freikorpsmenn over the Ronin - but they are a very basic, boring model.  Going to echo everybody else's sentiments. 

Convict gunslingers are a good 7SS model too if you want cheap.

 

What sort of list are you running Ratchet?

[Freman]

Although just to be precise, Convict Gunslingers are Enforcers.

[CapnBloodbeard]

45 minutes ago, Freman said:

Although just to be precise, Convict Gunslingers are Enforcers.

Ah of course.  Aren't trappers also enforcers?

[Freman]

No. Trappers are minions. They'd probably be broken if we could give them Scout the Field.

[Math Mathonwy]

12 hours ago, FinalForm said:

With all my respect- this sounds like a trolling of some sort, can you explain this?
In my experience ronins are as useful as Desperate Mercs. I never succeded with em and they never did enough with their 5MI, puny damage and 1".
Maybe(this is totaly possible) I just did it wrong.

Note that it is "ML" (like MeLee) not "MI"  

Ronin divide opinions. Joel, who tends to win tournaments left and right likes them so much that he has been including two in most Zipp crews he has been using.

The big thing about Ronin is how weirdly durable they are. They take a lot of AP to get rid of if you play them well. Since they can't be charged, the enemy often needs to walk and then hit. Two AP spent and due to Ronin having six wounds, they are unlikely to get them to HtK in one hit. Ronin have an in-built Push so next turn it's quite possibly the same thing. Again two AP and now the Ronin is at HtK. At which point she can turn into Soul Stones.

And it's even worse if your weak damage is 2 and you hit that twice.

They also have Flurry and ignore Armor. That last bit makes them very dangerous against some very durable models.

[Joel]

In 2016 I ran at least 1 ronin in every list I ran, over 110 games, across 7 factions, and went as high as 4 ronin in some lists.

at no point did I have cause to regret my choice.

Math is right about their durability, but I'd also add that the next target trigger on their sword can be incredibly useful, and that 2/3/5 damage spread a lot more scary when the crow trigger allows you to unleash a severe or RJ from your hand.  

I lost count of the izamus, peacekeepers, even masters that my ronin swooped in and dispatched.  Also how many stashes they guarded, prisoners taken, accusations denied, headhunters left headless and soulstones generated.

i was using them at 7ss for much of that year and considered them well-priced, at 6ss in outcasts they strike me as a bargain. 

[Adran]

14 hours ago, FinalForm said:

With all my respect- this sounds like a trolling of some sort, can you explain this?
In my experience ronins are as useful as Desperate Mercs. I never succeded with em and they never did enough with their 5MI, puny damage and 1".
Maybe(this is totaly possible) I just did it wrong.


As for my opinion-
Trapper is one of the best shooty models anywhere.
Void wretches are good shemerunners and can dodge some beating in second half of the turn.
Effigy is really good wel lrounded model.

Honorable mention goes to Bandidos and Dead outlaws.
Both models are good in Parker and pretty useful in number of schemes.

Not trolling. Ronin have a set of options in almost all circumstances to alter the board to their advantage. (Although I quite like the desperate merc if I want cheap bodies). They aren't my first choice as a scheme runner, but they can do it fine when they need to. (being able to escape engagement with their trigger and drop a scheme is powerful, so I wouldn't call them bad scheme runners)

I'll agree the trapper is a good shooty minion that can shape the initial battlefield, but thats largely it. And shooty models can be a trap in many games, they are rarely as good as ml models even when they come with better stats. 

I rate Void wretchs as scheme runners only on certain set ups, and with a decent anti scheme runner tech in their abiltiy to bury the enemy scheme runners or make them slow, but most of the time I expect them to die too fast, and I don't often play on boards where Flight or Incorporeal give a huge advantage, (Sure its gives a small advantage, but a lot of the time its not going to make the void wretch drop more markers than a desperate merc would). I've not bought winged plagues, but likewise I'm not a huge fan of flight, and the extra walk only gets me so far. Don't mind me is much more powerful than raw speed in so many situations that unless I know I really need the speed, I'd rather take the utility even at extra cost. 

 

Just for reference all the Outcast minions - 

Ronin, Friekorps Trapper, Friekorpsman, Void wretch, Guilty, rat king, Hodgepodge Effigy, Rat catcher, steam abomination, Winged Plague, Desperate mercanary, Bandido, Dead outlaw, Wokou raider (doc Mitchel).

Thats a 4-8 ss bracket. You might think 6 is expensive, but its not a lot more than 4. I've not used the newer minions, so I didn't include them in my ranking. 

 

[Rachet]

6 hours ago, CapnBloodbeard said:

What sort of list are you running Ratchet?

Well the only consistent thing so far are Viktorias. Other than that I'm experimenting with Hannah, Strongarm (still no idea what he does, in 2 games died instantly like a bitch, in third was slowed to oblivion entire match), Vanessa and Taylor (again, usually dies first, which I don't mind given how much AP it usually takes). 

Apart from that I value Student of Conflict more and more with every game I have her as well as every game I don't (since I always wish I did). 

