Coming back to the list game again

[Franchute]

Hello

I have a game saturday, so plenty of time to decide on which list to bring. Ive already thought of two possible lists but I am curious about what you guys would bring. I thought about that list game @Mrbedlam proposed a couple of times. This could be the opportunity to play it again.

What would you bring against a neverborn player who typically plays Lucius or Lilith but who may also come unexpectidly with Lynch or Pandora? It is a standard deployment headhunter game with claim jump, accusation, dig their graves, tail'em and inspection.

I dont know the map yet.

[Sybarite]

I would bring Sandeep with a bunch of wind gamin. They're very good for headhunter, wind gamins cant be scored for dig their grave and can do tail em very well, claim jump and accusation too.
Probably Visions upgrade for some more interact fun.

Then I'd look at some nice enforcers. I want Sandeep as my only tail em target, and he can teleport away, so scoring it on me might be hard.

Could go with mages, or something like langston, myranda (turns into a beast so no hench liability for tail em).

I'd bring a performer as well. Dont mind me is always handy in headhunter and being able to push models towards me and remove scheme markers is great too.

Arcane effigy for some condition removal.

[bertmac]

50 SS Arcanists Crew
Kaeris + 4 Pool
 - Arcane Reservoir (2)
 - Purifying Fire (1)
 - Blinding Flame (1)
The Firestarter (7)
Howard Langston (12)
 - Imbued Energies (1)
Sabretooth Cerberus (9)
 - Imbued Energies (1)
December Acolyte (7)
Union Miner (5)
Arcane Effigy (4)

 (exported from CrewFaux)

The scheme pool is quite tricky but for headhunter I always like Howard and a Cerberus due to being able to kill something then move and interact with the head.

Kaeris is good vs pandy due to having ca7 and a low damage track. Blinding flame also helps with headhunter as you can push enemies away from heads whilst stopping them from charging you. I tend to find the high CA is great vs most neverborn as once you can hit them they aren't that tough.

I like the acolyte as slow helps reduce the opponents number of interacts and can also pull enemies close to your hitters.

The miner can help with dig their graves and claim jump and the firestarter is another good multiple ap model to get heads/drop scheme markers.

[Franchute]

Hello,

Thanks a lot for your opinions @Sybarite and @bertmac. In the end, I decided to go for my first Ironsides game. I also thought Sandeep would be appropriate given the advantage of wind gamins for headhunter, but I wanted to try something new, just in case a Summer errata would come. People have been complaining about them so much all over the internet that this is possible. Unfortunately, I don't own Kaeris. Maybe I'll have the chance to try her in the future.

I went for the following list:

- Ironsides, with warding runes, challenge the crowd and iron determination and a cache of 6 soulstones
- Joss with warding runes and imbued energies
- Angelica with practised production
- 3 x mages with upgrades
- 3 x steam arachnids

My opponent had Lilith with her totem, doppleganger, 2 x wadgeists, Johan, Teddy, Baby Kade. I dont remember all the upgrades but Teddy had the one that ignores armour and Lilith the one that ignores terrain when she charges.

We both took Claim jump and Dig their graves. I took warding runes on both Ironsides and Joss to deny Tail'em and Accusation. My strategy was to pull a chunk of the opponent's crew towards Ironsides, while the arachnids would score Claim jump. At the same time, the mages would send back the rest of the opponent's crew towards their deployment zone. Angelica would drop markers next to Ironsides so that Digg their graves could be scored. Joss would help Ironsides to kill stuff for dig their graves. I wanted to try arachnids as an alternative to Wind gamins for headhunter: the idea was to resist a charge and then blow them up in order to deny headhunter.

It didn't go that well. I lost 6-7. I managed to score all my points for dig their graves, but only one point for claim jump and two for the strat. My opponent was less successful with dig their graves, but  did much better with the strat and claim jump.

Some specific comments:

- my steam arachnid strategy did not go well: the opponent's totem red-jokered an arachnid turn 2, giving him his first head. Then, he didnt care much about my arachnids, but I put myself in a bad position in a corner, making things difficult to maneuver.

- I had problems maneuvering my mages. I forgot arcane shield can reduce the damage to zero: I wanted to use an arachnid to ping two mages at the beginning to benefit from Hand-Picked Men but, since arachnids have min damage 1, I only managed to hurt one mage. I should have just sent that arachnid forward. I'll try Miss Fire next time, as has been recommended in the Ironsides post. I just need to assemble her first.

- Then, mages were all the time in melee. I never activated Angelica in the right moment to pull them out. I should do this more properly next time.

