Paradigm

I actually hadn't played miniature wargames at all growing up, but then halfway through college a friend of mine persuaded me to join his 40k Kill Team Campaign over the summer. It was pretty fun, and I had expanded up to around 1000 points worth of models by the end of the summer so that I could play a team tournament with another friend. By then I started to lose interest in 40k as I felt painting dozens of identical models was a huge chore. Tired of feeling like some sort of hobbyist industry worker, I played less and less. About six months after first getting into 40k, another friend was talking about Malifaux. He said that he had just quit Warhammer Fantasy and picked this new game up where you only needed around ten models (yeah, right...). I wasn't all that enthusiastic at first, as I was already regretting spending so much money on 40k only to lose interest. I first decided that I would pass on starting Malifaux, but the same friend who first convinced me to get into 40k was really hooked on the idea. After watching them play a demo game (Lucius vs Nicodem) my resolve crumbled and I ended up buying the Misaki box. I started out with the idea that I would only play thematic crews, but after losing time and again against my more experienced friends I fell into the slippery slope of adding more models to be able to compete. By now I own most of the Ten Thunders faction and I'm travelling all across the country to play competetively. My Malifaux carrier started out a bit shaky, but by now it's basically become my biggest passion at the moment. It's a really great game, and I'm glad I actually picked it up.

That's what I was thinking as well. This issue came up in my last game, and I wanted to get an unbiased interpretation of it

Smoke Markers are described as being Ht5 and Blocking. Since they are not Impassable, you can walk straight through them. Blocking means you can't see "through" the object. Does this mean that a model standing entirely inside a Smoke Marker is hidden by the cloud, or would the model have to be entirely on the other side of the marker?

Lynch is a good master to start with. Everything in his box is good and you only need a few more models to have him playable on a tournament level. He is also fairly easy to get a hang of, while still having access to a lot of nice tricks that you can learn over time. Good extra purchases for him would be Graves, Depleted and Beckoners. That way you can run a fairly strong crew with only thematic models.

I would put Lucas in top tier. Levi was substantially Cuddled, and probably sits pretty nicely somewhere around the middle. The others are all good, but not overpowered in any way.

Another big thing is using her to bully a lot of different masters. The ones that only have wp 5 have a hard time passing the terrify to actually do anything once they have minus flips. Trying to target Yin at all in those circumstances is a risky gambit, trying to walk out triggers disengaging strikes that actually do damage, and all the cast actions that could potentially target things outside the engagement also suffer minus flips. All in all, a good way to make Lynch, Lilith etc. really sad Burning the red joker to put gnawing fears on Pandora is also fun. Then she gets to choose between abysmal Df or Wp with minus flips while also getting minus flips on all of her actions.

Yep, it's certainly a strong option. In the case of Lynch I tend to not need it that much because I like playing him further back, and I also don't use Woke Up With a Hand or Wanna See a Trick all that often. Since it is so important to keep Lynch alive, and my meta is full of either strong alpha strikes with a huge threat range (double pushed Nekimas, Marcus with Alpha'd and fast Cerberus with effectively two activations) or simply Belle-lists, trying to maximize Lynch's offense often makes it too hard to keep him alive. I often activate him early, use him to optimize my hand and position in case I need to get Huggy back, and if an enemy overextends I dish out damage with either his ram trigger or setting up enemies with Brilliance. In that role Sensei Yu tends to provide less of what I need than the Emissary. But yeah, if you want to make maximum use of his last activation card draw and burst damage potential Sensei Yu would be better. It is also a good point that the scheme moving tricks of Sensei Yu can be incredibly strong, so I absolutely approve of picking him in those kinds of schemes. I suppose I seldom do so because I tend to play Shenlong instead in those matches.

I actually prefer the Shadow Emissary with Lynch over Sensei Yu. Sensei Yu can push a model 10" and give fast but requiring two 6+ cards. Emissary can push a model 8" and give fast requiring only one 4+ card. Of course, Sensei Yu is more flexible in the fact that he can target anything while Emissary can only target non-leaders with upgrades with his first push. This is usually not a problem the way I play Lynch, since the models I want to push almost always are non-leaders with upgrades (Huggy, Graves, Yin, Lone Swordsman etc.). Another good thing about the Emissary is that he can do all this and still walk forward, so he doesn't fall behind like Yu. The Emissary also tends to have more impact later with its superior damage potential. I suppose the big drawback of the Emissary is not being able to give fast to Lynch.

