spooky_squirrel

It's supposed to be Papa in a Box, which can appear in other Guild crews. There's a lot of talk of Sonnia. PiaB with Perdita can shoot hard and fast--which could potentially be mitigated by jamming and using LOS to your advantage as much as possible to avoid the shooting. The slingshot approach of the DM with the box in order to pop Papa out into the middle of a cluster means don't cluster (unless you're doing something that reduces/ignores pulse/blast damage), and if you can get an activation in before Papa does his thing, it might not be a bad idea to use a control piece to knock him back, paralyze him, or do something similar. If he's being carried in to drop explosives off on something important.. well.. I hope you've got a backup plan?

Absolutely, counterspell is really really good against control elements. It would have to be used against things like the watchers or other elements that are outside of the aura that are providing key pieces of the puzzle.

Magnetism from a couple of gamin would shorten its lifespan considerably. I was pondering Mei Feng into Sonnia for hyper-mobile support removal, and I'm itching for good excuses to put Sparks and The Porkchop on the table to run with--Sparks having several things that could gum up the machine described above and/or providing conditions that greatly support Mei Feng (fast constructs, burning enemies to get bonuses off of). Mei's living construct crew is more defense oriented, but not too weak on WP. The Metal Gamin, however, will be hurting if hit with Wp duels instead of Df. Kang's a great resser drop and if you expect constructs and/or terrifying on the other side of the table. Otherwise, you might look into hiring Henchmen and crew support based off of what counters or ignores Sonnia while completing your objectives. It sounds like Sonnia's machine can be picked apart by control pieces; an Oiran might be useful in this regard, either luring a cog out to where it can be killed or charging in and engaging (with unbeknownst if the cards in hand or the flip allow for it) to trip up activations, Sensei Yu airbursting people around can help, and Lust has been mentioned already as well. Bunrakus might be handy, as they can also pull things around the board. Onis have already been mentioned, and the handful of times I've played into them, they've been surprisingly mobile and hard hitting. TT Brothers are very good at soaking up AP that targets their Df. For going after Francisco, with some control/positioning, the Lone Samurai might be able to keep him under control. Wandering River Monks are speedy and dodgy, and might be able to tie up cogs to the machine as well if you're not using them for scheme running. This is all just theory-faux, however, as I don't have many of the models mentioned and have not faced off against someone familiar and comfortable with Sonnia and papa in a box. Others with more experience will be able to point out the details that I missed and errors in my thinking.

There's also potential for humans to end up with the Neverborn in other ways. Zoraida, for instance, was once a relatively normal human being. If you look at the character creation process for Through the Breach, there's a character background that involves a human child being stolen and raised by a Neverborn entity/group. The Dreamer is a human boy that's crossed over through dreams. Then there's Lynch and the Black Blood Scion (as retnab mentions above) that are spreading their own influences deliberately.

I just picked up the female TTB character box to scratch-build Amina for fielding. I think she'll be rock solid in Toni's crew, but I want to put her on the table a few times before commenting.

From the promo materials, it sounds like new, as-of-yet-unestablished personalities. English Ivan is fairly well established as an Arcanist spy that answers directly to Ramos.

Queue up Kaeris with Large Arachnids and Cassandra practice for me, right behind Mei and Ironsides practice. I didn't even think about the large spiders' marker interaction when I was trying to think of what I could do with all the scheme markers G&D provided me.

Completing this thought, nearly two weeks later: Rube Goldberg Machine alert: Kang gives nearby models a boost versus undead and constructs. Porkchop drops a free scrap marker, Sparks uses it to make the target of choice a construct. Looks interesting, but requires Kang and Sparks infiltrating into an Arcanist armor list with Kang in support position, Porkchop walking and dropping its tail, Sparks activating while scrap marker still exists to bolt some pieces onto the target, then the follow up beating/shooting from yet another model. This isn't as flexible as I would like in a Mei Feng crew, so I probably won't try it more than a couple of times. Would be absurd if the follow-up is something that doesn't care about armor (gunsmith with right trigger, Joss). /alert What seems more interesting (and reliable) is having Sparks keep your Rail Golem* fast and using the Hostile Work Environment to limit your opponent's ability to interact with the models that you're about to launch the Rail Golem into. It also would be interesting to make a gunsmith into a construct to provide a railwalk escape vector for Mei that targets a model that likes to hang back in the midfield, and if on her way out she manages to set a tank on fire, so much the better for their (0) The Hard Way follow up. * Or, since we're not infiltrating into Ten Thunders here, insert favorite M&SU construct beater that would love to have fast without it being a once-per-game feature of Imbued Energies. If you're concerned about Terrifying, make it a Living construct and enjoy some passive help from a nearby Kang (constantly fast Hank or Joss that's immune to Horror duels anyone?).