- My opponent smartly put Lilith markers to cut LoS of mages. I couldn't send back anybody towards their deployment zone at the beginning. They also lost LoS towards Ironsides turn 3 and 4, making things difficult.

- Because most of my crew was in melee all the time, it was difficult to pick up heads. I definitely need to acquire a performer. I almost had included Big Jake in my list for this reason, but somehow I had decided that 9 activations were better than 8 when I did the list. Next time, I think I'd go for a dont mind me model instead, especially if I play in such a bubble.

-I liked the fact that Ironsides and the mages can slow things. This was especially useful against Teddy and Johan who then cannot flurry.

- Warding runes helps a bit against tangle shadows and paralyzed, though a smell fear reaction killed Ironsides on turn 4.

If somebody has comments on this, I'd appreciate to hear them a lot.

[WWHSD]

29 minutes ago, Franchute said:

Hello,

Thanks a lot for your opinions @Sybarite and @bertmac. In the end, I decided to go for my first Ironsides game. I also thought Sandeep would be appropriate given the advantage of wind gamins for headhunter, but I wanted to try something new, just in case a Summer errata would come. People have been complaining about them so much all over the internet that this is possible. Unfortunately, I don't own Kaeris. Maybe I'll have the chance to try her in the future.

I went for the following list:

- Ironsides, with warding runes, challenge the crowd and iron determination and a cache of 6 soulstones
- Joss with warding runes and imbued energies
- Angelica with practised production
- 3 x mages with upgrades
- 3 x steam arachnids

My opponent had Lilith with her totem, doppleganger, 2 x wadgeists, Johan, Teddy, Baby Kade. I dont remember all the upgrades but Teddy had the one that ignores armour and Lilith the one that ignores terrain when she charges.

We both took Claim jump and Dig their graves. I took warding runes on both Ironsides and Joss to deny Tail'em and Accusation. My strategy was to pull a chunk of the opponent's crew towards Ironsides, while the arachnids would score Claim jump. At the same time, the mages would send back the rest of the opponent's crew towards their deployment zone. Angelica would drop markers next to Ironsides so that Digg their graves could be scored. Joss would help Ironsides to kill stuff for dig their graves. I wanted to try arachnids as an alternative to Wind gamins for headhunter: the idea was to resist a charge and then blow them up in order to deny headhunter.

It didn't go that well. I lost 6-7. I managed to score all my points for dig their graves, but only one point for claim jump and two for the strat. My opponent was less successful with dig their graves, but  did much better with the strat and claim jump.

Some specific comments:

- my steam arachnid strategy did not go well: the opponent's totem red-jokered an arachnid turn 2, giving him his first head. Then, he didnt care much about my arachnids, but I put myself in a bad position in a corner, making things difficult to maneuver.

- I had problems maneuvering my mages. I forgot arcane shield can reduce the damage to zero: I wanted to use an arachnid to ping two mages at the beginning to benefit from Hand-Picked Men but, since arachnids have min damage 1, I only managed to hurt one mage. I should have just sent that arachnid forward. I'll try Miss Fire next time, as has been recommended in the Ironsides post. I just need to assemble her first.

- Then, mages were all the time in melee. I never activated Angelica in the right moment to pull them out. I should do this more properly next time.

- My opponent smartly put Lilith markers to cut LoS of mages. I couldn't send back anybody towards their deployment zone at the beginning. They also lost LoS towards Ironsides turn 3 and 4, making things difficult.

- Because most of my crew was in melee all the time, it was difficult to pick up heads. I definitely need to acquire a performer. I almost had included Big Jake in my list for this reason, but somehow I had decided that 9 activations were better than 8 when I did the list. Next time, I think I'd go for a dont mind me model instead, especially if I play in such a bubble.

-I liked the fact that Ironsides and the mages can slow things. This was especially useful against Teddy and Johan who then cannot flurry.

- Warding runes helps a bit against tangle shadows and paralyzed, though a smell fear reaction killed Ironsides on turn 4.

If somebody has comments on this, I'd appreciate to hear them a lot.

Maybe you could have brought Mouse instead of one of the spiders? Have the Nemesis Mage punt Mouse and another Mage, then have Mouse lasso the other two Mages and heal himself (if he's holding a 5 or higher ). The Nemesis Mage and the Mage that he punted will both have a point of damage on them (assuming they took minimum damage from the attacks). You could always cheat in a low card instead of relenting on the other Mage that Mouse pulls and hope for Moderate damage so that the trio gets the flips from Handpicked Men.