Aesop

What sort of Zoraida lists are you guys running? I ran her with all nephilim once during the beta but with official rules I've been sticking mainly to swampfiends. I'm looking to switch it up and mix in a little variety. Any fun suggestions out there you guys have?

I'm with Eternal on this. I don't believe the terrain is moving. I think the hazardous terrain is static, but appearing and disappearing. I envision it as as the model moves, the terrain they are moving through is angrily rising up and striking at them. The thorn bushes don't grow legs and follow you wherever you go, they just spring up out of no where and lash out at you.

The only tricky thing is: are the resulting actions "declared". The rules on focus say that you can you it when declaring an action... I'd say they are because you have to declare which (1) AP action you're taking.

Direct damage? So stuff like black blood doesn't count either?

If you focus then flurry or charge can you expend the focus on one of resulting actions? Ie. flurry > focus strike, regular strike, regular strike.

A lot of overlap between this and the other thread but, what about specific conditions such as Sewn Fate? The voodoo doll is the only one handing out that condition. I realize the answer is probably just, all conditions are treated the same but I wish there was somewhere in the book that called that out.

So the burning and poison conditions don't count as me killing a model but the sewn fate condition does?

A few questions: Pg31 Friendly and Enemy reads: Pg66 Reckoning reads: In reckoning, 1) If you kill a enemy model with an enemy model through an obey, does it count as killed for VP purposes? 2) If a model dies of a condition you inflicted, such as burning or poison, does that count as killed for VP purposes? 3) If a model is killed through the Voodoo Doll's sewn fate condition, (ex. the model has 1 wd remaining and the Sewn Fate condition, you deal 1 wd to the Voodoo Doll, the model dies), does it count as killed for VP purposes?

I agree at 2 stones. But then while we're on the topic of healing being OP, I don't think healing flips should be cheatable...ok, maybe that wasn't very on topic.

At a cost of 1 it's an auto-take for me (on Barbaros). I'd say it's one of the strongest but not the absolute strongest. Dirty Cheater in gremlins is just ridiculous. To Joel's point sometimes when I'm on the fence on spending a stone of not if the model is wounded I'll spend one. But I don't find myself saving stones when I should be spending them.

During the beta I considered the mandrake an auto-take. It took liliths ml from 6 to 7, range from 2" to 3" and gave her effectively the pounce ability. Thankfully when the rulebook was rełeased they changed her Greatsword to match Lady J's at ml7. For that reason I don't find the upgrade nearly as essential anymore. That said, combining the thirsty mandrake, transfixing gaze and illusionary forest has HUGE potential. Drop the forest, push the target it's charge into it with trans gaze (dealing dg for them ending in it) and then swing away with positive twists on dg. It's definitely a recipe for murder. The only downside I see with that is I prefer to keep grow on Lilith herself and with those other three there's no room for it. So in the event everything goes to plan and you slaughter your intended target, the tot/young you have hanging back doesn't get the auto-grow. I see barbaros as a bad grow upgrade carrier because he's not so much of a killer as he is a mobile pushy tank. Lilith is the hardest hitter on the squad and she also has the functionally to get the enemy to her without leaving the rest of her brood behind.

If you use 2 soulstones in 1 action, say 1 on the defensive flip and 1 on damage mitigation, do you heal 4 dg or 2. The upgrade reads: Friendly models within :aura6 that spend a Soulstone heal 2 damage after the current Action is resolved.

