Necromorph

Don't forget since they're Ht1 Hamelin can just (1) Irresistible Lure the lot of them down without needing to make them insig first.

Agree on the Wiki, but I (as a new'ish Gremlin player) have a question. So, Hamelin.....that should be self explanatory, but it came up in conversation today.

How the f**k would you take him on?>! Don't tell me the 'ol Pere Ravage slingshot strat, I play Hamelin, and I can tell you any Hamelin player worth his salt can counter that s**t easily. So, I want to know, does he pretty much auto win against Grems or is there something I'm missing?! I've personally been in a kick where I don't use Hamelin except against Guild (don't know why, I just have no fun playing against most Guild crews so I just out cheese them with the Ham'), but does his Ht1 targeting restriction completely screw us, or are we dable to outmaneuver him enough to complete schemes and strategies? I only really have experience with Ophelia, and I can't wrap my head around how I'd even try to beat him with my little green (or in my case red) friends.

Indeed, I'm surprised we (as a community) haven't jumped on the wiki-wagon yet, lol. Granted, the Wyrd forums are awesome, but it would be much more condensed.

Collodi (and yes I know he's a henchman, just putting it out there) can move over 60" per turn with his Marionettes.

So, I know that Hoff is a total construct master, but I'd like to point out that Non-Construct ranged support is invaluable with Hoff (in my experience/frustration playing against him)

Austringers....well aside from being one of the most retarded, underpriced units in the game, are awesome with the Hoff. If you're running a standard line (Hoff, Ryle, Peacekeeper, Guardian), the Austingers give you serious ranged deterrence....oh and they can get armor from the Guardian, and they can chain activate models (oh and cb7 too boot...did I mention they're only 5 f**king points?!?!).

Nino/Santiago/Samael....just imagine them with armor +4 (I think? I don't believe Shield Wall is Construct specific, correct me if I'm wrong). Either way, their damage at range is much appreciated. Combine them with Ryle and an Attendant and you've got a VERY survivable, static gunline.

Very very nice! It also means that Ramos can be a viable brawl partner with Levi, since he can now take the Toolkit.

Well, one option I saw thrown around for the Attendant is in a Brawl with Levi

Unfortunately, Levi can't hire totems, so Hoffman would be without one in a brawl. Oddly enough, Hoffman is still the only practical choice for Levi in a brawl :surprised.

The Korps are definitely awesome, but don't forget about the other Mercs too. Hans and Hamelin both have their place in Mercenary lists (I consider all the Mercs to be 1 big group, though my lists typically run 'Korps heavy).

Ooh, good thing I caught the post about Breach Psychosis, that would get ugly if I started wasting casts to make him Insig. Though because Blight Counters cause wd instead of dg, and the help of bleeding disease, I don't see Hamelin really having a problem taking Hoffman down, especially when his constructs are all bunched up and I don't have to split my force haha.

ACME Rockets on their back?

Rofl!

Yeah, making rats charge is very iffy. You can only obey 1 at a time, and you run the risk of the rest of the swarm being out of range to do (0) Writhing Mass. Rats are great, but having 1 rat missile hit something without support really isn't going to accomplish much, lol.

A solid list. Yeah, I would use Levi to deliver Killjoy, I love Necropunks for their mobility and Objective grabbing capability, I think they would be much better kept alive then saccing them for Killjoy (esentially making him cost 14ss eeek). Once the Desi and Killjoy are out, you'll be down to a low model count and are likely going to be outactivated. Again, as Karn said, this isn't a huge deal with Levi as he can take on quite a bit by himself, but it's still useful to keep some extra models for those activations.

I've personally never used Killjoy, in offensive lists I prefer to go with a balance of range and melee, taking alyce and/or ryle, and then a couple melee heavy hitters (usually don't have enough points for Killjoy at that point) and I've had some success with it.

