Breng77

For arcanists 1.) Mechanical rider: not counting models in crew boxes (and possibly even then) this is easily one of the games most powerful models. Decently powerful attack, summoning, high survivability. No brianer #1 here. 2.) Malifaux raptor: great utility model, super cheap, very versatile. With a showgirl with priacticed production it becomes one of the games best scheme runners especially in headhunter or collect the bounty. Good for tying up shooting models, denying make them suffer. Borderline broken in interference. 3.) I find this to be the tough choice, I have not used some of the newer models, and most of my other top models are from crew boxes or mercs. So to me this slot is likely crew dependent. But I'll go with the December acolyte.

It is funny I rarely take it. I find having it ends up with me overextending at some point win a key model.

I've had some decent success with the IG with Colette. Give it armor of December and use prompt for a 6" move with the armor bonus. As long as you don't face a heavy hitter that ignores armor you can be pretty sturdy and pretty quick. Throw in a prompt for focus or a dove for positive to damage and that 3 ap attack is very scary

Interesting I find I trigger it quite a lot. With DF 6 she is even or better than most models, so if you win the initial flip the fact that you might have any mask in hand means that your opponent will need to "over cheat" just in case. I usually trigger it off middling mask cards against weaker attackers.

I used to use them a lot with myranda. I would bring a pair and hide her behind them which meant they were getting df6 with a positive flip which is tough for many models to deal with. Slither is also a nice action as you can leave engagement of enemy models with it, or attack something out of LOS. I would think a scorpions would help them out but haven't had a chance to try it. That said Ml5 is a big downside on these guys. Colette actually supports them fairly well as she can prompt them to focus or sacrifice a dove for positives to damage flips which helps them a lot. beyond that they are mostly just a durable model that can tie up enemy models.

I'll start by saying that you cannot copy understudy as it is not a CA action. Beyond that the issue I have found is that a lot of good arcanist spells rely on their triggers, which she cannot use.

when it serves no purpose other than to delay. Let's just take your above example of a master with 3 health left and burning 3. If there are 15 minutes left in the round would you be ok with me mulling over my play to stall out the game. At which point is endlessly flipping different from thinking my move over? The large difference is that one could delay the entire game. The result you desire is unachievable in any realistic timeframe, and thus deserves an FAQ. Pending that I'll (likely) speak for every TO by stating that you cannot do it. As an organizer for a small hobby game it is important to foster people's continued desire to play said game...this trick does the opposite as nothing is less enjoyable than one sided hopeless games. You can call it non-competitive, but it is clearly not the intent for the rule to work this way. Were I to FAQ this I would go with "triggers resulting from targeting this marker do not gain+6 CA".

I'm still not seeing where you can 100% guarantee what would be in your discard pile. Is it because if it were possible to shuffle infinite times every order of cards would occur at some point? I suppose that is true. But you cannot actually shuffle your deck infinite times, for any number of practical reasons (the deck would be destoyed, there is not enough time in your life, etc.). The "infinite "damage combs in magic are not actually infinite, just as much as needed which is a finite amount. Given any finite amount of shuffles you cannot guarantee with any level of certainty what will be in your discard pile. do I think this needs an FAQ sure I do. Do I believe anyone should try it in an event prior to said faq? Nope, and if you do he judge with snap rule against you and you shouldn't get upset because you knew he would.

