Since everyone else is doing it. Playing the Guild, or Fighting as the law

[Iron Skies]

Ok, since everyone else seems to be doing this I'm going to try and start a bit of a Guild project here. I'm going to try and share my experiences playing friendly and competative games with everyones favourite police state.

Obviously input is welcome and if anyone has anything constructive to share feel free to pitch in

Ok, best place to start would be a short rundown on the minions that I own at the moment and my thoughts on ones that I do not have (Highlighted with a T at the start)

Masters

Sonnia

My first master when I started playing while holding the position as one of my favourites she has been overtaken by the Hoff.

Strengths - Lots of magical blast damage. Hates spellcasters and strong magical resistance. Good as a 'timebomb' with inferno. Cheeky disassemble trigger.

Weaknesses - Low DF, bit of a soulstone appetite. Very low walk with no movement tricks.

Perdita

Only had a few games with Perdita but enjoying her so far.

Strengths - DF8, See the unseen. High movement speed and fast. Quick Draw. While needing the right suit anticipation for stacking your opponents deck a little.

Weanesses - 8 wounds, cache of 2 soulstones. Perdita wants to be shooting at something and killing it with the same shot - Card hungry.

Lady J

Strengths - boosts the rest of her crew with inspiring sword play, hits like a ton of bricks in melee. Paired pistols for the odd cheeky shot. High wounds count. No LOS to charge etc

Weaknesses - low DF, average walk. If focussed upon she will crumble easily. Very weak to shooting

Hoffman

My current favourite Master

Strengths - Makes constructs amazing, can machine puppet himself or other constructs. Lots of movement tricks. Spells suited for close-in combat (Just where his constructs will be)

Ability grabbing from constructs. Can activate a key construct after himself or reactivate one.

Weaknesses - Very low DF, low walk. Crew dependant, cannot harm constructs with his spells. Folds easily if targeted, has to have constructs near him.

Lucas MccabeT

Ahhh Lucas, the jury is still out on if his horse tastes just like raisins. All of this is theory so take with a HUGE pinch of salt. Not had a proxy game with him yet.

Strengths - Fast. Very fast if mounted especially. And if he can remain mounted he has 13 wounds!. Comes with bearskin armour and a ranged expert action when mounted melee when dismounted. With a walk of 8 when mounted he has a potential threat range of 24". Customisable against most situations and strategies. Gives out lots of slow and paralyze.

Weaknesses - Low DF for a master that want's to get close and in there. Looks very easy to get separated from the rest of his crew. Not many tricks so will need to plan out each turn.

Henchmen

Lucius

Aka Captain dogmuncher, not actually had that many games with him so take this with a pinch of salt.

Strengths - Negative flip to attack him, terrifying, excellent when supporting other masters. Especially hoffman or lady J.

Weaknesses - low DF if not with guardsmen, needs high cards to cast his spells. Big target, expensive if hired. Not that good at direct damage.

Going to summarise minions in another post as this one is getting huge. Won't be going into that much detail straight away unless pressed.

Edited August 24, 2012 by Iron Skies
Masters rundown

[Iron Skies]

Ok onto the minions. Only going to do a quick summary of each.

Guild Guard, Death Marshals and Witchling Stalkers

All good four point models, Guild guard and Stalkers have fairly similar CB stats whereas the Death Marshals have CB5 on both their guns and blades.

Pros : Armour 1 on Guild guard, pistol that can stop charges, high CB on sword and cheeky movement inhibitor. Magical resistance on witchlings and if they get their trigger can bounce the spell back. Easily nuked when low on wounds to explode. Death Marshals are good all rounders with hard to wound so will stick around a little and slow to die.

Cons : ALL walk 4, low DF all around, Will only get one or two shots off. Fold easily in melee.

Austringers

Crazy bird man! BAKAAW!

Pros : High WP, high CB and no LOS needed to make an attack. Can have 18" range and activate models after themselves.

Cons : low walk and normally priority target. Need to remain stationary to get the most out of them.

