Alpha strikes too poweful?

[Erik1978]

There are several alpha strikes in the game but today I saw one that I think is down right broken. As in: the rules shouldn't allow for this kind of thing.

Victorias with Emissary and Scion of the Void:

Scion walks 18" with oathkeeper and scramble, unburies Vic Henchman who then chain activates right away because of trinket from Emissary, charges 8" and hits 3 times with Ml 7, +flip on attack and damage with 4/5/8 damage track that ignores hard to wound, hard to kill, armor, and incorporeal. That's not even mentioning the whirlwind trigger. (Okay I mentioned it.)

Can reach pretty much anywhere on the table and only way to counter it, is standing behind a big BIG LoS blocker. 

Most masters in the game will be killed from this charge, most MODELS will be killed by this charge. Nomatter your hand. And if you don't have 6" between your models, you will lose more than 1.

A reactivating Howard, a beast controlled by Marcus and others out there are all pretty pathetic compared to this unstoppable killing machine. 

I feel this is a problem because unlike most combos out there, this one has a threat range of well... the table width, and when a Ml 7 attack ignores most things and have a 4/5/8 amage spread, it's kind of point-and-click? A flurry from Howard is like ice cream on the beach compared to this.

Too many things in the game ignore hard to kills, armor etc. (which is why Hoffman got that new upgrade).

[Ludvig]

Perhaps more of a philosophical debate for the general Malifaux section than a rules question but I agree that potent alphas lead to boring games. Bottom line is that there are a few alphas where you pretty much can't protect any model but they will likely be very exposed after removing the model of their choice so you need to be prepared to hurt them for it. Certain lure lists can pretty much kill any model but not expose themselves while doing it which is probably more infuriating.

Most of the time you can punish her because she will be very exposed after killing that model unless pokey Vik has the upgrade to rebury in this list? I'm fairly sure the Viks can also do that buff where all sisters get +2 damage to their melee attacks so it's 5/7/8. You ahould have seen this liat back when it could hire rats so they out acrivated any list in the game.

[Erik1978]

Perhaps you're right, not really a "rules" thing.

When a model hits THAT hard I think a 36" threat range should be impossible. At least with most alpha strike, like Tara, reactivating Howard, beast-activation with Marcus, you can see it coming, and it has normal range and normal attacks.

It was with the +2 damage so perhaps it was even worse than I remembered? 😐

[Stark]

Yeap you right, it's too OP combo (in my meta it's Victorias, Emissary and malifaux Child). That's alpha strike in 36 or more inches with ignoring almost all defensive abilities, with minimal damage like 5 and some on Atack and damage flips. That combo can kill any model with few exeptions (only models wit def. abilities for bounce back or Pandora\Iggy with mood swing can survive or break it. That's all). And it kills key model, often enemy master or the main models instead aaand that's all.

[Tors]

Thats evil! I wonder why this hasn't arrived at the tournament scene yet - vics should easily dominante with this. Maybe together with this awful Somer list posted elsewhere.

[solkan]

I'm confused concerning the details. I get that "The Soaring Dragon" is the upgrade that lets Victoria of Blood start the game buried to start all of this, but what's "trinket from Emissary" that causes the chain Activation?

Is there an Activation missing in this sequence where the Emissary activates, attaches a Trinket upgrade, and then the doom combo begins?  But the action to attach the trinket has a range of 6, so wouldn't VofB would have to be unburied, get the trinket, and then get Buried?

(As far as I can tell, the Trinket upgrade Memento says that it can't be purchased.)

[Thavius]

You know you could do this entire 1st super alpha before wave 2, its pretty much all I did with them it takes a lot more of a setup but is still as effective.

But the difference is that Blood has +2 damage and double positive to the attack and single positive to damage.

TL:DR Viks could always do this, just very few people did

[Erik1978]

@Solkan: Void Wretch buried Vic Henchman after he got the trinket, there was also a Malifaux child giving some +flip bonus along the way, or perhaps it was the +2 damage he cast there.

The sister that chain activated used a 0 action to gain some other +flip.

It was a tournament by the way, internet list FTW. (Which he did)

[Durza]

<Modhat> This seems less of a rules discussion so I've moved it to general discussion. <Modhat>

[Ludvig]

10 hours ago, Tors said:

Thats evil! I wonder why this hasn't arrived at the tournament scene yet - vics should easily dominante with this. Maybe together with this awful Somer list posted elsewhere.

It has appeared and gotten mercilessly pounded into the ground. Top table players usually handle this with little trouble. When people realized that they could use rats the Viks and levi were winning everything for a short while.

[Erik1978]

Does that mean you always play a specific counter-vic list if you play against Outcast? Or are you saying ANY crew can just handle a 35" threat range point and click kill? In that case I would love to know how...

