Myth

Since you choose a "artifact upgrade attached to this model", that specific upgrade (not another copy of it) is moved to the new target. You do not create a new copy of the upgrade and retain the one that is currently attached. As such, each model can continue passing those upgrades along in order to spread Fast throughout the crew.

I've tried him a few times - I think he is solid, in that he is a very mobile model with good damage. His attack is the best for raw damage of all the Riders, and the ability to reliably drop 3 or 4 damage blasts can be brutal against clustered enemies if you can set up the right positioning. However, if the enemy isn't clustered, his attack trigger is basically useless, while the other Riders can get great effect from card draw, conditions, forced movement. I also think the others have far better Revel abilities than he does - I've yet to get any use from the ability outside of the top end trigger. Which can certainly be very strong, but I don't think it is as devastating as the automatic damage and conditions that the Dead Rider and Pale Rider can give out. Mech Rider doesn't bring as much damage, but can really impact schemes - the ability to drop a scheme marker from 20" away, or the ability to reactivate a key model late game, can be huge. And all three of them have much stronger benefits from the basic ability itself. So overall, I think there is a reasonable balance comparing him to the other riders - he has a better attack up front, they have better bonuses everywhere else. The main issue is that as a result, they all feel pretty unique within their faction, whereas the Hooded Rider is just a big, fast beatstick, in a faction that has several of those. I'll likely still take him on occasion, but don't think there is nearly as much incentive compared to some of the other Riders.

I don't think there would be any value to making a change like this, personally. What made the Emissaries unique in M2E was having specifically customized abilities for each Master - which was unique and flavorful! But... also takes a lot of design energy, and definitely resulted in some options being much more potent than others. The shift away from that, as with elsewhere in M3E, does mean a less thematic model... but also a more balanced one. Giving the ability to gain Keywords wouldn't add any actual theme to the Emissaries... it would just mean they get a huge power-up with some Masters (Marcus, etc), and it is meaningless with others. While I can see room down the road to try and customize the Emissaries again, I think it would be something that needs playtesting and careful consideration, rather than tossing out a bonus as a throwaway onto the current versions. If you want something both interesting and balanced, I think that would involve custom upgrades once again - or maybe alternate Master versions that have built-in synergies/benefits if you bring an Emissary.

Yeah, I'm generally in agreement that Lazarus is reasonably balanced for his cost and has a solid role (durable ranged threat). It is just hard to justify taking him when Hannah and the Strongarm are so powerful that they are often auto-takes, and thus you rarely have the points left over for Lazarus.

Yeah, I like it quite a bit. I sometimes have trouble finding good Minion choices for it, since you want a model that is either sturdy enough to survive the action, or will be staying safe and out of trouble. But bonus initiative and bonus resources are always good. The Avoid Doom part itself, like with the original Pact, only ever comes up once every several games. Still, if you have a model with an action that you want to guarantee (like Leap), the insurance can be worth it. The only non-Minion I've taken it on has been Dreamer, to make sure he doesn't botch his summoning.

I've had decent luck with him. I know I've used him to good effect with Kaeris, by setting Raptors on fire, then having them gain Fast and fly way across the board to drop scheme markers (which he can then move further with his (0) Action). But Arcanists already have a lot of scheme marker manipulation (and some ways to gain Fast), so he doesn't bring as much as for some other factions.

My group tends to have the same opinion as Zebo regarding Von Schill. You can't point to any one area where he has a fatal flaw - he is just a little below the curve in a lot of areas. Which fits with his 'jack of all trades' design... but adds up to being on the low end of the curve with Masters. He has some cool features and a good player can (as with any Master) perform well with him, but he does feel like he could deserve some future tweaking, even just a bit more reasonable cache.