The Ortega's - Nino, Francesco, Santiago, Papa and Granny(T)

Out of all the Ortega's I do not have granny, apart from Papa they all fulfil similar roles with some variation on how they go about it IE As much damage as possible on one target to kill it ASAP.

Universal cons : fairly low walk and normal defence of only 4. Apart from Santiago they are all rather squishy.

Universal Pros : Alpha strike, high damage output via shooting and melee for Francesco.

(Faily sparse as I have only had a few games with them so far. Will add more)

The Judge

One of my favourite pieces, above average walk for a Guild minion and capable of dishing out a serious amount of hurt if the cards are right.

Pros : See above + good for second wave objective grabber

Cons : Very suit dependant to get the most amount of damage out of him.

Samael

Pros : High ranged damage output, especially against casters

Cons : Low DF, will be targeted early. Bit of a glass cannon and like most Guild minions rather slow.

ExecutionerT

Pros : Paired claws, terrifying. Heals when he attacks

Cons : Low DF, again a big target. Slow.

Not played at all with and only played one game against where I made him kill himself so not much experience here yet

The Lawyer

Found he's only really good in a brawl, anything else and he's too card hungry to really warrent taking. Situational.

Guild Guard Captain

Guild Guard + good for supporting them, shines when obeyed and ordered by other models.

(Only played 3 games with him so pinch of salt there)

Exorcist

Against Ressers and Hamelin or anything with non-living models he's a godsend. Slow though magical crossbow with critical strike and good range on it. Can take a wound for an extra walk and if protected by a guardian can be cheekily pinged onto the guardian.

Guild Hounds

Not played with these yet only proxied once where Lucius ate them. Will post more when I have had a chance to experiment. Impressions are good pairs for capturing objectives

Latigo Pistolero's

No experience at all, first impressions after reading the rules is cheap models to snackrifice and hold up bigger things while getting into position to destroy them.

Witchling Handler

Proxied for one game so far, very good at moving witchlings around and lethal in melee. Good when hiding behind cover near witchlings.

BOOK 4 MINIONS

Feel this needs a caveat. As there is no book 4 stuff out yet all of this is theory

Guild Rifleman

Pros : 11" range rifle that can go up to 14". 4 stones! They're a guardsman so +2cb from Lucius. Can ignore hard to wound and effective get ricochet. Can defend other Guardsmen close to them and if companioned with another rifleman can take 3 ranged strikes.

Cons : Low DF, 5 wounds. NO ARMOUR.

Typical ranged unit. Will crumple if engaged in Melee but possibly the best minion in the book.

Clockwork Trap

Pros : Cheap construct that can be summoned for free by certain models. Hard to lose harmless and have tiny as well. High DF

Cons : Low wd's and needs a spell for armour ending harmless. Sacrifices itself if it paralyses something

Can see these been used alot in Hoffman crews for a bit of movement control and general clamping shenanigans. Also cheap way to boost Hoffmans cast.

Guild Pathfinder

Pros : Another Guardsman for Lucius to play with. Summons traps for free. Can start out close to objectives but not get them till turn 3. Musket can ignore armour

Cons : Short ranged weapons, low WP during morale duels

Not sure what I make of him. Will need to have a few games to find out

Sirdar Alchibal

Pros : Keeps masters alive and if Lucas is the master he can be sacrificed to cancel the wounds. Can help the Wastrels sneak around with his obscuring spell. Boost DF as well. Nasty gun on par with Ryles and can shoot targets hiding behind big constructs etc

Cons : No extra actions. Slow for a model that needs to keep up with masters. Low DF for a model that wants to get close but a + healing flip action.

I can see his uses however the lack of any ranged or melee expert actions will really hamper him. However will need to play with him a few times to see.

Wastrels

Pros : 4 stones. Both weapons paired. Very fast if hidden. Can also be customised slightly against different factions

Cons : low WP, can only take one special item per crew, short range on guns. Rare 3

To me these look just like what the Latigo Pistolero's wanted to be. Alot of use and would make you think before passing them over to take something else.