I don't know about you guys, but I would really like to see some cheap ranged constructs in book 3, since ryle is really the only one and I don't consider him "cheap" exactly lol.

Woot, can't wait!

Yeah, I have fun with my card drain lists, hehe...they can take some luck and practice to work well though. Levi with Alyce, Daw, and Bete is pretty brutal.

I think next time I go up against Hoffman I'll take something like Von Schill, Convict, Hans, Libby, Specialist, Taelor, Student o Conflict. Should give me enough mobility (well not Hans lol) and armor ignoring utility...plus I can still drain his hand with the Convict (just gotta remember to make ryle slow first, lol).

Not Abernathy!! Haha, quite the compelling read, AB. Look forward to part 3.

Awesome as usual, good sir.

Very nice, curious to see what's in that chest, lol.

Infinity is an awesome Sci-fi skirmish game. Lots of good things about it, and it's one of the most balanced, intuitive rule sets I've ever played (nothing against Malifaux lol).

I think the best thing for the game would be to change the nature of man such that people play to have fun, not dominate another player or look for loopholes in the rules to exploit. Failing that, I just like more options/variety. I love the creativity in the game, but the hard part is the balancing the power on the knives edge such that nothing is auto-include. Good luck.

Bingo...that's just how some people operate, and I think even if you did make an oversimplified version of a game, people would always find ways to abuse it. That is the nature of gaming in general (both mini games and video games).

However, the basic nature of Malifaux, Master/list abuses/imbalances will kind of keep me from Tournament play on any kind of regular basis. Similar to 40k, I feel like tournaments could easily turn into a "Who Has the Cheeziest List" competition. Again, not to say that other games aren't like that, but the only game I've played that doesn't have an inherent, recurring cycle of abuse in competitve play is Infinity. I play Malifaux and 40k for fun, Infinity I play competitively because it's a little bit more about skill and tactics and less about who brings "that list" with "that faction." Ofc, that is just the difference in the basic design of each game.

I agree with you Pigi, but on the topic of "standard lists" I think all games suffer from that. There are certain combos that, through community play and trial-and-error stand out as more powerful. In other games there are very clearly defined "tournament" or "cookie cutter" lists that are seen very often in competitive play. It's a natural result of players testing combo's until they find something that is powerful enough to take on all comers and then it is abused until a counter is found, and then the cycle repeats itself.

Wouldn't mind seeing some Melee gremlins, possibly with a Master or Henchman to go with them. I would think of it either as a big brutish gremlin (like the one described earlier in the post) or a sneaky gremlin assassin type (big fan of Ork Kommando's in 40k even though I don't play them, they're just such an oxymoron that it's funny).

IMO, the number one rule I tell new players to follow is Know Your Crew!! Know what you can do and when you can do it. Damn near memorize your stat cards, and read up on tactica's, discussions, etc (the Wyrd community is one of the most helpful and supportive gaming groups out there).

Second would probably be know your opponent's crew. This one is much much more difficult. If you simply know your own crew, it gives you the advantage of being able to adapt to things thrown at you, but if you have no idea what your opponent is capable of, you'll spend the whole game "adapting" defensively, on the back foot, and less time focusing on your objectives. The reason this is such a difficult step is that, unlike other games where there are factions/armies that all have a couple "competitive lists" you have to know what every master from every faction is capable of (and most are unique). For example, you can't say things like "well guild shoots and Resers are Melee," like you can in other games where categorization is more simple. Not that everyone is going to be able to memorize every model and theory-faux their way to victory, you still need experience, but it helps to read up on opponents you may be unfamiliar with. Hell, I read any tactica I come across so I can know what their tricks are, but also I can use the information to help new players at my LGC who may be getting into that crew.

Third...hmm a couple close ones here. I'll say it's a tie between Resource Management (i.e. control cards / SS) and Schemes.

-RM is crucial because if you burn too many cards/stones to early, you will find yourself getting crushed later. It's common for new players to cheat Everything so they never take hits....early on. It doesn't take long for them to figure out this isn't a good idea, but it's something that comes with the learning experience.

