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You want at least two summoner activations to get mileage out of it. So if you have Asami, use Minako and are facing Sommer, well, suddenly you are drawing 3 cards a turn (discarding 2in the process), which is pretty nice. Outside of that scenario, it's shit yes.

Christ, I didn't process the Sebsei Yu nerf. Top tier plan! Only thing that made High River Monks kind of worth maybe considering! That will sure help them now!

Nah, I just think it should have a cost now that chiaki can preset the ancestor replace bu getting the upgrade on a gokudo. That action during beta got buffed to the high heavens since it was very hard to set up. Then Split the Soul happened like a week before ending the beta.

Of course Yasinori gets overcorrected when I finally decide to buy him XD He got absolutely castrated, see very little incentive to use him after this. His only real selling point is his mobility now since his resilience has gone way down with the opponent just needing to go to 2 cards to leave him naked and although with his bonus action he can do easier setups for Quick Reflexes, I'm still not sure how useful that would actually be in practice since now he seems like a schemer bully, not something you jam into the middle which also means less chances to trigger Quick Reflexes. As for the rest, fine, I'm mildly annoyed with the card discard required for Chiaki, but making it Retainer only makes all the sense in the world, Yan Lo will have to be more careful now though. Minako frankly didn't address the issue with her, when I field her I tend to bring Ototo for the ride anyway, so there I get my shadow markers (if you want them for cheap, a Torakage can at least give you 1) and I'm still surprised she can summon both Katashiro in the same turn. More surprised still that Katashiro can still leap for free. On other things that really raise my eyebrow is how Rebuild Corpus still just happens and Wandering River Style still hasn't gotten a TN. On the other side of the spectrum, Dawn Serpent still seems like crap to me and High River Monks are still hard sells just as an immediate couple of models I have gripes with. I was expecting more sweeping errata in general I guess, but seems they prefer to take it slow and well, they are the game devs

Whozers! Game is saved!

With Asami to get more use of A Mother's Love has been the plan, though his slow ass has caused me problems sometimes to get him into position. Deployment with him is KEY, badly placed he becomes a very shitty schemer. One game he was in good positioned and did a lot of work stripping Flicker, in another he barely did anything, though was in a decent position to secure a Turf War marker. Like stated, they can have use, but you NEED a plan for them and mostly stick to it.

The mad lad delivered! Took first place in the UK National with Shenlong! Hope we can get some bullet points on how things went.

Will definitely copy this approach! Thanks for sharing.

Yup, next time Sidir joined the fun and though not amazing, was certainly helpful. Question for more veteran Shenlong players. So I only really have High, Low and River monks as well as archers. Fermented I'm pretty meh on, and looking through the rest of the roster, only Lotus Eaters kind of seem interesting. Is it me or is this one of those versatile fodder themes? Anything in theme that is sort of a must have? Also, is the Chi ball on turn 1 a must or can the crew work well sort of on the fly? I tend to really dislike these "complicated set up" crews, and though I don't oppose doing a bit of it, it seems like Shenlong goes full balls to the wall with it.

Seems like all the playing with yourself could really screw you over once the opponent knows what you are on about, specially with the Distracted trick. Faced a Rasputina that was placing ice pillars blocking Shenlong constantly, so moral of the story, he only managed to attack once in like turn 4, rest of the time he ended up swapping between Low River and Wandering River since thankfully he can do whatever is needed at a given moment.

Or pass on Toshiro and just use Minako Rei, at the end of the day you just want to summon crap, and be it Toshiro or Minako, who cares. We also have a much easier time feeding Minako (single Obsidian Oni to generate some scrap for her or go full ham and bring Misaki to set up a Shadow Markers to feed her while she uses the other to do her thing). It is sad that Bone Ascendant is pretty much blank text for us and that Toshiro can't reliably summon, but Toshiro can be used as a minion enhancer. Samurai beefed up with Daimyo's gift means that you are giving them the focus you always want to give them plus either free attacks or more mobility and Leadership is always nice. Think of him as a mega Taniku that doesn't remove conditions, but always can give focus and conditionally can summon and can actually get into a scuffle. It does involve making a different type of list with Yan Lo though.

And the concept of bringing the Kamaitachi as well? Or is it still considered universally shit? I mean, outside of it's card draw, I still don't get the point.

Another one who didn't notice that interaction... On the topic of Asami and Minako, anybody considered the wonder Weasel to get an easy 2 card draw per turn from it? 3 if the enemy is also a summoner? or is 4 point insignificant a still too sour pill to be worth it? Ans since we consider Minako, anybody gone full tilt and also brought Misaki into the party? Suddenly those Katashiro don't need the scrap anymore and Misaki is a god tier harraser/schemer anyway, so it's not like you aren't getting some good shit out of it.