Edited August 24, 2012 by Iron Skies
More minions!

[Calmdown]

Do you find Lady J is actually that fragile? I find that focusing her is very dangerous, because if the Lady J player is holding masks and/or flips masks on stoned Df flips, you can pretty much give her the game as she batters all of your stuff for free.

[nilus]

Do you find Lady J is actually that fragile? I find that focusing her is very dangerous, because if the Lady J player is holding masks and/or flips masks on stoned Df flips, you can pretty much give her the game as she batters all of your stuff for free.

This holds up well against a small force of melee minions(like a dreamer crew). Where you can bank on keeping a few masks in your hand or getting them in a flip. But a lot of small cheap melee units tend to overwhelm her. She also goes down pretty quickly to ranged attacks and spells.

[Iron Skies]

Do you find Lady J is actually that fragile? I find that focusing her is very dangerous, because if the Lady J player is holding masks and/or flips masks on stoned Df flips, you can pretty much give her the game as she batters all of your stuff for free.

My experience with Lady J has been playing against her and each time I focus on her she has fallen rather quickly, while yes I have had everything bounced back at me before it's normally been on something that I don't mind losing and then gone in with something else to finish her off

[Dezzo]

My experience with Lady J has been playing against her and each time I focus on her she has fallen rather quickly, while yes I have had everything bounced back at me before it's normally been on something that I don't mind losing and then gone in with something else to finish her off

The LJ player is doing it wrong.

You can't play her as if she is Lilith.

[Iron Skies]

Minions updated, going to wait till I'm at home and have the cards for the constructs and the rest before putting a post with those up. Then faction strengths etc

[Iron Skies]

And onto the constructs. At the moment my main Guild master is Hoffman so this is going to be a bit more in depth than the others. Also going to stick to the pros and cons but with a little summary. So in order of cheapest first.

Watcher

Pros : Amazingly fast for a guild model, 16" range gun for machine puppet that removes terrifying and harmless, removes cover when within 4" of an enemy model, ignores harmless and pitiful itself. Can manipulate the next card drawn, significant 3SS model.

Cons : Low wounds, easily killed. Very easy to overextend with.

Great objective grabber and long range gun, not much damage though able to ping wounds off if machine puppeted.

Warden

Pros : High mobility thanks to relentless, two for the price of one peacekeeper, positive flips against models that have already activated. Guardsman so can be ordered by lucius,

Cons : Cb4 on both weapons, 6 wounds for a large target.

Proxy game so far. Used instead of a peacekeeper and found great to hover up the hoff while moving about.

Hunter

Pros : Cheapest way for the Guild to get 3 scrap counters, positive flips on models that are yet to activate, high movement thanks to shadow. Can slow models with it's chain spear.

Cons : Very fragile for a 6SS model, Movement tricks can easily overextend it.

I own two of these. Found them too fragile to be main line units which their 6SS cost would suggest, excellent objective grabber if they are working in pairs.

Guardian

Pros : Can boost armour of nearby models, protects other friendly models, has a melee attack that always hits and damage can be cheekily boosted with machine puppet, self healing ability, can push into base contact with a nearby friendly model in the end phase.

Cons : Very low defence, without the push it has a rather slow movement speed, needs a 10 of any suit in order to protect a model.

Excellent model for the Hoffman death star, able to protect other models and boost the armour of those around them. Good backup taxi for the Hoff especially if he is in melee. Good machine puppet target for guaranteed damage.

Ryle

Pros : Cannot be stopped from disengaging by most models and if confronted with nekima can just push away from her, ranged expert with a gun that can potentially do 16 damage in one shot, all his bad points go away when paired with Hoffman, range 12 gun that's a good machine puppet target

Cons : Huge target on his head, only armour 1 for a high value model. Gatling gun ram intensive to do the most damage, not friendly and low WP when not taken with Hoffman.