Darn. I assumed that they would get to finish the action even if you used the ability at Flicker +1, but at a closer look it seems they disappear instantly when reducing Flicker. Good of you to spot that! Placing three scheme markers in one activation did sound imbalanced, and being able to place two is still great.

Yeah, I was aware. I should've expressed myself better though. What I meant was that you want to summon Yokai at the end of one turn, and in the beginning of the next turn perform said sequence. Good of you to clarify either way! @Da Git and @Peregrine Falcon

I've now played Asami a few games, and I've been thinking about the situations in which she excels. I first tried playing her as a summoning factory, building the rest of my crew to work good defensively while Asami summoned things to deal most of the damage. I picked models like Obsidian Oni to generate scrap, Tannen for the aura that prevents cheating as well as occasional buff to summoning, Low River Monk for placing scheme markers for Asami to eat while also removing slow from summoned models, Brothers for schemes and Yin for being a tar pit. I felt that this was a fun way to play Asami, but it was very inconsistent. One game I got great cards for summoning, and managed to swarm my opponent with tons of Yokai and an occasional Jorogumo, and I won with a decent lead. Two games I hardly got any masks most turns, and often could not summon more than one or two Yokai while also using up all seven soulstones by turn 3. I think I barely lost one of those and tied one. When I didn't get the right cards, the rest of my list didn't pack enough punch to actually do much. In short, this play style felt potentially good but sadly very inconsistent. I have also tried playing her in quite a different way, and with great effect. Rather than playing her like a summoning factory, Asami actually works extremely well as a scheme master. Undercover Entourage is extremely easy to do with her potential movement of around 22" in one turn (with Heavenly Design), especially if you have a decent amount of blocking terrain. Detonate the Charges and Set Up are trivial with Asami being able to summon a Yokai at the end of turn one upfield, and then next turn having it drop a scheme marker, walk, and then use it's 0-action to drop a second scheme marker while lowering Flicker to 0, thus being sacrificed and placing a third scheme marker due to being within 10" of Asami. The same trick works extremely well for Covert Breakthrough as well. When using Asami like this, I prefer building a crew that is more independent. Snipers, Brothers, Shadow Emissary, Shadow Effigy, Lone Swordsman, Yin and Graves are the kind of models I want for this. One of the big advantages with this play style is that you don't need as many soulstones, and Asami doesn't use nearly as many cards from your hand. This makes all the other models perform much more reliably, giving the crew more flexibility and making it less vulnerable to bad flips. Given this I believe I will mostly look towards Asami as a specialist for performing certain schemes. I feel that we have other masters that provide better damage output for the same Resources (AP and cards), and still other masters who provide more flexibility for the games where you're not quite sure which schemes you want to take. Though I will of course also play Asami now and then simply because she is really fun, even if she is not the optimal choice!

I really like the idea of making a reference guide for how to adapt your crew to different matchups and schemes, though I feel it is going to be enormously difficult to establish good criteria for making accurate judgements. For an example, Shadow Emissary doesn't stand out in any particular way in your spreadsheet, but I have found him to be extremely good at Hunting Party. Being able to discard a card for Focus +2 and reliably deal 6 wounds to an opponent 12" away is incredible for killing many minions, and with all the focus you usually don't even have to cheat fate much. I would also like to argue that while Kang is good at making the rest of your crew good at handling Ressers, when considering strong models for scoring Hunting Party I consider Izamu to be much better. A third attack with similar damage potential due to natural positives on damage as well as Ruthless to ignore WP duels makes him great at killing even hardy minions.