That's certainly fair. I do think that Malifaux has a very high tendency for people to get blown away the first time they encounter something they aren't expecting. Whether it is facing a Master they haven't played before, or a combo between two models they didn't expect, that first experience can be overwhelming - and often demoralizing. At the same time, I don't think that those 'gotcha' effects are what needs to be targeted with errata. Models being powerful, and having unique and distinct capabilities, is a part of what makes Malifaux great. And, notably, there usually are answers to all of these things - sometimes in the crews you play, sometimes in the tactics you use or the schemes you choose. I know one player whose first experience against McMourning involved his entire crew getting absolutely wrecked by poison with very little he could do about it. A Chihuahua ran into the midst of his crew at the bottom of one turn (and then went again first the next round), and suddenly he had a ton of models suffering from Poison 4, while McMourning and Sebastian hung out nearby and amplified the poison effects. All without him getting to make any checks to resist - just like the worry about the Black Blood Bomb. Long story short, a turn or two later most of his crew was dead and turned into dogs, McMourning had expunged one of his best models into a Flesh Construct with a few high-Ca attacks and high cards, and he conceded right there and didn't play Malifaux again for a while. When he did return to playing, he refused to play against McMourning, believing him to be completely broken and an NPE. Eventually, he one day faced McMourning again - and won, since he knew what he was up against. He avoided clustering for the Chihuahua, focused on taking out the support pieces like Sebastian quickly, forced McMourning to overextend to get in range of key models, and ultimately was able to emerge victorious. Which is how things should be. One game of a powerful effect winning out isn't a reason to change things - it is a reason to look at what happened and figure out if there is any way to counter that effect or combo in the next game. In short, I think there is a difference between effects that have the potential to be strong - but can be mitigated by clever positioning or smart tactics or the right schemes - vs abilities that are reliably powerful with very few ways to respond to them. (Such as Ca 8 Lures, or Rooster Rider charges from 22" away, or Austringers threatening any vulnerable models that exited their opponents deployment zone.)

I suspect he was referring to the fact that there is no duel to resist Black Blood Pustule, so the Shaman can target a friendly model near enemies and pulse potentially 4 damage onto the foe without them having a check to stop it. (Though armor would certainly apply). Which... I mean, that was always the design of how the Shaman was supposed to operate. The fact that his abilities didn't actually work together was a flaw in his design, which the errata is fixing, not an exploit being made available. Sure, Illuminated are a sturdy model to give Black Blood and use as a target node. They also aren't unkillable, and they both need to get to the enemy (and within 1") and have the Shaman follow to get within range without dying himself. And there are various counters in the game to dangerous pulses (Freikorps, Seishin, etc). For that matter, there are also various other ways to splash enemies with damage, such as by chain blasts off your own models. I've seen a Carrion Emissary dropping blasts off either a tough target (Izamu) or expendable ones (Mindless Zombies). Sure, it is more limited range that the Shaman - but the Emissary is also bringing a lot more to the table than a single cool trick. I've seen Molly drop a pair of Punk Zombies near enemies, and then they make use of Slice and Dice on both the enemies and each other - sometimes even with Crooligans around to really crank the damage up. I certainly think the Shaman is much more playable now, but I don't see a 14 SS investment in a pair of minions to be the 'killer combo' that it is being described as. I think it was mainly for the range. At least in my experience, the Austringer could threaten a huge swath of the table with the potential for 18" range, with an attack whose focused shots were potentially very lethal to many scheme runners. Without being able to expand their range, Austringers are still quite scary within their 12" bubble, especially hiding behind terrain - but I feel like they won't be able to just have complete free reign of the board anymore. (And will also need to be choosier about where they hide, now that range limitation is more of a concern.)