Normally the 'Gun' of the death star Ryle adds a great ranged model that when paired with lucius and Hoffman can potentially get 13 shots off a turn

Pale RiderT

Pros : Same ranged gun as Ryle, self heals when it kills something, highly mobile, excellent machine puppet target, bulletproof 1 (situational) run and gun action. Can gain fast on a very bloody turn, above average DF for a 50mm base.

Cons : Big target, needs at least one model to die before activating to really be able to dish out any serious damage.

After Ryle and the Peacekeeper this is possible the best taxi for Hoffman adds a good ranged weapon to a rather mobile model. Mounted fusillade allows the rider to act as a bit of a guerilla fighter.

Peacekeeper

Pros : Scary! Paired claws that can flurry and has relentless for extra mobility. High damage track and Cb on main weapons, arachnid means no terrain penalties either. Rams built into both weapons.

Cons : Without the Hoff it's penalties for flipping low cards can cause it to seize up and not do anything on a key turn, large target and normally the first thing your opponent wants to kill.

Hoffs primary taxi if he wants to get close or run those pesky rats away, prime machine puppet target as the peacekeeper can get into position then Hoff activate and control it's weapons. Excellent at clawing big things to death or picking on groups of smaller minions.

Ok constructs done. Will move onto totems and Avatars tomorrow then faction strengths and behaviours in regards to objectives

Edited March 2, 2012 by Iron Skies

[mistercactus]

Nice work, I'm enjoying this!

Didid you mean 3 scrap counters for hunter?

[Iron Skies]

Nice work, I'm enjoying this!

Didid you mean 3 scrap counters for hunter?

Yup, thanks for spotting that!

[Iron Skies]

Onto the totems now.

I only actually own the mechanical attendant and drill sergeant so the rest is all theory.

Enslaved NephilimT

Pros : High movement, mask built in for obey, black blood if you want to get rid of it.

Cons : Low wounds as with all the other totems, only one real use - obey train

Govenors ProxyT

Pros : Boosts willpower to friendly Guild models, high WP

Cons : Kills your own models if they fail a morale duel. Low walk.

Purifying FlameT

Pros : boosted defence against ranged attacks, High charge

Cons : Kills itself when doing any ranged damage, no real use other than to die.

Scales of JusticeT

Pros : Can boost the next flips of friendly models. Can swap cards in hand

Cons : Low walk, low DF, low cast, has to discard a card before drawing one

Drill Sergeant

Pros : Boosts nearby guardsmen, high WP, can end paralysed and slow on models.

Cons : Low DF, low casting value, fairly static model for it's purpose.

So far only been used once, stayed with some austringers to boost their attack flips.

Mechanical Attendant

Pros : Only significant Guild totem, armour 1 and 5 wounds, expands the maintain machines bubble, ranged weapon that can be machine puppeted, can gain scrap counters from sacrificed constructs.

Cons : Takes wounds when gaining scrap from sacrificed models, target for those that know it's usefulness.

Used in nearly every game with the Hoff, can't say I have actually got any real complaints with it. IMHO the best totem of the lot

Luna T

Pros : Doesn't have insignificant on it's printing. Counts as a guild hound for the purposes of talents and spells (Think Guild kennels does fall under this) Crit on the bite.

Cons : Not elusive/evasive. Still a guild hound at the end of the day. Few spells to cast

---------- Post added 03-03-2012 at 01:06 AM ---------- Previous post was 03-02-2012 at 11:37 PM ----------

On to the avatars, have proxied all of them apart from lady J's. Not that many games with them still though so take this with a pinch of salt.

Hoffman

Pros : Both weapons paired, can alter his purpose when he activates. Heals when he kills a construct in melee, can make living models constructs, gains actions when killing constructs, gains immune to influence, cheeky paralyse trigger. Ability to make a whirlwind of death for an all action.

Cons : low DF, loses synergy with crew. High walk but no charge, only one spell will be used and then only when low on wounds.

When to manifest : late game turn 5/6, especially if your main damage dealer has been killed

Manifest requirements :Easy, Hoffman players will generally do one if not both requirements during a game.