Most tournaments are just fixed faction si you wouldn't know if the Vic list was gonna show up.

[katadder]

put out a sacrificial model to take the hit then kill vik of blood. or have some models that cant be charged also helps. maybe shoot her, she only has 7 wounds

[Ludvig]

9 hours ago, Erik1978 said:

Does that mean you always play a specific counter-vic list if you play against Outcast? Or are you saying ANY crew can just handle a 35" threat range point and click kill? In that case I would love to know how...

Most tournaments are just fixed faction si you wouldn't know if the Vic list was gonna show up.

Any competitive list should have at least two potent damage dealers and then deploy them so she can't kill them both on turn one and keep them unactivated. If your list fails due to the death of a single model then it will have problems against others than Viks. Not letting Vik attack you will require serious counter tech (which some factions can actually bring although not those I play) but mostly it's about not crumbling if something dies. Vik also doesn't ignore engagements when declaring the charge so the chaff models you moved around early can often be placed so she won't get to charge your most valued models. She only has that fenomenal threat range on certain paths and unless something has changed since I played against them last time she can't ignore terrain and models while charging.

I 100% agree that it is a fucking ridiculous design choice to first make the Viks have a slingshot that isn't allowed to chain because that would be dumb and op and then create models that provide an even better slingshot that does allow you to reactivate and not risk your master to boot. I also hate alphas and what they do to the game but it isn't unbeatable so at least there is that small comfort.   The problem is that it currently feels a lot like without alphas Nico (and potentially a few other good summoners) would win every last match because they're pretty much kill the master turn one or give up. The game kind of needs alphas to keep summoners in check.

[Seadhna]

There are so many ways to counter alpha strikes like the one you've described. 

I'll list a few:

- make a screen of several cheap models; you can't charge through them

- defensive triggers and damage reduction/prevention  (most Gremlin masters, Collodi, Zoraida, Rasputina, Seamus, Hoffman, Nellie...)

- countering the Glimpse the Void trigger by killing a model (yes, the unbury is mandatory) or by having a buried model in the first place (I hate Malifaux Raptors)

- placing your models more than 5" apart

- charging the Viks first (the combo needs several activations to go off: Child goes, Emissary goes, Wretch goes, Scion goes and unburies the Vik of Blood)

- winning the deployment flip and either letting them deploy first (learn to measure 25" from the Scion or 22.5" from Ashes) or picking a side that doesn't let them move freely (huge building or lots of severe terrain help)

Already way more than ways to score VP off an attack like that without gimping your future ability to play the match.

The slingshot build is completely helpless if it can't decimate your team in the first 2 turns of the game, they just don't have the staying power and activation control compared to other "honest" 8-model crews, not to mention summoners.

TL; DR: Viks are nowhere near OP, playing them is always a huge coin toss, like with any alpha strike build (see: reactivating Langston, Marcus alpha strike, Brutal Emissary taxi, Francois on an Iron Skeeter, Nothing Beast bomb, Powerful Control Zoraida, any Killjoy bomb, Leviticus+any undead).

If you can't win the game without one or two of your most valuable models (this includes your master), then it has nothing to do with balance, it's just you being unable to overcome the psychological blow.

 

One further note: GG18 favours passive playstyle. The less you charge in, the more opportunity you have to react and score VP (which win you the game, incidentally). Alpha strikes are old news and mostly work once.

[Adran]

22 hours ago, Erik1978 said:

Does that mean you always play a specific counter-vic list if you play against Outcast? Or are you saying ANY crew can just handle a 35" threat range point and click kill? In that case I would love to know how...

Most tournaments are just fixed faction si you wouldn't know if the Vic list was gonna show up.

Most lists can handle this becasue they are played ina  way to minimise the damage. Yes it can cover a lot of the table, but the Ml expert require s LOS to Vik of Blood. You have to spend some time setting up the ideal hit, which allows the oponent some time to counter play, such as killing or otherwise inconviencign the scion, or just makign sure that Vik doesn't hit too much. Seadha gives some great examples of how to actually stop it, and actually havign now properly read his post, says a lot of what I was trying to say but better.

Its something that ruins an unexpecting players day, but if you know about it, its not something that you can't stop. 

[Littlewicked]

Wanted to mention one thing about when Vic of blood starts the turn or game buried.  When Vic of ashes does sister of fury and Vic of blood is buried she will not receive the +2 dmg since she needs to be on the board to get this buff.  Seen this mistake happen multiple times.

[Mason]

32 minutes ago, Littlewicked said:

Wanted to mention one thing about when Vic of blood starts the turn or game buried.  When Vic of ashes does sister of fury and Vic of blood is buried she will not receive the +2 dmg since she needs to be on the board to get this buff.  Seen this mistake happen multiple times.

This is correct. Buried models are not considered to be in play, and Sisters in Fury and Sisters in Battle both only buff Sisters in play.