This.. right here. I found (in my Colette game over the weekend) that I was eating my own scheme markers constantly, even without including Large Arachnids or proxying Carlos.

One thing with Ramos' spider factory and things like Bleeding Edge Tech: At some point you might feel marker-deprived. You want scrap markers out there for heals, for boosting the large spider, for spawning more spiders, etc., but someone keeps eating your markers. Bleeding Edge Tech requires line of sight. So if you need to keep 1-2 spiders standing by for "free" scrap (magnetism from Ramos or the Emissary, or metal gamin if you brought them along too), keep them out of line of sight of the BET-bearing model. That way they stay down at 2 wounds for the whole turn, giving you scrap for magnetism in a pinch. Otherwise you may end up needing to sink AP into getting scrap, and that's not always something you want to do. Though Joss and the Large Arachnids can get you a two-for-one deal if you need them to. On the other side of the coin: sometimes you want to maximize your attrition game, so you need everyone regenerating as much as possible. In this case, make sure that the things that need to regenerate (new spiders, front line dudes not supported by Johan(na)) can draw line of sight to the BET-bearer before they activate.

The impression I got from Shifting Loyalties: right up until she lost control (if she had it in the first place), they were gleefully awaiting the agonizing demise of the people they had been spying on (which includes Zoraida herself). Red Cage falls and suddenly Fate's littlest minions get a mind of their own, grow three sizes, and fall in line with their factions (more or less). You see the Brutal Emissary drop down from the rooftop and lead the Guild survivors of a scrap on a fresh push, the Arcane Emissary dancing with Colette, Levi legitimately scared of the strange man on the donkey even as it gives him a trinket and wanders off, the Big Bosses of the Bayou glaring at each other until Lucky rolls through breaking all the things, etc. It's almost like Zoraida flipped a Black Joker on her attempts to steer the factions against the coming Bad Thing Happening to end all Bad Things that Happen.

Johan (Outcast, Merc) is great, especially in an Arcanist M&SU (Guild's Hoffman gets some help too) crew. In Arcanists, throw Imbued Energies on him and he's able to bump up into position for his pulse heal Open Revolt if he's not there already. Otherwise, you can bare bones* him and use control pushes/pulls to get him where he's needed. * or slap something non-movement/non-healing related, season to taste

Yeah--but the presence of beaters takes pressure off of the spiders (who get the regen and debuff targets, as well as being plentiful enough to run schemes or become bombs). Ramos' Combat Mechanic is what you can use to keep the Emissary kicking longer. I should have been more clear

I'm doing more in depth practicing and planning with Ironsides. His action with her Conflux lets you dial up Ironsides' control, as he can force people to move towards her regardless of your opponents' activation order being used to block charge/walk lanes (unlike her upgrade aura). Combined with her usual responses to being surrounded (and the controlling nature of her within her crew that I'm unlocking), it's solid. With Colette, being able to (0) teleport and line up a Cg 10, wow. Add in the ability to have Colette's crew use him as a scheme marker and her crew's mobility/lethality goes up. Ramos' upgrade giving it construct and magnetism seems soft. Until you start stacking in all the things that Ramos and his crew do with constructs. Bleeding Edge Tech on a medfield-leaning Henchman/Enforcer that can take it mixed with some Combat Mechanic shenanigans can make the raging bull stick around a lot longer. Magnetism is not as reliable and slippery as teleporting, but it does give him the possibility of non-linear threats similar to Colette's Emissary (or being the initiator of a spider factory chain, allowing Ramos to stay back longer). Kaeris being able to double-dip on (0) actions allows greater utilization of all of her abilities, without counting on the opponent playing along. I'm especially fond of the idea of flaring for cards to fuel my late-turn shenanigans. Masters I don't play: Rasputina having another channeling node is not a bad thing for her curse web. Turning off defensive triggers with Marcus as an aura seems really really good.