a big difference is that in Magic the damage need not be infinite, as soon as I can deal damage equal to your life total I can end the combo with certainty that it will work. Stacking the deck is far different in that no matter how many times I rail walk I can never be certain of my deck order. In fact I may never get to the point where it is stacked the way I want it as each time I reshuffle the deck the likely hood of my desired set up remains the same and doing it more often does not increase that chance. As it is not a certainty that it will happen attempting it would be slow play. It is akin to walking into a store to buy lotto tickets and saying well if I play this forever I'll eventually win.... For Example the probability of shaping your deck to have nothing but face cards and the RJ left is quite low lets consider the best case Mei with Arcane res, and Hannah, and having no face cards in hand. On each resuffle you have an ~0.0000000001% chance of getting the deck set up such that it is all face cards and the red joker. This does not improve the more you do it as you have not changed the state of the deck in anyway. So your chances are ~ 1 in ten billion to get that set up. Which don't seem like really great odds to me. Now you can say it will eventually happen if you shuffled infinite times. The problem is it is not possible for you to shuffle infinite times. That also assumes you never miscount a face card on your flips. Unlike infinite damage in magic (which is really only however much damage I need to do to kill you), this is never a given. If I have a set up in magic where I can infinitely tap and untap a card to do 1 damage. You and I can agree that I can tap it a number of times equal to your life total (usually 20) and that you will die. It would be inevitable. In this case we cannot agree that if I mill and reshuffle my deck a certain number of times that I will with certainty end up with a specific deck order. In the magic example I can turn to you and say. Hey I can keep doing this damage, so if I do this 20 times I win. In the rail walk case I cannot specify the number of times. Thus it is not inevitable that it will happen. At which point you are simply stalling time. Beyond that combos like that are what make magic uninteresting to play, furthermore matches are best 2/3 and side boarding is allowed. So having this happen once does not ruin 1 of your 3 matches for the day etc.

I'd be willing to let an opponent use it to reshuffle so long as the black joker is out of the deck, beyond that it gets silly. Stating that it can be used to sculpt the deck would require any player using it to have advanced card counting skills. Unlike tappin in magic shaping the deck requires actual skill to do and given a million years some players would never be able to do so meaningfully.

I find Mannequins mostly useful in schemes like plant explosives as throwing a marker 6" is basically a guarantee for that scheme. Mech rider can also do this at times but is not as reliable. But he could spawn one for the throw.

Hmm I knew a few people who were going to make the drive. Regardless good to know. I've removed it from the calendar. Thanks for the update, but sorry to yeah nice to hear that people were planning to attend but as Mike said we only had 4 people pre-reg and they were making a huge drive and if no one else showed up it would have sucked for them. We really needed more prereg to support the event.

Unfortunately due to low registration this event has been canceled

Except with the counter spell aura it can be spend 3 stones, and 3 cards to kill the opponents master which may still be worth it, but it is hardly easy.

Not saying it is impossible but now you are spending a ton of cards/stones to pull it off, and failing any one of those causes the whole thing to fail.

Does controlled detonation have a target number because if so putting him on negatives makes it unlikely to go off.

Yup counter spell makes that far less likely. It is really not that easy to pull off. That it needs to be changed.

Which is why I said triggers from CA targeting this marker. I.e. If you target the marker and generate a trigger that trigger won't get the +6 CA. So you can trigger into the +6 CA so long as that trigger wasn't generated using the +6 CA.

An easy fix would be to say that triggers from CA actions targeting his marker do not receive the +6 to CA

Mike has it right. After discussions we have reduced the price to $25 for the ticket.

I meant that with it revealed it was not bad to do it because you only need one marker on the enemy side. Howard seems like a really expensive piece to scheme run with but winning is winning.

I'm typically not big on puttin frame for murder on something like a gamin. It is too easy to ignore/kill with a non-master/henchman. So it seems suboptimal, I would probably put I on Howard. I also think your crew is a bit lacki for power ritual. Most of your models are not fast so getting to the corners can be tough. With it revealed it is no bad though.

It is a drive for you but there are events in NY back to back weekends in October

Tannen allows him to summon teddies. At NOVA some people were discussing a combo of dreamer with on dreaming wings(I think, upgrade to stone for 3 cards), tannen, Hannah, and Anna Lovelace. To essentially draw 11 cards each turn, and using high cards to summon teddies. Not sure how well it works, but it seems pretty crazy.

Thanks for the reply, and thanks again for running such a great event.