JusticeT

Pros: can boost allies attacks or defence, keeps alot of her melee skill but loses an active charge. Can draw back up to full control hand, spells for each suit

Cons : needs a certain crew build to be used effectively, zero action charge though may be fighting with other zero actions depending on the situation.

When to manifest : Early middle game turn 2/3 if possible to get the most out of crew boosts.

Manifest requirements : No comment here, not sure if they are easy or not.

Perdita

Pros : paired pistols, gains flight and 3 wounds, can discard and redraw cards, terrifying. Can gain soulstones from kills.

Cons : loses gunfighter and only gains it back from charging attack trigger. Turns into a support model (not particularly bad)

When to manifest : Mid game, turn 3/4.

Manifest requirements : If the cards are with you fairly easy to get at least one requirement by turn 2 otherwise hero's gamble.

Sonnia

Pros : Flight, magical area damage, can move pyre markers around, high cast value, strong melee attack but low cb, keeps counter spell but damage will only happen once against a good opponent if that.

Cons : Still only walk 4, low DF against ranged attacks, opponents that know what she can do will avoid/kill ASAP

When to manifest : Mid game turn 3/4.

Manifest requirements : One of the easiest though easy to focus on too much and forget objectives.

One to add in, left the effigy till last deliberately.

Brutal EffigyT

Pros : Object, melee expert, adds a healing spell as a zero action, height 1.

Cons : Needs a 9 of any suit to cast the spell, low wounds for a 4 stone model

Not got that much of an impression on the Brutal yet apart from adds healing to a guild crew and a model to replace a totem if manifesting.

Edited August 26, 2012 by Iron Skies

[nilus]

Something to consider

Enslaved Nephlim. Not terrible in melee combat. Can act as a pseudo melee bodyguard for models like Nino.

Scale of Justice. Can leave it with a group of Austringer behind cover and have it cast LJs see the unseen aura, which means they birds can get around of a lot of WP based targeting protection

[Iron Skies]

Hopefully the last big post for now

Faction strengths and weaknesses.

STRENGTHS!

First thing anyone will notice about the Guild, we got guns. We got lots of guns. With access to some of the longest ranged shooting in the game the Guild have an advantage in being able to reach out and touch models up to 18" away reliably.

Fairly straightforwards to get to grips with, the Guild seem to be the most newbie friendly to get into as individually each model is fairly simple though at more advanced levels the interactions get better and better.

Strong 4 point minions. The Guild has access to possibly the best 4 point minions in the game, while not overly amazing on their own with in built critical strike they do alot of damage.

Barring Hoffman all of the Guild masters are easy to get to grips with quickly, though reward repeated playing to find out just what they can do.

Able to take an all construct crew.

We have Batman (Lucius)

Weaknesses(Shh, don't tell anyone)

Low walk for most minions - The Guild models normally only have a walk of 4 so for objective based games they have to start moving straight away.

Low DF - Again, mostly 4 for the majority of models.

With high shooting and low melee ranges Guild models normally cannot block other models into Melee (there are exceptions however they are between 7-9 SS for a model that can do that effectively)

As soon as Guild crews start taking casualties their effectiveness drops significantly

[Iron Skies]

Something to consider

Enslaved Nephlim. Not terrible in melee combat. Can act as a pseudo melee bodyguard for models like Nino.

Scale of Justice. Can leave it with a group of Austringer behind cover and have it cast LJs see the unseen aura, which means they birds can get around of a lot of WP based targeting protection

Looking into getting Lady J at some point soon after I have had a few games with Perdita, so thanks for the sneaky tip!

[Guardian]

We have Batman (Lucius)

Can you elaborate?

[Iron Skies]

Can you elaborate?

Indeed! Batman err Lucius has a bit of everything going for him. High walk for a Guild model lets him get where he needs to be to support his crew. And if he is cought in Melee his CB is not to be sniffed at, especially with being able to use soulstones. Facing spirits? His hidden sniper is a spell which means it's magical damage (If we have been playing that wrong don't hesitate to say otherwise)

When near friendly Guardsmen or Elite division his DF gets a boost and is incredably difficult to kill with Slow to Die.