Ok, thought this allowed splicing things. In that context, yeah, Last Blossom is pretty meh

From where I stand, dead game is dead game. So yeah, a sort of soft reboot with a strong push is pretty much a must at this point if there is any intent of getting the game to get some traction. Just releasing the Guild + spooky ghost set and having radio silence for half a year would achieve nothing. Hell, I'd be tempted to suggest at this point that they don't even bother releasing the 2 player set unless they can immediately follow it up with Kimon and Three Kingdoms starters as well, because trickle release just doesn't work in the current state of the game, no hype, no interest, no traction. As others have stated, the game is fine, the latest errata I think cleans a lot of the stupid that was in the game, but I still haven't managed to get a game in and the current Malifaux League is going strong, while we had a The Other Side league be started and die a quick death where I was pretty much badgering my opponents to play. And really, the model problem cannot be overstated. The material quality is bad. The bendiness is rage inducing and it feels crummy as well as dodgy gluing where I had to unglue part of the King's Hand because it wasn't even or another person that had the Artillery Team come completely deformed. The model casting as such is good and there is some solid detail, but I prefer firmness at this point. GW plastic almost feels like an unfair comparison, and I don't know how big CMON is considered, but both have much better sculpting material and the later also comes with prebuilt models and they are cheaper than The Other Side to boot. Basically, without a true push (I believe those tournament packs still don't exist for example) and a reevaluation of material used for future releases, I don't really see the game ever getting any traction, and I would even dare say that it might not even be in Wyrd's interest since frankly, what I'm proposing ain't cheap, M3 seems to be doing very good on it's own.

I don't see why you cannot just dip into our versatile arsenal with Misaki though. I mean, yes, they are frail, but we got Samurai if you want to bring some armor and ranged support in a single package that also happens to bring some anti armor. No, they don't bring any synergy with her markers, but it's not that much of a deal as long as you have somebody in the crew that uses them beside Misaki (Minako, Torakage or Crime Bosses) I have been playing Misaki recently and been very pleasently surprised with her. I don't put much stock on the ranged part of the theme, but the Crime Bosses are pure gold (though a bit frail) and Torakage are a ton better than the initial credit I gave them (though Minako's Katashiro kind of steal their thunder). It does mean that a pure Last Blossom is going to be very frail, but who said you have to stick to pure theme?

It's the rough part of playing KE and why it feels a must to play with Abyssinian allies. Either you get a hand, or you use Stratagems, but you aren't getting both. And since you also have to do missions, Ta just ends up drying up almost instantly, so either you play tricks but have to depend on rawdecking or barely use Stratagems but get a hand. Or like said, get Kassa and some Abyssinia units and even post errata you can probably get some decent car draw going

Oh, ok, so there would be a flurry of opposed duels then?

Mostly possitive on the changes but need to see them on the table. I still expect Cult's mobility and Abyssinia's resource generation to keep them on top, though at least it won't be as blatant or oppresive I hope. A clarification on the new Rhino pulse. So Rhino flips card + 6, all enemies within 4 inches resist with Sp with the Tn being the total the Rhino flipped, right?

But that's not a unique selling point, Samurai, Fuhatsu and Sidir all have Juggernaut and I personally think they bring more to the table. What really makes Ototo be a boss is that extra shadow token since it really helps a lot with the crew synergy. Well that and if you are able to set up your attacks properly to gain Fast on as many activations as possible, in that scenario he becomes amazing, but I don't expect my opponent to let me get away with that too much if he can. Oh, a gigantic con with Misaki though which makes her risky is how anti-bury tech completely screws her over. So any faction that can product any of that you will probably want to keep her in your bag, which is what's really going to limit her competitive presence.