Side note: I'm getting more practice with scheme running and control crews to try and work around the skewing towards the mosh pit in the middle. I like having more flexible crews on the table and a more flexible mindset when a control crew starts pushing/pulling/burying/terrifying/obeying my models into doing things I don't want them to. Of course, this (being a Ramos thread) is not the place to bring up Toni

My perspective may be skewed, as I've been playing into the Turf War/Guard the Stash/Extraction/Collect the Bounty strategies (often with Hunting Party in the scheme pool) more often than not. Since these focus on surviving/killing, we (my local group) are all bringing things that have armor, HtW, ItW, go defensive without card loss (i.e. Metal Gamin), and/or stone to affect flips or ignore damage--because these are far more common and easier to spread out than Joss' ability, which in turn makes them harder to directly counter. With these strats and related schemes, staying power is critical, whether from high quality elite crews or high body count swarms (Ramos can put a ball of spiders in the middle of the table for Turf War/Guard the Stash/Extraction and do really well with attrition). I also tend to burn through my control hand quickly trying to get my planned effects off early in the turn, which severely restricts cheating options towards the end (I play aggressively). If Ramos is backed into a corner and absolutely must smack whatever is sitting next to him, he'll get more mileage out of a double focus and single swing than taking 2-3 swings, absolutely. But when it's Teddy that's backed him into a corner, you might want to figure out a way to get a spider to spawn behind you, use magnetism to pull away, then use his last two AP getting as much as you can out of Ramos before he meets a grisly (grizzly) end.

The caveat is that relying on the upper swing (Severe) of the damage track is not the best planning approach if you're looking at competitive games. It's awesome when it happens, but there's so much out there that pushes negatives, stops cheating (like Impossible to Wound), or forces you to dump additional cards in order to cheat--and none of it is "I'll play this in case of Ramos". People will play models with those effects because it minimizes damage (ItW) or helps with other things that they do (Insidious Madness and horror duels). The more competitive players in my meta benchmark models' damage on the assumption that they'll never get better than minimum. This is what leads to things like Cassandra, Joss, Hank, Rail Golem being seen as beaters even without looking at reactivation tricks and Imbued Energies. Canny players will also do what they can to mitigate the threats that these models present (which is what leads to Hank being alpha struck off the table before he gets to activate, Rail Golem getting the burning condition removed by opposing models before it can activate, etc.). Casual games? Heck yes, look at the wild swinging damage, sweet-talk your opponent into helping you get the Imbued Energies Rail Golem up to Burning 7+ so that you can see what full-tilt locomotion will do (min damage 5, triggers making your cards the only limit to the activation points used) with a fast Golem. Convince them to let your brass spider-Reactivated Imbued Energies-upgraded Hank live to activate twice (fast only works on one activation, so nimble-walk, charge, reactivate, gain fast, go to town). Switch over to Colette from Ramos and understudy/prompt yourself to the middle of the board, then slingshot the Coryphee pair into the enemy lines, final act them into the Duet, and watch them dance their way through your opponent's models. Of course, you may want to be a good sport and allow your opponent to see their own shenanigans on full-tilt (not to mention it is useful to see how nasty it can get, instead of avoiding it through blind luck). This will help everyone involved understand why they rarely get to see their crew's star do everything it's supposed to do in a less casual game. This is how I learned that when I'm playing against Rasputina I need to kill the Acolytes before they can activate and engage/kill as many frozen heart models as I possibly can, all while bringing counterspell-bearing models and/or chaff to limit her brutal curse web's effect on my schemes.

It's a secondary set of arms; upper arms are upper arms, lower arms are mechanical, and the "hands" and the blades. You could replace the blades on the arms and not have noticeable gaps on the model. That would be the conversion route I would go if you're wanting to take those off. Not sure what you might replace the "hands" with to complete the conversion (electric nodes maybe?).