A friend of mine runs Aionus as his leader in a really disgusting Henchman Hardcore crew together with a Convict Gunslinger, Librarian and Johan. Aionus ability to give Fast for cards rather than AP is amazing when you have six cards to use on so few models, and his being able to dish out slow on key targets can ruin the opponents plans quite severely. Outside of Henchman Hardcore Aionus is a nasty hard counter against Leveticus and Papa in the Box crews, in case you know what you will meet. Just hire him and Hannah and kill them by attacking them with focused attacks while they are buried. Leveticus ability doesn't save him while he is buried, and neither does Bete Noire's. Situational, but truly dirty.

@Tokapondora You propose an interesting play style that is very different from my own. I'll comment on some of the things you write: Concerning Yamaziko, I almost always find her contributing well against Ressers. First of all I always assume I'll be up against Belles, and her being Stubborn lets me use her to block the movement of my other models in case they are lured. I pick both Yamaziko and Yin and place them together near blocking terrain while not leaving enough space for a 30mm base to pass between. That way the Belles can try to lure my other models, but they will simply walk sideways or stop right by Yamaziko and Yin. If they want to Lure Yin or Yamaziko they are likely just wasting AP, since they either won't hit because of or if they focus the still only coax a 4" move from them. Also Yamazikos minimum damage of 3 plus Brace tends to give her amazing damage output against Ressers with HtW, especially for a 7ss model. I like Smoke Grenades on Yin because it makes her go from being annoying to hit to nearly impossible. In this particular match I didn't need it much, since few enemy models had ranged attacks, but it still gave me max points on Show of Force. I could have had some other upgrade instead, but I've found them to usually contribute even less on Yin. Now that wave 4 is out I might put Equality on her instead. I picked three models with condition removal because none of them really sacrifice anything for two reasons. First of all, having a measure of redundancy is always nice against Ressers who tend to dish out tons of conditions. That way I won't have to be as careful about activation orders. I hate it when I really need condition removal because a Nurse has made two beaters completely useless, only to have already used the model which had condition removal. Also, Johan is great in terms of damage output for his cost, so he would likely be worth it even if he didn't have condition removal at all. I haven't used Low River Monks up til now for two reasons mainly. Firstly they just didn't seem to contribute anything that Chiaki or Johan wouldn't do better in most matches, and if I wanted something for 4SS I would get the Effigy instead. Their ability to get Focus +3 for card draw via the Emissary is nice, but a Peasant has been able to do the same thing (only without being able to move as well) so I went with that instead. With the new upgrade from Wave 4 Low River Monks suddenly seem much better, so I'm finally planning to buy them. And with that, I will definately use them quite often. I like both Graves and Tannen and often use them. In this particular match I opted against them simply because I thought Yin, Yamaziko and the Emissary would contribute more to the strategy I had in mind. This is mainly due to my not needing Graves' pushes in a Shenlong crew. Tannen's anti-cheat aura is great, but I felt Yamaziko would provide sufficient defensive control with her Brace, while also having much better damage output and mobility than Tannen. Kang is incredible against Ressers, but I left him out this time because so many of my models already had high minimum damage and hardly needed the . The high prevalence of HtW typically means I would need both the aura and some other source of on damage to be able get cheatable damage. I simply didn't bother this time because it would require me to spend resources on either Focus or Recalled Training to get full use of Kang's aura, and I wanted the resources elsewhere. As for Sensei Yu, I almost never use him with Shenlong. I find I get enough pushes with Shenlong and the Emissary. Having Yu to handle pushes would let Shenlong be more offensive, but I would rather have Shenlong offer superior support while spending the SS Yu would cost on getting another big beater. All in all, you offer good suggestions and I'm sure your list also would've worked well. I will be sure to try something like it so I can compare it's pros and cons compared to my usual style more accurately. Thanks for the feedback!

I get tons of those moment from opponents whenever I play Shenlong. "Wait, why are you putting another peasant on the table when I won initiative?" "He has three other upgrades that he can switch between at will?" "Um, why did you just put both poison and burning on yourself?" "You just hit my Toshiro and somehow got on the damage flip?" The list basically goes on forever

Very nicely written! I think transcribing each activation in this much detail enables a much higher degree of understanding of how both players where thinking when it comes to strategy/scheme choices and crew buidling, as well as priorities during the action. I'd love to see more reports like this. Oh, and in case those of you reading this report have questions/suggestions concerning my (the 10T player) way of playing I'd be happy to discuss them!