Basically a little bit of everything, just like the Bat

Edited March 4, 2012 by Iron Skies

[Iron Skies]

Food for thought here, Peacekeeper or two Wardens with the Hoff?

Discuss

[Iron Skies]

Update for tonight played a friendly practice game against one of our club members Nat Sibley (can't remember if he is on the boards)

Guild vs Neverborn.

I had :

Hoffman, Ryle, Peacekeeper, Guardian, Francesco, Watcher and had paid two stones for AHoffman

Nat had :

Lilith, Lelu, Lilitu, Two Waldgeists, Cherub, Desperate merc, Terror tot and had taken ALilith as well

We went for individual strategies with me flipping Destroy The Evidence and Nat flipping Claim Jump.

For schemes I took and announced Breakthrough and Kill protege on Lelu

Nat had Hold Out announced and Kidnap which was not announced.

The board we were playing on had four buildings with a few woods scattered around the place.

The game started with Nat moving the forests around while I advanced everything in the Hoffman blob-star down the left hand side towards my evidence markers. Nat had chosen the other side of the board for his claim jump but moved to block me from getting to the evidence. During the second turn with high cards in my hand I let Lilitu lure Francesco onto one of the evidence markers before activating him and claiming the marker (high cards used to stop the follow up lures) Nat kept on moving the forests to stop Ryle from getting a clean shot at anyone though still managed to do 8 wounds to Lelu when he opened fire at last.

Francesco and Ryle were both killed by Lilith over two turns in contact with forests made by illusionary woods giving Nat both his requirements.

During this time Hoffman and the Peacekeeper got my two remaining markers before moving to make a run at Lelu in turn 4, killing them. Nat manifested Lilith in turn 4 as well doing slight damage to the Guardian which was healed up before turning to make for a run on the peacekeeper.

Turn 5 saw the Hoff manifest for me and back away with survival to prevent Nat from getting hold out while my Watcher made for te claim jump marker. By this point there was only Lilith and two Waldgeists left. One went for the claim jump marker while the other went to go get the Hoff but was stalled by the Guardian, Lilith meanwhile was stalled by the Peacekeeper needing all of her actions to kill it.

Turn 6 saw my watcher on Nats objective with Lilith then charging the Hoff. Thanks to some conservative play on my part he took no damage and caused Lilith to waste her actions. Hoff struck back but failed to Kill Lilith as the Guardian moved to block the second Waldgeist just in case however the game ended on turn 6 leaving it a 6 - 2 win for me.

Nat made the game as hard as he could for me to get to my objectives though in doing so lost sight of his own objectives. While I did not once get the initiative this proved to be a boon to me especially in the closing stages when I was no longer outnumbered.

[dunce002917]

Awesome battle report.

I'll get my first impressions of the Hoff on saturday. a small 15 ss game where me and my buddies learn the rules.

[Iron Skies]

I'd say keep it simple on your first few games. Where abouts are you located? Might be able to poke your local henchman into running a few demo's etc

[dunce002917]

I'm located in the San Jose area... and hooked up with a local Henchman so I can get a few games in..

[Iron Skies]

Ah dang, UK based myself

[Dumb Luck]

Question: Pale Rider. Best Long Range Machine Puppet or Best Long Range Machine Puppet?

[dunce002917]

Ah dang, UK based myself

Where in UK? I need to go back. I was in London back in 1990 and I enjoyed it. I'll avoid it this year due to the Olympics but definitely a destination for a vacation or two... you have Doctor Who, Torchwood and Downton Abbey to blame for that.

[Iron Skies]

Question: Pale Rider. Best Long Range Machine Puppet or Best Long Range Machine Puppet?

Clarification : Best long range MOBILE machine puppet, much better than Ryle as a Machine Puppet target as can move 12" a turn in the direction you want