To have the flat surfaces flush I ended up drilling about 1/8 inch into each arm--deep enough for a column of two of the magnets stacked to fit exactly inside (this is the part that mattered for how I approached this: the hole needs to be deep enough where a stack of two magnets sits inside, flush with the surface). From there, a tiny dot of loctite on the magnet face that's flush with the arm's join surface followed by putting the whole assembly into position and holding it for long enough for the magnets' glue to start curing. Once the magnet column was sticking to the body, I carefully took the rest of the assembly away and ignored it for a little bit. I then started test fitting the assembly onto the magnets (both magnets on the column) to make sure that it would be where I wanted it. Finally, to get the second magnet off of the magnet column and into the blade arm, I put a tiny amount of loctite on the back of it (the danger here was that too much might try to seal the two magnets together, which happened to me the first time; luckily I was able to break the superglue and separate the magnets to try again) and fitted the assembly over it. After a relatively short onset time for the glue to start curing, I carefully pulled the assembly away. What I looked for there was that the second magnet came off of the column and stayed inside the arm, leaving the first magnet on the flat join surface of the body assembly. Then the hard part of waiting for the glue to cure a little longer before test fitting and verifying that the assembly mounts correctly and the magnets hold it in position. I really appreciated that the other join surfaces for the blade-arm assembles are positioned in a way where I only needed the single magnet column (no position pin, no secondary inverted column to keep the piece from rotating) to have the assembly smoothly fit the whole.

Here's some more images, starting with a group shot with Joss and Ramos: As you can see, the Emissary is quite large. Here's a flank shot (sorry for the potato): The blades jut out pretty far, but they're attached by secondary arms that happen to have nice flat surfaces in their joins. This allowed me to magnetize it for storage/transport: I also magnetized the head so that I wouldn't have to worry about the horns in transit.

Similar to Hank's rapid demise, once you get the factory going, you'll find that people in your local meta start bringing armor counters and working against Ramos directly--which is enabled by how predictable his first turn is and how his stuff functions. So you'll also want to look into how to deal with counters to his shenanigans (anything that eats tokens, suppresses Ca suits, responds to newly summoned critters) as well as figuring out if you want to play him into strats/schemes that reward killing minions or getting at least 2 kills per turn, and if you do (or find you have to due to limited masters and/or hiring pool b/c tournament or owned model limitations) how to minimize the free points your opponent is looking at.

I'm also a fan of the idea of Joss having the potential to follow up into a cluster of spiders instead of waiting in the open at/near lure and other nasty effect ranges that you don't want/need disrupting your delivery or pulling apart your plan. I've rope-a-doped opponents' hitters out of their comfort area and into easy pounce range of my own stuff because they activated too early; I don't want to have someone pull it on me. If enough activations occur before you get to moving Joss, you can use him to advance your schemes/strat play instead of advancing your factory machine. Then there's also the simple fact that the Electric Creation/Magnetism approach is reliable, almost to the point of unstoppable (depending on how your opponent's crew is set up). If they try to stop it, killing the EC drops the scrap marker anyway, and something that pops up (or dives deep into) the middle of your M&SU spider farm is going to have a bad time unless they're locking down Ramos' summoning.

Here's body and head assembly with Rail Worker for scale:

The mobile toolkit's other abilities are what make me lean towards using either a hired spider or the electrical creation for the turn one factory play. Turning Hank, Joss, or other beaters up to an 11 makes it a potentially potent support piece. It's easier to kill than anything you might support with it, so your opponent might try to take it out for you (less of your own activations spent on this). Electrical Creation requires the least amount of AP to trigger (all things told) without hitting you too hard in the hiring pool or interfering with other things you might hire it to do (it only gets hired to die).

Just take one, don't worry about the electrical creation summoning upgrade for Ramos. It's a relatively cheap way to get a free move and scrap marker off of a model that's not going to survive the game in the first place. If you've got an 11T (or higher) in hand, you can get three spiders off of that one scrap marker and a soul stone. Otherwise, you can gamble for two (plan to cheat in what you need and/or stone for the Tome, which is what is typically the first turn for Ramos).