I didn't think much of Misaki till I played her, she truly does fill the board with her markers unless the opponent tailors specifically to nuke terrain and that makes all her crew amazing at taking objectives. Ototo is a bit of a wet fart, but his ability to set up an extra shadow marker may prove invaluable thanks to how amazing the Crime Bosses and Minako Rei are and how much they depend/enjoy those shadow markers. Asami I'd also place higher, she can do anything at any given moment, her versatility is just top notch and the Tengu and Yokai are pretty good schemers overall. Yan Lo is a beast, a bit of a slow starter himself, but his keyword is full of topnotch choices. McCabe I think is being slept on since he is missing some key pieces, once Desper and friends are out, he will do WORK, specially in areas that allow dual masters. Shenlong... is a weird one. Shenlong himself is amazing and can do pretty much anything at any given time. It's wonderful to know that you can kick something to death at one point, and if you can't get in, you can be one of the best healers in the game in the next turn. The rest of the crew dies to a stiff breeze though unless you top load the hell out of them with Chi which requires a lot of "self play" which I personally find kind of annoying. Definitely low river monks and Wandering river monks have a place, rest I find more debatable and wonder if he's better filling the list with Versatile models and from other keywords. Mei Feng I don't personally put much stock on, but our local top player considers her one of the most dangerous masters in Ten Thunders. He does emphasize that Sparks has to be in there and there is some evil to be had combining that with Lone Swordsman... Nothing to say about Youko nor Lynch, I just don't do them.

What kills my interest in the serpent is that it's a 2 action 9SS model with a very wonky bonus action. If I'm paying 9 points for something, I expect either a Flurry/Rapid Fire, or an incredibly efficient bonus action. Katanaka Crime bosses are fantastic for 8 SS since their bonus lets them teleport and still have 2 actions to get stuff done. Serpent on the other hand will only ever place 1 scheme marker for example and since it can't charge while engaged, even though Agile is nice, it doesn't work towards it's strength as a beater since moving out to go into something else still cost you two actions. So what is it? A very expensive beater or a very expensive schemer that doesn't excel at either of the roles? That it's ranged attack is kind of a wet fart doesn't help much either. I get that it wants to be versatile and do two roles, but it's kind of meh on both which is what leaves me underwhelmed with it. But hey, if it works for you, who am I to say much else? I'm just not expecting to reach for it any time in the future.

But at that point, why not just use Desper LaRaux? Costs the same outside of McCabe crews. can use stones, has Don't Mind Me and leap and is already ignoring everything while moving. He is worse at offense of course, but the Serpent isn't anything to be proud about and Desper is much better as a schemer. As for the Sensei Yu comments from @Modernpenguin, you are right, it's just that he lacks style so he seems kind of "boring". Doesn't help that since he is so focused on supporting monks, if for whatever reason you don't bring 3-4, he should probably stay at home. On a similar yet different topic, how do archers behave? Setting up a gunline giving them fast every turn for example, has anybody tried that or pure gimmick?

Played a game of Shenlong. Was mostly just screwing around. Brought Yu, 2 High River monks, a low river, a wandering river and the Dawn Serpent. I definitely noticed that you need to have a VERY clean turn 1 to do your setup. Did a lot of flubs like letting my aspiring students and low river monk get too left behind and forgot some stuff (bonus action Focused from Yu as well as Laugh Off, and other interactions). Found the crew a bit on the stressful side due to the amount of crap one has to keep tabs on. The High River Monk I was pretty scheptical on, and they do die to anything that looks at them funny, but I was certainly impressed by how one took out Snowstorm in an activation. It was fast, had 3 focus and 4 chi though. but still seemed impressive to me. Sensei Yu is... confusing, the Fast from the bonus action was gold, specially since no flip is required, having Shenlong use his bonus action to get Yu to do it again was pretty lucrative, but outside of spreading fast and giving Chi from his aura, Yu's own activation felt pretty lackluster, had a hard time getting places and once there seems like his only deal is to punch things to rotate hand. Shenlong I didn't get to use fully, since ice pillars made his life hell, but his versatility to make him be a support master on the flip of a dime is fantastic, letting him work even if he can't put his force to bear. Aspiring students are also amazing now that I noticed that copying a Shenlong action is a bonus action, though they also die to a stiff breeze. Does mean that their 1 AP actions are mostly just there to move and generate Chi/Focused which isn't a bad thing anyway. Low River Monk was fine though wasted due to positioning and the Wandering River Monk sadly never managed to leap. The big disappointment was the Dawn Serpent. Just don't see the appeal or what it really brings to the table compared to other similar costed models, not really expecting to field that one again any time soon unless somebody makes me see something important... For the future, aside from bringing Sidir and an Obsidian Oni vs Rasputing, I'm thinking on dropping some of the monks and bringing more versatile models. Mostly wondering what to keep though, a single High River Monk seems like a nice missile, but Yu seems like an important piece of the puzzle to get that bad boy feed and I wasn't thrilled with him which makes the High river less compelling. Low River is a shoe in and a Tanuki seems wise for condition control. Wandering also seems like a reasonable take but Fermented the more I read, the more lukewarm I feel about them.

Christmas sounds like the earliest like anything related to The Other Side will come out. In the meantime, it just keeps withering...