Right, that seems to be the divide here. From my perspective, there are Auras that can directly cause damage, and then there are Auras that can indirectly cause damage. Hollow specifically refers to Auras that deal damage, and so only works on those. Misery directly deals damage when the right conditions are met. Wrath's Aura does not - instead, it just gives a modifier to any attacks that target people within the Aura. Those Attacks are what are, ultimately, dealing the damage. Similarly, if an Aura existed like you described, the Aura itself is not what would be dealing damage to the Lightning Bug. Instead, the Lightning Bug is taking damage from a Condition, even if the Aura is what caused the Condition to trigger early. Actually, let's compare to a similar situation with attacks: Kaeris Trigger - Engulf: "After applying Burning, the target suffers damage equal to its Burning Condition Value and then removes the Burning Condition." Eternal Flame - Flaming Detonation: "Target model with the Burning Condition immediately resolves the Burning Condition as if it were the end of the turn." Note that these two effects operate very similarly. However, there is a key difference. With the Kaeris trigger, it is Kaeris herself who is dealing damage to the model, and simply is calculating the amount of that damage based on the value of the Burning on the target. If the model is killed, Kaeris counts as the one who killed them. A model that reduces damage from Conditions would still take full damage from Kaeris, since the Condition is not actually dealing the damage. The Eternal Flame, on the other hand, is causing their Burning Condition to immediately be processed, as if it were the end of the turn. A model that reduces damage from Conditions would be able to successfully use that protection against the Eternal Flame's attack, since it is simply causing the Condition to trigger, not dealing the damage itself. Same thing with Auras. If an Aura caused your Poison to trigger an additional time, the Poison is what is damaging you, not the Aura. If an Aura caused a Poisoned model to simply take damage when activating, then the Aura is what is causing the damage (and thus Hollow would apply.)

See, I don't think you can separate an aura from the ability is part of by saying it is 'just' a range measurement. Misery is an Aura that causes damage, not 'an Ability that causes damage which happens to use an Aura'. It is the same exact situation with Attacks. An attack which has a range of 2 is considered a "Attack". An Ability or Action which has an 3 as a range is considered an " effect". That is simply the shorthand the game uses, rather than constantly writing out, "Any Attack which has a range" or "Any Attack or Ability which has an range" when referencing such things. Look at, say, Lightning Bugs. It says they reduce the damage they take from all and effects by 1. If a Pulse never actually does direct damage (but is only a measurement for some other Ability that is dealing the damage), then their Ability would never actually work at all, right?

I do understand what you are getting at. I think the key is that a blst is part of an attack, and thus subject to the rules for that attack plus the rules for being a blast. An attack being boosted by an aura, however, is not part of an aura, in the same way that an attack being boosted by a condition is not, itself, a condition. If I am immune to damage from conditions, and a model attacks me while having a condition that causes it to do +2 damage with attacks, I still take all of that damage.

I think it does say you are immune to damage caused directly by auras - that is what "damage dealt" means. I think it would need much broader wording if it made you immune to all the damage-relevant effects of Auras, including ones that modify other effects or attacks on the board. Wrath's Aura, ultimately, does not deal damage to the target in the Aura. It just means that when other models attack that target, those attacks deal extra damage. As the 'dealing' of damage is coming from other sources, not from the Aura, Hollow does not apply. Count me in as another for whom it is pretty cut and dry that Hollow would not protect against Wrath's aura.

Like everyone else, I've seen Lust in a lot of crews - her aura is the easiest to punish enemies with, her deck control is always useful, movement tricks are great, and she can hit surprisingly hard in the right situation (especially with the aforementioned deck control). I'm a big fan of Envy. Very straightforward, durable, ranged damage-dealer, who is competent in melee, and can help out many crews with the ability to hand out Focus. Wrath and Greed and Sloth all bring some nice pieces to the table, and I usually see them in crews specifically built to work well with him. Wrath paired with Barbaros, for example - Wrath can make Barbaros hit harder, or Barbaros can draw in attacks and bring Wrath's aura into play. Sloth offers debuffs and healing and the most generically functional of the auras - and has the keywords for some nice synergy with certain Masters. Greed has a great Df trigger and song attack, especially if you can copy it (with Hannah, Changelings, etc.) I've never had much luck with Pride, but it always feels like the anti-Cheat-Fate stuff should be useful. Gluttony has been even more difficult to make work. He has some nice tricks for clearing enemy scheme markers... but it always feels like there are easier ways to make that happen. I had one cool game where Jack Daw used him and Crooked Men in a nifty combo, but outside of that very specific crew, he just feels less versatile than the other Crossroads folks, and particularly overcosted within the Gremlins faction.

Pretty sure it is just models. If the marker is moved, the first line of the statement ("enemy models") isn't applicable. Even if the movement effect originates from an enemy model, it is the marker that is ending a movement effect within the aura. In the same way that if the enemy used a push on your own models, the Dress doesn't stop them - it is your model that is ending a push effect within the aura, even if that effect was caused by the enemy.