Three very fine choices. I would say Lynch is certainly most beginner friendly of the bunch, but he also has a bunch of nifty tricks that make him strong in highly competetive play as well. His playstyle is centered around manipulating cards, making sure that your heavy-hitting crew can outplay your opponent with better hands to cheat fate with. Dreamer and Collodi have some similarities in that they are both mainly control masters who spend most of their actions on supporting your own crew or disrupting your enemy. Dreamer has some very interesting rules in his "Waking" that makes him shift between healing your models and transforming into a huge monster that kills things, while also being able to summon some strong models. Dreamer is easily able to field a strong crew that stays true to his theme, which I personally love. Collodi makes use of his ability to spread buffs to models which would normally not be able to be affected by them, enabling some interesting synergies that are only possible in his crew. He provides great support for his puppets, while also having a ranged attack that inflicts some nasty conditions on enemy models, stopping them from doing much of anything. I'd recommend making your choice based on which master's flavor appeals the most to you. You might want to think of their different learing curves as well, with Lynch being easier to learn while both Dreamer and Collodi are a bit more complicated. However, if you simply make sure to play some more games you will get a good handle on any of them.

You make good points, though I still think this doesn't settle the issue. Yu's ability could as easily be seen as requiring expenditure of Focused as a condition for being triggered, with its further reliance on the Focused condition ending there. In this case, it would be more consistent to make its duration apply like another ability with the same wording (like Channel) rather than interpreting this particular ability to work like a condition instead of an ability.

I think this point is off in this case, which could be illustrated by another ruling made in the FAQ. Leveticus' ability Channel states that "When declaring an Action, this model may suffer exactly 2 damage to gain positive flips to all duels and damage flips for the remainder of the Action". This ability, which has the same wording regarding its duration as Yu's plus 1 to duel totals, has been ruled in the FAQ to be applicable to a Charge Action, thus giving its bonus to all attacks that are part of the Charge Action.

Though it would seem Master of the Wandering River could be interpreted to work differently. Sure, you wouldn't get the positive flips from focus on any of the attacks generated by a charge if you (if possible) spent the focus on the charge action itself rather than the attacks it generated, but the way Yu's ability is worded the +1 to duel totals apply to the entirety of an action. From the wording I suppose this would work just like Leveticus' channel affecting an entire charge action (all of the attacks), as the FAQ explicitly states. The real question seems to be whether you can spend focus on the Charge action (not any of the attacks it causes), even though it normally wouldn't do anything.

Interesting. Would it be possible to use focus on the actual Rapid Fire/Charge action, even though it normally wouldn't do anything since neither action in itself contains a flip? This has got to be the only case where you would ever want to do that

I read over this ability on Sensei Yu again, and realized the wording has some implications I haven't considered before. It states that "Friendly models within 3" removing the Focused condition add 1 to their duel totals for the remainder of the Action." It's clear enough that this would essentially give applicable models +1 to their Ml/Sh/Ca on focused attacks near Sensei Yu, but would it apply to any other things? How about the simple duel generated by attacking a model with Terrifying or Manipulative with an attack that benefits from Focus? Or additional attacks generated by triggers, like the mask trigger on Shadow Emissary? Also, would it be possible to use Focus with a summoner like (presumably) Asami to summon things even though your cards are slightly too low? Do you know any other circumstances where the +1 to duel totals would have an impact?

This. I think there is even something in the FAQ clarifying this.

I've had some decent success with Toshiro, two Illuminated and Chiaki. Toshiro hands out fast/pushes to get Illuminated in place for (ideally) tagging enemies with brilliance with their Sh attack and then charging for 4/5/7 damage spread. Brutal when it works

This looks like the kind of crew that would likely get one or two kills turn one, only to drop dramatically in efficiency after that. Sure, you've got tons of lures, but those typically won't do much once everything is in the fray anyway. Both Beckoners and Oiran being kinda on the weak side of their SS-cost hardly helps either. Better reasons for playing Lynch in TT would be Brothers and Shadow Emissary.