In 1.5 I never had any interest in Lilith but when the new rules came out she jumped to the top of my list. In my experience so far here's what I've seen: I liken Lilith and her brood to the brief animated scene in Kill Bill where the deadly viper assassination squad stand in a circle throwing punches at the bride while she pinballs back and forth from person to person. Lilith's crew is all about hitting hard, passing the target around between each other and murdering. In 1.5 it just seems like a fast strong crew. Now it's more like a murder dance. If you have her nephilim in the right places and can connect when you need to you can orchestrate some deadly stuff. I'll start with the minions and then go to Lilith herself... Young Nephilim - Fast, fairly hard hitting, Ml 6 (so good at connecting) and a auto push trigger on the connect. This guy likes to charge just to the other side of an enemy, hit them once for some damage and hit them a second time for some additional damage and send the enemy back into your ranks. Tot - Weak on their own but extremely fast. The tots sprint is 100% reliable now compared to 1.5 as you always get at least 1 walk from it and even better now that you can cheat any mask in for the additional walk. When I draw a hand with a ace or 2 of mask I hold onto it sometimes now, where in the past I would have always discarded it (rush of magic). He also has pounce giving him a free swing when a model ends a push in his 1" ml range, which ties in perfectly with all the pushes the rest of your crew like to do. So really, there's 2 functions this guy can play for me depending on the situation. 1) he could be a quick little objective grabber/scheme marker dropper. 2) You can hang him back with the safety of his brood and let them feed him weakened prey to grow up into a bigger, more deadly young. Mature - I've been playing smaller games to get more in so I don't usually hire a mature. That said, the few times I've had him on the table (via grow mechanic) he's absolutely devastated the opposition. With a on every attack, 8" charge, ml6 and a 4/5/6 damage profile he's the very definition of monster. In addition, not unlike the rest of his brood he has a trigger on his attack that lets you choose to deal no damage and instead push the target 4" and charge someone else. Theoretically if you had the cards you could string a chain of charge, 1 swing for dg, 2nd swing for push and charge someone else. Finally, his tactical action (1) wing buffet just adds 1 more trick to your bag of push shenanigans. Barbaros - Again, more pushy tricks (seeing a theme here). Barbaros is quickly becoming my favorite model. Every time he connects he pushes the enemy 4". He's also resilient as a truck with Armor 1 and an amazing defensive trigger that on the mask damages the opponent and pushes them away (surprise!). Equipped with the right upgrades he is nearly unkillable. Cherub - Until last night I thought the cherub was cool, but not as awesome as I do today. The cherub's bow has an auto trigger to push an enemy 5" and do some minor damage. Simply another tool to get those models you want to devour closer to your hungry little tots and young. He also has a cool little innate ability that allows models to take interact actions for 1 less AP while within his aura. But my favorite trick the cherub has is on his attack action Rise Up which turns a 3" area around a model and the area the model is standing on into severe and hazardous terrain. This effectively halves the walk/charge of that model and forces an irresistible damage flip on it's activation. The utility of this little guy is huge. Finally the queen herself, Lilith - Lilith is what you'd expect her to be with more tricks. First and foremost high defense and great at swinging a sword. The defensive trigger makes her great while engaged, where she wants to be. Here most notable spell is probably Tangle Shadows (1.5's transposition). It's not easy to get off, casting on a 5, but when it does it can be a huge swing and very demoralizing for an opponent when one of his key models drops deep inside your crews nest. So that's base models, I'll quickly touch on the upgrades I've been taking and the tricks I've been pulling with combinations of abilities. Warning, some of these might be obvious. Lilith's sudden darkness ability is neat. A 0 action that give you +1 dg if you charge through terrain. However, you don't always have terrain available. But wait! Beckon Malifaux upgrade gives her a 0 action to place the Illusionary forest anywhere w/in 16". Crazy range, but more often than not I find myself dropping it in the line between me and the enemy I want to charge, 0 action Sudden Darkness and charging with 2-3 swings and a dg profile of 4/5/7 on ml7. That's enough to take most stuff down. Now maybe you'd rather the model come to you, instead of you charging to it. If you add the Wicked Mistress upgrade to Lilith she can first drop the Illusionary forest, then transfixing gaze a target, pushing it is cg towards her. If it ends in the Illusionary Forest (which it should if you measured right) it'll take a 1/2/3 dg flip and gain slow. Then Lilith can spend her other 2 ap swinging that big ole greatsword with on the dg flips (because she didn't charge) usually giving you the opportunity to cheat the dg up to severe. The last upgrade I love to take with Lilith is Rapid Growth. Growing nephilim is MUCH easier this time around, especially when your hardest hitter can kill the model and "feed" it to a tot or young w/in 2". This again ties in to all the pushes the whole crew has. If you keep your models strategically in a pack (and hope the other guy doesn't have a ton of blasts) you can generally pull or push a model into the heart of it and tear it apart, earning the soulstone for the upgrade back in 1 grow. Summon the blood is one I take sometimes but always get caught up growing stuff instead of using it the way I intend. But it definitely has it's uses. The upgrade allows Lilith to target a friendly model with the black blood ability deal 1 dg to it and have it spurt black blood in a 2" pulse around it. Ideally I think you'd run one of your super fast (sacrificial) tots into a pack of enemy models and then on lilith's activation have the opportunity to dish out 6 irresistible damage on the group of them. Finally, like I said, if you put the right upgrade on barbaros he becomes nearly impossible to kill. The specific upgrade I'm talking about is Nexus of Power, which lets any model which uses a soulstone w/in a 6" aura heal 2 dg at the end of the action. At 1 soulstone, I honestly don't see myself ever not taking it. Basically, I keep Liliths brood in a pack, tactically killing models to grow my tots and young with the variety of pushes, pulls and switcharoos available. The simple targeting of one of your opponents smaller models with tangle shadows to drop next to Lilith and a tot, murder them and insta-grow the tot to a young is beautiful. If I need to drop scheme markers, I'll dedicate a tot or two or have barbaros nimble his way around the board, dropping markers playing whack-a-mole and knocking folks aside using the defensive trigger (stoning for the mask if necessary because, why not, he'll heal 2 dg if they connect). I could probably go on for a while longer but I think I'll stop there.