However such a list, so far, has two major problems for me. 1st is a cost, two 10 SS dudes on top of ridiculous amount of upgrades Viks have and the fact that Ronin are 6 ss each means I end up running 2 Ronins and a student and severely lack activations in a turn as well as actual scheme runners. I do see why Ronins are so expensive, but in so many matchups that disguised and hard to kill doesnt even do, well, anything. They just get ignored and I'm left with 2 ronins and a student of conflict on the board by the turn 3. 

The second, unrelated, is lack of condition removal. So far my biggest issue is that my models simply burn to death or all are slowed and I can't do a thing about it. 

So far I'm liking Hannah more and more, I'll probably get back to Vanessa as well, who, although not durable to say the least, can do some serious work with the blasts and/or maybe healing or even the fact that she's a sister. Wish I knew how Strongarm performs, but as mentioned, so far he just gets shut down HARD.

[Nikodemus]

Johan is one of the best 7ss condition removal models in the game and you get him at 1ss discount. Can't remember off hand if Outcasts have other native condition removal.

I haven't played Strongarm Suit myself, but how are you using him? On paper he seems reasonably good at living, keeping in mind his Augmented Jump and all the mobility related survivability that comes with it.

[CapnBloodbeard]

Student of conflict isn't bad - I really like Malifaux Child myself.  Only 2SS, can do the master's cast at -3Ca (so, he can do the actions that buff Pokey Vik), and he has a 1AP heal.  I usually keep him next to Vanessa to heal her, thus heal all sisters. 

 

Strongarm Suit - he shouldn't be dying that much, with Armor 2 - maybe you're overextending him?  If the Viks are running into the scrum, SS could probably hunt down scheme runners.

 

Trapper - I tend to find that he provides good board control.  He affects how the opponent can move. 

 

I need to give Ronin a go again and think harder about how I'm playing them - clearly I'm doing something wrong!!

 

I'd agree that 2x 10SS models in your list is a problem.  Hannah probably goes best, and consider keeping here somewhere in reach of healing. 

[thatlatinspeakingguy]

My local top-vicks player tends to use both Performer (Arcanist Minion) and Emissary as his scheme runners. I know Emissary is not a minion, but if OP's main concern is scheme running, he should consider also this option. @Rachet I don't think you need that many 10ss beaters if you already have Victorias, so you could maybe swap one of them for Emissary. Both Performer and Emissary can push other models, further increasing your mobility.

[Rachet]

1 hour ago, Nikodemus said:

I haven't played Strongarm Suit myself, but how are you using him? On paper he seems reasonably good at living, keeping in mind his Augmented Jump and all the mobility related survivability that comes with it.

I'm not. So far he either died almost instantly or got slowed beyond reason and couldn't do a thing. My idea was to use him as a meat shield for viks along side with Hannah. Hannah tends to survive way more and I don't understand how.  Perhaps I'm just unlucky.

[Nikodemus]

Df5/Wp6, 10 wounds, Armour+2.

There are things that struggle with that and there are things that eat it for breakfast. You'll get better at knowing various models and assessing what's a threat to him and what isn't. I don't play Viks so can't speak for his best use in that specific crew. Though as a model he strikes me as a mobile scalpel, rather than a tank/tarpit. Might just be my Misaki roots and Diving Charge/Augmented Jump being a kickass ability.

 

[Zebo]

Strongarm was the 10ss Freikorps model that I like less when I started. Now I need to play more with both Hannah and Lazarus, because Strongarm has become an autotake for me. 

 

Not sure how you use him, or more important Who you face usually, but in my games he use to be the star. He rarely dies (he has one of the highest def of all the Armor +2 models, plus 10 wounds) and can hit really hard. 

 

I like to see him like a light tank. He is weaker than the Lazarus, but it's also quite more agile. You cannot take him out of the game by engaging him (he can charge out of the engagement), an he can also shoot with SH 7 and put slow on foes. You have Hard To Wound? My fist can trigger a positive flip to damage. You Have Armour? My fist can trigger that ignore all damage reduction. 

 

Sure, there're models that can kill Strongarm, but Strongarm can also run from them charging to another foe xD. 

[FunWithKnives]

Bishop>Strongarm

[CapnBloodbeard]

Depends. has positives and negatives.  

[Kolath]

Back on the original minion topic...

Winged Plagues - amazing schemers and fill a much needed cheap model slot

Trapper - solid on most crews. Can also do some jank gimmicks

I actually like one wokou raider a lot. They are surprisingly mobile and can generate two extra AP of attacks with their coordinated strike trigger.

 

[Rachet]

11 hours ago, Kolath said:

Back on the original minion topic...

Winged Plagues - amazing schemers and fill a much needed cheap model slot

Trapper - solid on most crews. Can also do some jank gimmicks

I actually like one wokou raider a lot. They are surprisingly mobile and can generate two extra AP of attacks with their coordinated strike trigger.

 

So far winged plagues seem to be what I'm leaning towards. They are exactly what I want - cheap and mobile. Trapper I will have to test out, but that would happen when I get the VS box. 

As for Wokou... They seem incredible on paper, but they're 8SS a piece... Might try a minion heavy list one day tho.