-Schemes are big, and can mean the difference between a tie/loss and a victory. However, some schemes (just like their higher VP cousins, Strategies) suit certain crews more than others, and knowing which scheme to take with which strategy, based on your crew and your opponent's crew, takes some time to get down. Also (and this ties in with resource management) you have to strategise on how to complete your schemes and strategies at the right time, while denying your opponent theirs. Timing is important. If you wait too long, or go for certain objectives too soon, your opponent can capitalize on that.

So i guess that's like my top 3(.5?) things that I feel are crucial skills.

Edit: Added RM and Schemes.

The Librarian is only stupid easy to kill unless she's near Von Schill, then she's damn near invincible so long as you have a ram / ram built in if she activated. Though if you set the Libby to firmly as the fulcrum of your crew, you risk disaster. I think at least one turn per game i'll draw a hand with no rams in it...and it that happens to be a crucial turn where a lot of stuff is going down, it can be very very bad.

Ugh, yeah it's uuuugly. I feel like when I use him with Levi I'll just be like, meh, not so awesome without Machine Puppet, lol. Granted, Levi, Alyce, and Ryle make one hell of a fire platform.

I feel like crews that can't cast or ignore armor in some way will have a haaaard time dealing with Hoffman. My first game with the Lacroix was his first game with Hoffman. I had to companion damn near my whole crew to drop the Guardian, doing 1 dmg every shot through his armor, and most crews can't pull off mass activation like that.

Though I did find a combo with Von Schill that can be brutal. Run him up, (0) Magnetic Pulse to make the constructs slow, then (1) Supressive Fire with the Convict. Forces them to blow their hand to activate all of their Slow models....it's pretty nasty. Even though I only got it off once before the Convict died, (well I did the tactic in reverse order, so Ryle wasn't slow after I cast SF and got all his shots off to kill the CGS before I could heal him) that one turn of totally messing with his activations was the only reason I didn't lose worse.

I expect to be pleasantly suprised no matter what gets released, but as to my speculations.

-Fourth Horsemen (Can't wait to bring on the Apocalypse with Levi).

-Expansion of Special Forces

--Ranged and Caster Dolls for Collodi

--More "basic" Kin and Family members to keep the Feud going, lol.

--I second the idea of a more Melee focused 'Korps model.

--Molly needs more special forces in general.

--Kaeris, same boat as Molly.

-Avatars - After the events of the fluff, we should hopefully see some more about this.

-Some more "non-special forces" models to keep the book 1-2 masters viable.

It is, quite frankly, retarded. I was on the business end of that combo yesterday and I'm now never going to show any mercy to anyone that runs the combo...I'll use Hamelin in all of his cheesy glory, gg lol. I mean, it's no Alp Bomb, but it's just very annoying.

He shot, what is it six times (well six shooting actions, 3 from Machine Puppet) triggering extra damage flips on half of them. Gunned down Taelor and a convict in 2 consecutive turns. Interesting note, he was shooting at both models in cover, Taelor is hard to wound as well, but he just managed to do 1 damage enough times to kill both models. I finally cut his lame ass in half with sword Vik turn 4, but then learned that magical weapons don't ignore armor (don't know how I missed THAT one lol) and that basically screwed me for the game, as I couldn't kill fast enough to stop him from dropping my supply wagon (I will ALWAYS burn a stone to reflip that f**king strategy from now on, lol). This was the first time I've seen that combo used...not gonna lie, kinda bummed. Yeah it's a nasty combo, but I screwed up on the placement of models a tad, (not to mention I "had" to move up because of that f**king supply wagon), and having to face that combo, plus making a dumb mistake, plus learning that your master doesn't fill the role you took them for (Magical not ignoring armor blah blah) didn't make for a very enjoyable game, lol.

/rant lol