First and foremost I want to see Bad juju, Mire Golem. His model is literally what got me interested in malifaux (I'm a big swamp thing fan). After that: Voodoo Doll and new conduit rules (I gather they'll add a range to conduit, will it be cuddled? Will it be op? I can't wait to see it and hope it isn't rage inducing like when I conduit first move turn 1 because I won the "who deploys first flip") Silurid Mature Neph (paired claws seems op with new soulstone rules) Ophelia and all her kin (someone referred to her as gremlin Rambo on a podcast somewhere...) General stuff I can't wait to see: Companion Strats and Schemes and to comment on an earlier post, I hope they DON'T change gunfighter to allow you to shoot out of melee, I think that would eliminate a big tactical portion of the game.

Malifaux being my first miniature game, I don't fully understand how faction decks work. I'm hoping someone more familiar with the hobby can fill me in. Is it just 1 card for each master and 1 for every model in the faction? How does it work if I have 8 or 12 of a model, like the bayou gremlin for example. Do I buy multiple faction decks to accommodate my crew?

Ok, on pg 52 and 53 of the mini rulebook it lays it out: 1) Declare spell and target, check range and check if capable to meet add'l requirements (don't meet them yet, just check if you can) 2) Flip starting duel total (CA > CC) 3) Cheat 4) Determine final duel total 5) Meet add'l requirements 6) Opponent's resist Additional requirements are defined as "These requirements are found in the first sentence of the Spell's description and inclde: the caster suffereng Wd, Sacrificing/discardings Counters or Solstones, sacrificing/killing friendly models (or the casting model), or other requirements indicated as "AR: [requirement]." So based on that, there's not really any distinction between spells that list AR: [requirement] and those that just have a requirement in the first sentence. ---------- Post added at 11:19 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:18 PM ---------- No, it doesn't. You only need to meet the AR if you successfully cast the spell.

So if it doesn't explicitly state "Additional Requirement" or "AR:", such as in the case of the Hamelin spell quoted in my original post, that portion, sacrificing a friendly model, only takes effect during the execution of the spell, ie after the spell is successfully cast and not resisted?

Some abilities have a AR: on them listed after the ability with something like "discard a soulstone". I don't have an example of this sitting in front of me or I would quote it. Other abilities has similar listings without the AR: such as Hamelin's Obedience Spell (CC: 13M / Rst: WP/ Rg: 12) Sacrifice a friendly model within 6". Target non-master model immediately takes a charge or (1) action controlled by this models controller. What's the difference between spells with the AR: and spells without them? Does the AR denote that the add'l req must be satisfied to even attempt the spell while the non-AR stuff, like sacrificing the model, only needs to be done if the spell is successfully cast and not resisted? thanks.

The Flock ability states: when activating this model, simultaneously activate all friendly malifaux rats within 4" that gave not already activated this turn. The fact it doesn't say "you may activate" means there's no choice in the matter, correct? I can't activate rats 1 at a time in order to out activate my opponent, can I?

Ok, a few more follow up q's: So will an opponent who knows what they're doing ever kill a rat? How does avatar Hamlin spread the plague? At first blush of the card it looks like he wants to summon rats and then pop them to get plague all over the place...but this isn't possible, right? Hamelin's goal overall is to spread plague and then have enemies bleed out, right? Or do I have it all wrong?

What's the point of the devoured ability? Why heal 2 wds? I'm trying to wrap my head around this new Hamelin crew I just picked up. Thanks! ---------- Post added at 03:45 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:39 PM ---------- I also can't wrap my head around, they're just rats: this model may not be reduced to less than 1 wd during another friendly models activation. Can hamelin sacrifice a rat? If 1 rat attacks a nephilim and black blood splashes everywhere, none of the other rats can die?

Malifaux is the first minis game I've played, so no, I'm not approaching it from a warhammer viewpoint. Actually I'm working on putting together a beatdown list and want to see if he's a justifiable include. In the portion you quoted I believe I've acknowledged his strength as an objective grabber. I specifically created this thread to see if anyone found a way to use him offensively, which I didn't think was such a stretch since his claws do some silly damage like 3/5/7 and he has flurry. More specifically the fact that he comes in zoraida starter box and is on her avatars base makes me really want to use him with her, and I have trouble justifying using an un-obeyable model in her crew.

Add the avatar and add another one! Yeah, probably not viable, but definitely looks fun.

Is there a way to do it? I really want to find a purpose for Bad Juju in my Zoraida crewother than a sponge and objective grabber. For a moment I thought Carrion Effigy's Diminished Resistance would do the trick but in closer reading of the ability it specifies "removes immunities from enemy models". Any ideas? Does anyone actually use bad juju for those brutal brutal claws he's sportin'? Or is he just a 10 stone annoyance for your opponent?

So why include the "unless focused or channeled"? Now that I'm thinking about it this came to mind: If an attack is focused or channeled does the attack not receive a negative flip? So if the attack is focused or channeled then it's the from focused or channeled and proper manners doesn't even trigger? So a overall? ---------- Post added at 08:43 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:42 AM ---------- Ah, thank you. If i had just waited an additional 15 seconds I could have saved myself that second post.