[Erik1978]

Thanks guys.

The coin toss analogy is good... which also tells you something about that trick. "Win or lose turn 1" is just boring and not why most people travel to tournaments (I hope).

Obvisouly I was completely unprepared for the model 30" away from me to deliver a killing machine like that, lost Shenlong, Crime Boss, and a Low River Monk.

I also think Wyrd should hit the breaks regarding hard hitters that ignore everything. Hoffman getting that improved harness just shows that Wyrd admits too many models don't care about armor and/or damage reduction.

[green-n-dumb]

3 minutes ago, Erik1978 said:

I also think Wyrd should hit the breaks regarding hard hitters that ignore everything. Hoffman getting that improved harness just shows that Wyrd admits too many models don't care about armor and/or damage reduction.

It has 2 sides - with nerfed hard hitters many masters with bunch of  high df-wp+armor/incorporeal/other machanics models will be just "tanking" all the game and refuse to die.

[Morgan Vening]

14 minutes ago, green-n-dumb said:

It has 2 sides - with nerfed hard hitters many masters with bunch of  high df-wp+armor/incorporeal/other machanics models will be just "tanking" all the game and refuse to die.

There's the possibility for a middle ground compromise though.

Off the top of my head, and yes, it's clunky, change "Ignore Armor and Incorporeal" to "Armor and Incorporeal cannot reduce this damage to less than 2*".

* Or 3, or 4, depending on how hard you want that particular weapon to hit. Can be customed from weapon to weapon.

You make Armor/Incorporeal able to affect bigger hits, but doesn't turn smaller hits into a piddling nuisance.

I'm sure there are other ways to handle this too. It doesn't have to be all or nothing.

[Seadhna]

38 minutes ago, Erik1978 said:

Thanks guys.

The coin toss analogy is good... which also tells you something about that trick. "Win or lose turn 1" is just boring and not why most people travel to tournaments (I hope).

Obvisouly I was completely unprepared for the model 30" away from me to deliver a killing machine like that, lost Shenlong, Crime Boss, and a Low River Monk.

I also think Wyrd should hit the breaks regarding hard hitters that ignore everything. Hoffman getting that improved harness just shows that Wyrd admits too many models don't care about armor and/or damage reduction.

That's why you take Misdirection on Shen Long and use soulstone prevention!

 

On a side note about the Viks: they are a very versatile master that excels at mind games mostly. Sure, you can wipe the opponent off the table with a coin toss, but it's never a good strategy to do that. What they do is project power and threaten that one turn of absolute hell while getting into position, which (again) doesn't really work against a prepared opponent.

[Erik1978]

Quote

and use soulstone prevention!

Yeah, I stoned  for Df AND I prevented damage 2 times, which meant I reduced the 12 damage to 10... yey.  The third hit didn't really matter at that point since she of course ignored hard to kill.

This game, I guess Illidan was right, I was not prepared. Perhaps I will be next time.

 

Quote

It has 2 sides - with nerfed hard hitters many masters with bunch of  high df-wp+armor/incorporeal/other machanics models will be just "tanking" all the game and refuse to die.

I don't think we suddenly see 3-4 Masters that never die, if we reduce the number of models that ignore everything. Perhaps people would instead need to THINK about what models attack what, carefully choosing their targets, instead of all powerful models that just attack everything with their eyes closed, like Vic of Blood.

A few specialized models OR some models that ignore armor, others ignore hard to kill etc. instead of more and more models that just ignore everything. 

 

[Seadhna]

3 minutes ago, Erik1978 said:

I don't think we suddenly see 3-4 Masters that never die, if we reduce the number of models that ignore everything. Perhaps people would instead need to THINK about what models attack what, carefully choosing their targets, instead of all powerful models that just attack everything with their eyes closed, like Vic of Blood.

 

That is sort of incorrect, since there are quite a few models that lil' Vik can't attack blindly, I've listed a couple in my big post above. I don't know of any model in Malifaux that can just outright kill every possible target (that would be imbalance, and Wyrd don't do imbalance or at least try not to).

[Erik1978]

Vic with Weak damage 5, 3 attacks ignores all but impossible to wound, seems like one that can kill any target out there? (Unless they have a certain Df trigger to skitter away or something)

[daniello_s]

6 minutes ago, Erik1978 said:

Vic with Weak damage 5, 3 attacks ignores all but impossible to wound, seems like one that can kill any target out there? (Unless they have a certain Df trigger to skitter away or something)

As long as she won't be blocked by terrain or another models. Or as long as Viks crew won't be out-activated heavily and she will be really really vulnerable to counter-strike. Viks were my first crew and i used sling-shot a lot. Good players were most of the time able to mitigate the onslaught and put load of pressure Pokey so I don't think those girls are OP.